Note 2159 — Chapter XXII · AUGUSTINE ON MAGIC AND ASTROLOGY

Duhem, II (1914), 314, seems to me to have overestimated the significance of Confessions, V, 5, and De Genesi ad litteram, I, 19, in saying, “L’assurance avec laquelle les Basile, les Grégoire de Nysse, les Ambroise, les Jean Chrysostome opposaient aux enseignements de la Physique profane les naïves assertions de leur science puérile contristait fort l’Évêque de Hippone.” There is nothing, I think, to indicate that Augustine had these men or men of their stamp in mind, and I doubt if his scientific attainments were superior to Basil’s.