27. Conf. 13.11.12 (CCL 27:247–48); my trans., based on Bourke, FOTC 21:417–18.
(11.12) Who understands the All-powerful Trinity? Yet who does not speak about it, if it is really That that people speak of. It is a rare soul who, saying anything whatever concerning the Trinity, knows what he is talking about. People argue and engage in controversies, yet no one may see this vision without peace. Here are three elements I would suggest that people reflect upon within themselves. These three are far different from that Trinity, but I mention them so that people may think them over carefully, test them, and realize how distant they are from the Trinity. I speak now of these three: being, knowing, willing. For I am and I know and I will. I am a knowing and willing being. I know that I am and that I will. I will to be and to know. Let the one who can, therefore, see how inseparable in life these three are: one life and one mind and one essence—in short, how inseparable is the distinction, and yet there is a distinction. Each one confronts the evidence within himself; let each pay attention to it within himself and see it and tell me about it. But when each one finds and speaks about these three, let him not suppose that he has already found That which exists immutably above these—what is immutably, knows immutably, wills immutably. Is the Trinity on account of these three, or are these three in each [Person] in such a way that each [Person] has all three; or is it both of these, so that God is both wondrously simple and yet multiple, being infinite in God's Self and yet each [Person] the endpoint of and in the other, whereby God is and is known to God's Self and is immutably sufficient to God's Self in the overflowing greatness of the unity? Who can easily meditate upon this? Who can speak of it in any way? Who would be so rash as to voice any sort of judgment on it?27
Publishing On the Trinity
On the Trinity was a work that Augustine composed slowly and fitfully. Other projects kept intervening, and the work sat on the shelf for years. His readers grew restless, and someone got hold of the still incomplete manuscript, copying it and publishing it. Augustine was so upset that he nearly refused to finish the work. Finally, he brought the project to completion and sent the following letter to his friend Aurelius, bishop of Carthage, asking that it serve as a preface for the work. This is Letter 174, given in its entirety:
In my youth I began a work on the Trinity, the supreme and true God; I have finished it in my old age. Indeed, I had laid the work aside after discovering that it had been carried off prematurely or stolen from me before I had
27. Conf. 13.11.12 (CCL 27:247–48); my trans., based on Bourke, FOTC 21:417–18.