The Five Senses

Augustine, Sermons 112.3 (Patrologia Latina, vol. 38, cols. 644-645; tr. Edmund Hill):

Now there are people, far removed from the faith, given to earthly concerns, of a materialistic cast of mind; they refuse to believe anything but what they can perceive with these five senses of the body. Indeed it is in its senses that they posit the standards for all truth. "I," he says, "don't believe anything except what I can see. There you have the sum of my knowledge, there you have my science. It's white, it's black. It's round, it's square, it's this or that color; I perceive it, I know it, I grasp it; nature herself teaches me. It's a voice, my senses tell me it's a voice. It sings well, sings badly, is pleasant, is hoarse. I perceive it, I know it, it has reached me. It smells nice, smells nasty; I sense it, I know it. This is sweet, this is bitter, this salty, this insipid; what more you can tell me, I don't know. I perceive by touch what is hard, what is soft, what is smooth, what is rough, what's hot, what's cold. What more are you going to show me?"

Sunt autem homines remoti a fide, terrenis dediti, carnalibus occupati; nolunt credere aliquid, nisi quod isto sensu corporis quinquepartito percipiunt. In eius vero sensibus totius veritatis sibi regulas ponunt. Non, inquit, credo ego, nisi quod video; ecce quod novi, ecce quod scio. Album est, nigrum est, rotundum est, quadrum est, sic vel sic coloratum est; novi, scio, teneo; natura ipsa me docet. Non cogor credere, quod mihi non potest ostendere. Vox est: sentio, quia vox est; bene cantat, male cantat, suavis est, raucus est; novi, scio, pervenit ad me. Bene olet, male olet: sentio, scio. Hoc dulce est, hoc amarum; hoc salsum, hoc fatuum est; quid mihi plus dicas, nescio. Tangendo novi, quid durum sit, quid molle sit, quid lene sit, quid asperum sit, quid caleat, quid frigeat; quid mihi plus demonstraturus es?

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