went to Rome, only to be disappointed in his hopes for glory as a
rhetorician; and after two years his mother joined him at Milan.

[Illustration: _ST. AUGUSTINE AND HIS MOTHER_. Photogravure from a
Painting by Ary Scheffer.]

[Illustration]

The great Ambrose had been called from the magistrate's chair to be
bishop of this important city; and his character and ability made a
great impression on Augustine. But Augustine was kept from acknowledging
and submitting to the truth, not by the intellectual difficulties which
he propounded as an excuse, but by his unwillingness to submit to the
moral demands which Christianity made upon him. At last there came one
great struggle, described in a passage from the 'Confessions' which is
given below; and Monica's hopes and prayers were answered in the
conversion of her son to the faith and obedience of Jesus Christ. On
Easter Day, 387, in the thirty-third year of his life, he was baptized,
an unsubstantiated tradition assigning to this occasion the composition
and first use of the _Te Deum_. His mother died at Ostia as they were
setting out for Africa; and he returned to his native land, with the
hope that he might there live a life of retirement and of simple
Christian obedience. But this might not be: on the occasion of
Augustine's visit to Hippo in 391, the bishop of that city persuaded him
to receive ordination to the priesthood and to remain with him as an
adviser; and four years later he was consecrated as colleague or
coadjutor in the episcopate. Thus he entered on a busy public life of
thirty-five years, which called for the exercise of all his powers as a
Christian, a metaphysician, a man of letters, a theologian, an
ecclesiastic, and an administrator.