For had I then loved the pears I stole, and wished to enjoy them, I
might have done it alone, had the bare commission of the theft
sufficed to attain my pleasure; nor needed I have inflamed the itching
of my desires by the excitement of accomplices. But since my
pleasure was not in those pears, it was in the offence itself, which
the company of fellow-sinners occasioned.

What then was this feeling? For of a truth it was too foul: and
woe was me, who had it. But yet what was it? Who can understand his
errors? It was the sport, which as it were tickled our hearts, that we
beguiled those who little thought what we were doing, and much
disliked it. Why then was my delight of such sort that I did it not
alone? Because none doth ordinarily laugh alone? ordinarily no one;
yet laughter sometimes masters men alone and singly when on one
whatever is with them, if anything very ludicrous presents itself to
their senses or mind. Yet I had not done this alone; alone I had never
done it. Behold my God, before Thee, the vivid remembrance of my soul;
alone, I had never committed that theft wherein what I stole pleased
me not, but that I stole; nor had it alone liked me to do it, nor
had I done it. O friendship too unfriendly! thou incomprehensible
inveigler of the soul, thou greediness to do mischief out of mirth and
wantonness, thou thirst of others' loss, without lust of my own gain
or revenge: but when it is said, "Let's go, let's do it," we are
ashamed not to be shameless.

Who can disentangle that twisted and intricate knottiness? Foul is
it: I hate to think on it, to look on it. But Thee I long for, O
Righteousness and Innocency, beautiful and comely to all pure eyes,
and of a satisfaction unsating. With Thee is rest entire, and life
imperturbable. Whoso enters into Thee, enters into the joy of his