(“Augustine breaks off the history of the mode whereby God led him to
holy Orders, in order to ‘confess’ God’s mercies in opening to him the
Scripture. Moses is not to be understood, but in Christ, not even the
first words _In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth_.
Answer to cavillers who asked, what did God before He created the heaven
and the earth, and whence willed He at length to make them, whereas He
did not make them before. Inquiry into the nature of Time.”)
(It is in considering the question of God’s actions before the Creation,
and of his delay in not bringing about the Creation sooner, that
Augustine comes to consider the nature of Time.)
(xiv) 17. At no time then hadst Thou not made anything, because time
itself Thou madest. And no times are coeternal with Thee, because Thou
abidest; but if they abode, they should not be times. For what is time?
Who can readily and briefly explain this? Who can even in thought
comprehend it, so as to utter a word about it? But what in discourse do
we mention more familiarly and knowingly than time? And we understand
when we speak of it; we understand also when we hear it spoken of by
another. What then is time? If no one asks me, I know: if I wish to
explain it to one that asketh, I know not: yet I say boldly that I know,
that if nothing passed away, time past were not; and if nothing were
coming, a time to come were not; and if nothing were, time present were
not. Those two times then, past and to come, how are they, seeing the
past now is not, and that to come is not yet? But the present, should it
always be present, and never pass into time past, verily it should not
be time, but eternity. If time present (if it is to be time) only cometh
into existence, because it passeth into time past, how can we say that
either this is, whose cause of being is, that it shall not be; so,
namely, that we cannot truly say that time is, but because it is tending
not to be?
(xv) 18. And yet we say, “a long time” and “a short time;” still, only
of time past or to come. A long time past (for example) we call an
hundred years since; and a long time to come, an hundred years hence.
But a short time past, we call (suppose) ten days since; and a short
time to come, ten days hence. But in what sense is that long or short,
which is not? For the past is not now; and the future is not yet. Let us
not then say “it is long”; but of the past, “it hath been long”; and of
the future, “it will be long.”
(But the past, being no more, cannot be long, for what ceases to be,
ceases also to be long. Yet can the present be long? Say, a hundred
years? No, for a hundred years is never present at once, nor even a
month, or a day, or an hour—only the smallest conceivable instant is
present. What then of the future? The future is not yet, so is not long;
and when the future is here, it is the present, which has been shown to
be the briefest conceivable instant.)
(xvi) 21. And yet, Lord, we perceive intervals of times, and compare
them, and say some are shorter and others longer. We measure also how
much longer or shorter this time is than that; and we answer, “This is
double, or treble; and that, but once, or only just so much as that.”
But we measure times as they are passing, by perceiving them; but past,
which now are not, or the future, which are not yet, who can measure?
unless a man shall presume to say that can be measured which is not.
When then time is passing, it may be perceived and measured; but when it
is past, it cannot, because it is not.
(xx) 26. What now is clear and plain is that neither things to come nor
past are. Nor is it properly said, “there be three times, past, present,
and to come”: yet perchance it might be properly said, “there be three
times; a present of things past, a present of things present, and a
present of things future.” For these three do exist in some sort, in the
soul, but otherwhere do I not see them; present of things past, memory;
present of things present, sight; present of things future, expectation.
If thus we be permitted to speak, I see three times, and I confess there
are three. Let it be said too, “there be three times, past, present, and
to come”: in our incorrect way. See, I object not, nor gainsay, nor find
fault, if what is so said be but understood, that neither what is to be,
now is, nor what is past. For but few things are there which we speak
properly, most things improperly; still the things intended are
understood.
(xxi) 27. I said then even now, we measure times as they pass, in order
to be able to say, this time is twice so much as that one; or, this is
just so much as that; and so of any other parts of time, which be
measurable. Wherefore, as I said, we measure times as they pass....
(xxiii) 30. I desire to know the force and nature of time, by which we
measure the motions of bodies, and say (for example) this motion is
twice as long as that....
(xxiv) 31. Dost Thou bid me assent, if any define time to be “motion of
a body?” Thou dost not bid me. For that no body is moved, but in time, I
hear; this Thou sayest; but that the motion of a body is time, I hear
not; Thou sayest it not.
(For it is quite possible to measure the time a body stands still, as,
for instance, in the expression: “It stood still twice as long as it
moved.” Time, therefore, is not the motion of a body.)
(xxvi) 33. Does not my soul most truly confess unto Thee that I do
measure times?... That I measure time, I know; and yet I measure not
time to come, for it is not yet; nor present, because it is not
protracted by any space; nor past, because it now is not. What then do I
measure? Times passing, not past? for so I said.
(Time is measured between the beginning and end of something, as between
the beginning and end of a sound. The sound cannot be measured before it
begins, while it is sounding, or after it has stopped. But, by noting
the beginning and ending, the interval can be determined.)
(xxvii) 36. It is in thee, my mind, that I measure times. Interrupt me
not, that is, interrupt not thyself with the tumults of thy impressions.
In thee I measure times; the impression, which things as they pass by
cause in thee, remains even when they are gone; this it is which still
present, I measure, not the things which pass by to make this
impression. This I measure, when I measure times. Either then this is
time, or I do not measure times. What when we measure silence, and say
that this silence hath held as long time as did that voice? do we not
stretch out our thought to the measure of a voice, as if it sounded?
that so we may be able to report of the intervals of silence in a given
space of time?...
(xxviii) 37. ... It is not future time that is long, for as yet it is
not: but a “long future” is “a long expectation of the future,” nor is
it time past, which now is not, that is long; but a long past is “a long
memory of the past.”
38. I am about to repeat a Psalm that I know. Before I begin, my
expectation is extended over the whole; but when I have begun, how much
soever of it I shall separate off into the past, is extended along my
memory; thus the life of this action of mine is divided between my
memory as to what I have repeated, and expectation as to what I am about
to repeat; but “consideration” is present with me, that through it what
was future may be conveyed over, so as to become past. Which the more it
is done again and again, so much the more the expectation being
shortened, is the memory enlarged; till the whole expectation be at
length exhausted, when the whole action being ended, shall have passed
into memory. And this which takes place in the whole Psalm, the same
takes place in each several portion of it, and each several syllable;
the same holds in that longer action, whereof this Psalm may be a part;
the same holds in the whole life of man, whereof all the actions of man
are parts; the same holds through the whole age of the sons of men,
whereof all the lives of men are parts.
(xxx) 40. And now I will stand and become firm in Thee, in my mold, Thy
truth; nor will I endure the questions of men, who by a penal disease
thirst for more than they can contain, and say, “what did God before He
_made heaven and earth_?” “Or, how came it into His mind to make
anything, having never before made anything?” Give them, O Lord, well to
bethink themselves what they say, and to find that “never” cannot be
predicated, when “time” is not. This then that He is said “never to have
made;” what else is it to say, then “in ‘no time’ to have made?” Let
them see therefore that time cannot be without created being, and cease
to _speak_ that _vanity_. May they also be _extended towards those
things which are before_; and understand Thee before all times, the
eternal Creator of all times, and that no times be coeternal with Thee,
nor any creature, even if there be any creature before all time.