There is another form of temptation, more complex in its peril. … It originates in an appetite for knowledge. … From this malady of curiosity are all those strange sights exhibited in the theatre. Hence do we proceed to search out the secret powers of nature (which is beside our end), which to know profits not, and wherein men desire nothing but to know.

X, 35 - Confessions (c. 397)

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume I/Confessions/Book X/Chapter 35