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Even by attempting to deny God's omnipotence, the sinner imitates it, thereby proving that nothing is outside of God's fullness and dominion.

Augustine's theft had no excuse beyond the illicit thrill of doing wrong.Īugustine concludes that this sin is a kind of rebellion against God's omnipotence, a perverse attempt to demonstrate the soul's imagined self-sufficiency. But Augustine did not even want the pears. Every crime has a motive, he says, and it is easy to understand crimes motivated by greed or some other self-interest. Scrutinizing his actions, Augustine expresses dismay at his complete lack of logical motivation for the theft. The second type of sin, the love of wrongdoing simply for the doing of it, is more difficult to classify. Viewed this way, Book 2 points up two types of sin: The first, lust, is an example of misdirected love, a confused attempt to seek satisfaction in transitory things that can never truly satisfy. However, do not accept the description at face value, because Augustine is using this episode to stand both as a generic example of all the other sins committed in his youth and of the common sins of humanity. Readers may wonder why Augustine lavishes such anguished and intense self-scrutiny on what sounds like an otherwise minor bit of juvenile delinquency: the theft of some pears from a neighbor's orchard. He withdraws from contemplation of his crime in disgust, taking refuge in God's peace. Augustine knows also that he would never have committed the theft alone. Trapped in misdirected love of earthly goods, the soul separates itself from God and tries to demonstrate its power over God by breaking God's laws. He simply enjoyed the act of doing wrong for its own sake. He did not want the pears, nor was he motivated by any self-interest. With a gang of his friends, Augustine sneaks into an orchard at night and steals a load of pears.

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