John the monk's vision and the limits of knowing how the dead appear
Augustine is recounting a story about John the monk, a prophet consulted by the emperor Theodosius, and using it to raise questions about how visions of the dead or martyrs occur.
We must believe this was the kind of man John the monk was, the one the elder Emperor Theodosius consulted about the outcome of a civil war; for he also had the gift of prophecy. I have no doubt that one person can possess not just one of these gifts but several. This John, then, was sought by a very devout woman who was impatient to see him and pressed her husband insistently to obtain it for her. John refused, since he had never allowed women to visit him, but he said, "Go and tell your wife: she will see me next night, but in a dream." And so it happened. He gave her whatever counsel a faithful married woman needed to receive. When she woke, she told her husband that she had seen the man of God just as her husband knew him, and she reported what she had heard from him. The man who learned this from them told it to me—a serious and noble man, entirely worthy of belief.
But if I had seen that holy monk myself, since he is said to have answered questions with the greatest patience and wisdom, I would have asked him about the point relevant to this question: whether he himself had come to that woman in her dream—that is, whether his spirit had come in the likeness of his body, just as we dream of ourselves in the likeness of our body—or whether, while he was doing something else, or if he was asleep, dreaming something else, the vision was produced in the woman's dream through an angel or in some other way, and he foreknew that it would happen because the spirit of prophecy revealed it to him when he made the promise. For if he was actually present to her as she dreamed, he could do that only by a wonderful grace, not by nature—by God's gift, not by his own power. But if he was doing something else, or sleeping and occupied with other dreams, while the woman saw him in her dream, then something happened like what we read in the Acts of the Apostles, where the Lord Jesus speaks to Ananias about Saul and tells him that Saul has seen Ananias coming to him, though Ananias himself did not know it (Acts 9:12).
Whichever of these that man of God might answer me, I would go on to ask him about the martyrs: whether they themselves are present in dreams, or in whatever other way they appear to those who see them, in whatever form they wish—and especially when demons in people confess that they are being tormented by them and beg them to spare them. Are these things done by God's command through angelic powers, for the honor and prayerful commending of the saints and for the benefit of human beings, while the saints themselves are placed in the highest rest and are free for other, far better visions, apart from us and praying for us? For at Milan, at the shrines of the holy martyrs Protasius and Gervasius, demons called by name not only the dead whom they were commemorating in the same way but also Ambrose, the bishop, who was still alive, and begged him to spare them—while Ambrose was doing something else and had no idea this was happening. Or are these things sometimes done through the actual presence of the martyrs, and sometimes through angels? And can the two be distinguished by us, and by what signs—or can no one perceive and judge these things except the one who has that gift through God's Spirit, who divides to each his own as he wills (1 Corinthians 12:11)?
I believe John would have discussed all these things with me as I wished, so that either I would learn from his teaching and recognize that what I heard was true and certain, or I would believe what I did not know because he was telling me what he knew. But if he had perhaps answered me from holy Scripture and said, "Do not seek things too high for you, and do not search out things too strong for you; but think always on what the Lord has commanded you" (Sirach 3:21-22), I would have accepted that too with gratitude. For it is no small fruit if, when some obscure and uncertain matters are beyond our grasp, it becomes at least clear and certain to us that they should not be sought after—and that whatever anyone wants to learn, thinking it will help him to know it, he should learn that it does him no harm not to know it.
Latin
Talem fuisse credendum est illum Iohannem monachum, quem de belli ciuilis euentu maior Theodosius consuluit imperator: habebat quippe etiam prophetiam. neque enim singulos singula munerum istorum, sed etiam plura unum habere posse non ambigo. Iohannes ergo iste cuidam mulieri religiosissimae inpatienter eum uidere cupienti atque ut hoc inpetraret per maritum suum uehementer instanti, cum ille nollet, quoniam id numquam permiserat feminis, uade, inquit, dic uxori tuae, uidebit me nocte proxima, sed in somnis. et factum est: monuitque illam quidquid fidelem coniugatam moneri oportebat. quae cum euigilasset, talem se uidisse hominem dei uiro suo, qualem ille eum nouerat, et quid ab illo audierit, iudicauit. qui hoc ab eis conperit, retulit mihi, uir grauis et nobilis et dignissimus credi. sed si illum sanctum monachum ipse uidissem, quia, sicut fertur, patientissime interrogabatur et sapientissime respondebat, quaesissem ab eo, quod ad istam pertinet quaestionem, utrum ipse ad illam feminam uenisset in somnis, id est spiritus eius in effigie corporis sui, sicut nos ipsos in effigie nostri corporis somniamus, an ipso aliud agente uel, si dormiebat, aliud somniante siue per angelum siue quocumque alio modo in mulieris somnio talis facta sit uisio, atque id futurum, ut ipse promitteret, prophetiae spiritu reuelante praesciuerit. si enim ipse interfuit somnianti, mirabili gratia utique id potuit, non natura, et dei munere, non propria facultate; si autem ipso aliud agente, siue dormiente et uisis aliis occupato, cum mulier uidit in somnis, profecto tale aliquid factum est, quale illud est, quod in apostolorum Actibus legimus, ubi dominus Iesus loquitur Ananiae de Saulo et indicat ei, quod Saulus uidit ad se uenientem Ananiam, cum hoc Ananias ipse nesciret. quodlibet horum mihi responderet ille homo dei, et de martyribus ab illo pergerem quaerere, utrum ipsi adsint in somnis uel quocumque alio modo uidentibus eos in qua figura uoluerint, et maxime quando ab eis se torqueri daemones in hominibus confitentur et rogant eos, ut pareant sibi, an ista fiant dei nutu per angelicas potestates in honorem commendationemque sanctorum ad utilitatem hominum illis in summa quiete positis et ad alia longe meliora uisa uacantibus seorsum a nobis orantibusque pro nobis; nam Mediolani apud sanctos Protasium et Geruasium martyres expresso nomine sicut defunctorum, quos eodem modo commemorabant, adhuc uiuum daemones episcopum confitebantur Ambrosium atque ut sibi parceret obsecrabant illo aliud agente atque hoc cum ageretur omnino nesciente; an uero aliquando per ipsam praesentiam martyrum fiant ista, aliquando per angelorum; et utrum possint uel quibus signis possint a nobis duo ista discerni, an ea sentire ac diiudicare non ualeat, nisi qui habeat illud donum per dei spiritum diuidentem propria unicuique prout uult: dissereret mihi, ut arbitror, ille Iohannes haec omnia, sicut uellem, ut aut eo docente discerem et ea quae audirem uera et certa esse cognoscerem, aut ego crederem quae nescirem illo dicente quae sciret. quodsi mihi forsitan de sancta scriptura responderet ac diceret: altiora te ne quaesieris, et fortiora te ne scrutatus fueris, sed quae tibi praecepit dominus, illa cogita semper, id etiam gratanter acciperem. non enim paruus est fructus, si aliqua obscura et incerta, quae conprehendere non ualemus, clarum saltem certumque sit nobis non esse quaerenda, et quod unusquisque uult discere putans prodesse si sciat, discat non obesse, si nesciat.