Confessions

³² These things, therefore, being heard and perceived according to my weakness of apprehension, which I confess unto You, O Lord, who know it, I see that two sorts of differences may arise when by signs anything is related, even by true reporters,— one concerning the truth of the things, the other concerning the meaning of him who reports them. For in one way we inquire, concerning the forming of the creature, what is true; but in another, what Moses, that excellent servant of Your faith, would have wished that the reader and hearer should understand by these words. As for the first kind, let all those depart from me who imagine themselves to know as true what is false. And as for the other also, let all depart from me who imagine Moses to have spoken things that are false. But let me be united in You, O Lord, with them, and in You delight myself with them that feed on Your truth, in the breadth of charity; and let us approach together unto the words of Your book, and in them make search for Your will, through the will of Your servant by whose pen You have dispensed them.