Catholic Review of: Confessions Of St. Augustine, Hardback

"[Q]uia fecisti nos ad te et inquietum est cor nostrum, donec requiescat in te.."   With these words St. Augustine pinpoints the very answer to man's intrinsic restlessness, a restlessness that has been with him since the beginning of time.  "When will I finally  find true happiness, and is it upon this earth?"

The Confessions of St. Augustine are essentially his journey through life.  Throughout the course of the book we travel with him from his very first memories up until the present time he was writing it.  Probably one of the greatest philosophical minds ever, St. Augustine purges his deepest thoughts in the quest to go ever further into the mystery of man's existence upon this earth. 

In searching for these answers he relates to the reader select events of his past life, and he considers and draws out the motives which compelled him to act as he did.  He explains how man's sinful actions are an expression of his yearning for complete happiness, and yet, no matter how often he ventures forth to fulfill this insatiable hunger, he will nonetheless always be left longing for more.  His stories and illustrations are meant to teach us that there is only one who can quench this thirst for happiness:  the one who put that desire there to begin with, the one who created us ex nihilo, the Father who loves us.

Over the years I have read many different excerpts and translations from the Confessions of St. Augustine, even translating it on my own from the original Latin.  And yet the key, I would say, to truly grasping what St. Augustine was trying to tell us doesn't lie in how many times you read it, but in what translation you choose to read.  Though the original language is by far the best, if you're looking for a version that is true to the Latin as it can be, then you will find it here in this translation by Philip Burton.

So, my advice to you, embark upon this journey with St. Augustine and search with him as he seeks to unfold the mystery of man's longing for happiness; a mystery that we all share and only One has the answer to...