nt civilization. He is the sainted doctor of the Church,
equally an authority with both Catholics and Protestants. His
penetrating genius, his comprehensive views of all systems of ancient
thought, and his marvellous powers as a systematizer of Christian
doctrines place him among the immortal benefactors of mankind; while his
humanity, his breadth, his charity, and his piety have endeared him to
the heart of the Christian world.

Let me present, as well as I can, his history, his services, and his
personal character, all of which form no small part of the inheritance
bequeathed to us by the giants of the fourth and fifth centuries,--that
which we call the Patristic literature,--the only literature worthy of
preservation in the declining days of the old Roman world.

Augustine was born at Tagaste, or Tagastum, near Carthage, in the
Numidian province of the Roman Empire, in the year 354,--a province
rich, cultivated, luxurious, where the people (at least the educated
classes) spoke the Latin language, and had adopted the Roman laws and
institutions. They were not black, like negroes, though probably
swarthy, being descended from Tyrians and Greeks, as well as Numidians.
They were as civilized as the Spaniards or the Gauls or the Syrians.
Carthage then rivalled Alexandria, which was a Grecian city. If
Augustine was not as white as Ptolemy or Cleopatra, he was probably no
darker than Athanasius.

Unlike most of the great Fathers, his parentage was humble. He owed
nothing to the circumstances of wealth and rank. His father was a
heathen, and lived, as Augustine tells us, in "heathenish sin." But his
mother was a woman of remarkable piety and strength of mind, who devoted
herself to the education of her son. Augustine never alludes to her
except with veneration; and his history adds additional confirmation to
the fact that nearly all the remarkable men of our world have had
remarkable mothers. No woman is dearer to the Church than Monica, the
sainted mother of Augustine, and chiefly in view of her intense
solicitude for his spiritual interests, and her extraordinary faith in
his future conversion, in spite of his youthful follies and
excesses,--encouraged by that good bishop who told her "that it was
impossible that the child of so many prayers could be lost."

Augustine, in his "Confessions,"--that remarkable book which has lasted
fifteen hundred years, and is still prized for its intensity, its
candor, and its profound