(Augustine’s twenty-ninth year: due to his knowledge of scientific subjects, he has begun to question many Manichean doctrines, and he is told that one Faustus, an eloquent defender of this sect, will remove all his doubts. This Faustus, however, in spite of his eloquence, fails to convince Augustine; on the contrary, he serves to expose even more the falsity of Manichean tenets. Augustine leaves Carthage for Rome, the better to continue his work in rhetoric, but in Rome he finds the distractions greater than he expected, so accepts a position as teacher of rhetoric in Milan. Here he meets Ambrose, the bishop who first shows him the way to divine truth—he is interested first, not by what Ambrose says, but by how he says it; yet, in the nature of things, he cannot entirely escape paying some attention to the thought as well as to the vehicle carrying it. Augustine therefore becomes a catechumen, or “beginner,” in the Catholic Church.)

( vi ) 10. …​ I now learned that neither ought anything to seem to be spoken truly, because eloquently; nor therefore falsely, because the utterance of the lips is inharmonious; nor, again, therefore true, because rudely delivered; nor therefore false, because the language is rich; but that wisdom and folly are as wholesome and unwholesome food; and adorned or unadorned phrases, as courtly or country vessels; either kind of meats may be served up in either kind of dishes.