Top 500 Saint Augustine Quotes (2025 Update)
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251. “We were ensnared by the wisdom of the serpent; we are set free by the foolishness of God .”

— Saint Augustine

252. “To seek the highest good is to live well.”

— Saint Augustine

253. “He that is kind is free, though he is a slave; he that is evil is a slave, though he be a king.”

— Saint Augustine

254. “Fill yourselves first and then only will you be able to give to others.”

— Saint Augustine

255. “Whoever, then, thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of them, but puts such an interpretation upon them as does not tend to build up this twofold love of God and our neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought.”

— Saint Augustine

256. “You cannot attain to charity except through humility.”

— Saint Augustine

257. “This awful catastrophe is not the end but the beginning. History does not end so. It is the way its chapters open.”

— Saint Augustine

258. “Ignorance itself is without a doubt a sin for those who do not wish to understand; for those who, however, cannot understand, it is the punishment of sin.”

— Saint Augustine

259. “Nothing, therefore, happens unless the Omnipotent wills it to happen. He either permits it to happen, or He brings it about Himself.”

— Saint Augustine

260. “Put no faith in salvation through the political order.”

— Saint Augustine

261. “If two friends ask you to judge a dispute, don’t accept, because you will lose one friend; on the other hand, if two strangers come with the same request, accept because you will gain one friend.”

— Saint Augustine

262. “We can know what God is not, but we cannot know what He is.”

— Saint Augustine

263. “The same thing which is now called Christian religion existed among the ancients. They have begun to call ‘Christian’ the true religion which existed before.”

— Saint Augustine

264. “O Lord, grant that I may do Thy will as if it were my will, so that Thou mayest do my will as if it were Thy will.”

— Saint Augustine

265. “Drunkenness is a flattering devil, a sweet poison, a pleasant sin, which whosoever hath, hath not himself, which whosoever doth commit, doth not commit sin, but he himself is wholly sin.”

— Saint Augustine

266. “The diversity of language alienates man from man.”

— Saint Augustine

267. “Humility must accompany all our actions, must be with us everywhere; for as soon as we glory in our good works they are of no further value to our advancement in virtue.”

— Saint Augustine

268. “Forgiveness is the remission of sins. For it is by this that what has been lost, and was found, is saved from being lost again.”

— Saint Augustine

269. “For so it is, O Lord my God, I measure it! But what it is I measure, I do not know.”

— Saint Augustine

270. “Free curiosity is of more value than harsh discipline.”

— Saint Augustine

271. “The Devil often transforms himself into an angel to tempt men, some for their instruction, some for their ruin.”

— Saint Augustine

272. “Longing desire prayeth always, though the tongue be silent. If thou art ever longing, thou art ever praying.”

— Saint Augustine

273. “Between urine and filth we are born.”

— Saint Augustine

274. “The will is truly free, when it is not the slave of vices and sins.”

— Saint Augustine

275. “There never can have been, and never can be, and there never shall be any sin without pride.”

— Saint Augustine

276. “Truth is not private property.”

— Saint Augustine

277. “To touch God a little with our mind is a great blessing, to grasp him is impossible.”

— Saint Augustine

278. “No eulogy is due to him who simply does his duty and nothing more.”

— Saint Augustine

279. “All plenty which is not my God is poverty to me.”

— Saint Augustine

280. “Only He who made man makes man happy.”

— Saint Augustine

281. “The arrogance is not greatness but swelling; and the swelling seems big but it’s not healthy.”

— Saint Augustine

282. “Let those who think I have said too little and those who think I have said too much, forgive me; and let those who think I have said just enough thank God with me.”

— Saint Augustine

283. “Do not follow any road, but that which Christ trod. This road seems hard, but it is safe.”

— Saint Augustine

284. “The honors of this world, what are they but puff, and emptiness, and peril of falling?”

— Saint Augustine

285. “O Lord, help me to be pure, but not yet.”

— Saint Augustine

286. “Venerate the martyrs, praise, love, proclaim, honor them. But worship the God of the martyrs.”

— Saint Augustine

287. “He that loveth little prayeth little, he that loveth much prayeth much.”

— Saint Augustine

288. “It is not by change of place that we can come nearer to Him who is in every place, but by the cultivation of pure desires and virtuous habits.”

— Saint Augustine

289. “Because a thing is eloquently expressed it should not be taken to be as necessarily true; nor because it is uttered with stammering lips should it be supposed false.”

— Saint Augustine

290. “Make friends with angels.”

— Saint Augustine

291. “I had a clear idea about what time is till I was asked to explain it and ceased to understand it altogether as soon as I began explaining it.”

— Saint Augustine

292. “Whoever possesses God is happy.”

— Saint Augustine

293. “Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending.”

— Saint Augustine

294. “For in our hope we are saved.”

— Saint Augustine

295. “Believe that others are better than you in the debths of their soul, although outwardly you may appear better than they.”

— Saint Augustine

296. “He who labours, prays.”

— Saint Augustine

297. “In failing to confess, Lord, I would only hide You from myself, not myself from You.”

— Saint Augustine

298. “Where was my heart to flee for refuge from my heart? Whither was I to fly, where I would not follow? In what place should I not be prey to myself?”

— Saint Augustine

299. “There are wolves within, and there are sheep without.”

— Saint Augustine

300. “Every city is a living body.”

— Saint Augustine