Conf. Fragment
Augustine, Confessions — an early fragmentary witness (Book I; Books X–XIII)
Augustine, bishop of Hippo
Probably 5th century — among the oldest witnesses of the Confessions. Unfortunately it survives only in fragments: the opening book, and then Books X–XIII. The restless heart, and then memory and time, with everything between them lost. It grew from a psalter — as the Confessions itself did.
- Catch rate
- Not found in the wild
- Base research
- 150
- Stat total
- 244
Base stats
Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.
Why these numbers
The game's own explanation, as a reader sees it in the backpack.
Only the opening book and Books X through XIII survive in this witness — the restless heart, then memory and time, but nothing in between. Partial survival, partial Stamina.
A copy made this close to Augustine’s own lifetime would be extraordinarily trustworthy. (Whether this one exists outside the dream is another question.)
Cited for this book
(Strange. Every other fragment you have carried, some professor once mentioned in a lecture or a footnote. This one — you cannot recall anyone ever naming it. Perhaps it exists only in the dream.)
Development
A book develops as it is read — the fragment becomes the work, the work becomes the corpus.
Moves learned
By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.
| Lv | Move | Type | Cat. | Pwr | Acc | PP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25 | Restless Heart | Experience | Argument | 75 | 100% | 10 |
Read it: The Restless Heart
The passages the Scriptorium holds on screen, word for word from a public-domain translation. Written in Latin.
“Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee.”
Augustine, Confessions 1.1 (trans. Pusey, 1838, public domain).
“Give what thou commandest, and command what thou wilt.”
Augustine, Confessions 10.29 (trans. Pusey, 1838, public domain).
What survives here is the opening book and then Books X to XIII — the restless heart, and then memory and time, with everything between them lost.
Hold the two lines together, because they are the same argument at either end of the book. The heart is restless until it rests in God; and the strength to obey is itself a thing God must give. Augustine will not let you supply either one yourself.
The second line is the one that scandalised Pelagius. If God has to give what he commands, then the commandment is not proof that we can keep it.
This copy grew out of a psalter, which sounds impossible until you notice that the Confessions is prayed from its first page. A psalter, prayed long enough, turns into someone’s own words.
(Strange, though. Every other fragment you have carried, some professor once mentioned in a lecture or a footnote. This one — you cannot recall anyone ever naming it.)