Chapter VI. The manner of conversion explained in the instance of Augustine. After a youth spent in vicious excess, Augustine was converted to the faith of the gospel, and admitted into the church by Ambrose at Milan, a. d. 387. Ten years afterwards he wrote his “Confessions,” in thirteen books; of which ten are occupied with a detail of his sinful conduct in early life, the circumstances of his conversion, and his personal history up to the period of his mother’s death, while the remaining three are devoted to an exposition of the Mosaic account of creation. The work is altogether of an unique and extraordinary character, — a direct address to the Deity, sustained with considerable skill and occasionally in strains of animated devotion, abounding in the most humble confession of the sins of the author’s youth, and marked everywhere with the vigour of genius. As a faithful and minute record of the internal workings of his heart, these “Confessions” of Augustine are of great service in illustrating the nature of the spiritual change implied in conversion. It is on this account Owen draws from them so largely in this chapter. Milner, for similar purposes, has embodied the substance of them in his “History of the Church.”The quotations made by Owen have been compared with Bruder’s edition of the “Confessions” (1837). In some instances these quotations are translated by Owen, but wherever a formal translation is not supplied, the reader may understand that the substance of what is quoted is given immediately afterwards in our author’s own words. — Ed.