Petrarch. I supposed just the opposite.
S. Augustine. I am not concerned with what you suppose, but with what you ought to suppose.
Petrarch. Well, I may tell you that in spite of that I will suppose it no more, if you prove to me that my supposition was a false one.
S. Augustine. That I will do easily enough, provided you are willing to admit the truth in good faith. For this end I will call in a witness who is not far away.
Petrarch. And who may that be, pray?
S. Augustine. Your conscience.
Petrarch. She testifies just the contrary.
S. Augustine. When you make an obscure, confused demand no witness can give precise or clear answers.
Petrarch. What has that to do with the subject, I would like to know?
S. Augustine. Much, every way. To see dearly, listen well. No man is so senseless (unless he be altogether out of his mind) as never once to remember his own weak nature, or who, if asked the question whether he were mortal and dwelt in a frail body, would not answer that he was. The pains of the body, the onsets of fever, attest the fact; and whom has the favour of Heaven made exempt? Moreover, your friends are carried out to their burial before your eyes; and this fills the soul with dread. When one goes to the graveside of some friend of one's own age one is forced to tremble at another's fall and to begin feeling uneasy for oneself; just as when you see your neighbour's roof on fire, you cannot fool quite happy for your own, because, as Horace puts it—