ABSTRACT
Not only is language as such important to Augustine; the sound of language is incredibly important as well. We have seen something of this in our discussion of the two excerpts from the Latin of the Confessions: this is why I have insisted on the need to read them aloud. Early in Augustine’s acquaintance with bishop Ambrose of Milan, Augustine comes upon him reading silently. ‘It was never otherwise, and so we too would sit for a long time in silence, for who would have the heart to interrupt a man so engrossed?’ (6.3.3). Augustine’s evident surprise, and the various explanations that he proposes from Ambrose’s choice, reveals not – as has often been suggested – that this practice was unknown to him, but simply that for him, language and sound were more or less inseparable.
