The Confessions
Book X, Chapter XXII: A Happy Life is to Rejoice in God, and for God.
Chapter XXII.—A Happy Life is to Rejoice in God, and for God.
32. Let it be far, O Lord,—let it be far from the heart of Thy servant who confesseth unto Thee; let it be far from me to think myself happy, be the joy what it may. For there is a joy which is not granted to the “wicked,” but to those who worship Thee thankfully, whose joy Thou Thyself art. And the happy life is this,—to rejoice unto Thee, in Thee, and for Thee; this it is, and there is no other. But those who think there is another follow after another joy, and that not the true one. Their will, however, is not turned away from some shadow of joy.
Edition and rights
NPNF1-01. The Confessions and Letters of St. Augustine, with a Sketch of his Life and Work. Historical English edition; series volume first published 1886.
J. G. Pilkington, translator of the Confessions
Ancient work and historical English translation: public domain in the United States (published before 1931). Copyright rules vary by country. This is a historical source transcription, not an official Church edition. Modern website material is not reproduced.
Historical footnotes and publisher introductions are omitted. Author-written openings are retained. Paragraph whitespace is normalized. Transcriptions can contain errors; this is not a critical edition. Attribution follows the historical edition, not universal scholarly agreement.
Digitization provenance (not an external reading link): https://www.ccel.org/ccel/s/schaff/npnf101.xml
Source section: vi.X.XXII · Text SHA-256: 540b889c6f263e112fc12a7132d547226982159667c4db37c2cc80478495b588