Now, undoubtedly, you will know the answers to all these questions, if you know thoroughly the proper objects of faith, hope, and love. You are anxious, you say, that I should write a sort of handbook for you, which you might always keep beside you, containing answers to the questions you put, viz.: what ought to be man's chief end in life what he ought, in view of the various heresies, chiefly to avoid to what extent religion is supported by reason what there is in reason that lends no support to faith, when faith stands alone what is the starting-point, what the goal, of religion what is the sum of the whole body of doctrine what is the sure and proper foundation of the catholic faith. If you have kept a copy of your letter, you can easily turn it up and read it over again: if you have not, you will have no difficulty in recalling it when I refresh your memory. And when I have done this, you will have an answer to all the questions you asked in your letter. Now if I should answer, that God is to be worshipped with faith, hope, and love, you will at once say that this answer is too brief, and will ask me briefly to unfold the objects of each of these three graces, viz., what we are to believe, what we are to hope for, and what we are to love.
God is to Be Worshipped Through Faith, Hope, and Love. And can you, who are anxious that I should treat of great matters in few words, wish for a briefer form of expression? Or perhaps you are anxious that this expression should itself be briefly explained, and that I should unfold in a short discourse the proper mode of worshipping God? Chapter 3. But when we are defining in what man's true wisdom consists, the most convenient word to use is that which distinctly expresses the fear of God. The Greeks sometimes call piety εὐσέβεια, which signifies right worship, though this, of course, refers specially to the worship of God. If you ask further what is meant in that place by pietas, the Greek calls it more definitely θεοσέβεια, that is, the worship of God. For we read there what wisdom itself has said to man: Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom. Now, just as no one can exist of himself, so no one can be wise of himself, but only by the enlightening influence of Him of whom it is written, All wisdom comes from the Lord.
I cannot express, my beloved son Laurentius, the delight with which I witness your progress in knowledge, and the earnest desire I have that you should be a wise man: not one of those of whom it is said, Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? but one of those of whom it is said, The multitude of the wise is the welfare of the world, and such as the apostles wishes those to become, whom he tells, I would have you wise unto that which is good, and simple concerning evil. The Author Desires the Gift of True Wisdom for Laurentius. The book begins: 'I cannot express,' etc. There I think I have pretty carefully treated of the manner in which God is to be worshipped, which knowledge divine Scripture defines to be the true wisdom of man. 63, as follows: I also wrote a book on Faith, Hope, and Charity, at the request of the person to whom I addressed it, that he might have a work of mine which should never be out of his hands, such as the Greeks call an Enchiridion ( Handbook). Augustine speaks of this book in his Retractations, l. The third part is a discourse on Christian love. Under the second head he gives a brief exposition of the Lord's Prayer.
He follows under the first head the order of the Apostles' Creed, and refutes, without naming them, the Manichæan, Apollinarian, Arian, and Pelagian heresies. The author usually calls the book On Faith, Hope and Love, because he treats the subject under these three heads cf. Augustine wrote it sometime after the death of Jerome (September 30, 420), for he alludes in Chapter 87 to Jerome of blessed memory. One manuscript calls him a deacon, another a notary of the city of Rome. The Enchiridion, or Handbook, is addressed to Laurentius, in answer to his questions.
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