In his dialogue 'De magistro', Augustine states a famous thesis: we get knowledge not from any human teacher, but from consulting the truth inhabiting in our inner man. Augustine's concept of this inner truth, however, seems to change in the course of the dialogue. When Augustine first introduces the idea of inner truth, he compares it to light and says "Concerning color and other things we consult light, the elements of this world, those bodies which we sense, and the senses themselves (12,39)". What he means here is that when we get sense perception, we are also aware whether this perception is true or false, that is whether it is of real things (res) or of false images. In this sense, the truth is something by which we are convinced that our knowledge is true. Augustine had acquired this concept of truth through the refutation against the Sceptics. But at the end of the dialogue, Augustine says, "pupils, looking to that inner truth, consider within themselves whether teachers say true or not. (14,45)" Here the truth is something by which we can judge whether what has been said is true or false. This transition can be explained as follows. Augustine from the beginning does not regard the certainty of knowledge as wholly objective. "We consult", he says, "the truth according to the capacity of each one." He is well aware of the limit of our capacity. It was this awareness that prompted Augustine to change his notion of the truth.
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