St Augustine Prayer: His Own Prayers, in Latin and English

The prayers of St Augustine are, first of all, the prayers he wrote himself: the Confessions are one long prayer addressed to God, and their most famous lines — "Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee", "Late have I loved Thee" — are prayers before they are quotations. Other prayers, above all "Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit", have long been printed under his name but are not found in his writings, and a few popular texts are not his at all. Below are the genuine prayers in Latin and English, the attributed ones clearly marked, the Church's own prayer on his feast, and what St Augustine taught about prayer.

The prayers St Augustine wrote himself

The texts in this section are taken from Augustine's own works; the English translations are ours, made directly from the Latin.

"Our heart is restless": the opening of the Confessions

The Confessions (written about 397-400) open not with a story but with an act of praise. This is the prayer that every Catholic should know by heart, at least its last line.

Confessions, Book I, chapter 1

Magnus es, Domine, et laudabilis valde: magna virtus tua, et sapientiae tuae non est numerus. Et laudare te vult homo, aliqua portio creaturae tuae, et homo circumferens mortalitatem suam, circumferens testimonium peccati sui et testimonium quia superbis resistis: et tamen laudare te vult homo, aliqua portio creaturae tuae. Tu excitas ut laudare te delectet, quia fecisti nos ad te, et inquietum est cor nostrum donec requiescat in te.

Great art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised: great is Thy power, and of Thy wisdom there is no number. And man desires to praise Thee, man who is but a small part of Thy creation; man who bears about him his mortality, who bears about him the witness of his sin and the witness that Thou resistest the proud: and yet man, a small part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee. Thou dost stir him up to delight in praising Thee, for Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.

"Late have I loved Thee": Confessions, Book X

This is the prayer most people mean when they look for "the prayer of St Augustine". He wrote it years after his conversion, looking back on the time he had lost seeking God everywhere except within.

Confessions, Book X, chapter 27

Sero te amavi, pulchritudo tam antiqua et tam nova, sero te amavi! Et ecce intus eras et ego foris, et ibi te quaerebam, et in ista formosa quae fecisti deformis irruebam. Mecum eras, et tecum non eram. Ea me tenebant longe a te, quae si in te non essent, non essent. Vocasti et clamasti et rupisti surditatem meam; coruscasti, splenduisti et fugasti caecitatem meam; fragrasti, et duxi spiritum et anhelo tibi; gustavi et esurio et sitio; tetigisti me, et exarsi in pacem tuam.

Late have I loved Thee, O Beauty ever ancient and ever new, late have I loved Thee! And behold, Thou wast within, and I was without, and there I sought Thee; and, deformed as I was, I rushed headlong upon those lovely things which Thou hast made. Thou wast with me, and I was not with Thee. Those things held me far from Thee which, unless they were in Thee, would not be at all. Thou didst call, and cry aloud, and break through my deafness; Thou didst flash and shine, and drive away my blindness; Thou didst breathe Thy fragrance, and I drew in my breath, and now I pant for Thee; I tasted, and I hunger and thirst; Thou didst touch me, and I burned for Thy peace.

The prayer is a short history of every conversion: God is not far away, we are; He calls first; and the soul that has once tasted Him can no longer be satisfied with anything else. It is also the best commentary on the life of St Augustine of Hippo, who was baptised at thirty-two after years of disorder and error.

"Let me know myself, let me know Thee": the Soliloquies

In the Soliloquies, written shortly after his conversion, Augustine converses with his own reason. At the opening of the second book, Reason asks him to pray "as briefly and as perfectly as you can", and he answers with one line:

Soliloquies, Book II, chapter 1

Deus semper idem, noverim me, noverim te.

O God, ever the same, let me know myself, let me know Thee.

It is the shortest prayer of St Augustine and perhaps the most complete: to know our own misery and to know God's mercy are, for him, the two halves of the spiritual life. Near the opening of the first book of the Soliloquies stands a much longer prayer, a great litany of praise to God the Creator and Father of truth, which is too long to give here but rewards reading in full.

A prayer for the dead: Augustine prays for his mother

St Monica died at Ostia in 387, a few months after her son's baptism. Her last request, as Augustine reports it, was: "Lay this body anywhere; let not the care of it trouble you at all. This only I ask of you, that you remember me at the altar of the Lord, wherever you may be" (Confessions IX, 11). At the end of the ninth book he keeps that request in a prayer for her soul, which has been read by Christians ever since as a model of prayer for the dead:

Confessions, Book IX, chapter 13

Ego itaque, laus mea et vita mea, Deus cordis mei, sepositis paulisper bonis eius actibus, pro quibus tibi gaudens gratias ago, nunc pro peccatis matris meae deprecor te. Exaudi me per medicinam vulnerum nostrorum, quae pependit in ligno et sedens ad dexteram tuam te interpellat pro nobis. Scio misericorditer operatam et ex corde dimisisse debita debitoribus suis. Dimitte illi et tu debita sua, si qua etiam contraxit per tot annos post aquam salutis. Dimitte, Domine, dimitte, obsecro, ne intres cum ea in iudicium.

I therefore, O my Praise and my Life, God of my heart, setting aside for a while her good deeds, for which I give Thee thanks with joy, now beseech Thee for the sins of my mother. Hear me, through the Healer of our wounds, who hung upon the tree and, sitting at Thy right hand, maketh intercession to Thee for us. I know that she dealt mercifully, and from her heart forgave her debtors their debts. Do Thou also forgive her her debts, if she contracted any in all the years since the water of salvation. Forgive her, O Lord, forgive her, I beseech Thee; enter not into judgment with her.

He ends the book by asking all who read the Confessions to remember Monica and his father Patricius "at Thy altar". This is the plain answer to the question what did St Augustine say about praying for the dead: he prayed for them, he asked others to pray for them at Mass, and he wrote a whole treatise, On the Care to be Had for the Dead, to explain why the prayers and the Sacrifice offered for them help them. The Litany for the Poor Souls in Purgatory continues that same charity.

The prayer to the Holy Spirit attributed to St Augustine

The prayer most often printed as "St Augustine's prayer to the Holy Spirit" is this one:

Prayer to the Holy Spirit, traditionally attributed to St Augustine

Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy.
Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy.
Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit, that I love but what is holy.
Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, to defend all that is holy.
Guard me, then, O Holy Spirit, that I always may be holy. Amen.

We must be honest about it: this prayer has never been traced to any work of St Augustine. It circulates under his name in prayer books and on prayer cards, its wording varies from one to another, and no book or sermon of his has been shown to contain it. Like many texts handed down as "of St Augustine" — there is a whole literature, which scholars call pseudo-Augustinian, of pieces put under his great name — it is best called a prayer in the spirit of Augustine. It is entirely orthodox and very good to pray; it simply should not be quoted as his words.

Those who love it will find the Church's own prayers to the Holy Ghost, the Veni Creator and the Veni Sancte Spiritus, in the Chaplet of the Holy Ghost, and a litany in the Litany of the Holy Ghost.

St Augustine's evening prayer

A night prayer is also widely printed under his name:

Evening prayer, attributed to St Augustine

Watch Thou, dear Lord, with those who wake, or watch, or weep tonight, and give Thine angels charge over those who sleep. Tend Thy sick ones, O Lord Christ. Rest Thy weary ones. Bless Thy dying ones. Soothe Thy suffering ones. Pity Thine afflicted ones. Shield Thy joyous ones. And all for Thy love's sake. Amen.

Here too the attribution is traditional, not documented: the prayer has not been traced to any of his works. Its petitions are sound and beautiful, and nothing prevents a Catholic from saying it; but the night prayer of the Church is Compline, the last Hour of the Divine Office in the Breviary.

A prayer to St Augustine: the Collect of his feast

St Augustine's feast in the 1962 calendar is kept on 28 August, as a feast of the third class: Saint Augustine, Bishop, Confessor and Doctor of the Church. The Collect of his Mass is the most authentic "prayer to St Augustine" there is, because it is the prayer of the Church herself, asking God's mercy through his intercession:

Collect of the Mass of St Augustine, 28 August

Adesto supplicationibus nostris, omnipotens Deus: et, quibus fiduciam sperandae pietatis indulges, intercedente beato Augustino Confessore tuo atque Pontifice, consuetae misericordiae tribue benignus effectum. Per Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum Filium tuum, qui tecum vivit et regnat in unitate Spiritus Sancti Deus, per omnia saecula saeculorum. Amen.

Give ear to our supplications, O almighty God: and to us, to whom Thou grantest the confidence of hoping for Thy loving-kindness, graciously grant, through the intercession of blessed Augustine, Thy Confessor and Bishop, the effect of Thy wonted mercy. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, world without end. Amen.

One may also simply say: St Augustine, pray for us. People ask his help above all for conversion — their own, or that of a child or husband far from God — for purity, which he won only after long struggle, and for the understanding of the faith. For these intentions the faithful also keep the nine days of the novena to St Augustine, with the Collect of his feast.

When the intention is a child's return to God, it is natural to ask the help of his mother too, with the Novena to St Monica: she prayed for him through all the years he spent in the Manichean sect, from about nineteen to twenty-eight, and until his baptism at Easter 387, when he was thirty-two. A bishop, pressed by her tears, told her that "it is not possible that the son of these tears should perish" (Confessions III, 12). Her story is told on our page on St Monica.

Note that a different saint, St Augustine of Canterbury, the apostle of the English, is kept on 28 May in the calendar of 1962; prayers "to St Augustine" usually mean the Doctor of Hippo.

What St Augustine taught about prayer

Augustine never wrote a treatise called "On Prayer", but two of his writings answer most of what people ask.

The letter to Proba. Anicia Faltonia Proba, a noble Roman widow, asked him how she ought to pray. His reply (Letter 130) is a small treatise. To the question what should I pray for? he answers in three words: Ora beatam vitam, "Pray for a happy life" — and then shows that the only happy life is God Himself. He warns against confusing many words with much prayer: "Multiplied words are one thing, long-continued warmth of desire is another," and he praises the monks of Egypt for their frequent but very brief prayers. Above all he teaches that "if we pray rightly, and as becomes our wants, we say nothing but what is already contained in the Lord's Prayer." That is St Augustine on the Lord's Prayer: every good prayer is the Our Father in other words.

Desire as prayer. Commenting on Psalm 37 (in the Vulgate numbering), he explains how one can obey the command to "pray without ceasing": "It is your heart's desire that is your prayer; and if your desire continues uninterrupted, your prayer continues also." Why is prayer important to St Augustine? Because man is made for God and restless without Him; prayer is that restlessness turned towards its rest.

Sayings wrongly attributed to St Augustine

Augustine is the most quoted of the Fathers, and also one of the most misquoted. Three texts in particular should not be put under his name.

• "He who sings prays twice." The phrase, often given in Latin as Qui bene cantat bis orat, does not occur in his works in that form. What he did write is shorter and deeper: Cantare amantis est — "singing belongs to one who loves" (Sermon 336). The love of sacred song he shows throughout the Confessions is real; the proverb is later. The Church's own song, Gregorian chant, is the best commentary on his sentence.
• "Pray as though everything depended on God, and work as though everything depended on you." This maxim is not found in his writings in that form either.
• "Death is nothing at all" (in Italian La morte non è niente, in French La mort n'est rien), and the different text that often accompanies it, "Do not weep if you love me" (Ne pleure pas si tu m'aimes). These words, often read at funerals as "a prayer of St Augustine", are not his. "Death is nothing at all" comes from a sermon preached in 1910 by Henry Scott Holland, an Anglican canon of St Paul's Cathedral in London; "Do not weep if you love me" has never been traced to Augustine's works either. Their message — that the dead have simply gone into the next room and nothing has changed — is foreign to Augustine, who wept for his mother, prayed for her sins and asked others to pray for her at the altar.

St Augustine's Prayer Book

Many people search for "St Augustine's Prayer Book" and assume it is a collection of his prayers. It is not. Saint Augustine's Prayer Book is an Anglo-Catholic devotional manual first published in the 1940s, for members of the Episcopal Church, by the Order of the Holy Cross, an Anglican monastic community in the United States. It borrows many Catholic devotions, but it is a book of the Anglican communion, not of the Catholic Church, and its prayers are not Augustine's. For the traditional Catholic prayers, the Raccolta, the Missal and the Breviary remain the Church's own books.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the most famous prayer of St Augustine?

"Late have I loved Thee, O Beauty ever ancient and ever new" (Confessions X, 27), together with the line from the first page of the same book: "Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee." Both are given above in Latin and English.

Did St Augustine write the "Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit" prayer?

It is traditionally attributed to him, but it has never been traced to his works. It is an orthodox and beautiful prayer to the Holy Ghost and may be prayed with profit; it should simply be called a prayer attributed to St Augustine.

How do you pray to St Augustine?

Ask God's mercy through his intercession, as the Church does in the Collect of his feast, given above; or say simply St Augustine, pray for us, adding your intention. Many pray to him for the conversion of a loved one, often together with St Monica.

When is the feast day of St Augustine?

28 August in the calendar of 1962, as a feast of the third class. His mother St Monica is kept on 4 May.

Did St Augustine pray to Mary?

No prayer to Our Lady survives among his authentic works, though Marian prayers have been attributed to him. But he honoured her singularly: speaking of sin, he excepted "the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, for the honour of the Lord, I wish to have no question at all when sins are treated of" (On Nature and Grace, 36).

Is "Death is nothing at all" a prayer of St Augustine?

No. The English text comes from a sermon by Henry Scott Holland, an Anglican canon, preached in 1910; the Italian and French versions circulating under Augustine's name have no source in his writings. Augustine's own words on death are his prayer for his mother, given above.

The Iter Fidei app carries the Mass and Office of St Augustine on 28 August, the traditional calendar of 1962, and the prayers of the Church in Latin and English. Join early access here.

Sources. St Augustine, Confessions I, 1; III, 12; IX, 11 and 13; X, 27. St Augustine, Soliloquies II, 1. St Augustine, Letter 130 to Proba; Exposition on Psalm 37, 14; Sermon 336, 1; On Nature and Grace, 36; On the Care to be Had for the Dead, 18. Roman Missal (1962), 28 August, St Augustine, Bishop, Confessor and Doctor of the Church.