Book X marks a major division in the Confessions, since Austine ends his autobiography in Book IX. Augustine begins a journey into the mind and the soul.
He journeys into the mind by exploring memory. Augustine wonders how the memory holds so much, and can recall things and events not before us with such vividness at times that we can almost feel, touch, smell, hear, and even see it. Augustine cannot grasp the vastness of this storehouse, which means his mind cannot fully know itself, and "I myself cannot grasp the totality of what I am."
Augustine goes on to examine the different kinds of memories, h
ow they were formed from our senses, and ponders how our mind knows the external world through our senses, and then process those experiences and stores them in our memory. Part of this goes into epistemology - that part of philosophy that explores the basis for knowledge (how we know we know). Augustine wonders how we know about things we forgot about, as well as how we recognize things we haven't yet experiened. This delves into a-priori knowledge (knowledge before experience). Most importantly, Augustine explores how we know or recognize God before or without sensory experience.
It's questions and explorations like this that makes Augustine so read by so many, Christians and non-Christians alike.
From here, Augustine goes on to relate his search for God, and an examination of himself before God, a journey into his soul. He carefully considers what John broadly describes as the three main sins that encompases everything in the world, "the lust of the flesh. and the lust of t
he eyes, and the pride of life (KJV - see other translations for alternative )." As Augustine carefully examines each area in his life, he confesses he is full of sin, especially in the pride of life, since he often seeks the praises of others, and places that above seeking the approval of God.
Augustine concludes that he can find no safe place for his soul except in God.
Onto Book XI
Back to Book IX
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