For Augustine, the pear tree was his parallel to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It was his personal reenactment of the Fall. His conviction that all humanity participates in Adam’s sin found validation in his own experience. His orchard was Adam’s garden; his peer pressure was Eve’s seduction; his theft from a slumbering neighbor was Adam’s disobedience while God was hidden from view. His stolen pears were the forbidden fruit. His guilt was Adams’s guilt. The heart-searching honesty