Poetry Is Devil's Wine.

I Inquired What Wickedness Is, And I Didn't Find A Substance, But A Perversity Of Will Twisted Away From The Highest Substance - You, O God - Towards Inferior Things, Rejecting Its Own Inner Life And Swelling With External Matters.

A Young Man Had Become Possessed By A Devil. The Thing Within Him Burst Into Loud Lamentation And Departed From The Man. At Once The Youth's Eye Fell Out On His Cheek, And The Whole Of The Pupil Which Had Been Black Became White.

It Is Indeed Better (as No One Ever Could Deny) That Men Should Be Led To Worship God By Teaching, Than That They Should Be Driven To It By Fear Of Punishment Or Pain; But It Does Not Follow That Because The Former Course Produces The Better Men, Therefore Those Who Do Not Yield To It Should Be Neglected. For Many Have Found Advantage (as We Have Proved, And Are Daily Proving By Actual Experiment), In Being First Compelled By Fear Or Pain, So That They Might Afterwards Be Influenced By Teaching, Or Might Follow Out In Act What They Had Already Learned In Word.

The Spiritual Virtue Of A Sacrament Is Like Light; Although It Passes Among The Impure, It Is Not Polluted.

Augustinethe Wounds Of A Friend Are Better Than The Kisses Of An Enemy. To Love With Sternness Is Better Than To Deceive With Gentleness.... In Luke [14:23] It Is Written: "compel People To Come In!" By Threats Of The Wrath Of God, The Father Draws Souls To His Son.