Augustine on enduring people who talk but have nothing to say

Augustine had hoped to get some answers from the Manichean, Faustus. Faustus doesn't have answers, but at least he is modest about it, unlike too many others...

"He knew that he did not know the answer to my questions and was not ashamed to admit it, for unlike many other talkative people whom I have had to endure, he would not try to teach me a lesson when he had nothing to say."

(Source: Confessions 5.7; tr R S Fine-Coffin)

Augustine via Calvin on False Humility

"Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind" [Colossians 2:18, tr. Calvin]

Calvin takes an insightful quote from Augustine in his Commentary on Colossians 2:18, regarding the puffing up that comes from false humility. He writes, "as Augustine elegantly writes to Paulinus, by wonderful means, as to the soul of man, that it is more puffed up from a false humility than if it were openly proud".

[The quote comes from Augustine's letter to Paulinus, #149/CXLIX, 2.28, fit enim miris modis in anima hominis, ut de falsa humilitate magis infletur, quam si apertius superbiret]