“What, then, is time? If no one ask of me, I know; if I wish to explain to him who asks…”

What, then, is time? If no one ask of me, I know; if I wish to explain to him who asks, I know not.

Augustine of Hippo · Confessions · NPNF1 I, Confessions, Book XI, chapter xiv, 17

The opening of the discussion of time that occupies the eleventh book, and the most cited sentence in ancient philosophy on the subject: everyone knows what time is until they are asked.

How this is known

These words were matched, word for word, against this project’s own copy of the volume cited.

Read in Pilkington, NPNF series 1 vol. 1 (1886) · J. G. Pilkington, M.A.

Also by

Augustine of Hippo every saying recorded of this person, and their page