fly to be killed to gain me it. " For he was to kill some living
creatures in his sacrifices, and by those honours to invite the devils
to favour me. But this ill also I rejected, not out of a pure love for
Thee, O God of my heart; for I knew not how to love Thee, who knew not
how to conceive aught beyond a material brightness. And doth not a
soul, sighing after such fictions, commit fornication against Thee,
trust in things unreal, and feed the wind? Still I would not
forsooth have sacrifices offered to devils for me, to whom I was
sacrificing myself by that superstition. For what else is it to feed
the wind, but to feed them, that is by going astray to become their
pleasure and derision?

Those impostors then, whom they style Mathematicians, I consulted
without scruple; because they seemed to use no sacrifice, nor to
pray to any spirit for their divinations: which art, however,
Christian and true piety consistently rejects and condemns. For, it is
a good thing to confess unto Thee, and to say, Have mercy upon me,
heal my soul, for I have sinned against Thee; and not to abuse Thy
mercy for a licence to sin, but to remember the Lord's words,
Behold, thou art made whole, sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto
thee. All which wholesome advice they labour to destroy, saying,
"The cause of thy sin is inevitably determined in heaven"; and "This
did Venus, or Saturn, or Mars": that man, forsooth, flesh and blood,
and proud corruption, might be blameless; while the Creator and
Ordainer of heaven and the stars is to bear the blame. And who is He
but our God? the very sweetness and well-spring of righteousness,
who renderest to every man according to his works: and a broken and
contrite heart wilt Thou not despise.

There was in those days a wise man, very skilful in physic, and