Chapter 1.—Of the Limits Which Must Be Put to the Necessity of Replying to an Adversary.

If the feeble mind of man did not presume to resist the clear evidence of truth, but yielded its infirmity to wholesome doctrines, as to a health-giving medicine, until it obtained from God, by its faith and piety, the grace needed to heal it, they who have just ideas, and express them in suitable language, would need to use no long discourse to refute the errors of empty conjecture.  But this mental infirmity is now more prevalent and hurtful than ever, to such an extent that even after the truth has been as fully demonstrated as man can prove it to man, they hold for the very truth their own unreasonable fancies, either on account of their great blindness, which prevents them from seeing what is plainly set before them, or on account of their opinionative obstinacy, which prevents them from acknowledging the force of what they do see.  There therefore frequently arises a necessity of speaking more fully on those points which are already clear, that we may, as it were, present them not to the eye, but even to the touch, so that they may be felt even by those who close their eyes against them.  And yet to what end shall we ever bring our discussions, or what bounds can be set to our discourse, if we proceed on the principle that we must always reply to those who reply to us?  For those who are either unable to understand our arguments, or are so hardened by the habit of contradiction, that though they understand they cannot yield to them, reply to us, and, as it is written, “speak hard things,”

Ps. xciv. 4.

Chapter 2.—Recapitulation of the Contents of the First Book.

In the foregoing book, having begun to speak of the city of God, to which I have resolved, Heaven helping me, to consecrate the whole of this work, it was my first endeavor to reply to those who attribute the wars by which the world is being devastated, and especially the recent sack of Rome by the barbarians, to the religion of Christ, which prohibits the offering of abominable sacrifices to devils.  I have shown that they ought rather to attribute it to Christ, that for His name’s sake the barbarians, in contravention of all custom and law of war, threw open as sanctuaries the largest churches, and in many instances showed such reverence to Christ, that not only His genuine servants, but even those who in their terror feigned themselves to be so, were exempted from all those hardships which by the custom of war may lawfully be inflicted.  Then out of this there arose the question, why wicked and ungrateful men were permitted to share in these benefits; and why, too, the hardships and calamities of war were inflicted on the godly as well as on the ungodly.  And in giving a suitably full answer to this large question, I occupied some considerable space, partly that I might relieve the anxieties which disturb many when they observe that the blessings of God, and the common and daily human casualties, fall to the lot of bad men and good without distinction; but mainly that I might minister some consolation to those holy and chaste women who were outraged by the enemy, in such a way as to shock their modesty, though not to sully their purity, and that I might preserve them from being ashamed of life, though they have no guilt to be ashamed of.  And then I briefly spoke against those who with a most shameless wantonness insult over those poor Christians who were subjected to those calamities, and especially over those broken-hearted and humiliated, though chaste and holy women; these fellows themselves being most depraved and unmanly profligates, quite degenerate from the genuine Romans, whose famous deeds are abundantly recorded in history, and everywhere celebrated, but who have found in their descendants the greatest enemies of their glory.  In truth, Rome, which was founded and increased by the labors of these ancient heroes, was more shamefully ruined by their descendants, while its walls were still standing, than it is now by the razing of them.  For in this ruin there fell stones and timbers; but in the ruin those profligates effected, there fell, not the mural, but the moral bulwarks and ornaments of the city, and their hearts burned with passions more destructive than the flames which consumed their houses.  Thus I brought my first book to a close.  And now I go on to speak of those calamities which that city itself, or its subject provinces, have suffered since its foundation; all of which they would equally have attributed to the Christian religion, if at that early period the doctrine of the gospel against their false and deceiving gods had been as largely and freely proclaimed as now.

Chapter 3.—That We Need Only to Read History in Order to See What Calamities the Romans Suffered Before the Religion of Christ Began to Compete with the Worship of the Gods.

But remember that, in recounting these things, I have still to address myself to ignorant men; so ignorant, indeed, as to give birth to the common saying, “Drought and Christianity go hand in hand.”

Pluvia defit, causa Christiani.  Similar accusations and similar replies may be seen in the celebrated passage of Tertullian’s Apol. c. 40, and in the eloquent exordium of Arnobius, C. Gentes.

Chapter 4.—That the Worshippers of the Gods Never Received from Them Any Healthy Moral Precepts, and that in Celebrating Their Worship All Sorts of Impurities Were Practiced.

First of all, we would ask why their gods took no steps to improve the morals of their worshippers.  That the true God should neglect those who did not seek His help, that was but justice; but why did those gods, from whose worship ungrateful men are now complaining that they are prohibited, issue no laws which might have guided their devotees to a virtuous life?  Surely it was but just, that such care as men showed to the worship of the gods, the gods on their part should have to the conduct of men.  But, it is replied, it is by his own will a man goes astray.  Who denies it?  But none the less was it incumbent on these gods, who were men’s guardians, to publish in plain terms the laws of a good life, and not to conceal them from their worshippers.  It was their part to send prophets to reach and convict such as broke these laws, and publicly to proclaim the punishments which await evil-doers, and the rewards which may be looked for by those that do well.  Did ever the walls of any of their temples echo to any such warning voice?  I myself, when I was a young man, used sometimes to go to the sacrilegious entertainments and spectacles; I saw the priests raving in religious excitement, and heard the choristers; I took pleasure in the shameful games which were celebrated in honor of gods and goddesses, of the virgin Cœlestis,

Tertullian (Apol. c. 24) mentions Cœlestis as specially worshipped in Africa.  Augustin mentions her again in the 26th chapter of this book, and in other parts of his works.

Chapter 5.—Of the Obscenities Practiced in Honor of the Mother of the Gods.

In this matter I would prefer to have as my assessors in judgment, not those men who rather take pleasure in these infamous customs than take pains to put an end to them, but that same Scipio Nasica who was chosen by the senate as the citizen most worthy to receive in his hands the image of that demon Cybele, and convey it into the city.  He would tell us whether he would be proud to see his own mother so highly esteemed by the state as to have divine honors adjudged to her; as the Greeks and Romans and other nations have decreed divine honors to men who had been of material service to them, and have believed that their mortal benefactors were thus made immortal, and enrolled among the gods.

See Cicero, De Nat. Deor, ii. 24.

Chapter 6.—That the Gods of the Pagans Never Inculcated Holiness of Life.

This is the reason why those divinities quite neglected the lives and morals of the cities and nations who worshipped them, and threw no dreadful prohibition in their way to hinder them from becoming utterly corrupt, and to preserve them from those terrible and detestable evils which visit not harvests and vintages, not house and possessions, not the body which is subject to the soul, but the soul itself, the spirit that rules the whole man.  If there was any such prohibition, let it be produced, let it be proved.  They will tell us that purity and probity were inculcated upon those who were initiated in the mysteries of religion, and that secret incitements to virtue were whispered in the ear of the élite; but this is an idle boast.  Let them show or name to us the places which were at any time consecrated to assemblages in which, instead of the obscene songs and licentious acting of players, instead of the celebration of those most filthy and shameless Fugalia

Fugalia.  Vives is uncertain to what feast Augustin refers.  Censorinus understands him to refer to a feast celebrating the expulsion of the kings from Rome.  This feast, however (celebrated on the 24th of February), was commonly called Regifugium.

Chapter 7.—That the Suggestions of Philosophers are Precluded from Having Any Moral Effect, Because They Have Not the Authority Which Belongs to Divine Instruction, and Because Man’s Natural Bias to Evil Induces Him Rather to Follow the Examples of the Gods Than to Obey the Precepts of Men.

But will they perhaps remind us of the schools of the philosophers, and their disputations?  In the first place, these belong not to Rome, but to Greece; and even if we yield to them that they are now Roman, because Greece itself has become a Roman province, still the teachings of the philosophers are not the commandments of the gods, but the discoveries of men, who, at the prompting of their own speculative ability, made efforts to discover the hidden laws of nature, and the right and wrong in ethics, and in dialectic what was consequent according to the rules of logic, and what was inconsequent and erroneous.  And some of them, by God’s help, made great discoveries; but when left to themselves they were betrayed by human infirmity, and fell into mistakes.  And this was ordered by divine providence, that their pride might be restrained, and that by their example it might be pointed out that it is humility which has access to the highest regions.  But of this we shall have more to say, if the Lord God of truth permit, in its own place.

See below, books viii.-xii.

Chapter 8.—That the Theatrical Exhibitions Publishing the Shameful Actions of the Gods, Propitiated Rather Than Offended Them.

But, some one will interpose, these are the fables of poets, not the deliverances of the gods themselves.  Well, I have no mind to arbitrate between the lewdness of theatrical entertainments and of mystic rites; only this I say, and history bears me out in making the assertion, that those same entertainments, in which the fictions of poets are the main attraction, were not introduced in the festivals of the gods by the ignorant devotion of the Romans, but that the gods themselves gave the most urgent commands to this effect, and indeed extorted from the Romans these solemnities and celebrations in their honor.  I touched on this in the preceding book, and mentioned that dramatic entertainments were first inaugurated at Rome on occasion of a pestilence, and by authority of the pontiff.  And what man is there who is not more likely to adopt, for the regulation of his own life, the examples that are represented in plays which have a divine sanction, rather than the precepts written and promulgated with no more than human authority?  If the poets gave a false representation of Jove in describing him as adulterous, then it were to be expected that the chaste gods should in anger avenge so wicked a fiction, in place of encouraging the games which circulated it.  Of these plays, the most inoffensive are comedies and tragedies, that is to say, the dramas which poets write for the stage, and which, though they often handle impure subjects, yet do so without the filthiness of language which characterizes many other performances; and it is these dramas which boys are obliged by their seniors to read and learn as a part of what is called a liberal and gentlemanly education.

This sentence recalls Augustin’s own experience as a boy, which he bewails in his Confessions.

Chapter 9.—That the Poetical License Which the Greeks, in Obedience to Their Gods, Allowed, Was Restrained by the Ancient Romans.

The opinion of the ancient Romans on this matter is attested by Cicero in his work De Republica, in which Scipio, one of the interlocutors, says, “The lewdness of comedy could never have been suffered by audiences, unless the customs of society had previously sanctioned the same lewdness.”  And in the earlier days the Greeks preserved a certain reasonableness in their license, and made it a law, that whatever comedy wished to say of any one, it must say it of him by name.  And so in the same work of Cicero’s, Scipio says, “Whom has it not aspersed?  Nay, whom has it not worried?  Whom has it spared?  Allow that it may assail demagogues and factions, men injurious to the commonwealth—a Cleon, a Cleophon, a Hyperbolus.  That is tolerable, though it had been more seemly for the public censor to brand such men, than for a poet to lampoon them; but to blacken the fame of Pericles with scurrilous verse, after he had with the utmost dignity presided over their state alike in war and in peace, was as unworthy of a poet, as if our own Plautus or Nævius were to bring Publius and Cneius Scipio on the comic stage, or as if Cæcilius were to caricature Cato.”  And then a little after he goes on:  “Though our Twelve Tables attached the penalty of death only to a very few offences, yet among these few this was one:  if any man should have sung a pasquinade, or have composed a satire calculated to bring infamy or disgrace on another person.  Wisely decreed.  For it is by the decisions of magistrates, and by a well-informed justice, that our lives ought to be judged, and not by the flighty fancies of poets; neither ought we to be exposed to hear calumnies, save where we have the liberty of replying, and defending ourselves before an adequate tribunal.”  This much I have judged it advisable to quote from the fourth book of Cicero’s De Republica; and I have made the quotation word for word, with the exception of some words omitted, and some slightly transposed, for the sake of giving the sense more readily.  And certainly the extract is pertinent to the matter I am endeavoring to explain.  Cicero makes some further remarks, and concludes the passage by showing that the ancient Romans did not permit any living man to be either praised or blamed on the stage.  But the Greeks, as I said, though not so moral, were more logical in allowing this license which the Romans forbade; for they saw that their gods approved and enjoyed the scurrilous language of low comedy when directed not only against men, but even against themselves; and this, whether the infamous actions imputed to them were the fictions of poets, or were their actual iniquities commemorated and acted in the theatres.  And would that the spectators had judged them worthy only of laughter, and not of imitation!  Manifestly it had been a stretch of pride to spare the good name of the leading men and the common citizens, when the very deities did not grudge that their own reputation should be blemished.

Chapter 10.—That the Devils, in Suffering Either False or True Crimes to Be Laid to Their Charge, Meant to Do Men a Mischief.

It is alleged, in excuse of this practice, that the stories told of the gods are not true, but false, and mere inventions, but this only makes matters worse, if we form our estimate by the morality our religion teaches; and if we consider the malice of the devils, what more wily and astute artifice could they practise upon men?  When a slander is uttered against a leading statesman of upright and useful life, is it not reprehensible in proportion to its untruth and groundlessness?  What punishment, then, shall be sufficient when the gods are the objects of so wicked and outrageous an injustice?  But the devils, whom these men repute gods, are content that even iniquities they are guiltless of should be ascribed to them, so long as they may entangle men’s minds in the meshes of these opinions, and draw them on along with themselves to their predestinated punishment:  whether such things were actually committed by the men whom these devils, delighting in human infatuation, cause to be worshipped as gods, and in whose stead they, by a thousand malign and deceitful artifices, substitute themselves, and so receive worship; or whether, though they were really the crimes of men, these wicked spirits gladly allowed them to be attributed to higher beings, that there might seem to be conveyed from heaven itself a sufficient sanction for the perpetration of shameful wickedness.  The Greeks, therefore, seeing the character of the gods they served, thought that the poets should certainly not refrain from showing up human vices on the stage, either because they desired to be like their gods in this, or because they were afraid that, if they required for themselves a more unblemished reputation than they asserted for the gods, they might provoke them to anger.

Chapter 11.—That the Greeks Admitted Players to Offices of State, on the Ground that Men Who Pleased the Gods Should Not Be Contemptuously Treated by Their Fellows.

It was a part of this same reasonableness of the Greeks which induced them to bestow upon the actors of these same plays no inconsiderable civic honors.  In the above-mentioned book of the De Republica, it is mentioned that Aeschines, a very eloquent Athenian, who had been a tragic actor in his youth, became a statesman, and that the Athenians again and again sent another tragedian, Aristodemus, as their plenipotentiary to Philip.  For they judged it unbecoming to condemn and treat as infamous persons those who were the chief actors in the scenic entertainments which they saw to be so pleasing to the gods.  No doubt this was immoral of the Greeks, but there can be as little doubt they acted in conformity with the character of their gods; for how could they have presumed to protect the conduct of the citizens from being cut to pieces by the tongues of poets and players, who were allowed, and even enjoined by the gods, to tear their divine reputation to tatters?  And how could they hold in contempt the men who acted in the theatres those dramas which, as they had ascertained, gave pleasure to the gods whom they worshipped?  Nay, how could they but grant to them the highest civic honors?  On what plea could they honor the priests who offered for them acceptable sacrifices to the gods, if they branded with infamy the actors who in behalf of the people gave to the gods that pleasure or honour which they demanded, and which, according to the account of the priests, they were angry at not receiving.  Labeo,

Labeo, a jurist of the time of Augustus, learned in law and antiquities, and the author of several works much prized by his own and some succeeding ages.  The two articles in Smith’s Dictionary on Antistius and Cornelius Labeo should be read.

Chapter 12.—That the Romans, by Refusing to the Poets the Same License in Respect of Men Which They Allowed Them in the Case of the Gods, Showed a More Delicate Sensitiveness Regarding Themselves than Regarding the Gods.

The Romans, however, as Scipio boasts in that same discussion, declined having their conduct and good name subjected to the assaults and slanders of the poets, and went so far as to make it a capital crime if any one should dare to compose such verses.  This was a very honorable course to pursue, so far as they themselves were concerned, but in respect of the gods it was proud and irreligious:  for they knew that the gods not only tolerated, but relished, being lashed by the injurious expressions of the poets, and yet they themselves would not suffer this same handling; and what their ritual prescribed as acceptable to the gods, their law prohibited as injurious to themselves.  How then, Scipio, do you praise the Romans for refusing this license to the poets, so that no citizen could be calumniated, while you know that the gods were not included under this protection?  Do you count your senate-house worthy of so much higher a regard than the Capitol?  Is the one city of Rome more valuable in your eyes than the whole heaven of gods, that you prohibit your poets from uttering any injurious words against a citizen, though they may with impunity cast what imputations they please upon the gods, without the interference of senator, censor, prince, or pontiff?  It was, forsooth, intolerable that Plautus or Nævus should attack Publius and Cneius Scipio, insufferable that Cæcilius should lampoon Cato; but quite proper that your Terence should encourage youthful lust by the wicked example of supreme Jove.

Chapter 13.—That the Romans Should Have Understood that Gods Who Desired to Be Worshipped in Licentious Entertainments Were Unworthy of Divine Honor.

But Scipio, were he alive, would possibly reply:  “How could we attach a penalty to that which the gods themselves have consecrated?  For the theatrical entertainments in which such things are said, and acted, and performed, were introduced into Roman society by the gods, who ordered that they should be dedicated and exhibited in their honor.”  But was not this, then, the plainest proof that they were no true gods, nor in any respect worthy of receiving divine honours from the republic?  Suppose they had required that in their honor the citizens of Rome should be held up to ridicule, every Roman would have resented the hateful proposal.  How then, I would ask, can they be esteemed worthy of worship, when they propose that their own crimes be used as material for celebrating their praises?  Does not this artifice expose them, and prove that they are detestable devils?  Thus the Romans, though they were superstitious enough to serve as gods those who made no secret of their desire to be worshipped in licentious plays, yet had sufficient regard to their hereditary dignity and virtue, to prompt them to refuse to players any such rewards as the Greeks accorded them.  On this point we have this testimony of Scipio, recorded in Cicero:  “They [the Romans] considered comedy and all theatrical performances as disgraceful, and therefore not only debarred players from offices and honors open to ordinary citizens, but also decreed that their names should be branded by the censor, and erased from the roll of their tribe.”  An excellent decree, and another testimony to the sagacity of Rome; but I could wish their prudence had been more thorough-going and consistent.  For when I hear that if any Roman citizen chose the stage as his profession, he not only closed to himself every laudable career, but even became an outcast from his own tribe, I cannot but exclaim:  This is the true Roman spirit, this is worthy of a state jealous of its reputation.  But then some one interrupts my rapture, by inquiring with what consistency players are debarred from all honors, while plays are counted among the honors due to the gods?  For a long while the virtue of Rome was uncontaminated by theatrical exhibitions;

According to Livy (vii. 2), theatrical exhibitions were introduced in the year 392 a.u.c.  Before that time, he says, there had only been the games of the circus.  The Romans sent to Etruria for players, who were called histriones, hister being the Tuscan word for a player.  Other particulars are added by Livy.

Chapter 14.—That Plato, Who Excluded Poets from a Well-Ordered City, Was Better Than These Gods Who Desire to Be Honoured by Theatrical Plays.

We have still to inquire why the poets who write the plays, and who by the law of the twelve tables are prohibited from injuring the good name of the citizens, are reckoned more estimable than the actors, though they so shamefully asperse the character of the gods?  Is it right that the actors of these poetical and God-dishonoring effusions be branded, while their authors are honored?  Must we not here award the palm to a Greek, Plato, who, in framing his ideal republic,

See the Republic, book iii.

This philosopher, Plato, has been elevated by Labeo to the rank of a demigod, and set thus upon a level with such as Hercules and Romulus.  Labeo ranks demigods higher than heroes, but both he counts among the deities.  But I have no doubt that he thinks this man whom he reckons a demigod worthy of greater respect not only than the heroes, but also than the gods themselves.  The laws of the Romans and the speculations of Plato have this resemblance, that the latter pronounce a wholesale condemnation of poetical fictions, while the former restrain the license of satire, at least so far as men are the objects of it.  Plato will not suffer poets even to dwell in his city:  the laws of Rome prohibit actors from being enrolled as citizens; and if they had not feared to offend the gods who had asked the services of the players, they would in all likelihood have banished them altogether.  It is obvious, therefore, that the Romans could not receive, nor reasonably expect to receive, laws for the regulation of their conduct from their gods, since the laws they themselves enacted far surpassed and put to shame the morality of the gods.  The gods demand stageplays in their own honor; the Romans exclude the players from all civic honors;

Comp. Tertullian, De Spectac. c. 22.

Chapter 15.—That It Was Vanity, Not Reason, Which Created Some of the Roman Gods.

But is it not manifest that vanity rather than reason regulated the choice of some of their false gods?  This Plato, whom they reckon a demigod, and who used all his eloquence to preserve men from the most dangerous spiritual calamities, has yet not been counted worthy even of a little shrine; but Romulus, because they can call him their own, they have esteemed more highly than many gods, though their secret doctrine can allow him the rank only of a demigod.  To him they allotted a flamen, that is to say, a priest of a class so highly esteemed in their religion (distinguished, too, by their conical mitres), that for only three of their gods were flamens appointed,—the Flamen Dialis for Jupiter, Martialis for Mars, and Quirinalis for Romulus (for when the ardor of his fellow-citizens had given Romulus a seat among the gods, they gave him this new name Quirinus).  And thus by this honor Romulus has been preferred to Neptune and Pluto, Jupiter’s brothers, and to Saturn himself, their father.  They have assigned the same priesthood to serve him as to serve Jove; and in giving Mars (the reputed father of Romulus) the same honor, is this not rather for Romulus’ sake than to honor Mars?

Chapter 16.—That If the Gods Had Really Possessed Any Regard for Righteousness, the Romans Should Have Received Good Laws from Them, Instead of Having to Borrow Them from Other Nations.

Moreover, if the Romans had been able to receive a rule of life from their gods, they would not have borrowed Solon’s laws from the Athenians, as they did some years after Rome was founded; and yet they did not keep them as they received them, but endeavored to improve and amend them.

In the year a.u. 299, three ambassadors were sent from Rome to Athens to copy Solon’s laws, and acquire information about the institutions of Greece.  On their return the Decemviri were appointed to draw up a code; and finally, after some tragic interruptions, the celebrated twelve tables were accepted as the fundamental statutes of Roman law (fons universi publici privatique juris).  These were graven on brass, and hung up for public information.  Livy, iii. 31–34.

Chapter 17.—Of the Rape of the Sabine Women, and Other Iniquities Perpetrated in Rome’s Palmiest Days.

But possibly we are to find the reason for this neglect of the Romans by their gods, in the saying of Sallust, that “equity and virtue prevailed among the Romans not more by force of laws than of nature.”

Sallust, Cat. Con. ix.  Compare the similar saying of Tacitus regarding the chastity of the Germans:  Plusque ibi boni mores valent, quam alibi bonæ leges  (Germ. xix.).

Again, I presume it was due to this natural equity and virtue, that after the expulsion of King Tarquin, whose son had violated Lucretia, Junius Brutus the consul forced Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus, Lucretia’s husband and his own colleague, a good and innocent man, to resign his office and go into banishment, on the one sole charge that he was of the name and blood of the Tarquins.  This injustice was perpetrated with the approval, or at least connivance, of the people, who had themselves raised to the consular office both Collatinus and Brutus.  Another instance of this equity and virtue is found in their treatment of Marcus Camillus.  This eminent man, after he had rapidly conquered the Veians, at that time the most formidable of Rome’s enemies, and who had maintained a ten years’ war, in which the Roman army had suffered the usual calamities attendant on bad generalship, after he had restored security to Rome, which had begun to tremble for its safety, and after he had taken the wealthiest city of the enemy, had charges brought against him by the malice of those that envied his success, and by the insolence of the tribunes of the people; and seeing that the city bore him no gratitude for preserving it, and that he would certainly be condemned, he went into exile, and even in his absence was fined 10,000 asses.  Shortly after, however, his ungrateful country had again to seek his protection from the Gauls.  But I cannot now mention all the shameful and iniquitous acts with which Rome was agitated, when the aristocracy attempted to subject the people, and the people resented their encroachments, and the advocates of either party were actuated rather by the love of victory than by any equitable or virtuous consideration.

Chapter 18.—What the History of Sallust Reveals Regarding the Life of the Romans, Either When Straitened by Anxiety or Relaxed in Security.

I will therefore pause, and adduce the testimony of Sallust himself, whose words in praise of the Romans (that “equity and virtue prevailed among them not more by force of laws than of nature”) have given occasion to this discussion.  He was referring to that period immediately after the expulsion of the kings, in which the city became great in an incredibly short space of time.  And yet this same writer acknowledges in the first book of his history, in the very exordium of his work, that even at that time, when a very brief interval had elapsed after the government had passed from kings to consuls, the more powerful men began to act unjustly, and occasioned the defection of the people from the patricians, and other disorders in the city.  For after Sallust had stated that the Romans enjoyed greater harmony and a purer state of society between the second and third Punic wars than at any other time, and that the cause of this was not their love of good order, but their fear lest the peace they had with Carthage might be broken (this also, as we mentioned, Nasica contemplated when he opposed the destruction of Carthage, for he supposed that fear would tend to repress wickedness, and to preserve wholesome ways of living), he then goes on to say:  “Yet, after the destruction of Carthage, discord, avarice, ambition, and the other vices which are commonly generated by prosperity, more than ever increased.”  If they “increased,” and that “more than ever,” then already they had appeared, and had been increasing.  And so Sallust adds this reason for what he said.  “For,” he says, “the oppressive measures of the powerful, and the consequent secessions of the plebs from the patricians, and other civil dissensions, had existed from the first, and affairs were administered with equity and well-tempered justice for no longer a period than the short time after the expulsion of the kings, while the city was occupied with the serious Tuscan war and Tarquin’s vengeance.”  You see how, even in that brief period after the expulsion of the kings, fear, he acknowledges, was the cause of the interval of equity and good order.  They were afraid, in fact, of the war which Tarquin waged against them, after he had been driven from the throne and the city, and had allied himself with the Tuscans.  But observe what he adds:  “After that, the patricians treated the people as their slaves, ordering them to be scourged or beheaded just as the kings had done, driving them from their holdings, and harshly tyrannizing over those who had no property to lose.  The people, overwhelmed by these oppressive measures, and most of all by exorbitant usury, and obliged to contribute both money and personal service to the constant wars, at length took arms and seceded to Mount Aventine and Mount Sacer, and thus obtained for themselves tribunes and protective laws.  But it was only the second Punic war that put an end on both sides to discord and strife.”  You see what kind of men the Romans were, even so early as a few years after the expulsion of the kings; and it is of these men he says, that “equity and virtue prevailed among them not more by force of law than of nature.”

Now, if these were the days in which the Roman republic shows fairest and best, what are we to say or think of the succeeding age, when, to use the words of the same historian, “changing little by little from the fair and virtuous city it was, it became utterly wicked and dissolute?”  This was, as he mentions, after the destruction of Carthage.  Sallust’s brief sum and sketch of this period may be read in his own history, in which he shows how the profligate manners which were propagated by prosperity resulted at last even in civil wars.  He says:  “And from this time the primitive manners, instead of undergoing an insensible alteration as hitherto they had done, were swept away as by a torrent:  the young men were so depraved by luxury and avarice, that it may justly be said that no father had a son who could either preserve his own patrimony, or keep his hands off other men’s.”  Sallust adds a number of particulars about the vices of Sylla, and the debased condition of the republic in general; and other writers make similar observations, though in much less striking language.

However, I suppose you now see, or at least any one who gives his attention has the means of seeing, in what a sink of iniquity that city was plunged before the advent of our heavenly King.  For these things happened not only before Christ had begun to teach, but before He was even born of the Virgin.  If, then, they dare not impute to their gods the grievous evils of those former times, more tolerable before the destruction of Carthage, but intolerable and dreadful after it, although it was the gods who by their malign craft instilled into the minds of men the conceptions from which such dreadful vices branched out on all sides, why do they impute these present calamities to Christ, who teaches life-giving truth, and forbids us to worship false and deceitful gods, and who, abominating and condemning with His divine authority those wicked and hurtful lusts of men, gradually withdraws His own people from a world that is corrupted by these vices, and is falling into ruins, to make of them an eternal city, whose glory rests not on the acclamations of vanity, but on the judgment of truth?

Chapter 19.—Of the Corruption Which Had Grown Upon the Roman Republic Before Christ Abolished the Worship of the Gods.

Here, then, is this Roman republic, “which has changed little by little from the fair and virtuous city it was, and has become utterly wicked and dissolute.”  It is not I who am the first to say this, but their own authors, from whom we learned it for a fee, and who wrote it long before the coming of Christ.  You see how, before the coming of Christ, and after the destruction of Carthage, “the primitive manners, instead of undergoing insensible alteration, as hitherto they had done, were swept away as by a torrent; and how depraved by luxury and avarice the youth were.”  Let them now, on their part, read to us any laws given by their gods to the Roman people, and directed against luxury and avarice.  And would that they had only been silent on the subjects of chastity and modesty, and had not demanded from the people indecent and shameful practices, to which they lent a pernicious patronage by their so-called divinity.  Let them read our commandments in the Prophets, Gospels, Acts of the Apostles or Epistles; let them peruse the large number of precepts against avarice and luxury which are everywhere read to the congregations that meet for this purpose, and which strike the ear, not with the uncertain sound of a philosophical discussion, but with the thunder of God’s own oracle pealing from the clouds.  And yet they do not impute to their gods the luxury and avarice, the cruel and dissolute manners, that had rendered the republic utterly wicked and corrupt, even before the coming of Christ; but whatever affliction their pride and effeminacy have exposed them to in these latter days, they furiously impute to our religion.  If the kings of the earth and all their subjects, if all princes and judges of the earth, if young men and maidens, old and young, every age, and both sexes; if they whom the Baptist addressed, the publicans and the soldiers, were all together to hearken to and observe the precepts of the Christian religion regarding a just and virtuous life, then should the republic adorn the whole earth with its own felicity, and attain in life everlasting to the pinnacle of kingly glory.  But because this man listens and that man scoffs, and most are enamored of the blandishments of vice rather than the wholesome severity of virtue, the people of Christ, whatever be their condition—whether they be kings, princes, judges, soldiers, or provincials, rich or poor, bond or free, male or female—are enjoined to endure this earthly republic, wicked and dissolute as it is, that so they may by this endurance win for themselves an eminent place in that most holy and august assembly of angels and republic of heaven, in which the will of God is the law.

Chapter 20.—Of the Kind of Happiness and Life Truly Delighted in by Those Who Inveigh Against the Christian Religion.

But the worshippers and admirers of these gods delight in imitating their scandalous iniquities, and are nowise concerned that the republic be less depraved and licentious.  Only let it remain undefeated, they say, only let it flourish and abound in resources; let it be glorious by its victories, or still better, secure in peace; and what matters it to us?  This is our concern, that every man be able to increase his wealth so as to supply his daily prodigalities, and so that the powerful may subject the weak for their own purposes.  Let the poor court the rich for a living, and that under their protection they may enjoy a sluggish tranquillity; and let the rich abuse the poor as their dependants, to minister to their pride.  Let the people applaud not those who protect their interests, but those who provide them with pleasure.  Let no severe duty be commanded, no impurity forbidden.  Let kings estimate their prosperity, not by the righteousness, but by the servility of their subjects.  Let the provinces stand loyal to the kings, not as moral guides, but as lords of their possessions and purveyors of their pleasures; not with a hearty reverence, but a crooked and servile fear.  Let the laws take cognizance rather of the injury done to another man’s property, than of that done to one’s own person.  If a man be a nuisance to his neighbor, or injure his property, family, or person, let him be actionable; but in his own affairs let everyone with impunity do what he will in company with his own family, and with those who willingly join him.  Let there be a plentiful supply of public prostitutes for every one who wishes to use them, but specially for those who are too poor to keep one for their private use.  Let there be erected houses of the largest and most ornate description:  in these let there be provided the most sumptuous banquets, where every one who pleases may, by day or night, play, drink, vomit,

The same collocation of words is used by Cicero with reference to the well-known mode of renewing the appetite in use among the Romans.

Chapter 22.—That the Roman Gods Never Took Any Steps to Prevent the Republic from Being Ruined by Immorality.

But what is relevant to the present question is this, that however admirable our adversaries say the republic was or is, it is certain that by the testimony of their own most learned writers it had become, long before the coming of Christ, utterly wicked and dissolute, and indeed had no existence, but had been destroyed by profligacy.  To prevent this, surely these guardian gods ought to have given precepts of morals and a rule of life to the people by whom they were worshipped in so many temples, with so great a variety of priests and sacrifices, with such numberless and diverse rites, so many festal solemnities, so many celebrations of magnificent games.  But in all this the demons only looked after their own interest, and cared not at all how their worshippers lived, or rather were at pains to induce them to lead an abandoned life, so long as they paid these tributes to their honor, and regarded them with fear.  If any one denies this, let him produce, let him point to, let him read the laws which the gods had given against sedition, and which the Gracchi transgressed when they threw everything into confusion; or those Marius, and Cinna, and Carbo broke when they involved their country in civil wars, most iniquitous and unjustifiable in their causes, cruelly conducted, and yet more cruelly terminated; or those which Sylla scorned, whose life, character, and deeds, as described by Sallust and other historians, are the abhorrence of all mankind.  Who will deny that at that time the republic had become extinct?

Possibly they will be bold enough to suggest in defence of the gods, that they abandoned the city on account of the profligacy of the citizens, according to the lines of Virgil:

“Gone from each fane, each sacred shrine,

Are those who made this realm divine.”

Æneid, ii. 351–2.

But, firstly, if it be so, then they cannot complain against the Christian religion, as if it were that which gave offence to the gods and caused them to abandon Rome, since the Roman immorality had long ago driven from the altars of the city a cloud of little gods, like as many flies.  And yet where was this host of divinities, when, long before the corruption of the primitive morality, Rome was taken and burnt by the Gauls?  Perhaps they were present, but asleep?  For at that time the whole city fell into the hands of the enemy, with the single exception of the Capitoline hill; and this too would have been taken, had not—the watchful geese aroused the sleeping gods!  And this gave occasion to the festival of the goose, in which Rome sank nearly to the superstition of the Egyptians, who worship beasts and birds.  But of these adventitious evils which are inflicted by hostile armies or by some disaster, and which attach rather to the body than the soul, I am not meanwhile disputing.  At present I speak of the decay of morality, which at first almost imperceptibly lost its brilliant hue, but afterwards was wholly obliterated, was swept away as by a torrent, and involved the republic in such disastrous ruin, that though the houses and walls remained standing the leading writers do not scruple to say that the republic was destroyed.  Now, the departure of the gods “from each fane, each sacred shrine,” and their abandonment of the city to destruction, was an act of justice, if their laws inculcating justice and a moral life had been held in contempt by that city.  But what kind of gods were these, pray, who declined to live with a people who worshipped them, and whose corrupt life they had done nothing to reform?

Chapter 23.—That the Vicissitudes of This Life are Dependent Not on the Favor or Hostility of Demons, But on the Will of the True God.

But, further, is it not obvious that the gods have abetted the fulfilment of men’s desires, instead of authoritatively bridling them?  For Marius, a low-born and self-made man, who ruthlessly provoked and conducted civil wars, was so effectually aided by them, that he was seven times consul, and died full of years in his seventh consulship, escaping the hands of Sylla, who immediately afterwards came into power.  Why, then, did they not also aid him, so as to restrain him from so many enormities?  For if it is said that the gods had no hand in his success, this is no trivial admission that a man can attain the dearly coveted felicity of this life even though his own gods be not propitious; that men can be loaded with the gifts of fortune as Marius was, can enjoy health, power, wealth, honours, dignity, length of days, though the gods be hostile to him; and that, on the other hand, men can be tormented as Regulus was, with captivity, bondage, destitution, watchings, pain, and cruel death, though the gods be his friends.  To concede this is to make a compendious confession that the gods are useless, and their worship superfluous.  If the gods have taught the people rather what goes clean counter to the virtues of the soul, and that integrity of life which meets a reward after death; if even in respect of temporal and transitory blessings they neither hurt those whom they hate nor profit whom they love, why are they worshipped, why are they invoked with such eager homage?  Why do men murmur in difficult and sad emergencies, as if the gods had retired in anger? and why, on their account, is the Christian religion injured by the most unworthy calumnies?  If in temporal matters they have power either for good or for evil, why did they stand by Marius, the worst of Rome’s citizens, and abandon Regulus, the best?  Does this not prove themselves to be most unjust and wicked?  And even if it be supposed that for this very reason they are the rather to be feared and worshipped, this is a mistake; for we do not read that Regulus worshipped them less assiduously than Marius.  Neither is it apparent that a wicked life is to be chosen, on the ground that the gods are supposed to have favored Marius more than Regulus.  For Metellus, the most highly esteemed of all the Romans, who had five sons in the consulship, was prosperous even in this life; and Catiline, the worst of men, reduced to poverty and defeated in the war his own guilt had aroused, lived and perished miserably.  Real and secure felicity is the peculiar possession of those who worship that God by whom alone it can be conferred.

It is thus apparent, that when the republic was being destroyed by profligate manners, its gods did nothing to hinder its destruction by the direction or correction of its manners, but rather accelerated its destruction by increasing the demoralization and corruption that already existed.  They need not pretend that their goodness was shocked by the iniquity of the city, and that they withdrew in anger. For they were there, sure enough; they are detected, convicted:  they were equally unable to break silence so as to guide others, and to keep silence so as to conceal themselves.  I do not dwell on the fact that the inhabitants of Minturnæ took pity on Marius, and commended him to the goddess Marica in her grove, that she might give him success in all things, and that from the abyss of despair in which he then lay he forthwith returned unhurt to Rome, and entered the city the ruthless leader of a ruthless army; and they who wish to know how bloody was his victory, how unlike a citizen, and how much more relentlessly than any foreign foe he acted, let them read the histories.  But this, as I said, I do not dwell upon; nor do I attribute the bloody bliss of Marius to, I know not what Minturnian goddess [Marica], but rather to the secret providence of God, that the mouths of our adversaries might be shut, and that they who are not led by passion, but by prudent consideration of events, might be delivered from error.  And even if the demons have any power in these matters, they have only that power which the secret decree of the Almighty allots to them, in order that we may not set too great store by earthly prosperity, seeing it is oftentimes vouchsafed even to wicked men like Marius; and that we may not, on the other hand, regard it as an evil, since we see that many good and pious worshippers of the one true God are, in spite of the demons pre-eminently successful; and, finally, that we may not suppose that these unclean spirits are either to be propitiated or feared for the sake of earthly blessings or calamities:  for as wicked men on earth cannot do all they would, so neither can these demons, but only in so far as they are permitted by the decree of Him whose judgments are fully comprehensible, justly reprehensible by none.

Chapter 24.—Of the Deeds of Sylla, in Which the Demons Boasted that He Had Their Help.

It is certain that Sylla—whose rule was so cruel that, in comparison with it, the preceding state of things which he came to avenge was regretted—when first he advanced towards Rome to give battle to Marius, found the auspices so favourable when he sacrificed, that, according to Livy’s account, the augur Postumius expressed his willingness to lose his head if Sylla did not, with the help of the gods, accomplish what he designed.  The gods, you see, had not departed from “every fane and sacred shrine,” since they were still predicting the issue of these affairs, and yet were taking no steps to correct Sylla himself.  Their presages promised him great prosperity but no threatenings of theirs subdued his evil passions.  And then, when he was in Asia conducting the war against Mithridates, a message from Jupiter was delivered to him by Lucius Titius, to the effect that he would conquer Mithridates; and so it came to pass.  And afterwards, when he was meditating a return to Rome for the purpose of avenging in the blood of the citizens injuries done to himself and his friends, a second message from Jupiter was delivered to him by a soldier of the sixth legion, to the effect that it was he who had predicted the victory over Mithridates, and that now he promised to give him power to recover the republic from his enemies, though with great bloodshed.  Sylla at once inquired of the soldier what form had appeared to him; and, on his reply, recognized that it was the same as Jupiter had formerly employed to convey to him the assurance regarding the victory over Mithridates.  How, then, can the gods be justified in this matter for the care they took to predict these shadowy successes, and for their negligence in correcting Sylla, and restraining him from stirring up a civil war so lamentable and atrocious, that it not merely disfigured, but extinguished, the republic?  The truth is, as I have often said, and as Scripture informs us, and as the facts themselves sufficiently indicate, the demons are found to look after their own ends only, that they may be regarded and worshipped as gods, and that men may be induced to offer to them a worship which associates them with their crimes, and involves them in one common wickedness and judgment of God.

Afterwards, when Sylla had come to Tarentum, and had sacrificed there, he saw on the head of the victim’s liver the likeness of a golden crown.  Thereupon the same soothsayer Postumius interpreted this to signify a signal victory, and ordered that he only should eat of the entrails.  A little afterwards, the slave of a certain Lucius Pontius cried out, “I am Bellona’s messenger; the victory is yours, Sylla!”  Then he added that the Capitol should be burned.  As soon as he had uttered this prediction he left the camp, but returned the following day more excited than ever, and shouted, “The Capitol is fired!”  And fired indeed it was.  This it was easy for a demon both to foresee and quickly to announce.  But observe, as relevant to our subject, what kind of gods they are under whom these men desire to live, who blaspheme the Saviour that delivers the wills of the faithful from the dominion of devils.  The man cried out in prophetic rapture, “The victory is yours, Sylla!”  And to certify that he spoke by a divine spirit, he predicted also an event which was shortly to happen, and which indeed did fall out, in a place from which he in whom this spirit was speaking was far distant.  But he never cried, “Forbear thy villanies, Sylla!”—the villanies which were committed at Rome by that victor to whom a golden crown on the calf’s liver had been shown as the divine evidence of his victory.  If such signs as this were customarily sent by just gods, and not by wicked demons, then certainly the entrails he consulted should rather have given Sylla intimation of the cruel disasters that were to befall the city and himself.  For that victory was not so conducive to his exaltation to power, as it was fatal to his ambition; for by it he became so insatiable in his desires, and was rendered so arrogant and reckless by prosperity, that he may be said rather to have inflicted a moral destruction on himself than corporal destruction on his enemies.  But these truely woeful and deplorable calamities the gods gave him no previous hint of, neither by entrails, augury, dream, nor prediction.  For they feared his amendment more than his defeat.  Yea, they took good care that this glorious conqueror of his own fellow-citizens should be conquered and led captive by his own infamous vices, and should thus be the more submissive slave of the demons themselves.

Chapter 25.—How Powerfully the Evil Spirits Incite Men to Wicked Actions, by Giving Them the Quasi-Divine Authority of Their Example.

Now, who does not hereby comprehend,—unless he has preferred to imitate such gods rather than by divine grace to withdraw himself from their fellowship,—who does not see how eagerly these evil spirits strive by their example to lend, as it were, divine authority to crime?  Is not this proved by the fact that they were seen in a wide plain in Campania rehearsing among themselves the battle which shortly after took place there with great bloodshed between the armies of Rome?  For at first there were heard loud crashing noises, and afterwards many reported that they had seen for some days together two armies engaged.  And when this battle ceased, they found the ground all indented with just such footprints of men and horses as a great conflict would leave.  If, then, the deities were veritably fighting with one another, the civil wars of men are sufficiently justified; yet, by the way, let it be observed that such pugnacious gods must be very wicked or very wretched.  If, however, it was but a sham-fight, what did they intend by this, but that the civil wars of the Romans should seem no wickedness, but an imitation of the gods?  For already the civil wars had begun; and before this, some lamentable battles and execrable massacres had occurred.  Already many had been moved by the story of the soldier, who, on stripping the spoils of his slain foe, recognized in the stripped corpse his own brother, and, with deep curses on civil wars, slew himself there and then on his brother’s body.  To disguise the bitterness of such tragedies, and kindle increasing ardor in this monstrous warfare, these malign demons, who were reputed and worshipped as gods, fell upon this plan of revealing themselves in a state of civil war, that no compunction for fellow-citizens might cause the Romans to shrink from such battles, but that the human criminality might be justified by the divine example.  By a like craft, too, did these evil spirits command that scenic entertainments, of which I have already spoken, should be instituted and dedicated to them.  And in these entertainments the poetical compositions and actions of the drama ascribed such iniquities to the gods, that every one might safely imitate them, whether he believed the gods had actually done such things, or, not believing this, yet perceived that they most eagerly desired to be represented as having done them.  And that no one might suppose, that in representing the gods as fighting with one another, the poets had slandered them, and imputed to them unworthy actions, the gods themselves, to complete the deception, confirmed the compositions of the poets by exhibiting their own battles to the eyes of men, not only through actions in the theatres, but in their own persons on the actual field.

We have been forced to bring forward these facts, because their authors have not scrupled to say and to write that the Roman republic had already been ruined by the depraved moral habits of the citizens, and had ceased to exist before the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Now this ruin they do not impute to their own gods, though they impute to our Christ the evils of this life, which cannot ruin good men, be they alive or dead.  And this they do, though our Christ has issued so many precepts inculcating virtue and restraining vice; while their own gods have done nothing whatever to preserve that republic that served them, and to restrain it from ruin by such precepts, but have rather hastened its destruction, by corrupting its morality through their pestilent example.  No one, I fancy, will now be bold enough to say that the republic was then ruined because of the departure of the gods “from each fane, each sacred shrine,” as if they were the friends of virtue, and were offended by the vices of men.  No, there are too many presages from entrails, auguries, soothsayings, whereby they boastingly proclaimed themselves prescient of future events and controllers of the fortune of war,—all which prove them to have been present.  And had they been indeed absent the Romans would never in these civil wars have been so far transported by their own passions as they were by the instigations of these gods.

Chapter 26.—That the Demons Gave in Secret Certain Obscure Instructions in Morals, While in Public Their Own Solemnities Inculcated All Wickedness.

Seeing that this is so,—seeing that the filthy and cruel deeds, the disgraceful and criminal actions of the gods, whether real or feigned, were at their own request published, and were consecrated, and dedicated in their honor as sacred and stated solemnities; seeing they vowed vengeance on those who refused to exhibit them to the eyes of all, that they might be proposed as deeds worthy of imitation, why is it that these same demons, who by taking pleasure in such obscenities, acknowledge themselves to be unclean spirits, and by delighting in their own villanies and iniquities, real or imaginary, and by requesting from the immodest, and extorting from the modest, the celebration of these licentious acts, proclaim themselves instigators to a criminal and lewd life;—why, I ask, are they represented as giving some good moral precepts to a few of their own elect, initiated in the secrecy of their shrines?  If it be so, this very thing only serves further to demonstrate the malicious craft of these pestilent spirits.  For so great is the influence of probity and chastity, that all men, or almost all men, are moved by the praise of these virtues; nor is any man so depraved by vice, but he hath some feeling of honor left in him.  So that, unless the devil sometimes transformed himself, as Scripture says, into an angel of light,

2 Cor. xi. 14.

Where and when those initiated in the mysteries of Cœlestis received any good instructions, we know not.  What we do know is, that before her shrine, in which her image is set, and amidst a vast crowd gathering from all quarters, and standing closely packed together, we were intensely interested spectators of the games which were going on, and saw, as we pleased to turn the eye, on this side a grand display of harlots, on the other the virgin goddess; we saw this virgin worshipped with prayer and with obscene rites.  There we saw no shame-faced mimes, no actress over-burdened with modesty; all that the obscene rites demanded was fully complied with.  We were plainly shown what was pleasing to the virgin deity, and the matron who witnessed the spectacle returned home from the temple a wiser woman.  Some, indeed, of the more prudent women turned their faces from the immodest movements of the players, and learned the art of wickedness by a furtive regard.  For they were restrained, by the modest demeanor due to men, from looking boldly at the immodest gestures; but much more were they restrained from condemning with chaste heart the sacred rites of her whom they adored.  And yet this licentiousness—which, if practised in one’s home, could only be done there in secret—was practised as a public lesson in the temple; and if any modesty remained in men, it was occupied in marvelling that wickedness which men could not unrestrainedly commit should be part of the religious teaching of the gods, and that to omit its exhibition should incur the anger of the gods.  What spirit can that be, which by a hidden inspiration stirs men’s corruption, and goads them to adultery, and feeds on the full-fledged iniquity, unless it be the same that finds pleasure in such religious ceremonies, sets in the temples images of devils, and loves to see in play the images of vices; that whispers in secret some righteous sayings to deceive the few who are good, and scatters in public invitations to profligacy, to gain possession of the millions who are wicked?

Chapter 28.—That the Christian Religion is Health-Giving.

They, then, are but abandoned and ungrateful wretches, in deep and fast bondage to that malign spirit, who complain and murmur that men are rescued by the name of Christ from the hellish thraldom of these unclean spirits, and from a participation in their punishment, and are brought out of the night of pestilential ungodliness into the light of most healthful piety.  Only such men could murmur that the masses flock to the churches and their chaste acts of worship, where a seemly separation of the sexes is observed; where they learn how they may so spend this earthly life, as to merit a blessed eternity hereafter; where Holy Scripture and instruction in righteousness are proclaimed from a raised platform in presence of all, that both they who do the word may hear to their salvation, and they who do it not may hear to judgment.  And though some enter who scoff at such precepts, all their petulance is either quenched by a sudden change, or is restrained through fear or shame.  For no filthy and wicked action is there set forth to be gazed at or to be imitated; but either the precepts of the true God are recommended, His miracles narrated, His gifts praised, or His benefits implored.

Chapter 29.—An Exhortation to the Romans to Renounce Paganism.

This, rather, is the religion worthy of your desires, O admirable Roman race,—the progeny of your Scævolas and Scipios, of Regulus, and of Fabricius.  This rather covet, this distinguish from that foul vanity and crafty malice of the devils.  If there is in your nature any eminent virtue, only by true piety is it purged and perfected, while by impiety it is wrecked and punished.  Choose now what you will pursue, that your praise may be not in yourself, but in the true God, in whom is no error.  For of popular glory you have had your share; but by the secret providence of God, the true religion was not offered to your choice.  Awake, it is now day; as you have already awaked in the persons of some in whose perfect virtue and sufferings for the true faith we glory:  for they, contending on all sides with hostile powers, and conquering them all by bravely dying, have purchased for us this country of ours with their blood; to which country we invite you, and exhort you to add yourselves to the number of the citizens of this city, which also has a sanctuary

Alluding to the sanctuary given to all who fled to Rome in its early days.

Chapter 1.—Of the Ills Which Alone the Wicked Fear, and Which the World Continually Suffered, Even When the Gods Were Worshipped.

Of moral and spiritual evils, which are above all others to be deprecated, I think enough has already been said to show that the false gods took no steps to prevent the people who worshipped them from being overwhelmed by such calamities, but rather aggravated the ruin.  I see I must now speak of those evils which alone are dreaded by the heathen—famine, pestilence, war, pillage, captivity, massacre, and the like calamities, already enumerated in the first book.  For evil men account those things alone evil which do not make men evil; neither do they blush to praise good things, and yet to remain evil among the good things they praise.  It grieves them more to own a bad house than a bad life, as if it were man’s greatest good to have everything good but himself.  But not even such evils as were alone dreaded by the heathen were warded off by their gods, even when they were most unrestrictedly worshipped.  For in various times and places before the advent of our Redeemer, the human race was crushed with numberless and sometimes incredible calamities; and at that time what gods but those did the world worship, if you except the one nation of the Hebrews, and, beyond them, such individuals as the most secret and most just judgment of God counted worthy of divine grace?

Compare Aug. Epist. ad Deogratias, 102, 13; and De Præd. Sanct., 19.

Chapter 2.—Whether the Gods, Whom the Greeks and Romans Worshipped in Common, Were Justified in Permitting the Destruction of Ilium.

First, then, why was Troy or Ilium, the cradle of the Roman people (for I must not overlook nor disguise what I touched upon in the first book

Ch. 4.

Chapter 3.—That the Gods Could Not Be Offended by the Adultery of Paris, This Crime Being So Common Among Themselves.

There is no ground, then, for representing the gods (by whom, as they say, that empire stood, though they are proved to have been conquered by the Greeks) as being enraged at the Trojan perjury.  Neither, as others again plead in their defence, was it indignation at the adultery of Paris that caused them to withdraw their protection from Troy.  For their habit is to be instigators and instructors in vice, not its avengers.  “The city of Rome,” says Sallust, “was first built and inhabited, as I have heard, by the Trojans, who, flying their country, under the conduct of Æneas, wandered about without making any settlement.”

De Conj. Cat.vi.

Chapter 4.—Of Varro’s Opinion, that It is Useful for Men to Feign Themselves the Offspring of the Gods.

Some one will say, But do you believe all this?  Not I indeed.  For even Varro, a very learned heathen, all but admits that these stories are false, though he does not boldly and confidently say so.  But he maintains it is useful for states that brave men believe, though falsely, that they are descended from the gods; for that thus the human spirit, cherishing the belief of its divine descent, will both more boldly venture into great enterprises, and will carry them out more energetically, and will therefore by its very confidence secure more abundant success.  You see how wide a field is opened to falsehood by this opinion of Varro’s, which I have expressed as well as I could in my own words; and how comprehensible it is, that many of the religions and sacred legends should be feigned in a community in which it was judged profitable for the citizens that lies should be told even about the gods themselves.

Chapter 6.—That the Gods Exacted No Penalty for the Fratricidal Act of Romulus.

I add another instance:  If the sins of men so greatly incensed those divinities, that they abandoned Troy to fire and sword to punish the crime of Paris, the murder of Romulus’ brother ought to have incensed them more against the Romans than the cajoling of a Greek husband moved them against the Trojans:  fratricide in a newly-born city should have provoked them more than adultery in a city already flourishing.  It makes no difference to the question we now discuss, whether Romulus ordered his brother to be slain, or slew him with his own hand; it is a crime which many shamelessly deny, many through shame doubt, many in grief disguise.  And we shall not pause to examine and weigh the testimonies of historical writers on the subject.  All agree that the brother of Romulus was slain, not by enemies, not by strangers.  If it was Romulus who either commanded or perpetrated this crime; Romulus was more truly the head of the Romans than Paris of the Trojans; why then did he who carried off another man’s wife bring down the anger of the gods on the Trojans, while he who took his brother’s life obtained the guardianship of those same gods?  If, on the other hand, that crime was not wrought either by the hand or will of Romulus, then the whole city is chargeable with it, because it did not see to its punishment, and thus committed, not fratricide, but parricide, which is worse.  For both brothers were the founders of that city, of which the one was by villainy prevented from being a ruler.  So far as I see, then, no evil can be ascribed to Troy which warranted the gods in abandoning it to destruction, nor any good to Rome which accounts for the gods visiting it with prosperity; unless the truth be, that they fled from Troy because they were vanquished, and betook themselves to Rome to practise their characteristic deceptions there.  Nevertheless they kept a footing for themselves in Troy, that they might deceive future inhabitants who re-peopled these lands; while at Rome, by a wider exercise of their malignant arts, they exulted in more abundant honors.

Chapter 7.—Of the Destruction of Ilium by Fimbria, a Lieutenant of Marius.

And surely we may ask what wrong poor Ilium had done, that, in the first heat of the civil wars of Rome, it should suffer at the hand of Fimbria, the veriest villain among Marius’ partisans, a more fierce and cruel destruction than the Grecian sack.

Livy, 83, one of the lost books; and Appian, in Mithridat.

Chapter 8.—Whether Rome Ought to Have Been Entrusted to the Trojan Gods.

Where, then, was the wisdom of entrusting Rome to the Trojan gods, who had demonstrated their weakness in the loss of Troy?  Will some one say that, when Fimbria stormed Troy, the gods were already resident in Rome?  How, then, did the image of Minerva remain standing?  Besides, if they were at Rome when Fimbria destroyed Troy, perhaps they were at Troy when Rome itself was taken and set on fire by the Gauls.  But as they are very acute in hearing, and very swift in their movements, they came quickly at the cackling of the goose to defend at least the Capitol, though to defend the rest of the city they were too long in being warned.

Chapter 9.—Whether It is Credible that the Peace During the Reign of Numa Was Brought About by the Gods.

It is also believed that it was by the help of the gods that the successor of Romulus, Numa Pompilius, enjoyed peace during his entire reign, and shut the gates of Janus, which are customarily kept open

The gates of Janus were not the gates of a temple, but the gates of a passage called Janus, which was used only for military purposes; shut therefore in peace, open in war.

Chapter 10.—Whether It Was Desirable that The Roman Empire Should Be Increased by Such a Furious Succession of Wars, When It Might Have Been Quiet and Safe by Following in the Peaceful Ways of Numa.

Do they reply that the Roman empire could never have been so widely extended, nor so glorious, save by constant and unintermitting wars?  A fit argument, truly!  Why must a kingdom be distracted in order to be great?  In this little world of man’s body, is it not better to have a moderate stature, and health with it, than to attain the huge dimensions of a giant by unnatural torments, and when you attain it to find no rest, but to be pained the more in proportion to the size of your members?  What evil would have resulted, or rather what good would not have resulted, had those times continued which Sallust sketched, when he says, “At first the kings (for that was the first title of empire in the world) were divided in their sentiments:  part cultivated the mind, others the body:  at that time the life of men was led without coveteousness; every one was sufficiently satisfied with his own!”

Sall. Conj. Cat. ii.

“At length stole on a baser age

And war’s indomitable rage,

And greedy lust of gain?”

Æneid, viii. 326–7.

But obviously the Romans have a plausible defence for undertaking and carrying on such disastrous wars,—to wit, that the pressure of their enemies forced them to resist, so that they were compelled to fight, not by any greed of human applause, but by the necessity of protecting life and liberty.  Well, let that pass.  Here is Sallust’s account of the matter:  “For when their state, enriched with laws, institutions, territory, seemed abundantly prosperous and sufficiently powerful, according to the ordinary law of human nature, opulence gave birth to envy.  Accordingly, the neighboring kings and states took arms and assaulted them.  A few allies lent assistance; the rest, struck with fear, kept aloof from dangers.  But the Romans, watchful at home and in war, were active, made preparations, encouraged one another, marched to meet their enemies,—protected by arms their liberty, country, parents.  Afterwards, when they had repelled the dangers by their bravery, they carried help to their allies and friends, and procured alliances more by conferring than by receiving favors.”

Sall. Cat. Conj. vi.

Chapter 11.—Of the Statue of Apollo at Cumæ, Whose Tears are Supposed to Have Portended Disaster to the Greeks, Whom the God Was Unable to Succor.

And it is still this weakness of the gods which is confessed in the story of the Cuman Apollo, who is said to have wept for four days during the war with the Achæans and King Aristonicus.  And when the augurs were alarmed at the portent, and had determined to cast the statue into the sea, the old men of Cumæ interposed, and related that a similar prodigy had occurred to the same image during the wars against Antiochus and against Perseus, and that by a decree of the senate, gifts had been presented to Apollo, because the event had proved favorable to the Romans.  Then soothsayers were summoned who were supposed to have greater professional skill, and they pronounced that the weeping of Apollo’s image was propitious to the Romans, because Cumæ was a Greek colony, and that Apollo was bewailing (and thereby presaging) the grief and calamity that was about to light upon his own land of Greece, from which he had been brought.  Shortly afterwards it was reported that King Aristonicus was defeated and made prisoner,—a defeat certainly opposed to the will of Apollo; and this he indicated by even shedding tears from his marble image.  And this shows us that, though the verses of the poets are mythical, they are not altogether devoid of truth, but describe the manners of the demons in a sufficiently fit style.  For in Virgil, Diana mourned for Camilla,

Æneid, xi. 532.

Chapter 12.—That the Romans Added a Vast Number of Gods to Those Introduced by Numa, and that Their Numbers Helped Them Not at All.

But though Pompilius introduced so ample a ritual, yet did not Rome see fit to be content with it.  For as yet Jupiter himself had not his chief temple,—it being King Tarquin who built the Capitol.  And Æsculapius left Epidaurus for Rome, that in this foremost city he might have a finer field for the exercise of his great medical skill.

Livy, x. 47.

Chapter 13.—By What Right or Agreement The Romans Obtained Their First Wives.

How is it that neither Juno, who with her husband Jupiter even then cherished

“Rome’s sons, the nation of the gown,”

Virgil, Æn. i. 286.

nor Venus herself, could assist the children of the loved Æneas to find wives by some right and equitable means?  For the lack of this entailed upon the Romans the lamentable necessity of stealing their wives, and then waging war with their fathers-in-law; so that the wretched women, before they had recovered from the wrong done them by their husbands, were dowried with the blood of their fathers.  “But the Romans conquered their neighbors.”  Yes; but with what wounds on both sides, and with what sad slaughter of relatives and neighbors!  The war of Cæsar and Pompey was the contest of only one father-in-law with one son-in-law; and before it began, the daughter of Cæsar, Pompey’s wife, was already dead.  But with how keen and just an accent of grief does Lucan

Pharsal. v. 1.

The Romans, then, conquered that they might, with hands stained in the blood of their fathers-in-law, wrench the miserable girls from their embrace,—girls who dared not weep for their slain parents, for fear of offending their victorious husbands; and while yet the battle was raging, stood with their prayers on their lips, and knew not for whom to utter them.  Such nuptials were certainly prepared for the Roman people not by Venus, but Bellona; or possibly that infernal fury Alecto had more liberty to injure them now that Juno was aiding them, than when the prayers of that goddess had excited her against Æneas.  Andromache in captivity was happier than these Roman brides.  For though she was a slave, yet, after she had become the wife of Pyrrhus, no more Trojans fell by his hand; but the Romans slew in battle the very fathers of the brides they fondled.  Andromache, the victor’s captive, could only mourn, not fear, the death of her people.  The Sabine women, related to men still combatants, feared the death of their fathers when their husbands went out to battle, and mourned their death as they returned, while neither their grief nor their fear could be freely expressed.  For the victories of their husbands, involving the destruction of fellow-townsmen, relatives, brothers, fathers, caused either pious agony or cruel exultation.  Moreover, as the fortune of war is capricious, some of them lost their husbands by the sword of their parents, while others lost husband and father together in mutual destruction.  For the Romans by no means escaped with impunity, but they were driven back within their walls, and defended themselves behind closed gates; and when the gates were opened by guile, and the enemy admitted into the town, the Forum itself was the field of a hateful and fierce engagement of fathers-in-law and sons-in-law.  The ravishers were indeed quite defeated, and, flying on all sides to their houses, sullied with new shame their original shameful and lamentable triumph.  It was at this juncture that Romulus, hoping no more from the valor of his citizens, prayed Jupiter that they might stand their ground; and from this occasion the god gained the name of Stator.  But not even thus would the mischief have been finished, had not the ravished women themselves flashed out with dishevelled hair, and cast themselves before their parents, and thus disarmed their just rage, not with the arms of victory, but with the supplications of filial affection.  Then Romulus, who could not brook his own brother as a colleague, was compelled to accept Titus Tatius, king of the Sabines, as his partner on the throne.  But how long would he who misliked the fellowship of his own twin-brother endure a stranger?  So, Tatius being slain, Romulus remained sole king, that he might be the greater god.  See what rights of marriage these were that fomented unnatural wars.  These were the Roman leagues of kindred, relationship, alliance, religion.  This was the life of the city so abundantly protected by the gods.  You see how many severe things might be said on this theme; but our purpose carries us past them, and requires our discourse for other matters.

Chapter 14.—Of the Wickedness of the War Waged by the Romans Against the Albans, and of the Victories Won by the Lust of Power.

But what happened after Numa’s reign, and under the other kings, when the Albans were provoked into war, with sad results not to themselves alone, but also to the Romans?  The long peace of Numa had become tedious; and with what endless slaughter and detriment of both states did the Roman and Alban armies bring it to an end!  For Alba, which had been founded by Ascanius, son of Æneas, and which was more properly the mother of Rome than Troy herself, was provoked to battle by Tullus Hostilius, king of Rome, and in the conflict both inflicted and received such damage, that at length both parties wearied of the struggle.  It was then devised that the war should be decided by the combat of three twin-brothers from each army:  from the Romans the three Horatii stood forward, from the Albans the three Curiatii.  Two of the Horatii were overcome and disposed of by the Curiatii; but by the remaining Horatius the three Curiatii were slain.  Thus Rome remained victorious, but with such a sacrifice that only one survivor returned to his home.  Whose was the loss on both sides?  Whose the grief, but of the offspring of Æneas, the descendants of Ascanius, the progeny of Venus, the grandsons of Jupiter?  For this, too, was a “worse than civil” war, in which the belligerent states were mother and daughter.  And to this combat of the three twin-brothers there was added another atrocious and horrible catastrophe.  For as the two nations had formerly been friendly (being related and neighbors), the sister of the Horatii had been betrothed to one of the Curiatii; and she, when she saw her brother wearing the spoils of her betrothed, burst into tears, and was slain by her own brother in his anger.  To me, this one girl seems to have been more humane than the whole Roman people.  I cannot think her to blame for lamenting the man to whom already she had plighted her troth, or, as perhaps she was doing, for grieving that her brother should have slain him to whom he had promised his sister.  For why do we praise the grief of Æneas (in Virgil

Æneid, x. 821, of Lausus:

“But when Anchises’ son surveyed

The fair, fair face so ghastly made,

He groaned, by tenderness unmanned,

And stretched the sympathizing hand,” etc.

Why allege to me the mere names and words of “glory” and “victory?”  Tear off the disguise of wild delusion, and look at the naked deeds:  weigh them naked, judge them naked.  Let the charge be brought against Alba, as Troy was charged with adultery.  There is no such charge, none like it found:  the war was kindled only in order that there

“Might sound in languid ears the cry

Of Tullus and of victory.”

Virgil, Æneid, vi. 813.

This vice of restless ambition was the sole motive to that social and parricidal war,—a vice which Sallust brands in passing; for when he has spoken with brief but hearty commendation of those primitive times in which life was spent without covetousness, and every one was sufficiently satisfied with what he had, he goes on:  “But after Cyrus in Asia, and the Lacedemonians and Athenians in Greece, began to subdue cities and nations, and to account the lust of sovereignty a sufficient ground for war, and to reckon that the greatest glory consisted in the greatest empire;”

Sallust, Cat. Conj. ii.

Yet those gods, guardians of the Roman empire, and, as it were, theatric spectators of such contests as these, were not satisfied until the sister of the Horatii was added by her brother’s sword as a third victim from the Roman side, so that Rome herself, though she won the day, should have as many deaths to mourn.  Afterwards, as a fruit of the victory, Alba was destroyed, though it was there the Trojan gods had formed a third asylum after Ilium had been sacked by the Greeks, and after they had left Lavinium, where Æneas had founded a kingdom in a land of banishment.  But probably Alba was destroyed because from it too the gods had migrated, in their usual fashion, as Virgil says:

“Gone from each fane, each sacred shrine,

Are those who made this realm divine.”

Æneid, ii. 351–2.

Gone, indeed, and from now their third asylum, that Rome might seem all the wiser in committing herself to them after they had deserted three other cities.  Alba, whose king Amulius had banished his brother, displeased them; Rome, whose king Romulus had slain his brother, pleased them.  But before Alba was destroyed, its population, they say, was amalgamated with the inhabitants of Rome so that the two cities were one.  Well, admitting it was so, yet the fact remains that the city of Ascanius, the third retreat of the Trojan gods, was destroyed by the daughter-city.  Besides, to effect this pitiful conglomerate of the war’s leavings, much blood was spilt on both sides.  And how shall I speak in detail of the same wars, so often renewed in subsequent reigns, though they seemed to have been finished by great victories; and of wars that time after time were brought to an end by great slaughters, and which yet time after time were renewed by the posterity of those who had made peace and struck treaties?  Of this calamitous history we have no small proof, in the fact that no subsequent king closed the gates of war; and therefore with all their tutelar gods, no one of them reigned in peace.

Chapter 15.—What Manner of Life and Death the Roman Kings Had.

And what was the end of the kings themselves?  Of Romulus, a flattering legend tells us that he was assumed into heaven.  But certain Roman historians relate that he was torn in pieces by the senate for his ferocity, and that a man, Julius Proculus, was suborned to give out that Romulus had appeared to him, and through him commanded the Roman people to worship him as a god; and that in this way the people, who were beginning to resent the action of the senate, were quieted and pacified.  For an eclipse of the sun had also happened; and this was attributed to the divine power of Romulus by the ignorant multitude, who did not know that it was brought about by the fixed laws of the sun’s course:  though this grief of the sun might rather have been considered proof that Romulus had been slain, and that the crime was indicated by this deprivation of the sun’s light; as, in truth, was the case when the Lord was crucified through the cruelty and impiety of the Jews.  For it is sufficiently demonstrated that this latter obscuration of the sun did not occur by the natural laws of the heavenly bodies, because it was then the Jewish Passover, which is held only at full moon, whereas natural eclipses of the sun happen only at the last quarter of the moon.  Cicero, too, shows plainly enough that the apotheosis of Romulus was imaginary rather than real, when, even while he is praising him in one of Scipio’s remarks in the De Republica, he says:  “Such a reputation had he acquired, that when he suddenly disappeared during an eclipse of the sun, he was supposed to have been assumed into the number of the gods, which could be supposed of no mortal who had not the highest reputation for virtue.”

Cicero, De Rep. ii. 10.

The other kings of Rome, too, with the exception of Numa Pompilius and Ancus Marcius, who died natural deaths, what horrible ends they had!  Tullus Hostilius, the conqueror and destroyer of Alba, was, as I said, himself and all his house consumed by lightning.  Priscus Tarquinius was slain by his predecessor’s sons.  Servius Tullius was foully murdered by his son-in-law Tarquinius Superbus, who succeeded him on the throne.  Nor did so flagrant a parricide committed against Rome’s best king drive from their altars and shrines those gods who were said to have been moved by Paris’ adultery to treat poor Troy in this style, and abandon it to the fire and sword of the Greeks.  Nay, the very Tarquin who had murdered, was allowed to succeed his father-in-law.  And this infamous parricide, during the reign he had secured by murder, was allowed to triumph in many victorious wars, and to build the Capitol from their spoils; the gods meanwhile not departing, but abiding, and abetting, and suffering their king Jupiter to preside and reign over them in that very splendid Capitol, the work of a parricide.  For he did not build the Capitol in the days of his innocence, and then suffer banishment for subsequent crimes; but to that reign during which he built the Capitol, he won his way by unnatural crime.  And when he was afterwards banished by the Romans, and forbidden the city, it was not for his own but his son’s wickedness in the affair of Lucretia,—a crime perpetrated not only without his cognizance, but in his absence.  For at that time he was besieging Ardea, and fighting Rome’s battles; and we cannot say what he would have done had he been aware of his son’s crime.  Notwithstanding, though his opinion was neither inquired into nor ascertained, the people stripped him of royalty; and when he returned to Rome with his army, it was admitted, but he was excluded, abandoned by his troops, and the gates shut in his face.  And yet, after he had appealed to the neighboring states, and tormented the Romans with calamitous but unsuccessful wars, and when he was deserted by the ally on whom he most depended, despairing of regaining the kingdom, he lived a retired and quiet life for fourteen years, as it is reported, in Tusculum, a Roman town, where he grew old in his wife’s company, and at last terminated his days in a much more desirable fashion than his father-in-law, who had perished by the hand of his son-in-law; his own daughter abetting, if report be true.  And this Tarquin the Romans called, not the Cruel, nor the Infamous, but the Proud; their own pride perhaps resenting his tyrannical airs.  So little did they make of his murdering their best king, his own father-in-law, that they elected him their own king.  I wonder if it was not even more criminal in them to reward so bountifully so great a criminal.  And yet there was no word of the gods abandoning the altars; unless, perhaps, some one will say in defence of the gods, that they remained at Rome for the purpose of punishing the Romans, rather than of aiding and profiting them, seducing them by empty victories, and wearing them out by severe wars.  Such was the life of the Romans under the kings during the much-praised epoch of the state which extends to the expulsion of Tarquinius Superbus in the 243d year, during which all those victories, which were bought with so much blood and such disasters, hardly pushed Rome’s dominion twenty miles from the city; a territory which would by no means bear comparison with that of any petty Gætulian state.

Chapter 16.—Of the First Roman Consuls, the One of Whom Drove the Other from the Country, and Shortly After Perished at Rome by the Hand of a Wounded Enemy, and So Ended a Career of Unnatural Murders.

To this epoch let us add also that of which Sallust says, that it was ordered with justice and moderation, while the fear of Tarquin and of a war with Etruria was impending.  For so long as the Etrurians aided the efforts of Tarquin to regain the throne, Rome was convulsed with distressing war.  And therefore he says that the state was ordered with justice and moderation, through the pressure of fear, not through the influence of equity.  And in this very brief period, how calamitous a year was that in which consuls were first created, when the kingly power was abolished!  They did not fulfill their term of office.  For Junius Brutus deprived his colleague Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus, and banished him from the city; and shortly after he himself fell in battle, at once slaying and slain, having formerly put to death his own sons and his brothers-in-law, because he had discovered that they were conspiring to restore Tarquin.  It is this deed that Virgil shudders to record, even while he seems to praise it; for when he says:

“And call his own rebellious seed

For menaced liberty to bleed,”

he immediately exclaims,

“Unhappy father! howsoe’er

The deed be judged by after days;”

that is to say, let posterity judge the deed as they please, let them praise and extol the father who slew his sons, he is unhappy.  And then he adds, as if to console so unhappy a man:

“His country’s love shall all o’erbear,

And unextinguished thirst of praise.”

Æneid, vi. 820, etc.

In the tragic end of Brutus, who slew his own sons, and though he slew his enemy, Tarquin’s son, yet could not survive him, but was survived by Tarquin the elder, does not the innocence of his colleague Collatinus seem to be vindicated, who, though a good citizen, suffered the same punishment as Tarquin himself, when that tyrant was banished?  For Brutus himself is said to have been a relative

His nephew.

Chapter 17.—Of the Disasters Which Vexed the Roman Republic After the Inauguration of the Consulship, and of the Non-Intervention of the Gods of Rome.

After this, when their fears were gradually diminished,—not because the wars ceased, but because they were not so furious,—that period in which things were “ordered with justice and moderation” drew to an end, and there followed that state of matters which Sallust thus briefly sketches:  “Then began the patricians to oppress the people as slaves, to condemn them to death or scourging, as the kings had done, to drive them from their holdings, and to tyrannize over those who had no property to lose.  The people, overwhelmed by these oppressive measures, and most of all by usury, and obliged to contribute both money and personal service to the constant wars, at length took arms and seceded to Mount Aventine and Mount Sacer, and thus secured for themselves tribunes and protective laws.  But it was only the second Punic war that put an end on both sides to discord and strife.”

Hist. i.

Where, then, were those gods who are supposed to be justly worshipped for the slender and delusive prosperity of this world, when the Romans, who were seduced to their service by lying wiles, were harassed by such calamities?  Where were they when Valerius the consul was killed while defending the Capitol, that had been fired by exiles and slaves?  He was himself better able to defend the temple of Jupiter, than that crowd of divinities with their most high and mighty king, whose temple he came to the rescue of were able to defend him.  Where were they when the city, worn out with unceasing seditions, was waiting in some kind of calm for the return of the ambassadors who had been sent to Athens to borrow laws, and was desolated by dreadful famine and pestilence?  Where were they when the people, again distressed with famine, created for the first time a prefect of the market; and when Spurius Melius, who, as the famine increased, distributed corn to the famishing masses, was accused of aspiring to royalty, and at the instance of this same prefect, and on the authority of the superannuated dictator L. Quintius, was put to death by Quintus Servilius, master of the horse,—an event which occasioned a serious and dangerous riot?  Where were they when that very severe pestilence visited Rome, on account of which the people, after long and wearisome and useless supplications of the helpless gods, conceived the idea of celebrating Lectisternia, which had never been done before; that is to say, they set couches in honor of the gods, which accounts for the name of this sacred rite, or rather sacrilege?

Lectisternia, from lectus, and sterno, I spread.

At that time, indeed, so many wars were everywhere engaged in, that through scarcity of soldiers they enrolled for military service the proletarii, who received this name, because, being too poor to equip for military service, they had leisure to beget offspring.

Proletarius, from proles, offspring.

Chapter 18.—The Disasters Suffered by the Romans in the Punic Wars, Which Were Not Mitigated by the Protection of the Gods.

In the Punic wars, again, when victory hung so long in the balance between the two kingdoms, when two powerful nations were straining every nerve and using all their resources against one another, how many smaller kingdoms were crushed, how many large and flourishing cities were demolished, how many states were overwhelmed and ruined, how many districts and lands far and near were desolated!  How often were the victors on either side vanquished!  What multitudes of men, both of those actually in arms and of others, were destroyed!  What huge navies, too, were crippled in engagements, or were sunk by every kind of marine disaster!  Were we to attempt to recount or mention these calamities, we should become writers of history.  At that period Rome was mightily perturbed, and resorted to vain and ludicrous expedients.  On the authority of the Sibylline books, the secular games were re-appointed, which had been inaugurated a century before, but had faded into oblivion in happier times.  The games consecrated to the infernal gods were also renewed by the pontiffs; for they, too, had sunk into disuse in the better times.  And no wonder; for when they were renewed, the great abundance of dying men made all hell rejoice at its riches, and give itself up to sport:  for certainly the ferocious wars, and disastrous quarrels, and bloody victories—now on one side, and now on the other—though most calamitous to men, afforded great sport and a rich banquet to the devils.  But in the first Punic war there was no more disastrous event than the Roman defeat in which Regulus was taken.  We made mention of him in the two former books as an incontestably great man, who had before conquered and subdued the Carthaginians, and who would have put an end to the first Punic war, had not an inordinate appetite for praise and glory prompted him to impose on the worn-out Carthagians harder conditions than they could bear.  If the unlooked-for captivity and unseemly bondage of this man, his fidelity to his oath, and his surpassingly cruel death, do not bring a blush to the face of the gods, it is true that they are brazen and bloodless.

Nor were there wanting at that time very heavy disasters within the city itself.  For the Tiber was extraordinarily flooded, and destroyed almost all the lower parts of the city; some buildings being carried away by the violence of the torrent, while others were soaked to rottenness by the water that stood round them even after the flood was gone.  This visitation was followed by a fire which was still more destructive, for it consumed some of the loftier buildings round the Forum, and spared not even its own proper temple, that of Vesta, in which virgins chosen for this honor, or rather for this punishment, had been employed in conferring, as it were, everlasting life on fire, by ceaselessly feeding it with fresh fuel.  But at the time we speak of, the fire in the temple was not content with being kept alive:  it raged.  And when the virgins, scared by its vehemence, were unable to save those fatal images which had already brought destruction on three cities

Troy, Lavinia, Alba.

Chapter 19.—Of the Calamity of the Second Punic War, Which Consumed the Strength of Both Parties.

As to the second Punic war, it were tedious to recount the disasters it brought on both the nations engaged in so protracted and shifting a war, that (by the acknowledgment even of those writers who have made it their object not so much to narrate the wars as to eulogize the dominion of Rome) the people who remained victorious were less like conquerors than conquered.  For, when Hannibal poured out of Spain over the Pyrenees, and overran Gaul, and burst through the Alps, and during his whole course gathered strength by plundering and subduing as he went, and inundated Italy like a torrent, how bloody were the wars, and how continuous the engagements, that were fought!  How often were the Romans vanquished!  How many towns went over to the enemy, and how many were taken and subdued!  What fearful battles there were, and how often did the defeat of the Romans shed lustre on the arms of Hannibal!  And what shall I say of the wonderfully crushing defeat at Cannæ, where even Hannibal, cruel as he was, was yet sated with the blood of his bitterest enemies, and gave orders that they be spared?  From this field of battle he sent to Carthage three bushels of gold rings, signifying that so much of the rank of Rome had that day fallen, that it was easier to give an idea of it by measure than by numbers and that the frightful slaughter of the common rank and file whose bodies lay undistinguished by the ring, and who were numerous in proportion to their meanness, was rather to be conjectured than accurately reported.  In fact, such was the scarcity of soldiers after this, that the Romans impressed their criminals on the promise of impunity, and their slaves by the bribe of liberty, and out of these infamous classes did not so much recruit as create an army.  But these slaves, or, to give them all their titles, these freed-men who were enlisted to do battle for the republic of Rome, lacked arms.  And so they took arms from the temples, as if the Romans were saying to their gods:  Lay down those arms you have held so long in vain, if by chance our slaves may be able to use to purpose what you, our gods, have been impotent to use.  At that time, too, the public treasury was too low to pay the soldiers, and private resources were used for public purposes; and so generously did individuals contribute of their property, that, saving the gold ring and bulla which each wore, the pitiful mark of his rank, no senator, and much less any of the other orders and tribes, reserved any gold for his own use.  But if in our day they were reduced to this poverty, who would be able to endure their reproaches, barely endurable as they are now, when more money is spent on actors for the sake of a superfluous gratification, than was then disbursed to the legions?

Chapter 20.—Of the Destruction of the Saguntines, Who Received No Help from the Roman Gods, Though Perishing on Account of Their Fidelity to Rome.

But among all the disasters of the second Punic war, there occurred none more lamentable, or calculated to excite deeper complaint, than the fate of the Saguntines.  This city of Spain, eminently friendly to Rome, was destroyed by its fidelity to the Roman people.  For when Hannibal had broken treaty with the Romans, he sought occasion for provoking them to war, and accordingly made a fierce assault upon Saguntum.  When this was reported at Rome, ambassadors were sent to Hannibal, urging him to raise the siege; and when this remonstrance was neglected, they proceeded to Carthage, lodged complaint against the breaking of the treaty, and returned to Rome without accomplishing their object.  Meanwhile the siege went on; and in the eighth or ninth month, this opulent but ill-fated city, dear as it was to its own state and to Rome, was taken, and subjected to treatment which one cannot read, much less narrate, without horror.  And yet, because it bears directly on the matter in hand, I will briefly touch upon it.  First, then, famine wasted the Saguntines, so that even human corpses were eaten by some:  so at least it is recorded.  Subsequently, when thoroughly worn out, that they might at least escape the ignominy of falling into the hands of Hannibal, they publicly erected a huge funeral pile, and cast themselves into its flames, while at the same time they slew their children and themselves with the sword.  Could these gods, these debauchees and gourmands, whose mouths water for fat sacrifices, and whose lips utter lying divinations,—could they not do anything in a case like this?  Could they not interfere for the preservation of a city closely allied to the Roman people, or prevent it perishing for its fidelity to that alliance of which they themselves had been the mediators?  Saguntum, faithfully keeping the treaty it had entered into before these gods, and to which it had firmly bound itself by an oath, was besieged, taken, and destroyed by a perjured person.  If afterwards, when Hannibal was close to the walls of Rome, it was the gods who terrified him with lightning and tempest, and drove him to a distance, why, I ask, did they not thus interfere before?  For I make bold to say, that this demonstration with the tempest would have been more honorably made in defence of the allies of Rome—who were in danger on account of their reluctance to break faith with the Romans, and had no resources of their own—than in defence of the Romans themselves, who were fighting in their own cause, and had abundant resources to oppose Hannibal.  If, then, they had been the guardians of Roman prosperity and glory, they would have preserved that glory from the stain of this Saguntine disaster; and how silly it is to believe that Rome was preserved from destruction at the hands of Hannibal by the guardian care of those gods who were unable to rescue the city of Saguntum from perishing through its fidelity to the alliance of Rome.  If the population of Saguntum had been Christian, and had suffered as it did for the Christian faith (though, of course, Christians would not have used fire and sword against their own persons), they would have suffered with that hope which springs from faith in Christ—the hope not of a brief temporal reward, but of unending and eternal bliss.  What, then, will the advocates and apologists of these gods say in their defence, when charged with the blood of these Saguntines; for they are professedly worshipped and invoked for this very purpose of securing prosperity in this fleeting and transitory life?  Can anything be said but what was alleged in the case of Regulus’ death?  For though there is a difference between the two cases, the one being an individual, the other a whole community, yet the cause of destruction was in both cases the keeping of their plighted troth.  For it was this which made Regulus willing to return to his enemies, and this which made the Saguntines unwilling to revolt to their enemies.  Does, then, the keeping of faith provoke the gods to anger?  Or is it possible that not only individuals, but even entire communities, perish while the gods are propitious to them?  Let our adversaries choose which alternative they will.  If, on the one hand, those gods are enraged at the keeping of faith, let them enlist perjured persons as their worshippers.  If, on the other hand, men and states can suffer great and terrible calamities, and at last perish while favored by the gods, then does their worship not produce happiness as its fruit.  Let those, therefore, who suppose that they have fallen into distress because their religious worship has been abolished, lay aside their anger; for it were quite possible that did the gods not only remain with them, but regard them with favor, they might yet be left to mourn an unhappy lot, or might, even like Regulus and the Saguntines, be horribly tormented, and at last perish miserably.

Chapter 21.—Of the Ingratitude of Rome to Scipio, Its Deliverer, and of Its Manners During the Period Which Sallust Describes as the Best.

Omitting many things, that I may not exceed the limits of the work I have proposed to myself, I come to the epoch between the second and last Punic wars, during which, according to Sallust, the Romans lived with the greatest virtue and concord.  Now, in this period of virtue and harmony, the great Scipio, the liberator of Rome and Italy, who had with surprising ability brought to a close the second Punic war—that horrible, destructive, dangerous contest—who had defeated Hannibal and subdued Carthage, and whose whole life is said to have been dedicated to the gods, and cherished in their temples,—this Scipio, after such a triumph, was obliged to yield to the accusations of his enemies, and to leave his country, which his valor had saved and liberated, to spend the remainder of his days in the town of Liternum, so indifferent to a recall from exile, that he is said to have given orders that not even his remains should lie in his ungrateful country.  It was at that time also that the pro-consul Cn. Manlius, after subduing the Galatians, introduced into Rome the luxury of Asia, more destructive than all hostile armies.  It was then that iron bedsteads and expensive carpets were first used; then, too, that female singers were admitted at banquets, and other licentious abominations were introduced.  But at present I meant to speak, not of the evils men voluntarily practise, but of those they suffer in spite of themselves.  So that the case of Scipio, who succumbed to his enemies, and died in exile from the country he had rescued, was mentioned by me as being pertinent to the present discussion; for this was the reward he received from those Roman gods whose temples he saved from Hannibal, and who are worshipped only for the sake of securing temporal happiness.  But since Sallust, as we have seen, declares that the manners of Rome were never better than at that time, I therefore judged it right to mention the Asiatic luxury then introduced, that it might be seen that what he says is true, only when that period is compared with the others during which the morals were certainly worse, and the factions more violent.  For at that time—I mean between the second and third Punic war—that notorious Lex Voconia was passed, which prohibited a man from making a woman, even an only daughter, his heir; than which law I am at a loss to conceive what could be more unjust.  It is true that in the interval between these two Punic wars the misery of Rome was somewhat less.  Abroad, indeed, their forces were consumed by wars, yet also consoled by victories; while at home there were not such disturbances as at other times.  But when the last Punic war had terminated in the utter destruction of Rome’s rival, which quickly succumbed to the other Scipio, who thus earned for himself the surname of Africanus, then the Roman republic was overwhelmed with such a host of ills, which sprang from the corrupt manners induced by prosperity and security, that the sudden overthrow of Carthage is seen to have injured Rome more seriously than her long-continued hostility.  During the whole subsequent period down to the time of Cæsar Augustus, who seems to have entirely deprived the Romans of liberty,—a liberty, indeed, which in their own judgment was no longer glorious, but full of broils and dangers, and which now was quite enervated and languishing,—and who submitted all things again to the will of a monarch, and infused as it were a new life into the sickly old age of the republic, and inaugurated a fresh régime;—during this whole period, I say, many military disasters were sustained on a variety of occasions, all of which I here pass by.  There was specially the treaty of Numantia, blotted as it was with extreme disgrace; for the sacred chickens, they say, flew out of the coop, and thus augured disaster to Mancinus the consul; just as if, during all these years in which that little city of Numantia had withstood the besieging army of Rome, and had become a terror to the republic, the other generals had all marched against it under unfavorable auspices.

Chapter 22.—Of the Edict of Mithridates, Commanding that All Roman Citizens Found in Asia Should Be Slain.

These things, I say, I pass in silence; but I can by no means be silent regarding the order given by Mithridates, king of Asia, that on one day all Roman citizens residing anywhere in Asia (where great numbers of them were following their private business) should be put to death:  and this order was executed.  How miserable a spectacle was then presented, when each man was suddenly and treacherously murdered wherever he happened to be, in the field or on the road, in the town, in his own home, or in the street, in market or temple, in bed or at table!  Think of the groans of the dying, the tears of the spectators, and even of the executioners themselves.  For how cruel a necessity was it that compelled the hosts of these victims, not only to see these abominable butcheries in their own houses, but even to perpetrate them:  to change their countenance suddenly from the bland kindliness of friendship, and in the midst of peace set about the business of war; and, shall I say, give and receive wounds, the slain being pierced in body, the slayer in spirit!  Had all these murdered persons, then, despised auguries?  Had they neither public nor household gods to consult when they left their homes and set out on that fatal journey?  If they had not, our adversaries have no reason to complain of these Christian times in this particular, since long ago the Romans despised auguries as idle.  If, on the other hand, they did consult omens, let them tell us what good they got thereby, even when such things were not prohibited, but authorized, by human, if not by divine law.

Chapter 24.—Of the Civil Dissension Occasioned by the Sedition of the Gracchi.

The civil wars originated in the seditions which the Gracchi excited regarding the agrarian laws; for they were minded to divide among the people the lands which were wrongfully possessed by the nobility.  But to reform an abuse of so long standing was an enterprise full of peril, or rather, as the event proved, of destruction.  For what disasters accompanied the death of the older Gracchus! what slaughter ensued when, shortly after, the younger brother met the same fate!  For noble and ignoble were indiscriminately massacred; and this not by legal authority and procedure, but by mobs and armed rioters.  After the death of the younger Gracchus, the consul Lucius Opimius, who had given battle to him within the city, and had defeated and put to the sword both himself and his confederates, and had massacred many of the citizens, instituted a judicial examination of others, and is reported to have put to death as many as 3000 men.  From this it may be gathered how many fell in the riotous encounters, when the result even of a judicial investigation was so bloody.  The assassin of Gracchus himself sold his head to the consul for its weight in gold, such being the previous agreement.  In this massacre, too, Marcus Fulvius, a man of consular rank, with all his children, was put to death.

Chapter 25.—Of the Temple of Concord, Which Was Erected by a Decree of the Senate on the Scene of These Seditions and Massacres.

A pretty decree of the senate it was, truly, by which the temple of Concord was built on the spot where that disastrous rising had taken place, and where so many citizens of every rank had fallen.

Under the inscription on the temple some person wrote the line, “Vecordiæ opus ædem facit Concordiæ.”—The work of discord makes the temple of Concord.

Chapter 26.—Of the Various Kinds of Wars Which Followed the Building of the Temple of Concord.

But they supposed that, in erecting the temple of Concord within the view of the orators, as a memorial of the punishment and death of the Gracchi, they were raising an effectual obstacle to sedition.  How much effect it had, is indicated by the still more deplorable wars that followed.  For after this the orators endeavored not to avoid the example of the Gracchi, but to surpass their projects; as did Lucius Saturninus, a tribune of the people, and Caius Servilius the prætor, and some time after Marcus Drusus, all of whom stirred seditions which first of all occasioned bloodshed, and then the social wars by which Italy was grievously injured, and reduced to a piteously desolate and wasted condition.  Then followed the servile war and the civil wars; and in them what battles were fought, and what blood was shed, so that almost all the peoples of Italy, which formed the main strength of the Roman empire, were conquered as if they were barbarians!  Then even historians themselves find it difficult to explain how the servile war was begun by a very few, certainly less than seventy gladiators, what numbers of fierce and cruel men attached themselves to these, how many of the Roman generals this band defeated, and how it laid waste many districts and cities. And that was not the only servile war:  the province of Macedonia, and subsequently Sicily and the sea-coast, were also depopulated by bands of slaves.  And who can adequately describe either the horrible atrocities which the pirates first committed, or the wars they afterwards maintained against Rome?

Chapter 27.—Of the Civil War Between Marius and Sylla.

But when Marius, stained with the blood of his fellow-citizens, whom the rage of party had sacrificed, was in his turn vanquished and driven from the city, it had scarcely time to breathe freely, when, to use the words of Cicero, “Cinna and Marius together returned and took possession of it.  Then, indeed, the foremost men in the state were put to death, its lights quenched.  Sylla afterwards avenged this cruel victory; but we need not say with what loss of life, and with what ruin to the republic.”

Cicero, in Catilin, iii. sub. fin.

Chapter 28.—Of the Victory of Sylla, the Avenger of the Cruelties of Marius.

Then followed the victory of Sylla, the so-called avenger of the cruelties of Marius.  But not only was his victory purchased with great bloodshed; but when hostilities were finished, hostility survived, and the subsequent peace was bloody as the war.  To the former and still recent massacres of the elder Marius, the younger Marius and Carbo, who belonged to the same party, added greater atrocities.  For when Sylla approached, and they despaired not only of victory, but of life itself, they made a promiscuous massacre of friends and foes.  And, not satisfied with staining every corner of Rome with blood, they besieged the senate, and led forth the senators to death from the curia as from a prison.  Mucius Scævola the pontiff was slain at the altar of Vesta, which he had clung to because no spot in Rome was more sacred than her temple; and his blood well-nigh extinguished the fire which was kept alive by the constant care of the virgins.  Then Sylla entered the city victorious, after having slaughtered in the Villa Publica, not by combat, but by an order, 7000 men who had surrendered, and were therefore unarmed; so fierce was the rage of peace itself, even after the rage of war was extinct.  Moreover, throughout the whole city every partisan of Sylla slew whom he pleased, so that the number of deaths went beyond computation, till it was suggested to Sylla that he should allow some to survive, that the victors might not be destitute of subjects.  Then this furious and promiscuous licence to murder was checked, and much relief was expressed at the publication of the proscription list, containing though it did the death-warrant of two thousand men of the highest ranks, the senatorial and equestrian.  The large number was indeed saddening, but it was consolatory that a limit was fixed; nor was the grief at the numbers slain so great as the joy that the rest were secure.  But this very security, hard-hearted as it was, could not but bemoan the exquisite torture applied to some of those who had been doomed to die.  For one was torn to pieces by the unarmed hands of the executioners; men treating a living man more savagely than wild beasts are used to tear an abandoned corpse.  Another had his eyes dug out, and his limbs cut away bit by bit, and was forced to live a long while, or rather to die a long while, in such torture.  Some celebrated cities were put up to auction, like farms; and one was collectively condemned to slaughter, just as an individual criminal would be condemned to death.  These things were done in peace when the war was over, not that victory might be more speedily obtained, but that, after being obtained, it might not be thought lightly of.  Peace vied with war in cruelty, and surpassed it:  for while war overthrew armed hosts, peace slew the defenceless.  War gave liberty to him who was attacked, to strike if he could; peace granted to the survivors not life, but an unresisting death.

Chapter 29.—A Comparison of the Disasters Which Rome Experienced During the Gothic and Gallic Invasions, with Those Occasioned by the Authors of the Civil Wars.

What fury of foreign nations, what barbarian ferocity, can compare with this victory of citizens over citizens?  Which was more disastrous, more hideous, more bitter to Rome:  the recent Gothic and the old Gallic invasion, or the cruelty displayed by Marius and Sylla and their partisans against men who were members of the same body as themselves?  The Gauls, indeed, massacred all the senators they found in any part of the city except the Capitol, which alone was defended; but they at least sold life to those who were in the Capitol, though they might have starved them out if they could not have stormed it.  The Goths, again, spared so many senators, that it is the more surprising that they killed any.  But Sylla, while Marius was still living, established himself as conqueror in the Capitol, which the Gauls had not violated, and thence issued his death-warrants; and when Marius had escaped by flight, though destined to return more fierce and bloodthirsty than ever, Sylla issued from the Capitol even decrees of the senate for the slaughter and confiscation of the property of many citizens.  Then, when Sylla left, what did the Marian faction hold sacred or spare, when they gave no quarter even to Mucius, a citizen, a senator, a pontiff, and though clasping in piteous embrace the very altar in which, they say, reside the destinies of Rome?  And that final proscription list of Sylla’s, not to mention countless other massacres, despatched more senators than the Goths could even plunder.

Chapter 30.—Of the Connection of the Wars Which with Great Severity and Frequency Followed One Another Before the Advent of Christ.

With what effrontery, then, with what assurance, with what impudence, with what folly, or rather insanity, do they refuse to impute these disasters to their own gods, and impute the present to our Christ!  These bloody civil wars, more distressing, by the avowal of their own historians, than any foreign wars, and which were pronounced to be not merely calamitous, but absolutely ruinous to the republic, began long before the coming of Christ, and gave birth to one another; so that a concatenation of unjustifiable causes led from the wars of Marius and Sylla to those of Sertorius and Cataline, of whom the one was proscribed, the other brought up by Sylla; from this to the war of Lepidus and Catulus, of whom the one wished to rescind, the other to defend the acts of Sylla; from this to the war of Pompey and Cæsar, of whom Pompey had been a partisan of Sylla, whose power he equalled or even surpassed, while Cæsar condemned Pompey’s power because it was not his own, and yet exceeded it when Pompey was defeated and slain.  From him the chain of civil wars extended to the second Cæsar, afterwards called Augustus, and in whose reign Christ was born.  For even Augustus himself waged many civil wars; and in these wars many of the foremost men perished, among them that skilful manipulator of the republic, Cicero.  Caius [Julius] Cæsar, when he had conquered Pompey, though he used his victory with clemency, and granted to men of the opposite faction both life and honors, was suspected of aiming at royalty, and was assassinated in the curia by a party of noble senators, who had conspired to defend the liberty of the republic.  His power was then coveted by Antony, a man of very different character, polluted and debased by every kind of vice, who was strenuously resisted by Cicero on the same plea of defending the liberty of the republic.  At this juncture that other Cæsar, the adopted son of Caius, and afterwards, as I said, known by the name of Augustus, had made his début as a young man of remarkable genius.  This youthful Cæsar was favored by Cicero, in order that his influence might counteract that of Antony; for he hoped that Cæsar would overthrow and blast the power of Antony, and establish a free state,—so blind and unaware of the future was he:  for that very young man, whose advancement and influence he was fostering, allowed Cicero to be killed as the seal of an alliance with Antony, and subjected to his own rule the very liberty of the republic in defence of which he had made so many orations.

Chapter 31.—That It is Effrontery to Impute the Present Troubles to Christ and the Prohibition of Polytheistic Worship Since Even When the Gods Were Worshipped Such Calamities Befell the People.

Let those who have no gratitude to Christ for His great benefits, blame their own gods for these heavy disasters.  For certainly when these occurred the altars of the gods were kept blazing, and there rose the mingled fragrance of “Sabæan incense and fresh garlands;”

Virgil, Æneid, i. 417.

Chapter 1.—Of the Things Which Have Been Discussed in the First Book.

Having begun to speak of the city of God, I have thought it necessary first of all to reply to its enemies, who, eagerly pursuing earthly joys and gaping after transitory things, throw the blame of all the sorrow they suffer in them—rather through the compassion of God in admonishing than His severity in punishing—on the Christian religion, which is the one salutary and true religion.  And since there is among them also an unlearned rabble, they are stirred up as by the authority of the learned to hate us more bitterly, thinking in their inexperience that things which have happened unwontedly in their days were not wont to happen in other times gone by; and whereas this opinion of theirs is confirmed even by those who know that it is false, and yet dissemble their knowledge in order that they may seem to have just cause for murmuring against us, it was necessary, from books in which their authors recorded and published the history of bygone times that it might be known, to demonstrate that it is far otherwise than they think; and at the same time to teach that the false gods, whom they openly worshipped, or still worship in secret, are most unclean spirits, and most malignant and deceitful demons, even to such a pitch that they take delight in crimes which, whether real or only fictitious, are yet their own, which it has been their will to have celebrated in honor of them at their own festivals; so that human infirmity cannot be called back from the perpetration of damnable deeds, so long as authority is furnished for imitating them that seems even divine.  These things we have proved, not from our own conjectures, but partly from recent memory, because we ourselves have seen such things celebrated, and to such deities, partly from the writings of those who have left these things on record to posterity, not as if in reproach but as in honor of their own gods.  Thus Varro, a most learned man among them, and of the weightiest authority, when he made separate books concerning things human and things divine, distributing some among the human, others among the divine, according to the special dignity of each, placed the scenic plays not at all among things human, but among things divine; though, certainly, if only there were good and honest men in the state, the scenic plays ought not to be allowed even among things human.  And this he did not on his own authority, but because, being born and educated at Rome, he found them among the divine things.  Now as we briefly stated in the end of the first book what we intended afterwards to discuss, and as we have disposed of a part of this in the next two books, we see what our readers will expect us now to take up.

Chapter 2.—Of Those Things Which are Contained in Books Second and Third.

We had promised, then, that we would say something against those who attribute the calamities of the Roman republic to our religion, and that we would recount the evils, as many and great as we could remember or might deem sufficient, which that city, or the provinces belonging to its empire, had suffered before their sacrifices were prohibited, all of which would beyond doubt have been attributed to us, if our religion had either already shone on them, or had thus prohibited their sacrilegious rites.  These things we have, as we think, fully disposed of in the second and third books, treating in the second of evils in morals, which alone or chiefly are to be accounted evils; and in the third, of those which only fools dread to undergo—namely, those of the body or of outward things—which for the most part the good also suffer.  But those evils by which they themselves become evil, they take, I do not say patiently, but with pleasure.  And how few evils have I related concerning that one city and its empire!  Not even all down to the time of Cæsar Augustus.  What if I had chosen to recount and enlarge on those evils, not which men have inflicted on each other; such as the devastations and destructions of war, but which happen in earthly things, from the elements of the world itself.  Of such evils Apuleius speaks briefly in one passage of that book which he wrote, De Mundo, saying that all earthly things are subject to change, overthrow, and destruction.

Comp. Bacon’s Essay on the Vicissitudes of Things.

Chapter 3.—Whether the Great Extent of the Empire, Which Has Been Acquired Only by Wars, is to Be Reckoned Among the Good Things Either of the Wise or the Happy.

Now, therefore, let us see how it is that they dare to ascribe the very great extent and duration of the Roman empire to those gods whom they contend that they worship honorably, even by the obsequies of vile games and the ministry of vile men:  although I should like first to inquire for a little what reason, what prudence, there is in wishing to glory in the greatness and extent of the empire, when you cannot point out the happiness of men who are always rolling, with dark fear and cruel lust, in warlike slaughters and in blood, which, whether shed in civil or foreign war, is still human blood; so that their joy may be compared to glass in its fragile splendor, of which one is horribly afraid lest it should be suddenly broken in pieces.  That this may be more easily discerned, let us not come to nought by being carried away with empty boasting, or blunt the edge of our attention by loud-sounding names of things, when we hear of peoples, kingdoms, provinces.  But let us suppose a case of two men; for each individual man, like one letter in a language, is as it were the element of a city or kingdom, however far-spreading in its occupation of the earth.  Of these two men let us suppose that one is poor, or rather of middling circumstances; the other very rich.  But the rich man is anxious with fears, pining with discontent, burning with covetousness, never se cure, always uneasy, panting from the perpetual strife of his enemies, adding to his patrimony indeed by these miseries to an immense degree, and by these additions also heaping up most bitter cares.  But that other man of moderate wealth is contented with a small and compact estate, most dear to his own family, enjoying the sweetest peace with his kindred neighbors and friends, in piety religious, benignant in mind, healthy in body, in life frugal, in manners chaste, in conscience secure.  I know not whether any one can be such a fool, that he dare hesitate which to prefer.  As, therefore, in the case of these two men, so in two families, in two nations, in two kingdoms, this test of tranquility holds good; and if we apply it vigilantly and without prejudice, we shall quite easily see where the mere show of happiness dwells, and where real felicity.  Wherefore if the true God is worshipped, and if He is served with genuine rites and true virtue, it is advantageous that good men should long reign both far and wide.  Nor is this advantageous so much to themselves, as to those over whom they reign.  For, so far as concerns themselves, their piety and probity, which are great gifts of God, suffice to give them true felicity, enabling them to live well the life that now is, and afterwards to receive that which is eternal.  In this world, therefore, the dominion of good men is profitable, not so much for themselves as for human affairs.  But the dominion of bad men is hurtful chiefly to themselves who rule, for they destroy their own souls by greater license in wickedness; while those who are put under them in service are not hurt except by their own iniquity.  For to the just all the evils imposed on them by unjust rulers are not the punishment of crime, but the test of virtue.  Therefore the good man, although he is a slave, is free; but the bad man, even if he reigns, is a slave, and that not of one man, but, what is far more grievous, of as many masters as he has vices; of which vices when the divine Scripture treats, it says, “For of whom any man is overcome, to the same he is also the bond-slave.”

2 Pet. ii. 19.

Chapter 4.—How Like Kingdoms Without Justice are to Robberies.

Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies?  For what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms?  The band itself is made up of men; it is ruled by the authority of a prince, it is knit together by the pact of the confederacy; the booty is divided by the law agreed on.  If, by the admittance of abandoned men, this evil increases to such a degree that it holds places, fixes abodes, takes possession of cities, and subdues peoples, it assumes the more plainly the name of a kingdom, because the reality is now manifestly conferred on it, not by the removal of covetousness, but by the addition of impunity.  Indeed, that was an apt and true reply which was given to Alexander the Great by a pirate who had been seized.  For when that king had asked the man what he meant by keeping hostile possession of the sea, he answered with bold pride, “What thou meanest by seizing the whole earth; but because I do it with a petty ship, I am called a robber, whilst thou who dost it with a great fleet art styled emperor.”

Nonius Marcell. borrows this anecdote from Cicero, De Repub. iii.

Chapter 5.—Of the Runaway Gladiators Whose Power Became Like that of Royal Dignity.

I shall not therefore stay to inquire what sort of men Romulus gathered together, seeing he deliberated much about them,—how, being assumed out of that life they led into the fellowship of his city, they might cease to think of the punishment they deserved, the fear of which had driven them to greater villainies; so that henceforth they might be made more peaceable members of society.  But this I say, that the Roman empire, which by subduing many nations had already grown great and an object of universal dread, was itself greatly alarmed, and only with much difficulty avoided a disastrous overthrow, because a mere handful of gladiators in Campania, escaping from the games, had recruited a great army, appointed three generals, and most widely and cruelly devastated Italy.  Let them say what god aided these men, so that from a small and contemptible band of robbers they attained to a kingdom, feared even by the Romans, who had such great forces and fortresses.  Or will they deny that they were divinely aided because they did not last long?

It was extinguished by Crassus in its third year.

Chapter 6.—Concerning the Covetousness of Ninus, Who Was the First Who Made War on His Neighbors, that He Might Rule More Widely.

Justinus, who wrote Greek or rather foreign history in Latin, and briefly, like Trogus Pompeius whom he followed, begins his work thus:  “In the beginning of the affairs of peoples and nations the government was in the hands of kings, who were raised to the height of this majesty not by courting the people, but by the knowledge good men had of their moderation.  The people were held bound by no laws; the decisions of the princes were instead of laws.  It was the custom to guard rather than to extend the boundaries of the empire; and kingdoms were kept within the bounds of each ruler’s native land.  Ninus king of the Assyrians first of all, through new lust of empire, changed the old and, as it were, ancestral custom of nations.  He first made war on his neighbors, and wholly subdued as far as to the frontiers of Libya the nations as yet untrained to resist.”  And a little after he says:  “Ninus established by constant possession the greatness of the authority he had gained.  Having mastered his nearest neighbors, he went on to others, strengthened by the accession of forces, and by making each fresh victory the instrument of that which followed, subdued the nations of the whole East.”  Now, with whatever fidelity to fact either he or Trogus may in general have written—for that they sometimes told lies is shown by other more trustworthy writers—yet it is agreed among other authors, that the kingdom of the Assyrians was extended far and wide by King Ninus.  And it lasted so long, that the Roman empire has not yet attained the same age; for, as those write who have treated of chronological history, this kingdom endured for twelve hundred and forty years from the first year in which Ninus began to reign, until it was transferred to the Medes.  But to make war on your neighbors, and thence to proceed to others, and through mere lust of dominion to crush and subdue people who do you no harm, what else is this to be called than great robbery?

Chapter 7.—Whether Earthly Kingdoms in Their Rise and Fall Have Been Either Aided or Deserted by the Help of the Gods.

If this kingdom was so great and lasting without the aid of the gods, why is the ample territory and long duration of the Roman empire to be ascribed to the Roman gods?  For whatever is the cause in it, the same is in the other also.  But if they contend that the prosperity of the other also is to be attributed to the aid of the gods, I ask of which?  For the other nations whom Ninus overcame, did not then worship other gods.  Or if the Assyrians had gods of their own, who, so to speak, were more skillful workmen in the construction and preservation of the empire, whether are they dead, since they themselves have also lost the empire; or, having been defrauded of their pay, or promised a greater, have they chosen rather to go over to the Medes, and from them again to the Persians, because Cyrus invited them, and promised them something still more advantageous?  This nation, indeed, since the time of the kingdom of Alexander the Macedonian, which was as brief in duration as it was great in extent, has preserved its own empire, and at this day occupies no small territories in the East.  If this is so, then either the gods are unfaithful, who desert their own and go over to their enemies, which Camillus, who was but a man, did not do, when, being victor and subduer of a most hostile state, although he had felt that Rome, for whom he had done so much, was ungrateful, yet afterwards, forgetting the injury and remembering his native land, he freed her again from the Gauls; or they are not so strong as gods ought to be, since they can be overcome by human skill or strength.  Or if, when they carry on war among themselves, the gods are not overcome by men, but some gods who are peculiar to certain cities are perchance overcome by other gods, it follows that they have quarrels among themselves which they uphold, each for his own part.  Therefore a city ought not to worship its own gods, but rather others who aid their own worshippers.  Finally, whatever may have been the case as to this change of sides, or flight, or migration, or failure in battle on the part of the gods, the name of Christ had not yet been proclaimed in those parts of the earth when these kingdoms were lost and transferred through great destructions in war.  For if, after more than twelve hundred years, when the kingdom was taken away from the Assyrians, the Christian religion had there already preached another eternal kingdom, and put a stop to the sacrilegious worship of false gods, what else would the foolish men of that nation have said, but that the kingdom which had been so long preserved, could be lost for no other cause than the desertion of their own religions and the reception of Christianity?  In which foolish speech that might have been uttered, let those we speak of observe their own likeness, and blush, if there is any sense of shame in them, because they have uttered similar complaints; although the Roman empire is afflicted rather than changed,—a thing which has befallen it in other times also, before the name of Christ was heard, and it has been restored after such affliction,—a thing which even in these times is not to be despaired of.  For who knows the will of God concerning this matter?

Chapter 8.—Which of the Gods Can the Romans Suppose Presided Over the Increase and Preservation of Their Empire, When They Have Believed that Even the Care of Single Things Could Scarcely Be Committed to Single Gods.

Next let us ask, if they please, out of so great a crowd of gods which the Romans worship, whom in especial, or what gods they believe to have extended and preserved that empire.  Now, surely of this work, which is so excellent and so very full of the highest dignity, they dare not ascribe any part to the goddess Cloacina;

Cloacina, supposed by Lactantius (De falsa relig. i. 20), Cyprian (De Idol. vanit.), and Augustin (infra, c. 23) to be the goddess of the cloaca, or sewage of Rome.  Others, however, suppose it to be equivalent to Cluacina, a title given to Venus, because the Romans after the end of the Sabine war purified themselves (cluere) in the vicinity of her statue.

Chapter 9.—Whether the Great Extent and Long Duration of the Roman Empire Should Be Ascribed to Jove, Whom His Worshippers Believe to Be the Chief God.

Therefore omitting, or passing by for a little, that crowd of petty gods, we ought to inquire into the part performed by the great gods, whereby Rome has been made so great as to reign so long over so many nations.  Doubtless, therefore, this is the work of Jove.  For they will have it that he is the king of all the gods and goddesses, as is shown by his sceptre and by the Capitol on the lofty hill.  Concerning that god they publish a saying which, although that of a poet, is most apt, “All things are full of Jove.”

Virgil, Eclog. iii. 60.

Chapter 10.—What Opinions Those Have Followed Who Have Set Divers Gods Over Divers Parts of the World.

Why, also, is Juno united to him as his wife, who is called at once “sister and yoke-fellow?”

Virgil, Æneid, i. 47.

“Then Ether, the Father Almighty, in copious showers descended

Into his spouse’s glad bosom, making it fertile,”

Virgil, Georg. ii. 325, 326.

—that is, into the bosom of Tellus, or the earth.  Although here, also, they will have it that there are some differences, and think that in the earth herself Terra is one thing, Tellus another, and Tellumo another.  And they have all these as gods, called by their own names distinguished by their own offices, and venerated with their own altars and rites.  This same earth also they call the mother of the gods, so that even the fictions of the poets are more tolerable, if, according, not to their poetical but sacred books, Juno is not only the sister and wife, but also the mother of Jove.  The same earth they worship as Ceres, and also as Vesta; while yet they more frequently affirm that Vesta is nothing else than fire, pertaining to the hearths, without which the city cannot exist; and therefore virgins are wont to serve her, because as nothing is born of a virgin, so nothing is born of fire;—but all this nonsense ought to be completely abolished and extinguished by Him who is born of a virgin.  For who can bear that, while they ascribe to the fire so much honor, and, as it were, chastity, they do not blush sometimes even to call Vesta Venus, so that honored virginity may vanish in her hand-maidens?  For if Vesta is Venus, how can virgins rightly serve her by abstaining from venery?  Are there two Venuses, the one a virgin, the other not a maid?  Or rather, are there three, one the goddess of virgins, who is also called Vesta, another the goddess of wives, and another of harlots?  To her also the Phenicians offered a gift by prostituting their daughters before they united them to husbands.

Eusebius, De Prœp. Evang.  i. 10.

Chapter 11.—Concerning the Many Gods Whom the Pagan Doctors Defend as Being One and the Same Jove.

Let them therefore assert as many things as ever they please in physical reasonings and disputations.  One while let Jupiter be the soul of this corporeal world, who fills and moves that whole mass, constructed and compacted out of four, or as many elements as they please; another while, let him yield to his sister and brothers their parts of it:  now let him be the ether, that from above he may embrace Juno, the air spread out beneath; again, let him be the whole heaven along with the air, and impregnate with fertilizing showers and seeds the earth, as his wife, and, at the same time, his mother (for this is not vile in divine beings); and yet again (that it may not be necessary to run through them all), let him, the one god, of whom many think it has been said by a most noble poet,

“For God pervadeth all things,

All lands, and the tracts of the sea, and the depth of the heavens,”

Virgil, Georg. iv. 221, 222.

—let it be him who in the ether is Jupiter; in the air, Juno; in the sea, Neptune; in the lower parts of the sea, Salacia; in the earth, Pluto; in the lower part of the earth, Proserpine; on the domestic hearths, Vesta; in the furnace of the workmen, Vulcan; among the stars, Sol and Luna, and the Stars; in divination, Apollo; in merchandise, Mercury; in Janus, the initiator; in Terminus, the terminator; Saturn, in time; Mars and Bellona, in war; Liber, in vineyards; Ceres, in cornfields; Diana, in forests; Minerva, in learning.  Finally, let it be him who is in that crowd, as it were, of plebeian gods:  let him preside under the name of Liber over the seed of men, and under that of Libera over that of women:  let him be Diespiter, who brings forth the birth to the light of day:  let him be the goddess Mena, whom they set over the menstruation of women:  let him be Lucina, who is invoked by women in childbirth:  let him bring help to those who are being born, by taking them up from the bosom of the earth, and let him be called Opis:  let him open the mouth in the crying babe, and be called the god Vaticanus:  let him lift it from the earth, and be called the goddess Levana;  let him watch over cradles, and be called the goddess Cunina:  let it be no other than he who is in those goddesses, who sing the fates of the new born, and are called Carmentes:  let him preside over fortuitous events, and be called Fortuna:  in the goddess Rumina, let him milk out the breast to the little one, because the ancients termed the breast ruma:  in the goddess Potina, let him administer drink:  in the goddess Educa, let him supply food:  from the terror of infants, let him be styled Paventia:  from the hope which comes, Venilia:  from voluptuousness, Volupia:  from action, Agenor: from the stimulants by which man is spurred on to much action, let him be named the goddess Stimula:  let him be the goddess Strenia, for making strenuous;  Numeria, who teaches to number;  Camoena, who teaches to sing:  let him be both the god Consus for granting counsel, and the goddess Sentia for inspiring sentences:  let him be the goddess Juventas, who, after the robe of boyhood is laid aside, takes charge of the beginning of the youthful age:  let him be Fortuna Barbata, who endues adults with a beard, whom they have not chosen to honor; so that this divinity, whatever it may be, should at least be a male god, named either Barbatus, from barba, like Nodotus, from nodus; or, certainly, not Fortuna, but because he has beards, Fortunius:  let him, in the god Jugatinus, yoke couples in marriage; and when the girdle of the virgin wife is loosed, let him be invoked as the goddess Virginiensis:  let him be Mutunus or Tuternus, who, among the Greeks, is called Priapus.  If they are not ashamed of it, let all these which I have named, and whatever others I have not named (for I have not thought fit to name all), let all these gods and goddesses be that one Jupiter, whether, as some will have it, all these are parts of him, or are his powers, as those think who are pleased to consider him the soul of the world, which is the opinion of most of their doctors, and these the greatest.  If these things are so (how evil they may be I do not yet meanwhile inquire), what would they lose, if they, by a more prudent abridgment, should worship one god?  For what part of him could be contemned if he himself should be worshipped?  But if they are afraid lest parts of him should be angry at being passed by or neglected, then it is not the case, as they will have it, that this whole is as the life of one living being, which contains all the gods together, as if they were its virtues, or members, or parts; but each part has its own life separate from the rest, if it is so that one can be angered, appeased, or stirred up more than another.  But if it is said that all together,—that is, the whole Jove himself,—would be offended if his parts were not also worshipped singly and minutely, it is foolishly spoken.  Surely none of them could be passed by if he who singly possesses them all should be worshipped.  For, to omit other things which are innumerable, when they say that all the stars are parts of Jove, and are all alive, and have rational souls, and therefore without controversy are gods, can they not see how many they do not worship, to how many they do not build temples or set up altars, and to how very few, in fact, of the stars they have thought of setting them up and offering sacrifice?  If, therefore, those are displeased who are not severally worshipped, do they not fear to live with only a few appeased, while all heaven is displeased?  But if they worship all the stars because they are part of Jove whom they worship, by the same compendious method they could supplicate them all in him alone.  For in this way no one would be displeased, since in him alone all would be supplicated.  No one would be contemned, instead of there being just cause of displeasure given to the much greater number who are passed by in the worship offered to some; especially when Priapus, stretched out in vile nakedness, is preferred to those who shine from their supernal abode.

Chapter 12.—Concerning the Opinion of Those Who Have Thought that God is the Soul of the World, and the World is the Body of God.

Ought not men of intelligence, and indeed men of every kind, to be stirred up to examine the nature of this opinion?  For there is no need of excellent capacity for this task, that putting away the desire of contention, they may observe that if God is the soul of the world, and the world is as a body to Him, who is the soul, He must be one living being consisting of soul and body, and that this same God is a kind of womb of nature containing all things in Himself, so that the lives and souls of all living things are taken, according to the manner of each one’s birth, out of His soul which vivifies that whole mass, and therefore nothing at all remains which is not a part of God.  And if this is so, who cannot see what impious and irreligious consequences follow, such as that whatever one may trample, he must trample a part of God, and in slaying any living creature, a part of God must be slaughtered?  But I am unwilling to utter all that may occur to those who think of it, yet cannot be spoken without irreverence.

Chapter 13.—Concerning Those Who Assert that Only Rational Animals are Parts of the One God.

But if they contend that only rational animals, such as men, are parts of God, I do not really see how, if the whole world is God, they can separate beasts from being parts of Him.  But what need is there of striving about that?  Concerning the rational animal himself,—that is, man,—what more unhappy belief can be entertained than that a part of God is whipped when a boy is whipped?  And who, unless he is quite mad, could bear the thought that parts of God can become lascivi ous, iniquitous, impious, and altogether damnable?  In brief, why is God angry at those who do not worship Him, since these offenders are parts of Himself?  It remains, therefore, that they must say that all the gods have their own lives; that each one lives for himself, and none of them is a part of any one; but that all are to be worshipped,—at least as many as can be known and worshipped; for they are so many it is impossible that all can be so.  And of all these, I believe that Jupiter, because he presides as king, is thought by them to have both established and extended the Roman empire.  For if he has not done it, what other god do they believe could have attempted so great a work, when they must all be occupied with their own offices and works, nor can one intrude on that of another?  Could the kingdom of men then be propagated and increased by the king of the gods?

Chapter 14.—The Enlargement of Kingdoms is Unsuitably Ascribed to Jove; For If, as They Will Have It, Victoria is a Goddess, She Alone Would Suffice for This Business.

Here, first of all, I ask, why even the kingdom itself is not some god.  For why should not it also be so, if Victory is a goddess?  Or what need is there of Jove himself in this affair, if Victory favors and is propitious, and always goes to those whom she wishes to be victorious?  With this goddess favorable and propitious, even if Jove was idle and did nothing, what nations could remain unsubdued, what kingdom would not yield?  But perhaps it is displeasing to good men to fight with most wicked unrighteousness, and provoke with voluntary war neighbors who are peaceable and do no wrong, in order to enlarge a kingdom?  If they feel thus, I entirely approve and praise them.

Chapter 15.—Whether It is Suitable for Good Men to Wish to Rule More Widely.

Let them ask, then, whether it is quite fitting for good men to rejoice in extended empire.  For the iniquity of those with whom just wars are carried on favors the growth of a kingdom, which would certainly have been small if the peace and justice of neighbors had not by any wrong provoked the carrying on of war against them; and human affairs being thus more happy, all kingdoms would have been small, rejoicing in neighborly concord; and thus there would have been very many kingdoms of nations in the world, as there are very many houses of citizens in a city.  Therefore, to carry on war and extend a kingdom over wholly subdued nations seems to bad men to be felicity, to good men necessity.  But because it would be worse that the injurious should rule over those who are more righteous, therefore even that is not unsuitably called felicity.  But beyond doubt it is greater felicity to have a good neighbor at peace, than to conquer a bad one by making war.  Your wishes are bad, when you desire that one whom you hate or fear should be in such a condition that you can conquer him.  If, therefore, by carrying on wars that were just, not impious or unrighteous, the Romans could have acquired so great an empire, ought they not to worship as a goddess even the injustice of foreigners?  For we see that this has cooperated much in extending the empire, by making foreigners so unjust that they became people with whom just wars might be carried on, and the empire increased.  And why may not injustice, at least that of foreign nations, also be a goddess, if Fear and Dread and Ague have deserved to be Roman gods?  By these two, therefore,—that is, by foreign injustice, and the goddess Victoria, for injustice stirs up causes of wars, and Victoria brings these same wars to a happy termination,—the empire has increased, even although Jove has been idle.  For what part could Jove have here, when those things which might be thought to be his benefits are held to be gods, called gods, worshipped as gods, and are themselves invoked for their own parts?  He also might have some part here, if he himself might be called Empire, just as she is called Victory.  Or if empire is the gift of Jove, why may not victory also be held to be his gift?  And it certainly would have been held to be so, had he been recognized and worshipped, not as a stone in the Capitol, but as the true King of kings and Lord of lords.

Chapter 16.—What Was the Reason Why the Romans, in Detailing Separate Gods for All Things and All Movements of the Mind, Chose to Have the Temple of Quiet Outside the Gates.

But I wonder very much, that while they assigned to separate gods single things, and (well nigh) all movements of the mind; that while they invoked the goddess Agenoria, who should excite to action; the goddess Stimula, who should stimulate to unusual action; the goddess Murcia, who should not move men beyond measure, but make them, as Pomponius says, murcid—that is, too slothful and inactive; the goddess Strenua, who should make them strenuous; and that while they offered to all these gods and goddesses solemn and public worship, they should yet have been unwilling to give public acknowledgment to her whom they name Quies because she makes men quiet, but built her temple outside the Colline gate.  Whether was this a symptom of an unquiet mind, or rather was it thus intimated that he who should persevere in worshipping that crowd, not, to be sure, of gods, but of demons, could not dwell with quiet; to which the true Physician calls, saying, “Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls?”

Chapter 17.—Whether, If the Highest Power Belongs to Jove, Victoria Also Ought to Be Worshipped.

Or do they say, perhaps, that Jupiter sends the goddess Victoria, and that she, as it were acting in obedience to the king of the gods, comes to those to whom he may have despatched her, and takes up her quarters on their side?  This is truly said, not of Jove, whom they, according to their own imagination, feign to be king of the gods, but of Him who is the true eternal King, because he sends, not Victory, who is no person, but His angel, and causes whom He pleases to conquer; whose counsel may be hidden, but cannot be unjust.  For if Victory is a goddess, why is not Triumph also a god, and joined to Victory either as husband, or brother, or son?  Indeed, they have imagined such things concerning the gods, that if the poets had feigned the like, and they should have been discussed by us, they would have replied that they were laughable figments of the poets not to be attributed to true deities.  And yet they themselves did not laugh when they were, not reading in the poets, but worshipping in the temples such doating follies.  Therefore they should entreat Jove alone for all things, and supplicate him only.  For if Victory is a goddess, and is under him as her king, wherever he might have sent her, she could not dare to resist and do her own will rather than his.

Chapter 18.—With What Reason They Who Think Felicity and Fortune Goddesses Have Distinguished Them.

What shall we say, besides, of the idea that Felicity also is a goddess?  She has received a temple; she has merited an altar; suitable rites of worship are paid to her.  She alone, then, should be worshipped.  For where she is present, what good thing can be absent?  But what does a man wish, that he thinks Fortune also a goddess and worships her?  Is felicity one thing, fortune another?  Fortune, indeed, may be bad as well as good; but felicity, if it could be bad, would not be felicity.  Certainly we ought to think all the gods of either sex (if they also have sex) are only good.  This says Plato; this say other philosophers; this say all estimable rulers of the republic and the nations.  How is it, then, that the goddess Fortune is sometimes good, sometimes bad?  Is it perhaps the case that when she is bad she is not a goddess, but is suddenly changed into a malignant demon?  How many Fortunes are there then?  Just as many as there are men who are fortunate, that is, of good fortune.  But since there must also be very many others who at the very same time are men of bad fortune, could she, being one and the same Fortune, be at the same time both bad and good—the one to these, the other to those?  She who is the goddess, is she always good?  Then she herself is felicity.  Why, then, are two names given her?  Yet this is tolerable; for it is customary that one thing should be called by two names.  But why different temples, different altars, different rituals?  There is a reason, say they, because Felicity is she whom the good have by previous merit; but fortune, which is termed good without any trial of merit, befalls both good and bad men fortuitously, whence also she is named Fortune.  How, therefore, is she good, who without any discernment comes—both to the good and to the bad?  Why is she worshipped, who is thus blind, running at random on any one whatever, so that for the most part she passes by her worshippers, and cleaves to those who despise her?  Or if her worshippers profit somewhat, so that they are seen by her and loved, then she follows merit, and does not come fortuitously.  What, then, becomes of that definition of fortune?  What becomes of the opinion that she has received her very name from fortuitous events?  For it profits one nothing to worship her if she is truly fortune.  But if she distinguishes her worshippers, so that she may benefit them, she is not fortune.  Or does, Jupiter send her too, whither he pleases?  Then let him alone be worshipped; because Fortune is not able to resist him when he commands her, and sends her where he pleases.  Or, at least, let the bad worship her, who do not choose to have merit by which the goddess Felicity might be invited.

Chapter 19.—Concerning Fortuna Muliebris.

The feminine Fortune.

To this supposed deity, whom they call Fortuna, they ascribe so much, indeed, that they have a tradition that the image of her, which was dedicated by the Roman matrons, and called Fortuna Muliebris, has spoken, and has said, once and again, that the matrons pleased her by their homage; which, indeed, if it is true, ought not to excite our wonder.  For it is not so difficult for malignant demons to deceive, and they ought the rather to advert to their wits and wiles, because it is that goddess who comes by haphazard who has spoken, and not she who comes to reward merit.  For Fortuna was loquacious, and Felicitas mute; and for what other reason but that men might not care to live rightly, having made Fortuna their friend, who could make them fortunate without any good desert?  And truly, if Fortuna speaks, she should at least speak, not with a womanly, but with a manly voice; lest they themselves who have dedicated the image should think so great a miracle has been wrought by feminine loquacity.

Chapter 20.—Concerning Virtue and Faith, Which the Pagans Have Honored with Temples and Sacred Rites, Passing by Other Good Qualities, Which Ought Likewise to Have Been Worshipped, If Deity Was Rightly Attributed to These.

They have made Virtue also a goddess, which, indeed, if it could be a goddess, had been preferable to many.  And now, because it is not a goddess, but a gift of God, let it be obtained by prayer from Him, by whom alone it can be given, and the whole crowd of false gods vanishes.  But why is Faith believed to be a goddess, and why does she herself receive temple and altar?  For whoever prudently acknowledges her makes his own self an abode for her.  But how do they know what faith is, of which it is the prime and greatest function that the true God may be believed in?  But why had not virtue sufficed?  Does it not include faith also?  Forasmuch as they have thought proper to distribute virtue into four divisions—prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance—and as each of these divisions has its own virtues, faith is among the parts of justice, and has the chief place with as many of us as know what that saying means, “The just shall live by faith.”

Hab. ii. 4.

Chapter 21.—That Although Not Understanding Them to Be the Gifts of God, They Ought at Least to Have Been Content with Virtue and Felicity.

These, not verity but vanity has made goddesses.  For these are gifts of the true God, not themselves goddesses.  However, where virtue and felicity are, what else is sought for?  What can suffice the man whom virtue and felicity do not suffice?  For surely virtue comprehends all things we need do, felicity all things we need wish for.  If Jupiter, then, was worshipped in order that he might give these two things,—because, if extent and duration of empire is something good, it pertains to this same felicity,—why is it not understood that they are not goddesses, but the gifts of God?  But if they are judged to be goddesses, then at least that other great crowd of gods should not be sought after.  For, having considered all the offices which their fancy has distributed among the various gods and goddesses, let them find out, if they can, anything which could be bestowed by any god whatever on a man possessing virtue, possessing felicity.  What instruction could be sought either from Mercury or Minerva, when Virtue already possessed all in herself?  Virtue, indeed, is defined by the ancients as itself the art of living well and rightly.  Hence, because virtue is called in Greek ἀρετη, it has been thought the Latins have derived from it the term art.  But if Virtue cannot come except to the clever, what need was there of the god Father Catius, who should make men cautious, that is, acute, when Felicity could confer this?  Because, to be born clever belongs to felicity.  Whence, although goddess Felicity could not be worshipped by one not yet born, in order that, being made his friend, she might bestow this on him, yet she might confer this favor on parents who were her worshippers, that clever children should be born to them.  What need had women in childbirth to invoke Lucina, when, if Felicity should be present, they would have, not only a good delivery, but good children too?  What need was there to commend the children to the goddess Ops when they were being born; to the god Vaticanus in their birth-cry; to the goddess Cunina when lying cradled; to the goddess Rimina when sucking; to the god Statilinus when standing; to the goddess Adeona when coming; to Abeona when going away; to the goddess Mens that they might have a good mind; to the god Volumnus, and the goddess Volumna, that they might wish for good things; to the nuptial gods, that they might make good matches; to the rural gods, and chiefly to the goddess Fructesca herself, that they might receive the most abundant fruits; to Mars and Bellona, that they might carry on war well; to the goddess Victoria, that they might be victorious; to the god Honor, that they might be honored; to the goddess Pecunia, that they might have plenty money; to the god Aesculanus, and his son Argentinus, that they might have brass and silver coin?  For they set down Aesculanus as the father of Argentinus for this reason, that brass coin began to be used before silver.  But I wonder Argentinus has not begotten Aurinus, since gold coin also has followed.  Could they have him for a god, they would prefer Aurinus both to his father Argentinus and his grandfather Aesculanus, just as they set Jove before Saturn.  Therefore, what necessity was there on account of these gifts, either of soul, or body, or outward estate, to worship and invoke so great a crowd of gods, all of whom I have not mentioned, nor have they themselves been able to provide for all human benefits, minutely and singly methodized, minute and single gods, when the one goddess Felicity was able, with the greatest ease, compendiously to bestow the whole of them? nor should any other be sought after, either for the bestowing of good things, or for the averting of evil.  For why should they invoke the goddess Fessonia for the weary; for driving away enemies, the goddess Pellonia; for the sick, as a physician, either Apollo or Æsculapius, or both together if there should be great danger?  Neither should the god Spiniensis be entreated that he might root out the thorns from the fields; nor the goddess Rubigo that the mildew might not come,—Felicitas alone being present and guarding, either no evils would have arisen, or they would have been quite easily driven away.  Finally, since we treat of these two goddesses, Virtue and Felicity, if felicity is the reward of virtue, she is not a goddess, but a gift of God.  But if she is a goddess, why may she not be said to confer virtue itself, inasmuch as it is a great felicity to attain virtue?

Chapter 22.—Concerning the Knowledge of the Worship Due to the Gods, Which Varro Glories in Having Himself Conferred on the Romans.

What is it, then, that Varro boasts he has bestowed as a very great benefit on his fellow-citizens, because he not only recounts the gods who ought to be worshipped by the Romans, but also tells what pertains to each of them?  “Just as it is of no advantage,” he says, “to know the name and appearance of any man who is a physician, and not know that he is a physician, so,” he says, “it is of no advantage to know well that Æsculapius is a god, if you are not aware that he can bestow the gift of health, and consequently do not know why you ought to supplicate him.”  He also affirms this by another comparison, saying, “No one is able, not only to live well, but even to live at all, if he does not know who is a smith, who a baker, who a weaver, from whom he can seek any utensil, whom he may take for a helper, whom for a leader, whom for a teacher;” asserting, “that in this way it can be doubtful to no one, that thus the knowledge of the gods is useful, if one can know what force, and faculty, or power any god may have in any thing.  For from this we may be able,” he says, “to know what god we ought to call to, and invoke for any cause; lest we should do as too many are wont to do, and desire water from Liber, and wine from Lymphs.”  Very useful, forsooth!  Who would not give this man thanks if he could show true things, and if he could teach that the one true God, from whom all good things are, is to be worshipped by men?

Chapter 23.—Concerning Felicity, Whom the Romans, Who Venerate Many Gods, for a Long Time Did Not Worship with Divine Honor, Though She Alone Would Have Sufficed Instead of All.

But how does it happen, if their books and rituals are true, and Felicity is a goddess, that she herself is not appointed as the only one to be worshipped, since she could confer all things, and all at once make men happy?  For who wishes anything for any other reason than that he may become happy?  Why was it left to Lucullus to dedicate a temple to so great a goddess at so late a date, and after so many Roman rulers?  Why did Romulus himself, ambitious as he was of founding a fortunate city, not erect a temple to this goddess before all others?  Why did he supplicate the other gods for anything, since he would have lacked nothing had she been with him?  For even he himself would neither have been first a king, then afterwards, as they think, a god, if this goddess had not been propitious to him.  Why, therefore, did he appoint as gods for the Romans, Janus, Jove, Mars, Picus, Faunus, Tibernus, Hercules, and others, if there were more of them?  Why did Titus Tatius add Saturn, Ops, Sun, Moon, Vulcan, Light, and whatever others he added, among whom was even the goddess Cloacina, while Felicity was neglected?  Why did Numa appoint so many gods and so many goddesses without this one?  Was it perhaps because he could not see her among so great a crowd?  Certainly king Hostilius would not have introduced the new gods Fear and Dread to be propitiated, if he could have known or might have worshipped this goddess.  For, in presence of Felicity, Fear and Dread would have disappeared,—I do not say propitiated, but put to flight.  Next, I ask, how is it that the Roman empire had already immensely increased before any one worshipped Felicity?  Was the empire, therefore, more great than happy?  For how could true felicity be there, where there was not true piety?  For piety is the genuine worship of the true God, and not the worship of as many demons as there are false gods.  Yet even afterwards, when Felicity had already been taken into the number of the gods, the great infelicity of the civil wars ensued.  Was Felicity perhaps justly indignant, both because she was invited so late, and was invited not to honor, but rather to reproach, because along with her were worshipped Priapus, and Cloacina, and Fear and Dread, and Ague, and others which were not gods to be worshipped, but the crimes of the worshippers?  Last of all, if it seemed good to worship so great a goddess along with a most unworthy crowd, why at least was she not worshipped in a more honorable way than the rest?  For is it not intolerable that Felicity is placed neither among the gods Consentes,

So called from the consent or harmony of the celestial movements of these gods.

Thus the goddess Felicity being established in the largest and loftiest place, the citizens should learn whence the furtherance of every good desire should be sought.  And so, by the persuasion of nature herself, the superfluous multitude of other gods being abandoned, Felicity alone would be worshipped, prayer would be made to her alone, her temple alone would be frequented by the citizens who wished to be happy, which no one of them would not wish; and thus felicity, who was sought for from all the gods, would be sought for only from her own self.  For who wishes to receive from any god anything else than felicity, or what he supposes to tend to felicity?  Wherefore, if Felicity has it in her power to be with what man she pleases (and she has it if she is a goddess), what folly is it, after all, to seek from any other god her whom you can obtain by request from her own self!  Therefore they ought to honor this goddess above other gods, even by dignity of place.  For, as we read in their own authors, the ancient Romans paid greater honors to I know not what Summanus, to whom they attributed nocturnal thunderbolts, than to Jupiter, to whom diurnal thunderbolts were held to pertain.  But, after a famous and conspicuous temple had been built to Jupiter, owing to the dignity of the building, the multitude resorted to him in so great numbers, that scarce one can be found who remembers even to have read the name of Summanus, which now he cannot once hear named.  But if Felicity is not a goddess, because, as is true, it is a gift of God, that god must be sought who has power to give it, and that hurtful multitude of false gods must be abandoned which the vain multitude of foolish men follows after, making gods to itself of the gifts of God, and offending Himself whose gifts they are by the stubbornness of a proud will.  For he cannot be free from infelicity who worships Felicity as a goddess, and forsakes God, the giver of felicity; just as he cannot be free from hunger who licks a painted loaf of bread, and does not buy it of the man who has a real one.

Chapter 24.—The Reasons by Which the Pagans Attempt to Defend Their Worshipping Among the Gods the Divine Gifts Themselves.

We may, however, consider their reasons.  Is it to be believed, say they, that our forefathers were besotted even to such a degree as not to know that these things are divine gifts, and not gods?  But as they knew that such things are granted to no one, except by some god freely bestowing them, they called the gods whose names they did not find out by the names of those things which they deemed to be given by them; sometimes slightly altering the name for that purpose, as, for example, from war they have named Bellona, not bellum; from cradles, Cunina, not cunæ; from standing corn, Segetia, not seges; from apples, Pomona, not pomum; from oxen, Bubona, not bos. Sometimes, again, with no alteration of the word, just as the things themselves are named, so that the goddess who gives money is called Pecunia, and money is not thought to be itself a goddess:  so of Virtus, who gives virtue; Honor, who gives honor; Concordia, who gives concord; Victoria, who gives victory.  So, they say, when Felicitas is called a goddess, what is meant is not the thing itself which is given, but that deity by whom felicity is given.

Chapter 25.—Concerning the One God Only to Be Worshipped, Who, Although His Name is Unknown, is Yet Deemed to Be the Giver of Felicity.

Having had that reason rendered to us, we shall perhaps much more easily persuade, as we wish, those whose heart has not become too much hardened.  For if now human infirmity has perceived that felicity cannot be given except by some god; if this was perceived by those who worshipped so many gods, at whose head they set Jupiter himself; if, in their ignorance of the name of Him by whom felicity was given, they agreed to call Him by the name of that very thing which they believed He gave;—then it follows that they thought that felicity could not be given even by Jupiter himself, whom they already worshipped, but certainly by him whom they thought fit to worship under the name of Felicity itself.  I thoroughly affirm the statement that they believed felicity to be given by a certain God whom they knew not:  let Him therefore be sought after, let Him be worshipped, and it is enough.  Let the train of innumerable demons be repudiated, and let this God suffice every man whom his gift suffices.  For him, I say, God the giver of felicity will not be enough to worship, for whom felicity itself is not enough to receive.  But let him for whom it suffices (and man has nothing more he ought to wish for) serve the one God, the giver of felicity.  This God is not he whom they call Jupiter.  For if they acknowledged him to be the giver of felicity, they would not seek, under the name of Felicity itself, for another god or goddess by whom felicity might be given; nor could they tolerate that Jupiter himself should be worshipped with such infamous attributes.  For he is said to be the debaucher of the wives of others; he is the shameless lover and ravisher of a beautiful boy.

Chapter 26.—Of the Scenic Plays, the Celebration of Which the Gods Have Exacted from Their Worshippers.

“But,” says Cicero, “Homer invented these things, and transferred things human to the gods:  I would rather transfer things divine to us.”

Tusc. Quæst.i. 26.

Chapter 27.—Concerning the Three Kinds of Gods About Which the Pontiff Scævola Has Discoursed.

It is recorded that the very learned pontiff Scævola

Called by Cicero (De Oratore, i. 39) the most eloquent of lawyers, and the best skilled lawyer among eloquent men.

Chapter 28.—Whether the Worship of the Gods Has Been of Service to the Romans in Obtaining and Extending the Empire.

Therefore such gods, who are propitiated by such honors, or rather are impeached by them (for it is a greater crime to delight in having such things said of them falsely, than even if they could be said truly), could never by any means have been able to increase and preserve the Roman empire.  For if they could have done it, they would rather have bestowed so grand a gift on the Greeks, who, in this kind of divine things,—that is, in scenic plays,—have worshipped them more honorably and worthily, although they have not exempted themselves from those slanders of the poets, by whom they saw the gods torn in pieces, giving them licence to ill-use any man they pleased, and have not deemed the scenic players themselves to be base, but have held them worthy even of distinguished honor.  But just as the Romans were able to have gold money, although they did not worship a god Aurinus, so also they could have silver and brass coin, and yet worship neither Argentinus nor his father Aesculanus; and so of all the rest, which it would be irksome for me to detail.  It follows, therefore, both that they could not by any means attain such dominion if the true God was unwilling; and that if these gods, false and many, were unknown or contemned, and He alone was known and worshipped with sincere faith and virtue, they would both have a better kingdom here, whatever might be its extent, and whether they might have one here or not, would afterwards receive an eternal kingdom.

Chapter 29.—Of the Falsity of the Augury by Which the Strength and Stability of the Roman Empire Was Considered to Be Indicated.

For what kind of augury is that which they have declared to be most beautiful, and to which I referred a little ago, that Mars, and Terminus, and Juventas would not give place even to Jove, the king of the gods?  For thus, they say, it was signified that the nation dedicated to Mars,—that is, the Roman,—should yield to none the place it once occupied; likewise, that on account of the god Terminus, no one would be able to disturb the Roman frontiers; and also, that the Roman youth, because of the goddess Juventas, should yield to no one.  Let them see, therefore, how they can hold him to be the king of their gods, and the giver of their own kingdom, if these auguries set him down for an adversary, to whom it would have been honorable not to yield.  However, if these things are true, they need not be at all afraid.  For they are not going to confess that the gods who would not yield to Jove have yielded to Christ.  For, without altering the boundaries of the empire, Jesus Christ has proved Himself able to drive them, not only from their temples, but from the hearts of their worshippers.  But, before Christ came in the flesh, and, indeed, before these things which we have quoted from their books could have been written, but yet after that auspice was made under king Tarquin, the Roman army has been divers times scattered or put to flight, and has shown the falseness of the auspice, which they derived from the fact that the goddess Juventas had not given place to Jove; and the nation dedicated to Mars was trodden down in the city itself by the invading and triumphant Gauls; and the boundaries of the empire, through the falling away of many cities to Hannibal, had been hemmed into a narrow space.  Thus the beauty of the auspices is made void, and there has remained only the contumacy against Jove, not of gods, but of demons.  For it is one thing not to have yielded, and another to have returned whither you have yielded.  Besides, even afterwards, in the oriental regions, the boundaries of the Roman empire were changed by the will of Hadrian; for he yielded up to the Persian empire those three noble provinces, Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria.  Thus that god Terminus, who according to these books was the guardian of the Roman frontiers, and by that most beautiful auspice had not given place to Jove, would seem to have been more afraid of Hadrian, a king of men, than of the king of the gods.  The aforesaid provinces having also been taken back again, almost within our own recollection the frontier fell back, when Julian, given up to the oracles of their gods, with immoderate daring ordered the victualling ships to be set on fire.  The army being thus left destitute of provisions, and he himself also being presently killed by the enemy, and the legions being hard pressed, while dismayed by the loss of their commander, they were reduced to such extremities that no one could have escaped, unless by articles of peace the boundaries of the empire had then been established where they still remain; not, indeed, with so great a loss as was suffered by the concession of Hadrian, but still at a considerable sacrifice.  It was a vain augury, then, that the god Terminus did not yield to Jove, since he yielded to the will of Hadrian, and yielded also to the rashness of Julian, and the necessity of Jovinian.   The more intelligent and grave Romans have seen these things, but have had little power against the custom of the state, which was bound to observe the rites of the demons; because even they themselves, although they perceived that these things were vain, yet thought that the religious worship which is due to God should be paid to the nature of things which is established under the rule and government of the one true God, “serving,” as saith the apostle, “the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for evermore.”

Rom. i. 25.

Chapter 30.—What Kind of Things Even Their Worshippers Have Owned They Have Thought About the Gods of the Nations.

Cicero the augur laughs at auguries, and reproves men for regulating the purposes of life by the cries of crows and jackdaws.

De Divin.ii. 37.

Chapter 31.—Concerning the Opinions of Varro, Who, While Reprobating the Popular Belief, Thought that Their Worship Should Be Confined to One God, Though He Was Unable to Discover the True God.

What says Varro himself, whom we grieve to have found, although not by his own judgment, placing the scenic plays among things divine?  When in many passages he is exhorting, like a religious man, to the worship of the gods, does he not in doing so admit that he does not in his own judgment believe those things which he relates that the Roman state has instituted; so that he does not hesitate to affirm that if he were founding a new state, he could enumerate the gods and their names better by the rule of nature?  But being born into a nation already ancient, he says that he finds himself bound to accept the traditional names and surnames of the gods, and the histories connected with them, and that his purpose in investigating and publishing these details is to incline the people to worship the gods, and not to despise them.  By which words this most acute man sufficiently indicates that he does not publish all things, because they would not only have been contemptible to himself, but would have seemed despicable even to the rabble, unless they had been passed over in silence.  I should be thought to conjecture these things, unless he himself, in another passage, had openly said, in speaking of religious rites, that many things are true which it is not only not useful for the common people to know, but that it is expedient that the people should think otherwise, even though falsely, and therefore the Greeks have shut up the religious ceremonies and mysteries in silence, and within walls.  In this he no doubt expresses the policy of the so-called wise men by whom states and peoples are ruled.  Yet by this crafty device the malign demons are wonderfully delighted, who possess alike the deceivers and the deceived, and from whose tyranny nothing sets free save the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The same most acute and learned author also says, that those alone seem to him to have perceived what God is, who have believed Him to be the soul of the world, governing it by design and reason.

See Cicero, De Nat. Deor. i. 2.

Chapter 32.—In What Interest the Princes of the Nations Wished False Religions to Continue Among the People Subject to Them.

Varro says also, concerning the generations of the gods, that the people have inclined to the poets rather than to the natural philosophers; and that therefore their forefathers,—that is, the ancient Romans,—believed both in the sex and the generations of the gods, and settled their marriages; which certainly seems to have been done for no other cause except that it was the business of such men as were prudent and wise to deceive the people in matters of religion, and in that very thing not only to worship, but also to imitate the demons, whose greatest lust is to deceive.  For just as the demons cannot possess any but those whom they have deceived with guile, so also men in princely office, not indeed being just, but like demons, have persuaded the people in the name of religion to receive as true those things which they themselves knew to be false; in this way, as it were, binding them up more firmly in civil society, so that they might in like manner possess them as subjects.  But who that was weak and unlearned could escape the deceits of both the princes of the state and the demons?

Chapter 33.—That the Times of All Kings and Kingdoms are Ordained by the Judgment and Power of the True God.

Therefore that God, the author and giver of felicity, because He alone is the true God, Himself gives earthly kingdoms both to good and bad.  Neither does He do this rashly, and, as it were, fortuitously,—because He is God not fortune,—but according to the order of things and times, which is hidden from us, but thoroughly known to Himself; which same order of times, however, He does not serve as subject to it, but Himself rules as lord and appoints as governor.  Felicity He gives only to the good.  Whether a man be a subject or a king makes no difference; he may equally either possess or not possess it.  And it shall be full in that life where kings and subjects exist no longer.  And therefore earthly kingdoms are given by Him both to the good and the bad; lest His worshippers, still under the conduct of a very weak mind, should covet these gifts from Him as some great things.  And this is the mystery of the Old Testament, in which the New was hidden, that there even earthly gifts are promised:  those who were spiritual understanding even then, although not yet openly declaring, both the eternity which was symbolized by these earthly things, and in what gifts of God true felicity could be found.

Chapter 34.—Concerning the Kingdom of the Jews, Which Was Founded by the One and True God, and Preserved by Him as Long as They Remained in the True Religion.

Therefore, that it might be known that these earthly good things, after which those pant who cannot imagine better things, remain in the power of the one God Himself, not of the many false gods whom the Romans have formerly believed worthy of worship, He multiplied His people in Egypt from being very few, and delivered them out of it by wonderful signs.  Nor did their women invoke Lucina when their offspring was being incredibly multiplied; and that nation having increased incredibly, He Himself delivered, He Himself saved them from the hands of the Egyptians, who persecuted them, and wished to kill all their infants.  Without the goddess Rumina they sucked; without Cunina they were cradled, without Educa and Potina they took food and drink; without all those puerile gods they were educated; without the nuptial gods they were married; without the worship of Priapus they had conjugal intercourse; without invocation of Neptune the divided sea opened up a way for them to pass over, and overwhelmed with its returning waves their enemies who pursued them.  Neither did they consecrate any goddess Mannia when they received manna from heaven; nor, when the smitten rock poured forth water to them when they thirsted, did they worship Nymphs and Lymphs.  Without the mad rites of Mars and Bellona they carried on war; and while, indeed, they did not conquer without victory, yet they did not hold it to be a goddess, but the gift of their God.  Without Segetia they had harvests; without Bubona, oxen; honey without Mellona; apples without Pomona:  and, in a word, everything for which the Romans thought they must supplicate so great a crowd of false gods, they received much more happily from the one true God.  And if they had not sinned against Him with impious curiosity, which seduced them like magic arts, and drew them to strange gods and idols, and at last led them to kill Christ, their kingdom would have remained to them, and would have been, if not more spacious, yet more happy, than that of Rome.  And now that they are dispersed through almost all lands and nations, it is through the providence of that one true God; that whereas the images, altars, groves, and temples of the false gods are everywhere overthrown, and their sacrifices prohibited, it may be shown from their books how this has been foretold by their prophets so long before; lest, perhaps, when they should be read in ours, they might seem to be invented by us.  But now, reserving what is to follow for the following book, we must here set a bound to the prolixity of this one.

Preface.

Since, then, it is established that the complete attainment of all we desire is that which constitutes felicity, which is no goddess, but a gift of God, and that therefore men can worship no god save Him who is able to make them happy,—and were Felicity herself a goddess, she would with reason be the only object of worship,—since, I say, this is established, let us now go on to consider why God, who is able to give with all other things those good gifts which can be possessed by men who are not good, and consequently not happy, has seen fit to grant such extended and long-continued dominion to the Roman empire; for that this was not effected by that multitude of false gods which they worshipped, we have both already adduced, and shall, as occasion offers, yet adduce considerable proof.

Chapter 1.—That the Cause of the Roman Empire, and of All Kingdoms, is Neither Fortuitous Nor Consists in the Position of the Stars.

On the application of astrology to national prosperity, and the success of certain religions, see Lecky’s Rationalism, i. 303.

The cause, then, of the greatness of the Roman empire is neither fortuitous nor fatal, according to the judgment or opinion of those who call those things fortuitous which either have no causes, or such causes as do not proceed from some intelligible order, and those things fatal which happen independently of the will of God and man, by the necessity of a certain order.  In a word, human kingdoms are established by divine providence.  And if any one attributes their existence to fate, because he calls the will or the power of God itself by the name of fate, let him keep his opinion, but correct his language.  For why does he not say at first what he will say afterwards, when some one shall put the question to him, What he means by fate?  For when men hear that word, according to the ordinary use of the language, they simply understand by it the virtue of that particular position of the stars which may exist at the time when any one is born or conceived, which some separate altogether from the will of God, whilst others affirm that this also is dependent on that will.  But those who are of opinion that, apart from the will of God, the stars determine what we shall do, or what good things we shall possess, or what evils we shall suffer, must be refused a hearing by all, not only by those who hold the true religion, but by those who wish to be the worshippers of any gods whatsoever, even false gods.  For what does this opinion really amount to but this, that no god whatever is to be worshipped or prayed to?  Against these, however, our present disputation is not intended to be directed, but against those who, in defence of those whom they think to be gods, oppose the Christian religion.  They, however, who make the position of the stars depend on the divine will, and in a manner decree what character each man shall have, and what good or evil shall happen to him, if they think that these same stars have that power conferred upon them by the supreme power of God, in order that they may determine these things according to their will, do a great injury to the celestial sphere, in whose most brilliant senate, and most splendid senate-house, as it were, they suppose that wicked deeds are decreed to be done,—such deeds as that, if any terrestrial state should decree them, it would be condemned to overthrow by the decree of the whole human race.  What judgment, then, is left to God concerning the deeds of men, who is Lord both of the stars and of men, when to these deeds a celestial necessity is attributed?  Or, if they do not say that the stars, though they have indeed received a certain power from God, who is supreme, determine those things according to their own discretion, but simply that His commands are fulfilled by them instrumentally in the application and enforcing of such necessities, are we thus to think concerning God even what it seemed unworthy that we should think concerning the will of the stars?  But, if the stars are said rather to signify these things than to effect them, so that that position of the stars is, as it were, a kind of speech predicting, not causing future things,—for this has been the opinion of men of no ordinary learning,—certainly the mathematicians are not wont so to speak saying, for example, Mars in such or such a position signifies a homicide, but makes a homicide.  But, nevertheless, though we grant that they do not speak as they ought, and that we ought to accept as the proper form of speech that employed by the philosophers in predicting those things which they think they discover in the position of the stars, how comes it that they have never been able to assign any cause why, in the life of twins, in their actions, in the events which befall them, in their professions, arts, honors, and other things pertaining to human life, also in their very death, there is often so great a difference, that, as far as these things are concerned, many entire strangers are more like them than they are like each other, though separated at birth by the smallest interval of time, but at conception generated by the same act of copulation, and at the same moment?

Chapter 2.—On the Difference in the Health of Twins.

Cicero says that the famous physician Hippocrates has left in writing that he had suspected that a certain pair of brothers were twins, from the fact that they both took ill at once, and their disease advanced to its crisis and subsided in the same time in each of them.

This fact is not recorded in any of the extant works of Hippocrates or Cicero.  Vives supposes it may have found place in Cicero’s book, De Fato.

Chapter 3.—Concerning the Arguments Which Nigidius the Mathematician Drew from the Potter’s Wheel, in the Question About the Birth of Twins.

It is to no purpose, therefore, that that famous fiction about the potter’s wheel is brought forward, which tells of the answer which Nigidius is said to have given when he was perplexed with this question, and on account of which he was called Figulus.

I.e. the potter.

Chapter 4.—Concerning the Twins Esau and Jacob, Who Were Very Unlike Each Other Both in Their Character and Actions.

In the time of the ancient fathers, to speak concerning illustrious persons, there were born two twin brothers, the one so immediately after the other, that the first took hold of the heel of the second.  So great a difference existed in their lives and manners, so great a dissimilarity in their actions, so great a difference in their parents’ love for them respectively, that the very contrast between them produced even a mutual hostile antipathy.  Do we mean, when we say that they were so unlike each other, that when the one was walking the other was sitting, when the one was sleeping the other was waking,—which differences are such as are attributed to those minute portions of space which cannot be appreciated by those who note down the position of the stars which exists at the moment of one’s birth, in order that the mathematicians may be consulted concerning it?  One of these twins was for a long time a hired servant; the other never served.  One of them was beloved by his mother; the other was not so.  One of them lost that honor which was so much valued among their people; the other obtained it.  And what shall we say of their wives, their children, and their possessions?  How different they were in respect to all these!  If, therefore, such things as these are connected with those minute intervals of time which elapse between the births of twins, and are not to be attributed to the constellations, wherefore are they predicted in the case of others from the examination of their constellations?  And if, on the other hand, these things are said to be predicted, because they are connected, not with minute and inappreciable moments, but with intervals of time which can be observed and noted down, what purpose is that potter’s wheel to serve in this matter, except it be to whirl round men who have hearts of clay, in order that they may be prevented from detecting the emptiness of the talk of the mathematicians?

Chapter 5.—In What Manner the Mathematicians are Convicted of Professing a Vain Science.

Do not those very persons whom the medical sagacity of Hippocrates led him to suspect to be twins, because their disease was observed by him to develop to its crisis and to subside again in the same time in each of them,—do not these, I say, serve as a sufficient refutation of those who wish to attribute to the influence of the stars that which was owing to a similarity of bodily constitution?  For wherefore were they both sick of the same disease, and at the same time, and not the one after the other in the order of their birth? (for certainly they could not both be born at the same time.)  Or, if the fact of their having been born at different times by no means necessarily implies that they must be sick at different times, why do they contend that the difference in the time of their births was the cause of their difference in other things?  Why could they travel in foreign parts at different times, marry at different times, beget children at different times, and do many other things at different times, by reason of their having been born at different times, and yet could not, for the same reason, also be sick at different times?  For if a difference in the moment of birth changed the horoscope, and occasioned dissimilarity in all other things, why has that simultaneousness which belonged to their conception remained in their attacks of sickness?  Or, if the destinies of health are involved in the time of conception, but those of other things be said to be attached to the time of birth, they ought not to predict anything concerning health from examination of the constellations of birth, when the hour of conception is not also given, that its constellations may be inspected.  But if they say that they predict attacks of sickness without examining the horoscope of conception, because these are indicated by the moments of birth, how could they inform either of these twins when he would be sick, from the horoscope of his birth, when the other also, who had not the same horoscope of birth, must of necessity fall sick at the same time?  Again, I ask, if the distance of time between the births of twins is so great as to occasion a difference of their constellations on account of the difference of their horoscopes, and therefore of all the cardinal points to which so much influence is attributed, that even from such change there comes a difference of destiny, how is it possible that this should be so, since they cannot have been conceived at different times?  Or, if two conceived at the same moment of time could have different destinies with respect to their births, why may not also two born at the same moment of time have different destinies for life and for death?  For if the one moment in which both were conceived did not hinder that the one should be born before the other, why, if two are born at the same moment, should anything hinder them from dying at the same moment?  If a simultaneous conception allows of twins being differently affected in the womb, why should not simultaneousness of birth allow of any two individuals having different fortunes in the world? and thus would all the fictions of this art, or rather delusion, be swept away.  What strange circumstance is this, that two children conceived at the same time, nay, at the same moment, under the same position of the stars, have different fates which bring them to different hours of birth, whilst two children, born of two different mothers, at the same moment of time, under one and the same position of the stars, cannot have different fates which shall conduct them by necessity to diverse manners of life and of death?  Are they at conception as yet without destinies, because they can only have them if they be born?  What, therefore, do they mean when they say that, if the hour of the conception be found, many things can be predicted by these astrologers? from which also arose that story which is reiterated by some, that a certain sage chose an hour in which to lie with his wife, in order to secure his begetting an illustrious son.  From this opinion also came that answer of Posidonius, the great astrologer and also philosopher, concerning those twins who were attacked with sickness at the same time, namely, “That this had happened to them because they were conceived at the same time, and born at the same time.”  For certainly he added “conception,” lest it should be said to him that they could not both be born at the same time, knowing that at any rate they must both have been conceived at the same time; wishing thus to show that he did not attribute the fact of their being similarly and simultaneously affected with sickness to the similarity of their bodily constitutions as its proximate cause, but that he held that even in respect of the similarity of their health, they were bound together by a sidereal connection.  If, therefore, the time of conception has so much to do with the similarity of destinies, these same destinies ought not to be changed by the circumstances of birth; or, if the destinies of twins be said to be changed because they are born at different times, why should we not rather understand that they had been already changed in order that they might be born at different times?  Does not, then, the will of men living in the world change the destinies of birth, when the order of birth can change the destinies they had at conception?

Chapter 6.—Concerning Twins of Different Sexes.

But even in the very conception of twins, which certainly occurs at the same moment in the case of both, it often happens that the one is conceived a male, and the other a female.  I know two of different sexes who are twins.  Both of them are alive, and in the flower of their age; and though they resemble each other in body, as far as difference of sex will permit, still they are very different in the whole scope and purpose of their lives (consideration being had of those differences which necessarily exist between the lives of males and females),—the one holding the office of a count, and being almost constantly away from home with the army in foreign service, the other never leaving her country’s soil, or her native district.  Still more,—and this is more incredible, if the destinies of the stars are to be believed in, though it is not wonderful if we consider the wills of men, and the free gifts of God,—he is married; she is a sacred virgin:  he has begotten a numerous offspring; she has never even married.  But is not the virtue of the horoscope very great?  I think I have said enough to show the absurdity of that.  But, say those astrologers, whatever be the virtue of the horoscope in other respects, it is certainly of significance with respect to birth.  But why not also with respect to conception, which takes place undoubtedly with one act of copulation?  And, indeed, so great is the force of nature, that after a woman has once conceived, she ceases to be liable to conception.  Or were they, perhaps, changed at birth, either he into a male, or she into a female, because of the difference in their horoscopes?  But, whilst it is not altogether absurd to say that certain sidereal influences have some power to cause differences in bodies alone,—as, for instance, we see that the seasons of the year come round by the approaching and receding of the sun, and that certain kinds of things are increased in size or diminished by the waxings and wanings of the moon, such as sea-urchins, oysters, and the wonderful tides of the ocean,—it does not follow that the wills of men are to be made subject to the position of the stars.  The astrologers, however, when they wish to bind our actions also to the constellations, only set us on investigating whether, even in these bodies, the changes may not be attributable to some other than a sidereal cause.  For what is there which more intimately concerns a body than its sex?  And yet, under the same position of the stars, twins of different sexes may be conceived.  Wherefore, what greater absurdity can be affirmed or believed than that the position of the stars, which was the same for both of them at the time of conception, could not cause that the one child should not have been of a different sex from her brother, with whom she had a common constellation, whilst the position of the stars which existed at the hour of their birth could cause that she should be separated from him by the great distance between marriage and holy virginity?

Chapter 7.—Concerning the Choosing of a Day for Marriage, or for Planting, or Sowing.

Now, will any one bring forward this, that in choosing certain particular days for particular actions, men bring about certain new destinies for their actions?  That man, for instance, according to this doctrine, was not born to have an illustrious son, but rather a contemptible one, and therefore, being a man of learning, he choose an hour in which to lie with his wife.  He made, therefore, a destiny which he did not have before, and from that destiny of his own making something began to be fatal which was not contained in the destiny of his natal hour.  Oh, singular stupidity!  A day is chosen on which to marry; and for this reason, I believe, that unless a day be chosen, the marriage may fall on an unlucky day, and turn out an unhappy one.  What then becomes of what the stars have already decreed at the hour of birth?  Can a man be said to change by an act of choice that which has already been determined for him, whilst that which he himself has determined in the choosing of a day cannot be changed by another power?  Thus, if men alone, and not all things under heaven, are subject to the influence of the stars, why do they choose some days as suitable for planting vines or trees, or for sowing grain, other days as suitable for taming beasts on, or for putting the males to the females, that the cows and mares may be impregnated, and for such-like things?  If it be said that certain chosen days have an influence on these things, because the constellations rule over all terrestrial bodies, animate and inanimate, according to differences in moments of time, let it be considered what innumerable multitudes of beings are born or arise, or take their origin at the very same instant of time, which come to ends so different, that they may persuade any little boy that these observations about days are ridiculous.  For who is so mad as to dare affirm that all trees, all herbs, all beasts, serpents, birds, fishes, worms, have each separately their own moments of birth or commencement?  Nevertheless, men are wont, in order to try the skill of the mathematicians, to bring before them the constellations of dumb animals, the constellations of whose birth they diligently observe at home with a view to this discovery; and they prefer those mathematicians to all others, who say from the inspection of the constellations that they indicate the birth of a beast and not of a man.  They also dare tell what kind of beast it is, whether it is a wool-bearing beast, or a beast suited for carrying burthens, or one fit for the plough, or for watching a house; for the astrologers are also tried with respect to the fates of dogs, and their answers concerning these are followed by shouts of admiration on the part of those who consult them.  They so deceive men as to make them think that during the birth of a man the births of all other beings are suspended, so that not even a fly comes to life at the same time that he is being born, under the same region of the heavens.  And if this be admitted with respect to the fly, the reasoning cannot stop there, but must ascend from flies till it lead them up to camels and elephants.  Nor are they willing to attend to this, that when a day has been chosen whereon to sow a field, so many grains fall into the ground simultaneously, germinate simultaneously, spring up, come to perfection, and ripen simultaneously; and yet, of all the ears which are coeval, and, so to speak, congerminal, some are destroyed by mildew, some are devoured by the birds, and some are pulled by men.  How can they say that all these had their different constellations, which they see coming to so different ends?  Will they confess that it is folly to choose days for such things, and to affirm that they do not come within the sphere of the celestial decree, whilst they subject men alone to the stars, on whom alone in the world God has bestowed free wills?  All these things being considered, we have good reason to believe that, when the astrologers give very many wonderful answers, it is to be attributed to the occult inspiration of spirits not of the best kind, whose care it is to insinuate into the minds of men, and to confirm in them, those false and noxious opinions concerning the fatal influence of the stars, and not to their marking and inspecting of horoscopes, according to some kind of art which in reality has no existence.

Chapter 8.—Concerning Those Who Call by the Name of Fate, Not the Position of the Stars, But the Connection of Causes Which Depends on the Will of God.

But, as to those who call by the name of fate, not the disposition of the stars as it may exist when any creature is conceived, or born, or commences its existence, but the whole connection and train of causes which makes everything become what it does become, there is no need that I should labor and strive with them in a merely verbal controversy, since they attribute the so-called order and connection of causes to the will and power of God most high, who is most rightly and most truly believed to know all things before they come to pass, and to leave nothing unordained; from whom are all powers, although the wills of all are not from Him.  Now, that it is chiefly the will of God most high, whose power extends itself irresistibly through all things which they call fate, is proved by the following verses, of which, if I mistake not, Annæus Seneca is the author:—

“Father supreme, Thou ruler of the lofty heavens,

Lead me where’er it is Thy pleasure; I will give

A prompt obedience, making no delay,

Lo! here I am.  Promptly I come to do Thy sovereign will;

If thy command shall thwart my inclination, I will still

Follow Thee groaning, and the work assigned,

With all the suffering of a mind repugnant,

Will perform, being evil; which, had I been good,

I should have undertaken and performed, though hard,

With virtuous cheerfulness.

The Fates do lead the man that follows willing;

But the man that is unwilling, him they drag.”

Epist. 107.

Most evidently, in this last verse, he calls that “fate” which he had before called “the will of the Father supreme,” whom, he says, he is ready to obey that he may be led, being willing, not dragged, being unwilling, since “the Fates do lead the man that follows willing, but the man that is unwilling, him they drag.”

Chapter 9.—Concerning the Foreknowledge of God and the Free Will of Man, in Opposition to the Definition of Cicero.

The manner in which Cicero addresses himself to the task of refuting the Stoics, shows that he did not think he could effect anything against them in argument unless he had first demolished divination.

De Divinat.ii.

But, in refuting these conjectures of the mathematicians, his argument is triumphant, because truly these are such as destroy and refute themselves.  Nevertheless, they are far more tolerable who assert the fatal influence of the stars than they who deny the foreknowledge of future events.  For, to confess that God exists, and at the same time to deny that He has foreknowledge of future things, is the most manifest folly.  This Cicero himself saw, and therefore attempted to assert the doctrine embodied in the words of Scripture, “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.”

Ps. xiv. 1.

But, let these perplexing debatings and disputations of the philosophers go on as they may, we, in order that we may confess the most high and true God Himself, do confess His will, supreme power, and prescience.  Neither let us be afraid lest, after all, we do not do by will that which we do by will, because He, whose foreknowledge is infallible, foreknew that we would do it.  It was this which Cicero was afraid of, and therefore opposed foreknowledge.  The Stoics also maintained that all things do not come to pass by necessity, although they contended that all things happen according to destiny.  What is it, then, that Cicero feared in the prescience of future things?  Doubtless it was this,—that if all future things have been foreknown, they will happen in the order in which they have been foreknown; and if they come to pass in this order, there is a certain order of things foreknown by God; and if a certain order of things, then a certain order of causes, for nothing can happen which is not preceded by some efficient cause.  But if there is a certain order of causes according to which everything happens which does happen, then by fate, says he, all things happen which do happen.  But if this be so, then is there nothing in our own power, and there is no such thing as freedom of will; and if we grant that, says he, the whole economy of human life is subverted.  In vain are laws enacted.  In vain are reproaches, praises, chidings, exhortations had recourse to; and there is no justice whatever in the appointment of rewards for the good, and punishments for the wicked.  And that consequences so disgraceful, and absurd, and pernicious to humanity may not follow, Cicero chooses to reject the foreknowledge of future things, and shuts up the religious mind to this alternative, to make choice between two things, either that something is in our own power, or that there is foreknowledge,—both of which cannot be true; but if the one is affirmed, the other is thereby denied.  He therefore, like a truly great and wise man, and one who consulted very much and very skillfully for the good of humanity, of those two chose the freedom of the will, to confirm which he denied the foreknowledge of future things; and thus, wishing to make men free he makes them sacrilegious.  But the religious mind chooses both, confesses both, and maintains both by the faith of piety.  But how so? says Cicero; for the knowledge of future things being granted, there follows a chain of consequences which ends in this, that there can be nothing depending on our own free wills.  And further, if there is anything depending on our wills, we must go backwards by the same steps of reasoning till we arrive at the conclusion that there is no foreknowledge of future things.  For we go backwards through all the steps in the following order:—If there is free will, all things do not happen according to fate; if all things do not happen according to fate, there is not a certain order of causes; and if there is not a certain order of causes, neither is there a certain order of things foreknown by God,—for things cannot come to pass except they are preceded by efficient causes,—but, if there is no fixed and certain order of causes foreknown by God, all things cannot be said to happen according as He foreknew that they would happen.  And further, if it is not true that all things happen just as they have been foreknown by Him, there is not, says he, in God any foreknowledge of future events.

Now, against the sacrilegious and impious darings of reason, we assert both that God knows all things before they come to pass, and that we do by our free will whatsoever we know and feel to be done by us only because we will it.  But that all things come to pass by fate, we do not say; nay we affirm that nothing comes to pass by fate; for we demonstrate that the name of fate, as it is wont to be used by those who speak of fate, meaning thereby the position of the stars at the time of each one’s conception or birth, is an unmeaning word, for astrology itself is a delusion.  But an order of causes in which the highest efficiency is attributed to the will of God, we neither deny nor do we designate it by the name of fate, unless, perhaps, we may understand fate to mean that which is spoken, deriving it from fari, to speak; for we cannot deny that it is written in the sacred Scriptures, “God hath spoken once; these two things have I heard, that power belongeth unto God.  Also unto Thee, O God, belongeth mercy:  for Thou wilt render unto every man according to his works.”

Ps. lxii. 11, 12.

Chapter 10.—Whether Our Wills are Ruled by Necessity.

Wherefore, neither is that necessity to be feared, for dread of which the Stoics labored to make such distinctions among the causes of things as should enable them to rescue certain things from the dominion of necessity, and to subject others to it.  Among those things which they wished not to be subject to necessity they placed our wills, knowing that they would not be free if subjected to necessity.  For if that is to be called our necessity which is not in our power, but even though we be unwilling effects what it can effect,—as, for instance, the necessity of death,—it is manifest that our wills by which we live up-rightly or wickedly are not under such a necessity; for we do many things which, if we were not willing, we should certainly not do.  This is primarily true of the act of willing itself,—for if we will, it is; if we will not, it is not,—for we should not will if we were unwilling.  But if we define necessity to be that according to which we say that it is necessary that anything be of such or such a nature, or be done in such and such a manner, I know not why we should have any dread of that necessity taking away the freedom of our will.  For we do not put the life of God or the foreknowledge of God under necessity if we should say that it is necessary that God should live forever, and foreknow all things; as neither is His power diminished when we say that He cannot die or fall into error,—for this is in such a way impossible to Him, that if it were possible for Him, He would be of less power.  But assuredly He is rightly called omnipotent, though He can neither die nor fall into error.  For He is called omnipotent on account of His doing what He wills, not on account of His suffering what He wills not; for if that should befall Him, He would by no means be omnipotent.  Wherefore, He cannot do some things for the very reason that He is omnipotent.  So also, when we say that it is necessary that, when we will, we will by free choice, in so saying we both affirm what is true beyond doubt, and do not still subject our wills thereby to a necessity which destroys liberty.  Our wills, therefore, exist as wills, and do themselves whatever we do by willing, and which would not be done if we were unwilling.  But when any one suffers anything, being unwilling by the will of another, even in that case will retains its essential validity, —we do not mean the will of the party who inflicts the suffering, for we resolve it into the power of God.  For if a will should simply exist, but not be able to do what it wills, it would be overborne by a more powerful will.  Nor would this be the case unless there had existed will, and that not the will of the other party, but the will of him who willed, but was not able to accomplish what he willed.  Therefore, whatsoever a man suffers contrary to his own will, he ought not to attribute to the will of men, or of angels, or of any created spirit, but rather to His will who gives power to wills.  It is not the case, therefore, that because God foreknew what would be in the power of our wills, there is for that reason nothing in the power of our wills.  For he who foreknew this did not foreknow nothing.  Moreover, if He who foreknew what would be in the power of our wills did not foreknow nothing, but something, assuredly, even though He did foreknow, there is something in the power of our wills.  Therefore we are by no means compelled, either, retaining the prescience of God, to take away the freedom of the will, or, retaining the freedom of the will, to deny that He is prescient of future things, which is impious.  But we embrace both.  We faithfully and sincerely confess both.  The former, that we may believe well; the latter, that we may live well.  For he lives ill who does not believe well concerning God.  Wherefore, be it far from us, in order to maintain our freedom, to deny the prescience of Him by whose help we are or shall be free.  Consequently, it is not in vain that laws are enacted, and that reproaches, exhortations, praises, and vituperations are had recourse to; for these also He foreknew, and they are of great avail, even as great as He foreknew that they would be of.  Prayers, also, are of avail to procure those things which He foreknew that He would grant to those who offered them; and with justice have rewards been appointed for good deeds, and punishments for sins.  For a man does not therefore sin because God foreknew that he would sin.  Nay, it cannot be doubted but that it is the man himself who sins when he does sin, because He, whose foreknowledge is infallible, foreknew not that fate, or fortune, or something else would sin, but that the man himself would sin, who, if he wills not, sins not.  But if he shall not will to sin, even this did God foreknow.

Chapter 11.—Concerning the Universal Providence of God in the Laws of Which All Things are Comprehended.

Therefore God supreme and true, with His Word and Holy Spirit (which three are one), one God omnipotent, creator and maker of every soul and of every body; by whose gift all are happy who are happy through verity and not through vanity; who made man a rational animal consisting of soul and body, who, when he sinned, neither permitted him to go unpunished, nor left him without mercy; who has given to the good and to the evil, being in common with stones, vegetable life in common with trees, sensuous life in common with brutes, intellectual life in common with angels alone; from whom is every mode, every species, every order; from whom are measure, number, weight; from whom is everything which has an existence in nature, of whatever kind it be, and of whatever value; from whom are the seeds of forms and the forms of seeds, and the motion of seeds and of forms; who gave also to flesh its origin, beauty, health, reproductive fecundity, disposition of members, and the salutary concord of its parts; who also to the irrational soul has given memory, sense, appetite, but to the rational soul, in addition to these, has given intelligence and will; who has not left, not to speak of heaven and earth, angels and men, but not even the entrails of the smallest and most contemptible animal, or the feather of a bird, or the little flower of a plant, or the leaf of a tree, without an harmony, and, as it were, a mutual peace among all its parts;—that God can never be believed to have left the kingdoms of men, their dominations and servitudes, outside of the laws of His providence.

Chapter 12.—By What Virtues the Ancient Romans Merited that the True God, Although They Did Not Worship Him, Should Enlarge Their Empire.

Wherefore let us go on to consider what virtues of the Romans they were which the true God, in whose power are also the kingdoms of the earth, condescended to help in order to raise the empire, and also for what reason He did so.  And, in order to discuss this question on clearer ground, we have written the former books, to show that the power of those gods, who, they thought, were to be worshipped with such trifling and silly rites, had nothing to do in this matter; and also what we have already accomplished of the present volume, to refute the doctrine of fate, lest any one who might have been already persuaded that the Roman empire was not extended and preserved by the worship of these gods, might still be attributing its extension and preservation to some kind of fate, rather than to the most powerful will of God most high.  The ancient and primitive Ro mans, therefore, though their history shows us that, like all the other nations, with the sole exception of the Hebrews, they worshipped false gods, and sacrificed victims, not to God, but to demons, have nevertheless this commendation bestowed on them by their historian, that they were “greedy of praise, prodigal of wealth, desirous of great glory, and content with a moderate fortune.”

Sallust, Cat. vii.

“Porsenna there, with pride elate,

Bids Rome to Tarquin ope her gate;

With arms he hems the city in,

Æneas’ sons stand firm to win.”

Æneid, viii. 646.

At that time it was their greatest ambition either to die bravely or to live free; but when liberty was obtained, so great a desire of glory took possession of them, that liberty alone was not enough unless domination also should be sought, their great ambition being that which the same poet puts into the mouth of Jupiter:

“Nay, Juno’s self, whose wild alarms

Set ocean, earth, and heaven in arms,

Shall change for smiles her moody frown,

And vie with me in zeal to crown

Rome’s sons, the nation of the gown.

So stands my will.  There comes a day,

While Rome’s great ages hold their way,

When old Assaracus’s sons

Shall quit them on the myrmidons,

O’er Phthia and Mycenæ reign,

And humble Argos to their chain.”

Ibid. i. 279.

Which things, indeed, Virgil makes Jupiter predict as future, whilst, in reality, he was only himself passing in review in his own mind, things which were already done, and which were beheld by him as present realities.  But I have mentioned them with the intention of showing that, next to liberty, the Romans so highly esteemed domination, that it received a place among those things on which they bestowed the greatest praise.  Hence also it is that that poet, preferring to the arts of other nations those arts which peculiarly belong to the Romans, namely, the arts of ruling and commanding, and of subjugating and vanquishing nations, says,

“Others, belike, with happier grace,

From bronze or stone shall call the face,

Plead doubtful causes, map the skies,

And tell when planets set or rise;

But Roman thou, do thou control

The nations far and wide;

Be this thy genius, to impose

The rule of peace on vanquished foes,

Show pity to the humble soul,

And crush the sons of pride.”

Ibid. vi. 847.

These arts they exercised with the more skill the less they gave themselves up to pleasures, and to enervation of body and mind in coveting and amassing riches, and through these corrupting morals, by extorting them from the miserable citizens and lavishing them on base stage-players.  Hence these men of base character, who abounded when Sallust wrote and Virgil sang these things, did not seek after honors and glory by these arts, but by treachery and deceit.  Wherefore the same says, “But at first it was rather ambition than avarice that stirred the minds of men, which vice, however, is nearer to virtue.  For glory, honor, and power are desired alike by the good man and by the ignoble; but the former,” he says, “strives onward to them by the true way, whilst the other, knowing nothing of the good arts, seeks them by fraud and deceit.”

Sallust, in Cat. c. xi.

But, of the two great Romans of that time, Cato was he whose virtue was by far the nearest to the true idea of virtue.  Wherefore, let us refer to the opinion of Cato himself, to discover what was the judgment he had formed concerning the condition of the state both then and in former times.  “I do not think,” he says, “that it was by arms that our ancestors made the republic great from being small.  Had that been the case, the republic of our day would have been by far more flourishing than that of their times, for the number of our allies and citizens is far greater; and, besides, we possess a far greater abundance of armor and of horses than they did.  But it was other things than these that made them great, and we have none of them:  industry at home, just government without, a mind free in deliberation, addicted neither to crime nor to lust.  Instead of these, we have luxury and avarice, poverty in the state, opulence among citizens; we laud riches, we follow laziness; there is no difference made between the good and the bad; all the rewards of virtue are got possession of by intrigue.  And no wonder, when every individual consults only for his own good, when ye are the slaves of pleasure at home, and, in public affairs, of money and favor, no wonder that an onslaught is made upon the unprotected republic.”

Sallust, in Cat. c. 52.

He who hears these words of Cato or of Sallust probably thinks that such praise bestowed on the ancient Romans was applicable to all of them, or, at least, to very many of them.  It is not so; otherwise the things which Cato himself writes, and which I have quoted in the second book of this work, would not be true.  In that passage he says, that even from the very beginning of the state wrongs were committed by the more powerful, which led to the separation of the people from the fathers, besides which there were other internal dissensions; and the only time at which there existed a just and moderate administration was after the banishment of the kings, and that no longer than whilst they had cause to be afraid of Tarquin, and were carrying on the grievous war which had been undertaken on his account against Etruria; but afterwards the fathers oppressed the people as slaves, flogged them as the kings had done, drove them from their land, and, to the exclusion of all others, held the government in their own hands alone.  And to these discords, whilst the fathers were wishing to rule, and the people were unwilling to serve, the second Punic war put an end; for again great fear began to press upon their disquieted minds, holding them back from those distractions by another and greater anxiety, and bringing them back to civil concord.  But the great things which were then achieved were accomplished through the administration of a few men, who were good in their own way.  And by the wisdom and forethought of these few good men, which first enabled the republic to endure these evils and mitigated them, it waxed greater and greater.  And this the same historian affirms, when he says that, reading and hearing of the many illustrious achievements of the Roman people in peace and in war, by land and by sea, he wished to understand what it was by which these great things were specially sustained.  For he knew that very often the Romans had with a small company contended with great legions of the enemy; and he knew also that with small resources they had carried on wars with opulent kings.  And he says that, after having given the matter much consideration, it seemed evident to him that the pre-eminent virtue of a few citizens had achieved the whole, and that that explained how poverty overcame wealth, and small numbers great multitudes.  But, he adds, after that the state had been corrupted by luxury and indolence, again the republic, by its own greatness, was able to bear the vices of its magistrates and generals.  Wherefore even the praises of Cato are only applicable to a few; for only a few were possessed of that virtue which leads men to pursue after glory, honor, and power by the true way,—that is, by virtue itself.  This industry at home, of which Cato speaks, was the consequence of a desire to enrich the public treasury, even though the result should be poverty at home; and therefore, when he speaks of the evil arising out of the corruption of morals, he reverses the expression, and says, “Poverty in the state, riches at home.”

Chapter 13.—Concerning the Love of Praise, Which, Though It is a Vice, is Reckoned a Virtue, Because by It Greater Vice is Restrained.

Wherefore, when the kingdoms of the East had been illustrious for a long time, it pleased God that there should also arise a Western empire, which, though later in time, should be more illustrious in extent and greatness.  And, in order that it might overcome the grievous evils which existed among other nations, He purposely granted it to such men as, for the sake of honor, and praise, and glory, consulted well for their country, in whose glory they sought their own, and whose safety they did not hesitate to prefer to their own, suppressing the desire of wealth and many other vices for this one vice, namely, the love of praise.  For he has the soundest perception who recognizes that even the love of praise is a vice; nor has this escaped the perception of the poet Horace, who says,

“You’re bloated by ambition? take advice:

Yon book will ease you if you read it thrice.”

Horace, Epist. i. l. 36, 37.

 And the same poet, in a lyric song, hath thus spoken with the desire of repressing the passion for domination:

“Rule an ambitious spirit, and thou hast

A wider kingdom than if thou shouldst join

To distant Gades Lybia, and thus

Shouldst hold in service either Carthaginian.”

Hor. Carm. ii. 2.

Nevertheless, they who restrain baser lusts, not by the power of the Holy Spirit obtained by the faith of piety, or by the love of intelligible beauty, but by desire of human praise, or, at all events, restrain them better by the love of such praise, are not indeed yet holy, but only less base.  Even Tully was not able to conceal this fact; for, in the same books which he wrote, De Republica, when speaking concerning the education of a chief of the state, who ought, he says, to be nourished on glory, goes on to say that their ancestors did many wonderful and illustrious things through desire of glory.  So far, therefore, from resisting this vice, they even thought that it ought to be excited and kindled up, supposing that that would be beneficial to the republic.  But not even in his books on philosophy does Tully dissimulate this poisonous opinion, for he there avows it more clearly than day.  For when he is speaking of those studies which are to be pursued with a view to the true good, and not with the vainglorious desire of human praise, he introduces the following universal and general statement:

“Honor nourishes the arts, and all are stimulated to the prosecution of studies by glory; and those pursuits are always neglected which are generally discredited.”

Tusc. Quæst.i. 2.

Chapter 14.—Concerning the Eradication of the Love of Human Praise, Because All the Glory of the Righteous is in God.

It is, therefore, doubtless far better to resist this desire than to yield to it, for the purer one is from this defilement, the liker is he to God; and, though this vice be not thoroughly eradicated from his heart,—for it does not cease to tempt even the minds of those who are making good progress in virtue,—at any rate, let the desire of glory be surpassed by the love of righteousness, so that, if there be seen anywhere “lying neglected things which are generally discredited,” if they are good, if they are right, even the love of human praise may blush and yield to the love of truth.  For so hostile is this vice to pious faith, if the love of glory be greater in the heart than the fear or love of God, that the Lord said, “How can ye believe, who look for glory from one another, and do not seek the glory which is from God alone?”

John v. 44.

Chapter 15.—Concerning the Temporal Reward Which God Granted to the Virtues of the Romans.

Now, therefore, with regard to those to whom God did not purpose to give eternal life with His holy angels in His own celestial city, to the society of which that true piety which does not render the service of religion, which the Greeks call λατρεία, to any save the true God conducts, if He had also withheld from them the terrestrial glory of that most excellent empire, a reward would not have been rendered to their good arts,—that is, their virtues,—by which they sought to attain so great glory.  For as to those who seem to do some good that they may receive glory from men, the Lord also says, “Verily I say unto you, they have received their reward.”

Matt. vi. 2.

Chapter 16.—Concerning the Reward of the Holy Citizens of the Celestial City, to Whom the Example of the Virtues of the Romans are Useful.

But the reward of the saints is far different, who even here endured reproaches for that city of God which is hateful to the lovers of this world.  That city is eternal.  There none are born, for none die.  There is true and full felicity,—not a goddess, but a gift of God.  Thence we receive the pledge of faith whilst on our pilgrimage we sigh for its beauty.  There rises not the sun on the good and the evil, but the Sun of Righteousness protects the good alone.  There no great industry shall be expended to enrich the public treasury by suffering privations at home, for there is the common treasury of truth.  And, therefore, it was not only for the sake of recompensing the citizens of Rome that her empire and glory had been so signally extended, but also that the citizens of that eternal city, during their pilgrimage here, might diligently and soberly contemplate these examples, and see what a love they owe to the supernal country on account of life eternal, if the terrestrial country was so much beloved by its citizens on account of human glory.

Chapter 17.—To What Profit the Romans Carried on Wars, and How Much They Contributed to the Well-Being of Those Whom They Conquered.

For, as far as this life of mortals is concerned, which is spent and ended in a few days, what does it matter under whose government a dying man lives, if they who govern do not force him to impiety and iniquity?  Did the Romans at all harm those nations, on whom, when subjugated, they imposed their laws, except in as far as that was accomplished with great slaughter in war?  Now, had it been done with consent of the nations, it would have been done with greater success, but there would have been no glory of conquest, for neither did the Romans themselves live exempt from those laws which they imposed on others.  Had this been done without Mars and Bellona, so that there should have been no place for victory, no one conquering where no one had fought, would not the condition of the Romans and of the other nations have been one and the same, especially if that had been done at once which afterwards was done most humanely and most acceptably, namely, the admission of all to the rights of Roman citizens who belonged to the Roman empire, and if that had been made the privilege of all which was formerly the privilege of a few, with this one condition, that the humbler class who had no lands of their own should live at the public expense—an alimentary impost, which would have been paid with a much better grace by them into the hands of good administrators of the republic, of which they were members, by their own hearty consent, than it would have been paid with had it to be extorted from them as conquered men?  For I do not see what it makes for the safety, good morals, and certainly not for the dignity, of men, that some have conquered and others have been conquered, except that it yields them that most insane pomp of human glory, in which “they have received their reward,” who burned with excessive desire of it, and carried on most eager wars.  For do not their lands pay tribute?  Have they any privilege of learning what the others are not privileged to learn?  Are there not many senators in the other countries who do not even know Rome by sight?  Take away outward show,

Jactantia.

Chapter 18.—How Far Christians Ought to Be from Boasting, If They Have Done Anything for the Love of the Eternal Country, When the Romans Did Such Great Things for Human Glory and a Terrestrial City.

What great thing, therefore, is it for that eternal and celestial city to despise all the charms of this world, however pleasant, if for the sake of this terrestrial city Brutus could even put to death his son,—a sacrifice which the heavenly city compels no one to make?  But certainly it is more difficult to put to death one’s sons, than to do what is required to be done for the heavenly country, even to distribute to the poor those things which were looked upon as things to be massed and laid up for one’s children, or to let them go, if there arise any temptation which compels us to do so, for the sake of faith and righteousness.  For it is not earthly riches which make us or our sons happy; for they must either be lost by us in our lifetime, or be possessed when we are dead, by whom we know not, or perhaps by whom we would not.  But it is God who makes us happy, who is the true riches of minds.  But of Brutus, even the poet who celebrates his praises testifies that it was the occasion of unhappiness to him that he slew his son, for he says,

“And call his own rebellious seed

For menaced liberty to bleed.

Unhappy father! howsoe’er

The deed be judged by after days.”

Æneid, vi. 820.

But in the following verse he consoles him in his unhappiness, saying,

“His country’s love shall all o’erbear.”

There are those two things, namely, liberty and the desire of human praise, which compelled the Romans to admirable deeds.  If, therefore, for the liberty of dying men, and for the desire of human praise which is sought after by mortals, sons could be put to death by a father, what great thing is it, if, for the true liberty which has made us free from the dominion of sin, and death, and the devil,—not through the desire of human praise, but through the earnest desire of fleeing men, not from King Tarquin, but from demons and the prince of the demons,—we should, I do not say put to death our sons, but reckon among our sons Christ’s poor ones?  If, also, another Roman chief, surnamed Torquatus, slew his son, not because he fought against his country, but because, being challenged by an enemy, he through youthful impetuosity fought, though for his country, yet contrary to orders which he his father had given as general; and this he did, notwithstanding that his son was victorious, lest there should be more evil in the example of authority despised, than good in the glory of slaying an enemy;—if, I say, Torquatus acted thus, wherefore should they boast themselves, who, for the laws of a celestial country, despise all earthly good things, which are loved far less than sons?  If Furius Camillus, who was condemned by those who envied him, notwithstanding that he had thrown off from the necks of his countrymen the yoke of their most bitter enemies, the Veientes, again delivered his ungrateful country from the Gauls, because he had no other in which he could have better opportunities for living a life of glory;—if Camillus did thus, why should he be extolled as having done some great thing, who, having, it may be, suffered in the church at the hands of carnal enemies most grievous and dishonoring injury, has not betaken himself to heretical enemies, or himself raised some heresy against her, but has rather defended her, as far as he was able, from the most pernicious perversity of heretics, since there is not another church, I say not in which one can live a life of glory, but in which eternal life can be obtained?  If Mucius, in order that peace might be made with King Porsenna, who was pressing the Romans with a most grievous war, when he did not succeed in slaying Porsenna, but slew another by mistake for him, reached forth his right hand and laid it on a red-hot altar, saying that many such as he saw him to be had conspired for his destruction, so that Porsenna, terrified at his daring, and at the thought of a conspiracy of such as he, without any delay recalled all his warlike purposes, and made peace;—if, I say, Mucius did this, who shall speak of his meritorious claims to the kingdom of heaven, if for it he may have given to the flames not one hand, but even his whole body, and that not by his own spontaneous act, but because he was persecuted by another?  If Curtius, spurring on his steed, threw himself all armed into a precipitous gulf, obeying the oracles of their gods, which had commanded that the Romans should throw into that gulf the best thing which they possessed, and they could only understand thereby that, since they excelled in men and arms, the gods had commanded that an armed man should be cast headlong into that destruction;—if he did this, shall we say that that man has done a great thing for the eternal city who may have died by a like death, not, however, precipitating himself spontaneously into a gulf, but having suffered this death at the hands of some enemy of his faith, more especially when he has received from his Lord, who is also King of his country, a more certain oracle, “Fear not them who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul?”

Matt. x. 28.

Chapter 19.—Concerning the Difference Between True Glory and the Desire of Domination.

There is assuredly a difference between the desire of human glory and the desire of domination; for, though he who has an overweening delight in human glory will be also very prone to aspire earnestly after domination, nevertheless they who desire the true glory even of human praise strive not to displease those who judge well of them.  For there are many good moral qualities, of which many are competent judges, although they are not possessed by many; and by those good moral qualities those men press on to glory, honor and domination, of whom Sallust says, “But they press on by the true way.”

But whosoever, without possessing that desire of glory which makes one fear to displease those who judge his conduct, desires domination and power, very often seeks to obtain what he loves by most open crimes.  Therefore he who desires glory presses on to obtain it either by the true way, or certainly by deceit and artifice, wishing to appear good when he is not.  Therefore to him who possesses virtues it is a great virtue to despise glory; for contempt of it is seen by God, but is not manifest to human judgment.  For whatever any one does before the eyes of men in order to show himself to be a despiser of glory, if they suspect that he is doing it in order to get greater praise,—that is, greater glory,—he has no means of demonstrating to the perceptions of those who suspect him that the case is really otherwise than they suspect it to be.  But he who despises the judgment of praisers, despises also the rashness of suspectors.  Their salvation, indeed, he does not despise, if he is truly good; for so great is the righteousness of that man who receives his virtues from the Spirit of God, that he loves his very enemies, and so loves them that he desires that his haters and detractors may be turned to righteousness, and become his associates, and that not in an earthly but in a heavenly country.  But with respect to his praisers, though he sets little value on their praise, he does not set little value on their love; neither does he elude their praise, lest he should forfeit their love.  And, therefore, he strives earnestly to have their praises directed to Him from whom every one receives whatever in him is truly praiseworthy.  But he who is a despiser of glory, but is greedy of domination, exceeds the beasts in the vices of cruelty and luxuriousness.  Such, indeed, were certain of the Romans, who, wanting the love of esteem, wanted not the thirst for domination; and that there were many such, history testifies.  But it was Nero Cæsar who was the first to reach the summit, and, as it were, the citadel, of this vice; for so great was his luxuriousness, that one would have thought there was nothing manly to be dreaded in him, and such his cruelty, that, had not the contrary been known, no one would have thought there was anything effeminate in his character.  Nevertheless power and domination are not given even to such men save by the providence of the most high God, when He judges that the state of human affairs is worthy of such lords.  The divine utterance is clear on this matter; for the Wisdom of God thus speaks:  “By me kings reign, and tyrants possess the land.”

Prov. viii. 15.

“For know that treaty may not stand

Where king greets king and joins not hand,”

Æneid, vii. 266.

in another place it is most unambiguously said of God, that He “maketh the man who is an hypocrite to reign on account of the perver sity of the people.”

Job xxxiv. 30.

Chapter 20.—That It is as Shameful for the Virtues to Serve Human Glory as Bodily Pleasure.

Philosophers,—who place the end of human good in virtue itself, in order to put to shame certain other philosophers, who indeed approve of the virtues, but measure them all with reference to the end of bodily pleasure, and think that this pleasure is to be sought for its own sake, but the virtues on account of pleasure,—are wont to paint a kind of word-picture, in which Pleasure sits like a luxurious queen on a royal seat, and all the virtues are subjected to her as slaves, watching her nod, that they may do whatever she shall command.  She commands Prudence to be ever on the watch to discover how Pleasure may rule, and be safe.  Justice she orders to grant what benefits she can, in order to secure those friendships which are necessary for bodily pleasure; to do wrong to no one, lest, on account of the breaking of the laws, Pleasure be not able to live in security.  Fortitude she orders to keep her mistress, that is, Pleasure, bravely in her mind, if any affliction befall her body which does not occasion death, in order that by remembrance of former delights she may mitigate the poignancy of present pain.  Temperance she commands to take only a certain quantity even of the most favorite food, lest, through immoderate use, anything prove hurtful by disturbing the health of the body, and thus Pleasure, which the Epicureans make to consist chiefly in the health of the body, be grievously offended.  Thus the virtues, with the whole dignity of their glory, will be the slaves of Pleasure, as of some imperious and disreputable woman.

There is nothing, say our philosophers, more disgraceful and monstrous than this picture, and which the eyes of good men can less endure.  And they say the truth.  But I do not think that the picture would be sufficiently becoming, even if it were made so that the virtues should be represented as the slaves of human glory; for, though that glory be not a luxurious woman, it is nevertheless puffed up, and has much vanity in it.  Wherefore it is unworthy of the solidity and firmness of the virtues to represent them as serving this glory, so that Prudence shall provide nothing, Justice distribute nothing, Temperance moderate nothing, except to the end that men may be pleased and vain glory served.  Nor will they be able to defend themselves from the charge of such baseness, whilst they, by way of being despisers of glory, disregard the judgment of other men, seem to themselves wise, and please themselves.  For their virtue,—if, indeed, it is virtue at all,—is only in another way subjected to human praise; for he who seeks to please himself seeks still to please man.  But he who, with true piety towards God, whom he loves, believes, and hopes in, fixes his attention more on those things in which he displeases himself, than on those things, if there are any such, which please himself, or rather, not himself, but the truth, does not attribute that by which he can now please the truth to anything but to the mercy of Him whom he has feared to displease, giving thanks for what in him is healed, and pouring out prayers for the healing of that which is yet unhealed.

Chapter 21.—That the Roman Dominion Was Granted by Him from Whom is All Power, and by Whose Providence All Things are Ruled.

These things being so, we do not attribute the power of giving kingdoms and empires to any save to the true God, who gives happiness in the kingdom of heaven to the pious alone, but gives kingly power on earth both to the pious and the impious, as it may please Him, whose good pleasure is always just.  For though we have said something about the principles which guide His administration, in so far as it has seemed good to Him to explain it, nevertheless it is too much for us, and far surpasses our strength, to discuss the hidden things of men’s hearts, and by a clear examination to determine the merits of various kingdoms.  He, therefore, who is the one true God, who never leaves the human race without just judgment and help, gave a kingdom to the Romans when He would, and as great as He would, as He did also to the Assyrians, and even the Persians, by whom, as their own books testify, only two gods are worshipped, the one good and the other evil,—to say nothing concerning the Hebrew people, of whom I have already spoken as much as seemed necessary, who, as long as they were a kingdom, worshipped none save the true God.  The same, therefore, who gave to the Persians harvests, though they did not worship the goddess Segetia, who gave the other blessings of the earth, though they did not worship the many gods which the Romans supposed to preside, each one over some particular thing, or even many of them over each several thing,—He, I say, gave the Persians dominion, though they worshipped none of those gods to whom the Romans believed themselves indebted for the empire.  And the same is true in respect of men as well as nations.  He who gave power to Marius gave it also to Caius Cæsar; He who gave it to Augustus gave it also to Nero; He also who gave it to the most benignant emperors, the Vespasians, father and son, gave it also to the cruel Domitian; and, finally, to avoid the necessity of going over them all, He who gave it to the Christian Constantine gave it also to the apostate Julian, whose gifted mind was deceived by a sacrilegious and detestable curiosity, stimulated by the love of power.  And it was because he was addicted through curiosity to vain oracles, that, confident of victory, he burned the ships which were laden with the provisions necessary for his army, and therefore, engaging with hot zeal in rashly audacious enterprises, he was soon slain, as the just consequence of his recklessness, and left his army unprovisioned in an enemy’s country, and in such a predicament that it never could have escaped, save by altering the boundaries of the Roman empire, in violation of that omen of the god Terminus of which I spoke in the preceding book; for the god Terminus yielded to necessity, though he had not yielded to Jupiter.  Manifestly these things are ruled and governed by the one God according as He pleases; and if His motives are hid, are they therefore unjust?

Chapter 22.—The Durations and Issues of War Depend on the Will of God.

Thus also the durations of wars are determined by Him as He may see meet, according to His righteous will, and pleasure, and mercy, to afflict or to console the human race, so that they are sometimes of longer, sometimes of shorter duration.  The war of the Pirates and the third Punic war were terminated with incredible celerity.  Also the war of the fugitive gladiators, though in it many Roman generals and the consuls were defeated, and Italy was terribly wasted and ravaged, was nevertheless ended in the third year, having itself been, during its continuance, the end of much.  The Picentes, the Marsi, and the Peligni, not distant but Italian nations, after a long and most loyal servitude under the Roman yoke, attempted to raise their heads into liberty, though many nations had now been subjected to the Roman power, and Carthage had been overthrown.  In this Italian war the Romans were very often defeated, and two consuls perished, besides other noble senators; nevertheless this calamity was not protracted over a long space of time, for the fifth year put an end to it.  But the second Punic war, lasting for the space of eighteen years, and occasioning the greatest disasters and calamities to the republic, wore out and well-nigh consumed the strength of the Romans; for in two battles about seventy thousand Romans fell.

Of the Thrasymene Lake and Cannæ.

Chapter 23.—Concerning the War in Which Radagaisus, King of the Goths, a Worshipper of Demons, Was Conquered in One Day, with All His Mighty Forces.

Nevertheless they do not mention with thanksgiving what God has very recently, and within our own memory, wonderfully and mercifully done, but as far as in them lies they attempt, if possible, to bury it in universal oblivion.  But should we be silent about these things, we should be in like manner ungrateful.  When Radagaisus, king of the Goths, having taken up his position very near to the city, with a vast and savage army, was already close upon the Romans, he was in one day so speedily and so thoroughly beaten, that, whilst not even one Roman was wounded, much less slain, far more than a hundred thousand of his army were prostrated, and he himself and his sons, having been captured, were forthwith put to death, suffering the punishment they deserved.  For had so impious a man, with so great and so impious a host, entered the city, whom would he have spared? what tombs of the martyrs would he have respected? in his treatment of what person would he have manifested the fear of God? whose blood would he have refrained from shedding? whose chastity would he have wished to preserve inviolate?  But how loud would they not have been in the praises of their gods!  How insultingly they would have boasted, saying that Radagaisus had conquered, that he had been able to achieve such great things, because he propitiated and won over the gods by daily sacrifices,—a thing which the Christian religion did not allow the Romans to do!  For when he was approaching to those places where he was overwhelmed at the nod of the Supreme Majesty, as his fame was everywhere increasing, it was being told us at Carthage that the pagans were believing, publishing, and boasting, that he, on account of the help and protection of the gods friendly to him, because of the sacrifices which he was said to be daily offering to them, would certainly not be conquered by those who were not performing such sacrifices to the Roman gods, and did not even permit that they should be offered by any one.  And now these wretched men do not give thanks to God for his great mercy, who, having determined to chastise the corruption of men, which was worthy of far heavier chastisement than the corruption of the barbarians, tempered His indignation with such mildness as, in the first instance, to cause that the king of the Goths should be conquered in a wonderful manner, lest glory should accrue to demons, whom he was known to be supplicating, and thus the minds of the weak should be overthrown; and then, afterwards, to cause that, when Rome was to be taken, it should be taken by those barbarians who, contrary to any custom of all former wars, protected, through reverence for the Christian religion, those who fled for refuge to the sacred places, and who so opposed the demons themselves, and the rites of impious sacrifices, that they seemed to be carrying on a far more terrible war with them than with men.  Thus did the true Lord and Governor of things both scourge the Romans mercifully, and, by the marvellous defeat of the worshippers of demons, show that those sacrifices were not necessary even for the safety of present things; so that, by those who do not obstinately hold out, but prudently consider the matter, true religion may not be deserted on account of the urgencies of the present time, but may be more clung to in most confident expectation of eternal life.

Chapter 24.—What Was the Happiness of the Christian Emperors, and How Far It Was True Happiness.

For neither do we say that certain Christian emperors were therefore happy because they ruled a long time, or, dying a peaceful death, left their sons to succeed them in the empire, or subdued the enemies of the republic, or were able both to guard against and to suppress the attempt of hostile citizens rising against them.  These and other gifts or comforts of this sorrowful life even certain worshippers of demons have merited to receive, who do not belong to the kingdom of God to which these belong; and this is to be traced to the mercy of God, who would not have those who believe in Him desire such things as the highest good.  But we say that they are happy if they rule justly; if they are not lifted up amid the praises of those who pay them sublime honors, and the obsequiousness of those who salute them with an excessive humility, but remember that they are men; if they make their power the handmaid of His majesty by using it for the greatest possible extension of His worship; if they fear, love, worship God; if more than their own they love that kingdom in which they are not afraid to have partners; if they are slow to punish, ready to pardon; if they apply that punishment as necessary to government and defence of the republic, and not in order to gratify their own enmity; if they grant pardon, not that iniquity may go unpunished, but with the hope that the transgressor may amend his ways; if they compensate with the lenity of mercy and the liberality of benevolence for whatever severity they may be compelled to decree; if their luxury is as much restrained as it might have been unrestrained; if they prefer to govern depraved desires rather than any nation whatever; and if they do all these things, not through ardent desire of empty glory, but through love of eternal felicity, not neglecting to offer to the true God, who is their God, for their sins, the sacrifices of humility, contrition, and prayer.  Such Christian emperors, we say, are happy in the present time by hope, and are destined to be so in the enjoyment of the reality itself, when that which we wait for shall have arrived.

Chapter 25.—Concerning the Prosperity Which God Granted to the Christian Emperor Constantine.

For the good God, lest men, who believe that He is to be worshipped with a view to eternal life, should think that no one could attain to all this high estate, and to this terrestrial dominion, unless he should be a worshipper of the demons,—supposing that these spirits have great power with respect to such things,—for this reason He gave to the Emperor Constantine, who was not a worshipper of demons, but of the true God Himself, such fullness of earthly gifts as no one would even dare wish for.  To him also He granted the honor of founding a city,

Constantinople.

Chapter 26.—On the Faith and Piety of Theodosius Augustus.

And on this account, Theodosius not only preserved during the lifetime of Gratian that fidelity which was due to him, but also, after his death, he, like a true Christian, took his little brother Valentinian under his protection, as joint emperor, after he had been expelled by Maximus, the murderer of his father.  He guarded him with paternal affection, though he might without any difficulty have got rid of him, being entirely destitute of all resources, had he been animated with the desire of extensive empire, and not with the ambition of being a benefactor.  It was therefore a far greater pleasure to him, when he had adopted the boy, and preserved to him his imperial dignity, to console him by his very humanity and kindness.  Afterwards, when that success was rendering Maximus terrible, Theodosius, in the midst of his perplexing anxieties, was not drawn away to follow the suggestions of a sacrilegious and unlawful curiosity, but sent to John, whose abode was in the desert of Egypt,—for he had learned that this servant of God (whose fame was spreading abroad) was endowed with the gift of prophecy,—and from him he received assurance of victory.  Immediately the slayer of the tyrant Maximus, with the deepest feelings of compassion and respect, restored the boy Valentinianus to his share in the empire from which he had been driven.  Valentinianus being soon after slain by secret assassination, or by some other plot or accident, Theodosius, having again received a response from the prophet, and placing entire confidence in it, marched against the tyrant Eugenius, who had been unlawfully elected to succeed that emperor, and defeated his very powerful army, more by prayer than by the sword.  Some soldiers who were at the battle reported to me that all the missiles they were throwing were snatched from their hands by a vehement wind, which blew from the direction of Theodosius’ army upon the enemy; nor did it only drive with greater velocity the darts which were hurled against them, but also turned back upon their own bodies the darts which they themselves were throwing.  And therefore the poet Claudian, although an alien from the name of Christ, nevertheless says in his praises of him, “O prince, too much beloved by God, for thee Æolus pours armed tempests from their caves; for thee the air fights, and the winds with one accord obey thy bugles.”

Panegyr, de tertio Honorii consulatu.

Preface.

In the five former books, I think I have sufficiently disputed against those who believe that the many false gods, which the Christian truth shows to be useless images, or unclean spirits and pernicious demons, or certainly creatures, not the Creator, are to be worshipped for the advantage of this mortal life, and of terrestrial affairs, with that rite and service which the Greeks call λατρεία, and which is due to the one true God.  And who does not know that, in the face of excessive stupidity and obstinacy, neither these five nor any other number of books whatsoever could be enough, when it is esteemed the glory of vanity to yield to no amount of strength on the side of truth,—certainly to his destruction over whom so heinous a vice tyrannizes?  For, notwithstanding all the assiduity of the physician who attempts to effect a cure, the disease remains unconquered, not through any fault of his, but because of the incurableness of the sick man.  But those who thoroughly weigh the things which they read, having understood and considered them, without any, or with no great and excessive degree of that obstinacy which belongs to a long-cherished error, will more readily judge that, in the five books already finished, we have done more than the necessity of the question demanded, than that we have given it less discussion than it required.  And they cannot have doubted but that all the hatred which the ignorant attempt to bring upon the Christian religion on account of the disasters of this life, and the destruction and change which befall terrestrial things, whilst the learned do not merely dissimulate, but encourage that hatred, contrary to their own consciences, being possessed by a mad impiety;—they cannot have doubted, I say, but that this hatred is devoid of right reflection and reason, and full of most light temerity, and most pernicious animosity.

Chapter 1.—Of Those Who Maintain that They Worship the Gods Not for the Sake of Temporal But Eternal Advantages.

Now, as, in the next place (as the promised order demands), those are to be refuted and taught who contend that the gods of the nations, which the Christian truth destroys, are to be worshipped not on account of this life, but on account of that which is to be after death, I shall do well to commence my disputation with the truthful oracle of the holy psalm, “Blessed is the man whose hope is the Lord God, and who respecteth not vanities and lying follies.”

Ps. xl. 4.

Chapter 2.—What We are to Believe that Varro Thought Concerning the Gods of the Nations, Whose Various Kinds and Sacred Rites He Has Shown to Be Such that He Would Have Acted More Reverently Towards Them Had He Been Altogether Silent Concerning Them.

Who has investigated those things more carefully than Marcus Varro?  Who has discovered them more learnedly?  Who has considered them more attentively?  Who has distinguished them more acutely?  Who has written about them more diligently and more fully?—who, though he is less pleasing in his eloquence, is nevertheless so full of instruction and wisdom, that in all the erudition which we call secular, but they liberal, he will teach the student of things as much as Cicero delights the student of words.  And even Tully himself renders him such testimony, as to say in his Academic books that he had held that disputation which is there carried on with Marcus Varro, “a man,” he adds, “unquestionably the acutest of all men, and, without any doubt, the most learned.”

Of the four books De Acad., dedicated to Varro, only a part of the first is extant.

This man, then, of so distinguished and excellent acquirements, and, as Terentian briefly says of him in a most elegant verse,

“Varro, a man universally informed,”

In his book De Metris,, chapter on phalæcian verses.

who read so much that we wonder when he had time to write, wrote so much that we can scarcely believe any one could have read it all,—this man, I say, so great in talent, so great in learning, had he been an opposer and destroyer of the so-called divine things of which he wrote, and had he said that they pertained to superstition rather than to religion, might perhaps, even in that case, not have written so many things which are ridiculous, contemptible, detestable.  But when he so worshipped these same gods, and so vindicated their worship, as to say, in that same literary work of his, that he was afraid lest they should perish, not by an assault by enemies, but by the negligence of the citizens, and that from this ignominy they are being delivered by him, and are being laid up and preserved in the memory of the good by means of such books, with a zeal far more beneficial than that through which Metellus is declared to have rescued the sacred things of Vesta from the flames, and Æneas to have rescued the Penates from the burning of Troy; and when he nevertheless, gives forth such things to be read by succeeding ages as are deservedly judged by wise and unwise to be unfit to be read, and to be most hostile to the truth of religion; what ought we to think but that a most acute and learned man,—not, however made free by the Holy Spirit,—was overpowered by the custom and laws of his state, and, not being able to be silent about those things by which he was influenced, spoke of them under pretence of commending religion?

Chapter 3.—Varro’s Distribution of His Book Which He Composed Concerning the Antiquities of Human and Divine Things.

He wrote forty-one books of antiquities.  These he divided into human and divine things.  Twenty-five he devoted to human things, sixteen to divine things; following this plan in that division,—namely, to give six books to each of the four divisions of human things.  For he directs his attention to these considerations:  who perform, where they perform, when they perform, what they perform.  Therefore in the first six books he wrote concerning men; in the second six, concerning places; in the third six, concerning times; in the fourth and last six, concerning things.  Four times six, however, make only twenty-four.  But he placed at the head of them one separate work, which spoke of all these things conjointly.

In divine things, the same order he preserved throughout, as far as concerns those things which are performed to the gods.  For sacred things are performed by men in places and times.  These four things I have mentioned he embraced in twelve books, allotting three to each.  For he wrote the first three concerning men, the following three concerning places, the third three concerning times, and the fourth three concerning sacred rites,—showing who should perform, where they should perform, when they should perform, what they should perform, with most subtle distinction.  But because it was necessary to say—and that especially was expected—to whom they should perform sacred rites, he wrote concerning the gods themselves the last three books; and these five times three made fifteen.  But they are in all, as we have said, sixteen.  For he put also at the beginning of these one distinct book, speaking by way of introduction of all which follows; which being finished, he proceeded to subdivide the first three in that five-fold distribution which pertain to men, making the first concerning high priests, the second concerning augurs, the third concerning the fifteen men presiding over the sacred ceremonies.

Tarquin the Proud, having bought the books of the sibyl, appointed two men to preserve and interpret them (Dionys. Halic. Antiq. iv. 62.  These were afterwards increased to ten, while the plebeians were contended for larger privileges; and subsequently five more were added.

Chapter 4.—That from the Disputation of Varro, It Follows that the Worshippers of the Gods Regard Human Things as More Ancient Than Divine Things.

In this whole series of most beautiful and most subtle distributions and distinctions, it will most easily appear evident from the things we have said already, and from what is to be said hereafter, to any man who is not, in the obstinacy of his heart, an enemy to himself, that it is vain to seek and to hope for, and even most impudent to wish for eternal life.  For these institutions are either the work of men or of demons,—not of those whom they call good demons, but, to speak more plainly, of unclean, and, without controversy, malign spirits, who with wonderful slyness and secretness suggest to the thoughts of the impious, and sometimes openly present to their understandings, noxious opinions, by which the human mind grows more and more foolish, and becomes unable to adapt itself to and abide in the immutable and eternal truth, and seek to confirm these opinions by every kind of fallacious attestation in their power.  This very same Varro testifies that he wrote first concerning human things, but afterwards concerning divine things, because the states existed first, and afterward these things were instituted by them.  But the true religion was not instituted by any earthly state, but plainly it established the celestial city.  It, however, is inspired and taught by the true God, the giver of eternal life to His true worshippers.

The following is the reason Varro gives when he confesses that he had written first concerning human things, and afterwards of divine things, because these divine things were instituted by men:—“As the painter is before the painted tablet, the mason before the edifice, so states are before those things which are instituted by states.”  But he says that he would have written first concerning the gods, afterwards concerning men, if he had been writing concerning the whole nature of the gods,—as if he were really writing concerning some portion of, and not all, the nature of the gods; or as if, indeed, some portion of, though not all, the nature of the gods ought not to be put before that of men.  How, then, comes it that in those three last books, when he is diligently explaining the certain, uncertain and select gods, he seems to pass over no portion of the nature of the gods?  Why, then, does he say, “If we had been writing on the whole nature of the gods, we would first have finished the divine things before we touched the human?”  For he either writes concerning the whole nature of the gods, or concerning some portion of it, or concerning no part of it at all.  If concerning it all, it is certainly to be put before human things; if concerning some part of it, why should it not, from the very nature of the case, precede human things?  Is not even some part of the gods to be preferred to the whole of humanity?  But if it is too much to prefer a part of the divine to all human things, that part is certainly worthy to be preferred to the Romans at least.  For he writes the books concerning human things, not with reference to the whole world, but only to Rome; which books he says he had properly placed, in the order of writing, before the books on divine things, like a painter before the painted tablet, or a mason before the building, most openly confessing that, as a picture or a structure, even these divine things were instituted by men.  There remains only the third supposition, that he is to be understood to have written concerning no divine nature, but that he did not wish to say this openly, but left it to the intelligent to infer; for when one says “not all,” usage understands that to mean “some,” but it may be understood as meaning none, because that which is none is neither all nor some.  In fact, as he himself says, if he had been writing concerning all the nature of the gods, its due place would have been before human things in the order of writing.  But, as the truth declares, even though Varro is silent, the divine nature should have taken precedence of Roman things, though it were not all, but only some.  But it is properly put after, therefore it is none.  His arrangement, therefore, was due, not to a desire to give human things priority to divine things, but to his unwillingness to prefer false things to true.  For in what he wrote on human things, he followed the history of affairs; but in what he wrote concerning those things which they call divine, what else did he follow but mere conjectures about vain things?  This, doubtless, is what, in a subtle manner, he wished to signify; not only writing concerning divine things after the human, but even giving a reason why he did so; for if he had suppressed this, some, perchance, would have defended his doing so in one way, and some in another.  But in that very reason he has rendered, he has left nothing for men to conjecture at will, and has sufficiently proved that he preferred men to the institutions of men, not the nature of men to the nature of the gods.  Thus he confessed that, in writing the books concerning divine things, he did not write concerning the truth which belongs to nature, but the falseness which belongs to error; which he has elsewhere expressed more openly (as I have mentioned in the fourth book

Ch. 31.

Chapter 5.—Concerning the Three Kinds of Theology According to Varro, Namely, One Fabulous, the Other Natural, the Third Civil.

Now what are we to say of this proposition of his, namely, that there are three kinds of theology, that is, of the account which is given of the gods; and of these, the one is called mythical, the other physical, and the third civil?  Did the Latin usage permit, we should call the kind which he has placed first in order fabular,

Fabulare.

Chapter 6.—Concerning the Mythic, that Is, the Fabulous, Theology, and the Civil, Against Varro.

O Marcus Varro! thou art the most acute, and without doubt the most learned, but still a man, not God,—now lifted up by the Spirit of God to see and to announce divine things, thou seest, indeed, that divine things are to be separated from human trifles and lies, but thou fearest to offend those most corrupt opinions of the populace, and their customs in public superstitions, which thou thyself, when thou considerest them on all sides, perceivest, and all your literature loudly pronounces to be abhorrent from the nature of the gods, even of such gods as the frailty of the human mind supposes to exist in the elements of this world.  What can the most excellent human talent do here?  What can human learning, though manifold, avail thee in this perplexity?  Thou desirest to worship the natural gods; thou art compelled to worship the civil.  Thou hast found some of the gods to be fabulous, on whom thou vomitest forth very freely what thou thinkest, and, whether thou willest or not, thou wettest therewith even the civil gods.  Thou sayest, forsooth, that the fabulous are adapted to the theatre, the natural to the world, and the civil to the city; though the world is a divine work, but cities and theatres are the works of men, and though the gods who are laughed at in the theatre are not other than those who are adored in the temples; and ye do not exhibit games in honor of other gods than those to whom ye immolate victims.  How much more freely and more subtly wouldst thou have decided these hadst thou said that some gods are natural, others established by men; and concerning those who have been so established, the literature of the poets gives one account, and that of the priests another,—both of which are, nevertheless, so friendly the one to the other, through fellowship in falsehood, that they are both pleasing to the demons, to whom the doctrine of the truth is hostile.

That theology, therefore, which they call natural, being put aside for a moment, as it is afterwards to be discussed, we ask if any one is really content to seek a hope for eternal life from poetical, theatrical, scenic gods?  Perish the thought!  The true God avert so wild and sacrilegious a madness!  What, is eternal life to be asked from those gods whom these things pleased, and whom these things propitiate, in which their own crimes are represented?  No one, as I think, has arrived at such a pitch of headlong and furious impiety.  So then, neither by the fabulous nor by the civil theology does any one obtain eternal life.  For the one sows base things concerning the gods by feigning them, the other reaps by cherishing them; the one scatters lies, the other gathers them together; the one pursues divine things with false crimes, the other incorporates among divine things the plays which are made up of these crimes; the one sounds abroad in human songs impious fictions concerning the gods, the other consecrates these for the festivities of the gods themselves; the one sings the misdeeds and crimes of the gods, the other loves them; the one gives forth or feigns, the other either attests the true or delights in the false.  Both are base; both are damnable.  But the one which is theatrical teaches public abomination, and that one which is of the city adorns itself with that abomination.  Shall eternal life be hoped for from these, by which this short and temporal life is polluted?  Does the society of wicked men pollute our life if they insinuate themselves into our affections, and win our assent? and does not the society of demons pollute the life, who are worshipped with their own crimes?—if with true crimes, how wicked the demons! if with false, how wicked the worship!

When we say these things, it may perchance seem to some one who is very ignorant of these matters that only those things concerning the gods which are sung in the songs of the poets and acted on the stage are unworthy of the divine majesty, and ridiculous, and too detestable to be celebrated, whilst those sacred things which not stage-players but priests perform are pure and free from all unseemliness.  Had this been so, never would any one have thought that these theatrical abominations should be celebrated in their honor, never would the gods themselves have ordered them to be performed to them.  But men are in nowise ashamed to perform these things in the theatres, because similar things are carried on in the temples.  In short, when the fore-mentioned author attempted to distinguish the civil theology from the fabulous and natural, as a sort of third and distinct kind, he wished it to be understood to be rather tempered by both than separated from either.  For he says that those things which the poets write are less than the people ought to follow, whilst what the philosophers say is more than it is expedient for the people to pry into.  “Which,” says he, “differ in such a way, that nevertheless not a few things from both of them have been taken to the account of the civil theology; wherefore we will indicate what the civil theology has in common with that of the poet, though it ought to be more closely connected with the theology of philosophers.”  Civil theology is therefore not quite disconnected from that of the poets.  Nevertheless, in another place, concerning the generations of the gods, he says that the people are more inclined toward the poets than toward the physical theologists.  For in this place he said what ought to be done; in that other place, what was really done.  He said that the latter had written for the sake of utility, but the poets for the sake of amusement.  And hence the things from the poets’ writings, which the people ought not to follow, are the crimes of the gods; which, nevertheless, amuse both the people and the gods.  For, for amusement’s sake, he says, the poets write, and not for that of utility; nevertheless they write such things as the gods will desire, and the people perform.

Chapter 7.—Concerning the Likeness and Agreement of the Fabulous and Civil Theologies.

That theology, therefore, which is fabulous, theatrical, scenic, and full of all baseness and unseemliness, is taken up into the civil theology; and part of that theology, which in its totality is deservedly judged to be worthy of reprobation and rejection, is pronounced worthy to be cultivated and observed;—not at all an incongruous part, as I have undertaken to show, and one which, being alien to the whole body, was unsuitably attached to and suspended from it, but a part entirely congruous with, and most harmoniously fitted to the rest, as a member of the same body.  For what else do those images, forms, ages, sexes, characteristics of the gods show?  If the poets have Jupiter with a beard and Mercury beardless, have not the priests the same?  Is the Priapus of the priests less obscene than the Priapus of the players?  Does he receive the adoration of worshippers in a different form from that in which he moves about the stage for the amusement of spectators?  Is not Saturn old and Apollo young in the shrines where their images stand as well as when represented by actors’ masks?  Why are Forculus, who presides over doors, and Limentinus, who presides over thresholds and lintels, male gods, and Cardea between them feminine, who presides over hinges?  Are not those things found in books on divine things, which grave poets have deemed unworthy of their verses?  Does the Diana of the theatre carry arms, whilst the Diana of the city is simply a virgin?  Is the stage Apollo a lyrist, but the Delphic Apollo ignorant of this art?  But these things are decent compared with the more shameful things.  What was thought of Jupiter himself by those who placed his wet nurse in the Capitol?  Did they not bear witness to Euhemerus, who, not with the garrulity of a fable-teller, but with the gravity of an historian who had diligently investigated the matter, wrote that all such gods had been men and mortals?  And they who appointed the Epulones as parasites at the table of Jupiter, what else did they wish for but mimic sacred rites.  For if any mimic had said that parasites of Jupiter were made use of at his table, he would assuredly have appeared to be seeking to call forth laughter.  Varro said it,—not when he was mocking, but when he was commending the gods did he say it.  His books on divine, not on human, things testify that he wrote this,—not where he set forth the scenic games, but where he explained the Capitoline laws.  In a word, he is conquered, and confesses that, as they made the gods with a human form, so they believed that they are delighted with human pleasures.

For also malign spirits were not so wanting to their own business as not to confirm noxious opinions in the minds of men by converting them into sport.  Whence also is that story about the sacristan of Hercules, which says that, having nothing to do, he took to playing at dice as a pastime, throwing them alternately with the one hand for Hercules, with the other for himself, with this understanding, that if he should win, he should from the funds of the temple prepare himself a supper, and hire a mistress; but if Hercules should win the game, he himself should, at his own expense, provide the same for the pleasure of Hercules.  Then, when he had been beaten by himself, as though by Hercules, he gave to the god Hercules the supper he owed him, and also the most noble harlot Larentina.  But she, having fallen asleep in the temple, dreamed that Hercules had had intercourse with her, and had said to her that she would find her payment with the youth whom she should first meet on leaving the temple, and that she was to believe this to be paid to her by Hercules.  And so the first youth that met her on going out was the wealthy Tarutius, who kept her a long time, and when he died left her his heir.  She, having obtained a most ample fortune, that she should not seem ungrateful for the divine hire, in her turn made the Roman people her heir, which she thought to be most acceptable to the deities; and, having disappeared, the will was found.  By which meritorious conduct they say that she gained divine honors.

Now had these things been feigned by the poets and acted by the mimics, they would without any doubt have been said to pertain to the fabulous theology, and would have been judged worthy to be separated from the dig nity of the civil theology.  But when these shameful things,—not of the poets, but of the people; not of the mimics, but of the sacred things; not of the theatres, but of the temples, that is, not of the fabulous, but of the civil theology,—are reported by so great an author, not in vain do the actors represent with theatrical art the baseness of the gods, which is so great; but surely in vain do the priests attempt, by rites called sacred, to represent their nobleness of character, which has no existence.  There are sacred rites of Juno; and these are celebrated in her beloved island, Samos, where she was given in marriage to Jupiter.  There are sacred rites of Ceres, in which Proserpine is sought for, having been carried off by Pluto.  There are sacred rites of Venus, in which, her beloved Adonis being slain by a boar’s tooth, the lovely youth is lamented.  There are sacred rites of the mother of the gods, in which the beautiful youth Atys, loved by her, and castrated by her through a woman’s jealousy, is deplored by men who have suffered the like calamity, whom they call Galli.  Since, then, these things are more unseemly than all scenic abomination, why is it that they strive to separate, as it were, the fabulous fictions of the poet concerning the gods, as, forsooth, pertaining to the theatre, from the civil theology which they wish to belong to the city, as though they were separating from noble and worthy things, things unworthy and base?  Wherefore there is more reason to thank the stage-actors, who have spared the eyes of men and have not laid bare by theatrical exhibition all the things which are hid by the walls of the temples.  What good is to be thought of their sacred rites which are concealed in darkness, when those which are brought forth into the light are so detestable?  And certainly they themselves have seen what they transact in secret through the agency of mutilated and effeminate men.  Yet they have not been able to conceal those same men miserably and vile enervated and corrupted.  Let them persuade whom they can that they transact anything holy through such men, who, they cannot deny, are numbered, and live among their sacred things.  We know not what they transact, but we know through whom they transact; for we know what things are transacted on the stage, where never, even in a chorus of harlots, hath one who is mutilated or an effeminate appeared.  And, nevertheless, even these things are acted by vile and infamous characters; for, indeed, they ought not to be acted by men of good character.  What, then, are those sacred rites, for the performance of which holiness has chosen such men as not even the obscenity of the stage has admitted?

Chapter 8.—Concerning the Interpretations, Consisting of Natural Explanations, Which the Pagan Teachers Attempt to Show for Their Gods.

But all these things, they say, have certain physical, that is, natural interpretations, showing their natural meaning; as though in this disputation we were seeking physics and not theology, which is the account, not of nature, but of God.  For although He who is the true God is God, not by opinion, but by nature, nevertheless all nature is not God; for there is certainly a nature of man, of a beast, of a tree, of a stone,—none of which is God.  For if, when the question is concerning the mother of the gods, that from which the whole system of interpretation starts certainly is, that the mother of the gods is the earth, why do we make further inquiry? why do we carry our investigation through all the rest of it?  What can more manifestly favor them who say that all those gods were men?  For they are earth-born in the sense that the earth is their mother.  But in the true theology the earth is the work, not the mother, of God.  But in whatever way their sacred rites may be interpreted, and whatever reference they may have to the nature of things, it is not according to nature, but contrary to nature, that men should be effeminates.  This disease, this crime, this abomination, has a recognized place among those sacred things, though even depraved men will scarcely be compelled by torments to confess they are guilty of it.  Again, if these sacred rites, which are proved to be fouler than scenic abominations, are excused and justified on the ground that they have their own interpretations, by which they are shown to symbolize the nature of things, why are not the poetical things in like manner excused and justified?  For many have interpreted even these in like fashion, to such a degree that even that which they say is the most monstrous and most horrible,—namely, that Saturn devoured his own children,—has been interpreted by some of them to mean that length of time, which is signified by the name of Saturn, consumes whatever it begets; or that, as the same Varro thinks, Saturn belongs to seeds which fall back again into the earth from whence they spring.  And so one interprets it in one way, and one in another.  And the same is to be said of all the rest of this theology.

And, nevertheless, it is called the fabulous theology, and is censured, cast off, rejected, together with all such interpretations belonging to it.  And not only by the natural theology, which is that of the philosophers, but also by this civil theology, concerning which we are speaking, which is asserted to pertain to cities and peoples, it is judged worthy of repudiation, because it has invented unworthy things concerning the gods.  Of which, I wot, this is the secret:  that those most acute and learned men, by whom those things were written, understood that both theologies ought to be rejected,—to wit, both that fabulous and this civil one,—but the former they dared to reject, the latter they dared not; the former they set forth to be censured, the latter they showed to be very like it; not that it might be chosen to be held in preference to the other, but that it might be understood to be worthy of being rejected together with it.  And thus, without danger to those who feared to censure the civil theology, both of them being brought into contempt, that theology which they call natural might find a place in better disposed minds; for the civil and the fabulous are both fabulous and both civil.  He who shall wisely inspect the vanities and obscenities of both will find that they are both fabulous; and he who shall direct his attention to the scenic plays pertaining to the fabulous theology in the festivals of the civil gods, and in the divine rites of the cities, will find they are both civil.  How, then, can the power of giving eternal life be attributed to any of those gods whose own images and sacred rites convict them of being most like to the fabulous gods, which are most openly reprobated, in forms, ages, sex, characteristics, marriages, generations, rites; in all which things they are understood either to have been men, and to have had their sacred rites and solemnities instituted in their honor according to the life or death of each of them, the demons suggesting and confirming this error, or certainly most foul spirits, who, taking advantage of some occasion or other, have stolen into the minds of men to deceive them?

Chapter 9.—Concerning the Special Offices of the Gods.

And as to those very offices of the gods, so meanly and so minutely portioned out, so that they say that they ought to be supplicated, each one according to his special function,—about which we have spoken much already, though not all that is to be said concerning it,—are they not more consistent with mimic buffoonery than divine majesty?  If any one should use two nurses for his infant, one of whom should give nothing but food, the other nothing but drink, as these make use of two goddesses for this purpose, Educa and Potina, he should certainly seem to be foolish, and to do in his house a thing worthy of a mimic.  They would have Liber to have been named from “liberation,” because through him males at the time of copulation are liberated by the emission of the seed.  They also say that Libera (the same in their opinion as Venus) exercises the same function in the case of women, because they say that they also emit seed; and they also say that on this account the same part of the male and of the female is placed in the temple, that of the male to Liber, and that of the female to Libera.  To these things they add the women assigned to Liber, and the wine for exciting lust.  Thus the Bacchanalia are celebrated with the utmost insanity, with respect to which Varro himself confesses that such things would not be done by the Bacchanals except their minds were highly excited.  These things, however, afterwards displeased a saner senate, and it ordered them to be discontinued.  Here, at length, they perhaps perceived how much power unclean spirits, when held to be gods, exercise over the minds of men.  These things, certainly, were not to be done in the theatres; for there they play, not rave, although to have gods who are delighted with such plays is very like raving.

But what kind of distinction is this which he makes between the religious and the superstitious man, saying that the gods are feared

Timeri.

Chapter 10.—Concerning the Liberty of Seneca, Who More Vehemently Censured the Civil Theology Than Varro Did the Fabulous.

That liberty, in truth, which this man wanted, so that he did not dare to censure that theology of the city, which is very similar to the theatrical, so openly as he did the theatrical itself, was, though not fully, yet in part possessed by Annæus Seneca, whom we have some evidence to show to have flourished in the times of our apostles.  It was in part possessed by him, I say, for he possessed it in writing, but not in living.  For in that book which he wrote against superstition,

Mentioned also by Tertullian, Apol. 12, but not extant.

 He next relates those things which are wont to be done in the Capitol, and with the utmost intrepidity insists that they are such things as one could only believe to be done by men making sport, or by madmen.  For having spoken with derision of this, that in the Egyptian sacred rites Osiris, being lost, is lamented for, but straightway, when found, is the occasion of great joy by his reappearance, because both the losing and the finding of him are feigned; and yet that grief and that joy which are elicited thereby from those who have lost nothing and found nothing are real;—having I say, so spoken of this, he says, “Still there is a fixed time for this frenzy.  It is tolerable to go mad once in the year.  Go into the Capitol.  One is suggesting divine commands

Numina.  Another reading is nomina; and with either reading another translation is admissible; “One is announcing to a god the names (or gods) who salute him.”

This liberty Varro did not enjoy.  It was only the poetical theology he seemed to censure.  The civil, which this man cuts to pieces, he was not bold enough to impugn.  But if we attend to the truth, the temples where these things are performed are far worse than the theatres where they are represented.  Whence, with respect to these sacred rites of the civil theology, Seneca preferred, as the best course to be followed by a wise man, to feign respect for them in act, but to have no real regard for them at heart.  “All which things,” he says, “a wise man will observe as being commanded by the laws, but not as being pleasing to the gods.”  And a little after he says, “And what of this, that we unite the gods in marriage, and that not even naturally, for we join brothers and sisters?  We marry Bellona to Mars, Venus to Vulcan, Salacia to Neptune.  Some of them we leave unmarried, as though there were no match for them, which is surely needless, especially when there are certain unmarried goddesses, as Populonia, or Fulgora, or the goddess Rumina, for whom I am not astonished that suitors have been awanting.  All this ignoble crowd of gods, which the superstition of ages has amassed, we ought,” he says, “to adore in such a way as to remember all the while that its worship belongs rather to custom than to reality.”  Wherefore, neither those laws nor customs instituted in the civil theology that which was pleasing to the gods, or which pertained to reality.  But this man, whom philosophy had made, as it were, free, nevertheless, because he was an illustrious senator of the Roman people, worshipped what he censured, did what he condemned, adored what he reproached, because, forsooth, philosophy had taught him something great,—namely, not to be superstitious in the world, but, on account of the laws of cities and the customs of men, to be an actor, not on the stage, but in the temples,—conduct the more to be condemned, that those things which he was deceitfully acting he so acted that the people thought he was acting sincerely.  But a stage-actor would rather delight people by acting plays than take them in by false pretences.

Chapter 11.—What Seneca Thought Concerning the Jews.

Seneca, among the other superstitions of civil theology, also found fault with the sacred things of the Jews, and especially the sabbaths, affirming that they act uselessly in keeping those seventh days, whereby they lose through idleness about the seventh part of their life, and also many things which demand immediate attention are damaged.  The Christians, however, who were already most hostile to the Jews, he did not dare to mention, either for praise or blame, lest, if he praised them, he should do so against the ancient custom of his country, or, perhaps, if he should blame them, he should do so against his own will.

When he was speaking concerning those Jews, he said, “When, meanwhile, the customs of that most accursed nation have gained such strength that they have been now received in all lands, the conquered have given laws to the conquerors.”  By these words he expresses his astonishment; and, not knowing what the providence of God was leading him to say, subjoins in plain words an opinion by which he showed what he thought about the meaning of those sacred institutions:  “For,” he says, “those, however, know the cause of their rites, whilst the greater part of the people know not why they perform theirs.”  But concerning the solemnities of the Jews, either why or how far they were instituted by divine authority, and afterwards, in due time, by the same authority taken away from the people of God, to whom the mystery of eternal life was revealed, we have both spoken elsewhere, especially when we were treating against the Manichæans, and also intend to speak in this work in a more suitable place.

Chapter 12.—That When Once the Vanity of the Gods of the Nations Has Been Exposed, It Cannot Be Doubted that They are Unable to Bestow Eternal Life on Any One, When They Cannot Afford Help Even with Respect to the Things Of this Temporal Life.

Now, since there are three theologies, which the Greeks call respectively mythical, physical, and political, and which may be called in Latin fabulous, natural, and civil; and since neither from the fabulous, which even the worshippers of many and false gods have themselves most freely censured, nor from the civil, of which that is convicted of being a part, or even worse than it, can eternal life be hoped for from any of these theologies,—if any one thinks that what has been said in this book is not enough for him, let him also add to it the many and various dissertations concerning God as the giver of felicity, contained in the former books, especially the fourth one.

For to what but to felicity should men consecrate themselves, were felicity a goddess?  However, as it is not a goddess, but a gift of God, to what God but the giver of happiness ought we to consecrate ourselves, who piously love eternal life, in which there is true and full felicity?  But I think, from what has been said, no one ought to doubt that none of those gods is the giver of happiness, who are worshipped with such shame, and who, if they are not so worshipped, are more shamefully enraged, and thus confess that they are most foul spirits.  Moreover, how can he give eternal life who cannot give happiness?  For we mean by eternal life that life where there is endless happiness.  For if the soul live in eternal punishments, by which also those unclean spirits shall be tormented, that is rather eternal death than eternal life.  For there is no greater or worse death than when death never dies.  But because the soul from its very nature, being created immortal, cannot be without some kind of life, its utmost death is alienation from the life of God in an eternity of punishment.  So, then, He only who gives true happiness gives eternal life, that is, an endlessly happy life.  And since those gods whom this civil theology worships have been proved to be unable to give this happiness, they ought not to be worshipped on account of those temporal and terrestrial things, as we showed in the five former books, much less on account of eternal life, which is to be after death, as we have sought to show in this one book especially, whilst the other books also lend it their co-operation.  But since the strength of inveterate habit has its roots very deep, if any one thinks that I have not disputed sufficiently to show that this civil theology ought to be rejected and shunned, let him attend to another book which, with God’s help, is to be joined to this one.

Preface.

It will be the duty of those who are endowed with quicker and better understandings, in whose case the former books are sufficient, and more than sufficient, to effect their intended object, to bear with me with patience and equanimity whilst I attempt with more than ordinary diligence to tear up and eradicate depraved and ancient opinions hostile to the truth of piety, which the long-continued error of the human race has fixed very deeply in unenlightened minds; co-operating also in this, according to my little measure, with the grace of Him who, being the true God, is able to accomplish it, and on whose help I depend in my work; and, for the sake of others, such should not deem superfluous what they feel to be no longer necessary for themselves.  A very great matter is at stake when the true and truly holy divinity is commended to men as that which they ought to seek after and to worship; not, however, on account of the transitory vapor of mortal life, but on account of life eternal, which alone is blessed, although the help necessary for this frail life we are now living is also afforded us by it.

Chapter 1.—Whether, Since It is Evident that Deity is Not to Be Found in the Civil Theology, We are to Believe that It is to Be Found in the Select Gods.

If there is any one whom the sixth book, which I have last finished, has not persuaded that this divinity, or, so to speak, deity—for this word also our authors do not hesitate to use, in order to translate more accurately that which the Greeks call θεότης;—if there is any one, I say, whom the sixth book has not persuaded that this divinity or deity is not to be found in that theology which they call civil, and which Marcus Varro has explained in sixteen books,—that is, that the happiness of eternal life is not attainable through the worship of gods such as states have established to be worshipped, and that in such a form,—perhaps, when he has read this book, he will not have anything further to desire in order to the clearing up of this question.  For it is possible that some one may think that at least the select and chief gods, whom Varro comprised in his last book, and of whom we have not spoken sufficiently, are to be worshipped on account of the blessed life, which is none other than eternal.  In respect to which matter I do not say what Tertullian said, perhaps more wittily than truly, “If gods are selected like onions, certainly the rest are rejected as bad.”

Tert. Apol. 13, Nec electio sine reprobatione; and Ad Nationes, ii. 9, Si dei bulbi seliguntur, qui non seliguntur, reprobi pronuntiantur.

Chapter 3.—How There is No Reason Which Can Be Shown for the Selection of Certain Gods, When the Administration of More Exalted Offices is Assigned to Many Inferior Gods.

 What is the cause, therefore, which has driven so many select gods to these very small works, in which they are excelled by Vitumnus and Sentinus, though little known and sunk in obscurity, inasmuch as they confer the munificent gifts of life and sensation?  For the select Janus bestows an entrance, and, as it were, a door

Januam.

Chapter 4.—The Inferior Gods, Whose Names are Not Associated with Infamy, Have Been Better Dealt with Than the Select Gods, Whose Infamies are Celebrated.

However, any one who eagerly seeks for celebrity and renown, might congratulate those select gods, and call them fortunate, were it not that he saw that they have been selected more to their injury than to their honor.  For that low crowd of gods have been protected by their very meanness and obscurity from being overwhelmed with infamy.  We laugh, indeed, when we see them distributed by the mere fiction of human opinions, according to the special works assigned to them, like those who farm small portions of the public revenue, or like workmen in the street of the silversmiths,

Vicus argentarius.

Chapter 5.—Concerning the More Secret Doctrine of the Pagans, and Concerning the Physical Interpretations.

But let us hear their own physical interpretations by which they attempt to color, as with the appearance of profounder doctrine, the baseness of most miserable error.  Varro, in the first place, commends these interpretations so strongly as to say, that the ancients invented the images, badges, and adornments of the gods, in order that when those who went to the mysteries should see them with their bodily eyes, they might with the eyes of their mind see the soul of the world, and its parts, that is, the true gods; and also that the meaning which was intended by those who made their images with the human form, seemed to be this,—namely, that the mind of mortals, which is in a human body, is very like to the immortal mind,

Cicero, Tusc. Quæst. v. 13.

Chapter 6.—Concerning the Opinion of Varro, that God is the Soul of the World, Which Nevertheless, in Its Various Parts, Has Many Souls Whose Nature is Divine.

The same Varro, then, still speaking by anticipation, says that he thinks that God is the soul of the world (which the Greeks call κόσμος), and that this world itself is God; but as a wise man, though he consists of body and mind, is nevertheless called wise on account of his mind, so the world is called God on account of mind, although it consists of mind and body. Here he seems, in some fashion at least, to acknowledge one God; but that he may introduce more, he adds that the world is divided into two parts, heaven and earth, which are again divided each into two parts, heaven into ether and air, earth into water and land, of all which the ether is the highest, the air second, the water third, and the earth the lowest.  All these four parts, he says, are full of souls; those which are in the ether and air being immortal, and those which are in the water and on the earth mortal.  From the highest part of the heavens to the orbit of the moon there are souls, namely, the stars and planets; and these are not only understood to be gods, but are seen to be such.  And between the orbit of the moon and the commencement of the region of clouds and winds there are aerial souls; but these are seen with the mind, not with the eyes, and are called Heroes, and Lares, and Genii.  This is the natural theology which is briefly set forth in these anticipatory statements, and which satisfied not Varro only, but many philosophers besides.  This I must discuss more carefully, when, with the help of God, I shall have completed what I have yet to say concerning the civil theology, as far as it concerns the select gods.

Chapter 7.—Whether It is Reasonable to Separate Janus and Terminus as Two Distinct Deities.

Who, then, is Janus, with whom Varro commences?  He is the world.  Certainly a very brief and unambiguous reply.  Why, then, do they say that the beginnings of things pertain to him, but the ends to another whom they call Terminus?  For they say that two months have been dedicated to these two gods, with reference to beginnings and ends—January to Janus, and February to Terminus—over and above those ten months which commence with March and end with December.  And they say that that is the reason why the Terminalia are celebrated in the month of February, the same month in which the sacred purification is made which they call Februum, and from which the month derives its name.

An interesting account of the changes made in the Roman year by Numa is given in Plutarch’s life of that king.  Ovid also (Fasti, ii.) explains the derivation of February, telling us that it was the last month of the old year, and took its name from the lustrations performed then:  Februa Romani dixere piamina patres.

Chapter 8.—For What Reason the Worshippers of Janus Have Made His Image with Two Faces, When They Would Sometimes Have It Be Seen with Four.

But now let the interpretation of the two-faced image be produced.  For they say that it has two faces, one before and one behind, because our gaping mouths seem to resemble the world:  whence the Greeks call the palate οὐρανός, and some Latin poets,

Ennius, in Cicero, De Nat. Deor. ii. 18.

Chapter 9.—Concerning the Power of Jupiter, and a Comparison of Jupiter with Janus.

But they also show whom they would have Jove (who is also called Jupiter) understood to be.  He is the god, say they, who has the power of the causes by which anything comes to be in the world.  And how great a thing this is, that most noble verse of Virgil testifies:

“Happy is he who has learned the causes of things.”

Georgic, ii. 470.

But why is Janus preferred to him?  Let that most acute and most learned man answer us this question.  “Because,” says he, “Janus has dominion over first things, Jupiter over highest

Summa, which also includes the meaning—last.

Now this would have been rightly said had the first parts of things which are done been distinguished from the highest parts; as, for instance, it is the beginning of a thing done to set out, the highest part to arrive.  The commencing to learn is the first part of a thing begun, the acquirement of knowledge is the highest part.  And so of all things:  the beginnings are first, the ends highest.  This matter, however, has been already discussed in connection with Janus and Terminus.  But the causes which are attributed to Jupiter are things effecting, not things effected; and it is impossible for them to be prevented in time by things which are made or done, or by the beginnings of such things; for the thing which makes is always prior to the thing which is made.  Therefore, though the beginnings of things which are made or done pertain to Janus, they are nevertheless not prior to the efficient causes which they attribute to Jupiter.  For as nothing takes place without being preceded by an efficient cause, so without an efficient cause nothing begins to take place.  Verily, if the people call this god Jupiter, in whose power are all the causes of all natures which have been made, and of all natural things, and worship him with such insults and infamous criminations, they are guilty of more shocking sacrilege than if they should totally deny the existence of any god.  It would therefore be better for them to call some other god by the name of Jupiter—some one worthy of base and criminal honors; substituting instead of Jupiter some vain fiction (as Saturn is said to have had a stone given to him to devour instead of his son,) which they might make the subject of their blasphemies, rather than speak of that god as both thundering and committing adultery,—ruling the whole world, and laying himself out for the commission of so many licentious acts,—having in his power nature and the highest causes of all natural things, but not having his own causes good.

Next, I ask what place they find any longer for this Jupiter among the gods, if Janus is the world; for Varro defined the true gods to be the soul of the world, and the parts of it.  And therefore whatever falls not within this definition, is certainly not a true god, according to them.  Will they then say that Jupiter is the soul of the world, and Janus the body —that is, this visible world?  If they say this, it will not be possible for them to affirm that Janus is a god.  For even, according to them, the body of the world is not a god, but the soul of the world and its parts.  Wherefore Varro, seeing this, says that he thinks God is the soul of the world, and that this world itself is God; but that as a wise man though he consists of soul and body, is nevertheless called wise from the soul, so the world is called God from the soul, though it consists of soul and body.  Therefore the body of the world alone is not God, but either the soul of it alone, or the soul and the body together, yet so as that it is God not by virtue of the body, but by virtue of the soul.  If, therefore, Janus is the world, and Janus is a god, will they say, in order that Jupiter may be a god, that he is some part of Janus?  For they are wont rather to attribute universal existence to Jupiter; whence the saying, “All things are full of Jupiter.”

Virgil, Eclog. iii. 60, who borrows the expression from the Phœnomena of Aratus.

“Almighty Jove, progenitor of kings, and things, and gods,

And eke the mother of the gods, god one and all.”

But in the same book he expounds these verses by saying that as the male emits seed, and the female receives it, so Jupiter, whom they believed to be the world, both emits all seeds from himself and receives them into himself.  For which reason, he says, Soranus wrote, “Jove, progenitor and mother;” and with no less reason said that one and all were the same.  For the world is one, and in that one are all things.

Chapter 10.—Whether the Distinction Between Janus and Jupiter is a Proper One.

Since, therefore, Janus is the world, and Jupiter is the world, wherefore are Janus and Jupiter two gods, while the world is but one?  Why do they have separate temples, separate altars, different rites, dissimilar images?  If it be because the nature of beginnings is one, and the nature of causes another, and the one has received the name of Janus, the other of Jupiter; is it then the case, that if one man has two distinct offices of authority, or two arts, two judges or two artificers are spoken of, because the nature of the offices or the arts is different?  So also with respect to one god:  if he have the power of beginnings and of causes, must he therefore be thought to be two gods, because beginnings and causes are two things?  But if they think that this is right, let them also affirm that Jupiter is as many gods as they have given him surnames, on account of many powers; for the things from which these surnames are applied to him are many and diverse.  I shall mention a few of them.

Chapter 11.—Concerning the Surnames of Jupiter, Which are Referred Not to Many Gods, But to One and the Same God.

They have called him Victor, Invictus, Opitulus, Impulsor, Stator, Centumpeda, Supinalis, Tigillus, Almus, Ruminus, and other names which it were long to enumerate.  But these surnames they have given to one god on account of diverse causes and powers, but yet have not compelled him to be, on account of so many things, as many gods.  They gave him these surnames because he conquered all things; because he was conquered by none; because he brought help to the needy; because he had the power of impelling, stopping, stablishing, throwing on the back; because as a beam

Tigillus.

“Almighty Jove, progenitor of kings, and things, and gods,

And eke the mother of the gods,” etc.

Why, then, was he called Ruminus, when they who may perchance inquire more diligently may find that he is also that goddess Rumina?

If, then, it was rightly thought unworthy of the majesty of the gods, that in one ear of corn one god should have the care of the joint, another that of the husk, how much more unworthy of that majesty is it, that one thing, and that of the lowest kind, even the giving of the pap to animals that they may be nourished, should be under the care of two gods, one of whom is Jupiter himself, the very king of all things, who does this not along with his own wife, but with some ignoble Rumina (unless perhaps he himself is Rumina, being Ruminus for males and Rumina for females)!  I should certainly have said that they had been unwilling to apply to Jupiter a feminine name, had he not been styled in these verses “progenitor and mother,” and had I not read among other surnames of his that of Pecunia [money], which we found as a goddess among those petty deities, as I have already mentioned in the fourth book.  But since both males and females have money [pecuniam], why has he not been called both Pecunius and Pecunia?  That is their concern.

Chapter 12.—That Jupiter is Also Called Pecunia.

How elegantly they have accounted for this name!  “He is also called Pecunia,” say they, “because all things belong to him.”  Oh how grand an explanation of the name of a deity!  Yes; he to whom all things belong is most meanly and most contumeliously called Pecunia.  In comparison of all things which are contained by heaven and earth, what are all things together which are possessed by men under the name of money?

Pecunia,that is, property; the original meaning of pecunia being property in cattle, then property or wealth of any kind.  Comp. Augustin, De discipl. Christ. 6.

Chapter 13.—That When It is Expounded What Saturn Is, What Genius Is, It Comes to This, that Both of Them are Shown to Be Jupiter.

But why speak more of this Jupiter, with whom perchance all the rest are to be identified; so that, he being all, the opinion as to the existence of many gods may remain as a mere opinion, empty of all truth?  And they are all to be referred to him, if his various parts and powers are thought of as so many gods, or if the principle of mind which they think to be diffused through all things has received the names of many gods from the various parts which the mass of this visible world combines in itself, and from the manifold administration of nature.  For what is Saturn also?  “One of the principal gods,” he says, “who has dominion over all sowings.”  Does not the exposition of the verses of Valerius Soranus teach that Jupiter is the world, and that he emits all seeds from himself, and receives them into himself?

It is he, then, with whom is the dominion of all sowings.  What is Genius?  “He is the god who is set over, and has the power of begetting, all things.”  Who else than the world do they believe to have this power, to which it has been said:

“Almighty Jove, progenitor and mother?”

And when in another place he says that Genius is the rational soul of every one, and therefore exists separately in each individual, but that the corresponding soul of the world is God, he just comes back to this same thing,—namely, that the soul of the world itself is to be held to be, as it were, the universal genius.  This, therefore, is what he calls Jupiter.  For if every genius is a god, and the soul of every man a genius, it follows that the soul of every man is a god.  But if very absurdity compels even these theologists themselves to shrink from this, it remains that they call that genius god by special and pre-eminent distinction, whom they call the soul of the world, and therefore Jupiter.

Chapter 14.—Concerning the Offices of Mercury and Mars.

But they have not found how to refer Mercury and Mars to any parts of the world, and to the works of God which are in the elements; and therefore they have set them at least over human works, making them assistants in speaking and in carrying on wars.  Now Mercury, if he has also the power of the speech of the gods, rules also over the king of the gods himself, if Jupiter, as he receives from him the faculty of speech, also speaks according as it is his pleasure to permit him—which surely is absurd; but if it is only the power over human speech which is held to be attributed to him, then we say it is incredible that Jupiter should have condescended to give the pap not only to children, but also to beasts—from which he has been surnamed Ruminus—and yet should have been unwilling that the care of our speech, by which we excel the beasts, should pertain to him.  And thus speech itself both belongs to Jupiter, and is Mercury.  But if speech itself is said to be Mercury, as those things which are said concerning him by way of interpretation show it to be;—for he is said to have been called Mercury, that is, he who runs between,

Quasi medius currens.

Chapter 15.—Concerning Certain Stars Which the Pagans Have Called by the Names of Their Gods.

But possibly these stars which have been called by their names are these gods.  For they call a certain star Mercury, and likewise a certain other star Mars.  But among those stars which are called by the names of gods, is that one which they call Jupiter, and yet with them Jupiter is the world.  There also is that one they call Saturn, and yet they give to him no small property besides,—namely, all seeds.  There also is that brightest of them all which is called by them Venus, and yet they will have this same Venus to be also the moon:—not to mention how Venus and Juno are said by them to contend about that most brilliant star, as though about another golden apple.  For some say that Lucifer belongs to Venus, and some to Juno.  But, as usual, Venus conquers.  For by far the greatest number assign that star to Venus, so much so that there is scarcely found one of them who thinks otherwise.  But since they call Jupiter the king of all, who will not laugh to see his star so far surpassed in brilliancy by the star of Venus?  For it ought to have been as much more brilliant than the rest, as he himself is more powerful.  They answer that it only appears so because it is higher up, and very much farther away from the earth.  If, therefore, its greater dignity has deserved a higher place, why is Saturn higher in the heavens than Jupiter?  Was the vanity of the fable which made Jupiter king not able to reach the stars?  And has Saturn been permitted to obtain at least in the heavens, what he could not obtain in his own kingdom nor in the Capitol?

But why has Janus received no star?  If it is because he is the world, and they are all in him, the world is also Jupiter’s, and yet he has one.  Did Janus compromise his case as best he could, and instead of the one star which he does not have among the heavenly bodies, accept so many faces on earth?  Again, if they think that on account of the stars alone Mercury and Mars are parts of the world, in order that they may be able to have them for gods, since speech and war are not parts of the world, but acts of men, how is it that they have made no altars, established no rites, built no temples for Aries, and Taurus, and Cancer, and Scorpio, and the rest which they number as the celestial signs, and which consist not of single stars, but each of them of many stars, which also they say are situated above those already mentioned in the highest part of the heavens, where a more constant motion causes the stars to follow an undeviating course?  And why have they not reckoned them as gods, I do not say among those select gods, but not even among those, as it were, plebeian gods?

Chapter 16.—Concerning Apollo and Diana, and the Other Select Gods Whom They Would Have to Be Parts of the World.

Although they would have Apollo to be a diviner and physician, they have nevertheless given him a place as some part of the world.  They have said that he is also the sun; and likewise they have said that Diana, his sister, is the moon, and the guardian of roads.  Whence also they will have her be a virgin, because a road brings forth nothing.  They also make both of them have arrows, because those two planets send their rays from the heavens to the earth.  They make Vulcan to be the fire of the world; Neptune the waters of the world; Father Dis, that is, Orcus, the earthy and lowest part of the world.  Liber and Ceres they set over seeds,—the former over the seeds of males, the latter over the seeds of females; or the one over the fluid part of seed, but the other over the dry part.  And all this together is referred to the world, that is, to Jupiter, who is called “progenitor and mother,” because he emitted all seeds from himself, and received them into himself.  For they also make this same Ceres to be the Great Mother, who they say is none other than the earth, and call her also Juno.  And therefore they assign to her the second causes of things, notwithstanding that it has been said to Jupiter, “progenitor and mother of the gods;” because, according to them, the whole world itself is Jupiter’s.  Minerva, also, because they set her over human arts, and did not find even a star in which to place her, has been said by them to be either the highest ether, or even the moon.  Also Vesta herself they have thought to be the highest of the goddesses, because she is the earth; although they have thought that the milder fire of the world, which is used for the ordinary purposes of human life, not the more violent fire, such as belongs to Vulcan, is to be assigned to her.  And thus they will have all those select gods to be the world and its parts,—some of them the whole world, others of them its parts; the whole of it Jupiter,—its parts, Genius, Mater Magna, Sol and Luna, or rather Apollo and Diana, and so on.  And sometimes they make one god many things; sometimes one thing many gods.  Many things are one god in the case of Jupiter; for both the whole world is Jupiter, and the sky alone is Jupiter, and the star alone is said and held to be Jupiter.  Juno also is mistress of second causes,—Juno is the air, Juno is the earth; and had she won it over Venus, Juno would have been the star.  Likewise Minerva is the highest ether, and Minerva is likewise the moon, which they suppose to be in the lowest limit of the ether.  And also they make one thing many gods in this way.  The world is both Janus and Jupiter; also the earth is Juno, and Mater Magna, and Ceres.

Chapter 17.—That Even Varro Himself Pronounced His Own Opinions Regarding the Gods Ambiguous.

And the same is true with respect to all the rest, as is true with respect to those things which I have mentioned for the sake of example.  They do not explain them, but rather involve them.  They rush hither and thither, to this side or to that, according as they are driven by the impulse of erratic opinion; so that even Varro himself has chosen rather to doubt concerning all things, than to affirm anything.  For, having written the first of the three last books concerning the certain gods, and having commenced in the second of these to speak of the uncertain gods, he says:  “I ought not to be censured for having stated in this book the doubtful opinions concerning the gods.  For he who, when he has read them, shall think that they both ought to be, and can be, conclusively judged of, will do so himself.  For my own part, I can be more easily led to doubt the things which I have written in the first book, than to attempt to reduce all the things I shall write in this one to any orderly system.”  Thus he makes uncertain not only that book concerning the uncertain gods, but also that other concerning the certain gods.  Moreover, in that third book concerning the select gods, after having exhibited by anticipation as much of the natural theology as he deemed necessary, and when about to commence to speak of the vanities and lying insanities of the civil theology, where he was not only without the guidance of the truth of things, but was also pressed by the authority of tradition, he says:  “I will write in this book concerning the public gods of the Roman people, to whom they have dedicated temples, and whom they have conspicuously distinguished by many adornments; but, as Xenophon of Colophon writes, I will state what I think, not what I am prepared to maintain:  it is for man to think those things, for God to know them.”

It is not, then, an account of things comprehended and most certainly believed which he promised, when about to write those things which were instituted by men.  He only timidly promises an account of things which are but the subject of doubtful opinion.  Nor, indeed, was it possible for him to affirm with the same certainty that Janus was the world, and such like things; or to discover with the same certainty such things as how Jupiter was the son of Saturn, while Saturn was made subject to him as king:—he could, I say, neither affirm nor discover such things with the same certainty with which he knew such things as that the world existed, that the heavens and earth existed, the heavens bright with stars, and the earth fertile through seeds; or with the same perfect conviction with which he believed that this universal mass of nature is governed and administered by a certain invisible and mighty force.

Chapter 18.—A More Credible Cause of the Rise of Pagan Error.

A far more credible account of these gods is given, when it is said that they were men, and that to each one of them sacred rites and solemnities were instituted, according to his particular genius, manners, actions, circumstances; which rites and solemnities, by gradually creeping through the souls of men, which are like demons, and eager for things which yield them sport, were spread far and wide; the poets adorning them with lies, and false spirits seducing men to receive them.  For it is far more likely that some youth, either impious himself, or afraid of being slain by an impious father, being desirous to reign, dethroned his father, than that (according to Varro’s interpretation) Saturn was overthrown by his son Jupiter:  for cause, which belongs to Jupiter, is before seed, which belongs to Saturn.  For had this been so, Saturn would never have been before Jupiter, nor would he have been the father of Jupiter.  For cause always precedes seed, and is never generated from seed.  But when they seek to honor by natural interpretation most vain fables or deeds of men, even the acutest men are so perplexed that we are compelled to grieve for their folly also.

Chapter 19.—Concerning the Interpretations Which Compose the Reason of the Worship of Saturn.

They said, says Varro, that Saturn was wont to devour all that sprang from him, because seeds returned to the earth from whence they sprang.  And when it is said that a lump of earth was put before Saturn to be devoured instead of Jupiter, it is signified, he says, that before the art of ploughing was discovered, seeds were buried in the earth by the hands of men.  The earth itself, then, and not seeds, should have been called Saturn, because it in a manner devours what it has brought forth, when the seeds which have sprung from it return again into it.  And what has Saturn’s receiving of a lump of earth instead of Jupiter to do with this, that the seeds were covered in the soil by the hands of men?  Was the seed kept from being devoured, like other things, by being covered with the soil?  For what they say would imply that he who put on the soil took away the seed, as Jupiter is said to have been taken away when the lump of soil was offered to Saturn instead of him, and not rather that the soil, by covering the seed, only caused it to be devoured the more eagerly.  Then, in that way, Jupiter is the seed, and not the cause of the seed, as was said a little before.

But what shall men do who cannot find anything wise to say, because they are interpreting foolish things?  Saturn has a pruning-knife.  That, says Varro, is on account of agriculture.  Certainly in Saturn’s reign there as yet existed no agriculture, and therefore the former times of Saturn are spoken of, because, as the same Varro interprets the fables, the primeval men lived on those seeds which the earth produced spontaneously.  Perhaps he received a pruning-knife when he had lost his sceptre; that he who had been a king, and lived at ease during the first part of his time, should become a laborious workman whilst his son occupied the throne.  Then he says that boys were wont to be immolated to him by certain peoples, the Carthaginians for instance; and also that adults were immolated by some nations, for example the Gauls—because, of all seeds, the human race is the best.  What need we say more concerning this most cruel vanity.  Let us rather attend to and hold by this, that these interpretations are not carried up to the true God,—a living, incorporeal, unchangeable nature, from whom a blessed life enduring for ever may be obtained,—but that they end in things which are corporeal, temporal, mutable, and mortal.  And whereas it is said in the fables that Saturn castrated his father Cœlus, this signifies, says Varro, that the divine seed belongs to Saturn, and not to Cœlus; for this reason, as far as a reason can be discovered, namely, that in heaven

Cælo.

Chapter 20.—Concerning the Rites of Eleusinian Ceres.

Now among the rites of Ceres, those Eleusinian rites are much famed which were in the highest repute among the Athenians, of which Varro offers no interpretation except with respect to corn, which Ceres discovered, and with respect to Proserpine, whom Ceres lost, Orcus having carried her away.  And this Proserpine herself, he says, signifies the fecundity of seeds.  But as this fecundity departed at a certain season, whilst the earth wore an aspect of sorrow through the consequent sterility, there arose an opinion that the daughter of Ceres, that is, fecundity itself, who was called Proserpine, from proserpere (to creep forth, to spring), had been carried away by Orcus, and detained among the inhabitants of the nether world; which circumstance was celebrated with public mourning.  But since the same fecundity again returned, there arose joy because Proserpine had been given back by Orcus, and thus these rites were instituted.  Then Varro adds, that many things are taught in the mysteries of Ceres which only refer to the discovery of fruits.

Chapter 22.—Concerning Neptune, and Salacia and Venilia.

Now Neptune had Salacia to wife, who they say is the nether waters of the sea.  Wherefore was Venilia also joined to him?  Was it not simply through the lust of the soul desiring a greater number of demons to whom to prostitute itself, and not because this goddess was necessary to the perfection of their sacred rites?  But let the interpretation of this illustrious theology be brought forward to restrain us from this censuring by rendering a satisfactory reason.  Venilia, says this theology, is the wave which comes to the shore, Salacia the wave which returns into the sea.  Why, then, are there two goddesses, when it is one wave which comes and returns?  Certainly it is mad lust itself, which in its eagerness for many deities resembles the waves which break on the shore.  For though the water which goes is not different from that which returns, still the soul which goes and returns not is defiled by two demons, whom it has taken occasion by this false pretext to invite.  I ask thee, O Varro, and you who have read such works of learned men, and think ye have learned something great,—I ask you to interpret this, I do not say in a manner consistent with the eternal and unchangeable nature which alone is God, but only in a manner consistent with the doctrine concerning the soul of the world and its parts, which ye think to be the true gods.  It is a somewhat more tolerable thing that ye have made that part of the soul of the world which pervades the sea your god Neptune.  Is the wave, then, which comes to the shore and returns to the main, two parts of the world, or two parts of the soul of the world?  Who of you is so silly as to think so?  Why, then, have they made to you two goddesses?  The only reason seems to be, that your wise ancestors have provided, not that many gods should rule you, but that many of such demons as are delighted with those vanities and falsehoods should possess you.  But why has that Salacia, according to this interpretation, lost the lower part of the sea, seeing that she was represented as subject to her husband?  For in saying that she is the receding wave, ye have put her on the surface.  Was she enraged at her husband for taking Venilia as a concubine, and thus drove him from the upper part of the sea?

Chapter 23.—Concerning the Earth, Which Varro Affirms to Be a Goddess, Because that Soul of the World Which He Thinks to Be God Pervades Also This Lowest Part of His Body, and Imparts to It a Divine Force.

Surely the earth, which we see full of its own living creatures, is one; but for all that, it is but a mighty mass among the elements, and the lowest part of the world.  Why, then, would they have it to be a goddess?  Is it because it is fruitful?  Why, then, are not men rather held to be gods, who render it fruitful by cultivating it; but though they plough it, do not adore it?  But, say they, the part of the soul of the world which pervades it makes it a goddess.  As if it were not a far more evident thing, nay, a thing which is not called in question, that there is a soul in man.  And yet men are not held to be gods, but (a thing to be sadly lamented), with wonderful and pitiful delusion, are subjected to those who are not gods, and than whom they themselves are better, as the objects of deserved worship and adoration.  And certainly the same Varro, in the book concerning the select gods, affirms that there are three grades of soul in universal nature.  One which pervades all the living parts of the body, and has not sensation, but only the power of life,—that principle which penetrates into the bones, nails and hair.  By this principle in the world trees are nourished, and grow without being possessed of sensation, and live in a manner peculiar to themselves.  The second grade of soul is that in which there is sensation.  This principle penetrates into the eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, and the organs of sensation.  The third grade of soul is the highest, and is called mind, where intelligence has its throne.  This grade of soul no mortal creatures except man are possessed of.  Now this part of the soul of the world, Varro says, is called God, and in us is called Genius.  And the stones and earth in the world, which we see, and which are not pervaded by the power of sensation, are, as it were, the bones and nails of God.  Again, the sun, moon, and stars, which we perceive, and by which He perceives, are His organs of perception.  Moreover, the ether is His mind; and by the virtue which is in it, which penetrates into the stars, it also makes them gods; and because it penetrates through them into the earth, it makes it the goddess Tellus, whence again it enters and permeates the sea and ocean, making them the god Neptune.

Let him return from this, which he thinks to be natural theology, back to that from which he went out, in order to rest from the fatigue occasioned by the many turnings and windings of his path.  Let him return, I say, let him return to the civil theology.  I wish to detain him there a while.  I have somewhat to say which has to do with that theology.  I am not yet saying, that if the earth and stones are similar to our bones and nails, they are in like manner devoid of intelligence, as they are devoid of sensation.  Nor am I saying that, if our bones and nails are said to have intelligence, because they are in a man who has intelligence, he who says that the things analogous to these in the world are gods, is as stupid as he is who says that our bones and nails are men.  We shall perhaps have occasion to dispute these things with the philosophers.  At present, however, I wish to deal with Varro as a political theologian.  For it is possible that, though he may seem to have wished to lift up his head, as it were, into the liberty of natural theology, the consciousness that the book with which he was occupied was one concerning a subject belonging to civil theology, may have caused him to relapse into the point of view of that theology, and to say this in order that the ancestors of his nation, and other states, might not be believed to have bestowed on Neptune an irrational worship.  What I am to say is this:  Since the earth is one, why has not that part of the soul of the world which permeates the earth made it that one goddess which he calls Tellus?  But had it done so, what then had become of Orcus, the brother of Jupiter and Neptune, whom they call Father Dis?

See ch. 16.

Chapter 24.—Concerning the Surnames of Tellus and Their Significations, Which, Although They Indicate Many Properties, Ought Not to Have Established the Opinion that There is a Corresponding Number of Gods.

The one earth, then, on account of this fourfold virtue, ought to have had four surnames, but not to have been considered as four gods,—as Jupiter and Juno, though they have so many surnames, are for all that only single deities,—for by all these surnames it is signified that a manifold virtue belongs to one god or to one goddess; but the multitude of surnames does not imply a multitude of gods.  But as sometimes even the vilest women themselves grow tired of those crowds which they have sought after under the impulse of wicked passion, so also the soul, become vile, and prostituted to impure spirits, sometimes begins to loathe to multiply to itself gods to whom to surrender itself to be polluted by them, as much as it once delighted in so doing.  For Varro himself, as if ashamed of that crowd of gods, would make Tellus to be one goddess.  “They say,” says he, “that whereas the one great mother has a tympanum, it is signified that she is the orb of the earth; whereas she has towers on her head, towns are signified; and whereas seats are fixed round about her, it is signified that whilst all things move, she moves not.  And their having made the Galli to serve this goddess, signifies that they who are in need of seed ought to follow the earth for in it all seeds are found.  By their throwing themselves down before her, it is taught,” he says, “that they who cultivate the earth should not sit idle, for there is always something for them to do.  The sound of the cymbals signifies the noise made by the throwing of iron utensils, and by men’s hands, and all other noises connected with agricultural operations; and these cymbals are of brass, because the ancients used brazen utensils in their agriculture before iron was discovered.  They place beside the goddess an unbound and tame lion, to show that there is no kind of land so wild and so excessively barren as that it would be profitless to attempt to bring it in and cultivate it.”  Then he adds that, because they gave many names and surnames to mother Tellus, it came to be thought that these signified many gods.  “They think,” says he, “that Tellus is Ops, because the earth is improved by labor; Mother, because it brings forth much; Great, because it brings forth seed; Proserpine, because fruits creep forth from it; Vesta, because it is invested with herbs.  And thus,” says he, “they not at all absurdly identify other goddesses with the earth.”  If, then, it is one goddess (though, if the truth were consulted, it is not even that), why do they nevertheless separate it into many?  Let there be many names of one goddess, and let there not be as many goddesses as there are names.

But the authority of the erring ancients weighs heavily on Varro, and compels him, after having expressed this opinion, to show signs of uneasiness; for he immediately adds, “With which things the opinion of the ancients, who thought that there were really many goddesses, does not conflict.”  How does it not conflict, when it is entirely a different thing to say that one goddess has many names, and to say that there are many goddesses?  But it is possible, he says, that the same thing may both be one, and yet have in it a plurality of things.  I grant that there are many things in one man; are there therefore in him many men?  In like manner, in one goddess there are many things; are there therefore also many goddesses?  But let them divide, unite, multiply, reduplicate, and implicate as they like.

These are the famous mysteries of Tellus and the Great Mother, all of which are shown to have reference to mortal seeds and to agriculture.  Do these things, then,—namely, the tympanum, the towers, the Galli, the tossing to and fro of limbs, the noise of cymbals, the images of lions,—do these things, having this reference and this end, promise eternal life?  Do the mutilated Galli, then, serve this Great Mother in order to signify that they who are in need of seed should follow the earth, as though it were not rather the case that this very service caused them to want seed?  For whether do they, by following this goddess, acquire seed, being in want of it, or, by following her, lose seed when they have it?  Is this to interpret or to deprecate?  Nor is it considered to what a degree malign demons have gained the upper hand, inasmuch as they have been able to exact such cruel rites without having dared to promise any great things in return for them.  Had the earth not been a goddess, men would have, by laboring, laid their hands on it in order to obtain seed through it, and would not have laid violent hands on themselves in order to lose seed on account of it.  Had it not been a goddess, it would have become so fertile by the hands of others, that it would not have compelled a man to be rendered barren by his own hands; nor that in the festival of Liber an honorable matron put a wreath on the private parts of a man in the sight of the multitude, where perhaps her husband was standing by blushing and perspiring, if there is any shame left in men; and that in the celebration of marriages the newly-married bride was ordered to sit upon Priapus.  These things are bad enough, but they are small and contemptible in comparison with that most cruel abomination, or most abominable cruelty, by which either set is so deluded that neither perishes of its wound.  There the enchantment of fields is feared; here the amputation of members is not feared.  There the modesty of the bride is outraged, but in such a manner as that neither her fruitfulness nor even her virginity is taken away; here a man is so mutilated that he is neither changed into a woman nor remains a man.

Chapter 25.—The Interpretation of the Mutilation of Atys Which the Doctrine of the Greek Sages Set Forth.

Varro has not spoken of that Atys, nor sought out any interpretation for him, in memory of whose being loved by Ceres the Gallus is mutilated.  But the learned and wise Greeks have by no means been silent about an interpretation so holy and so illustrious.  The celebrated philosopher Porphyry has said that Atys signifies the flowers of spring, which is the most beautiful season, and therefore was mutilated because the flower falls before the fruit appears.

In the book De Ratione Naturali Deorum.

Chapter 26.—Concerning the Abomination of the Sacred Rites of the Great Mother.

Concerning the effeminates consecrated to the same Great Mother, in defiance of all the modesty which belongs to men and women, Varro has not wished to say anything, nor do I remember to have read anywhere aught concerning them.  These effeminates, no later than yesterday, were going through the streets and places of Carthage with anointed hair, whitened faces, relaxed bodies, and feminine gait, exacting from the people the means of maintaining their ignominious lives.  Nothing has been said concerning them.  Interpretation failed, reason blushed, speech was silent.  The Great Mother has surpassed all her sons, not in greatness of deity, but of crime.  To this monster not even the monstrosity of Janus is to be compared.  His deformity was only in his image; hers was the deformity of cruelty in her sacred rites.  He has a redundancy of members in stone images; she inflicts the loss of members on men.  This abomination is not surpassed by the licentious deeds of Jupiter, so many and so great.  He, with all his seductions of women, only disgraced heaven with one Ganymede; she, with so many avowed and public effeminates, has both defiled the earth and outraged heaven.  Perhaps we may either compare Saturn to this Magna Mater, or even set him before her in this kind of abominable cruelty, for he mutilated his father.  But at the festivals of Saturn, men could rather be slain by the hands of others than mutilated by their own.  He devoured his sons, as the poets say, and the natural theologists interpret this as they list.  History says he slew them.  But the Romans never received, like the Carthaginians, the custom of sacrificing their sons to him.  This Great Mother of the gods, however, has brought mutilated men into Roman temples, and has preserved that cruel custom, being believed to promote the strength of the Romans by emasculating their men.  Compared with this evil, what are the thefts of Mercury, the wantonness of Venus, and the base and flagitious deeds of the rest of them, which we might bring forward from books, were it not that they are daily sung and danced in the theatres?  But what are these things to so great an evil,—an evil whose magnitude was only proportioned to the greatness of the Great Mother,—especially as these are said to have been invented by the poets? as if the poets had also invented this that they are acceptable to the gods.  Let it be imputed, then, to the audacity and impudence of the poets that these things have been sung and written of.  But that they have been incorporated into the body of divine rites and honors, the deities themselves demanding and extorting that incorporation, what is that but the crime of the gods? nay more, the confession of demons and the deception of wretched men?  But as to this that the Great Mother is considered to be worshipped in the appropriate form when she is worshipped by the consecration of mutilated men, this is not an invention of the poets, nay, they have rather shrunk from it with horror than sung of it.  Ought any one, then, to be consecrated to these select gods, that he may live blessedly after death, consecrated to whom he could not live decently before death, being subjected to such foul superstitions, and bound over to unclean demons?  But all these things, says Varro, are to be referred to the world.

Mundum.

Chapter 27.—Concerning the Figments of the Physical Theologists, Who Neither Worship the True Divinity, Nor Perform the Worship Wherewith the True Divinity Should Be Served.

We see that these select gods have, indeed, become more famous than the rest; not, however, that their merits may be brought to light, but that their opprobrious deeds may not be hid.  Whence it is more credible that they were men, as not only poetic but also historical literature has handed down.  For this which Virgil says,

“Then from Olympus’ heights came down

Good Saturn, exiled from his throne

By Jove, his mightier heir;”

Virgil, Æneid, viii. 319–20.

and what follows with reference to this affair, is fully related by the historian Euhemerus, and has been translated into Latin by Ennius.  And as they who have written before us in the Greek or in the Latin tongue against such errors as these have said much concerning this matter, I have thought it unnecessary to dwell upon it.  When I consider those physical reasons, then, by which learned and acute men attempt to turn human things into divine things, all I see is that they have been able to refer these things only to temporal works and to that which has a corporeal nature, and even though invisible still mutable; and this is by no means the true God.  But if this worship had been performed as the symbolism of ideas at least congruous with religion, though it would indeed have been cause of grief that the true God was not announced and proclaimed by its symbolism, nevertheless it could have been in some degree borne with, when it did not occasion and command the performance of such foul and abominable things.  But since it is impiety to worship the body or the soul for the true God, by whose indwelling alone the soul is happy, how much more impious is it to worship those things through which neither soul nor body can obtain either salvation or human honor?  Wherefore if with temple, priest, and sacrifice, which are due to the true God, any element of the world be worshipped, or any created spirit, even though not impure and evil, that worship is still evil, not because the things are evil by which the worship is performed, but because those things ought only to be used in the worship of Him to whom alone such worship and service are due.  But if any one insist that he worships the one true God,—that is, the Creator of every soul and of every body,—with stupid and monstrous idols, with human victims, with putting a wreath on the male organ, with the wages of unchastity, with the cutting of limbs, with emasculation, with the consecration of effeminates, with impure and obscene plays, such a one does not sin because he worships One who ought not to be worshipped, but because he worships Him who ought to be worshipped in a way in which He ought not to be worshipped.  But he who worships with such things,—that is, foul and obscene things,—and that not the true God, namely, the maker of soul and body, but a creature, even though not a wicked creature, whether it be soul or body, or soul and body together, twice sins against God, because he both worships for God what is not God, and also worships with such things as neither God nor what is not God ought to be worshipped with.  It is, indeed, manifest how these pagans worship,—that is, how shamefully and criminally they worship; but what or whom they worship would have been left in obscurity, had not their history testi fied that those same confessedly base and foul rites were rendered in obedience to the demands of the gods, who exacted them with terrible severity.  Wherefore it is evident beyond doubt that this whole civil theology is occupied in inventing means for attracting wicked and most impure spirits, inviting them to visit senseless images, and through these to take possession of stupid hearts.

Chapter 28.—That the Doctrine of Varro Concerning Theology is in No Part Consistent with Itself.

To what purpose, then, is it that this most learned and most acute man Varro attempts, as it were, with subtle disputation, to reduce and refer all these gods to heaven and earth?  He cannot do it.  They go out of his hands like water; they shrink back; they slip down and fall.  For when about to speak of the females, that is, the goddesses, he says, “Since, as I observed in the first book concerning places, heaven and earth are the two origins of the gods, on which account they are called celestials and terrestrials, and as I began in the former books with heaven, speaking of Janus, whom some have said to be heaven, and others the earth, so I now commence with Tellus in speaking concerning the goddesses.”  I can understand what embarrassment so great a mind was experiencing.  For he is influenced by the perception of a certain plausible resemblance, when he says that the heaven is that which does, and the earth that which suffers, and therefore attributes the masculine principle to the one, and the feminine to the other, not considering that it is rather He who made both heaven and earth who is the maker of both activity and passivity.  On this principle he interprets the celebrated mysteries of the Samothracians, and promises, with an air of great devoutness, that he will by writing expound these mysteries, which have not been so much as known to his countrymen, and will send them his exposition.  Then he says that he had from many proofs gathered that, in those mysteries, among the images one signifies heaven, another the earth, another the patterns of things, which Plato calls ideas.  He makes Jupiter to signify heaven, Juno the earth, Minerva the ideas.  Heaven, by which anything is made; the earth, from which it is made; and the pattern, according to which it is made.  But, with respect to the last, I am forgetting to say that Plato attributed so great an importance to these ideas as to say, not that anything was made by heaven according to them, but that according to them heaven itself was made.

In the Timæus.

Chapter 29.—That All Things Which the Physical Theologists Have Referred to the World and Its Parts, They Ought to Have Referred to the One True God.

For all those things which, according to the account given of those gods, are referred to the world by so-called physical interpretation, may, without any religious scruple, be rather assigned to the true God, who made heaven and earth, and created every soul and every body; and the following is the manner in which we see that this may be done.  We worship God,—not heaven and earth, of which two parts this world consists, nor the soul or souls diffused through all living things,—but God who made heaven and earth, and all things which are in them; who made every soul, whatever be the nature of its life, whether it have life without sensation and reason, or life with sensation, or life with both sensation and reason.

Chapter 31.—What Benefits God Gives to the Followers of the Truth to Enjoy Over and Above His General Bounty.

For, besides such benefits as, according to this administration of nature of which we have made some mention, He lavishes on good and bad alike, we have from Him a great manifestation of great love, which belongs only to the good.  For although we can never sufficiently give thanks to Him, that we are, that we live, that we behold heaven and earth, that we have mind and reason by which to seek after Him who made all these things, nevertheless, what hearts, what number of tongues, shall affirm that they are sufficient to render thanks to Him for this, that He hath not wholly departed from us, laden and overwhelmed with sins, averse to the contemplation of His light, and blinded by the love of darkness, that is, of iniquity, but hath sent to us His own Word, who is His only Son, that by His birth and suffering for us in the flesh, which He assumed, we might know how much God valued man, and that by that unique sacrifice we might be purified from all our sins, and that, love being shed abroad in our hearts by His Spirit, we might, having surmounted all difficulties, come into eternal rest, and the ineffable sweetness of the contemplation of Himself?

Chapter 32.—That at No Time in the Past Was the Mystery of Christ’s Redemption Awanting, But Was at All Times Declared, Though in Various Forms.

This mystery of eternal life, even from the beginning of the human race, was, by certain signs and sacraments suitable to the times, announced through angels to those to whom it was meet.  Then the Hebrew people was congregated into one republic, as it were, to perform this mystery; and in that republic was foretold, sometimes through men who understood what they spake, and sometimes through men who understood not, all that had transpired since the advent of Christ until now, and all that will transpire.  This same nation, too, was afterwards dispersed through the nations, in order to testify to the scriptures in which eternal salvation in Christ had been declared.  For not only the prophecies which are contained in words, nor only the precepts for the right conduct of life, which teach morals and piety, and are contained in the sacred writings,—not only these, but also the rites, priesthood, tabernacle or temple, altars, sacrifices, ceremonies, and whatever else belongs to that service which is due to God, and which in Greek is properly called λατρεία,—all these signified and fore-announced those things which we who believe in Jesus Christ unto eternal life believe to have been fulfilled, or behold in process of fulfillment, or confidently believe shall yet be fulfilled.

Chapter 33.—That Only Through the Christian Religion Could the Deceit of Malign Spirits, Who Rejoice in the Errors of Men, Have Been Manifested.

This, the only true religion, has alone been able to manifest that the gods of the nations are most impure demons, who desire to be thought gods, availing themselves of the names of certain defunct souls, or the appearance of mundane creatures, and with proud impurity rejoicing in things most base and infamous, as though in divine honors, and envying human souls their conversion to the true God.  From whose most cruel and most impious dominion a man is liberated when he believes on Him who has afforded an example of humility, following which men may rise as great as was that pride by which they fell.  Hence are not only those gods, concerning whom we have already spoken much, and many others belonging to different nations and lands, but also those of whom we are now treating, who have been selected as it were into the senate of the gods,—selected, however, on account of the notoriousness of their crimes, not on account of the dignity of their virtues,—whose sacred things Varro attempts to refer to certain natural reasons, seeking to make base things honorable, but cannot find how to square and agree with these reasons, because these are not the causes of those rites, which he thinks, or rather wishes to be thought to be so.  For had not only these, but also all others of this kind, been real causes, even though they had nothing to do with the true God and eternal life, which is to be sought in religion, they would, by affording some sort of reason drawn from the nature of things, have mitigated in some degree that offence which was occasioned by some turpitude or absurdity in the sacred rites, which was not understood.  This he attempted to do in respect to certain fables of the theatres, or mysteries of the shrines; but he did not acquit the theatres of likeness to the shrines, but rather condemned the shrines for likeness to the theatres.  However, he in some way made the attempt to soothe the feelings shocked by horrible things, by rendering what he would have to be natural interpretations.

Chapter 34.—Concerning the Books of Numa Pompilius, Which the Senate Ordered to Be Burned, in Order that the Causes of Sacred Rights Therein Assigned Should Not Become Known.

But, on the other hand, we find, as the same most learned man has related, that the causes of the sacred rites which were given from the books of Numa Pompilius could by no means be tolerated, and were considered unworthy, not only to become known to the religious by being read, but even to lie written in the darkness in which they had been concealed.  For now let me say what I promised in the third book of this work to say in its proper place.  For, as we read in the same Varro’s book on the worship of the gods, “A certain one Terentius had a field at the Janiculum, and once, when his ploughman was passing the plough near to the tomb of Numa Pompilius, he turned up from the ground the books of Numa, in which were written the causes of the sacred institutions; which books he carried to the prætor, who, having read the beginnings of them, referred to the senate what seemed to be a matter of so much importance.  And when the chief senators had read certain of the causes why this or that rite was instituted, the senate assented to the dead Numa, and the conscript fathers, as though concerned for the interests of religion, ordered the prætor to burn the books.”

Plutarch’s Numa; Livy, xl. 29.

Chapter 35.—Concerning the Hydromancy Through Which Numa Was Befooled by Certain Images of Demons Seen in the Water.

For Numa himself also, to whom no prophet of God, no holy angel was sent, was driven to have recourse to hydromancy, that he might see the images of the gods in the water (or, rather, appearances whereby the demons made sport of him), and might learn from them what he ought to ordain and observe in the sacred rites.  This kind of divination, says Varro, was introduced from the Persians, and was used by Numa himself, and at an after time by the philosopher Pythagoras.  In this divination, he says, they also inquire at the inhabitants of the nether world, and make use of blood; and this the Greeks call νεκρομαντείαν.  But whether it be called necromancy or hydromancy it is the same thing, for in either case the dead are supposed to foretell future things.  But by what artifices these things are done, let themselves consider; for I am unwilling to say that these artifices were wont to be prohibited by the laws, and to be very severely punished even in the Gentile states, before the advent of our Saviour.  I am unwilling, I say, to affirm this, for perhaps even such things were then allowed.  However, it was by these arts that Pompilius learned those sacred rites which he gave forth as facts, whilst he concealed their causes; for even he himself was afraid of that which he had learned.  The senate also caused the books in which those causes were recorded to be burned.  What is it, then, to me, that Varro attempts to adduce all sorts of fanciful physical interpretations, which if these books had contained, they would certainly not have been burned?  For otherwise the conscript fathers would also have burned those books which Varro published and dedicated to the high priest Cæsar.

Comp. Lactantius, Instit. i. 6.

Chapter 1.—That the Question of Natural Theology is to Be Discussed with Those Philosophers Who Sought a More Excellent Wisdom.

We shall require to apply our mind with far greater intensity to the present question than was requisite in the solution and unfolding of the questions handled in the preceding books; for it is not with ordinary men, but with philosophers that we must confer concerning the theology which they call natural.  For it is not like the fabulous, that is, the theatrical; nor the civil, that is, the urban theology:  the one of which displays the crimes of the gods, whilst the other manifests their criminal desires, which demonstrate them to be rather malign demons than gods.  It is, we say, with philosophers we have to confer with respect to this theology,—men whose very name, if rendered into Latin, signifies those who profess the love of wisdom.  Now, if wisdom is God, who made all things, as is attested by the divine authority and truth,

Wisdom vii. 24–27.

Chapter 2.—Concerning the Two Schools of Philosophers, that Is, the Italic and Ionic, and Their Founders.

As far as concerns the literature of the Greeks, whose language holds a more illustrious place than any of the languages of the other nations, history mentions two schools of philosophers, the one called the Italic school, originating in that part of Italy which was formerly called Magna Græcia; the other called the Ionic school, having its origin in those regions which are still called by the name of Greece.  The Italic school had for its founder Pythagoras of Samos, to whom also the term “philosophy” is said to owe its origin.  For whereas formerly those who seemed to excel others by the laudable manner in which they regulated their lives were called sages, Pythagoras, on being asked what he professed, replied that he was a philosopher, that is, a student or lover of wisdom; for it seemed to him to be the height of arrogance to profess oneself a sage.

Sapiens,that is, a wise man, one who had attained to wisdom.

Chapter 3.—Of the Socratic Philosophy.

Socrates is said to have been the first who directed the entire effort of philosophy to the correction and regulation of manners, all who went before him having expended their greatest efforts in the investigation of physical, that is, natural phenomena.  However, it seems to me that it cannot be certainly discovered whether Socrates did this because he was wearied of obscure and uncertain things, and so wished to direct his mind to the discovery of something manifest and certain, which was necessary in order to the obtaining of a blessed life,—that one great object toward which the labor, vigilance, and industry of all philosophers seem to have been directed,—or whether (as some yet more favorable to him suppose) he did it because he was unwilling that minds defiled with earthly desires should essay to raise themselves upward to divine things.  For he saw that the causes of things were sought for by them,—which causes he believed to be ultimately reducible to nothing else than the will of the one true and supreme God,—and on this account he thought they could only be comprehended by a purified mind; and therefore that all diligence ought to be given to the purification of the life by good morals, in order that the mind, delivered from the depressing weight of lusts, might raise itself upward by its native vigor to eternal things, and might, with purified understanding, contemplate that nature which is incorporeal and unchangeable light, where live the causes of all created natures.  It is evident, however, that he hunted out and pursued, with a wonderful pleasantness of style and argument, and with a most pointed and insinuating urbanity, the foolishness of ignorant men, who thought that they knew this or that,—sometimes confessing his own ignorance, and sometimes dissimulating his knowledge, even in those very moral questions to which he seems to have directed the whole force of his mind.  And hence there arose hostility against him, which ended in his being calumniously impeached, and condemned to death.  Afterwards, however, that very city of the Athenians, which had publicly condemned him, did publicly bewail him,—the popular indignation having turned with such vehemence on his accusers, that one of them perished by the violence of the multitude, whilst the other only escaped a like punishment by voluntary and perpetual exile.

Illustrious, therefore, both in his life and in his death, Socrates left very many disciples of his philosophy, who vied with one another in desire for proficiency in handling those moral questions which concern the chief good (summum bonum), the possession of which can make a man blessed; and because, in the disputations of Socrates, where he raises all manner of questions, makes assertions, and then demolishes them, it did not evidently appear what he held to be the chief good, every one took from these disputations what pleased him best, and every one placed the final good

Finem boni.

Chapter 4.—Concerning Plato, the Chief Among the Disciples of Socrates, and His Threefold Division of Philosophy.

But, among the disciples of Socrates, Plato was the one who shone with a glory which far excelled that of the others, and who not unjustly eclipsed them all.  By birth, an Athenian of honorable parentage, he far surpassed his fellow-disciples in natural endowments, of which he was possessed in a wonderful degree.  Yet, deeming himself and the Socratic discipline far from sufficient for bringing philosophy to perfection, he travelled as extensively as he was able, going to every place famed for the cultivation of any science of which he could make himself master.  Thus he learned from the Egyptians whatever they held and taught as important; and from Egypt, passing into those parts of Italy which were filled with the fame of the Pythagoreans, he mastered, with the greatest facility, and under the most eminent teachers, all the Italic philosophy which was then in vogue.  And, as he had a peculiar love for his master Socrates, he made him the speaker in all his dialogues, putting into his mouth whatever he had learned, either from others, or from the efforts of his own powerful intellect, tempering even his moral disputations with the grace and politeness of the Socratic style.  And, as the study of wisdom consists in action and contemplation, so that one part of it may be called active, and the other contemplative,—the active part having reference to the conduct of life, that is, to the regulation of morals, and the contemplative part to the investigation into the causes of nature and into pure truth,—Socrates is said to have excelled in the active part of that study, while Pythagoras gave more attention to its contemplative part, on which he brought to bear all the force of his great intellect.  To Plato is given the praise of having perfected philosophy by combining both parts into one. He then divides it into three parts,—the first moral, which is chiefly occupied with action; the second natural, of which the object is contemplation; and the third rational, which discriminates between the true and the false.  And though this last is necessary both to action and contemplation, it is contemplation, nevertheless, which lays peculiar claim to the office of investigating the nature of truth.  Thus this tripartite division is not contrary to that which made the study of wisdom to consist in action and contemplation.  Now, as to what Plato thought with respect to each of these parts,—that is, what he believed to be the end of all actions, the cause of all natures, and the light of all intelligences,—it would be a question too long to discuss, and about which we ought not to make any rash affirmation.  For, as Plato liked and constantly affected the well-known method of his master Socrates, namely, that of dissimulating his knowledge or his opinions, it is not easy to discover clearly what he himself thought on various matters, any more than it is to discover what were the real opinions of Socrates.  We must, nevertheless, insert into our work certain of those opinions which he expresses in his writings, whether he himself uttered them, or narrates them as expressed by others, and seems himself to approve of,—opinions sometimes favorable to the true religion, which our faith takes up and defends, and sometimes contrary to it, as, for example, in the questions concerning the existence of one God or of many, as it relates to the truly blessed life which is to be after death.  For those who are praised as having most closely followed Plato, who is justly preferred to all the other philosophers of the Gentiles, and who are said to have manifested the greatest acuteness in understanding him, do perhaps entertain such an idea of God as to admit that in Him are to be found the cause of existence, the ultimate reason for the understanding, and the end in reference to which the whole life is to be regulated.  Of which three things, the first is understood to pertain to the natural, the second to the rational, and the third to the moral part of philosophy.  For if man has been so created as to attain, through that which is most excellent in him, to that which excels all things,—that is, to the one true and absolutely good God, without whom no nature exists, no doctrine instructs, no exercise profits,—let Him be sought in whom all things are secure to us, let Him be discovered in whom all truth becomes certain to us, let Him be loved in whom all becomes right to us.

Chapter 5.—That It is Especially with the Platonists that We Must Carry on Our Disputations on Matters of Theology, Their Opinions Being Preferable to Those of All Other Philosophers.

If, then, Plato defined the wise man as one who imitates, knows, loves this God, and who is rendered blessed through fellowship with Him in His own blessedness, why discuss with the other philosophers?  It is evident that none come nearer to us than the Platonists.  To them, therefore, let that fabulous theology give place which delights the minds of men with the crimes of the gods; and that civil theology also, in which impure demons, under the name of gods, have seduced the peoples of the earth given up to earthly pleasures, desiring to be honored by the errors of men, and by filling the minds of their worshippers with impure desires, exciting them to make the representation of their crimes one of the rites of their worship, whilst they themselves found in the spectators of these exhibitions a most pleasing spectacle,—a theology in which, whatever was honorable in the temple, was defiled by its mixture with the obscenity of the theatre, and whatever was base in the theatre was vindicated by the abominations of the temples.  To these philosophers also the interpretations of Varro must give place, in which he explains the sacred rites as having reference to heaven and earth, and to the seeds and operations of perishable things; for, in the first place, those rites have not the signification which he would have men believe is attached to them, and therefore truth does not follow him in his attempt so to interpret them; and even if they had this signification, still those things ought not to be worshipped by the rational soul as its god which are placed below it in the scale of nature, nor ought the soul to prefer to itself as gods things to which the true God has given it the preference.  The same must be said of those writings pertaining to the sacred rites, which Numa Pompilius took care to conceal by causing them to be buried along with himself, and which, when they were afterwards turned up by the plough, were burned by order of the senate.  And, to treat Numa with all honor, let us mention as belonging to the same rank as these writings that which Alexander of Macedon wrote to his mother as communicated to him by Leo, an Egyptian high priest.  In this letter not only Picus and Faunus, and Æneas and Romulus or even Hercules, and Æsculapius and Liber, born of Semele, and the twin sons of Tyndareus, or any other mortals who have been deified, but even the principal gods themselves,

Dii majorum gentium.

Chapter 6.—Concerning the Meaning of the Platonists in that Part of Philosophy Called Physical.

These philosophers, then, whom we see not undeservedly exalted above the rest in fame and glory, have seen that no material body is God, and therefore they have transcended all bodies in seeking for God.  They have seen that whatever is changeable is not the most high God, and therefore they have transcended every soul and all changeable spirits in seeking the supreme.  They have seen also that, in every changeable thing, the form which makes it that which it is, whatever be its mode or nature, can only be through Him who truly is, because He is unchangeable.  And therefore, whether we consider the whole body of the world, its figure, qualities, and orderly movement, and also all the bodies which are in it; or whether we consider all life, either that which nourishes and maintains, as the life of trees, or that which, besides this, has also sensation, as the life of beasts; or that which adds to all these intelligence, as the life of man; or that which does not need the support of nutriment, but only maintains, feels, understands, as the life of angels,—all can only be through Him who absolutely is.  For to Him it is not one thing to be, and another to live, as though He could be, not living; nor is it to Him one thing to live, and another thing to understand, as though He could live, not understanding; nor is it to Him one thing to understand, another thing to be blessed, as though He could understand and not be blessed.  But to Him to live, to understand, to be blessed, are to be.  They have understood, from this unchangeableness and this simplicity, that all things must have been made by Him, and that He could Himself have been made by none.  For they have considered that whatever is is either body or life, and that life is something better than body, and that the nature of body is sensible, and that of life intelligible.  Therefore they have preferred the intelligible nature to the sensible.  We mean by sensible things such things as can be perceived by the sight and touch of the body; by intelligible things, such as can be understood by the sight of the mind.  For there is no corporeal beauty, whether in the condition of a body, as figure, or in its movement, as in music, of which it is not the mind that judges.  But this could never have been, had there not existed in the mind itself a superior form of these things, without bulk, without noise of voice, without space and time.  But even in respect of these things, had the mind not been mutable, it would not have been possible for one to judge better than another with regard to sensible forms.  He who is clever, judges better than he who is slow, he who is skilled than he who is unskillful, he who is practised than he who is unpractised; and the same person judges better after he has gained experience than he did before.  But that which is capable of more and less is mutable; whence able men, who have thought deeply on these things, have gathered that the first form is not to be found in those things whose form is changeable.  Since, therefore, they saw that body and mind might be more or less beautiful in form, and that, if they wanted form, they could have no existence, they saw that there is some existence in which is the first form, unchangeable, and therefore not admitting of degrees of comparison, and in that they most rightly believed was the first principle of things which was not made, and by which all things were made.  Therefore that which is known of God He manifested to them when His invisible things were seen by them, being understood by those things which have been made; also His eternal power and Godhead by whom all visible and temporal things have been created.

Rom. i. 19, 20.

Chapter 7.—How Much the Platonists are to Be Held as Excelling Other Philosophers in Logic, i.e. Rational Philosophy.

Then, again, as far as regards the doctrine which treats of that which they call logic, that is, rational philosophy, far be it from us to compare them with those who attributed to the bodily senses the faculty of discriminating truth, and thought, that all we learn is to be measured by their untrustworthy and fallacious rules.  Such were the Epicureans, and all of the same school.  Such also were the Stoics, who ascribed to the bodily senses that expertness in disputation which they so ardently love, called by them dialectic, asserting that from the senses the mind conceives the notions (ἒννοιαι) of those things which they explicate by definition.  And hence is developed the whole plan and connection of their learning and teaching.  I often wonder, with respect to this, how they can say that none are beautiful but the wise; for by what bodily sense have they perceived that beauty, by what eyes of the flesh have they seen wisdom’s comeliness of form?  Those, however, whom we justly rank before all others, have distinguished those things which are conceived by the mind from those which are perceived by the senses, neither taking away from the senses anything to which they are competent, nor attributing to them anything beyond their competency.  And the light of our understandings, by which all things are learned by us, they have affirmed to be that selfsame God by whom all things were made.

Chapter 8.—That the Platonists Hold the First Rank in Moral Philosophy Also.

The remaining part of philosophy is morals, or what is called by the Greeks ἠθική, in which is discussed the question concerning the chief good,—that which will leave us nothing further to seek in order to be blessed, if only we make all our actions refer to it, and seek it not for the sake of something else, but for its own sake.  Therefore it is called the end, because we wish other things on account of it, but itself only for its own sake.  This beatific good, therefore, according to some, comes to a man from the body, according to others, from the mind, and, according to others, from both together.  For they saw that man himself consists of soul and body; and therefore they believed that from either of these two, or from both together, their well-being must proceed, consisting in a certain final good, which could render them blessed, and to which they might refer all their actions, not requiring anything ulterior to which to refer that good itself.  This is why those who have added a third kind of good things, which they call extrinsic,—as honor, glory, wealth, and the like,—have not regarded them as part of the final good, that is, to be sought after for their own sake, but as things which are to be sought for the sake of something else, affirming that this kind of good is good to the good, and evil to the evil.  Wherefore, whether they have sought the good of man from the mind or from the body, or from both together, it is still only from man they have supposed that it must be sought.  But they who have sought it from the body have sought it from the inferior part of man; they who have sought it from the mind, from the superior part; and they who have sought it from both, from the whole man.  Whether therefore, they have sought it from any part, or from the whole man, still they have only sought it from man; nor have these differences, being three, given rise only to three dissentient sects of philosophers, but to many.  For diverse philosophers have held diverse opinions, both concerning the good of the body, and the good of the mind, and the good of both together.  Let, therefore, all these give place to those philosophers who have not affirmed that a man is blessed by the enjoyment of the body, or by the enjoyment of the mind, but by the enjoyment of God,—enjoying Him, however, not as the mind does the body or itself, or as one friend enjoys another, but as the eye enjoys light, if, indeed, we may draw any comparison between these things.  But what the nature of this comparison is, will, if God help me, be shown in another place, to the best of my ability.  At present, it is sufficient to mention that Plato determined the final good to be to live according to virtue, and affirmed that he only can attain to virtue who knows and imitates God,—which knowledge and imitation are the only cause of blessedness.  Therefore he did not doubt that to philosophize is to love God, whose nature is incorporeal.  Whence it certainly follows that the student of wisdom, that is, the philosopher, will then become blessed when he shall have begun to enjoy God.  For though he is not necessarily blessed who enjoys that which he loves (for many are miserable by loving that which ought not to be loved, and still more miserable when they enjoy it), nevertheless no one is blessed who does not enjoy that which he loves.  For even they who love things which ought not to be loved do not count themselves blessed by loving merely, but by enjoying them.  Who, then, but the most miserable will deny that he is blessed, who enjoys that which he loves, and loves the true and highest good?  But the true and highest good, according to Plato, is God, and therefore he would call him a philosopher who loves God; for philosophy is directed to the obtaining of the blessed life, and he who loves God is blessed in the enjoyment of God.

Chapter 9.—Concerning that Philosophy Which Has Come Nearest to the Christian Faith.

Whatever philosophers, therefore, thought concerning the supreme God, that He is both the maker of all created things, the light by which things are known, and the good in reference to which things are to be done; that we have in Him the first principle of nature, the truth of doctrine, and the happiness of life,—whether these philosophers may be more suitably called Platonists, or whether they may give some other name to their sect; whether, we say, that only the chief men of the Ionic school, such as Plato himself, and they who have well understood him, have thought thus; or whether we also include the Italic school, on account of Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans, and all who may have held like opinions; and, lastly, whether also we include all who have been held wise men and philosophers among all nations who are discovered to have seen and taught this, be they Atlantics, Libyans, Egyptians, Indians, Persians, Chaldeans, Scythians, Gauls, Spaniards, or of other nations,—we prefer these to all other philosophers, and confess that they approach nearest to us.

Chapter 10.—That the Excellency of the Christian Religion is Above All the Science of Philosophers.

For although a Christian man instructed only in ecclesiastical literature may perhaps be ignorant of the very name of Platonists, and may not even know that there have existed two schools of philosophers speaking the Greek tongue, to wit, the Ionic and Italic, he is nevertheless not so deaf with respect to human affairs, as not to know that philosophers profess the study, and even the possession, of wisdom.  He is on his guard, however, with respect to those who philosophize according to the elements of this world, not according to God, by whom the world itself was made; for he is warned by the precept of the apostle, and faithfully hears what has been said, “Beware that no one deceive you through philosophy and vain deceit, according to the elements of the world.”

Col. ii. 8.

Chapter 11.—How Plato Has Been Able to Approach So Nearly to Christian Knowledge.

Certain partakers with us in the grace of Christ, wonder when they hear and read that Plato had conceptions concerning God, in which they recognize considerable agreement with the truth of our religion.  Some have concluded from this, that when he went to Egypt he had heard the prophet Jeremiah, or, whilst travelling in the same country, had read the prophetic scriptures, which opinion I myself have expressed in certain of my writings.

De Doctrina Christiana, ii. 43.  Comp. Retract. ii. 4, 2.

Chapter 12.—That Even the Platonists, Though They Say These Things Concerning the One True God, Nevertheless Thought that Sacred Rites Were to Be Performed in Honor of Many Gods.

But we need not determine from what source he learned these things,—whether it was from the books of the ancients who preceded him, or, as is more likely, from the words of the apostle:  “Because that which is known of God, has been manifested among them, for God hath manifested it to them.  For His invisible things from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by those things which have been made, also His eternal power and Godhead.”

Rom. i. 20.

Chapter 13.—Concerning the Opinion of Plato, According to Which He Defined the Gods as Beings Entirely Good and the Friends of Virtue.

Therefore, although in many other important respects they differ from us, nevertheless with respect to this particular point of difference, which I have just stated, as it is one of great moment, and the question on hand concerns it, I will first ask them to what gods they think that sacred rites are to be performed,—to the good or to the bad, or to both the good and the bad?  But we have the opinion of Plato affirming that all the gods are good, and that there is not one of the gods bad.  It follows, therefore, that these are to be performed to the good, for then they are performed to gods; for if they are not good, neither are they gods.  Now, if this be the case (for what else ought we to believe concerning the gods?), certainly it explodes the opinion that the bad gods are to be propitiated by sacred rites in order that they may not harm us, but the good gods are to be invoked in order that they may assist us.  For there are no bad gods, and it is to the good that, as they say, the due honor of such rites is to be paid.  Of what character, then, are those gods who love scenic displays, even demanding that a place be given them among divine things, and that they be exhibited in their honor?  The power of these gods proves that they exist, but their liking such things proves that they are bad.  For it is well-known what Plato’s opinion was concerning scenic plays.  He thinks that the poets themselves, because they have composed songs so unworthy of the majesty and goodness of the gods, ought to be banished from the state.  Of what character, therefore, are those gods who contend with Plato himself about those scenic plays?  He does not suffer the gods to be defamed by false crimes; the gods command those same crimes to be celebrated in their own honor.

In fine, when they ordered these plays to be inaugurated, they not only demanded base things, but also did cruel things, taking from Titus Latinius his son, and sending a disease upon him because he had refused to obey them, which they removed when he had fulfilled their commands.  Plato, however, bad though they were, did not think they were to be feared; but, holding to his opinion with the utmost firmness and constancy, does not hesitate to remove from a well-ordered state all the sacrilegious follies of the poets, with which these gods are delighted because they themselves are impure.  But Labeo places this same Plato (as I have mentioned already in the second book

Ch. 14.

Chapter 14.—Of the Opinion of Those Who Have Said that Rational Souls are of Three Kinds, to Wit, Those of the Celestial Gods, Those of the Aerial Demons, and Those of Terrestrial Men.

There is, say they, a threefold division of all animals endowed with a rational soul, namely, into gods, men, and demons.  The gods occupy the loftiest region, men the lowest, the demons the middle region.  For the abode of the gods is heaven, that of men the earth, that of the demons the air.  As the dignity of their regions is diverse, so also is that of their natures; therefore the gods are better than men and demons.  Men have been placed below the gods and demons, both in respect of the order of the regions they inhabit, and the difference of their merits.  The demons, therefore, who hold the middle place, as they are inferior to the gods, than whom they inhabit a lower region, so they are superior to men, than whom they inhabit a loftier one.  For they have immortality of body in common with the gods, but passions of the mind in common with men.  On which account, say they, it is not wonderful that they are delighted with the obscenities of the theatre, and the fictions of the poets, since they are also subject to human passions, from which the gods are far removed, and to which they are altogether strangers.  Whence we conclude that it was not the gods, who are all good and highly exalted, that Plato deprived of the pleasure of theatric plays, by reprobating and prohibiting the fictions of the poets, but the demons.

Of these things many have written:  among others Apuleius, the Platonist of Madaura, who composed a whole work on the subject, entitled, Concerning the God of Socrates.  He there discusses and explains of what kind that deity was who attended on Socrates, a sort of familiar, by whom it is said he was admon ished to desist from any action which would not turn out to his advantage.  He asserts most distinctly, and proves at great length, that it was not a god but a demon; and he discusses with great diligence the opinion of Plato concerning the lofty estate of the gods, the lowly estate of men, and the middle estate of demons.  These things being so, how did Plato dare to take away, if not from the gods, whom he removed from all human contagion, certainly from the demons, all the pleasures of the theatre, by expelling the poets from the state?  Evidently in this way he wished to admonish the human soul, although still confined in these moribund members, to despise the shameful commands of the demons, and to detest their impurity, and to choose rather the splendor of virtue.  But if Plato showed himself virtuous in answering and prohibiting these things, then certainly it was shameful of the demons to command them.  Therefore either Apuleius is wrong, and Socrates’ familiar did not belong to this class of deities, or Plato held contradictory opinions, now honoring the demons, now removing from the well-regulated state the things in which they delighted, or Socrates is not to be congratulated on the friendship of the demon, of which Apuleius was so ashamed that he entitled his book On the God of Socrates, whilst according to the tenor of his discussion, wherein he so diligently and at such length distinguishes gods from demons, he ought not to have entitled it, Concerning the God, but Concerning the Demon of Socrates.  But he preferred to put this into the discussion itself rather than into the title of his book.  For, through the sound doctrine which has illuminated human society, all, or almost all men have such a horror at the name of demons, that every one who before reading the dissertation of Apuleius, which sets forth the dignity of demons, should have read the title of the book, On the Demon of Socrates, would certainly have thought that the author was not a sane man.  But what did even Apuleius find to praise in the demons, except subtlety and strength of body and a higher place of habitation?  For when he spoke generally concerning their manners, he said nothing that was good, but very much that was bad.  Finally, no one, when he has read that book, wonders that they desired to have even the obscenity of the stage among divine things, or that, wishing to be thought gods, they should be delighted with the crimes of the gods, or that all those sacred solemnities, whose obscenity occasions laughter, and whose shameful cruelty causes horror, should be in agreement with their passions.

Chapter 15.—That the Demons are Not Better Than Men Because of Their Aerial Bodies, or on Account of Their Superior Place of Abode.

Wherefore let not the mind truly religious, and submitted to the true God, suppose that demons are better than men, because they have better bodies.  Otherwise it must put many beasts before itself which are superior to us both in acuteness of the senses, in ease and quickness of movement, in strength and in long-continued vigor of body.  What man can equal the eagle or the vulture in strength of vision?  Who can equal the dog in acuteness of smell?  Who can equal the hare, the stag, and all the birds in swiftness?  Who can equal in strength the lion or the elephant?  Who can equal in length of life the serpents, which are affirmed to put off old age along with their skin, and to return to youth again?  But as we are better than all these by the possession of reason and understanding, so we ought also to be better than the demons by living good and virtuous lives.  For divine providence gave to them bodies of a better quality than ours, that that in which we excel them might in this way be commended to us as deserving to be far more cared for than the body, and that we should learn to despise the bodily excellence of the demons compared with goodness of life, in respect of which we are better than they, knowing that we too shall have immortality of body,—not an immortality tortured by eternal punishment, but that which is consequent on purity of soul.

But now, as regards loftiness of place, it is altogether ridiculous to be so influenced by the fact that the demons inhabit the air, and we the earth, as to think that on that account they are to be put before us; for in this way we put all the birds before ourselves.  But the birds, when they are weary with flying, or require to repair their bodies with food, come back to the earth to rest or to feed, which the demons, they say, do not.  Are they, therefore, inclined to say that the birds are superior to us, and the demons superior to the birds?  But if it be madness to think so, there is no reason why we should think that, on account of their inhabiting a loftier element, the demons have a claim to our religious submission.  But as it is really the case that the birds of the air are not only not put before us who dwell on the earth; but are even subjected to us on account of the dignity of the rational soul which is in us, so also it is the case that the demons, though they are aerial, are not better than we who are terrestrial because the air is higher than the earth, but, on the contrary, men are to be put before demons because their despair is not to be compared to the hope of pious men.  Even that law of Plato’s, according to which he mutually orders and arranges the four elements, inserting between the two extreme elements—namely, fire, which is in the highest degree mobile, and the immoveable earth—the two middle ones, air and water, that by how much the air is higher up than the water, and the fire than the air, by so much also are the waters higher than the earth,—this law, I say, sufficiently admonishes us not to estimate the merits of animated creatures according to the grades of the elements.  And Apuleius himself says that man is a terrestrial animal in common with the rest, who is nevertheless to be put far before aquatic animals, though Plato puts the waters themselves before the land.  By this he would have us understand that the same order is not to be observed when the question concerns the merits of animals, though it seems to be the true one in the gradation of bodies; for it appears to be possible that a soul of a higher order may inhabit a body of a lower, and a soul of a lower order a body of a higher.

Chapter 16.—What Apuleius the Platonist Thought Concerning the Manners and Actions of Demons.

The same Apuleius, when speaking concerning the manners of demons, said that they are agitated with the same perturbations of mind as men; that they are provoked by injuries, propitiated by services and by gifts, rejoice in honors, are delighted with a variety of sacred rites, and are annoyed if any of them be neglected.  Among other things, he also says that on them depend the divinations of augurs, soothsayers, and prophets, and the revelations of dreams, and that from them also are the miracles of the magicians.  But, when giving a brief definition of them, he says, “Demons are of an animal nature, passive in soul, rational in mind, aerial in body, eternal in time.”  “Of which five things, the three first are common to them and us, the fourth peculiar to themselves, and the fifth common to therewith the gods.”

De Deo Socratis.

Chapter 17.—Whether It is Proper that Men Should Worship Those Spirits from Whose Vices It is Necessary that They Be Freed.

Wherefore, to omit other things, and confine our attention to that which he says is common to the demons with us, let us ask this question:  If all the four elements are full of their own animals, the fire and the air of immortal, and the water and the earth of mortal ones, why are the souls of demons agitated by the whirlwinds and tempests of passions?—for the Greek word παθος means perturbation, whence he chose to call the demons “passive in soul,” because the word passion, which is derived from πάθος, signified a commotion of the mind contrary to reason.  Why, then, are these things in the minds of demons which are not in beasts?  For if anything of this kind appears in beasts, it is not perturbation, because it is not contrary to reason, of which they are devoid.  Now it is foolishness or misery which is the cause of these perturbations in the case of men, for we are not yet blessed in the possession of that perfection of wisdom which is promised to us at last, when we shall be set free from our present mortality.  But the gods, they say, are free from these perturbations, because they are not only eternal, but also blessed; for they also have the same kind of rational souls, but most pure from all spot and plague.  Wherefore, if the gods are free from perturbation because they are blessed, not miserable animals, and the beasts are free from them because they are animals which are capable neither of blessedness nor misery, it remains that the demons, like men, are subject to perturbations because they are not blessed but miserable animals.  What folly, therefore, or rather what madness, to submit ourselves through any sentiment of religion to demons, when it belongs to the true religion to deliver us from that depravity which makes us like to them!  For Apuleius himself, although he is very sparing toward them, and thinks they are worthy of divine honors, is nevertheless compelled to confess that they are subject to anger; and the true religion commands us not to be moved with anger, but rather to resist it.  The demons are won over by gifts; and the true religion commands us to favor no one on account of gifts received.  The demons are flattered by honors; but the true religion commands us by no means to be moved by such things.  The demons are haters of some men and lovers of others, not in consequence of a prudent and calm judgment, but because of what he calls their “passive soul;” whereas the true religion commands us to love even our enemies.  Lastly, the true religion commands us to put away all disquietude of heart and agitation of mind, and also all commotions and tempests of the soul, which Apuleius asserts to be continually swelling and surging in the souls of demons.  Why, therefore, except through foolishness and miserable error shouldst thou humble thyself to worship a being to whom thou desirest to be unlike in thy life?  And why shouldst thou pay religious homage to him whom thou art unwilling to imitate, when it is the highest duty of religion to imitate Him whom thou worshippest?

Chapter 18.—What Kind of Religion that is Which Teaches that Men Ought to Employ the Advocacy of Demons in Order to Be Recommended to the Favor of the Good Gods.

In vain, therefore, have Apuleius, and they who think with him, conferred on the demons the honor of placing them in the air, between the ethereal heavens and the earth, that they may carry to the gods the prayers of men, to men the answers of the gods:  for Plato held, they say, that no god has intercourse with man.  They who believe these things have thought it unbecoming that men should have intercourse with the gods, and the gods with men, but a befitting thing that the demons should have intercourse with both gods and men, presenting to the gods the petitions of men, and conveying to men what the gods have granted; so that a chaste man, and one who is a stranger to the crimes of the magic arts, must use as patrons, through whom the gods may be induced to hear him, demons who love these crimes, although the very fact of his not loving them ought to have recommended him to them as one who deserved to be listened to with greater readiness and willingness on their part.  They love the abominations of the stage, which chastity does not love.  They love, in the sorceries of the magicians, “a thousand arts of inflicting harm,”

Virgil, Æn. 7, 338.

Chapter 19.—Of the Impiety of the Magic Art, Which is Dependent on the Assistance of Malign Spirits.

Moreover, against those magic arts, concerning which some men, exceedingly wretched and exceedingly impious, delight to boast, may not public opinion itself be brought forward as a witness?  For why are those arts so severely punished by the laws, if they are the works of deities who ought to be worshipped?  Shall it be said that the Christians have or dained those laws by which magic arts are punished?  With what other meaning, except that these sorceries are without doubt pernicious to the human race, did the most illustrious poet say,

“By heaven, I swear, and your dear life,

Unwillingly these arms I wield,

And take, to meet the coming strife,

Enchantment’s sword and shield.”

Virgil, Æn. 4. 492, 493.

And that also which he says in another place concerning magic arts,

“I’ve seen him to another place transport the standing corn,”

Virgil, Ec. 8. 99.

has reference to the fact that the fruits of one field are said to be transferred to another by these arts which this pestiferous and accursed doctrine teaches.  Does not Cicero inform us that, among the laws of the Twelve Tables, that is, the most ancient laws of the Romans, there was a law written which appointed a punishment to be inflicted on him who should do this?

Pliny (Hist. Nat. xxviii. 2) and others quote the law as running:  Qui fruges incantasit, qui malum carmen incantasit…neu alienam segetem pelexeris.

Chapter 20.—Whether We are to Believe that the Good Gods are More Willing to Have Intercourse with Demons Than with Men.

But does any urgent and most pressing cause compel the demons to mediate between the gods and men, that they may offer the prayers of men, and bring back the answers from the gods? and if so, what, pray, is that cause, what is that so great necessity?  Because, say they, no god has intercourse with man.  Most admirable holiness of God, which has no intercourse with a supplicating man, and yet has intercourse with an arrogant demon! which has no intercourse with a penitent man, and yet has intercourse with a deceiving demon! which has no intercourse with a man fleeing for refuge to the divine nature, and yet has intercourse with a demon feigning divinity! which has no intercourse with a man seeking pardon, and yet has intercourse with a demon persuading to wickedness! which has no intercourse with a man expelling the poets by means of philosophical writings from a well-regulated state, and yet has intercourse with a demon requesting from the princes and priests of a state the theatri cal performance of the mockeries of the poets! which has no intercourse with the man who prohibits the ascribing of crime to the gods, and yet has intercourse with a demon who takes delight in the fictitious representation of their crimes! which has no intercourse with a man punishing the crimes of the magicians by just laws, and yet has intercourse with a demon teaching and practising magical arts! which has no intercourse with a man shunning the imitation of a demon, and yet has intercourse with a demon lying in wait for the deception of a man!

Chapter 21.—Whether the Gods Use the Demons as Messengers and Interpreters, and Whether They are Deceived by Them Willingly, or Without Their Own Knowledge.

But herein, no doubt, lies the great necessity for this absurdity, so unworthy of the gods, that the ethereal gods, who are concerned about human affairs, would not know what terrestrial men were doing unless the aerial demons should bring them intelligence, because the ether is suspended far away from the earth and far above it, but the air is contiguous both to the ether and to the earth.  O admirable wisdom! what else do these men think concerning the gods who, they say, are all in the highest degree good, but that they are concerned about human affairs, lest they should seem unworthy of worship, whilst, on the other hand, from the distance between the elements, they are ignorant of terrestrial things?  It is on this account that they have supposed the demons to be necessary as agents, through whom the gods may inform themselves with respect to human affairs, and through whom, when necessary, they may succor men; and it is on account of this office that the demons themselves have been held as deserving of worship.  If this be the case, then a demon is better known by these good gods through nearness of body, than a man is by goodness of mind.  O mournful necessity, or shall I not rather say detestable and vain error, that I may not impute vanity to the divine nature!  For if the gods can, with their minds free from the hindrance of bodies, see our mind, they do not need the demons as messengers from our mind to them; but if the ethereal gods, by means of their bodies, perceive the corporeal indices of minds, as the countenance, speech, motion, and thence understand what the demons tell them, then it is also possible that they may be deceived by the falsehoods of demons.  Moreover, if the divinity of the gods cannot be deceived by the demons, neither can it be ignorant of our actions.  But I would they would tell me whether the demons have informed the gods that the fictions of the poets concerning the crimes of the gods displease Plato, concealing the pleasure which they themselves take in them; or whether they have concealed both, and have preferred that the gods should be ignorant with respect to this whole matter, or have told both, as well the pious prudence of Plato with respect to the gods as their own lust, which is injurious to the gods; or whether they have concealed Plato’s opinion, according to which he was unwilling that the gods should be defamed with falsely alleged crimes through the impious license of the poets, whilst they have not been ashamed nor afraid to make known their own wickedness, which make them love theatrical plays, in which the infamous deeds of the gods are celebrated.  Let them choose which they will of these four alternatives, and let them consider how much evil any one of them would require them to think of the gods.  For if they choose the first, they must then confess that it was not possible for the good gods to dwell with the good Plato, though he sought to prohibit things injurious to them, whilst they dwelt with evil demons, who exulted in their injuries; and this because they suppose that the good gods can only know a good man, placed at so great a distance from them, through the mediation of evil demons, whom they could know on account of their nearness to themselves.

Another reading, whom they could not know, though near to themselves.

Chapter 22.—That We Must, Notwithstanding the Opinion of Apuleius, Reject the Worship of Demons.

None of these four alternatives, then, is to be chosen; for we dare not suppose such unbecoming things concerning the gods as the adoption of any one of them would lead us to think.  It remains, therefore, that no credence whatever is to be given to the opinion of Apuleius and the other philosophers of the same school, namely, that the demons act as messengers and interpreters between the gods and men to carry our petitions from us to the gods, and to bring back to us the help of the gods.  On the contrary, we must believe them to be spirits most eager to inflict harm, utterly alien from righteousness, swollen with pride, pale with envy, subtle in deceit; who dwell indeed in this air as in a prison, in keeping with their own character, because, cast down from the height of the higher heaven, they have been condemned to dwell in this element as the just reward of irretrievable transgression.  But, though the air is situated above the earth and the waters, they are not on that account superior in merit to men, who, though they do not surpass them as far as their earthly bodies are concerned, do nevertheless far excel them through piety of mind,—they having made choice of the true God as their helper.  Over many, however, who are manifestly unworthy of participation in the true religion, they tyrannize as over captives whom they have subdued,—the greatest part of whom they have persuaded of their divinity by wonderful and lying signs, consisting either of deeds or of predictions.  Some, nevertheless, who have more attentively and diligently considered their vices, they have not been able to persuade that they are gods, and so have feigned themselves to be messengers between the gods and men.  Some, indeed, have thought that not even this latter honor ought to be acknowledged as belonging to them, not believing that they were gods, because they saw that they were wicked, whereas the gods, according to their view, are all good.  Nevertheless they dared not say that they were wholly unworthy of all divine honor, for fear of offending the multitude, by whom, through inveterate superstition, the demons were served by the performance of many rites, and the erection of many temples.

Chapter 23.—What Hermes Trismegistus Thought Concerning Idolatry, and from What Source He Knew that the Superstitions of Egypt Were to Be Abolished.

The Egyptian Hermes, whom they call Trismegistus, had a different opinion concerning those demons.  Apuleius, indeed, denies that they are gods; but when he says that they hold a middle place between the gods and men, so that they seem to be necessary for men as mediators between them and the gods, he does not distinguish between the worship due to them and the religious homage due to the supernal gods.  This Egyptian, however, says that there are some gods made by the supreme God, and some made by men.  Any one who hears this, as I have stated it, no doubt supposes that it has reference to images, because they are the works of the hands of men; but he asserts that visible and tangible images are, as it were, only the bodies of the gods, and that there dwell in them certain spirits, which have been invited to come into them, and which have power to inflict harm, or to fulfil the desires of those by whom divine honors and services are rendered to them.  To unite, therefore, by a certain art, those invisible spirits to visible and material things, so as to make, as it were, animated bodies, dedicated and given up to those spirits who inhabit them,—this, he says, is to make gods, adding that men have received this great and wonderful power.  I will give the words of this Egyptian as they have been translated into our tongue:  “And, since we have undertaken to discourse concerning the relationship and fellowship between men and the gods, know, O Æsculapius, the power and strength of man.  As the Lord and Father, or that which is highest, even God, is the maker of the celestial gods, so man is the maker of the gods who are in the temples, content to dwell near to men.”

These quotations are from a dialogue between Hermes and Æsculapius, which is said to have been translated into Latin by Apuleius.

Hermes then follows out at great length the statements of this passage, in which he seems to predict the present time, in which the Christian religion is overthrowing all lying figments with a vehemence and liberty proportioned to its superior truth and holiness, in order that the grace of the true Saviour may deliver men from those gods which man has made, and subject them to that God by whom man was made.  But when Hermes predicts these things, he speaks as one who is a friend to these same mockeries of demons, and does not clearly express the name of Christ.  On the contrary, he deplores, as if it had already taken place, the future abolition of those things by the observance of which there was maintained in Egypt a resemblance of heaven,—he bears witness to Christianity by a kind of mournful prophecy.  Now it was with reference to such that the apostle said, that “knowing God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened; professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of corruptible man,”

Rom. i. 21.

For these vain, deceitful, pernicious, sacrilegious things did the Egyptian Hermes sorrow, because he knew that the time was coming when they should be removed.  But his sorrow was as impudently expressed as his knowledge was imprudently obtained; for it was not the Holy Spirit who revealed these things to him, as He had done to the holy prophets, who, foreseeing these things, said with exultation, “If a man shall make gods, lo, they are no gods;”

Jer. xvi. 10.

Chapter 24.—How Hermes Openly Confessed the Error of His Forefathers, the Coming Destruction of Which He Nevertheless Bewailed.

After a long interval, Hermes again comes back to the subject of the gods which men have made, saying as follows:  “But enough on this subject.  Let us return to man and to reason, that divine gift on account of which man has been called a rational animal.  For the things which have been said concerning man, wonderful though they are, are less wonderful than those which have been said concerning reason.  For man to discover the divine nature, and to make it, surpasses the wonder of all other wonderful things.  Because, therefore, our forefathers erred very far with respect to the knowledge of the gods, through incredulity and through want of attention to their worship and service, they invented this art of making gods; and this art once invented, they associated with it a suitable virtue borrowed from universal nature, and being incapable of making souls, they evoked those of demons or of angels, and united them with these holy images and divine mysteries, in order that through these souls the images might have power to do good or harm to men.”  I know not whether the demons themselves could have been made, even by adjuration, to confess as he has confessed in these words:  “Because our forefathers erred very far with respect to the knowledge of the gods, through incredulity and through want of attention to their worship and service, they invented the art of making gods.”  Does he say that it was a moderate degree of error which resulted in their discovery of the art of making gods, or was he content to say “they erred?”  No; he must needs add “very far,” and say, “They erred very far.”  It was this great error and incredulity, then, of their forefathers who did not attend to the worship and service of the gods, which was the origin of the art of making gods.  And yet this wise man grieves over the ruin of this art at some future time, as if it were a divine religion.  Is he not verily compelled by divine influence, on the one hand, to reveal the past error of his forefathers, and by a diabolical influence, on the other hand, to bewail the future punishment of demons?  For if their forefathers, by erring very far with respect to the knowledge of the gods, through incredulity and aversion of mind from their worship and service, invented the art of making gods, what wonder is it that all that is done by this detestable art, which is opposed to the divine religion, should be taken away by that religion, when truth corrects error, faith refutes incredulity, and conversion rectifies aversion?

For if he had only said, without mentioning the cause, that his forefathers had discovered the art of making gods, it would have been our duty, if we paid any regard to what is right and pious, to consider and to see that they could never have attained to this art if they had not erred from the truth, if they had believed those things which are worthy of God, if they had attended to divine worship and service.  However, if we alone should say that the causes of this art were to be found in the great error and incredulity of men, and aversion of the mind erring from and unfaithful to divine religion, the impudence of those who resist the truth were in some way to be borne with; but when he who admires in man, above all other things, this power which it has been granted him to practise, and sorrows because a time is coming when all those figments of gods invented by men shall even be commanded by the laws to be taken away,—when even this man confesses nevertheless, and explains the causes which led to the discovery of this art, saying that their ancestors, through great error and incredulity, and through not attending to the worship and service of the gods, invented this art of making gods,—what ought we to say, or rather to do, but to give to the Lord our God all the thanks we are able, because He has taken away those things by causes the contrary of those which led to their institution?  For that which the prevalence of error instituted, the way of truth took away; that which incredulity instituted, faith took away; that which aversion from divine worship and service instituted, conversion to the one true and holy God took away.  Nor was this the case only in Egypt, for which country alone the spirit of the demons lamented in Hermes, but in all the earth, which sings to the Lord a new song,

Ps. xcvi. 1.

Wherefore he who sorrowed because a time was coming when the worship of idols should be abolished, and the domination of the demons over those who worshipped them, wished, under the influence of a demon, that that captivity should always continue, at the cessation of which that psalm celebrates the building of the house of the Lord in all the earth.  Hermes foretold these things with grief, the prophet with joyfulness; and because the Spirit is victorious who sang these things through the ancient prophets, even Hermes himself was compelled in a wonderful manner to confess, that those very things which he wished not to be removed, and at the prospect of whose removal he was sorrowful, had been instituted, not by prudent, faithful, and religious, but by erring and unbelieving men, averse to the worship and service of the gods.  And although he calls them gods, nevertheless, when he says that they were made by such men as we certainly ought not to be, he shows, whether he will or not, that they are not to be worshipped by those who do not resemble these image-makers, that is, by prudent, faithful, and religious men, at the same time also making it manifest that the very men who made them involved themselves in the worship of those as gods who were not gods.  For true is the saying of the prophet, “If a man make gods, lo, they are no gods.”

Jer. xvi. 20.

Chapter 25.—Concerning Those Things Which May Be Common to the Holy Angels and to Men.

Wherefore we must by no means seek, through the supposed mediation of demons, to avail ourselves of the benevolence or beneficence of the gods, or rather of the good angels, but through resembling them in the possession of a good will, through which we are with them, and live with them, and worship with them the same God, although we cannot see them with the eyes of our flesh.  But it is not in locality we are distant from them, but in merit of life, caused by our miserable unlikeness to them in will, and by the weakness of our character; for the mere fact of our dwelling on earth under the conditions of life in the flesh does not prevent our fellowship with them.  It is only prevented when we, in the impurity of our hearts, mind earthly things.  But in this present time, while we are being healed that we may eventually be as they are, we are brought near to them by faith, if by their assistance we believe that He who is their blessedness is also ours.

Chapter 26.—That All the Religion of the Pagans Has Reference to Dead Men.

It is certainly a remarkable thing how this Egyptian, when expressing his grief that a time was coming when those things would be taken away from Egypt, which he confesses to have been invented by men erring, incredulous, and averse to the service of divine religion, says, among other things, “Then shall that land, the most holy place of shrines and temples, be full of sepulchres and dead men,” as if, in sooth, if these things were not taken away, men would not die! as if dead bodies could be buried elsewhere than in the ground! as if, as time advanced, the number of sepulchres must not necessarily increase in proportion to the increase of the number of the dead!  But they who are of a perverse mind, and opposed to us, suppose that what he grieves for is that the memorials of our martyrs were to succeed to their temples and shrines, in order, forsooth, that they may have grounds for thinking that gods were worshipped by the pagans in temples, but that dead men are worshipped by us in sepulchres.  For with such blindness do impious men, as it were, stumble over mountains, and will not see the things which strike their own eyes, that they do not attend to the fact that in all the literature of the pagans there are not found any, or scarcely any gods, who have not been men, to whom, when dead, divine honors have been paid.  I will not enlarge on the fact that Varro says that all dead men are thought by them to be gods—Manes and proves it by those sacred rites which are performed in honor of almost all the dead, among which he mentions funeral games, considering this the very highest proof of divinity, because games are only wont to be celebrated in honor of divinities.  Hermes himself, of whom we are now treating, in that same book in which, as if foretelling future things, he says with sorrow “Then shall that land, the most holy place of shrines and temples, be full of sepulchres and dead men,” testifies that the gods of Egypt were dead men.  For, having said that their forefathers, erring very far with respect to the knowledge of the gods, incredulous and inattentive to the divine worship and service, invented the art of making gods, with which art, when invented, they associated the appropriate virtue which is inherent in universal nature, and by mixing up that virtue with this art, they called forth the souls of demons or of angels (for they could not make souls), and caused them to take possession of, or associate themselves with holy images and divine mysteries, in order that through these souls the images might have power to do good or harm to men;—having said this, he goes on, as it were, to prove it by illustrations, saying, “Thy grandsire, O Æsculapius, the first discoverer of medicine, to whom a temple was consecrated in a mountain of Libya, near to the shore of the crocodiles, in which temple lies his earthly man, that is, his body,—for the better part of him, or rather the whole of him, if the whole man is in the intelligent life, went back to heaven,—affords even now by his divinity all those helps to infirm men which formerly he was wont to afford to them by the art of medicine.”  He says, therefore that a dead man was worshipped as a god in that place where he had his sepulchre.  He deceives men by a falsehood, for the man “went back to heaven.”  Then he adds “Does not Hermes, who was my grandsire, and whose name I bear, abiding in the country which is called by his name, help and preserve all mortals who come to him from every quarter?”  For this elder Hermes, that is, Mercury, who, he says, was his grandsire, is said to be buried in Hermopolis, that is, in the city called by his name; so here are two gods whom he affirms to have been men, Æsculapius and Mercury.  Now concerning Æsculapius, both the Greeks and the Latins think the same thing; but as to Mercury, there are many who do not think that he was formerly a mortal, though Hermes testifies that he was his grandsire.  But are these two different individuals who were called by the same name?  I will not dispute much whether they are different individuals or not.  It is sufficient to know that this Mercury of whom Hermes speaks is, as well as Æsculapius, a god who once was a man, according, to the testimony of this same Trismegistus, esteemed so great by his countrymen, and also the grandson of Mercury himself.

Hermes goes on to say, “But do we know how many good things Isis, the wife of Osiris, bestows when she is propitious, and what great opposition she can offer when enraged?”  Then, in order to show that there were gods made by men through this art, he goes on to say, “For it is easy for earthly and mundane gods to be angry, being made and composed by men out of either nature;” thus giving us to understand that he believed that demons were formerly the souls of dead men, which, as he says, by means of a certain art invented by men very far in error, incredulous, and irreligious, were caused to take possession of images, because they who made such gods were not able to make souls.  When, therefore, he says “either nature,” he means soul and body,—the demon being the soul, and the image the body.  What, then, becomes of that mournful complaint, that the land of Egypt, the most holy place of shrines and temples, was to be full of sepulchres and dead men?  Verily, the fallacious spirit, by whose inspiration Hermes spoke these things, was compelled to confess through him that even already that land was full of sepulchres and of dead men, whom they were worshipping as gods.  But it was the grief of the demons which was expressing itself through his mouth, who were sorrowing on account of the punishments which were about to fall upon them at the tombs of the martyrs.  For in many such places they are tortured and compelled to confess, and are cast out of the bodies of men, of which they had taken possession.

Chapter 27.—Concerning the Nature of the Honor Which the Christians Pay to Their Martyrs.

But, nevertheless, we do not build temples, and ordain priests, rites, and sacrifices for these same martyrs; for they are not our gods, but their God is our God.  Certainly we honor their reliquaries, as the memorials of holy men of God who strove for the truth even to the death of their bodies, that the true religion might be made known, and false and fictitious religions exposed.  For if there were some before them who thought that these religions were really false and fictitious, they were afraid to give expression to their convictions.  But who ever heard a priest of the faithful, standing at an altar built for the honor and worship of God over the holy body of some martyr, say in the prayers, I offer to thee a sacrifice, O Peter, or O Paul, or O Cyprian? for it is to God that sacrifices are offered at their tombs,—the God who made them both men and martyrs, and associated them with holy angels in celestial honor; and the reason why we pay such honors to their memory is, that by so doing we may both give thanks to the true God for their victories, and, by recalling them afresh to remembrance, may stir ourselves up to imitate them by seeking to obtain like crowns and palms, calling to our help that same God on whom they called.  Therefore, whatever honors the religious may pay in the places of the martyrs, they are but honors rendered to their memory,

Ornamenta memoriarum.

Chapter 1.—The Point at Which the Discussion Has Arrived, and What Remains to Be Handled.

Some have advanced the opinion that there are both good and bad gods; but some, thinking more respectfully of the gods, have attributed to them so much honor and praise as to preclude the supposition of any god being wicked.  But those who have maintained that there are wicked gods as well as good ones have included the demons under the name “gods,” and sometimes though more rarely, have called the gods demons; so that they admit that Jupiter, whom they make the king and head of all the rest, is called a demon by Homer.

See Plutarch, on the Cessation of Oracles.

Chapter 2.—Whether Among the Demons, Inferior to the Gods, There are Any Good Spirits Under Whose Guardianship the Human Soul Might Reach True Blessedness.

This book, then, ought, according to the promise made in the end of the preceding one, to contain a discussion, not of the difference which exists among the gods, who, according to the Platonists, are all good, nor of the difference between gods and demons, the former of whom they separate by a wide interval from men, while the latter are placed intermediately between the gods and men, but of the difference, since they make one, among the demons themselves.  This we shall discuss so far as it bears on our theme.  It has been the common and usual belief that some of the demons are bad, others good; and this opinon, whether it be that of the Platonists or any other sect, must by no means be passed over in silence, lest some one suppose he ought to cultivate the good demons in order that by their mediation he may be accepted by the gods, all of whom he believes to be good, and that he may live with them after death; whereas he would thus be ensnared in the toils of wicked spirits, and would wander far from the true God, with whom alone, and in whom alone, the human soul, that is to say, the soul that is rational and intellectual, is blessed.

Chapter 3.—What Apuleius Attributes to the Demons, to Whom, Though He Does Not Deny Them Reason, He Does Not Ascribe Virtue.

What, then, is the difference between good and evil demons?  For the Platonist Apuleius, in a treatise on this whole subject,

The De Deo Socratis.

Chapter 4.—The Opinion of the Peripatetics and Stoics About Mental Emotions.

Among the philosophers there are two opinions about these mental emotions, which the Greeks call παθη, while some of our own writers, as Cicero, call them perturbations,

De Fin. iii. 20; Tusc. Disp. iii. 4.

Chapter 6.—Of the Passions Which, According to Apuleius, Agitate the Demons Who Are Supposed by Him to Mediate Between Gods and Men.

Deferring for the present the question about the holy angels, let us examine the opinion of the Platonists, that the demons who mediate between gods and men are agitated by passions.  For if their mind, though exposed to their incursion, still remained free and superior to them, Apuleius could not have said that their hearts are tossed with passions as the sea by stormy winds.

De Deo Soc.

Chapter 7.—That the Platonists Maintain that the Poets Wrong the Gods by Representing Them as Distracted by Party Feeling, to Which the Demons and Not the Gods, are Subject.

But if any one says that it is not of all the demons, but only of the wicked, that the poets, not without truth, say that they violently love or hate certain men,—for it was of them Apuleius said that they were driven about by strong currents of emotion,—how can we accept this interpretation, when Apuleius, in the very same connection, represents all the demons, and not only the wicked, as intermediate between gods and men by their aerial bodies?  The fiction of the poets, according to him, consists in their making gods of demons, and giving them the names of gods, and assigning them as allies or enemies to individual men, using this poetical license, though they profess that the gods are very different in character from the demons, and far exalted above them by their celestial abode and wealth of beatitude.  This, I say, is the poets’ fiction, to say that these are gods who are not gods, and that, under the names of gods, they fight among themselves about the men whom they love or hate with keen partisan feeling.  Apuleius says that this is not far from the truth, since, though they are wrongfully called by the names of the gods, they are described in their own proper character as demons.  To this category, he says, belongs the Minerva of Homer, “who interposed in the ranks of the Greeks to restrain Achilles.”

De Deo. Soc.

Chapter 8.—How Apuleius Defines the Gods Who Dwell in Heaven, the Demons Who Occupy the Air, and Men Who Inhabit Earth.

The definition which Apuleius gives of demons, and in which he of course includes all demons, is that they are in nature animals, in soul subject to passion, in mind reasonable, in body aerial, in duration eternal.  Now in these five qualities he has named absolutely nothing which is proper to good men and not also to bad.  For when Apuleius had spoken of the celestials first, and had then extended his description so as to include an account of those who dwell far below on the earth, that, after describing the two extremes of rational being, he might proceed to speak of the intermediate demons, he says, “Men, therefore, who are endowed with the faculty of reason and speech, whose soul is immortal and their members mortal, who have weak and anxious spirits, dull and corruptible bodies, dissimilar characters, similar ignorance, who are obstinate in their audacity, and persistent in their hope, whose labor is vain, and whose fortune is ever on the wane, their race immortal, themselves perishing, each generation replenished with creatures whose life is swift and their wisdom slow, their death sudden and their life a wail,—these are the men who dwell on the earth.”

De Deo Soc.

Chapter 9.—Whether the Intercession of the Demons Can Secure for Men the Friendship of the Celestial Gods.

How, then, can men hope for a favorable introduction to the friendship of the gods by such mediators as these, who are, like men, defective in that which is the better part of every living creature, viz., the soul, and who resemble the gods only in the body, which is the inferior part?  For a living creature or animal consists of soul and body, and of these two parts the soul is undoubtedly the better; even though vicious and weak, it is obviously better than even the soundest and strongest body, for the greater excellence of its nature is not reduced to the level of the body even by the pollution of vice, as gold, even when tarnished, is more precious than the purest silver or lead.  And yet these mediators, by whose interposition things human and divine are to be harmonized, have an eternal body in common with the gods, and a vicious soul in common with men,—as if the religion by which these demons are to unite gods and men were a bodily, and not a spiritual matter.  What wickedness, then, or punishment has suspended these false and deceitful mediators, as it were head downwards, so that their inferior part, their body, is linked to the gods above, and their superior part, the soul, bound to men beneath; united to the celestial gods by the part that serves, and miserable, together with the inhabitants of earth, by the part that rules?  For the body is the servant, as Sallust says:  “We use the soul to rule, the body to obey;”

Cat. Conj.i.

Chapter 10.—That, According to Plotinus, Men, Whose Body is Mortal, are Less Wretched Than Demons, Whose Body is Eternal.

Plotinus, whose memory is quite recent,

Plotinus died in 270 A.D.  For his relation to Plato, see Augustin’s Contra Acad. iii. 41.

Chapter 11.—Of the Opinion of the Platonists, that the Souls of Men Become Demons When Disembodied.

He

Apuleius, not Plotinus.

Chapter 12.—Of the Three Opposite Qualities by Which the Platonists Distinguish Between the Nature of Men and that of Demons.

But at present we are speaking of those beings whom he described as being properly intermediate between gods and men, in nature animals, in mind rational, in soul subject to passion, in body aerial, in duration eternal.  When he had distinguished the gods, whom he placed in the highest heaven, from men, whom he placed on earth, not only by position but also by the unequal dignity of their natures, he concluded in these words:  “You have here two kinds of animals:  the gods, widely distinguished from men by sublimity of abode, perpetuity of life, perfection of nature; for their habitations are separated by so wide an interval that there can be no intimate communication between them, and while the vitality of the one is eternal and indefeasible, that of the others is fading and precarious, and while the spirits of the gods are exalted in bliss, those of men are sunk in miseries.”

De Deo Socratis.

Chapter 13.—How the Demons Can Mediate Between Gods and Men If They Have Nothing in Common with Both, Being Neither Blessed Like the Gods, Nor Miserable Like Men.

If, now, we endeavor to find between these opposites the mean occupied by the demons, there can be no question as to their local position; for, between the highest and lowest place, there is a place which is rightly considered and called the middle place.  The other two qualities remain, and to them we must give greater care, that we may see whether they are altogether foreign to the demons, or how they are so bestowed upon them without infringing upon their mediate position.  We may dismiss the idea that they are foreign to them.  For we cannot say that the demons, being rational animals, are neither blessed nor wretched, as we say of the beasts and plants, which are void of feeling and reason, or as we say of the middle place, that it is neither the highest nor the lowest.  The demons, being rational, must be either miserable or blessed.  And, in like manner, we cannot say that they are neither mortal nor immortal; for all living things either live eternally or end life in death.  Our author, besides, stated that the demons are eternal.  What remains for us to suppose, then, but that these mediate beings are assimilated to the gods in one of the two remaining qualities, and to men in the other?  For if they received both from above, or both from beneath, they should no longer be mediate, but either rise to the gods above, or sink to men beneath.  Therefore, as it has been demonstrated that they must possess these two qualities, they will hold their middle place if they receive one from each party.  Consequently, as they cannot receive their eternity from beneath, because it is not there to receive, they must get it from above; and accordingly they have no choice but to complete their mediate position by accepting misery from men.

According to the Platonists, then, the gods, who occupy the highest place, enjoy eternal blessedness, or blessed eternity; men, who occupy the lowest, a mortal misery, or a miserable mortality; and the demons, who occupy the mean, a miserable eternity, or an eternal misery.  As to those five things which Apu leius included in his definition of demons, he did not show, as he promised, that the demons are mediate.  For three of them, that their nature is animal, their mind rational, their soul subject to passions, he said that they have in common with men; one thing, their eternity, in common with the gods; and one proper to themselves, their aerial body.  How, then, are they intermediate, when they have three things in common with the lowest, and only one in common with the highest?  Who does not see that the intermediate position is abandoned in proportion as they tend to, and are depressed towards, the lowest extreme?  But perhaps we are to accept them as intermediate because of their one property of an aerial body, as the two extremes have each their proper body, the gods an ethereal, men a terrestrial body, and because two of the qualities they possess in common with man they possess also in common with the gods, namely, their animal nature and rational mind.  For Apuleius himself, in speaking of gods and men, said, “You have two animal natures.”  And Platonists are wont to ascribe a rational mind to the gods.  Two qualities remain, their liability to passion, and their eternity,—the first of which they have in common with men, the second with the gods; so that they are neither wafted to the highest nor depressed to the lowest extreme, but perfectly poised in their intermediate position.  But then, this is the very circumstance which constitutes the eternal misery, or miserable eternity, of the demons.  For he who says that their soul is subject to passions would also have said that they are miserable, had he not blushed for their worshippers.  Moreover, as the world is governed, not by fortuitous haphazard, but, as the Platonists themselves avow, by the providence of the supreme God, the misery of the demons would not be eternal unless their wickedness were great.

If, then, the blessed are rightly styled eudemons, the demons intermediate between gods and men are not eudemons.  What, then, is the local position of those good demons, who, above men but beneath the gods, afford assistance to the former, minister to the latter?  For if they are good and eternal, they are doubtless blessed.  But eternal blessedness destroys their intermediate character, giving them a close resemblance to the gods, and widely separating them from men.  And therefore the Platonists will in vain strive to show how the good demons, if they are both immortal and blessed, can justly be said to hold a middle place between the gods, who are immortal and blessed, and men, who are mortal and miserable.  For if they have both immortality and blessedness in common with the gods, and neither of these in common with men, who are both miserable and mortal, are they not rather remote from men and united with the gods, than intermediate between them.  They would be intermediate if they held one of their qualities in common with the one party, and the other with the other, as man is a kind of mean between angels and beasts,—the beast being an irrational and mortal animal, the angel a rational and immortal one, while man, inferior to the angel and superior to the beast, and having in common with the one mortality, and with the other reason, is a rational and mortal animal.  So, when we seek for an intermediate between the blessed immortals and miserable mortals, we should find a being which is either mortal and blessed, or immortal and miserable.

Chapter 14.—Whether Men, Though Mortal, Can Enjoy True Blessedness.

It is a great question among men, whether man can be mortal and blessed.  Some, taking the humbler view of his condition, have denied that he is capable of blessedness so long as he continues in this mortal life; others, again, have spurned this idea, and have been bold enough to maintain that, even though mortal, men may be blessed by attaining wisdom.  But if this be the case, why are not these wise men constituted mediators between miserable mortals and the blessed immortals, since they have blessedness in common with the latter, and mortality in common with the former?  Certainly, if they are blessed, they envy no one (for what more miserable than envy?), but seek with all their might to help miserable mortals on to blessedness, so that after death they may become immortal, and be associated with the blessed and immortal angels.

Chapter 15.—Of the Man Christ Jesus, the Mediator Between God and Men.

But if, as is much more probable and credible, it must needs be that all men, so long as they are mortal, are also miserable, we must seek an intermediate who is not only man, but also God, that, by the interposition of His blessed mortality, He may bring men out of their mortal misery to a blessed immortality.  In this intermediate two things are requisite, that He become mortal, and that He do not continue mortal.  He did become mortal, not rendering the divinity of the Word infirm, but assuming the infirmity of flesh.  Neither did He continue mortal in the flesh, but raised it from the dead; for it is the very fruit of His mediation that those, for the sake of whose redemption He became the Mediator, should not abide eternally in bodily death.  Wherefore it became the Mediator between us and God to have both a transient mortality and a permanent blessedness, that by that which is transient He might be assimilated to mortals, and might translate them from mortality to that which is permanent.  Good angels, therefore, cannot mediate between miserable mortals and blessed immortals, for they themselves also are both blessed and immortal; but evil angels can mediate, because they are immortal like the one party, miserable like the other.  To these is opposed the good Mediator, who, in opposition to their immortality and misery, has chosen to be mortal for a time, and has been able to continue blessed in eternity.  It is thus He has destroyed, by the humility of His death and the benignity of His blessedness, those proud immortals and hurtful wretches, and has prevented them from seducing to misery by their boast of immortality those men whose hearts He has cleansed by faith, and whom He has thus freed from their impure dominion.

Man, then, mortal and miserable, and far removed from the immortal and the blessed, what medium shall he choose by which he may be united to immortality and blessedness?  The immortality of the demons, which might have some charm for man, is miserable; the mortality of Christ, which might offend man, exists no longer.  In the one there is the fear of an eternal misery; in the other, death, which could not be eternal, can no longer be feared, and blessedness, which is eternal, must be loved.  For the immortal and miserable mediator interposes himself to prevent us from passing to a blessed immortality, because that which hinders such a passage, namely, misery, continues in him; but the mortal and blessed Mediator interposed Himself, in order that, having passed through mortality, He might of mortals make immortals (showing His power to do this in His own resurrection), and from being miserable to raise them to the blessed company from the number of whom He had Himself never departed.  There is, then, a wicked mediator, who separates friends, and a good Mediator, who reconciles enemies.  And those who separate are numerous, because the multitude of the blessed are blessed only by their participation in the one God; of which participation the evil angels being deprived, they are wretched, and interpose to hinder rather than to help to this blessedness, and by their very number prevent us from reaching that one beatific good, to obtain which we need not many but one Mediator, the uncreated Word of God, by whom all things were made, and in partaking of whom we are blessed.  I do not say that He is Mediator because He is the Word, for as the Word He is supremely blessed and supremely immortal, and therefore far from miserable mortals; but He is Mediator as He is man, for by His humanity He shows us that, in order to obtain that blessed and beatific good, we need not seek other mediators to lead us through the successive steps of this attainment, but that the blessed and beatific God, having Himself become a partaker of our humanity, has afforded us ready access to the participation of His divinity.  For in delivering us from our mortality and misery, He does not lead us to the immortal and blessed angels, so that we should become immortal and blessed by participating in their nature, but He leads us straight to that Trinity, by participating in which the angels themselves are blessed.  Therefore, when He chose to be in the form of a servant, and lower than the angels, that He might be our Mediator, He remained higher than the angels, in the form of God,—Himself at once the way of life on earth and life itself in heaven.

Chapter 16.—Whether It is Reasonable in the Platonists to Determine that the Celestial Gods Decline Contact with Earthly Things and Intercourse with Men, Who Therefore Require the Intercession of the Demons.

That opinion, which the same Platonist avers that Plato uttered, is not true, “that no god holds intercourse with men.”

Apuleius, ibid.

Chapter 17.—That to Obtain the Blessed Life, Which Consists in Partaking of the Supreme Good, Man Needs Such Mediation as is Furnished Not by a Demon, But by Christ Alone.

I am considerably surprised that such learned men, men who pronounce all material and sensible things to be altogether inferior to those that are spiritual and intelligible, should mention bodily contact in connection with the blessed life.  Is that sentiment of Plotinus forgotten?—“We must fly to our beloved fatherland.  There is the Father, there our all.  What fleet or flight shall convey us thither?  Our way is, to become like God.”

Augustin apparently quotes from memory from two passages of the Enneades, l. vi. 8, and ii. 3.

Chapter 18.—That the Deceitful Demons, While Promising to Conduct Men to God by Their Intercession, Mean to Turn Them from the Path of Truth.

As to the demons, these false and deceitful mediators, who, though their uncleanness of spirit frequently reveals their misery and malignity, yet, by virtue of the levity of their aerial bodies and the nature of the places they inhabit, do contrive to turn us aside and hinder our spiritual progress; they do not help us towards God, but rather prevent us from reaching Him.  Since even in the bodily way, which is erroneous and misleading, and in which righteousness does not walk,—for we must rise to God not by bodily ascent, but by incorporeal or spiritual conformity to Him,—in this bodily way, I say, which the friends of the demons arrange according to the weight of the various elements, the aerial demons being set between the ethereal gods and earthy men, they imagine the gods to have this privilege, that by this local interval they are preserved from the pollution of human contact.  Thus they believe that the demons are contaminated by men rather than men cleansed by the demons, and that the gods themselves should be polluted unless their local superiority preserved them.  Who is so wretched a creature as to expect purification by a way in which men are contaminating, demons contaminated, and gods contaminable?  Who would not rather choose that way whereby we escape the contamination of the demons, and are cleansed from pollution by the incontaminable God, so as to be associated with the uncontaminated angels?

Chapter 19.—That Even Among Their Own Worshippers the Name “Demon” Has Never a Good Signification.

But as some of these demonolators, as I may call them, and among them Labeo, allege that those whom they call demons are by others called angels, I must, if I would not seem to dispute merely about words, say something about the good angels.  The Platonists do not deny their existence, but prefer to call them good demons.  But we, following Scripture, according to which we are Christians, have learned that some of the angels are good, some bad, but never have we read in Scripture of good demons; but wherever this or any cognate term occurs, it is applied only to wicked spirits.  And this usage has become so universal, that, even among those who are called pagans, and who maintain that demons as well as gods should be worshipped, there is scarcely a man, no matter how well read and learned, who would dare to say by way of praise to his slave, You have a demon, or who could doubt that the man to whom he said this would consider it a curse?  Why, then, are we to subject ourselves to the necessity of explaining away what we have said when we have given offence by using the word demon, with which every one, or almost every one, connects a bad meaning, while we can so easily evade this necessity by using the word angel?

Chapter 20.—Of the Kind of Knowledge Which Puffs Up the Demons.

However, the very origin of the name suggests something worthy of consideration, if we compare it with the divine books.  They are called demons from a Greek word meaning knowledge.

δαίμων=δαήμων, knowing; so Plato, Cratylus, 398. B.

Chapter 21.—To What Extent the Lord Was Pleased to Make Himself Known to the Demons.

The devils themselves knew this manifestation of God so well, that they said to the Lord though clothed with the infirmity of flesh, “What have we to do with Thee, Jesus of Nazareth?  Art Thou come to destroy us before the time?”

Mark i. 24.

Chapter 22.—The Difference Between the Knowledge of the Holy Angels and that of the Demons.

The good angels, therefore, hold cheap all that knowledge of material and transitory things which the demons are so proud of possessing,—not that they are ignorant of these things, but because the love of God, whereby they are sanctified, is very dear to them, and because, in comparison of that not merely immaterial but also unchangeable and ineffable beauty, with the holy love of which they are inflamed, they despise all things which are beneath it, and all that is not it, that they may with every good thing that is in them enjoy that good which is the source of their goodness.  And therefore they have a more certain knowledge even of those temporal and mutable things, because they contemplate their principles and causes in the word of God, by which the world was made,—those causes by which one thing is, approved, another rejected, and all arranged.  But the demons do not behold in the wisdom of God these eternal, and, as it were, cardinal causes of things temporal, but only foresee a larger part of the future than men do, by reason of their greater acquaintance with the signs which are hidden from us.  Sometimes, too, it is their own intentions they predict.  And, finally, the demons are frequently, the angels never, deceived.  For it is one thing, by the aid of things temporal and changeable, to conjecture the changes that may occur in time, and to modify such things by one’s own will and faculty,—and this is to a certain extent permitted to the demons,—it is another thing to foresee the changes of times in the eternal and immutable laws of God, which live in His wisdom, and to know the will of God, the most infallible and powerful of all causes, by participating in His spirit; and this is granted to the holy angels by a just discretion.  And thus they are not only eternal, but blessed.  And the good wherein they are blessed is God, by whom they were created.  For without end they enjoy the contemplation and participation of Him.

Chapter 1.—That the Platonists Themselves Have Determined that God Alone Can Confer Happiness Either on Angels or Men, But that It Yet Remains a Question Whether Those Spirits Whom They Direct Us to Worship, that We May Obtain Happiness, Wish Sacrifice to Be Offered to Themselves, or to the One God Only.

It is the decided opinion of all who use their brains, that all men desire to be happy.  But who are happy, or how they become so, these are questions about which the weakness of human understanding stirs endless and angry controversies, in which philosophers have wasted their strength and expended their leisure.  To adduce and discuss their various opinions would be tedious, and is unnecessary.  The reader may remember what we said in the eighth book, while making a selection of the philosophers with whom we might discuss the question regarding the future life of happiness, whether we can reach it by paying divine honors to the one true God, the Creator of all gods, or by worshipping many gods, and he will not expect us to repeat here the same argument, especially as, even if he has forgotten it, he may refresh his memory by reperusal.  For we made selection of the Platonists, justly esteemed the noblest of the philosophers, because they had the wit to perceive that the human soul, immortal and rational, or intellectual, as it is, cannot be happy except by partaking of the light of that God by whom both itself and the world were made; and also that the happy life which all men desire cannot be reached by any who does not cleave with a pure and holy love to that one supreme good, the unchangeable God.  But as even these philosophers, whether accommodating to the folly and ignorance of the people, or, as the apostle says, “becoming vain in their imaginations,”

Rom. i. 21.

For this is the worship which is due to the Divinity, or, to speak more accurately, to the Deity; and, to express this worship in a single word as there does not occur to me any Latin term sufficiently exact, I shall avail myself, whenever necessary, of a Greek word. Λατρεία, whenever it occurs in Scripture, is rendered by the word service.  But that service which is due to men, and in reference to which the apostle writes that servants must be subject to their own masters,

Eph. vi. 5.

Chapter 2.—The Opinion of Plotinus the Platonist Regarding Enlightenment from Above.

But with these more estimable philosophers we have no dispute in this matter.  For they perceived, and in various forms abundantly expressed in their writings, that these spirits have the same source of happiness as ourselves,—a certain intelligible light, which is their God, and is different from themselves, and illumines them that they may be penetrated with light, and enjoy perfect happiness in the participation of God.  Plotinus, commenting on Plato, repeatedly and strongly asserts that not even the soul which they believe to be the soul of the world, derives its blessedness from any other source than we do, viz., from that Light which is distinct from it and created it, and by whose intelligible illumination it enjoys light in things intelligible.  He also compares those spiritual things to the vast and conspicuous heavenly bodies, as if God were the sun, and the soul the moon; for they suppose that the moon derives its light from the sun.  That great Platonist, therefore, says that the rational soul, or rather the intellectual soul,—in which class he comprehends the souls of the blessed immortals who inhabit heaven,—has no nature superior to it save God, the Creator of the world and the soul itself, and that these heavenly spirits derive their blessed life, and the light of truth from their blessed life, and the light of truth, the source as ourselves, agreeing with the gospel where we read, “There was a man sent from God whose name was John; the same came for a witness to bear witness of that Light, that through Him all might believe.  He was not that Light, but that he might bear witness of the Light.  That was the true Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world;”

John i. 6–9.

Chapter 3.—That the Platonists, Though Knowing Something of the Creator of the Universe, Have Misunderstood the True Worship of God, by Giving Divine Honor to Angels, Good or Bad.

This being so, if the Platonists, or those who think with them, knowing God, glorified Him as God and gave thanks, if they did not become vain in their own thoughts, if they did not originate or yield to the popular errors, they would certainly acknowledge that neither could the blessed immortals retain, nor we miserable mortals reach, a happy condition without worshipping the one God of gods, who is both theirs and ours.  To Him we owe the service which is called in Greek λατρεία, whether we render it outwardly or inwardly; for we are all His temple, each of us severally and all of us together, because He condescends to inhabit each individually and the whole harmonious body, being no greater in all than in each, since He is neither expanded nor divided.  Our heart when it rises to Him is His altar; the priest who intercedes for us is His Only-begotten; we sacrifice to Him bleeding victims when we contend for His truth even unto blood; to Him we offer the sweetest incense when we come before Him burning with holy and pious love; to Him we devote and surrender ourselves and His gifts in us; to Him, by solemn feasts and on appointed days, we consecrate the memory of His benefits, lest through the lapse of time ungrateful oblivion should steal upon us; to Him we offer on the altar of our heart the sacrifice of humility and praise, kindled by the fire of burning love.  It is that we may see Him, so far as He can be seen; it is that we may cleave to Him, that we are cleansed from all stain of sins and evil passions, and are consecrated in His name.  For He is the fountain of our happiness, He the end of all our desires.  Being attached to Him, or rather let me say, re-attached,—for we had detached ourselves and lost hold of Him,—being, I say, re-attached to Him,

Augustin here remarks, in a clause that cannot be given in English, that the word religio is derived from religere.—So Cicero, De Nat. Deor. ii. 28.

Chapter 4.—That Sacrifice is Due to the True God Only.

But, putting aside for the present the other religious services with which God is worshipped, certainly no man would dare to say that sacrifice is due to any but God.  Many parts, indeed, of divine worship are unduly used in showing honor to men, whether through an excessive humility or pernicious flattery; yet, while this is done, those persons who are thus worshipped and venerated, or even adored, are reckoned no more than human; and who ever thought of sacrificing save to one whom he knew, supposed, or feigned to be a god?  And how ancient a part of God’s worship sacrifice is, those two brothers, Cain and Abel, sufficiently show, of whom God rejected the elder’s sacrifice, and looked favorably on the younger’s.

Chapter 5.—Of the Sacrifices Which God Does Not Require, But Wished to Be Observed for the Exhibition of Those Things Which He Does Require.

And who is so foolish as to suppose that the things offered to God are needed by Him for some uses of His own?  Divine Scripture in many places explodes this idea.  Not to be wearisome, suffice it to quote this brief saying from a psalm:  “I have said to the Lord, Thou art my God:  for Thou needest not my goodness.”

Ps. xvi. 2.

Chapter 6.—Of the True and Perfect Sacrifice.

Thus a true sacrifice is every work which is done that we may be united to God in holy fellowship, and which has a reference to that supreme good and end in which alone we can be truly blessed.

On the service rendered to the Church by this definition, see Waterland’s Works, v. 124.

Chapter 7.—Of the Love of the Holy Angels, Which Prompts Them to Desire that We Worship the One True God, and Not Themselves.

It is very right that these blessed and immortal spirits, who inhabit celestial dwellings, and rejoice in the communications of their Creator’s fullness, firm in His eternity, assured in His truth, holy by His grace, since they compassionately and tenderly regard us miserable mortals, and wish us to become immortal and happy, do not desire us to sacrifice to themselves, but to Him whose sacrifice they know themselves to be in common with us.  For we and they together are the one city of God, to which it is said in the psalm, “Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God;”

Ps. lxxxvii. 3.

Chapter 9.—Of the Illicit Arts Connected with Demonolatry, and of Which the Platonist Porphyry Adopts Some, and Discards Others.

These miracles, and many others of the same nature, which it were tedious to mention, were wrought for the purpose of commending the worship of the one true God, and prohibiting the worship of a multitude of false gods.  Moreover, they were wrought by simple faith and godly confidence, not by the incantations and charms composed under the influence of a criminal tampering with the unseen world, of an art which they call either magic, or by the more abominable title necromancy,

Goetia.

Chapter 10.—Concerning Theurgy, Which Promises a Delusive Purification of the Soul by the Invocation of Demons.

But here we have another and a much more learned Platonist than Apuleius, Porphyry, to wit, asserting that, by I know not what theurgy, even the gods themselves are subjected to passions and perturbations; for by adjurations they were so bound and terrified that they could not confer purity of soul,—were so terrified by him who imposed on them a wicked command, that they could not by the same theurgy be freed from that terror, and fulfill the righteous behest of him who prayed to them, or do the good he sought.  Who does not see that all these things are fictions of deceiving demons, unless he be a wretched slave of theirs, and an alien from the grace of the true Liberator?  For if the Chaldæan had been dealing with good gods, certainly a well-disposed man, who sought to purify his own soul, would have had more influence with them than an evil-disposed man seeking to hinder him.  Or, if the gods were just, and considered the man unworthy of the purification he sought, at all events they should not have been terrified by an envious person, nor hindered, as Porphyry avows, by the fear of a stronger deity, but should have simply denied the boon on their own free judgment.  And it is surprising that that well-disposed Chaldæan, who desired to purify his soul by theurgical rites, found no superior deity who could either terrify the frightened gods still more, and force them to confer the boon, or compose their fears, and so enable them to do good without compulsion,—even supposing that the good theurgist had no rites by which he himself might purge away the taint of fear from the gods whom he invoked for the purification of his own soul.  And why is it that there is a god who has power to terrify the inferior gods, and none who has power to free them from fear?  Is there found a god who listens to the envious man, and frightens the gods from doing good? and is there not found a god who listens to the well-disposed man, and removes the fear of the gods that they may do him good?  O excellent theurgy!  O admirable purification of the soul!—a theurgy in which the violence of an impure envy has more influence than the entreaty of purity and holiness.  Rather let us abominate and avoid the deceit of such wicked spirits, and listen to sound doctrine.  As to those who perform these filthy cleansings by sacrilegious rites, and see in their initiated state (as he further tells us, though we may question this vision) certain wonderfully lovely appearances of angels or gods, this is what the apostle refers to when he speaks of “Satan transforming himself into an angel of light.”

2 Cor. xi. 14.

Chapter 11.—Of Porphyry’s Epistle to Anebo, in Which He Asks for Information About the Differences Among Demons.

It was a better tone which Porphyry adopted in his letter to Anebo the Egyptian, in which, assuming the character of an inquirer consulting him, he unmasks and explodes these sacrilegious arts.  In that letter, indeed, he repudiates all demons, whom he maintains to be so foolish as to be attracted by the sacrificial vapors, and therefore residing not in the ether, but in the air beneath the moon, and indeed in the moon itself.  Yet he has not the boldness to attribute to all the demons all the deceptions and malicious and foolish practices which justly move his indignation.  For, though he acknowledges that as a race demons are foolish, he so far accommodates himself to popular ideas as to call some of them benignant demons.  He expresses surprise that sacrifices not only incline the gods, but also compel and force them to do what men wish; and he is at a loss to understand how the sun and moon, and other visible celestial bodies,—for bodies he does not doubt that they are,—are considered gods, if the gods are distinguished from the demons by their incorporeality; also, if they are gods, how some are called beneficent and others hurtful, and how they, being corporeal, are numbered with the gods, who are incorporeal.  He inquires further, and still as one in doubt, whether diviners and wonderworkers are men of unusually powerful souls, or whether the power to do these things is communicated by spirits from without.  He inclines to the latter opinion, on the ground that it is by the use of stones and herbs that they lay spells on people, and open closed doors, and do similar wonders.  And on this account, he says, some suppose that there is a race of beings whose property it is to listen to men,—a race deceitful, full of contrivances, capable of assuming all forms, simulating gods, demons, and dead men,—and that it is this race which bring about all these things which have the appearance of good or evil, but that what is really good they never help us in, and are indeed unacquainted with, for they make wickedness easy, but throw obstacles in the path of those who eagerly follow virtue; and that they are filled with pride and rashness, delight in sacrificial odors, are taken with flattery.  These and the other characteristics of this race of deceitful and malicious spirits, who come into the souls of men and delude their senses, both in sleep and waking, he describes not as things of which he is himself convinced, but only with so much suspicion and doubt as to cause him to speak of them as commonly received opinions.  We should sympathize with this great philosopher in the difficulty he experienced in acquainting himself with and confidently assailing the whole fraternity of devils, which any Christian old woman would unhesitatingly describe and most unreservedly detest.  Perhaps, however, he shrank from offending Anebo, to whom he was writing, himself the most eminent patron of these mysteries, or the others who marvelled at these magical feats as divine works, and closely allied to the worship of the gods.

However, he pursues this subject, and, still in the character of an inquirer, mentions some things which no sober judgment could attribute to any but malicious and deceitful powers.  He asks why, after the better class of spirits have been invoked, the worse should be commanded to perform the wicked desires of men; why they do not hear a man who has just left a woman’s embrace, while they themselves make no scruple of tempting men to incest and adultery; why their priests are commanded to abstain from animal food for fear of being polluted by the corporeal exhalations, while they themselves are attracted by the fumes of sacrifices and other exhalations; why the initiated are forbidden to touch a dead body, while their mysteries are celebrated almost entirely by means of dead bodies; why it is that a man addicted to any vice should utter threats, not to a demon or to the soul of a dead man, but to the sun and moon, or some of the heavenly bodies, which he intimidates by imaginary terrors, that he may wring from them a real boon,—for he threatens that he will demolish the sky, and such like impossibilities,—that those gods, being alarmed, like silly children, with imaginary and absurd threats, may do what they are ordered.  Porphyry further relates that a man, Chæremon, profoundly versed in these sacred or rather sacrilegious mysteries, had written that the famous Egyptian mysteries of Isis and her husband Osiris had very great influence with the gods to compel them to do what they were ordered, when he who used the spells threatened to divulge or do away with these mysteries, and cried with a threatening voice that he would scatter the members of Osiris if they neglected his orders.  Not without reason is Porphyry surprised that a man should utter such wild and empty threats against the gods,—not against gods of no account, but against the heavenly gods, and those that shine with sidereal light,—and that these threats should be effectual to constrain them with resistless power, and alarm them so that they fulfill his wishes.  Not without reason does he, in the character of an inquirer into the reasons of these surprising things, give it to be understood that they are done by that race of spirits which he previously described as if quoting other people’s opinions,—spirits who deceive not, as he said, by nature, but by their own corruption, and who simulate gods and dead men, but not, as he said, demons, for demons they really are.  As to his idea that by means of herbs, and stones, and animals, and certain incantations and noises, and drawings, sometimes fanciful, and sometimes copied from the motions of the heavenly bodies, men create upon earth powers capable of bringing about various results, all that is only the mystification which these demons practise on those who are subject to them, for the sake of furnishing themselves with merriment at the expense of their dupes.  Either, then, Porphyry was sincere in his doubts and inquiries, and mentioned these things to demonstrate and put beyond question that they were the work, not of powers which aid us in obtaining life, but of deceitful demons; or, to take a more favorable view of the philosopher, he adopted this method with the Egyptian who was wedded to these errors, and was proud of them, that he might not offend him by assuming the attitude of a teacher, nor discompose his mind by the altercation of a professed assailant, but, by assuming the character of an inquirer, and the humble attitude of one who was anxious to learn, might turn his attention to these matters, and show how worthy they are to be despised and relinquished.  Towards the conclusion of his letter, he requests Anebo to inform him what the Egyptian wisdom indicates as the way to blessedness.  But as to those who hold intercourse with the gods, and pester them only for the sake of finding a runaway slave, or acquiring property, or making a bargain of a marriage, or such things, he declares that their pretensions to wisdom are vain.  He adds that these same gods, even granting that on other points their utterances were true, were yet so ill-advised and unsatisfactory in their disclosures about blessedness, that they cannot be either gods or good demons, but are either that spirit who is called the deceiver, or mere fictions of the imagination.

Chapter 12.—Of the Miracles Wrought by the True God Through the Ministry of the Holy Angels.

Since by means of these arts wonders are done which quite surpass human power, what choice have we but to believe that these predictions and operations, which seem to be miraculous and divine, and which at the same time form no part of the worship of the one God, in adherence to whom, as the Platonists themselves abundantly testify, all blessedness consists, are the pastime of wicked spirits, who thus seek to seduce and hinder the truly godly?  On the other hand, we cannot but believe that all miracles, whether wrought by angels or by other means, so long as they are so done as to commend the worship and religion of the one God in whom alone is blessedness, are wrought by those who love us in a true and godly sort, or through their means, God Himself working in them.  For we cannot listen to those who maintain that the invisible God works no visible miracles; for even they believe that He made the world, which surely they will not deny to be visible.  Whatever marvel happens in this world, it is certainly less marvellous than this whole world itself,—I mean the sky and earth, and all that is in them,—and these God certainly made.  But, as the Creator Himself is hidden and incomprehensible to man, so also is the manner of creation.  Although, therefore, the standing miracle of this visible world is little thought of, because always before us, yet, when we arouse ourselves to contemplate it, it is a greater miracle than the rarest and most unheard-of marvels.  For man himself is a greater miracle than any miracle done through his instrumentality.  Therefore God, who made the visible heaven and earth, does not disdain to work visible miracles in heaven or earth, that He may thereby awaken the soul which is immersed in  things visible to worship Himself, the Invisible.  But the place and time of these miracles are dependent on His unchangeable will, in which things future are ordered as if already they were accomplished.  For He moves things temporal without Himself moving in time, He does not in one way know things that are to be, and, in another, things that have been; neither does He listen to those who pray otherwise than as He sees those that will pray.  For, even when His angels hear us, it is He Himself who hears us in them, as in His true temple not made with hands, as in those men who are His saints; and His answers, though accomplished in time, have been arranged by His eternal appointment.

Chapter 13.—Of the Invisible God, Who Has Often Made Himself Visible, Not as He Really Is, But as the Beholders Could Bear the Sight.

Neither need we be surprised that God, invisible as He is, should often have appeared visibly to the patriarchs.  For as the sound which communicates the thought conceived in the silence of the mind is not the thought itself, so the form by which God, invisible in His own nature, became visible, was not God Himself.  Nevertheless it is He Himself who was seen under that form, as that thought itself is heard in the sound of the voice; and the patriarchs recognized that, though the bodily form was not God, they saw the invisible God.  For, though Moses conversed with God, yet he said, “If I have found grace in Thy sight, show me Thyself, that I may see and know Thee.”

Ex. xxxiii. 13.

Chapter 14.—That the One God is to Be Worshipped Not Only for the Sake of Eternal Blessings, But Also in Connection with Temporal Prosperity, Because All Things are Regulated by His Providence.

The education of the human race, represented by the people of God, has advanced, like that of an individual, through certain epochs, or, as it were, ages, so that it might gradually rise from earthly to heavenly things, and from the visible to the invisible.  This object was kept so clearly in view, that, even in the period when temporal rewards were promised, the one God was presented as the object of worship, that men might not acknowledge any other than the true Creator and Lord of the spirit, even in connection with the earthly blessings of this transitory life.  For he who denies that all things, which either angels or men can give us, are in the hand of the one Almighty, is a madman.  The Platonist Plotinus discourses concerning providence, and, from the beauty of flowers and foliage, proves that from the supreme God, whose beauty is unseen and ineffable, providence reaches down even to these earthly things here below; and he argues that all these frail and perishing things could not have so exquisite and elaborate a beauty, were they not fashioned by Him whose unseen and unchangeable beauty continually pervades all things.

Plotin. Ennead. III. ii. 13.

Chapter 16.—Whether Those Angels Who Demand that We Pay Them Divine Honor, or Those Who Teach Us to Render Holy Service, Not to Themselves, But to God, are to Be Trusted About the Way to Life Eternal.

What angels, then, are we to believe in this matter of blessed and eternal life?—those who wish to be worshipped with religious rites and observances, and require that men sacrifice to them; or those who say that all this worship is due to one God, the Creator, and teach us to render it with true piety to Him, by the vision of whom they are themselves already blessed, and in whom they promise that we shall be so?  For that vision of God is the beauty of a vision so great, and is so infinitely desirable, that Plotinus does not hesitate to say that he who enjoys all other blessings in abundance, and has not this, is supremely miserable.

Ennead. 1. vi. 7.

As for those miracles which history ascribes to the gods of the heathen,—I do not refer to those prodigies which at intervals happen from some unknown physical causes, and which are arranged and appointed by Divine Providence, such as monstrous births, and unusual meteorological phenomena, whether startling only, or also injurious, and which are said to be brought about and removed by communication with demons, and by their most deceitful craft,—but I refer to these prodigies which manifestly enough are wrought by their power and force, as, that the household gods which Æneas carried from Troy in his flight moved from place to place; that Tarquin cut a whetstone with a razor; that the Epidaurian serpent attached himself as a companion to Æsculapius on his voyage to Rome; that the ship in which the image of the Phrygian mother stood, and which could not be moved by a host of men and oxen, was moved by one weak woman, who attached her girdle to the vessel and drew it, as proof of her chastity; that a vestal, whose virginity was questioned, removed the suspicion by carrying from the Tiber a sieve full of water without any of it dropping:  these, then, and the like, are by no means to be compared for greatness and virtue to those which, we read, were wrought among God’s people.  How much less can we compare those marvels, which even the laws of heathen nations prohibit and punish,—I mean the magical and theurgic marvels, of which the great part are merely illusions practised upon the senses, as the drawing down of the moon, “that,” as Lucan says, “it may shed a stronger influence on the plants?”

Pharsal. vi. 503.

Chapter 17.—Concerning the Ark of the Covenant, and the Miraculous Signs Whereby God Authenticated the Law and the Promise.

On this account it was that the law of God, given by the disposition of angels, and which commanded that the one God of gods alone receive sacred worship, to the exclusion of all others, was deposited in the ark, called the ark of the testimony.  By this name it is sufficiently indicated, not that God, who was worshipped by all those rites, was shut up and enclosed in that place, though His responses emanated from it along with signs appreciable by the senses, but that His will was declared from that throne.  The law itself, too, was engraven on tables of stone, and, as I have said, deposited in the ark, which the priests carried with due reverence during the sojourn in the wilderness, along with the tabernacle, which was in like manner called the tabernacle of the testimony; and there was then an accompanying sign, which appeared as a cloud by day and as a fire by night; when the cloud moved, the camp was shifted, and where it stood the camp was pitched.  Besides these signs, and the voices which proceeded from the place where the ark was, there were other miraculous testimonies to the law.  For when the ark was carried across Jordan, on the entrance to the land of promise, the upper part of the river stopped in its course, and the lower part flowed on, so as to present both to the ark and the people dry ground to pass over.  Then, when it was carried seven times round the first hostile and polytheistic city they came to, its walls suddenly fell down, though assaulted by no hand, struck by no battering-ram.  Afterwards, too, when they were now resident in the land of promise, and the ark had, in punishment of their sin, been taken by their enemies, its captors triumphantly placed it in the temple of their favorite god, and left it shut up there, but, on opening the temple next day, they found the image they used to pray to fallen to the ground and shamefully shattered.  Then, being them selves alarmed by portents, and still more shamefully punished, they restored the ark of the testimony to the people from whom they had taken it.  And what was the manner of its restoration?  They placed it on a wagon, and yoked to it cows from which they had taken the calves, and let them choose their own course, expecting that in this way the divine will would be indicated; and the cows without any man driving or directing them, steadily pursued the way to the Hebrews, without regarding the lowing of their calves, and thus restored the ark to its worshippers.  To God these and such like wonders are small, but they are mighty to terrify and give wholesome instruction to men.  For if philosophers, and especially the Platonists, are with justice esteemed wiser than other men, as I have just been mentioning, because they taught that even these earthly and insignificant things are ruled by Divine Providence, inferring this from the numberless beauties which are observable not only in the bodies of animals, but even in plants and grasses, how much more plainly do these things attest the presence of divinity which happen at the time predicted, and in which that religion is commended which forbids the offering of sacrifice to any celestial, terrestrial, or infernal being, and commands it to be offered to God only, who alone blesses us by His love for us, and by our love to Him, and who, by arranging the appointed times of those sacrifices, and by predicting that they were to pass into a better sacrifice by a better Priest, testified that He has no appetite for these sacrifices, but through them indicated others of more substantial blessing,—and all this not that He Himself may be glorified by these honors, but that we may be stirred up to worship and cleave to Him, being inflamed by His love, which is our advantage rather than His?

Chapter 18.—Against Those Who Deny that the Books of the Church are to Be Believed About the Miracles Whereby the People of God Were Educated.

Will some one say that these miracles are false, that they never happened, and that the records of them are lies?  Whoever says so, and asserts that in such matters no records whatever can be credited, may also say that there are no gods who care for human affairs.  For they have induced men to worship them only by means of miraculous works, which the heathen histories testify, and by which the gods have made a display of their own power rather than done any real service.  This is the reason why we have not undertaken in this work, of which we are now writing the tenth book, to refute those who either deny that there is any divine power, or contend that it does not interfere with human affairs, but those who prefer their own god to our God, the Founder of the holy and most glorious city, not knowing that He is also the invisible and unchangeable Founder of this visible and changing world, and the truest bestower of the blessed life which resides not in things created, but in Himself.  For thus speaks His most trustworthy prophet:  “It is good for me to be united to God.”

Ps. lxxiii. 28.

Chapter 19.—On the Reasonableness of Offering, as the True Religion Teaches, a Visible Sacrifice to the One True and Invisible God.

As to those who think that these visible sacrifices are suitably offered to other gods, but that invisible sacrifices, the graces of purity of mind and holiness of will, should be offered, as greater and better, to the invisible God, Himself greater and better than all others, they must be oblivious that these visible sacrifices are signs of the invisible, as the words we utter are the signs of things.  And therefore, as in prayer or praise we direct intelligible words to Him to whom in our heart we offer the very feelings we are expressing, so we are to understand that in sacrifice we offer visible sacrifice only to Him to whom in our heart we ought to present ourselves an invisible sacrifice.  It is then that the angels, and all those superior powers who are mighty by their goodness and piety, regard us with pleasure, and rejoice with us and assist us to the utmost of their power.  But if we offer such worship to them, they decline it; and when on any mission to men they become visible to the senses, they positively forbid it.  Examples of this occur in holy writ.  Some fancied they should, by adoration or sacrifice, pay the same honor to angels as is due to God, and were prevented from doing so by the angels themselves, and ordered to render it to Him to whom alone they know it to be due.  And the holy angels have in this been imitated by holy men of God.  For Paul and Barnabas, when they had wrought a miracle of healing in Lycaonia, were thought to be gods, and the Lycaonians desired to sacrifice to them, and they humbly and piously declined this honor, and announced to them the God in whom they should believe.  And those deceitful and proud spirits, who exact worship, do so simply because they know it to be due to the true God.  For that which they take pleasure in is not, as Porphyry says and some fancy, the smell of the victims, but divine honors.  They have, in fact, plenty odors on all hands, and if they wished more, they could provide them for themselves.  But the spirits who arrogate to themselves divinity are delighted not with the smoke of carcasses but with the suppliant spirit which they deceive and hold in subjection, and hinder from drawing near to God, preventing him from offering himself in sacrifice to God by inducing him to sacrifice to others.

Chapter 20.—Of the Supreme and True Sacrifice Which Was Effected by the Mediator Between God and Men.

And hence that true Mediator, in so far as, by assuming the form of a servant, He became the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, though in the form of God He received sacrifice together with the Father, with whom He is one God, yet in the form of a servant He chose rather to be than to receive a sacrifice, that not even by this instance any one might have occasion to suppose that sacrifice should be rendered to any creature.  Thus He is both the Priest who offers and the Sacrifice offered.  And He designed that there should be a daily sign of this in the sacrifice of the Church, which, being His body, learns to offer herself through Him.  Of this true Sacrifice the ancient sacrifices of the saints were the various and numerous signs; and it was thus variously figured, just as one thing is signified by a variety of words, that there may be less weariness when we speak of it much.  To this supreme and true sacrifice all false sacrifices have given place.

Chapter 21 .—Of the Power Delegated to Demons for the Trial and Glorification of the Saints, Who Conquer Not by Propitiating the Spirits of the Air, But by Abiding in God.

The power delegated to the demons at certain appointed and well-adjusted seasons, that they may give expression to their hostility to the city of God by stirring up against it the men who are under their influence, and may not only receive sacrifice from those who willingly offer it, but may also extort it from the unwilling by violent persecution;—this power is found to be not merely harmless, but even useful to the Church, completing as it does the number of martyrs, whom the city of God esteems as all the more illustrious and honored citizens, because they have striven even to blood against the sin of impiety.  If the ordinary language of the Church allowed it, we might more elegantly call these men our heroes.  For this name is said to be derived from Juno, who in Greek is called Hêrê, and hence, according to the Greek myths, one of her sons was called Heros.  And these fables mystically signified that Juno was mistress of the air, which they suppose to be inhabited by the demons and the heroes, understanding by heroes the souls of the well-deserving dead.  But for a quite opposite reason would we call our martyrs heroes,—supposing, as I said, that the usage of ecclesiastical language would admit of it,—not because they lived along with the demons in the air, but because they conquered these demons or powers of the air, and among them Juno herself, be she what she may, not unsuitably represented, as she commonly is by the poets, as hostile to virtue, and jealous of men of mark aspiring to the heavens.  Virgil, however, unhappily gives way, and yields to her; for, though he represents her as saying, “I am conquered by Æneas,”

Æn., vii. 310.

“Pay vows to Juno:  overbear

Her queenly soul with gift and prayer.”

Æn., iii. 438, 439.

In conformity with this opinion, Porphyry— expressing, however, not so much his own views as other people’s—says that a good god or genius cannot come to a man unless the evil genius has been first of all propitiated, implying that the evil deities had greater power than the good; for, until they have been appeased and give place, the good can give no assistance; and if the evil deities oppose, the good can give no help; whereas the evil can do injury without the good being able to prevent them.  This is not the way of the true and truly holy religion; not thus do our martyrs conquer Juno, that is to say, the powers of the air, who envy the virtues of the pious.  Our heroes, if we could so call them, overcome Hêrê, not by suppliant gifts, but by divine virtues.  As Scipio, who conquered Africa by his valor, is more suitably styled Africanus than if he had appeased his enemies by gifts, and so won their mercy.

Chapter 22.—Whence the Saints Derive Power Against Demons and True Purification of Heart.

It is by true piety that men of God cast out the hostile power of the air which opposes godliness; it is by exorcising it, not by propitiating it; and they overcome all the temptations of the adversary by praying, not to him, but to their own God against him.  For the devil cannot conquer or subdue any but those who are in league with sin; and therefore he is conquered in the name of Him who assumed humanity, and that without sin, that Himself being both Priest and Sacrifice, He might bring about the remission of sins, that is to say, might bring it about through the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, by whom we are reconciled to God, the cleansing from sin being accomplished.  For men are separated from God only by sins, from which we are in this life cleansed not by our own virtue, but by the divine compassion; through His indulgence, not through our own power.  For, whatever virtue we call our own is itself bestowed upon us by His goodness.  And we might attribute too much to ourselves while in the flesh, unless we lived in the receipt of pardon until we laid it down.  This is the reason why there has been vouchsafed to us, through the Mediator, this grace, that we who are polluted by sinful flesh should be cleansed by the likeness of sinful flesh.  By this grace of God, wherein He has shown His great compassion toward us, we are both governed by faith in this life, and, after this life, are led onwards to the fullest perfection by the vision of immutable truth.

Chapter 23.—Of the Principles Which, According to the Platonists, Regulate the Purification of the Soul.

Even Porphyry asserts that it was revealed by divine oracles that we are not purified by any sacrifices

Teletis.

Chapter 24.—Of the One Only True Principle Which Alone Purifies and Renews Human Nature.

Accordingly, when we speak of God, we do not affirm two or three principles, no more than we are at liberty to affirm two or three gods; although, speaking of each, of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Holy Ghost, we confess that each is God:  and yet we do not say, as the Sabellian heretics say, that the Father is the same as the Son, and the Holy Spirit the same as the Father and the Son; but we say that the Father is the Father of the Son, and the Son the Son of the Father, and that the Holy Spirit of the Father and the Son is neither the Father nor the Son.  It was therefore truly said that man is cleansed only by a Principle, although the Platonists erred in speaking in the plural of principles.  But Porphyry, being under the dominion of these envious powers, whose influence he was at once ashamed of and afraid to throw off, refused to recognize that Christ is the Principle by whose incarnation we are purified.  Indeed he despised Him, because of the flesh itself which He assumed, that He might offer a sacrifice for our purification,—a great mystery, unintelligible to Porphyry’s pride, which that true and benignant Redeemer brought low by His humility, manifesting Himself to mortals by the mortality which He assumed, and which the malignant and deceitful mediators are proud of wanting, promising, as the boon of immortals, a deceptive assistance to wretched men.  Thus the good and true Mediator showed that it is sin which is evil, and not the substance or nature of flesh; for this, together with the human soul, could without sin be both assumed and retained, and laid down in death, and changed to something better by resurrection.  He showed also that death itself, although the punishment of sin, was submitted to by Him for our sakes without sin, and must not be evaded by sin on our part, but rather, if opportunity serves, be borne for righteousness’ sake.  For he was able to expiate sins by dying, because He both died, and not for sin of His own.  But He has not been recognized by Porphyry as the Principle, otherwise he would have recognized Him as the Purifier.  The Principle is neither the flesh nor the human soul in Christ but the Word by which all things were made.  The flesh, therefore, does not by its own virtue purify, but by virtue of the Word by which it was assumed, when “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

John i. 14.

Chapter 25.—That All the Saints, Both Under the Law and Before It, Were Justified by Faith in the Mystery of Christ’s Incarnation.

It was by faith in this mystery, and godliness of life, that purification was attainable even by the saints of old, whether before the law was given to the Hebrews (for God and the angels were even then present as instructors), or in the periods under the law, although the promises of spiritual things, being presented in figure, seemed to be carnal, and hence the name of Old Testament.  For it was then the prophets lived, by whom, as by angels, the same promise was announced; and among them was he whose grand and divine sentiment regarding the end and supreme good of man I have just now quoted, “It is good for me to cleave to God.”

Ps. lxxiii. 28.

Chapter 26.—Of Porphyry’s Weakness in Wavering Between the Confession of the True God and the Worship of Demons.

I know not how it is so, but it seems to me that Porphyry blushed for his friends the theurgists; for he knew all that I have adduced, but did not frankly condemn polytheistic worship.  He said, in fact, that there are some angels who visit earth, and reveal divine truth to theurgists, and others who publish on earth the things that belong to the Father, His height and depth.  Can we believe, then, that the angels whose office it is to declare the will of the Father, wish us to be subject to any but Him whose will they declare?  And hence, even this Platonist himself judiciously observes that we should rather imitate than invoke them.  We ought not, then, to fear that we may offend these immortal and happy subjects of the one God by not sacrificing to them; for this they know to be due only to the one true God, in allegiance to whom they themselves find their blessedness, and therefore they will not have it given to them, either in figure or in the reality, which the mysteries of sacrifice symbolized.  Such arrogance belongs to proud and wretched demons, whose disposition is diametrically opposite to the piety of those who are subject to God, and whose blessedness consists in attachment to Him.  And, that we also may attain to this bliss, they aid us, as is fit, with sincere kindliness, and usurp over us no dominion, but declare to us Him under whose rule we are then fellow-subjects.  Why, then, O philosopher, do you still fear to speak freely against the powers which are inimical both to true virtue and to the gifts of the true God?  Already you have discriminated between the angels who proclaim God’s will, and those who visit theurgists, drawn down by I know not what art.  Why do you still ascribe to these latter the honor of declaring divine truth?  If they do not declare the will of the Father, what divine revelations can they make?  Are not these the evil spirits who were bound over by the incantations of an envious man,

See above, c. 9.

Chapter 27.—Of the Impiety of Porphyry, Which is Worse Than Even the Mistake of Apuleius.

How much more tolerable and accordant with human feeling is the error of your Platonist co-sectary Apuleius! for he attributed the diseases and storms of human passions only to the demons who occupy a grade beneath the moon, and makes even this avowal as by constraint regarding gods whom he honors; but the superior and celestial gods, who inhabit the ethereal regions, whether visible, as the sun, moon, and other luminaries, whose brilliancy makes them conspicuous, or invisible, but believed in by him, he does his utmost to remove beyond the slightest stain of these perturbations.  It is not, then, from Plato, but from your Chaldæan teachers you have learned to elevate human vices to the ethereal and empyreal regions of the world and to the celestial firmament, in order that your theurgists might be able to obtain from your gods divine revelations; and yet you make yourself superior to these divine revelations by your intellectual life, which dispenses with these theurgic purifications as not needed by a philosopher.  But, by way of rewarding your teachers, you recommend these arts to other men, who, not being philosophers, may be persuaded to use what you acknowledge to be useless to yourself, who are capable of higher things; so that those who cannot avail themselves of the virtue of philosophy, which is too arduous for the multitude, may, at your instigation, betake themselves to theurgists by whom they may be purified, not, indeed, in the intellectual, but in the spiritual part of the soul.  Now, as the persons who are unfit for philosophy form incomparably the majority of mankind, more may be compelled to consult these secret and illicit teachers of yours than frequent the Platonic schools.  For these most impure demons, pretending to be ethereal gods, whose herald and messenger you have become, have promised that those who are purified by theurgy in the spiritual part of their soul shall not indeed return to the Father, but shall dwell among the ethereal gods above the aerial regions.  But such fancies are not listened to by the multitudes of men whom Christ came to set free from the tyranny of demons.  For in Him they have the most gracious cleansing, in which mind, spirit, and body alike participate.  For, in order that He might heal the whole man from the plague of sin, He took without sin the whole human nature.  Would that you had known Him, and would that you had committed yourself for healing to Him rather than to your own frail and infirm human virtue, or to pernicious and curious arts!  He would not have deceived you; for Him your own oracles, on your own showing, acknowledged holy and immortal.  It is of Him, too, that the most famous poet speaks, poetically indeed, since he applies it to the person of another, yet truly, if you refer it to Christ , saying, “Under thine auspices, if any traces of our crimes remain, they shall be obliterated, and earth freed from its perpetual fear.”

Virgil, Eclog. iv. 13, 14.

Chapter 28.—How It is that Porphyry Has Been So Blind as Not to Recognize the True Wisdom—Christ.

You drive men, therefore, into the most palpable error.  And yet you are not ashamed of doing so much harm, though you call yourself a lover of virtue and wisdom.  Had you been true and faithful in this profession, you would have recognized Christ, the virtue of God and the wisdom of God, and would not, in the pride of vain science, have revolted from His wholesome humility.  Nevertheless you acknowledge that the spiritual part of the soul can be purified by the virtue of chastity without the aid of those theurgic arts and mysteries which you wasted your time in learning.  You even say, sometimes, that these mysteries do not raise the soul after death, so that, after the termination of this life, they seem to be of no service even to the part you call spiritual; and yet you recur on every opportunity to these arts, for no other purpose, so far as I see, than to appear an accomplished theurgist, and gratify those who are curious in illicit arts, or else to inspire others with the same curiosity.  But we give you all praise for saying that this art is to be feared, both on account of the legal enactments against it, and by reason of the danger involved in the very practice of it.  And would that in this, at least, you were listened to by its wretched votaries, that they might be withdrawn from entire absorption in it, or might even be preserved from tampering with it at all!  You say, indeed, that ignorance, and the numberless vices resulting from it, cannot be removed by any mysteries, but only by the πατρικὸς νοῦς, that is, the Father’s mind or intellect conscious of the Father’s will.  But that Christ is this mind you do not believe; for Him you despise on account of the body He took of a woman and the shame of the cross; for your lofty wisdom spurns such low and contemptible things, and soars to more exalted regions.  But He fulfills what the holy prophets truly predicted regarding Him:  “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nought the prudence of the prudent.”

Isa. xxix. 14.

Chapter 29.—Of the Incarnation of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Which the Platonists in Their Impiety Blush to Acknowledge.

You proclaim the Father and His Son, whom you call the Father’s intellect or mind, and between these a third, by whom we suppose you mean the Holy Spirit, and in your own fashion you call these three Gods.  In this, though your expressions are inaccurate, you do in some sort, and as through a veil, see what we should strive towards; but the incarnation of the unchangeable Son of God, whereby we are saved, and are enabled to reach the things we believe, or in part understand, this is what you refuse to recognize.  You see in a fashion, although at a distance, although with filmy eye, the country in which we should abide; but the way to it you know not.  Yet you believe in grace, for you say it is granted to few to reach God by virtue of intelligence.  For you do not say, “Few have thought fit or have wished,” but, “It has been granted to few,”—distinctly acknowledging God’s grace, not man’s sufficiency.  You also use this word more expressly, when, in accordance with the opinion of Plato, you make no doubt that in this life a man cannot by any means attain to perfect wisdom, but that whatever is lacking is in the future life made up to those who live intellectually, by God’s providence and grace.  Oh, had you but recognized the grace of God in Jesus Christ our Lord, and that very incarnation of His, wherein He assumed a human soul and body, you might have seemed the brightest example of grace!

According to another reading, “You might have seen it to be,” etc.

But in order to your acquiescence in this truth, it is lowliness that is requisite, and to this it is extremely difficult to bend you.  For what is there incredible, especially to men like you, accustomed to speculation, which might have predisposed you to believe in this,—what is there incredible, I say, in the assertion that God assumed a human soul and body?  You yourselves ascribe such excellence to the intellectual soul, which is, after all, the human soul, that you maintain that it can become consubstantial with that intelligence of the Father whom you believe in as the Son of God.  What incredible thing is it, then, if some one soul be assumed by Him in an ineffable and unique manner for the salvation of many?  Moreover, our nature itself testifies that a man is incomplete unless a body be united with the soul.  This certainly would be more incredible, were it not of all things the most common; for we should more easily believe in a union between spirit and spirit, or, to use your own terminology, between the incorporeal and the incorporeal, even though the one were human, the other divine, the one changeable and the other unchangeable, than in a union between the corporeal and the incorporeal.  But perhaps it is the unprecedented birth of a body from a virgin that staggers you?  But, so far from this being a difficulty, it ought rather to assist you to receive our religion, that a miraculous person was born miraculously.  Or, do you find a difficulty in the fact that, after His body had been given up to death, and had been changed into a higher kind of body by resurrection, and was now no longer mortal but incorruptible, He carried it up into heavenly places?  Perhaps you refuse to believe this, because you remember that Porphyry, in these very books from which I have cited so much, and which treat of the return of the soul, so frequently teaches that a body of every kind is to be escaped from, in order that the soul may dwell in blessedness with God.  But here, in place of following Porphyry, you ought rather to have corrected him, especially since you agree with him in believing such incredible things about the soul of this visible world and huge material frame.  For, as scholars of Plato, you hold that the world is an animal, and a very happy animal, which you wish to be also everlasting.  How, then, is it never to be loosed from a body, and yet never lose its happiness, if, in order to the happiness of the soul, the body must be left behind?  The sun, too, and the other stars, you not only acknowledge to be bodies, in which you have the cordial assent of all seeing men, but also, in obedience to what you reckon a profounder insight, you declare that they are very blessed animals, and eternal, together with their bodies.  Why is it, then, that when the Christian faith is pressed upon you, you forget, or pretend to ignore, what you habitually discuss or teach?  Why is it that you refuse to be Christians, on the ground that you hold opinions which, in fact, you yourselves demolish?  Is it not because Christ came in lowliness, and ye are proud?  The precise nature of the resurrection bodies of the saints may sometimes occasion discussion among those who are best read in the Christian Scriptures; yet there is not among us the smallest doubt that they shall be everlasting, and of a nature exemplified in the instance of Christ’s risen body.  But whatever be their nature, since we maintain that they shall be absolutely incorruptible and immortal, and shall offer no hindrance to the soul’s contemplation, by which it is fixed in God, and as you say that among the celestials the bodies of the eternally blessed are eternal, why do you maintain that, in order to blessedness, every body must be escaped from?  Why do you thus seek such a plausible reason for escaping from the Christian faith, if not because, as I again say, Christ is humble and ye proud?  Are ye ashamed to be corrected?  This is the vice of the proud.  It is, forsooth, a degradation for learned men to pass from the school of Plato to the discipleship of Christ, who by His Spirit taught a fisherman to think and to say, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  The same was in the beginning with God.  All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made.  In Him was life; and the life was the light of men.  And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.”

John i. 1–5.

Chapter 30.—Porphyry’s Emendations and Modifications of Platonism.

If it is considered unseemly to emend anything which Plato has touched, why did Porphyry himself make emendations, and these not a few? for it is very certain that Plato wrote that the souls of men return after death to the bodies of beasts.

Comp. Euseb. Præp. Evan. xiii. 16.

Chapter 31.—Against the Arguments on Which the Platonists Ground Their Assertion that the Human Soul is Co-Eternal with God.

Why, then, do we not rather believe the divinity in those matters, which human talent cannot fathom?  Why do we not credit the assertion of divinity, that the soul is not co-eternal with God, but is created, and once was not?  For the Platonists seemed to themselves to allege an adequate reason for their rejection of this doctrine, when they affirmed that nothing could be everlasting which had not always existed.  Plato, however, in writing concerning the world and the gods in it, whom the Supreme made, most expressly states that they had a beginning and yet would have no end, but, by the sovereign will of the Creator, would endure eternally.  But, by way of interpreting this, the Platonists have discovered that he meant a beginning, not of time, but of cause.  “For as if a foot,” they say, “had been always from eternity in dust, there would always have been a print underneath it; and yet no one would doubt that this print was made by the pressure of the foot, nor that, though the one was made by the other, neither was prior to the other; so,” they say, “the world and the gods created in it have always been, their Creator always existing, and yet they were made.”  If, then, the soul has always existed, are we to say that its wretchedness has always existed?  For if there is something in it which was not from eternity, but began in time, why is it impossible that the soul itself, though not previously existing, should begin to be in time?  Its blessedness, too, which, as he owns, is to be more stable, and indeed endless, after the soul’s experience of evils,—this undoubtedly has a beginning in time, and yet is to be always, though previously it had no existence.  This whole argumentation, therefore, to establish that nothing can be endless except that which has had no beginning, falls to the ground.  For here we find the blessedness of the soul, which has a beginning, and yet has no end.  And, therefore, let the incapacity of man give place to the authority of God; and let us take our belief regarding the true religion from the ever-blessed spirits, who do not seek for themselves that honor which they know to be due to their God and ours, and who do not command us to sacrifice save only to Him, whose sacrifice, as I have often said already, and must often say again, we and they ought together to be, offered through that Priest who offered Himself to death a sacrifice for us, in that human nature which He assumed, and according to which He desired to be our Priest.

Chapter 32.—Of the Universal Way of the Soul’s Deliverance, Which Porphyry Did Not Find Because He Did Not Rightly Seek It, and Which the Grace of Christ Has Alone Thrown Open.

This is the religion which possesses the universal way for delivering the soul; for except by this way, none can be delivered.  This is a kind of royal way, which alone leads to a kingdom which does not totter like all temporal dignities, but stands firm on eternal foundations.  And when Porphyry says, towards the end of the first book De Regressu Animœ, that no system of doctrine which furnishes the universal way for delivering the soul has as yet been received, either from the truest philosophy, or from the ideas and practices of the Indians, or from the reasoning

Inductio.

This, then, is the universal way of the soul’s deliverance, the way that is granted by the divine compassion to the nations universally.  And no nation to which the knowledge of it has already come, or may hereafter come, ought to demand, Why so soon? or, Why so late?—for the design of Him who sends it is impenetrable by human capacity.  This was felt by Porphyry when he confined himself to saying that this gift of God was not yet received, and had not yet come to his knowledge.  For though this was so, he did not on that account pronounce that the way it self had no existence.  This, I say, is the universal way for the deliverance of believers, concerning which the faithful Abraham received the divine assurance, “In thy seed shall all nations be blessed.”

Gen. xxii. 18.

As to Porphyry’s statement that the universal way of the soul’s deliverance had not yet come to his knowledge by any acquaintance he had with history, I would ask, what more remarkable history can be found than that which has taken possession of the whole world by its authoritative voice? or what more trustworthy than that which narrates past events, and predicts the future with equal clearness, and in the unfulfilled predictions of which we are constrained to believe by those that are already fulfilled?  For neither Porphyry nor any Platonists can despise divination and prediction, even of things that pertain to this life and earthly matters, though they justly despise ordinary soothsaying and the divination that is connected with magical arts.  They deny that these are the predictions of great men, or are to be considered important, and they are right; for they are founded, either on the foresight of subsidiary causes, as to a professional eye much of the course of a disease is foreseen by certain pre-monitory symptoms, or the unclean demons predict what they have resolved to do, that they may thus work upon the thoughts and desires of the wicked with an appearance of authority, and incline human frailty to imitate their impure actions.  It is not such things that the saints who walk in the universal way care to predict as important, although, for the purpose of commending the faith, they knew and often predicted even such things as could not be detected by human observation, nor be readily verified by experience.  But there were other truly important and divine events which they predicted, in so far as it was given them to know the will of God.  For the incarnation of Christ, and all those important marvels that were accomplished in Him, and done in His name; the repentance of men and the conversion of their wills to God; the remission of sins, the grace of righteousness, the faith of the pious, and the multitudes in all parts of the world who believe in the true divinity; the overthrow of idolatry and demon worship, and the testing of the faithful by trials; the purification of those who persevered, and their deliverance from all evil; the day of judgment, the resurrection of the dead, the eternal damnation of the community of the ungodly, and the eternal kingdom of the most glorious city of God, ever-blessed in the enjoyment of the vision of God,—these things were predicted and promised in the Scriptures of this way; and of these we see so many fulfilled, that we justly and piously trust that the rest will also come to pass.  As for those who do not believe, and consequently do not understand, that this is the way which leads straight to the vision of God and to eternal fellowship with Him, according to the true predictions and statements of the Holy Scriptures, they may storm at our position, but they cannot storm it.

And therefore, in these ten books, though not meeting, I dare say, the expectation of some, yet I have, as the true God and Lord has vouchsafed to aid me, satisfied the desire of certain persons, by refuting the objections of the ungodly, who prefer their own gods to the Founder of the holy city, about which we undertook to speak.  Of these ten books, the first five were directed against those who think we should worship the gods for the sake of the blessings of this life, and the second five against those who think we should worship them for the sake of the life which is to be after death.  And now, in fulfillment of the promise I made in the first book, I shall go on to say, as God shall aid me, what I think needs to be said regarding the origin, history, and deserved ends of the two cities, which, as already remarked, are in this world commingled and implicated with one another.

Chapter 1.—Of This Part of the Work, Wherein We Begin to Explain the Origin and End of the Two Cities.

The city of God we speak of is the same to which testimony is borne by that Scripture, which excels all the writings of all nations by its divine authority, and has brought under its influence all kinds of minds, and this not by a casual intellectual movement, but obviously by an express providential arrangement.  For there it is written, “Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God.”

Ps. lxxxvii. 3.

Chapter 2.—Of the Knowledge of God, to Which No Man Can Attain Save Through the Mediator Between God and Men, the Man Christ Jesus.

 It is a great and very rare thing for a man, after he has contemplated the whole creation, corporeal and incorporeal, and has discerned its mutability, to pass beyond it, and, by the continued soaring of his mind, to attain to the unchangeable substance of God, and, in that height of contemplation, to learn from God Himself that none but He has made all that is not of the divine essence.  For God speaks with a man not by means of some audible creature dinning in his ears, so that atmospheric vibrations connect Him that makes with him that hears the sound, nor even by means of a spiritual being with the semblance of a body, such as we see in dreams or similar states; for even in this case He speaks as if to the ears of the body, because it is by means of the semblance of a body He speaks, and with the appearance of a real interval of space,—for visions are exact representations of bodily objects.  Not by these, then, does God speak, but by the truth itself, if any one is prepared to hear with the mind rather than with the body.  For He speaks to that part of man which is better than all else that is in him, and than which God Himself alone is better.  For since man is most properly understood (or, if that cannot be, then, at least, believed) to be made in God’s image, no doubt it is that part of him by which he rises above those lower parts he has in common with the beasts, which brings him nearer to the Supreme.  But since the mind itself, though naturally capable of reason and intelligence is disabled by besotting and inveterate vices not merely from delighting and abiding in, but even from tolerating His unchangeable light, until it has been gradually healed, and renewed, and made capable of such felicity, it had, in the first place, to be impregnated with faith, and so purified.  And that in this faith it might advance the more confidently towards the truth, the truth itself, God, God’s Son, assuming humanity without destroying His divinity,

Homine assumto, non Deo consumto.

Chapter 3.—Of the Authority of the Canonical Scriptures Composed by the Divine Spirit.

This Mediator, having spoken what He judged sufficient first by the prophets, then by His own lips, and afterwards by the apostles, has besides produced the Scripture which is called canonical, which has paramount authority, and to which we yield assent in all matters of which we ought not to be ignorant, and yet cannot know of ourselves.  For if we attain the knowledge of present objects by the testimony of our own senses,

A clause is here inserted to give the etymology of prœsentia from prœ sensibus.

Chapter 4.—That the World is Neither Without Beginning, Nor Yet Created by a New Decree of God, by Which He Afterwards Willed What He Had Not Before Willed.

Of all visible things, the world is the greatest; of all invisible, the greatest is God.  But, that the world is, we see; that God is, we believe.  That God made the world, we can believe from no one more safely than from God Himself.  But where have we heard Him?  Nowhere more distinctly than in the Holy Scriptures, where His prophet said, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Gen. i. 1.

Chapter 5.—That We Ought Not to Seek to Comprehend the Infinite Ages of Time Before the World, Nor the Infinite Realms of Space.

Next, we must see what reply can be made to those who agree that God is the Creator of the world, but have difficulties about the time of its creation, and what reply, also, they can make to difficulties we might raise about the place of its creation.  For, as they demand why the world was created then and no sooner, we may ask why it was created just here where it is, and not elsewhere.  For if they imagine infinite spaces of time before the world, during which God could not have been idle, in like manner they may conceive outside the world infinite realms of space, in which, if any one says that the Omnipotent cannot hold His hand from working, will it not follow that they must adopt Epicurus’ dream of innumerable worlds? with this difference only, that he asserts that they are formed and destroyed by the fortuitous movements of atoms, while they will hold that they are made by God’s hand, if they maintain that, throughout the boundless immensity of space, stretching interminably in every direction round the world, God cannot rest, and that the worlds which they suppose Him to make cannot be destroyed.  For here the question is with those who, with ourselves, believe that God is spiritual, and the Creator of all existences but Himself.  As for others, it is a condescension to dispute with them on a religious ques tion, for they have acquired a reputation only among men who pay divine honors to a number of gods, and have become conspicuous among the other philosophers for no other reason than that, though they are still far from the truth, they are near it in comparison with the rest.  While these, then, neither confine in any place, nor limit, nor distribute the divine substance, but, as is worthy of God, own it to be wholly though spiritually present everywhere, will they perchance say that this substance is absent from such immense spaces outside the world, and is occupied in one only, (and that a very little one compared with the infinity beyond), the one, namely, in which is the world?  I think they will not proceed to this absurdity.  Since they maintain that there is but one world, of vast material bulk, indeed, yet finite, and in its own determinate position, and that this was made by the working of God, let them give the same account of God’s resting in the infinite times before the world as they give of His resting in the infinite spaces outside of it.  And as it does not follow that God set the world in the very spot it occupies and no other by accident rather than by divine reason, although no human reason can comprehend why it was so set, and though there was no merit in the spot chosen to give it the precedence of infinite others, so neither does it follow that we should suppose that God was guided by chance when He created the world in that and no earlier time, although previous times had been running by during an infinite past, and though there was no difference by which one time could be chosen in preference to another.  But if they say that the thoughts of men are idle when they conceive infinite places, since there is no place beside the world, we reply that, by the same showing, it is vain to conceive of the past times of God’s rest, since there is no time before the world.

Chapter 6.—That the World and Time Had Both One Beginning, and the One Did Not Anticipate the Other.

For if eternity and time are rightly distinguished by this, that time does not exist without some movement and transition, while in eternity there is no change, who does not see that there could have been no time had not some creature been made, which by some motion could give birth to change,—the various parts of which motion and change, as they cannot be simultaneous, succeed one another,—and thus, in these shorter or longer intervals of duration, time would begin?  Since then, God, in whose eternity is no change at all, is the Creator and Ordainer of time, I do not see how He can be said to have created the world after spaces of time had elapsed, unless it be said that prior to the world there was some creature by whose movement time could pass.  And if the sacred and infallible Scriptures say that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, in order that it may be understood that He had made nothing previously,—for if He had made anything before the rest, this thing would rather be said to have been made “in the beginning,”—then assuredly the world was made, not in time, but simultaneously with time.  For that which is made in time is made both after and before some time,—after that which is past, before that which is future.  But none could then be past, for there was no creature by whose movements its duration could be measured.  But simultaneously with time the world was made, if in the world’s creation change and motion were created, as seems evident from the order of the first six or seven days.  For in these days the morning and evening are counted, until, on the sixth day, all things which God then made were finished, and on the seventh the rest of God was mysteriously and sublimely signalized.  What kind of days these were it is extremely difficult, or perhaps impossible for us to conceive, and how much more to say!

Chapter 7.—Of the Nature of the First Days, Which are Said to Have Had Morning and Evening, Before There Was a Sun.

We see, indeed, that our ordinary days have no evening but by the setting, and no morning but by the rising, of the sun; but the first three days of all were passed without sun, since it is reported to have been made on the fourth day.  And first of all, indeed, light was made by the word of God, and God, we read, separated it from the darkness, and called the light Day, and the darkness Night; but what kind of light that was, and by what periodic movement it made evening and morning, is beyond the reach of our senses; neither can we understand how it was, and yet must unhesitatingly believe it.  For either it was some material light, whether proceeding from the upper parts of the world, far removed from our sight, or from the spot where the sun was afterwards kindled; or under the name of light the holy city was signified, composed of holy angels and blessed spirits, the city of which the apostle says, “Jerusalem which is above is our eternal mother in heaven;”

Gal. iv. 26.

Chapter 8.—What We are to Understand of God’s Resting on the Seventh Day, After the Six Days’ Work.

When it is said that God rested on the seventh day from all His works, and hallowed it, we are not to conceive of this in a childish fashion, as if work were a toil to God, who “spake and it was done,”—spake by the spiritual and eternal, not audible and transitory word.  But God’s rest signifies the rest of those who rest in God, as the joy of a house means the joy of those in the house who rejoice, though not the house, but something else, causes the joy.  How much more intelligible is such phraseology, then, if the house itself, by its own beauty, makes the inhabitants joyful!  For in this case we not only call it joyful by that figure of speech in which the thing containing is used for the thing contained (as when we say, “The theatres applaud,” “The meadows low,” meaning that the men in the one applaud, and the oxen in the other low), but also by that figure in which the cause is spoken of as if it were the effect, as when a letter is said to be joyful, because it makes its readers so.  Most appropriately, therefore, the sacred narrative states that God rested, meaning thereby that those rest who are in Him, and whom He makes to rest.  And this the prophetic narrative promises also to the men to whom it speaks, and for whom it was written, that they themselves, after those good works which God does in and by them, if they have managed by faith to get near to God in this life, shall enjoy in Him eternal rest.  This was pre-figured to the ancient people of God by the rest enjoined in their sabbath law, of which, in its own place, I shall speak more at large.

Chapter 9.—What the Scriptures Teach Us to Believe Concerning the Creation of the Angels.

At present, since I have undertaken to treat of the origin of the holy city, and first of the holy angels, who constitute a large part of this city, and indeed the more blessed part, since they have never been expatriated, I will give myself to the task of explaining, by God’s help, and as far as seems suitable, the Scriptures which relate to this point.  Where Scripture speaks of the world’s creation, it is not plainly said whether or when the angels were created; but if mention of them is made, it is implicitly under the name of “heaven,” when it is said, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” or perhaps rather under the name of “light,” of which presently.  But that they were wholly omitted, I am unable to believe, because it is written that God on the seventh day rested from all His works which He made; and this very book itself begins, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” so that before heaven and earth God seems to have made nothing.  Since, therefore, He began with the heavens and the earth,—and the earth itself, as Scripture adds, was at first invisible and formless, light not being as yet made, and darkness covering the face of the deep (that is to say, covering an undefined chaos of earth and sea, for where light is not, darkness must needs be),—and then when all things, which are recorded to have been completed in six days, were created and arranged, how should the angels be omitted, as if they were not among the works of God, from which on the seventh day He rested?  Yet, though the fact that the angels are the work of God is not omitted here, it is indeed not explicitly mentioned; but elsewhere Holy Scripture asserts it in the clearest manner.  For in the Hymn of the Three Children in the Furnace it was said, “O all ye works of the Lord bless ye the Lord;”

Ver. 35.

Chapter 10.—Of the Simple and Unchangeable Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, One God, in Whom Substance and Quality are Identical.

There is, accordingly, a good which is alone simple, and therefore alone unchangeable, and this is God.  By this Good have all others been created, but not simple, and therefore not unchangeable.  “Created,” I say,—that is, made, not begotten.  For that which is begotten of the simple Good is simple as itself, and the same as itself.  These two we call the Father and the Son; and both together with the Holy Spirit are one God; and to this Spirit the epithet Holy is in Scripture, as it were, appropriated.  And He is another than the Father and the Son, for He is neither the Father nor the Son.  I say “another,” not “another thing,” because He is equally with them the simple Good, unchangeable and co-eternal.  And this Trinity is one God; and none the less simple because a Trinity.  For we do not say that the nature of the good is simple, because the Father alone possesses it, or the Son alone, or the Holy Ghost alone; nor do we say, with the Sabellian heretics, that it is only nominally a Trinity, and has no real distinction of persons; but we say it is simple, because it is what it has, with the exception of the relation of the persons to one another.  For, in regard to this relation, it is true that the Father has a Son, and yet is not Himself the Son; and the Son has a Father, and is not Himself the Father.  But, as regards Himself, irrespective of relation to the other, each is what He has; thus, He is in Himself living, for He has life, and is Himself the Life which He has.

It is for this reason, then, that the nature of the Trinity is called simple, because it has not anything which it can lose, and because it is not one thing and its contents another, as a cup and the liquor, or a body and its color, or the air and the light or heat of it, or a mind and its wisdom.  For none of these is what it has:  the cup is not liquor, nor the body color, nor the air light and heat, nor the mind wisdom.  And hence they can be deprived of what they have, and can be turned or changed into other qualities and states, so that the cup may be emptied of the liquid of which it is full, the body be discolored, the air darken, the mind grow silly.  The incorruptible body which is promised to the saints in the resurrection cannot, indeed, lose its quality of incorruption, but the bodily substance and the quality of incorruption are not the same thing.  For the quality of incorruption resides entire in each several part, not greater in one and less in another; for no part is more incorruptible than another.  The body, indeed, is itself greater in whole than in part; and one part of it is larger, another smaller, yet is not the larger more incorruptible than the smaller.  The body, then, which is not in each of its parts a whole body, is one thing; incorruptibility, which is throughout complete, is another thing;—for every part of the incorruptible body, however unequal to the rest otherwise, is equally incorrupt.  For the hand, e.g., is not more incorrupt than the finger because it is larger than the finger; so, though finger and hand are unequal, their incorruptibility is equal.  Thus, although incorruptibility is inseparable from an incorruptible body, yet the substance of the body is one thing, the quality of incorruption another.  And therefore the body is not what it has.  The soul itself, too, though it be always wise (as it will be eternally when it is redeemed), will be so by participating in the unchangeable wisdom, which it is not; for though the air be never robbed of the light that is shed abroad in it, it is not on that account the same thing as the light.  I do not mean that the soul is air, as has been supposed by some who could not conceive a spiritual nature;

Plutarch (De Plac. Phil. i. 3, and iv. 3) tells us that this opinion was held by Anaximenes of Miletus, the followers of Anaxagoras, and many of the Stoics.  Diogenes the Cynic, as well, as Diogenes of Appollonia seems to have adopted the same opinion.  See Zeller’s Stoics, pp. 121 and 199.

According to this, then, those things which are essentially and truly divine are called simple, because in them quality and substance are identical, and because they are divine, or wise, or blessed in themselves, and without extraneous supplement.  In Holy Scripture, it is true, the Spirit of wisdom is called “manifold”

Wisdom vii. 22.

Chapter 11.—Whether the Angels that Fell Partook of the Blessedness Which the Holy Angels Have Always Enjoyed from the Time of Their Creation.

And since these things are so, those spirits whom we call angels were never at any time or in any way darkness, but, as soon as they were made, were made light; yet they were not so created in order that they might exist and live in any way whatever, but were enlightened that they might live wisely and blessedly.  Some of them, having turned away from this light, have not won this wise and blessed life, which is certainly eternal, and accompanied with the sure confidence of its eternity; but they have still the life of reason, though darkened with folly, and this they cannot lose even if they would.  But who can determine to what extent they were partakers of that wisdom before they fell?  And how shall we say that they participated in it equally with those who through it are truly and fully blessed, resting in a true certainty of eternal felicity?  For if they had equally participated in this true knowledge, then the evil angels would have remained eternally blessed equally with the good, because they were equally expectant of it.  For, though a life be never so long, it cannot be truly called eternal if it is destined to have an end; for it is called life inasmuch as it is lived, but eternal because it has no end.  Wherefore, although everything eternal is not therefore blessed (for hell-fire is eternal), yet if no life can be truly and perfectly blessed except it be eternal, the life of these angels was not blessed, for it was doomed to end, and therefore not eternal, whether they knew it or not.  In the one case fear, in the other ignorance, prevented them from being blessed.  And even if their ignorance was not so great as to breed in them a wholly false expectation, but left them wavering in uncertainty whether their good would be eternal or would some time terminate, this very doubt concerning so grand a destiny was incompatible with the plenitude of blessedness which we believe the holy angels enjoyed.  For we do not so narrow and restrict the application of the term “blessedness” as to apply it to God only,

Vives remarks that the ancients defined blessedness as an absolutely perfect state in all good, peculiar to God.  Perhaps Augustin had a reminiscence of the remarkable discussion in the Tusc. Disp. lib. v., and the definition, Neque ulla alia huic verbo, quum beatum dicimus, subjecta notio est, nisi, secretis malis omnibus, cumulata bonorum complexio.

Chapter 12.—A Comparison of the Blessedness of the Righteous, Who Have Not Yet Received the Divine Reward, with that of Our First Parents in Paradise.

And the angels are not the only members of the rational and intellectual creation whom we call blessed.  For who will take upon him to deny that those first men in Paradise were blessed previously to sin, although they were uncertain how long their blessedness was to last, and whether it would be eternal (and eternal it would have been had they not sinned),—who, I say, will do so, seeing that even now we not unbecomingly call those blessed whom we see leading a righteous and holy life, in hope of immortality, who have no harrowing remorse of conscience, but obtain readily divine remission of the sins of their present infirmity?  These, though they are certain that they shall be rewarded if they persevere, are not certain that they will persevere.  For what man can know that he will persevere to the end in the exercise and increase of grace, unless he has been certified by some revelation from Him who, in His just and secret judgment, while He deceives none, informs few regarding this matter?  Accordingly, so far as present comfort goes, the first man in Paradise was more blessed than any just man in this insecure state; but as regards the hope of future good, every man who not merely supposes, but certainly knows that he shall eternally enjoy the most high God in the company of angels, and beyond the reach of ill,—this man, no matter what bodily torments afflict him, is more blessed than was he who, even in that great felicity of Paradise, was uncertain of his fate.

With this chapter compare the books De Dono Persever, and De Correp. et Gratia.

Chapter 13.—Whether All the Angels Were So Created in One Common State of Felicity, that Those Who Fell Were Not Aware that They Would Fall, and that Those Who Stood Received Assurance of Their Own Perseverance After the Ruin of the Fallen.

From all this, it will readily occur to any one that the blessedness which an intelligent being desires as its legitimate object results from a combination of these two things, namely, that it uninterruptedly enjoy the unchangeable good, which is God; and that it be delivered from all dubiety, and know certainly that it shall eternally abide in the same enjoyment.  That it is so with the angels of light we piously believe; but that the fallen angels, who by their own default lost that light, did not enjoy this blessedness even before they sinned, reason bids us conclude.  Yet if their life was of any duration before they fell, we must allow them a blessedness of some kind, though not that which is accompanied with foresight.  Or, if it seems hard to believe that, when the angels were created, some were created in ignorance either of their perseverance or their fall, while others were most certainly assured of the eternity of their felicity,—if it is hard to believe that they were not all from the beginning on an equal footing, until these who are now evil did of their own will fall away from the light of goodness, certainly it is much harder to believe that the holy angels are now uncertain of their eternal blessedness, and do not know regarding themselves as much as we have been able to gather regarding them from the Holy Scriptures.  For what catholic Christian does not know that no new devil will ever arise among the good angels, as he knows that this present devil will never again return into the fellowship of the good?  For the truth in the gospel promises to the saints and the faithful that they will be equal to the angels of God; and it is also promised them that they will “go away into life eternal.”

Matt. xxv. 46.

Chapter 14.—An Explanation of What is Said of the Devil, that He Did Not Abide in the Truth, Because the Truth Was Not in Him.

Moreover, as if we had been inquiring why the devil did not abide in the truth, our Lord subjoins the reason, saying, “because the truth is not in him.”  Now, it would be in him had he abode in it.  But the phraseology is unusual.  For, as the words stand, “He abode not in the truth, because the truth is not in him,” it seems as if the truth’s not being in him were the cause of his not abiding in it; whereas his not abiding in the truth is rather the cause of its not being in him.  The same form of speech is found in the psalm:  “I have called upon Thee, for Thou hast heard me, O God,”

Ps. xvii. 6.

Chapter 15.—How We are to Understand the Words, “The Devil Sinneth from the Beginning.”

As for what John says about the devil, “The devil sinneth from the beginning”

1 John iii. 8.

Chapter 16.—Of the Ranks and Differences of the Creatures, Estimated by Their Utility, or According to the Natural Gradations of Being.

For, among those beings which exist, and which are not of God the Creator’s essence, those which have life are ranked above those which have none; those that have the power of generation, or even of desiring, above those which want this faculty.  And, among things that have life, the sentient are higher than those which have no sensation, as animals are ranked above trees.  And, among the sentient, the intelligent are above those that have not intelligence,—men, e.g., above cattle.  And, among the intelligent, the immortal such as the angels, above the mortal, such as men.  These are the gradations according to the order of nature; but according to the utility each man finds in a thing, there are various standards of value, so that it comes to pass that we prefer some things that have no sensation to some sentient beings.  And so strong is this preference, that, had we the power, we would abolish the latter from nature altogether, whether in ignorance of the place they hold in nature, or, though we know it, sacrificing them to our own convenience.  Who, e.g., would not rather have bread in his house than mice, gold than fleas?  But there is little to wonder at in this, seeing that even when valued by men themselves (whose nature is certainly of the highest dignity), more is often given for a horse than for a slave, for a jewel than for a maid.  Thus the reason of one contemplating nature prompts very different judgments from those dictated by the necessity of the needy, or the desire of the voluptuous; for the former considers what value a thing in itself has in the scale of creation, while necessity considers how it meets its need; reason looks for what the mental light will judge to be true, while pleasure looks for what pleasantly titilates the bodily sense.  But of such consequence in rational natures is the weight, so to speak, of will and of love, that though in the order of nature angels rank above men, yet, by the scale of justice, good men are of greater value than bad angels.

Chapter 17.—That the Flaw of Wickedness is Not Nature, But Contrary to Nature, and Has Its Origin, Not in the Creator, But in the Will.

It is with reference to the nature, then, and not to the wickedness of the devil, that we are to understand these words, “This is the beginning of God’s handiwork;”

Job. xl. 14 (LXX.).

Chapter 18.—Of the Beauty of the Universe, Which Becomes, by God’s Ordinance, More Brilliant by the Opposition of Contraries.

For God would never have created any, I do not say angel, but even man, whose future wickedness He foreknew, unless He had equally known to what uses in behalf of the good He could turn him, thus embellishing, the course of the ages, as it were an exquisite poem set off with antitheses.  For what are called antitheses are among the most elegant of the ornaments of speech.  They might be called in Latin “oppositions,” or, to speak more accurately, “contrapositions;” but this word is not in common use among us,

Quintilian uses it commonly in the sense of antithesis.

Chapter 19.—What, Seemingly, We are to Understand by the Words, “God Divided the Light from the Darkness.”

Accordingly, though the obscurity of the divine word has certainly this advantage, that it causes many opinions about the truth to be started and discussed, each reader seeing some fresh meaning in it, yet, whatever is said to be meant by an obscure passage should be either confirmed by the testimony of obvious facts, or should be asserted in other and less ambiguous texts.  This obscurity is beneficial, whether the sense of the author is at last reached after the discussion of many other interpretations, or whether, though that sense remain concealed, other truths are brought out by the discussion of the obscurity.  To me it does not seem incongruous with the working of God, if we understand that the angels were created when that first light was made, and that a separation was made between the holy and the unclean angels, when, as is said, “God divided the light from the darkness; and God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night.”  For He alone could make this discrimination, who was able also before they fell, to foreknow that they would fall, and that, being deprived of the light of truth, they would abide in the darkness of pride.  For, so far as regards the day and night, with which we are familiar, He commanded those luminaries of heaven that are obvious to our senses to divide between the light and the darkness.  “Let there be,” He says, “lights in the firmament of the heaven, to divide the day from the night;” and shortly after He says, “And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night:  the stars also.  And God set them in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness.”

Gen. i. 14–18.

Chapter 20.—Of the Words Which Follow the Separation of Light and Darkness, “And God Saw the Light that It Was Good.”

Then, we must not pass from this passage of Scripture without noticing that when God said, “Let there be light, and there was light,” it was immediately added, “And God saw the light that it was good.”  No such expression followed the statement that He separated the light from the darkness, and called the light Day and the darkness Night, lest the seal of His approval might seem to be set on such darkness, as well as on the light.  For when the darkness was not subject of disapprobation, as when it was divided by the heavenly bodies from this light which our eyes discern, the statement that God saw that it was good is inserted, not before, but after the division is recorded.  “And God set them,” so runs the passage, “in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness:  and God saw that it was good.”  For He approved of both, because both were sinless.  But where God said, “Let there be light, and there was light; and God saw the light that it was good;” and the narrative goes on, “and God divided the light from the darkness! and God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night,” there was not in this place subjoined the statement, “And God saw that it was good,” lest both should be designated good, while one of them was evil, not by nature, but by its own fault.  And therefore, in this case, the light alone received the approbation of the Creator, while the angelic darkness, though it had been ordained, was yet not approved.

Chapter 21.—Of God’s Eternal and Unchangeable Knowledge and Will, Whereby All He Has Made Pleased Him in the Eternal Design as Well as in the Actual Result.

For what else is to be understood by that invariable refrain, “And God saw that it was good,” than the approval of the work in its design, which is the wisdom of God?  For certainly God did not in the actual achievement of the work first learn that it was good, but, on the contrary, nothing would have been made had it not been first known by Him.  While, therefore, He sees that that is good which, had He not seen it before it was made, would never have been made, it is plain that He is not discovering, but teaching that it is good.  Plato, indeed, was bold enough to say that, when the universe was completed, God was, as it were, elated with joy.

The reference is to the Timæus, p. 37 C., where he says, “When the parent Creator perceived this created image of the eternal Gods in life and motion, He was delighted, and in His joy considered how He might make it still liker its model.”

Chapter 23.—Of the Error in Which the Doctrine of Origen is Involved.

But it is much more surprising that some even of those who, with ourselves, believe that there is one only source of all things, and that no nature which is not divine can exist unless originated by that Creator, have yet refused to accept with a good and simple faith this so good and simple a reason of the world’s creation, that a good God made it good; and that the things created, being different from God, were inferior to Him, and yet were good, being created by none other than He.  But they say that souls, though not, indeed, parts of God, but created by Him, sinned by abandoning God; that, in proportion to their various sins, they merited different degrees of debasement from heaven to earth, and diverse bodies as prison-houses; and that this is the world, and this the cause of its creation, not the production of good things, but the restraining of evil.  Origen is justly blamed for holding this opinion.  For in the books which he entitles περὶ αρχῶν, that is, Of Origins, this is his sentiment, this his utterance.  And I can not sufficiently express my astonishment, that a man so erudite and well versed in ecclesiastical literature, should not have observed, in the first place, how opposed this is to the meaning of this authoritative Scripture, which, in recounting all the works of God, regularly adds, “And God saw that it was good;” and, when all were completed, inserts the words, “And God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good.”

Gen. i. 31.

In the second place, Origen, and all who think with him, ought to have seen that if it were the true opinion that the world was created in order that souls might, for their sins, be accommodated with bodies in which they should be shut up as in houses of correction, the more venial sinners receiving lighter and more ethereal bodies, while the grosser and graver sinners received bodies more crass and grovelling, then it would follow that the devils, who are deepest in wickedness, ought, rather than even wicked men, to have earthly bodies, since these are the grossest and least ethereal of all.  But in point of fact, that we might see that the deserts of souls are not to be estimated by the qualities of bodies, the wickedest devil possesses an ethereal body, while man, wicked, it is true, but with a wickedness small and venial in comparison with his, received even before his sin a body of clay.  And what more foolish assertion can be advanced than that God, by this sun of ours, did not design to benefit the material creation, or lend lustre to its loveliness, and therefore created one single sun for this single world, but that it so happened that one soul only had so sinned as to deserve to be enclosed in such a body as it is?  On this principle, if it had chanced that not one, but two, yea, or ten, or a hundred had sinned similarly, and with a like degree of guilt, then this world would have one hundred suns.  And that such is not the case, is due not to the considerate foresight of the Creator, contriving the safety and beauty of things material, but rather to the fact that so fine a quality of sinning was hit upon by only one soul, so that it alone has merited such a body.  Manifestly persons holding such opinions should aim at confining, not souls of which they know not what they say, but themselves, lest they fall, and deservedly, far indeed from the truth.  And as to these three answers which I formerly recommended when in the case of any creature the questions are put, Who made it? By what means? Why? that it should be replied, God, By the Word, Because it was good,—as to these three answers, it is very questionable whether the Trinity itself is thus mystically indicated, that is, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, or whether there is some good reason for this acceptation in this passage of Scripture,—this, I say, is questionable, and one can’t be expected to explain everything in one volume.

Chapter 24.—Of the Divine Trinity, and the Indications of Its Presence Scattered Everywhere Among Its Works.

We believe, we maintain, we faithfully preach, that the Father begat the Word, that is, Wisdom, by which all things were made, the only-begotten Son, one as the Father is one, eternal as the Father is eternal, and, equally with the Father, supremely good; and that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit alike of Father and of Son, and is Himself consubstantial and co-eternal with both; and that this whole is a Trinity by reason of the individuality

Proprietas.  [The Greeks call it ἰδιώτης or ἴδιον, i.e. the propriety or characteristic individuality of each divine person, namely the fatherhood, paternitas, ἀγεννησια, of the first person; the sonship, filiatio, generatio, γεννησία, of the second person; the procession, processio, ἐκπόρευσις, of the third person.—P.S.]

Chapter 25.—Of the Division of Philosophy into Three Parts.

As far as one can judge, it is for the same reason that philosophers have aimed at a threefold division of science, or rather, were enabled to see that there was a threefold division (for they did not invent, but only discovered it), of which one part is called physical, another logical, the third ethical.  The Latin equivalents of these names are now naturalized in the writings of many authors, so that these divisions are called natural, rational, and moral, on which I have touched slightly in the eighth book.  Not that I would conclude that these philosophers, in this threefold division, had any thought of a trinity in God, although Plato is said to have been the first to discover and promulgate this distribution, and he saw that God alone could be the author of nature, the bestower of intelligence, and the kindler of love by which life becomes good and blessed.  But certain it is that, though philosophers disagree both regarding the nature of things, and the mode of investigating truth, and of the good to which all our actions ought to tend, yet in these three great general questions all their intellectual energy is spent.  And though there be a confusing diversity of opinion, every man striving to establish his own opinion in regard to each of these questions, yet no one of them all doubts that nature has some cause, science some method, life some end and aim.  Then, again, there are three things which every artificer must possess if he is to effect anything,—nature, education, practice.  Nature is to be judged by capacity, education by knowledge, practice by its fruit.  I am aware that, properly speaking, fruit is what one enjoys, use [practice] what one uses.  And this seems to be the difference between them, that we are said to enjoy that which in itself, and irrespective of other ends, delights us; to use that which we seek for the sake of some end beyond.  For which reason the things of time are to be used rather than enjoyed, that we may deserve to enjoy things eternal; and not as those perverse creatures who would fain enjoy money and use God,—not spending money for God’s sake, but worshipping God for money’s sake.  However, in common parlance, we both use fruits and enjoy uses.  For we correctly speak of the “fruits of the field,” which certainly we all use in the present life.  And it was in accordance with this usage that I said that there were three things to be observed in a man, nature, education, practice.  From these the philosophers have elaborated, as I said, the threefold division of that science by which a blessed life is attained:  the natural having respect to nature, the rational to education, the moral to practice.  If, then, we were ourselves the authors of our nature, we should have generated knowledge in ourselves, and should not require to reach it by education, i.e., by learning it from others.  Our love, too, proceeding from ourselves and returning to us, would suffice to make our life blessed, and would stand in need of no extraneous enjoyment.  But now, since our nature has God as its requisite author, it is certain that we must have Him for our teacher that we may be wise; Him, too, to dispense to us spiritual sweetness that we may be blessed.

Chapter 27.—Of Existence, and Knowledge of It, and the Love of Both.

And truly the very fact of existing is by some natural spell so pleasant, that even the wretched are, for no other reason, unwilling to perish; and, when they feel that they are wretched, wish not that they themselves be annihilated, but that their misery be so.  Take even those who, both in their own esteem, and in point of fact, are utterly wretched, and who are reckoned so, not only by wise men on account of their folly, but by those who count themselves blessed, and who think them wretched because they are poor and destitute,—if any one should give these men an immortality, in which their misery should be deathless, and should offer the alternative, that if they shrank from existing eternally in the same misery they might be annihilated, and exist nowhere at all, nor in any condition, on the instant they would joyfully, nay exultantly, make election to exist always, even in such a condition, rather than not exist at all.  The well-known feeling of such men witnesses to this.  For when we see that they fear to die, and will rather live in such misfortune than end it by death, is it not obvious enough how nature shrinks from annihilation?  And, accordingly, when they know that they must die, they seek, as a great boon, that this mercy be shown them, that they may a little longer live in the same misery, and delay to end it by death.  And so they indubitably prove with what glad alacrity they would accept immortality, even though it secured to them endless destruction.  What! do not even all irrational animals, to whom such calculations are unknown, from the huge dragons down to the least worms, all testify that they wish to exist, and therefore shun death by every movement in their power?  Nay, the very plants and shrubs, which have no such life as enables them to shun destruction by movements we can see, do not they all seek in their own fashion to conserve their existence, by rooting themselves more and more deeply in the earth, that so they may draw nourishment, and throw out healthy branches towards the sky?  In fine, even the lifeless bodies, which want not only sensation but seminal life, yet either seek the upper air or sink deep, or are balanced in an intermediate position, so that they may protect their existence in that situation where they can exist in most accordance with their nature.

 And how much human nature loves the knowledge of its existence, and how it shrinks from being deceived, will be sufficiently understood from this fact, that every man prefers to grieve in a sane mind, rather than to be glad in madness.  And this grand and wonderful instinct belongs to men alone of all animals; for, though some of them have keener eyesight than ourselves for this world’s light, they cannot attain to that spiritual light with which our mind is somehow irradiated, so that we can form right judgments of all things.  For our power to judge is proportioned to our acceptance of this light.  Nevertheless, the irrational animals, though they have not knowledge, have certainly something resembling knowledge; whereas the other material things are said to be sensible, not because they have senses, but because they are the objects of our senses.  Yet among plants, their nourishment and generation have some resemblance to sensible life.  However, both these and all material things have their causes hidden in their nature; but their outward forms, which lend beauty to this visible structure of the world, are perceived by our senses, so that they seem to wish to compensate for their own want of knowledge by providing us with knowledge.  But we perceive them by our bodily senses in such a way that we do not judge of them by these senses.  For we have another and far superior sense, belonging to the inner man, by which we perceive what things are just, and what unjust,—just by means of an intelligible idea, unjust by the want of it.  This sense is aided in its functions neither by the eyesight, nor by the orifice of the ear, nor by the air-holes of the nostrils, nor by the palate’s taste, nor by any bodily touch.  By it I am assured both that I am, and that I know this; and these two I love, and in the same manner I am assured that I love them.

Chapter 28.—Whether We Ought to Love the Love Itself with Which We Love Our Existence and Our Knowledge of It, that So We May More Nearly Resemble the Image of the Divine Trinity.

We have said as much as the scope of this work demands regarding these two things, to wit, our existence, and our knowledge of it, and how much they are loved by us, and how there is found even in the lower creatures a kind of likeness of these things, and yet with a difference.  We have yet to speak of the love wherewith they are loved, to determine whether this love itself is loved.  And doubtless it is; and this is the proof.  Because in men who are justly loved, it is rather love itself that is loved; for he is not justly called a good man who knows what is good, but who loves it.  Is it not then obvious that we love in ourselves the very love wherewith we love whatever good we love?  For there is also a love wherewith we love that which we ought not to love; and this love is hated by him who loves that wherewith he loves what ought to be loved.  For it is quite possible for both to exist in one man.  And this co-existence is good for a man, to the end that this love which conduces to our living well may grow, and the other, which leads us to evil may decrease, until our whole life be perfectly healed and transmuted into good.  For if we were beasts, we should love the fleshly and sensual life, and this would be our sufficient good; and when it was well with us in respect of it, we should seek nothing beyond.  In like manner, if we were trees, we could not, indeed, in the strict sense of the word, love anything; nevertheless we should seem, as it were, to long for that by which we might become more abundantly and luxuriantly fruitful.  If we were stones, or waves, or wind, or flame, or anything of that kind, we should want, indeed, both sensation and life, yet should possess a kind of attraction towards our own proper position and natural order.  For the specific gravity of bodies is, as it were, their love, whether they are carried downwards by their weight, or upwards by their levity.  For the body is borne by its gravity, as the spirit by love, whithersoever it is borne.

Compare the Confessions, xiii. 9.

Chapter 29.—Of the Knowledge by Which the Holy Angels Know God in His Essence, and by Which They See the Causes of His Works in the Art of the Worker, Before They See Them in the Works of the Artist.

Those holy angels come to the knowledge of God not by audible words, but by the presence to their souls of immutable truth, i.e., of the only-begotten Word of God; and they know this Word Himself, and the Father, and their Holy Spirit, and that this Trinity is indivisible, and that the three persons of it are one substance, and that there are not three Gods but one God; and this they so know that it is better understood by them than we are by ourselves.  Thus, too, they know the creature also, not in itself, but by this better way, in the wisdom of God, as if in the art by which it was created; and, consequently, they know themselves better in God than in themselves, though they have also this latter knowledge.  For they were created, and are different from their Creator.  In Him, therefore, they have, as it were, a noonday knowledge; in themselves, a twilight knowledge, according to our former explanations.

Ch. 7.

Chapter 30.—Of the Perfection of the Number Six, Which is the First of the Numbers Which is Composed of Its Aliquot Parts.

These works are recorded to have been completed in six days (the same day being six times repeated), because six is a perfect number,—not because God required a protracted time, as if He could not at once create all things, which then should mark the course of time by the movements proper to them, but because the perfection of the works was signified by the number six.  For the number six is the first which is made up of its own

Or aliquot parts.

Chapter 31.—Of the Seventh Day, in Which Completeness and Repose are Celebrated.

But, on the seventh day (i.e., the same day repeated seven times, which number is also a perfect one, though for another reason), the rest of God is set forth, and then, too, we first hear of its being hallowed.  So that God did not wish to hallow this day by His works, but by His rest, which has no evening, for it is not a creature; so that, being known in one way in the Word of God, and in another in itself, it should make a twofold knowledge, daylight and dusk (day and evening).  Much more might be said about the perfection of the number seven, but this book is already too long, and I fear lest I should seem to catch at an opportunity of airing my little smattering of science more childishly than profitably.  I must speak, therefore, in moderation and with dignity, lest, in too keenly following “number,” I be accused of forgetting “weight” and “measure.”  Suffice it here to say, that three is the first whole number that is odd, four the first that is even, and of these two, seven is composed.  On this account it is often put for all numbers together, as, “A just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again,”

Prov. xxiv. 16.

Chapter 32.—Of the Opinion that the Angels Were Created Before the World.

But if some one oppose our opinion, and say that the holy angels are not referred to when it is said, “Let there be light, and there was light;” if he suppose or teach that some material light, then first created, was meant, and that the angels were created, not only before the firmament dividing the waters and named “the heaven,” but also before the time signified in the words, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth;” if he allege that this phrase, “In the beginning,” does not mean that nothing was made before (for the angels were), but that God made all things by His Wisdom or Word, who is named in Scripture “the Beginning,” as He Himself, in the gospel, replied to the Jews when they asked Him who He was, that He was the Beginning;

Augustin refers to John viii. 25; see p. 195.  He might rather have referred to Rev. iii. 14.

Chapter 33.—Of the Two Different and Dissimilar Communities of Angels, Which are Not Inappropriately Signified by the Names Light and Darkness.

That certain angels sinned, and were thrust down to the lowest parts of this world, where they are, as it were, incarcerated till their final damnation in the day of judgment, the Apostle Peter very plainly declares, when he says that “God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved into judgment.”

2 Peter ii. 4.

Chapter 34.—Of the Idea that the Angels Were Meant Where the Separation of the Waters by the Firmament is Spoken Of, and of that Other Idea that the Waters Were Not Created.

Some,

Augustin himself published this idea in his Conf. xiii. 32 but afterwards retracted it, as “said without sufficient consideration” (Retract. II. vi. 2).  Epiphanius and Jerome ascribe it to Origen.

Chapter 1.—That the Nature of the Angels, Both Good and Bad, is One and the Same.

It has already, in the preceding book, been shown how the two cities originated among the angels.  Before I speak of the creation of man, and show how the cities took their rise so far as regards the race of rational mortals I see that I must first, so far as I can, adduce what may demonstrate that it is not incongruous and unsuitable to speak of a society composed of angels and men together; so that there are not four cities or societies,—two, namely, of angels, and as many of men,—but rather two in all, one composed of the good, the other of the wicked, angels or men indifferently.

That the contrary propensities in good and bad angels have arisen, not from a difference in their nature and origin, since God, the good Author and Creator of all essences, created them both, but from a difference in their wills and desires, it is impossible to doubt.  While some steadfastly continued in that which was the common good of all, namely, in God Himself, and in His eternity, truth, and love; others, being enamored rather of their own power, as if they could be their own good, lapsed to this private good of their own, from that higher and beatific good which was common to all, and, bartering the lofty dignity of eternity for the inflation of pride, the most assured verity for the slyness of vanity, uniting love for factious partisanship, they became proud, deceived, envious.  The cause, therefore, of the blessedness of the good is adherence to God.  And so the cause of the others’ misery will be found in the contrary, that is, in their not adhering to God.  Wherefore, if when the question is asked, why are the former blessed, it is rightly answered, because they adhere to God; and when it is asked, why are the latter miserable, it is rightly answered, because they do not adhere to God,—then there is no other good for the rational or intellectual creature save God only.  Thus, though it is not every creature that can be blessed (for beasts, trees, stones, and things of that kind have not this capacity), yet that creature which has the capacity cannot be blessed of itself, since it is created out of nothing, but only by Him by whom it has been created.  For it is blessed by the possession of that whose loss makes it miserable.  He, then, who is blessed not in another, but in himself, cannot be miserable, because he cannot lose himself.

Accordingly we say that there is no unchangeable good but the one, true, blessed God; that the things which He made are indeed good because from Him, yet mutable because made not out of Him, but out of nothing.  Although, therefore, they are not the supreme good, for God is a greater good, yet those mutable things which can adhere to the immutable good, and so be blessed, are very good; for so completely is He their good, that without Him they cannot but be wretched.  And the other created things in the universe are not better on this account, that they cannot be miserable.  For no one would say that the other members of the body are superior to the eyes, because they cannot be blind.  But as the sentient nature, even when it feels pain, is superior to the stony, which can feel none, so the rational nature, even when wretched, is more excellent than that which lacks reason or feeling, and can therefore experience no misery.  And since this is so, then in this nature which has been created so excellent, that though it be mutable itself, it can yet secure its blessedness by adhering to the immutable good, the supreme God; and since it is not satisfied unless it be perfectly blessed, and cannot be thus blessed save in God,—in this nature, I say, not to adhere to God, is manifestly a fault.

Vitium:  perhaps “fault,” most nearly embraces all the uses of this word.

Chapter 2.—That There is No Entity

Essentia.

This may be enough to prevent any one from supposing, when we speak of the apostate angels, that they could have another nature, derived, as it were, from some different origin, and not from God.  From the great impiety of this error we shall disentangle ourselves the more readily and easily, the more distinctly we understand that which God spoke by the angel when He sent Moses to the children of Israel:  “I am that I am.”

Ex. iii. 14.

Chapter 3.—That the Enemies of God are So, Not by Nature, But by Will, Which, as It Injures Them, Injures a Good Nature; For If Vice Does Not Injure, It is Not Vice.

In Scripture they are called God’s enemies who oppose His rule, not by nature, but by vice; having no power to hurt Him, but only themselves.  For they are His enemies, not through their power to hurt, but by their will to oppose Him.  For God is unchangeable, and wholly proof against injury.  Therefore the vice which makes those who are called His enemies resist Him, is an evil not to God, but to themselves.  And to them it is an evil, solely because it corrupts the good of their nature.  It is not nature, therefore, but vice, which is contrary to God.  For that which is evil is contrary to the good.  And who will deny that God is the supreme good?  Vice, therefore, is contrary to God, as evil to good.  Further, the nature it vitiates is a good, and therefore to this good also it is contrary.  But while it is contrary to God only as evil to good, it is contrary to the nature it vitiates, both as evil and as hurtful.  For to God no evils are hurtful; but only to natures mutable and corruptible, though, by the testimony of the vices themselves, originally good.  For were they not good, vices could not hurt them.  For how do they hurt them but by depriving them of integrity, beauty, welfare, virtue, and, in short, whatever natural good vice is wont to diminish or destroy?  But if there be no good to take away, then no injury can be done, and consequently there can be no vice.  For it is impossible that there should be a harmless vice.  Whence we gather, that though vice cannot injure the unchangeable good, it can injure nothing but good; because it does not exist where it does not injure.  This, then, may be thus formulated:  Vice cannot be in the highest good, and cannot be but in some good.  Things solely good, therefore, can in some circumstances exist; things solely evil, never; for even those natures which are vitiated by an evil will, so far indeed as they are vitiated, are evil, but in so far as they are natures they are good.  And when a vitiated nature is punished, besides the good it has in being a nature, it has this also, that it is not unpunished.

With this may be compared the argument of Socrates in the Gorgias, in which it is shown that to escape punishment is worse than to suffer it, and that the greatest of evils is to do wrong and not be chastised.

Chapter 4.—Of the Nature of Irrational and Lifeless Creatures, Which in Their Own Kind and Order Do Not Mar the Beauty of the Universe.

But it is ridiculous to condemn the faults of beasts and trees, and other such mortal and mutable things as are void of intelligence, sensation, or life, even though these faults should destroy their corruptible nature; for these creatures received, at their Creator’s will, an existence fitting them, by passing away and giving place to others, to secure that lowest form of beauty, the beauty of seasons, which in its own place is a requisite part of this world.  For things earthly were neither to be made equal to things heavenly, nor were they, though inferior, to be quite omitted from the universe.  Since, then, in those situations where such things are appropriate, some perish to make way for others that are born in their room, and the less succumb to the greater, and the things that are overcome are transformed into the quality of those that have the mastery, this is the appointed order of things transitory.  Of this order the beauty does not strike us, because by our mortal frailty we are so involved in a part of it, that we cannot perceive the whole, in which these fragments that offend us are harmonized with the most accurate fitness and beauty.  And therefore, where we are not so well able to perceive the wisdom of the Creator, we are very properly enjoined to believe it, lest in the vanity of human rashness we presume to find any fault with the work of so great an Artificer.  At the same time, if we attentively consider even these faults of earthly things, which are neither voluntary nor penal, they seem to illustrate the excellence of the natures themselves, which are all originated and created by God; for it is that which pleases us in this nature which we are displeased to see removed by the fault,—unless even the natures themselves displease men, as often happens when they become hurtful to them, and then men estimate them not by their nature, but by their utility; as in the case of those animals whose swarms scourged the pride of the Egyptians.  But in this way of estimating, they may find fault with the sun itself; for certain criminals or debtors are sentenced by the judges to be set in the sun.  Therefore it is not with respect to our convenience or discomfort, but with respect to their own nature, that the creatures are glorifying to their Artificer.  Thus even the nature of the eternal fire, penal though it be to the condemned sinners, is most assuredly worthy of praise.  For what is more beautiful than fire flaming, blazing, and shining?  What more useful than fire for warming, restoring, cooking, though nothing is more destructive than fire burning and consuming?  The same thing, then, when applied in one way, is destructive, but when applied suitably, is most beneficial.  For who can find words to tell its uses throughout the whole world?  We must not listen, then, to those who praise the light of fire but find fault with its heat, judging it not by its nature, but by their convenience or discomfort.  For they wish to see, but not to be burnt.  But they forget that this very light which is so pleasant to them, disagrees with and hurts weak eyes; and in that heat which is disagreeable to them, some animals find the most suitable conditions of a healthy life.

Chapter 5.—That in All Natures, of Every Kind and Rank, God is Glorified.

All natures, then, inasmuch as they are, and have therefore a rank and species of their own, and a kind of internal harmony, are certainly good.  And when they are in the places assigned to them by the order of their nature, they preserve such being as they have received.  And those things which have not received everlasting being, are altered for better or for worse, so as to suit the wants and motions of those things to which the Creator’s law has made them subservient; and thus they tend in the divine providence to that end which is embraced in the general scheme of the government of the universe.  So that, though the corruption of transitory and perishable things brings them to utter destruction, it does not prevent their producing that which was designed to be their result.  And this being so, God, who supremely is, and who therefore created every being which has not supreme existence (for that which was made of nothing could not be equal to Him, and indeed could not be at all had He not made it), is not to be found fault with on account of the creature’s faults, but is to be praised in view of the natures He has made.

Chapter 6.—What the Cause of the Blessedness of the Good Angels Is, and What the Cause of the Misery of the Wicked.

Thus the true cause of the blessedness of the good angels is found to be this, that they cleave to Him who supremely is.  And if we ask the cause of the misery of the bad, it occurs to us, and not unreasonably, that they are miserable because they have forsaken Him who supremely is, and have turned to themselves who have no such essence.  And this vice, what else is it called than pride?  For “pride is the beginning of sin.”

Eccles. x. 13.

If the further question be asked, What was the efficient cause of their evil will? there is none.  For what is it which makes the will bad, when it is the will itself which makes the action bad?  And consequently the bad will is the cause of the bad action, but nothing is the efficient cause of the bad will.  For if anything is the cause, this thing either has or has not a will.  If it has, the will is either good or bad.  If good, who is so left to himself as to say that a good will makes a will bad?  For in this case a good will would be the cause of sin; a most absurd supposition.  On the other hand, if this hypothetical thing has a bad will, I wish to know what made it so; and that we may not go on forever, I ask at once, what made the first evil will bad?  For that is not the first which was itself corrupted by an evil will, but that is the first which was made evil by no other will.  For if it were preceded by that which made it evil, that will was first which made the other evil.  But if it is replied, “Nothing made it evil; it always was evil,” I ask if it has been existing in some nature.  For if not, then it did not exist at all; and if it did exist in some nature, then it vitiated and corrupted it, and injured it, and consequently deprived it of good.  And therefore the evil will could not exist in an evil nature, but in a nature at once good and mutable, which this vice could injure.  For if it did no injury, it was no vice; and consequently the will in which it was, could not be called evil.  But if it did injury, it did it by taking away or diminishing good.  And therefore there could not be from eternity, as was suggested, an evil will in that thing in which there had been previously a natural good, which the evil will was able to diminish by corrupting it.  If, then, it was not from eternity, who, I ask, made it?  The only thing that can be suggested in reply is, that something which itself had no will, made the will evil.  I ask, then, whether this thing was superior, inferior, or equal to it?  If superior, then it is better.  How, then, has it no will, and not rather a good will?  The same reasoning applies if it was equal; for so long as two things have equally a good will, the one cannot produce in the other an evil will.  Then remains the supposition that that which corrupted the will of the angelic nature which first sinned, was itself an inferior thing without a will.  But that thing, be it of the lowest and most earthly kind, is certainly itself good, since it is a nature and being, with a form and rank of its own in its own kind and order.  How, then, can a good thing be the efficient cause of an evil will?  How, I say, can good be the cause of evil?  For when the will abandons what is above itself, and turns to what is lower, it becomes evil—not because that is evil to which it turns, but because the turning itself is wicked.  Therefore it is not an inferior thing which has made the will evil, but it is itself which has become so by wickedly and inordinately desiring an inferior thing.  For if two men, alike in physical and moral constitution, see the same corporal beauty, and one of them is excited by the sight to desire an illicit enjoyment while the other steadfastly maintains a modest restraint of his will, what do we suppose brings it about, that there is an evil will in the one and not in the other?  What produces it in the man in whom it exists?  Not the bodily beauty, for that was presented equally to the gaze of both, and yet did not produce in both an evil will.  Did the flesh of the one cause the desire as he looked?  But why did not the flesh of the other?  Or was it the disposition?  But why not the disposition of both?  For we are supposing that both were of a like temperament of body and soul.  Must we, then, say that the one was tempted by a secret suggestion of the evil spirit?  As if it was not by his own will that he consented to this suggestion and to any inducement whatever!  This consent, then, this evil will which he presented to the evil suasive influence,—what was the cause of it, we ask?  For, not to delay on such a difficulty as this, if both are tempted equally and one yields and consents to the temptation while the other remains unmoved by it, what other account can we give of the matter than this, that the one is willing, the other unwilling, to fall away from chastity?  And what causes this but their own wills, in cases at least such as we are supposing, where the temperament is identical?  The same beauty was equally obvious to the eyes of both; the same secret temptation pressed on both with equal violence.  However minutely we examine the case, therefore, we can discern nothing which caused the will of the one to be evil.  For if we say that the man himself made his will evil, what was the man himself before his will was evil but a good nature created by God, the unchangeable good?  Here are two men who, before the temptation, were alike in body and soul, and of whom one yielded to the tempter who persuaded him, while the other could not be persuaded to desire that lovely body which was equally before the eyes of both.  Shall we say of the successfully tempted man that he corrupted his own will, since he was certainly good before his will became bad?  Then, why did he do so?  Was it because his will was a nature, or because it was made of nothing?  We shall find that the latter is the case.  For if a nature is the cause of an evil will, what else can we say than that evil arises from good or that good is the cause of evil?  And how can it come to pass that a nature, good though mutable, should produce any evil—that is to say, should make the will itself wicked?

Chapter 7.—That We Ought Not to Expect to Find Any Efficient Cause of the Evil Will.

Let no one, therefore, look for an efficient cause of the evil will; for it is not efficient, but deficient, as the will itself is not an effecting of something, but a defect.  For defection from that which supremely is, to that which has less of being,—this is to begin to have an evil will.  Now, to seek to discover the causes of these defections,—causes, as I have said, not efficient, but deficient,—is as if some one sought to see darkness, or hear silence.  Yet both of these are known by us, and the former by means only of the eye, the latter only by the ear; but not by their positive actuality,

Specie.

Chapter 8.—Of the Misdirected Love Whereby the Will Fell Away from the Immutable to the Mutable Good.

 This I do know, that the nature of God can never, nowhere, nowise be defective, and that natures made of nothing can.  These latter, however, the more being they have, and the more good they do (for then they do something positive), the more they have efficient causes; but in so far as they are defective in being, and consequently do evil (for then what is their work but vanity?), they have deficient causes.  And I know likewise, that the will could not become evil, were it unwilling to become so; and therefore its failings are justly punished, being not necessary, but voluntary.  For its defections are not to evil things, but are themselves evil; that is to say, are not towards things that are naturally and in themselves evil, but the defection of the will is evil, because it is contrary to the order of nature, and an abandonment of that which has supreme being for that which has less.  For avarice is not a fault inherent in gold, but in the man who inordinately loves gold, to the detriment of justice, which ought to be held in incomparably higher regard than gold. Neither is luxury the fault of lovely and charming objects, but of the heart that inordinately loves sensual pleasures, to the neglect of temperance, which attaches us to objects more lovely in their spirituality, and more delectable by their incorruptibility.  Nor yet is boasting the fault of human praise, but of the soul that is inordinately fond of the applause of men, and that makes light of the voice of conscience.  Pride, too, is not the fault of him who delegates power, nor of power itself, but of the soul that is inordinately enamored of its own power, and despises the more just dominion of a higher authority.  Consequently he who inordinately loves the good which any nature possesses, even though he obtain it, himself becomes evil in the good, and wretched because deprived of a greater good.

Chapter 9.—Whether the Angels, Besides Receiving from God Their Nature, Received from Him Also Their Good Will by the Holy Spirit Imbuing Them with Love.

There is, then, no natural efficient cause or, if I may be allowed the expression, no essential cause, of the evil will, since itself is the origin of evil in mutable spirits, by which the good of their nature is diminished and corrupted; and the will is made evil by nothing else than defection from God,—a defection of which the cause, too, is certainly deficient.  But as to the good will, if we should say that there is no efficient cause of it, we must beware of giving currency to the opinion that the good will of the good angels is not created, but is co-eternal with God.  For if they themselves are created, how can we say that their good will was eternal?  But if created, was it created along with themselves, or did they exist for a time without it?  If along with themselves, then doubtless it was created by Him who created them, and, as soon as ever they were created, they attached themselves to Him who created them, with the love He created in them.  And they are separated from the society of the rest, because they have continued in the same good will; while the others have fallen away to another will, which is an evil one, by the very fact of its being a falling away from the good; from which, we may add, they would not have fallen away had they been unwilling to do so.  But if the good angels existed for a time without a good will, and produced it in themselves without God’s interference, then it follows that they made themselves better than He made them.  Away with such a thought!  For without a good will, what were they but evil?  Or if they were not evil, because they had not an evil will any more than a good one (for they had not fallen away from that which as yet they had not begun to enjoy), certainly they were not the same, not so good, as when they came to have a good will.  Or if they could not make themselves better than they were made by Him who is surpassed by none in His work, then certainly, without His helpful operation, they could not come to possess that good will which made them better.  And though their good will effected that they did not turn to themselves, who had a more stinted existence, but to Him who supremely is, and that, being united to Him, their own being was enlarged, and they lived a wise and blessed life by His communications to them, what does this prove but that the will, however good it might be, would have continued helplessly only to desire Him, had not He who had made their nature out of nothing, and yet capable of enjoying Him, first stimulated it to desire Him, and then filled it with Himself, and so made it better?

Besides, this too has to be inquired into, whether, if the good angels made their own will good, they did so with or without will?  If without, then it was not their doing.  If with, was the will good or bad?  If bad, how could a bad will give birth to a good one?  If good, then already they had a good will.  And who made this will, which already they had, but He who created them with a good will, or with that chaste love by which they cleaved to Him, in one and the same act creating their nature, and endowing it with grace?  And thus we are driven to believe that the holy angels never existed without a good will or the love of God.  But the angels who, though created good, are yet evil now, became so by their own will.  And this will was not made evil by their good nature, unless by its voluntary defection from good; for good is not the cause of evil, but a defection from good is.  These angels, therefore, either received less of the grace of the divine love than those who persevered in the same; or if both were created equally good, then, while the one fell by their evil will, the others were more abundantly assisted, and attained to that pitch of blessedness at which they became certain they should never fall from it,—as we have already shown in the preceding book.

C. 13.

Chapter 10.—Of the Falseness of the History Which Allots Many Thousand Years to the World’s Past.

Let us, then, omit the conjectures of men who know not what they say, when they speak of the nature and origin of the human race.  For some hold the same opinion regarding men that they hold regarding the world itself, that they have always been.  Thus Apuleius says when he is describing our race, “Individually they are mortal, but collectively, and as a race, they are immortal.”

De Deo Socrates.

They are deceived, too, by those highly mendacious documents which profess to give the history of many thousand years, though, reckoning by the sacred writings, we find that not 6000 years have yet passed.

Augustin here follows the chronology of Eusebius, who reckons 5611 years from the Creation to the taking of Rome by the Goths; adopting the Septuagint version of the Patriarchal ages.

Chapter 11.—Of Those Who Suppose that This World Indeed is Not Eternal, But that Either There are Numberless Worlds, or that One and the Same World is Perpetually Resolved into Its Elements, and Renewed at the Conclusion of Fixed Cycles.

There are some, again, who, though they do not suppose that this world is eternal, are of opinion either that this is not the only world, but that there are numberless worlds or that indeed it is the only one, but that it dies, and is born again at fixed intervals, and this times without number;

The former opinion was held by Democritus and his disciple Epicurus; the latter by Heraclitus, who supposed that “God amused Himself” by thus renewing worlds.

Chapter 12.—How These Persons are to Be Answered, Who Find Fault with the Creation of Man on the Score of Its Recent Date.

As to those who are always asking why man was not created during these countless ages of the infinitely extended past, and came into being so lately that, according to Scripture, less than 6000 years have elapsed since He began to be, I would reply to them regarding the creation of man, just as I replied regarding the origin of the world to those who will not believe that it is not eternal, but had a beginning, which even Plato himself most plainly declares, though some think his statement was not consistent with his real opinion.

The Alexandrian Neo-Platonists endeavored in this way to escape from the obvious meaning of the Timæus.

Chapter 13.—Of the Revolution of the Ages, Which Some Philosophers Believe Will Bring All Things Round Again, After a Certain Fixed Cycle, to the Same Order and Form as at First.

This controversy some philosophers have seen no other approved means of solving than by introducing cycles of time, in which there should be a constant renewal and repetition of the order of nature;

Antoninus says (ii. 14):  “All things from eternity are of like forms, and come round in a circle.”  Cf. also ix. 28, and the references to more ancient philosophical writers in Gataker’s notes in these passages.

Some, too, in advocating these recurring cycles that restore all things to their original cite in favor of their supposition what Solomon says in the book of Ecclesiastes:  “What is that which hath been?  It is that which shall be.  And what is that which is done?  It is that which shall be done:  and there is no new thing under the sun.  Who can speak and say, See, this is new?  It hath been already of old time, which was before us.”

Eccles. i. 9, 10.  So Origen, de Prin. iii. 5, and ii. 3.

Chapter 14.—Of the Creation of the Human Race in Time, and How This Was Effected Without Any New Design or Change of Purpose on God’s Part.

What wonder is it if, entangled in these circles, they find neither entrance nor egress?  For they know not how the human race, and this mortal condition of ours, took its origin, nor how it will be brought to an end, since they cannot penetrate the inscrutable wisdom of God.  For, though Himself eternal, and without beginning, yet He caused time to have a beginning; and man, whom He had not previously made He made in time, not from a new and sudden resolution, but by His unchangeable and eternal design.  Who can search out the unsearchable depth of this purpose, who can scrutinize the inscrutable wisdom, wherewith God, without change of will, created man, who had never before been, and gave him an existence in time, and increased the human race from one individual?  For the Psalmist himself, when he had first said, “Thou shalt keep us, O Lord, Thou shall preserve us from this generation for ever,” and had then rebuked those whose foolish and impious doctrine preserves for the soul no eternal deliverance and blessedness adds immediately, “The wicked walk in a circle.”  Then, as if it were said to him, “What then do you believe, feel, know?  Are we to believe that it suddenly occurred to God to create man, whom He had never before made in a past eternity,—God, to whom nothing new can occur, and in whom is no changeableness?” the Psalmist goes on to reply, as if addressing God Himself, “According to the depth of Thy wisdom Thou hast multiplied the children of men.”  Let men, he seems to say, fancy what they please, let them conjecture and dispute as seems good to them, but Thou hast multiplied the children of men according to the depth of thy wisdom, which no man can comprehend.  For this is a depth indeed, that God always has been, and that man, whom He had never made before, He willed to make in time, and this without changing His design and will.

Chapter 15.—Whether We are to Believe that God, as He Has Always Been Sovereign Lord, Has Always Had Creatures Over Whom He Exercised His Sovereignty; And in What Sense We Can Say that the Creature Has Always Been, and Yet Cannot Say It is Co-Eternal.

For my own part, indeed, as I dare not say that there ever was a time when the Lord God was not Lord,

Cf. de Trin. v. 17.

Chapter 16.—How We are to Understand God’s Promise of Life Eternal, Which Was Uttered Before the “Eternal Times.”

I own that I do not know what ages passed before the human race was created, yet I have no doubt that no created thing is co-eternal with the Creator.  But even the apostle speaks of time as eternal, and this with reference, not to the future, but, which is more surprising, to the past.  For he says, “In hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie promised before the eternal times, but hath in due times manifested His word.”

Titus i. 2, 3.  Augustin here follows the version of Jerome, and not the Vulgate.  Comp. Contra Priscill. 6, and de Gen. c. Man. iv. 4.

Chapter 17.—What Defence is Made by Sound Faith Regarding God’s Unchangeable Counsel and Will, Against the Reasonings of Those Who Hold that the Works of God are Eternally Repeated in Revolving Cycles that Restore All Things as They Were.

Of this, too, I have no doubt, that before the first man was created, there never had been a man at all, neither this same man himself recurring by I know not what cycles, and having made I know not how many revolutions, nor any other of similar nature.  From this belief I am not frightened by philosophical arguments, among which that is reckoned the most acute which is founded on the assertion that the infinite cannot be comprehended by any mode of knowledge.  Consequently, they argue, God has in his own mind finite conceptions of all finite things which He makes.  Now it cannot be supposed that His goodness was ever idle; for if it were, there should be ascribed to Him an awakening to activity in time, from a past eternity of inactivity, as if He repented of an idleness that had no beginning, and proceeded, therefore, to make a beginning of work.  This being the case, they say it must be that the same things are always repeated, and that as they pass, so they are destined always to return, whether amidst all these changes the world remains the same,—the world which has always been, and yet was created,—or that the world in these revolutions is perpetually dying out and being renewed; otherwise, if we point to a time when the works of God were begun, it would be believed that He considered His past eternal leisure to be inert and indolent, and therefore condemned and altered it as displeasing to Himself.  Now if God is supposed to have been indeed always making temporal things, but different from one another, and one after the other, so, that He thus came at last to make man, whom He had never made before, then it may seem that He made man not with knowledge (for they suppose no knowledge can comprehend the infinite succession of creatures), but at the dictate of the hour, as it struck him at the moment, with a sudden and accidental change of mind.  On the other hand, say they, if those cycles be admitted, and if we suppose that the same temporal things are repeated, while the world either remains identical through all these rotations, or else dies away and is renewed, then there is ascribed to God neither the slothful ease of a past eternity, nor a rash and unforeseen creation.  And if the same things be not thus repeated in cycles, then they cannot by any science or prescience be comprehended in their endless diversity.  Even though reason could not refute, faith would smile at these argumentations, with which the godless endeavor to turn our simple piety from the right way, that we may walk with them “in a circle.”  But by the help of the Lord our God, even reason, and that readily enough, shatters these revolving circles which conjecture frames.  For that which specially leads these men astray to refer their own circles to the straight path of truth, is, that they measure by their own human, changeable, and narrow intellect the divine mind, which is absolutely unchangeable, infinitely capacious, and without succession of thought, counting all things without number.  So that saying of the apostle comes true of them, for, “comparing themselves with themselves, they do not understand.”

2 Cor. x. 12.  Here, and in Enar. in Ps. xxxiv. and also in Cont. Faust. xxii. 47, Augustin follows the Greek, and not the Vulgate.

Chapter 18.—Against Those Who Assert that Things that are Infinite

I.e.indefinite, or an indefinite succession of things.

As for their other assertion, that God’s knowledge cannot comprehend things infinite, it only remains for them to affirm, in order that they may sound the depths of their impiety, that God does not know all numbers.  For it is very certain that they are infinite; since, no matter of what number you suppose an end to be made, this number can be, I will not say, increased by the addition of one more, but however great it be, and however vast be the multitude of which it is the rational and scientific expression, it can still be not only doubled, but even multiplied.  Moreover, each number is so defined by its own properties, that no two numbers are equal.  They are therefore both unequal and different from one another; and while they are simply finite, collectively they are infinite.  Does God, therefore, not know numbers on account of this infinity; and does His knowledge extend only to a certain height in numbers, while of the rest He is ignorant?  Who is so left to himself as to say so?  Yet they can hardly pretend to put numbers out of the question, or maintain that they have nothing to do with the knowledge of God; for Plato,

Again in the Timæus.

Chapter 19.—Of Worlds Without End, or Ages of Ages.

De sæculis sæculorum.

I do not presume to determine whether God does so, and whether these times which are called “ages of ages” are joined together in a continuous series, and succeed one another with a regulated diversity, and leave exempt from their vicissitudes only those who are freed from their misery, and abide without end in a blessed immortality; or whether these are called “ages of ages,” that we may understand that the ages remain unchangeable in God’s unwavering wisdom, and are the efficient causes, as it were, of those ages which are being spent in time.  Possibly “ages” is used for “age,” so that nothing else is meant by “ages of ages” than by “age of age,” as nothing else is meant by “heavens of heavens” than by “heaven of heaven.”  For God called the firmament, above which are the waters, “Heaven,” and yet the psalm says, “Let the waters that are above the heavens praise the name of the Lord.”

Ps. cxlviii. 4.

Chapter 20.—Of the Impiety of Those Who Assert that the Souls Which Enjoy True and Perfect Blessedness, Must Yet Again and Again in These Periodic Revolutions Return to Labor and Misery.

What pious ears could bear to hear that after a life spent in so many and severe distresses (if, indeed, that should be called a life at all which is rather a death, so utter that the love of this present death makes us fear that death which delivers us from it,) that after evils so disastrous, and miseries of all kinds have at length been expiated and finished by the help of true religion and wisdom, and when we have thus attained to the vision of God, and have entered into bliss by the contemplation of spiritual light and participation in His unchangeable immortality, which we burn to attain,—that we must at some time lose all this, and that they who do lose it are cast down from that eternity, truth, and felicity to infernal mortality and shameful foolishness, and are involved in accursed woes, in which God is lost, truth held in detestation, and happiness sought in iniquitous impurities? and that this will happen endlessly again and again, recurring at fixed intervals, and in regularly returning periods? and that this everlasting and ceaseless revolution of definite cycles, which remove and restore true misery and deceitful bliss in turn, is contrived in order that God may be able to know His own works, since on the one hand He cannot rest from creating and on the other, cannot know the infinite number of His creatures, if He always makes creatures?  Who, I say, can listen to such things?  Who can accept or suffer them to be spoken?  Were they true, it were not only more prudent to keep silence regarding them, but even (to express myself as best I can) it were the part of wisdom not to know them.  For if in the future world we shall not remember these things, and by this oblivion be blessed, why should we now increase our misery, already burdensome enough, by the knowledge of them?  If, on the other hand, the knowledge of them will be forced upon us hereafter, now at least let us remain in ignorance, that in the present expectation we may enjoy a blessedness which the future reality is not to bestow; since in this life we are expecting to obtain life everlasting, but in the world to come are to discover it to be blessed, but not everlasting.

And if they maintain that no one can attain to the blessedness of the world to come, unless in this life he has been indoctrinated in those cycles in which bliss and misery relieve one another, how do they avow that the more a man loves God, the more readily he attains to blessedness,—they who teach what paralyzes love itself?  For who would not be more remiss and lukewarm in his love for a person whom he thinks he shall be forced to abandon, and whose truth and wisdom he shall come to hate; and this, too, after he has quite attained to the utmost and most blissful knowledge of Him that he is capable of?  Can any one be faithful in his love, even to a human friend, if he knows that he is destined to become his enemy?

Cicero has the same (de Amicitia, 16):  Quonam modo quisquam amicus esse poterit, cui se putabit inimicum esse posse?  He also quotes Scipio to the effect that no sentiment is more unfriendly to friendship than this, that we should love as if some day we were to hate.

Chapter 21.—That There Was Created at First But One Individual, and that the Human Race Was Created in Him.

Now that we have solved, as well as we could, this very difficult question about the eternal God creating new things, without any novelty of will, it is easy to see how much better it is that God was pleased to produce the human race from the one individual whom He created, than if He had originated it in several men.  For as to the other animals, He created some solitary, and naturally seeking lonely places,—as the eagles, kites, lions, wolves, and such like; others gregarious, which herd together, and prefer to live in company,—as pigeons, starlings, stags, and little fallow deer, and the like:  but neither class did He cause to be propagated from individuals, but called into being several at once.  Man, on the other hand, whose nature was to be a mean between the angelic and bestial, He created in such sort, that if he remained in subjection to His Creator as his rightful Lord, and piously kept His commandments, he should pass into the company of the angels, and obtain, without the intervention of death,

Coquaeus remarks that this is levelled against the Pelagians.

Chapter 22.—That God Foreknew that the First Man Would Sin, and that He at the Same Time Foresaw How Large a Multitude of Godly Persons Would by His Grace Be Translated to the Fellowship of the Angels.

And God was not ignorant that man would sin, and that, being himself made subject now to death, he would propagate men doomed to die, and that these mortals would run to such enormities in sin, that even the beasts devoid of rational will, and who were created in numbers from the waters and the earth, would live more securely and peaceably with their own kind than men, who had been propagated from one individual for the very purpose of commending concord.  For not even lions or dragons have ever waged with their kind such wars as men have waged with one another.

                “Quando leoni

Fortior eripuit vitam leo? quo nemore unquam

Exspiravit aper majoris dentibus apri?

Indica tigris agit rabida cum tigride pacem

Perpetuam; sævis inter se convenit ursis.

Ast homini,”etc.

Juvenal, Sat. xv. 160—5.

—See also the very striking lines which precede these.

Chapter 23.—Of the Nature of the Human Soul Created in the Image of God.

God, then, made man in His own image.  For He created for him a soul endowed with reason and intelligence, so that he might excel all the creatures of earth, air, and sea, which were not so gifted.  And when He had formed the man out of the dust of the earth, and had willed that his soul should be such as I have said,—whether He had already made it, and now by breathing imparted it to man, or rather made it by breathing, so that that breath which God made by breathing (for what else is “to breathe” than to make breath?) is the soul,

See this further discussed in Gen. ad Lit. vii. 35, and in Delitzsch’s Bibl. Psychology.

Chapter 24.—Whether the Angels Can Be Said to Be the Creators of Any, Even the Least Creature.

But in this book we have nothing to do with those who do not believe that the divine mind made or cares for this world.  As for those who believe their own Plato, that all mortal animals—among whom man holds the pre-eminent place, and is near to the gods themselves—were created not by that most high God who made the world, but by other lesser gods created by the Supreme, and exercising a delegated power under His control,—if only those persons be delivered from the superstition which prompts them to seek a plausible reason for paying divine honors and sacrificing to these gods as their creators, they will easily be disentangled also from this their error.  For it is blasphemy to believe or to say (even before it can be understood) that any other than God is creator of any nature, be it never so small and mortal.  And as for the angels, whom those Platonists prefer to call gods, although they do, so far as they are permitted and commissioned, aid in the production of the things around us, yet not on that account are we to call them creators, any more than we call gardeners the creators of fruits and trees.

Chapter 25.—That God Alone is the Creator of Every Kind of Creature, Whatever Its Nature or Form.

For whereas there is one form which is given from without to every bodily substance,—such as the form which is constructed by potters and smiths, and that class of artists who paint and fashion forms like the body of animals,—but another and internal form which is not itself constructed, but, as the efficient cause, produces not only the natural bodily forms, but even the life itself of the living creatures, and which proceeds from the secret and hidden choice of an intelligent and living nature,—let that first-mentioned form be attributed to every artificer, but this latter to one only, God, the Creator and Originator who made the world itself and the angels, without the help of world or angels.  For the same divine and, so to speak, creative energy, which cannot be made, but makes, and which gave to the earth and sky their roundness,—this same divine, effective, and creative energy gave their roundness to the eye and to the apple; and the other natural objects which we anywhere see, received also their form, not from without, but from the secret and profound might of the Creator, who said, “Do not I fill heaven and earth?”

Jer. xxiii. 24.

Chapter 26.—Of that Opinion of the Platonists, that the Angels Were Themselves Indeed Created by God, But that Afterwards They Created Man’s Body.

It is obvious, that in attributing the creation of the other animals to those inferior gods who were made by the Supreme, he meant it to be understood that the immortal part was taken from God Himself, and that these minor creators added the mortal part; that is to say, he meant them to be considered the creators of our bodies, but not of our souls.  But since Porphyry maintains that if the soul is to be purified all entanglement with a body must be escaped from; and at the same time agrees with Plato and the Platonistsin thinking that those who have not spent a temperate and honorable life return to mortal bodies as their punishment (to bodies of brutes in Plato’s opinion, to human bodies in Porphyry’s); it follows that those whom they would have us worship as our parents and authors, that they may plausibly call them gods, are, after all, but the forgers of our fetters and chains,—not our creators, but our jailers and turnkeys, who lock us up in the most bitter and melancholy house of correction.  Let the Platonists, then, either cease menacing us with our bodies as the punishment of our souls, or preaching that we are to worship as gods those whose work upon us they exhort us by all means in our power to avoid and escape from.  But, indeed, both opinions are quite false.  It is false that souls return again to this life to be punished; and it is false that there is any other creator of anything in heaven or earth, than He who made the heaven and the earth.  For if we live in a body only to expiate our sins, how says Plato in another place, that the world could not have been the most beautiful and good, had it not been filled with all kinds of creatures, mortal and immortal?

The deity, desirous of making the universe in all respects resemble the most beautiful and entirely perfect of intelligible objects, formed it into one visible animal, containing within itself all the other animals with which it is naturally allied.—Timæus, c. xi.

Chapter 27.—That the Whole Plenitude of the Human Race Was Embraced in the First Man, and that God There Saw the Portion of It Which Was to Be Honored and Rewarded, and that Which Was to Be Condemned and Punished.

With good cause, therefore, does the true religion recognize and proclaim that the same God who created the universal cosmos, created also all the animals, souls as well as bodies.  Among the terrestrial animals man was made by Him in His own image, and, for the reason I have given, was made one individual, though he was not left solitary.  For there is nothing so social by nature, so unsocial by its corruption, as this race.  And human nature has nothing more appropriate, either for the prevention of discord, or for the healing of it, where it exists, than the remembrance of that first parent of us all, whom God was pleased to create alone, that all men might be derived from one, and that they might thus be admonished to preserve unity among their whole multitude.  But from the fact that the woman was made for him from his side, it was plainly meant that we should learn how dear the bond between man and wife should be.  These works of God do certainly seem extraordinary, because they are the first works.  They who do not believe them, ought not to believe any prodigies; for these would not be called prodigies did they not happen out of the ordinary course of nature.  But, is it possible that anything should happen in vain, however hidden be its cause, in so grand a government of divine providence?  One of the sacred Psalmists says, “Come, behold the works of the Lord, what prodigies He hath wrought in the earth.”

Ps. xlvi. 8.

Chapter 1.—Of the Fall of the First Man, Through Which Mortality Has Been Contracted.

Having disposed of the very difficult questions concerning the origin of our world and the beginning of the human race, the natural order requires that we now discuss the fall of the first man (we may say of the first men), and of the origin and propagation of human death.  For God had not made man like the angels, in such a condition that, even though they had sinned, they could none the more die.  He had so made them, that if they discharged the obligations of obedience, an angelic immortality and a blessed eternity might ensue, without the intervention of death; but if they disobeyed, death should be visited on them with just sentence—which, too, has been spoken to in the preceding book.

Chapter 2.—Of that Death Which Can Affect an Immortal Soul, and of that to Which the Body is Subject.

But I see I must speak a little more carefully of the nature of death.  For although the human soul is truly affirmed to be immortal, yet it also has a certain death of its own.  For it is therefore called immortal, because, in a sense, it does not cease to live and to feel; while the body is called mortal, because it can be forsaken of all life, and cannot by itself live at all.  The death, then, of the soul takes place when God forsakes it, as the death of the body when the soul forsakes it.  Therefore the death of both—that is, of the whole man—occurs when the soul, forsaken by God, forsakes the body.  For, in this case, neither is God the life of the soul, nor the soul the life of the body.  And this death of the whole man is followed by that which, on the authority of the divine oracles, we call the second death.  This the Saviour referred to when He said, “Fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”

Matt. x. 28.

Chapter 3.—Whether Death, Which by the Sin of Our First Parents Has Passed Upon All Men, is the Punishment of Sin, Even to the Good.

But a question not to be shirked arises:  Whether in very truth death, which separates soul and body, is good to the good?

On this question compare the 24th and 25th epistles of Jerome, de obitu Leæ, and de obitu Blesillæ filiæ.  Coquæus.

Chapter 4.—Why Death, the Punishment of Sin, is Not Withheld from Those Who by the Grace of Regeneration are Absolved from Sin.

If, moreover, any one is solicitous about this point, how, if death be the very punishment of sin, they whose guilt is cancelled by grace do yet suffer death, this difficulty has already been handled and solved in our other work which we have written on the baptism of infants.

De Baptismo Parvulorum is the second half of the title of the book, de Peccatorum Meritis et Remissione.

Chapter 5.—As the Wicked Make an Ill Use of the Law, Which is Good, So the Good Make a Good Use of Death, Which is an Ill.

The apostle, wishing to show how hurtful a thing sin is, when grace does not aid us, has not hesitated to say that the strength of sin is that very law by which sin is prohibited.  “The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.”

1 Cor. xv. 56.

Chapter 6.—Of the Evil of Death in General, Considered as the Separation of Soul and Body.

Wherefore, as regards bodily death, that is, the separation of the soul from the body, it is good unto none while it is being endured by those whom we say are in the article of death.  For the very violence with which body and soul are wrenched asunder, which in the living had been conjoined and closely intertwined, brings with it a harsh experience, jarring horridly on nature so long as it continues, till there comes a total loss of sensation, which arose from the very interpenetration of spirit and flesh.  And all this anguish is sometimes forestalled by one stroke of the body or sudden flitting of the soul, the swiftness of which prevents it from being felt.  But whatever that may be in the dying which with violently painful sensation robs of all sensation, yet, when it is piously and faithfully borne, it increases the merit of patience, but does not make the name of punishment inapplicable.  Death, proceeding by ordinary generation from the first man, is the punishment of all who are born of him, yet, if it be endured for righteousness’ sake, it becomes the glory of those who are born again; and though death be the award of sin, it sometimes secures that nothing be awarded to sin.

Chapter 7.—Of the Death Which the Unbaptized

Literally, unregenerate.

For whatever unbaptized persons die confessing Christ, this confession is of the same efficacy for the remission of sins as if they were washed in the sacred font of baptism.  For He who said, “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God,”

John iii. 5.

Chapter 8.—That the Saints, by Suffering the First Death for the Truth’s Sake, are Freed from the Second.

For if we look at the matter a little more carefully, we shall see that even when a man dies faithfully and laudably for the truth’s sake, it is still death he is avoiding.  For he submits to some part of death, for the very purpose of avoiding the whole, and the second and eternal death over and above.  He submits to the separation of soul and body, lest the soul be separated both from God and from the body, and so the whole first death be completed, and the second death receive him everlastingly.  Wherefore death is indeed, as I said, good to none while it is being actually suffered, and while it is subduing the dying to its power; but it is meritoriously endured for the sake of retaining or winning what is good.  And regarding what happens after death, it is no absurdity to say that death is good to the good, and evil to the evil.  For the disembodied spirits of the just are at rest; but those of the wicked suffer punishment till their bodies rise again,—those of the just to life everlasting, and of the others to death eternal, which is called the second death.

Chapter 9.—Whether We Should Say that The Moment of Death, in Which Sensation Ceases, Occurs in the Experience of the Dying or in that of the Dead.

The point of time in which the souls of the good and evil are separated from the body, are we to say it is after death, or in death rather?  If it is after death, then it is not death which is good or evil, since death is done with and past, but it is the life which the soul has now entered on.  Death was an evil when it was present, that is to say, when it was being suffered by the dying; for to them it brought with it a severe and grievous experience, which the good make a good use of.  But when death is past, how can that which no longer is be either good or evil?  Still further, if we examine the matter more closely, we shall see that even that sore and grievous pain which the dying experience is not death itself.  For so long as they have any sensation, they are certainly still alive; and, if still alive, must rather be said to be in a state previous to death than in death.  For when death actually comes, it robs us of all bodily sensation, which, while death is only approaching is painful.  And thus it is difficult to explain how we speak of those who are not yet dead, but are agonized in their last and mortal extremity, as being in the article of death.  Yet what else can we call them than dying persons? for when death which was imminent shall have actually come, we can no longer call them dying but dead.  No one, therefore, is dying unless living; since even he who is in the last extremity of life, and, as we say, giving up the ghost, yet lives.  The same person is therefore at once dying and living, but drawing near to death, departing from life; yet in life, because his spirit yet abides in the body; not yet in death, because not yet has his spirit forsaken the body.  But if, when it has forsaken it, the man is not even then in death, but after death, who shall say when he is in death?  On the one hand, no one can be called dying, if a man cannot be dying and living at the same time; and as long as the soul is in the body, we cannot deny that he is living.  On the other hand, if the man who is approaching death be rather called dying, I know not who is living.

Chapter 10.—Of the Life of Mortals, Which is Rather to Be Called Death Than Life.

For no sooner do we begin to live in this dying body, than we begin to move ceaselessly towards death.

Much of this paradoxical statement about death is taken from Seneca.  See, among other places, his epistle on the premeditation of future dangers, the passage beginning, Quotidie morimur, quotide enim demitur aliqua pars vitæ.

Chapter 11.—Whether One Can Both Be Living and Dead at the Same Time.

But if it is absurd to say that a man is in death before he reaches death (for to what is his course running as he passes through life, if already he is in death?), and if it outrage common usage to speak of a man being at once alive and dead, as much as it does so to speak of him as at once asleep and awake, it remains to be asked when a man is dying?  For, before death comes, he is not dying but living; and when death has come, he is not dying but dead.  The one is before, the other after death.  When, then, is he in death so that we can say he is dying?  For as there are three times, before death, in death, after death, so there are three states corresponding, living, dying, dead.  And it is very hard to define when a man is in death or dying, when he is neither living, which is before death, nor dead, which is after death, but dying, which is in death.  For so long as the soul is in the body, especially if consciousness remain, the man certainly lives; for body and soul constitute the man.  And thus, before death, he cannot be said to be in death, but when, on the other hand, the soul has departed, and all bodily sensation is extinct, death is past, and the man is dead.  Between these two states the dying condition finds no place; for if a man yet lives, death has not arrived; if he has ceased to live, death is past.  Never, then, is he dying, that is, comprehended in the state of death.  So also in the passing of time,—you try to lay your finger on the present, and cannot find it, because the present occupies no space, but is only the transition of time from the future to the past.  Must we then conclude that there is thus no death of the body at all?  For if there is, where is it, since it is in no one, and no one can be in it?  Since, indeed, if there is yet life, death is not yet; for this state is before death, not in death:  and if life has already ceased, death is not present; for this state is after death, not in death.  On the other hand, if there is no death before or after, what do we mean when we say “after death,” or “before death?”  This is a foolish way of speaking if there is no death.  And would that we had lived so well in Paradise that in very truth there were now no death!  But not only does it now exist, but so grievous a thing is it, that no skill is sufficient either to explain or to escape it.

Let us, then, speak in the customary way,—no man ought to speak otherwise,—and let us call the time before death come, “before death;” as it is written, “Praise no man before his death.”

Ecclus. xi. 28.

And therefore I think it has not unsuitably nor inappropriately come to pass, though not by the intention of man, yet perhaps with divine purpose, that this Latin word moritur cannot be declined by the grammarians according to the rule followed by similar words.  For oritur gives the form ortus est for the perfect; and all similar verbs form this tense from their perfect participles.  But if we ask the perfect of moritur, we get the regular answer mortuus est, with a double u.  For thus mortuus is pronounced, like fatuus, arduus, conspicuus, and similar words, which are not perfect participles but adjectives, and are declined without regard to tense.  But mortuus, though in form an adjective, is used as perfect participle, as if that were to be declined which cannot be declined; and thus it has suitably come to pass that, as the thing itself cannot in point of fact be declined, so neither can the word significant of the act be declined.  Yet, by the aid of our Redeemer’s grace, we may manage at least to decline the second.  For that is more grievous still, and, indeed, of all evils the worst, since it consists not in the separation of soul and body, but in the uniting of both in death eternal.  And there, in striking contrast to our present conditions, men will not be before or after death, but always in death; and thus never living, never dead, but endlessly dying.  And never can a man be more disastrously in death than when death itself shall be deathless.

Chapter 12.—What Death God Intended, When He Threatened Our First Parents with Death If They Should Disobey His Commandment.

When, therefore, it is asked what death it was with which God threatened our first parents if they should transgress the commandment they had received from Him, and should fail to preserve their obedience,—whether it was the death of soul, or of body, or of the whole man, or that which is called second death,—we must answer, It is all.  For the first consists of two; the second is the complete death, which consists of all.  For, as the whole earth consists of many lands, and the Church universal of many churches, so death universal consists of all deaths.  The first consists of two, one of the body, and another of the soul.  So that the first death is a death of the whole man, since the soul without God and without the body suffers punishment for a time; but the second is when the soul, without God but with the body, suffers punishment everlasting.  When, therefore, God said to that first man whom he had placed in Paradise, referring to the forbidden fruit, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die,”

Gen. ii. 17.

Chapter 13.—What Was the First Punishment of the Transgression of Our First Parents.

For, as soon as our first parents had transgressed the commandment, divine grace forsook them, and they were confounded at their own wickedness; and therefore they took fig-leaves (which were possibly the first that came to hand in their troubled state of mind), and covered their shame; for though their members remained the same, they had shame now where they had none before.  They experienced a new motion of their flesh, which had become disobedient to them, in strict retribution of their own disobedience to God.  For the soul, revelling in its own liberty, and scorning to serve God, was itself deprived of the command it had formerly maintained over the body.  And because it had willfully deserted its superior Lord, it no longer held its own inferior servant; neither could it hold the flesh subject, as it would always have been able to do had it remained itself subject to God.  Then began the flesh to lust against the Spirit,

Gal. v. 17.

Chapter 14.—In What State Man Was Made by God, and into What Estate He Fell by the Choice of His Own Will.

For God, the author of natures, not of vices, created man upright; but man, being of his own will corrupted, and justly condemned, begot corrupted and condemned children.  For we all were in that one man, since we all were that one man, who fell into sin by the woman who was made from him before the sin.  For not yet was the particular form created and distributed to us, in which we as individuals were to live, but already the seminal nature was there from which we were to be propagated; and this being vitiated by sin, and bound by the chain of death, and justly condemned, man could not be born of man in any other state.  And thus, from the bad use of free will, there originated the whole train of evil, which, with its concatenation of miseries, convoys the human race from its depraved origin, as from a corrupt root, on to the destruction of the second death, which has no end, those only being excepted who are freed by the grace of God.

Chapter 15.—That Adam in His Sin Forsook God Ere God Forsook Him, and that His Falling Away From God Was the First Death of the Soul.

It may perhaps be supposed that because God said, “Ye shall die the death,”

Gen. ii. 17.

Chapter 16.—Concerning the Philosophers Who Think that the Separation of Soul and Body is Not Penal, Though Plato Represents the Supreme Deity as Promising to the Inferior Gods that They Shall Never Be Dismissed from Their Bodies.

But the philosophers against whom we are defending the city of God, that is, His Church seem to themselves to have good cause to deride us, because we say that the separation of the soul from the body is to be held as part of man’s punishment.  For they suppose that the blessedness of the soul then only is complete, when it is quite denuded of the body, and returns to God a pure and simple, and, as it were, naked soul.  On this point, if I should find nothing in their own literature to refute this opinion, I should be forced laboriously to demonstrate that it is not the body, but the corruptibility of the body, which is a burden to the soul.  Hence that sentence of Scripture we quoted in a foregoing book, “For the corruptible body presseth down the soul.”

Wisdom ix. 15.

Whether this opinion of Plato’s about the stars is true or not, is another question.  For we cannot at once grant to him that these luminous bodies or globes, which by day and night shine on the earth with the light of their bodily substance, have also intellectual and blessed souls which animate each its own body, as he confidently affirms of the universe itself, as if it were one huge animal, in which all other animals were contained.

Plato, in the Timæus, represents the Demiurgus as constructing the kosmos or universe to be a complete representation of the idea of animal.  He planted in its centre a soul, spreading outwards so as to pervade the whole body of the kosmos; and then he introduced into it those various species of animals which were contained in the idea of animal.  Among these animals stand first the celestial, the gods embodied in the stars, and of these the oldest is the earth, set in the centre of all, close packed round the great axis which traverses the centre of the kosmos.—See the Timæus and Grote’s Plato, iii. 250 et seq.

Chapter 17.—Against Those Who Affirm that Earthly Bodies Cannot Be Made Incorruptible and Eternal.

These same philosophers further contend that terrestrial bodies cannot be eternal though they make no doubt that the whole earth, which is itself the central member of their god,—not, indeed, of the greatest, but yet of a great god, that is, of this whole world,—is eternal.  Since, then, the Supreme made for them another god, that is, this world, superior to the other gods beneath Him; and since they suppose that this god is an animal, having, as they affirm, a rational or intellectual soul enclosed in the huge mass of its body, and having, as the fitly situated and adjusted members of its body, the four elements, whose union they wish to be indissoluble and eternal, lest perchance this great god of theirs might some day perish; what reason is there that the earth, which is the central member in the body of a greater creature, should be eternal, and the bodies of other terrestrial creatures should not possibly be eternal if God should so will it?  But earth, say they, must return to earth, out of which the terrestrial bodies of the animals have been taken.  For this, they say, is the reason of the necessity of their death and dissolution, and this the manner of their restoration to the solid and eternal earth whence they came.  But if any one says the same thing of fire, holding that the bodies which are derived from it to make celestial beings must be restored to the universal fire, does not the immortality which Plato represents these gods as receiving from the Supreme evanesce in the heat of this dispute?  Or does this not happen with those celestials because God, whose will, as Plato says, overpowers all powers, has willed it should not be so?  What, then, hinders God from ordaining the same of terrestrial bodies?  And since, indeed, Plato acknowledges that God can prevent things that are born from dying, and things that are joined from being sundered, and things that are composed from being dissolved, and can ordain that the souls once allotted to their bodies should never abandon them, but enjoy along with them immortality and everlasting bliss, why may He not also effect that terrestrial bodies die not?  Is God powerless to do everything that is special to the Christian’s creed, but powerful to effect everything the Platonists desire?  The philosophers, forsooth, have been admitted to a knowledge of the divine purposes and power which has been denied to the prophets!  The truth is, that the Spirit of God taught His prophets so much of His will as He thought fit to reveal, but the philosophers, in their efforts to discover it, were deceived by human conjecture.

But they should not have been so led astray, I will not say by their ignorance, but by their obstinacy, as to contradict themselves so frequently; for they maintain, with all their vaunted might, that in order to the happiness of the soul, it must abandon not only its earthly body, but every kind of body.  And yet they hold that the gods, whose souls are most blessed, are bound to everlasting bodies, the celestials to fiery bodies, and the soul of Jove himself (or this world, as they would have us believe) to all the physical elements which compose this entire mass reaching from earth to heaven.  For this soul Plato believes to be extended and diffused by musical numbers,

On these numbers see Grote’s Plato, iii. 254.

Chapter 18.—Of Earthly Bodies, Which the Philosophers Affirm Cannot Be in Heavenly Places, Because Whatever is of Earth is by Its Natural Weight Attracted to Earth.

But it is necessary, they say, that the natural weight of earthly bodies either keeps them on earth or draws them to it; and therefore they cannot be in heaven.  Our first parents were indeed on earth, in a well-wooded and fruitful spot, which has been named Paradise.  But let our adversaries a little more carefully consider this subject of earthly weight, because it has important bearings, both on the ascension of the body of Christ, and also on the resurrection body of the saints.  If human skill can by some contrivance fabricate vessels that float, out of metals which sink as soon as they are placed on the water, how much more credible is it that God, by some occult mode of operation, should even more certainly effect that these earthy masses be emancipated from the downward pressure of their weight?  This cannot be impossible to that God by whose almighty will, according to Plato, neither things born perish, nor things composed dissolve, especially since it is much more wonderful that spiritual and bodily essences be conjoined than that bodies be adjusted to other material substances.  Can we not also easily believe that souls, being made perfectly blessed, should be endowed with the power of moving their earthy but incorruptible bodies as they please, with almost spontaneous movement, and of placing them where they please with the readiest action?  If the angels transport whatever terrestrial creatures they please from any place they please, and convey them whither they please, is it to be believed that they cannot do so without toil and the feeling of burden?  Why, then, may we not believe that the spirits of the saints, made perfect and blessed by divine grace, can carry their own bodies where they please, and set them where they will?  For, though we have been accustomed to notice, in bearing weights, that the larger the quantity the greater the weight of earthy bodies is, and that the greater the weight the more burdensome it is, yet the soul carries the members of its own flesh with less difficulty when they are massive with health, than in sickness when they are wasted.  And though the hale and strong man feels heavier to other men carrying him than the lank and sickly, yet the man himself moves and carries his own body with less feeling of burden when he has the greater bulk of vigorous health, than when his frame is reduced to a minimum by hunger or disease.  Of such consequence, in estimating the weight of earthly bodies, even while yet corruptible and mortal, is the consideration not of dead weight, but of the healthy equilibrium of the parts.  And what words can tell the difference between what we now call health and future immortality?  Let not the philosophers, then, think to upset our faith with arguments from the weight of bodies; for I don’t care to inquire why they cannot believe an earthly body can be in heaven, while the whole earth is suspended on nothing.  For perhaps the world keeps its central place by the same law that attracts to its centre all heavy bodies.  But this I say, if the lesser gods, to whom Plato committed the creation of man and the other terrestrial creatures, were able, as he affirms, to withdraw from the fire its quality of burning, while they left it that of lighting, so that it should shine through the eyes; and if to the supreme God Plato also concedes the power of preserving from death things that have been born, and of preserving from dissolution things that are composed of parts so different as body and spirit;—are we to hesitate to concede to this same God the power to operate on the flesh of him whom He has endowed with immortality, so as to withdraw its corruption but leave its nature, remove its burdensome weight but retain its seemly form and members?  But concerning our belief in the resurrection of the dead, and concerning their immortal bodies, we shall speak more at large, God willing, in the end of this work.

Chapter 19.—Against the Opinion of Those Who Do Not Believe that the Primitive Men Would Have Been Immortal If They Had Not Sinned.

At present let us go on, as we have begun, to give some explanation regarding the bodies of our first parents.  I say then, that, except as the just consequence of sin, they would not have been subjected even to this death, which is good to the good,—this death, which is not exclusively known and believed in by a few, but is known to all, by which soul and body are separated, and by which the body of an animal which was but now visibly living is now visibly dead.  For though there can be no manner of doubt that the souls of the just and holy dead live in peaceful rest, yet so much better would it be for them to be alive in healthy, well-conditioned bodies, that even those who hold the tenet that it is most blessed to be quit of every kind of body, condemn this opinion in spite of themselves.  For no one will dare to set wise men, whether yet to die or already dead,—in other words, whether already quit of the body, or shortly to be so,—above the immortal gods, to whom the Supreme, in Plato, promises as a munificent gift life indissoluble, or in eternal union with their bodies.  But this same Plato thinks that nothing better can happen to men than that they pass through life piously and justly, and, being separated from their bodies, be received into the bosom of the gods, who never abandon theirs; “that, oblivious of the past, they may revisit the upper air, and conceive the longing to return again to the body.”

Virgil, Æn, vi. 750, 751.

Chapter 20.—That the Flesh Now Resting in Peace Shall Be Raised to a Perfection Not Enjoyed by the Flesh of Our First Parents.

Thus the souls of departed saints are not affected by the death which dismisses them from their bodies, because their flesh rests in hope, no matter what indignities it receives after sensation is gone.  For they do not desire that their bodies be forgotten, as Plato thinks fit, but rather, because they remember what has been promised by Him who deceives no man, and who gave them security for the safe keeping even of the hairs of their head, they with a longing patience wait in hope of the resurrection of their bodies, in which they have suffered many hardships, and are now to suffer never again.  For if they did not “hate their own flesh,” when it, with its native infirmity, opposed their will, and had to be constrained by the spiritual law, how much more shall they love it, when it shall even itself have become spiritual!  For as, when the spirit serves the flesh, it is fitly called carnal, so, when the flesh serves the spirit, it will justly be called spiritual.  Not that it is converted into spirit, as some fancy from the words, “It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption,”

1 Cor. xv. 42.

Chapter 21.—Of Paradise, that It Can Be Understood in a Spiritual Sense Without Sacrificing the Historic Truth of the Narrative Regarding The Real Place.

On this account some allegorize all that concerns Paradise itself, where the first men, the parents of the human race, are, according to the truth of holy Scripture, recorded to have been; and they understand all its trees and fruit-bearing plants as virtues and habits of life, as if they had no existence in the external world, but were only so spoken of or related for the sake of spiritual meanings.  As if there could not be a real terrestrial Paradise!  As if there never existed these two women, Sarah and Hagar, nor the two sons who were born to Abraham, the one of the bond woman, the other of the free, because the apostle says that in them the two covenants were prefigured; or as if water never flowed from the rock when Moses struck it, because therein Christ can be seen in a figure, as the same apostle says, “Now that rock was Christ!”

1 Cor. x. 4.

These things can also and more profitably be understood of the Church, so that they become prophetic foreshadowings of things to come.  Thus Paradise is the Church, as it is called in the Canticles;

Cant. iv. 13.

Chapter 22.—That the Bodies of the Saints Shall After the Resurrection Be Spiritual, and Yet Flesh Shall Not Be Changed into Spirit.

The bodies of the righteous, then, such as they shall be in the resurrection, shall need neither any fruit to preserve them from dying of disease or the wasting decay of old age, nor any other physical nourishment to allay the cravings of hunger or of thirst; for they shall be invested with so sure and every way inviolable an immortality, that they shall not eat save when they choose, nor be under the necessity of eating, while they enjoy the power of doing so.  For so also was it with the angels who presented themselves to the eye and touch of men, not because they could do no otherwise, but because they were able and desirous to suit themselves to men by a kind of manhood ministry.  For neither are we to suppose, when men receive them as guests, that the angels eat only in appearance, though to any who did not know them to be angels they might seem to eat from the same necessity as ourselves.  So these words spoken in the Book of Tobit, “You saw me eat, but you saw it but in vision;”

Tobit xii. 19.

Chapter 23.—What We are to Understand by the Animal and Spiritual Body; Or of Those Who Die in Adam, And of Those Who are Made Alive in Christ.

For as those bodies of ours, that have a living soul, though not as yet a quickening spirit, are called soul-informed bodies, and yet are not souls but bodies, so also those bodies are called spiritual,—yet God forbid we should therefore suppose them to be spirits and not bodies,—which, being quickened by the Spirit, have the substance, but not the unwieldiness and corruption of flesh.  Man will then be not earthly but heavenly,—not because the body will not be that very body which was made of earth, but because by its heavenly endowment it will be a fit inhabitant of heaven, and this not by losing its nature, but by changing its quality.  The first man, of the earth earthy, was made a living soul, not a quickening spirit,—which rank was reserved for him as the reward of obedience.  And therefore his body, which required meat and drink to satisfy hunger and thirst, and which had no absolute and indestructible immortality, but by means of the tree of life warded off the necessity of dying, and was thus maintained in the flower of youth,—this body, I say, was doubtless not spiritual, but animal; and yet it would not have died but that it provoked God’s threatened vengeance by offending.  And though sustenance was not denied him even outside Paradise, yet, being forbidden the tree of life, he was delivered over to the wasting of time, at least in respect of that life which, had he not sinned, he might have retained perpetually in Paradise, though only in an animal body, till such time as it became spiritual in acknowledgment of his obedience.

Wherefore, although we understand that this manifest death, which consists in the separation of soul and body, was also signified by God when He said, “In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die,”

Gen. ii. 17.

Chapter 1.—That the Disobedience of the First Man Would Have Plunged All Men into the Endless Misery of the Second Death, Had Not the Grace of God Rescued Many.

We have already stated in the preceding books that God, desiring not only that the human race might be able by their similarity of nature to associate with one another, but also that they might be bound together in harmony and peace by the ties of relationship, was pleased to derive all men from one individual, and created man with such a nature that the members of the race should not have died, had not the two first (of whom the one was created out of nothing, and the other out of him) merited this by their disobedience; for by them so great a sin was committed, that by it the human nature was altered for the worse, and was transmitted also to their posterity, liable to sin and subject to death.  And the kingdom of death so reigned over men, that the deserved penalty of sin would have hurled all headlong even into the second death, of which there is no end, had not the undeserved grace of God saved some therefrom.  And thus it has come to pass, that though there are very many and great nations all over the earth, whose rites and customs, speech, arms, and dress, are distinguished by marked differences, yet there are no more than two kinds of human society, which we may justly call two cities, according to the language of our Scriptures.  The one consists of those who wish to live after the flesh, the other of those who wish to live after the spirit; and when they severally achieve what they wish, they live in peace, each after their kind.

Chapter 2.—Of Carnal Life, Which is to Be Understood Not Only of Living in Bodily Indulgence, But Also of Living in the Vices of the Inner Man.

First, we must see what it is to live after the flesh, and what to live after the spirit.  For any one who either does not recollect, or does not sufficiently weigh, the language of sacred Scripture, may, on first hearing what we have said, suppose that the Epicurean philosophers live after the flesh, because they place man’s highest good in bodily pleasure; and that those others do so who have been of opinion that in some form or other bodily good is man’s supreme good; and that the mass of men do so who, without dogmatizing or philosophizing on the subject, are so prone to lust that they cannot delight in any pleasure save such as they receive from bodily sensations:  and he may suppose that the Stoics, who place the supreme good of men in the soul, live after the spirit; for what is man’s soul, if not spirit?  But in the sense of the divine Scripture both are proved to live after the flesh.  For by flesh it means not only the body of a terrestrial and mortal animal, as when it says, “All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, another of birds,”

1 Cor. xv. 39.

Since, then, Scripture uses the word flesh in many ways, which there is not time to collect and investigate, if we are to ascertain what it is to live after the flesh (which is certainly evil, though the nature of flesh is not itself evil), we must carefully examine that passage of the epistle which the Apostle Paul wrote to the Galatians, in which he says, “Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these:  adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like:  of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”

Gal. v. 19–21.

Chapter 3.—That the Sin is Caused Not by the Flesh, But by the Soul, and that the Corruption Contracted from Sin is Not Sin But Sin’s Punishment.

But if any one says that the flesh is the cause of all vices and ill conduct, inasmuch as the soul lives wickedly only because it is moved by the flesh, it is certain he has not carefully considered the whole nature of man.  For “the corruptible body, indeed, weigheth down the soul.”

Wisd. ix. 15.

Chapter 4.—What It is to Live According to Man, and What to Live According to God.

When, therefore, man lives according to man, not according to God, he is like the devil.  Because not even an angel might live according to an angel, but only according to God, if he was to abide in the truth, and speak God’s truth and not his own lie.  And of man, too, the same apostle says in another place, “If the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie;”

Rom. iii. 7.

In enunciating this proposition of ours, then, that because some live according to the flesh and others according to the spirit, there have arisen two diverse and conflicting cities, we might equally well have said, “because some live according to man, others according to God.”  For Paul says very plainly to the Corinthians, “For whereas there is among you envying and strife, are ye not carnal, and walk according to man?”

1 Cor. iii. 3.

Chapter 5.—That the Opinion of the Platonists Regarding the Nature of Body and Soul is Not So Censurable as that of the Manichæans, But that Even It is Objectionable, Because It Ascribes the Origin of Vices to the Nature of The Flesh.

 There is no need, therefore, that in our sins and vices we accuse the nature of the flesh to the injury of the Creator, for in its own kind and degree the flesh is good; but to desert the Creator good, and live according to the created good, is not good, whether a man choose to live according to the flesh, or according to the soul, or according to the whole human nature, which is composed of flesh and soul, and which is therefore spoken of either by the name flesh alone, or by the name soul alone.  For he who extols the nature of the soul as the chief good, and condemns the nature of the flesh as if it were evil, assuredly is fleshly both in his love of the soul and hatred of the flesh; for these his feelings arise from human fancy, not from divine truth.  The Platonists, indeed, are not so foolish as, with the Manichæans, to detest our present bodies as an evil nature;

See Augustin, De Hæres. 46.

“O father! and can thought conceive

That happy souls this realm would leave,

And seek the upper sky,

With sluggish clay to reunite?

This direful longing for the light,

Whence comes it, say, and why?”

Æneid, vi. 719–21.

This direful longing, then, does it still exist even in that boasted purity of the disembodied spirits, and does it still proceed from the death-infected members and earthly limbs?  Does he not assert that, when they begin to long to return to the body, they have already been delivered from all these so-called pestilences of the body?  From which we gather that, were this endlessly alternating purification and defilement of departing and returning souls as true as it is most certainly false, yet it could not be averred that all culpable and vicious motions of the soul originate in the earthly body; for, on their own showing, “this direful longing,” to use the words of their noble exponent, is so extraneous to the body, that it moves the soul that is purged of all bodily taint, and is existing apart from any body whatever, and moves it, moreover, to be embodied again.  So that even they themselves acknowledge that the soul is not only moved to desire, fear, joy, sorrow, by the flesh, but that it can also be agitated with these emotions at its own instance.

Chapter 6.—Of the Character of the Human Will Which Makes the Affections of the Soul Right or Wrong.

But the character of the human will is of moment; because, if it is wrong, these motions of the soul will be wrong, but if it is right, they will be not merely blameless, but even praiseworthy.  For the will is in them all; yea, none of them is anything else than will.  For what are desire and joy but a volition of consent to the things we wish?  And what are fear and sadness but a volition of aversion from the things which we do not wish?  But when consent takes the form of seeking to possess the things we wish, this is called desire; and when consent takes the form of enjoying the things we wish, this is called joy.  In like manner, when we turn with aversion from that which we do not wish to happen, this volition is termed fear; and when we turn away from that which has happened against our will, this act of will is called sorrow.  And generally in respect of all that we seek or shun, as a man’s will is attracted or repelled, so it is changed and turned into these different affections.  Wherefore the man who lives according to God, and not according to man, ought to be a lover of good, and therefore a hater of evil.  And since no one is evil by nature, but whoever is evil is evil by vice, he who lives according to God ought to cherish towards evil men a perfect hatred, so that he shall neither hate the man because of his vice, nor love the vice because of the man, but hate the vice and love the man.  For the vice being cursed, all that ought to be loved, and nothing that ought to be hated, will remain.

Chapter 7.—That the Words Love and Regard (Amor and Dilectio) are in Scripture Used Indifferently of Good and Evil Affection.

He who resolves to love God, and to love his neighbor as himself, not according to man but according to God, is on account of this love said to be of a good will; and this is in Scripture more commonly called charity, but it is also, even in the same books, called love.  For the apostle says that the man to be elected as a ruler of the people must be a lover of good.

Tit. i. 8, according to Greek and Vulgate.

I have judged it right to mention this, because some are of opinion that charity or regard (dilectio) is one thing, love (amor) another.  They say that dilectio is used of a good affection, amor of an evil love.  But it is very certain that even secular literature knows no such distinction.  However, it is for the philosophers to determine whether and how they differ, though their own writings sufficiently testify that they make great account of love (amor) placed on good objects, and even on God Himself.  But we wished to show that the Scriptures of our religion, whose authority we prefer to all writings whatsoever, make no distinction between amor, dilectio, and caritas; and we have already shown that amor is used in a good connection.  And if any one fancy that amor is no doubt used both of good and bad loves, but that dilectio is reserved for the good only, let him remember what the psalm says, “He that loveth (diligit) iniquity hateth his own soul;”

Ps. xi. 5.

Chapter 8.—Of the Three Perturbations, Which the Stoics Admitted in the Soul of the Wise Man to the Exclusion of Grief or Sadness, Which the Manly Mind Ought Not to Experience.

Those emotions which the Greeks call εὐπαθείαι, and which Cicero calls constantiœ, the Stoics would restrict to three; and, instead of three “perturbations” in the soul of the wise man, they substituted severally, in place of desire, will; in place of joy, contentment; and for fear, caution; and as to sickness or pain, which we, to avoid ambiguity, preferred to call sorrow, they denied that it could exist in the mind of a wise man.  Will, they say, seeks the good, for this the wise man does.  Contentment has its object in good that is possessed, and this the wise man continually possesses.  Caution avoids evil, and this the wise man ought to avoid.  But sorrow arises from evil that has already happened; and as they suppose that no evil can happen to the wise man, there can be no representative of sorrow in his mind.  According to them, therefore, none but the wise man wills, is contented, uses caution; and that the fool can do no more than desire, rejoice, fear, be sad.  The former three affections Cicero calls constantiœ, the last four perturbationes.  Many, however, calls these last passions; and, as I have said, the Greeks call the former εὐπαθείαι, and the latter πάθη.  And when I made a careful examination of Scripture to find whether this terminology was sanctioned by it, I came upon this saying of the prophet:  “There is no contentment to the wicked, saith the Lord;”

Isa. lvii. 21.

Yet though we may sometimes avail ourselves of these precise proprieties of language, we are not to be always bridled by them; and when we read those writers against whose authority it is unlawful to reclaim, we must accept the meanings above mentioned in passages where a right sense can be educed by no other interpretation, as in those instances we adduced partly from the prophet, partly from the Gospel.  For who does not know that the wicked exult with joy?  Yet “there is no contentment for the wicked, saith the Lord.” And how so, unless because contentment, when the word is used in its proper and distinctive significance, means something different from joy?  In like manner, who would deny that it were wrong to enjoin upon men that whatever they desire others to do to them they should themselves do to others, lest they should mutually please one another by shameful and illicit pleasure?  And yet the precept, “Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so to them,” is very wholesome and just.  And how is this, unless because the will is in this place used strictly, and signifies that will which cannot have evil for its object?  But ordinary phraseology would not have allowed the saying, “Be unwilling to make any manner of lie,”

Ecclus. vii. 13.

“Hence they fear and desire, grieve and are content”

Æneid, vi. 733.

The same author had also used the expression, “the evil contentments of the mind.”

Æneid, v. 278.

Chapter 9.—Of the Perturbations of the Soul Which Appear as Right Affections in the Life of the Righteous.

But so far as regards this question of mental perturbations, we have answered these philosophers in the ninth book

C. 4, 5.

Chapter 10.—Whether It is to Be Believed that Our First Parents in Paradise, Before They Sinned, Were Free from All Perturbation.

But it is a fair question, whether our first parent or first parents (for there was a marriage of two), before they sinned, experienced in their animal body such emotions as we shall not experience in the spiritual body when sin has been purged and finally abolished.  For if they did, then how were they blessed in that boasted place of bliss, Paradise?  For who that is affected by fear or grief can be called absolutely blessed?  And what could those persons fear or suffer in such affluence of blessings, where neither death nor ill-health was feared, and where nothing was wanting which a good will could desire, and nothing present which could interrupt man’s mental or bodily enjoyment?  Their love to God was unclouded, and their mutual affection was that of faithful and sincere marriage; and from this love flowed a wonderful delight, because they always enjoyed what was loved.  Their avoidance of sin was tranquil; and, so long as it was maintained, no other ill at all could invade them and bring sorrow.  Or did they perhaps desire to touch and eat the forbidden fruit, yet feared to die; and thus both fear and desire already, even in that blissful place, preyed upon those first of mankind?  Away with the thought that such could be the case where there was no sin!  And, indeed, this is already sin, to desire those things which the law of God forbids, and to abstain from them through fear of punishment, not through love of righteousness.  Away, I say, with the thought, that before there was any sin, there should already have been committed regarding that fruit the very sin which our Lord warns us against regarding a woman:  “Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.”

Matt. v. 28.

Chapter 11.—Of the Fall of the First Man, in Whom Nature Was Created Good, and Can Be Restored Only by Its Author.

But because God foresaw all things, and was therefore not ignorant that man also would fall, we ought to consider this holy city in connection with what God foresaw and ordained, and not according to our own ideas, which do not embrace God’s ordination.  For man, by his sin, could not disturb the divine counsel, nor compel God to change what He had decreed; for God’s foreknowledge had anticipated both,—that is to say, both how evil the man whom He had created good should become, and what good He Himself should even thus derive from him.  For though God is said to change His determinations (so that in a tropical sense the Holy Scripture says even that God repented

Gen. vi. 6, and 1 Sam. xv. 11.

Chapter 12.—Of the Nature of Man’s First Sin.

If any one finds a difficulty in understanding why other sins do not alter human nature as it was altered by the transgression of those first human beings, so that on account of it this nature is subject to the great corruption we feel and see, and to death, and is distracted and tossed with so many furious and contending emotions, and is certainly far different from what it was before sin, even though it were then lodged in an animal body,—if, I say, any one is moved by this, he ought not to think that that sin was a small and light one because it was committed about food, and that not bad nor noxious, except because it was forbidden; for in that spot of singular felicity God could not have created and planted any evil thing.  But by the precept He gave, God commended obedience, which is, in a sort, the mother and guardian of all the virtues in the reasonable creature, which was so created that submission is advantageous to it, while the fulfillment of its own will in preference to the Creator’s is destruction.  And as this commandment enjoining abstinence from one kind of food in the midst of great abundance of other kinds was so easy to keep,—so light a burden to the memory,—and, above all, found no resistance to its observance in lust, which only afterwards sprung up as the penal consequence of sin, the iniquity of violating it was all the greater in proportion to the ease with which it might have been kept.

Chapter 13.—That in Adam’s Sin an Evil Will Preceded the Evil Act.

Our first parents fell into open disobedience because already they were secretly corrupted; for the evil act had never been done had not an evil will preceded it.  And what is the origin of our evil will but pride?  For “pride is the beginning of sin.”

Ecclus. x. 13.

Chapter 14.—Of the Pride in the Sin, Which Was Worse Than the Sin Itself.

But it is a worse and more damnable pride which casts about for the shelter of an excuse even in manifest sins, as these our first parents did, of whom the woman said, “The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat;” and the man said, “The woman whom Thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.”

Gen. iii. 12, 13.

Chapter 15.—Of the Justice of the Punishment with Which Our First Parents Were Visited for Their Disobedience.

Therefore, because the sin was a despising of the authority of God,—who had created man; who had made him in His own image; who had set him above the other animals; who had placed him in Paradise; who had enriched him with abundance of every kind and of safety; who had laid upon him neither many, nor great, nor difficult commandments, but, in order to make a wholesome obedience easy to him, had given him a single very brief and very light precept by which He reminded that creature whose service was to be free that He was Lord,—it was just that condemnation followed, and condemnation such that man, who by keeping the commandments should have been spiritual even in his flesh, became fleshly even in his spirit; and as in his pride he had sought to be his own satisfaction, God in His justice abandoned him to himself, not to live in the absolute independence he affected, but instead of the liberty he desired, to live dissatisfied with himself in a hard and miserable bondage to him to whom by sinning he had yielded himself, doomed in spite of himself to die in body as he had willingly become dead in spirit, condemned even to eternal death (had not the grace of God delivered him) because he had forsaken eternal life.  Whoever thinks such punishment either excessive or unjust shows his inability to measure the great iniquity of sinning where sin might so easily have been avoided.  For as Abraham’s obedience is with justice pronounced to be great, because the thing commanded, to kill his son, was very difficult, so in Paradise the disobedience was the greater, because the difficulty of that which was commanded was imperceptible.  And as the obedience of the second Man was the more laudable because He became obedient even “unto death,”

Phil. ii. 8.

In short, to say all in a word, what but disobedience was the punishment of disobedience in that sin?  For what else is man’s misery but his own disobedience to himself, so that in consequence of his not being willing to do what he could do, he now wills to do what he cannot?  For though he could not do all things in Paradise before he sinned, yet he wished to do only what he could do, and therefore he could do all things he wished.  But now, as we recognize in his offspring, and as divine Scripture testifies, “Man is like to vanity.”

Ps. cxliv. 4.

Chapter 16.—Of the Evil of Lust,—A Word Which, Though Applicable to Many Vices, is Specially Appropriated to Sexual Uncleanness.

Although, therefore, lust may have many objects, yet when no object is specified, the word lust usually suggests to the mind the lustful excitement of the organs of generation.  And this lust not only takes possession of the whole body and outward members, but also makes itself felt within, and moves the whole man with a passion in which mental emotion is mingled with bodily appetite, so that the pleasure which results is the greatest of all bodily pleasures.  So possessing indeed is this pleasure, that at the moment of time in which it is consummated, all mental activity is suspended.  What friend of wisdom and holy joys, who, being married, but knowing, as the apostle says, “how to possess his vessel in santification and honor, not in the disease of desire, as the Gentiles who know not God,”

1 Thess. iv. 4.

Chapter 17.—Of the Nakedness of Our First Parents, Which They Saw After Their Base and Shameful Sin.

Justly is shame very specially connected with this lust; justly, too, these members themselves, being moved and restrained not at our will, but by a certain independent autocracy, so to speak, are called “shameful.”  Their condition was different before sin.  For as it is written, “They were naked and were not ashamed,”

Gen. ii. 25.

Chapter 18.—Of the Shame Which Attends All Sexual Intercourse.

Lust requires for its consummation darkness and secrecy; and this not only when un lawful intercourse is desired, but even such fornication as the earthly city has legalized.  Where there is no fear of punishment, these permitted pleasures still shrink from the public eye.  Even where provision is made for this lust, secrecy also is provided; and while lust found it easy to remove the prohibitions of law, shamelessness found it impossible to lay aside the veil of retirement.  For even shameless men call this shameful; and though they love the pleasure, dare not display it.  What! does not even conjugal intercourse, sanctioned as it is by law for the propagation of children, legitimate and honorable though it be, does it not seek retirement from every eye?  Before the bridegroom fondles his bride, does he not exclude the attendants, and even the paranymphs, and such friends as the closest ties have admitted to the bridal chamber?  The greatest master of Roman eloquence says, that all right actions wish to be set in the light, i.e., desire to be known.  This right action, however, has such a desire to be known, that yet it blushes to be seen.  Who does not know what passes between husband and wife that children may be born?  Is it not for this purpose that wives are married with such ceremony?  And yet, when this well-understood act is gone about for the procreation of children, not even the children themselves, who may already have been born to them, are suffered to be witnesses.  This right action seeks the light, in so far as it seeks to be known, but yet dreads being seen.  And why so, if not because that which is by nature fitting and decent is so done as to be accompanied with a shame-begetting penalty of sin?

Chapter 19.—That It is Now Necessary, as It Was Not Before Man Sinned, to Bridle Anger and Lust by the Restraining Influence of Wisdom.

Hence it is that even the philosophers who have approximated to the truth have avowed that anger and lust are vicious mental emotions, because, even when exercised towards objects which wisdom does not prohibit, they are moved in an ungoverned and inordinate manner, and consequently need the regulation of mind and reason.  And they assert that this third part of the mind is posted as it were in a kind of citadel, to give rule to these other parts, so that, while it rules and they serve, man’s righteousness is preserved without a breach.

See Plato’s Republic, book iv.

Chapter 20.—Of the Foolish Beastliness of the Cynics.

It is this which those canine or cynic

The one word being the Latin form, the other the Greek, of the same adjective.

Chapter 21.—That Man’s Transgression Did Not Annul the Blessing of Fecundity Pronounced Upon Man Before He Sinned But Infected It with the Disease of Lust.

Far be it, then, from us to suppose that our first parents in Paradise felt that lust which caused them afterwards to blush and hide their nakedness, or that by its means they should have fulfilled the benediction of God, “Increase and multiply and replenish the earth;”

Gen. i. 28.

Chapter 22.—Of the Conjugal Union as It Was Originally Instituted and Blessed by God.

But we, for our part, have no manner of doubt that to increase and multiply and replenish the earth in virtue of the blessing of God, is a gift of marriage as God instituted it from the beginning before man sinned, when He created them male and female,—in other words, two sexes manifestly distinct.  And it was this work of God on which His blessing was pronounced.  For no sooner had Scripture said, “Male and female created He them,”

Gen. i. 27, 28.

Chapter 23.—Whether Generation Should Have Taken Place Even in Paradise Had Man Not Sinned, or Whether There Should Have Been Any Contention There Between Chastity and Lust.

But he who says that there should have been neither copulation nor generation but for sin, virtually says that man’s sin was necessary to complete the number of the saints.  For if these two by not sinning should have continued to live alone, because, as is supposed, they could not have begotten children had they not sinned, then certainly sin was necessary in order that there might be not only two but many righteous men.  And if this cannot be maintained without absurdity, we must rather believe that the number of the saints fit to complete this most blessed city would have been as great though no one had sinned, as it is now that the grace of God gathers its citizens out of the multitude of sinners, so long as the children of this world generate and are generated.

Luke xx. 34.

And therefore that marriage, worthy of the happiness of Paradise, should have had desirable fruit without the shame of lust, had there been no sin.  But how that could be, there is now no example to teach us.  Nevertheless, it ought not to seem incredible that one member might serve the will without lust then, since so many serve it now.  Do we now move our feet and hands when we will to do the things we would by means of these members? do we meet with no resistance in them, but perceive that they are ready servants of the will, both in our own case and in that of others, and especially of artisans employed in mechanical operations, by which the weakness and clumsiness of nature become, through industrious exercise, wonderfully dexterous? and shall we not believe that, like as all those members obediently serve the will, so also should the members have discharged the function of generation, though lust, the award of disobedience, had been awanting?  Did not Cicero, in discussing the difference of governments in his De Republica, adopt a simile from human nature, and say that we command our bodily members as children, they are so obedient; but that the vicious parts of the soul must be treated as slaves, and be coerced with a more stringent authority?  And no doubt, in the order of nature, the soul is more excellent than the body; and yet the soul commands the body more easily than itself.  Nevertheless this lust, of which we at present speak, is the more shameful on this account, because the soul is therein neither master of itself, so as not to lust at all, nor of the body, so as to keep the members under the control of the will; for if they were thus ruled, there should be no shame.  But now the soul is ashamed that the body, which by nature is inferior and subject to it, should resist its authority.  For in the resistance experienced by the soul in the other emotions there is less shame, because the resistance is from itself, and thus, when it is conquered by itself, itself is the conqueror, although the conquest is inordinate and vicious, because accomplished by those parts of the soul which ought to be subject to reason, yet, being accomplished by its own parts and energies, the conquest is, as I say, its own.  For when the soul conquers itself to a due subordination, so that its unreasonable motions are controlled by reason, while it again is subject to God, this is a conquest virtuous and praiseworthy.  Yet there is less shame when the soul is resisted by its own vicious parts than when its will and order are resisted by the body, which is distinct from and inferior to it, and dependent on it for life itself.

But so long as the will retains under its authority the other members, without which the members excited by lust to resist the will cannot accomplish what they seek, chastity is preserved, and the delight of sin foregone.  And certainly, had not culpable disobedience been visited with penal disobedience, the marriage of Paradise should have been ignorant of this struggle and rebellion, this quarrel between will and lust, that the will may be satisfied and lust restrained, but those members, like all the rest, should have obeyed the will.  The field of generation

See Virgil, Georg. iii. 136.

Chapter 24.—That If Men Had Remained Innocent and Obedient in Paradise, the Generative Organs Should Have Been in Subjection to the Will as the Other Members are.

The man, then, would have sown the seed, and the woman received it, as need required, the generative organs being moved by the will, not excited by lust.  For we move at will not only those members which are furnished with joints of solid bone, as the hands, feet, and fingers, but we move also at will those which are composed of slack and soft nerves:  we can put them in motion, or stretch them out, or bend and twist them, or contract and stiffen them, as we do with the muscles of the mouth and face.  The lungs, which are the very tenderest of the viscera except the brain, and are therefore carefully sheltered in the cavity of the chest, yet for all purposes of inhaling and exhaling the breath, and of uttering and modulating the voice, are obedient to the will when we breathe, exhale, speak, shout, or sing, just as the bellows obey the smith or the organist.  I will not press the fact that some animals have a natural power to move a single spot of the skin with which their whole body is covered, if they have felt on it anything they wish to drive off,—a power so great, that by this shivering tremor of the skin they can not only shake off flies that have settled on them, but even spears that have fixed in their flesh.  Man, it is true, has not this power; but is this any reason for supposing that God could not give it to such creatures as He wished to possess it?  And therefore man himself also might very well have enjoyed absolute power over his members had he not forfeited it by his disobedience; for it was not difficult for God to form him so that what is now moved in his body only by lust should have been moved only at will.

We know, too, that some men are differently constituted from others, and have some rare and remarkable faculty of doing with their body what other men can by no effort do, and, indeed, scarcely believe when they hear of others doing.  There are persons who can move their ears, either one at a time, or both together.  There are some who, without moving the head, can bring the hair down upon the forehead, and move the whole scalp backwards and forwards at pleasure.  Some, by lightly pressing their stomach, bring up an incredible quantity and variety of things they have swallowed, and produce whatever they please, quite whole, as if out of a bag.  Some so accurately mimic the voices of birds and beasts and other men, that, unless they are seen, the difference cannot be told.  Some have such command of their bowels, that they can break wind continuously at pleasure, so as to produce the effect of singing.  I myself have known a man who was accustomed to sweat whenever he wished.  It is well known that some weep when they please, and shed a flood of tears.  But far more incredible is that which some of our brethren saw quite recently.  There was a presbyter called Restitutus, in the parish of the Calamensian

The position of Calama is described by Augustin as between Constantine and Hippo, but nearer Hippo.—Contra I.it. Petil. ii. 228.  A full description of it is given in Poujoulat’s Histoire de S. Augustin, i. 340, who says it was one of the most important towns of Numidia, eighteen leagues south of Hippo, and represented by the modern Ghelma.  It is to its bishop, Possidius, we owe the contemporary Life of Augustin.

Chapter 25.—Of True Blessedness, Which This Present Life Cannot Enjoy.

However, if we look at this a little more closely, we see that no one lives as he wishes but the blessed, and that no one is blessed but the righteous.  But even the righteous himself does not live as he wishes, until he has arrived where he cannot die, be deceived, or injured, and until he is assured that this shall be his eternal condition.  For this nature demands; and nature is not fully and perfectly blessed till it attains what it seeks.  But what man is at present able to live as he wishes, when it is not in his power so much as to live?  He wishes to live, he is compelled to die.  How, then, does he live as he wishes who does not live as long as he wishes? or if he wishes to die, how can he live as he wishes, since he does not wish even to live?  Or if he wishes to die, not because he dislikes life, but that after death he may live better, still he is not yet living as he wishes, but only has the prospect of so living when, through death, he reaches that which he wishes.  But admit that he lives as he wishes, because he has done violence to himself, and forced himself not to wish what he cannot obtain, and to wish only what he can (as Terence has it, “Since you cannot do what you will, will what you can”

Andr. ii. 1, 5.

Chapter 26.—That We are to Believe that in Paradise Our First Parents Begat Offspring Without Blushing.

In Paradise, then, man lived as he desired so long as he desired what God had commanded.  He lived in the enjoyment of God, and was good by God’s goodness; he lived without any want, and had it in his power so to live eternally.  He had food that he might not hunger, drink that he might not thirst, the tree of life that old age might not waste him.  There was in his body no corruption, nor seed of corruption, which could produce in him any unpleasant sensation.  He feared no inward disease, no outward accident.  Soundest health blessed his body, absolute tranquillity his soul.  As in Paradise there was no excessive heat or cold, so its inhabitants were exempt from the vicissitudes of fear and desire.  No sadness of any kind was there, nor any foolish joy; true gladness ceaselessly flowed from the presence of God, who was loved “out of a pure heart, and a good conscience, and faith unfeigned.”

1 Tim. i. 5.

Chapter 27.—Of the Angels and Men Who Sinned, and that Their Wickedness Did Not Disturb the Order of God’s Providence.

The sins of men and angels do nothing to impede the “great works of the Lord which accomplish His will.”

Ps. cxi. 2.

Chapter 28.—Of the Nature of the Two Cities, the Earthly and the Heavenly.

Accordingly, two cities have been formed by two loves: the earthly by the love of self, even to the contempt of God; the heavenly by the love of God, even to the contempt of self.  The former, in a word, glories in itself, the latter in the Lord.  For the one seeks glory from men; but the greatest glory of the other is God, the witness of conscience.  The one lifts up its head in its own glory; the other says to its God, “Thou art my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.”

Ps. iii. 3.

Chapter 1.—Of the Two Lines of the Human Race Which from First to Last Divide It.

Of the bliss of Paradise, of Paradise itself, and of the life of our first parents there, and of their sin and punishment, many have thought much, spoken much, written much.  We ourselves, too, have spoken of these things in the foregoing books, and have written either what we read in the Holy Scriptures, or what we could reasonably deduce from them.  And were we to enter into a more detailed investigation of these matters, an endless number of endless questions would arise, which would involve us in a larger work than the present occasion admits.  We cannot be expected to find room for replying to every question that may be started by unoccupied and captious men, who are ever more ready to ask questions than capable of understanding the answer.  Yet I trust we have already done justice to these great and difficult questions regarding the beginning of the world, or of the soul, or of the human race itself.  This race we have distributed into two parts, the one consisting of those who live according to man, the other of those who live according to God.  And these we also mystically call the two cities, or the two communities of men, of which the one is predestined to reign eternally with God, and the other to suffer eternal punishment with the devil.  This, however, is their end, and of it we are to speak afterwards.  At present, as we have said enough about their origin, whether among the angels, whose numbers we know not, or in the two first human beings, it seems suitable to attempt an account of their career, from the time when our two first parents began to propagate the race until all human generation shall cease.  For this whole time or world-age, in which the dying give place and those who are born succeed, is the career of these two cities concerning which we treat.

Of these two first parents of the human race, then, Cain was the first-born, and he belonged to the city of men; after him was born Abel, who belonged to the city of God.  For as in the individual the truth of the apostle’s statement is discerned, “that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural, and afterward that which is spiritual,”

1 Cor. xv. 46.

Chapter 2.—Of the Children of the Flesh and the Children of the Promise.

There was indeed on earth, so long as it was needed, a symbol and foreshadowing image of this city, which served the purpose of reminding men that such a city was to be rather than of making it present; and this image was itself called the holy city, as a symbol of the future city, though not itself the reality.  Of this city which served as an image, and of that free city it typified, Paul writes to the Galatians in these terms:  “Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?  For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bond maid, the other by a free woman.  But he who was of the bond woman was born after the flesh, but he of the free woman was by promise.  Which things are an allegory:

Comp. De Trin. xv. c. 15.

Chapter 3.—That Sarah’s Barrenness was Made Productive by God’s Grace.

Sarah, in fact, was barren; and, despairing of offspring, and being resolved that she would have at least through her handmaid that blessing she saw she could not in her own person procure, she gave her handmaid to her husband, to whom she herself had been unable to bear children.  From him she required this conjugal duty, exercising her own right in another’s womb.  And thus Ishmael was born according to the common law of human generation, by sexual intercourse.  Therefore it is said that he was born “according to the flesh,”—not because such births are not the gifts of God, nor His handiwork, whose creative wisdom “reaches,” as it is written, “from one end to another mightily, and sweetly doth she order all things,”

Wisdom viii. 1.

Chapter 4.—Of the Conflict and Peace of the Earthly City.

But the earthly city, which shall not be everlasting (for it will no longer be a city when it has been committed to the extreme penalty), has its good in this world, and rejoices in it with such joy as such things can afford.  But as this is not a good which can discharge its devotees of all distresses, this city is often divided against itself by litigations, wars, quarrels, and such victories as are either life-destroying or short-lived.  For each part of it that arms against another part of it seeks to triumph over the nations through itself in bondage to vice.  If, when it has conquered, it is inflated with pride, its victory is life-destroying; but if it turns its thoughts upon the common casualties of our mortal condition, and is rather anxious concerning the disasters that may befall it than elated with the successes already achieved, this victory, though of a higher kind, is still only short-lived; for it cannot abidingly rule over those whom it has victoriously subjugated.  But the things which this city desires cannot justly be said to be evil, for it is itself, in its own kind, better than all other human good.  For it desires earthly peace for the sake of enjoying earthly goods, and it makes war in order to attain to this peace; since, if it has conquered, and there remains no one to resist it, it enjoys a peace which it had not while there were opposing parties who contested for the enjoyment of those things which were too small to satisfy both.  This peace is purchased by toilsome wars; it is obtained by what they style a glorious victory.  Now, when victory remains with the party which had the juster cause, who hesitates to congratulate the victor, and style it a desirable peace?  These things, then, are good things, and without doubt the gifts of God.  But if they neglect the better things of the heavenly city, which are secured by eternal victory and peace never-ending, and so inordinately covet these present good things that they believe them to be the only desirable things, or love them better than those things which are believed to be better,—if this be so, then it is necessary that misery follow and ever increase.

Chapter 5.—Of the Fratricidal Act of the Founder of the Earthly City, and the Corresponding Crime of the Founder of Rome.

Thus the founder of the earthly city was a fratricide.  Overcome with envy, he slew his own brother, a citizen of the eternal city, and a sojourner on earth.  So that we cannot be surprised that this first specimen, or, as the Greeks say, archetype of crime, should, long afterwards, find a corresponding crime at the foundation of that city which was destined to reign over so many nations, and be the head of this earthly city of which we speak.  For of that city also, as one of their poets has mentioned, “the first walls were stained with a brother’s blood,”

Lucan, Phar. i. 95.

Chapter 6.—Of the Weaknesses Which Even the Citizens of the City of God Suffer During This Earthly Pilgrimage in Punishment of Sin, and of Which They are Healed by God’s Care.

This sickliness—that is to say, that disobedience of which we spoke in the fourteenth book—is the punishment of the first disobedience.  It is therefore not nature, but vice; and therefore it is said to the good who are growing in grace, and living in this pilgrimage by faith, “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”

Gal. vi. 2.

Chapter 7.—Of the Cause of Cain’s Crime and His Obstinacy, Which Not Even the Word of God Could Subdue.

But though God made use of this very mode of address which we have been endeavoring to explain, and spoke to Cain in that form by which He was wont to accommodate Himself to our first parents and converse with them as a companion, what good influence had it on Cain?  Did he not fulfill his wicked intention of killing his brother even after he was warned by God’s voice?  For when God had made a distinction between their sacrifices, neglecting Cain’s, regarding Abel’s, which was doubtless intimated by some visible sign to that effect; and when God had done so because the works of the one were evil but those of his brother good, Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.  For thus it is written:  “And the Lord said unto Cain, Why are thou wroth, and why is thy countenance fallen?  If thou offerest rightly, but dost not rightly distinguish, hast thou not sinned?  Fret not thyself, for unto thee shall be his turning, and thou shalt rule over him.”

Gen. iv. 6, 7.

Yet He does not dismiss him without counsel, holy, just, and good.  “Fret not thyself,” He says, “for unto thee shall be his turning, and thou shall rule over him.”  Over his brother, does He mean?  Most certainly not.  Over what, then, but sin?  For He had said, “Thou hast sinned,” and then He added, “Fret not thyself, for to thee shall be its turning, and thou shall rule over it.”

We alter the pronoun to suit Augustin’s interpretation.

Chapter 8.—What Cain’s Reason Was for Building a City So Early in the History of the Human Race.

At present it is the history which I aim at defending, that Scripture may not be reckoned incredible when it relates that one man built a city at a time in which there seem to have been but four men upon earth, or rather indeed but three, after one brother slew the other,—to wit, the first man the father of all, and Cain himself, and his son Enoch, by whose name the city was itself called.  But they who are moved by this consideration forget to take into account that the writer of the sacred history does not necessarily mention all the men who might be alive at that time, but those only whom the scope of his work required him to name.  The design of that writer (who in this matter was the instrument of the Holy Ghost) was to descend to Abraham through the successions of ascertained generations propagated from one man, and then to pass from Abraham’s seed to the people of God, in whom, separated as they were from other nations, was prefigured and predicted all that relates to the city whose reign is eternal, and to its king and founder Christ, which things were foreseen in the Spirit as destined to come; yet neither is this object so effected as that nothing is said of the other society of men which we call the earthly city, but mention is made of it so far as seemed needful to enhance the glory of the heavenly city by contrast to its opposite.  Accordingly, when the divine Scripture, in mentioning the number of years which those men lived, concludes its account of each man of whom it speaks, with the words, “And he begat sons and daughters, and all his days were so and so, and he died,” are we to understand that, because it does not name those sons and daughters, therefore, during that long term of years over which one lifetime extended in those early days, there might not have been born very many men, by whose united numbers not one but several cities might have been built?  But it suited the purpose of God, by whose inspiration these histories were composed, to arrange and distinguish from the first these two societies in their several generations,—that on the one side the generations of men, that is to say, of those who live according to man, and on the other side the generations of the sons of God, that is to say, of men living according to God, might be traced down together and yet apart from one another as far as the deluge, at which point their dissociation and association are exhibited:  their dissociation, inasmuch as the generations of both lines are recorded in separate tables, the one line descending from the fratricide Cain, the other from Seth, who had been born to Adam instead of him whom his brother slew; their association, inasmuch as the good so deteriorated that the whole race became of such a character that it was swept away by the deluge, with the exception of one just man, whose name was Noah, and his wife and three sons and three daughters-in-law, which eight persons were alone deemed worthy to escape from that desolating visitation which destroyed all men.

Therefore, although it is written, “And Cain knew his wife, and she conceived and bare Enoch, and he builded a city and called the name of the city after the name of his son Enoch,”

Gen. iv. 17.

Chapter 10.—Of the Different Computation of the Ages of the Antediluvians, Given by the Hebrew Manuscripts and by Our Own.

Our own Mss., of which Augustin here speaks, were the Latin versions of the Septuagint used by the Church before Jerome’s was received; the “Hebrew Mss.” were the versions made from the Hebrew text.  Compare De Doct. Christ. ii. 15 et seqq.

Wherefore, although there is a discrepancy for which I cannot account between our manuscripts and the Hebrew, in the very number of years assigned to the antediluvians, yet the discrepancy is not so great that they do not agree about their longevity.  For the very first man, Adam, before he begot his son Seth, is in our manuscripts found to have lived 230 years, but in the Hebrew mss. 130.  But after he begot Seth, our copies read that he lived 700 years, while the Hebrew give 800.  And thus, when the two periods are taken together, the sum agrees.  And so throughout the succeeding generations, the period before the father begets a son is always made shorter by 100 years in the Hebrew, but the period after his son is begotten is longer by 100 years in the Hebrew than in our copies.  And thus, taking the two periods together, the result is the same in both.  And in the sixth generation there is no discrepancy at all.  In the seventh, however, of which Enoch is the representative, who is recorded to have been translated without death because he pleased God, there is the same discrepancy as in the first five generations, 100 years more being ascribed to him by our mss. before he begat a son.  But still the result agrees; for according to both documents he lived before he was translated 365 years.  In the eighth generation the discrepancy is less than in the others, and of a different kind.  For Methuselah, whom Enoch begat, lived, before he begat his successor, not 100 years less, but 100 years more, according to the Hebrew reading; and in our mss. again these years are added to the period after he begat his son; so that in this case also the sum-total is the same.  And it is only in the ninth generation, that is, in the age of Lamech, Methuselah’s son and Noah’s father, that there is a discrepancy in the sum total; and even in this case it is slight.  For the Hebrew mss. represent him as living twenty-four years more than ours assign to him.  For before he begat his son, who was called Noah, six years fewer are given to him by the Hebrew mss. than by ours; but after he begat this son, they give him thirty years more than ours; so that, deducting the former six, there remains, as we said, a surplus of twenty-four.

Chapter 11.—Of Methuselah’s Age, Which Seems to Extend Fourteen Years Beyond the Deluge.

From this discrepancy between the Hebrew books and our own arises the well-known question as to the age of Methuselah;

Jerome (De Quæst. Heb. in Gen.) says it was a question famous in all the churches—Vives.

Chapter 12.—Of the Opinion of Those Who Do Not Believe that in These Primitive Times Men Lived So Long as is Stated.

For they are by no means to be listened to who suppose that in those times years were differently reckoned, and were so short that one of our years may be supposed to be equal to ten of theirs.  So that they say, when we read or hear that some man lived 900 years, we should understand ninety, ten of those years making but one of ours, and ten of ours equalling 100 of theirs.  Consequently, as they suppose, Adam was twenty-three years of age when he begat Seth, and Seth himself was twenty years and six months old when his son Enos was born, though the Scripture calls these months 205 years.  For, on the hypothesis of those whose opinion we are explaining, it was customary to divide one such year as we have into ten parts, and to call each part a year.  And each of these parts was composed of six days squared; because God finished His works in six days, that He might rest the seventh.  Of this I disputed according to my ability in the eleventh book.

C. 8.

Chapter 13.—Whether, in Computing Years, We Ought to Follow the Hebrew or the Septuagint.

But if I say this, I shall presently be answered, It is one of the Jews’ lies.  This, however, we have disposed of above, showing that it cannot be that men of so just a reputation as the seventy translators should have falsified their version.  However, if I ask them which of the two is more credible, that the Jewish nation, scattered far and wide, could have unanimously conspired to forge this lie, and so, through envying others the authority of their Scriptures, have deprived themselves of their verity; or that seventy men, who were also themselves Jews, shut up in one place (for Ptolemy king of Egypt had got them together for this work), should have envied foreign nations that same truth, and by common consent inserted these errors:  who does not see which can be more naturally and readily believed?  But far be it from any prudent man to believe either that the Jews, however malicious and wrong-headed, could have tampered with so many and so widely-dispersed manuscripts; or that those renowned seventy individuals had any common purpose to grudge the truth to the nations.  One must therefore more plausibly maintain, that when first their labors began to be transcribed from the copy in Ptolemy’s library, some such misstatement might find its way into the first copy made, and from it might be disseminated far and wide; and that this might arise from no fraud, but from a mere copyist’s error.  This is a sufficiently plausible account of the difficulty regarding Methuselah’s life, and of that other case in which there is a difference in the total of twenty-four years.  But in those cases in which there is a methodical resemblance in the falsification, so that uniformly the one version allots to the period before a son and successor is born 100 years more than the other, and to the period subsequent 100 years less, and vice versâ, so that the totals may agree,—and this holds true of the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and seventh generations,—in these cases error seems to have, if we may say so, a certain kind of constancy, and savors not of accident, but of design.

Accordingly, that diversity of numbers which distinguishes the Hebrew from the Greek and Latin copies of Scripture, and which consists of a uniform addition and deduction of 100 years in each lifetime for several consecutive generations, is to be attributed neither to the malice of the Jews nor to men so diligent and prudent as the seventy translators, but to the error of the copyist who was first allowed to transcribe the manuscript from the library of the above-mentioned king.  For even now, in cases where numbers contribute nothing to the easier comprehension or more satisfactory knowledge of anything, they are both carelessly transcribed, and still more carelessly emended.  For who will trouble himself to learn how many thousand men the several tribes of Israel contained?  He sees no resulting benefit of such knowledge.  Or how many men are there who are aware of the vast advantage that lies hid in this knowledge?  But in this case, in which during so many consecutive generations 100 years are added in one manuscript where they are not reckoned in the other, and then, after the birth of the son and successor, the years which were wanting are added, it is obvious that the copyist who contrived this arrangement designed to insinuate that the antediluvians lived an excessive number of years only because each year was excessively brief, and that he tried to draw the attention to this fact by his statement of their age of puberty at which they became able to beget children.  For, lest the incredulous might stumble at the difficulty of so long a lifetime, he insinuated that 100 of their years equalled but ten of ours; and this insinuation he conveyed by adding 100 years whenever he found the age below 160 years or thereabouts, deducting these years again from the period after the son’s birth, that the total might harmonize.  By this means he intended to ascribe the generation of offspring to a fit age, without diminishing the total sum of years ascribed to the lifetime of the individuals.  And the very fact that in the sixth generation he departed from this uniform practice, inclines us all the rather to believe that when the circumstance we have referred to required his alterations, he made them; seeing that when this circumstance did not exist, he made no alteration.  For in the same generation he found in the Hebrew ms., that Jared lived before he begat Enoch 162 years, which, according to the short year computation, is sixteen years and somewhat less than two months, an age capable of procreation; and therefore it was not necessary to add 100 short years, and so make the age twenty-six years of the usual length; and of course it was not necessary to deduct, after the son’s birth, years which he had not added before it.  And thus it comes to pass that in this instance there is no variation between the two manuscripts.

This is corroborated still further by the fact that in the eighth generation, while the Hebrew books assign 182

One hundred and eighty-seven is the number given in the Hebrew, and one hundred and sixty-seven in the Septuagint; but notwithstanding the confusion, the argument of Augustin is easily followed.

Chapter 14.—That the Years in Those Ancient Times Were of the Same Length as Our Own.

Let us now see how it can be plainly made out that in the enormously protracted lives of those men the years were not so short that ten of their years were equal to only one of ours, but were of as great length as our own, which are measured by the course of the sun.  It is proved by this, that Scripture states that the flood occurred in the six hundredth year of Noah’s life.  But why in the same place is it also written, “The waters of the flood were upon the earth in the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the twenty-seventh day of the month,”

Gen. vii. 10, 11, (in our version the seventeenth day).

But that discrepancy of numbers which is found to exist between our own and the Hebrew text does not touch the longevity of the ancients; and if there is any diversity so great that both versions cannot be true, we must take our ideas of the real facts from that text out of which our own version has been translated.  However, though any one who pleases has it in his power to correct this version, yet it is not unimportant to observe that no one has presumed to emend the Septuagint from the Hebrew text in the many places where they seem to disagree.  For this difference has not been reckoned a falsification; and for my own part I am persuaded it ought not to be reckoned so.  But where the difference is not a mere copyist’s error, and where the sense is agreeable to truth and illustrative of truth, we must believe that the divine Spirit prompted them to give a varying version, not in their function of translators, but in the liberty of prophesying.  And therefore we find that the apostles justly sanction the Septuagint, by quoting it as well as the Hebrew when they adduce proofs from the Scriptures.  But as I have promised to treat this subject more carefully, if God help me, in a more fitting place, I will now go on with the matter in hand.  For there can be no doubt that, the lives of men being so long, the first-born of the first man could have built a city,—a city, however, which was earthly, and not that which is called the city of God, to describe which we have taken in hand this great work.

Chapter 16.—Of Marriage Between Blood-Relations, in Regard to Which the Present Law Could Not Bind the Men of the Earliest Ages.

As, therefore, the human race, subsequently to the first marriage of the man who was made of dust, and his wife who was made out of his side, required the union of males and females in order that it might multiply, and as there were no human beings except those who had been born of these two, men took their sisters for wives,—an act which was as certainly dictated by necessity in these ancient days as afterwards it was condemned by the prohibitions of religion.  For it is very reasonable and just that men, among whom concord is honorable and useful, should be bound together by various relationships; and one man should not himself sustain many relationships, but that the various relationships should be distributed among several, and should thus serve to bind together the greatest number in the same social interests.  “Father” and “father-in-law” are the names of two relationships.  When, therefore, a man has one person for his father, another for his father-in-law, friendship extends itself to a larger number.  But Adam in his single person was obliged to hold both relations to his sons and daughters, for brothers and sisters were united in marriage.  So too Eve his wife was both mother and mother-in-law to her children of both sexes; while, had there been two women, one the mother, the other the mother-in-law, the family affection would have had a wider field.  Then the sister herself by becoming a wife sustained in her single person two relationships, which, had they been distributed among individuals, one being sister, and another being wife, the family tie would have embraced a greater number of persons.  But there was then no material for effecting this, since there were no human beings but the brothers and sisters born of those two first parents.  Therefore, when an abundant population made it possible, men ought to choose for wives women who were not already their sisters; for not only would there then be no necessity for marrying sisters, but, were it done, it would be most abominable.  For if the grandchildren of the first pair, being now able to choose their cousins for wives, married their sisters, then it would no longer be only two but three relationships that were held by one man, while each of these relationships ought to have been held by a separate individual, so as to bind together by family affection a larger number.  For one man would in that case be both father, and father-in-law, and uncle

His own children being the children of his sister, and therefore his nephews.

And we see that, since the human race has increased and multiplied, this is so strictly observed even among the profane worshippers of many and false gods, that though their laws perversely allow a brother to marry his sister,

This was allowed by the Egyptians and Athenians, never by the Romans.

Chapter 17.—Of the Two Fathers and Leaders Who Sprang from One Progenitor.

Since, then, Adam was the father of both lines,—the father, that is to say, both of the line which belonged to the earthly, and of that which belonged to the heavenly city,—when Abel was slain, and by his death exhibited a marvellous mystery, there were henceforth two lines proceeding from two fathers, Cain and Seth, and in those sons of theirs, whom it behoved to register, the tokens of these two cities began to appear more distinctly.  For Cain begat Enoch, in whose name he built a city, an earthly one, which was not from home in this world, but rested satisfied with its temporal peace and happiness.  Cain, too, means “possession;” wherefore at his birth either his father or mother said,” I have gotten a man through God.”  Then Enoch means “dedication;” for the earthly city is dedicated in this world in which it is built, for in this world it finds the end towards which it aims and aspires.  Further, Seth signifies “resurrection,” and Enos his son signifies “man,” not as Adam, which also signifies man, but is used in Hebrew indifferently for man and woman, as it is written, “Male and female created He them, and blessed them, and called their name Adam,”

Gen. v. 2.

Chapter 18.—The Significance of Abel, Seth, and Enos to Christ and His Body the Church.

“And to Seth,” it is said, “there was born a son, and he called his name Enos:  he hoped to call on the name of the Lord God.”

Gen. iv. 26.

Chapter 19.—The Significance Of Enoch’s Translation.

For that line also of which Seth is the father has the name “Dedication” in the seventh generation from Adam, counting Adam.  For the seventh from him is Enoch, that is, Dedication.  But this is that man who was translated because he pleased God, and who held in the order of the generations a remarkable place, being the seventh from Adam, a number signalized by the consecration of the Sabbath.  But, counting from the diverging point of the two lines, or from Seth, he was the sixth.  Now it was on the sixth day God made man, and consummated His works.  But the translation of Enoch prefigured our deferred dedication; for though it is indeed already accomplished in Christ our Head, who so rose again that He shall die no more, and who was Himself also translated, yet there remains another dedication of the whole house, of which Christ Himself is the foundation, and this dedication is deferred till the end, when all shall rise again to die no more.  And whether it is the house of God, or the temple of God, or the city of God, that is said to be dedicated, it is all the same, and equally in accordance with the usage of the Latin language.  For Virgil himself calls the city of widest empire “the house of Assaracus,”

Æneid, i. 288.

Chapter 20.—How It is that Cain’s Line Terminates in the Eighth Generation, While Noah, Though Descended from the Same Father, Adam, is Found to Be the Tenth from Him.

Some one will say, If the writer of this history intended, in enumerating the generations from Adam through his son Seth, to descend through them to Noah, in whose time the deluge occurred, and from him again to trace the connected generations down to Abraham, with whom Matthew begins the pedigree of Christ the eternal King of the city of God, what did he intend by enumerating the generations from Cain, and to what terminus did he mean to trace them?  We reply, To the deluge, by which the whole stock of the earthly city was destroyed, but repaired by the sons of Noah.  For the earthly city and community of men who live after the flesh will never fail until the end of this world, of which our Lord says, “The children of this world generate, and are generated.”

Luke xx. 34.

Why, then, is so small a number of Cain’s generations registered, if it was proper to trace them to the deluge, and if there was no such delay of the date of puberty as to preclude the hope of offspring for a hundred or more years?  For if the author of this book had not in view some one to whom he might rigidly trace the series of generations, as he designed in those which sprang from Seth’s seed to descend to Noah, and thence to start again by a rigid order, what need was there of omitting the first-born sons for the sake of descending to Lamech, in whose sons that line terminates,—that is to say, in the eighth generation from Adam, or the seventh from Cain,—as if from this point he had wished to pass on to another series, by which he might reach either the Israelitish people, among whom the earthly Jerusalem presented a prophetic figure of the heavenly city, or to Jesus Christ, “according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed for ever,”

Rom. ix. 5.

Chapter 21.—Why It is That, as Soon as Cain’s Son Enoch Has Been Named, the Genealogy is Forthwith Continued as Far as the Deluge, While After the Mention of Enos, Seth’s Son, the Narrative Returns Again to the Creation of Man.

We must first see why, in the enumeration of Cain’s posterity, after Enoch, in whose name the city was built, has been first of all mentioned, the rest are at once enumerated down to that terminus of which I have spoken, and at which that race and the whole line was destroyed in the deluge; while, after Enos the son of Seth, has been mentioned, the rest are not at once named down to the deluge, but a clause is inserted to the following effect:  “This is the book of the generations of Adam.  In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made He him; male and female created He them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.”

Gen. v. 1.

Chapter 22.—Of the Fall of the Sons of God Who Were Captivated by the Daughters of Men, Whereby All, with the Exception of Eight Persons, Deservedly Perished in the Deluge.

When the human race, in the exercise of this freedom of will, increased and advanced, there arose a mixture and confusion of the two cities by their participation in a common iniquity.  And this calamity, as well as the first, was occasioned by woman, though not in the same way; for these women were not themselves betrayed, neither did they persuade the men to sin, but having belonged to the earthly city and society of the earthly, they had been of corrupt manners from the first, and were loved for their bodily beauty by the sons of God, or the citizens of the other city which sojourns in this world.  Beauty is indeed a good gift of God; but that the good may not think it a great good, God dispenses it even to the wicked.  And thus, when the good that is great and proper to the good was abandoned by the sons of God, they fell to a paltry good which is not peculiar to the good, but common to the good and the evil; and when they were captivated by the daughters of men, they adopted the manners of the earthly to win them as their brides, and forsook the godly ways they had followed in their own holy society.  And thus beauty, which is indeed God’s handiwork, but only a temporal, carnal, and lower kind of good, is not fitly loved in preference to God, the eternal, spiritual, and unchangeable good.  When the miser prefers his gold to justice, it is through no fault of the gold, but of the man; and so with every created thing.  For though it be good, it may be loved with an evil as well as with a good love:  it is loved rightly when it is loved ordinately; evilly, when inordinately.  It is this which some one has briefly said in these verses in praise of the Creator:

Or, according to another reading, “Which I briefly said in these verses in praise of a taper.”

But if the Creator is truly loved, that is, if He Himself is loved and not another thing in His stead, He cannot be evilly loved; for love itself is to be ordinately loved, because we do well to love that which, when we love it, makes us live well and virtuously.  So that it seems to me that it is a brief but true definition of virtue to say, it is the order of love; and on this account, in the Canticles, the bride of Christ, the city of God, sings, “Order love within me.”

Cant. ii. 4.

Chapter 23.—Whether We are to Believe that Angels, Who are of a Spiritual Substance, Fell in Love with the Beauty of Women, and Sought Them in Marriage, and that from This Connection Giants Were Born.

In the third book of this work (c. 5) we made a passing reference to this question, but did not decide whether angels, inasmuch as they are spirits, could have bodily intercourse with women.  For it is written, “Who maketh His angels spirits,”

Ps. civ. 4.

Chapter 24.—How We are to Understand This Which the Lord Said to Those Who Were to Perish in the Flood:  “Their Days Shall Be 120 Years.”

But that which God said, “Their days shall be a hundred and twenty years,” is not to be understood as a prediction that henceforth men should not live longer than 120 years,—for even after the deluge we find that they lived more than 500 years,—but we are to understand that God said this when Noah had nearly completed his fifth century, that is, had lived 480 years, which Scripture, as it frequently uses the name of the whole of the largest part, calls 500 years.  Now the deluge came in the 600th year of Noah’s life, the second month; and thus 120 years were predicted as being the remaining span of those who were doomed, which years being spent, they should be destroyed by the deluge.  And it is not unreasonably believed that the deluge came as it did, because already there were not found upon earth any who were not worthy of sharing a death so manifestly judicial,—not that a good man, who must die some time, would be a jot the worse of such a death after it was past.  Nevertheless there died in the deluge none of those mentioned in the sacred Scripture as descended from Seth.  But here is the divine account of the cause of the deluge:  “The Lord God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.  And it repented

Lit.:  The Lord thought and reconsidered.

Chapter 26.—That the Ark Which Noah Was Ordered to Make Figures In Every Respect Christ and the Church.

Moreover, inasmuch as God commanded Noah, a just man, and, as the truthful Scripture says, a man perfect in his generation,—not indeed with the perfection of the citizens of the city of God in that immortal condition in which they equal the angels, but in so far as they can be perfect in their sojourn in this world,—inasmuch as God commanded him, I say, to make an ark, in which he might be rescued from the destruction of the flood, along with his family, i.e., his wife, sons, and daughters-in-law, and along with the animals who, in obedience to God’s command, came to him into the ark:  this is certainly a figure of the city of God sojourning in this world; that is to say, of the church, which is rescued by the wood on which hung the Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus.

1 Tim. ii. 5.

But we have not now time to pursue this subject; and, indeed, we have already dwelt upon it in the work we wrote against Faustus the Manichean, who denies that there is anything prophesied of Christ in the Hebrew books.  It may be that one man’s exposition excels another’s, and that ours is not the best; but all that is said must be referred to this city of God we speak of, which sojourns in this wicked world as in a deluge, at least if the expositor would not widely miss the meaning of the author.  For example, the interpretation I have given in the work against Faustus, of the words, “with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it,” is, that because the church is gathered out of all nations, it is said to have two stories, to represent the two kinds of men,—the circumcision, to wit, and the uncircumcision, or, as the apostle otherwise calls them, Jews and Gentiles; and to have three stories, because all the nations were replenished from the three sons of Noah.  Now any one may object to this interpretation, and may give another which harmonizes with the rule of faith.  For as the ark was to have rooms not only on the lower, but also on the upper stories, which were called “third stories,” that there might be a habitable space on the third floor from the basement, some one may interpret these to mean the three graces commended by the apostle.—faith, hope, and charity.  Or even more suitably they may be supposed to represent those three harvests in the gospel, thirty-fold, sixty-fold, an hundred-fold,—chaste marriage dwelling in the ground floor, chaste widowhood in the upper, and chaste virginity in the top story.  Or any better interpretation may be given, so long as the reference to this city is maintained.  And the same statement I would make of all the remaining particulars in this passage which require exposition, viz., that although different explanations are given, yet they must all agree with the one harmonious catholic faith.

Chapter 27.—Of the Ark and the Deluge, and that We Cannot Agree with Those Who Receive the Bare History, But Reject the Allegorical Interpretation, Nor with Those Who Maintain the Figurative and Not the Historical Meaning.

Yet no one ought to suppose either that these things were written for no purpose, or that we should study only the historical truth, apart from any allegorical meanings; or, on the contrary, that they are only allegories, and that there were no such facts at all, or that, whether it be so or no, there is here no prophecy of the church.  For what right-minded man will contend that books so religiously preserved during thousands of years, and transmitted by so orderly a succession, were written without an object, or that only the bare historical facts are to be considered when we read them?  For, not to mention other instances, if the number of the animals entailed the construction of an ark of great size, where was the necessity of sending into it two unclean and seven clean animals of each species, when both could have been preserved in equal numbers?  Or could not God, who ordered them to be preserved in order to replenish the race, restore them in the same way He had created them?

But they who contend that these things never happened, but are only figures setting forth other things, in the first place suppose that there could not be a flood so great that the water should rise fifteen cubits above the highest mountains, because it is said that clouds cannot rise above the top of Mount Olympus, because it reaches the sky where there is none of that thicker atmosphere in which winds, clouds, and rains have their origin.  They do not reflect that the densest element of all, earth, can exist there; or perhaps they deny that the top of the mountain is earth.  Why, then, do these measurers and weighers of the elements contend that earth can be raised to those aerial altitudes, and that water cannot, while they admit that water is lighter, and liker to ascend than earth?  What reason do they adduce why earth, the heavier and lower element, has for so many ages scaled to the tranquil ether, while water, the lighter, and more likely to ascend, is not suffered to do the same even for a brief space of time?

They say, too, that the area of that ark could not contain so many kinds of animals of both sexes, two of the unclean and seven of the clean.  But they seem to me to reckon only one area of 300 cubits long and 50 broad, and not to remember that there was another similar in the story above, and yet another as large in the story above that again; and that there was consequently an area of 900 cubits by 150.  And if we accept what Origen

In his second homily on Genesis.

As to another customary inquiry of the scrupulous about the very minute creatures, not only such as mice and lizards, but also locusts, beetles, flies, fleas, and so forth, whether there were not in the ark a larger number of them than was determined by God in His command, those persons who are moved by this difficulty are to be reminded that the words “every creeping thing of the earth” only indicate that it was not needful to preserve in the ark the animals that can live in the water, whether the fishes that live submerged in it, or the sea-birds that swim on its surface.  Then, when it is said “male and female,” no doubt reference is made to the repairing of the races, and consequently there was no need for those creatures being in the ark which are born without the union of the sexes from inanimate things, or from their corruption; or if they were in the ark, they might be there as they commonly are in houses, not in any determinate numbers; or if it was necessary that there should be a definite number of all those animals that cannot naturally live in the water, that so the most sacred mystery which was being enacted might be bodied forth and perfectly figured in actual realities, still this was not the care of Noah or his sons, but of God.  For Noah did not catch the animals and put them into the ark, but gave them entrance as they came seeking it.  For this is the force of the words, “They shall come unto thee,”

Gen. vi. 19, 20.

Another question is commonly raised regarding the food of the carnivorous animals,—whether, without transgressing the command which fixed the number to be preserved, there were necessarily others included in the ark for their sustenance; or, as is more probable, there might be some food which was not flesh, and which yet suited all.  For we know how many animals whose food is flesh eat also vegetable products and fruits, especially figs and chestnuts.  What wonder is it, therefore, if that wise and just man was instructed by God what would suit each, so that without flesh he prepared and stored provision fit for every species?  And what is there which hunger would not make animals eat?  Or what could not be made sweet and wholesome by God, who, with a divine facility, might have enabled them to do without food at all, had it not been requisite to the completeness of so great a mystery that they should be fed?  But none but a contentious man can suppose that there was no prefiguring of the church in so manifold and circumstantial a detail.  For the nations have already so filled the church, and are comprehended in the framework of its unity, the clean and unclean together, until the appointed end, that this one very manifest fulfillment leaves no doubt how we should interpret even those others which are somewhat more obscure, and which cannot so readily be discerned.  And since this is so, if not even the most audacious will presume to assert that these things were written without a purpose, or that though the events really happened they mean nothing, or that they did not really happen, but are only allegory, or that at all events they are far from having any figurative reference to the church; if it has been made out that, on the other hand, we must rather believe that there was a wise purpose in their being committed to memory and to writing, and that they did happen, and have a significance, and that this significance has a prophetic reference to the church, then this book, having served this purpose, may now be closed, that we may go on to trace in the history subsequent to the deluge the courses of the two cities,—the earthly, that lives according to men, and the heavenly, that lives according to God.

Chapter 1.—Whether, After the Deluge, from Noah to Abraham, Any Families Can Be Found Who Lived According to God.

It is difficult to discover from Scripture, whether, after the deluge, traces of the holy city are continuous, or are so interrupted by intervening seasons of godlessness, that not a single worshipper of the one true God was found among men; because from Noah, who, with his wife, three sons, and as many daughters-in-law, achieved deliverance in the ark from the destruction of the deluge, down to Abraham, we do not find in the canonical books that the piety of any one is celebrated by express divine testimony, unless it be in the case of Noah, who commends with a prophetic benediction his two sons Shem and Japheth, while he beheld and foresaw what was long afterwards to happen.  It was also by this prophetic spirit that, when his middle son—that is, the son who was younger than the first and older than the last born—had sinned against him, he cursed him not in his own person, but in his son’s (his own grandson’s), in the words, “Cursed be the lad Canaan; a servant shall he be unto his brethren.”

Gen. ix. 25.

Chapter 2.—What Was Prophetically Prefigured in the Sons of Noah.

The things which then were hidden are now sufficiently revealed by the actual events which have followed.  For who can carefully and intelligently consider these things without recognizing them accomplished in Christ?  Shem, of whom Christ was born in the flesh, means “named.”  And what is of greater name than Christ, the fragrance of whose name is now everywhere perceived, so that even prophecy sings of it beforehand, comparing it in the Song of Songs,

Song of Solomon i. 3.

Chapter 3.—Of the Generations of the Three Sons of Noah.

We must therefore introduce into this work an explanation of the generations of the three sons of Noah, in so far as that may illustrate the progress in time of the two cities.  Scripture first mentions that of the youngest son, who is called Japheth:  he had eight sons,

Augustin here follows the Greek version, which introduces the name Elisa among the sons of Japheth, though not found in the Hebrew.  It is not found in the Complutensian Greek translation, nor in the Mss. used by Jerome.

It remains to mention the sons of Shem, Noah’s eldest son; for to him this genealogical narrative gradually ascends from the youngest.  But in the commencement of the record of Shem’s sons there is an obscurity which calls for explanation, since it is closely connected with the object of our investigation.  For we read, “Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Heber, the brother of Japheth the elder, were children born.”

Gen. x. 21.

Chapter 4.—Of the Diversity of Languages, and of the Founding of Babylon.

But though these nations are said to have been dispersed according to their languages, yet the narrator recurs to that time when all had but one language, and explains how it came to pass that a diversity of languages was introduced.  “The whole earth,” he says, “was of one lip, and all had one speech.  And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and dwelt there.  And they said one to another, Come, and let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.  And they had bricks for stone, and slime for mortar.  And they said, Come, and let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top shall reach the sky; and let us make us a name, before we be scattered abroad on the face of all the earth.  And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.  And the Lord God said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do:  and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.  Come, and let us go down, and confound there their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.  And God scattered them thence on the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city and the tower.  Therefore the name of it is called Confusion; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth:  and the Lord God scattered them thence on the face of all the earth.”

Gen. xi. 1–9.

Chapter 5.—Of God’s Coming Down to Confound the Languages of the Builders of the City.

We read, “The Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men built:”  it was not the sons of God, but that society which lived in a merely human way, and which we call the earthly city.  God, who is always wholly everywhere, does not move locally; but He is said to descend when He does anything in the earth out of the usual course, which, as it were, makes His presence felt.  And in the same way, He does not by “seeing” learn some new thing, for He cannot ever be ignorant of anything; but He is said to see and recognize, in time, that which He causes others to see and recognize.  And therefore that city was not previously being seen as God made it be seen when He showed how offensive it was to Him.  We might, indeed, interpret God’s descending to the city of the descent of His angels in whom He dwells; so that the following words, “And the Lord God said, Behold, they are all one race and of one language,” and also what follows, “Come, and let us go down and confound their speech,” are a recapitulation, explaining how the previously intimated “descent of the Lord” was accomplished.  For if He had already gone down, why does He say, “Come, and let us go down and confound?”—words which seem to be addressed to the angels, and to intimate that He who was in the angels descended in their descent.  And the words most appropriately are, not, “Go ye down and confound,” but, “Let us confound their speech;” showing that He so works by His servants, that they are themselves also fellow-laborers with God, as the apostle says, “For we are fellow-laborers with God.”

1 Cor. iii. 9.

Chapter 6.—What We are to Understand by God’s Speaking to the Angels.

We might have supposed that the words uttered at the creation of man, “Let us,” and not Let me, “make man,” were addressed to the angels, had He not added “in our image;” but as we cannot believe that man was made in the image of angels, or that the image of God is the same as that of angels, it is proper to refer this expression to the plurality of the Trinity.  And yet this Trinity, being one God, even after saying “Let us make,” goes on to say, “And God made man in His image,”

Gen. i. 26.

Chapter 7.—Whether Even the Remotest Islands Received Their Fauna from the Animals Which Were Preserved, Through the Deluge, in the Ark.

There is a question raised about all those kinds of beasts which are not domesticated, nor are produced like frogs from the earth, but are propagated by male and female parents, such as wolves and animals of that kind; and it is asked how they could be found in the islands after the deluge, in which all the animals not in the ark perished, unless the breed was restored from those which were preserved in pairs in the ark.  It might, indeed, be said that they crossed to the islands by swimming, but this could only be true of those very near the mainland; whereas there are some so distant, that we fancy no animal could swim to them.  But if men caught them and took them across with themselves, and thus propagated these breeds in their new abodes, this would not imply an incredible fondness for the chase.  At the same time, it cannot be denied that by the intervention of angels they might be transferred by God’s order or permission.  If, however, they were produced out of the earth as at their first creation, when God said, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature,”

Gen. i. 24.

Chapter 8.—Whether Certain Monstrous Races of Men are Derived from the Stock of Adam or Noah’s Sons.

It is also asked whether we are to believe that certain monstrous races of men, spoken of in secular history,

Pliny, Hist. Nat. vii. 2; Aulus Gellius, Noct. Att. ix. 4.

Chapter 9.—Whether We are to Believe in the Antipodes.

But as to the fable that there are Antipodes, that is to say, men on the opposite side of the earth, where the sun rises when it sets to us, men who walk with their feet opposite ours, that is on no ground credible.  And, indeed, it is not affirmed that this has been learned by historical knowledge, but by scientific conjecture, on the ground that the earth is suspended within the concavity of the sky, and that it has as much room on the one side of it as on the other:  hence they say that the part which is beneath must also be inhabited.  But they do not remark that, although it be supposed or scientifically demonstrated that the world is of a round and spherical form, yet it does not follow that the other side of the earth is bare of water; nor even, though it be bare, does it immediately follow that it is peopled.  For Scripture, which proves the truth of its historical statements by the accomplishment of its prophecies, gives no false information; and it is too absurd to say, that some men might have taken ship and traversed the whole wide ocean, and crossed from this side of the world to the other, and that thus even the inhabitants of that distant region are descended from that one first man.  Wherefore let us seek if we can find the city of God that sojourns on earth among those human races who are catalogued as having been divided into seventy-two nations and as many languages.  For it continued down to the deluge and the ark, and is proved to have existed still among the sons of Noah by their blessings, and chiefly in the eldest son Shem; for Japheth received this blessing, that he should dwell in the tents of Shem.

Chapter 10.—Of the Genealogy of Shem, in Whose Line the City of God is Preserved Till the Time of Abraham.

It is necessary, therefore, to preserve the series of generations descending from Shem, for the sake of exhibiting the city of God after the flood; as before the flood it was exhibited in the series of generations descending from Seth.  And therefore does divine Scripture, after exhibiting the earthly city as Babylon or “Confusion,” revert to the patriarch Shem, and recapitulate the generations from him to Abraham, specifying besides, the year in which each father begat the son that belonged to this line, and how long he lived.  And unquestionably it is this which fulfills the promise I made, that it should appear why it is said of the sons of Heber, “The name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided.”

Gen. x. 25.

But to avoid needless prolixity, we shall mention not the number of years each member of this series lived, but only the year of his life in which he begat his heir, that we may thus reckon the number of years from the flood to Abraham, and may at the same time leave room to touch briefly and cursorily upon some other matters necessary to our argument.  In the second year, then, after the flood, Shem when he was a hundred years old begat Arphaxad; Arphaxad when he was 135 years old begat Cainan; Cainan when he was 130 years begat Salah.  Salah himself, too, was the same age when he begat Eber.  Eber lived 134 years, and begat Peleg, in whose days the earth was divided.  Peleg himself lived 130 years, and begat Reu; and Reu lived 132 years, and begat Serug; Serug 130, and begat Nahor; and Nahor 79, and begat Terah; and Terah 70, and begat Abram, whose name God afterwards changed into Abraham.  There are thus from the flood to Abraham 1072 years, according to the Vulgate or Septuagint versions.  In the Hebrew copies far fewer years are given; and for this either no reason or a not very credible one is given.

When, therefore, we look for the city of God in these seventy-two nations, we cannot affirm that while they had but one lip, that is, one language, the human race had departed from the worship of the true God, and that genuine godliness had survived only in those generations which descend from Shem through Arphaxad and reach to Abraham; but from the time when they proudly built a tower to heaven, a symbol of godless exaltation, the city or society of the wicked becomes apparent.  Whether it was only disguised before, or non-existent; whether both cities remained after the flood,—the godly in the two sons of Noah who were blessed, and in their posterity, and the ungodly in the cursed son and his descendants, from whom sprang that mighty hunter against the Lord,—is not easily determined.  For possibly—and certainly this is more credible—there were despisers of God among the descendants of the two sons, even before Babylon was founded, and worshippers of God among the descendants of Ham.  Certainly neither race was ever obliterated from earth.  For in both the Psalms in which it is said, “They are all gone aside, they are altogether become filthy; there is none that doeth good, no, not one,” we read further, “Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who eat up my people as they eat bread, and call not upon the Lord.”

Ps. xiv. 3, 4; liii. 3, 4.

Chapter 11.—That the Original Language in Use Among Men Was that Which Was Afterwards Called Hebrew, from Heber, in Whose Family It Was Preserved When the Confusion of Tongues Occurred.

Wherefore, as the fact of all using one language did not secure the absence of sin-infected men from the race,—for even before the deluge there was one language, and yet all but the single family of just Noah were found worthy of destruction by the flood,—so when the nations, by a prouder godlessness, earned the punishment of the dispersion and the confusion of tongues, and the city of the godless was called Confusion or Babylon, there was still the house of Heber in which the primitive language of the race survived.  And therefore, as I have already mentioned, when an enumeration is made of the sons of Shem, who each founded a nation, Heber is first mentioned, although he was of the fifth generation from Shem.  And because, when the other races were divided by their own peculiar languages, his family preserved that language which is not unreasonably believed to have been the common language of the race, it was on this account thenceforth named Hebrew.  For it then became necessary to distinguish this language from the rest by a proper name; though, while there was only one, it had no other name than the language of man, or human speech, it alone being spoken by the whole human race.  Some one will say:  If the earth was divided by languages in the days of Peleg, Heber’s son, that language, which was formerly common to all, should rather have been called after Peleg.  But we are to understand that Heber himself gave to his son this name Peleg, which means Division; because he was born when the earth was divided, that is, at the very time of the division, and that this is the meaning of the words, “In his days the earth was divided.”

Gen. x. 25.

But yet another question is mooted:  How did Heber and his son Peleg each found a nation, if they had but one language?  For no doubt the Hebrew nation propagated from Heber through Abraham, and becoming through him a great people, is one nation.  How, then, are all the sons of the three branches of Noah’s family enumerated as founding a nation each, if Heber and Peleg did not so?  It is very probable that the giant Nimrod founded also his nation, and that Scripture has named him separately on account of the extraordinary dimensions of his empire and of his body, so that the number of seventy-two nations remains.  But Peleg was mentioned, not because he founded a nation (for his race and language are Hebrew), but on account of the critical time at which he was born, all the earth being then divided.  Nor ought we to be surprised that the giant Nimrod lived to the time in which Babylon was founded and the confusion of tongues occurred, and the consequent division of the earth.  For though Heber was in the sixth generation from Noah, and Nimrod in the fourth, it does not follow that they could not be alive at the same time.  For when the generations are few, they live longer and are born later; but when they are many, they live a shorter time, and come into the world earlier.  We are to understand that, when the earth was divided, the descendants of Noah who are registered as founders of nations were not only already born, but were of an age to have immense families, worthy to be called tribes or nations.  And therefore we must by no means suppose that they were born in the order in which they were set down; otherwise, how could the twelve sons of Joktan, another son of Heber’s, and brother of Peleg, have already founded nations, if Joktan was born, as he is registered, after his brother Peleg, since the earth was divided at Peleg’s birth?  We are therefore to understand that, though Peleg is named first, he was born long after Joktan, whose twelve sons had already families so large as to admit of their being divided by different languages.  There is nothing extraordinary in the last born being first named:  of the sons of Noah, the descendants of Japheth are first named; then the sons of Ham, who was the second son; and last the sons of Shem, who was the first and oldest.  Of these nations the names have partly survived, so that at this day we can see from whom they have sprung, as the Assyrians from Assur, the Hebrews from Heber, but partly have been altered in the lapse of time, so that the most learned men, by profound research in ancient records, have scarcely been able to discover the origin, I do not say of all, but of some of these nations.  There is, for example, nothing in the name Egyptians to show that they are descended from Misraim, Ham’s son, nor in the name Ethiopians to show a connection with Cush, though such is said to be the origin of these nations.  And if we take a general survey of the names, we shall find that more have been changed than have remained the same.

Chapter 12.—Of the Era in Abraham’s Life from Which a New Period in the Holy Succession Begins.

Let us now survey the progress of the city of God from the era of the patriarch Abraham, from whose time it begins to be more conspicuous, and the divine promises which are now fulfilled in Christ are more fully revealed.  We learn, then, from the intimations of holy Scripture, that Abraham was born in the country of the Chaldeans, a land belonging to the Assyrian empire.  Now, even at that time impious superstitions were rife with the Chaldeans, as with other nations.  The family of Terah, to which Abraham belonged, was the only one in which the worship of the true God survived, and the only one, we may suppose, in which the Hebrew language was preserved; although Joshua the son of Nun tells us that even this family served other gods in Mesopotamia.

Josh. xxiv. 2.

Chapter 13.—Why, in the Account of Terah’s Emigration, on His Forsaking the Chaldeans and Passing Over into Mesopotamia, No Mention is Made of His Son Nahor.

Next it is related how Terah with his family left the region of the Chaldeans and came into Mesopotamia, and dwelt in Haran.  But nothing is said about one of his sons called Nahor, as if he had not taken him along with him.  For the narrative runs thus:  “And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his son’s son, and Sarah his daughter-in-law, his son Abram’s wife, and led them forth out of the region of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan; and he came into Haran, and dwelt there.”

Gen. xi. 31.

Chapter 14.—Of the Years of Terah, Who Completed His Lifetime in Haran.

On Terah’s death in Mesopotamia, where he is said to have lived 205 years, the promises of God made to Abraham now begin to be pointed out; for thus it is written:  “And the days of Terah in Haran were two hundred and five years, and he died in Haran.”

Gen. xi. 32.

Chapter 15.—Of the Time of the Migration of Abraham, When, According to the Commandment of God, He Went Out from Haran.

When, after the record of the death of Terah, the father of Abraham, we next read, “And the Lord said to Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house,”

Gen. xii. 1.

Chapter 16.—Of the Order and Nature of the Promises of God Which Were Made to Abraham.

God’s promises made to Abraham are now to be considered; for in these the oracles of our God,

Various reading, “of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Chapter 17.—Of the Three Most Famous Kingdoms of the Nations, of Which One, that is the Assyrian, Was Already Very Eminent When Abraham Was Born.

During the same period there were three famous kingdoms of the nations, in which the city of the earth-born, that is, the society of men living according to man under the domination of the fallen angels, chiefly flourished, namely, the three kingdoms of Sicyon, Egypt, and Assyria.  Of these, Assyria was much the most powerful and sublime; for that king Ninus, son of Belus, had subdued the people of all Asia except India.  By Asia I now mean not that part which is one province of this greater Asia, but what is called Universal Asia, which some set down as the half, but most as the third part of the whole world,—the three being Asia, Europe, and Africa, thereby making an unequal division.  For the part called Asia stretches from the south through the east even to the north; Europe from the north even to the west; and Africa from the west even to the south.  Thus we see that two, Europe and Africa, contain one half of the world, and Asia alone the other half.  And these two parts are made by the circumstance, that there enters between them from the ocean all the Mediterranean water, which makes this great sea of ours.  So that, if you divide the world into two parts, the east and the west, Asia will be in the one, and Europe and Africa in the other.  So that of the three kingdoms then famous, one, namely Sicyon, was not under the Assyrians, because it was in Europe; but as for Egypt, how could it fail to be subject to the empire which ruled all Asia with the single exception of India?  In Assyria, therefore, the dominion of the impious city had the pre-eminence.  Its head was Babylon,—an earth-born city, most fitly named, for it means confusion.  There Ninus reigned after the death of his father Belus, who first had reigned there sixty-five years.  His son Ninus, who, on his father’s death, succeeded to the kingdom, reigned fifty-two years, and had been king forty-three years when Abraham was born, which was about the 1200th year before Rome was founded, as it were another Babylon in the west.

Chapter 18.—Of the Repeated Address of God to Abraham, in Which He Promised the Land of Canaan to Him and to His Seed.

Abraham, then, having departed out of Haran in the seventy-fifth year of his own age, and in the hundred and forty-fifth of his father’s, went with Lot, his brother’s son, and Sarah his wife, into the land of Canaan, and came even to Sichem, where again he received the divine oracle, of which it is thus written:  “And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said unto him, Unto thy seed will I give this land.”

Gen. xii. 7.

Chapter 19.—Of the Divine Preservation of Sarah’s Chastity in Egypt, When Abraham Had Called Her Not His Wife But His Sister.

Having built an altar there, and called upon God, Abraham proceeded thence and dwelt in the desert, and was compelled by pressure of famine to go on into Egypt.  There he called his wife his sister, and told no lie.  For she was this also, because she was near of blood; just as Lot, on account of the same nearness, being his brother’s son, is called his brother.  Now he did not deny that she was his wife, but held his peace about it, committing to God the defence of his wife’s chastity, and providing as a man against human wiles; because if he had not provided against the danger as much as he could, he would have been tempting God rather than trusting in Him.  We have said enough about this matter against the calumnies of Faustus the Manichæan.  At last what Abraham had expected the Lord to do took place.  For Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who had taken her to him as his wife, restored her to her husband on being severely plagued.  And far be it from us to believe that she was defiled by lying with another; because it is much more credible that, by these great afflictions, Pharaoh was not permitted to do this.

Chapter 20.—Of the Parting of Lot and Abraham, Which They Agreed to Without Breach of Charity.

On Abraham’s return out of Egypt to the place he had left, Lot, his brother’s son, departed from him into the land of Sodom, without breach of charity.  For they had grown rich, and began to have many herdmen of cattle, and when these strove together, they avoided in this way the pugnacious discord of their families.  Indeed, as human affairs go, this cause might even have given rise to some strife between themselves.  Consequently these are the words of Abraham to Lot, when taking precaution against this evil, “Let there be no strife between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren.  Behold, is not the whole land before thee?  Separate thyself from me:  if thou wilt go to the left hand, I will go to the right; or if thou wilt go to the right hand, I will go to the left.”

Gen. xiii. 8, 9.

Chapter 21.—Of the Third Promise of God, by Which He Assured the Land of Canaan to Abraham and His Seed in Perpetuity.

Now, when Abraham and Lot had separated, and dwelt apart, owing to the necessity of supporting their families, and not to vile discord, and Abraham was in the land of Canaan, but Lot in Sodom, the Lord said to Abraham in a third oracle, “Lift up thine eyes, and look from the place where thou now art, to the north, and to Africa, and to the east, and to the sea; for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever.  And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth:  if any one can number the dust of the earth, thy seed shall also be numbered.  Arise, and walk through the land, in the length of it, and in the breadth of it; for unto thee will I give it.”

Gen. xiii. 14–17.

Chapter 22.—Of Abraham’s Overcoming the Enemies of Sodom, When He Delivered Lot from Captivity and Was Blessed by Melchizedek the Priest.

Having received this oracle of promise, Abraham migrated, and remained in another place of the same land, that is, beside the oak of Mamre, which was Hebron.  Then on the invasion of Sodom, when five kings carried on war against four, and Lot was taken captive with the conquered Sodomites, Abraham delivered him from the enemy, leading with him to battle three hundred and eighteen of his home-born servants, and won the victory for the kings of Sodom, but would take nothing of the spoils when offered by the king for whom he had won them.  He was then openly blessed by Melchizedek, who was priest of God Most High, about whom many and great things are written in the epistle which is inscribed to the Hebrews, which most say is by the Apostle Paul, though some deny this.  For then first appeared the sacrifice which is now offered to God by Christians in the whole wide world, and that is fulfilled which long after the event was said by the prophet to Christ, who was yet to come in the flesh, “Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek,”

Ps. cx. 4.

Chapter 23.—Of the Word of the Lord to Abraham, by Which It Was Promised to Him that His Posterity Should Be Multiplied According to the Multitude of the Stars; On Believing Which He Was Declared Justified While Yet in Uncircumcision.

The word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision also.  For when God promised him protection and exceeding great reward, he, being solicitous about posterity, said that a certain Eliezer of Damascus, born in his house, would be his heir.  Immediately he was promised an heir, not that house-born servant, but one who was to come forth of Abraham himself; and again a seed innumerable, not as the dust of the earth, but as the stars of heaven,—which rather seems to me a promise of a posterity exalted in celestial felicity.  For, so far as multitude is concerned, what are the stars of heaven to the dust of the earth, unless one should say the comparison is like inasmuch as the stars also cannot be numbered?  For it is not to be believed that all of them can be seen.  For the more keenly one observes them, the more does he see.  So that it is to be supposed some remain concealed from the keenest observers, to say nothing of those stars which are said to rise and set in another part of the world most remote from us.  Finally, the authority of this book condemns those like Aratus or Eudoxus, or any others who boast that they have found out and written down the complete number of the stars.  Here, indeed, is set down that sentence which the apostle quotes in order to commend the grace of God, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness;”

Rom. iv. 3; Gen. xv. 6.

Chapter 24.—Of the Meaning of the Sacrifice Abraham Was Commanded to Offer When He Supplicated to Be Taught About Those Things He Had Believed.

In the same vision, God in speaking to him also says, “I am God that brought thee out of the region of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it.”

Gen. xv. 7.

All these things were said and done in a vision from God; but it would take long, and would exceed the scope of this work, to treat of them exactly in detail.  It is enough that we should know that, after it was said Abram believed in God, and it was counted to him for righteousness, he did not fail in faith in saying, “Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?” for the inheritance of that land was promised to him.  Now he does not say, How shall I know, as if he did not yet believe; but he says, “Whereby shall I know,” meaning that some sign might be given by which he might know the manner of those things which he had believed, just as it is not for lack of faith the Virgin Mary says, “How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?”

Luke i. 34.

But what is said to Abraham, “Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land not theirs, and they shall reduce them to servitude, and shall afflict them 400 years,” is most clearly a prophecy about the people of Israel which was to be in servitude in Egypt.  Not that this people was to be in that servitude under the oppressive Egyptians for 400 years, but it is foretold that this should take place in the course of those 400 years.  For as it is written of Terah the father of Abraham, “And the days of Terah in Haran were 205 years,”

Gen. xi. 32.

When it is added, “And when the sun was now setting there was a flame, and lo, a smoking furnace, and lamps of fire, which passed through between those pieces,” this signifies that at the end of the world the carnal shall be judged by fire.  For just as the affliction of the city of God, such as never was before, which is expected to take place under Antichrist, was signified by Abraham’s horror of great darkness about the going down of the sun, that is, when the end of the world draws nigh,—so at the going down of the sun, that is, at the very end of the world, there is signified by that fire the day of judgment, which separates the carnal who are to be saved by fire from those who are to be condemned in the fire.  And then the covenant made with Abraham particularly sets forth the land of Canaan, and names eleven tribes in it from the river of Egypt even to the great river Euphrates.  It is not then from the great river of Egypt, that is, the Nile, but from a small one which separates Egypt from Palestine, where the city of Rhinocorura is.

Chapter 25.—Of Sarah’s Handmaid, Hagar, Whom She Herself Wished to Be Abraham’s Concubine.

And here follow the times of Abraham’s sons, the one by Hagar the bond maid, the other by Sarah the free woman, about whom we have already spoken in the previous book.  As regards this transaction, Abraham is in no way to be branded as guilty concerning this concubine, for he used her for the begetting of progeny, not for the gratification of lust; and not to insult, but rather to obey his wife, who supposed it would be solace of her barrenness if she could make use of the fruitful womb of her handmaid to supply the defect of her own nature, and by that law of which the apostle says, “Likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife,”

1 Cor. vii. 4.

Chapter 26.—Of God’s Attestation to Abraham, by Which He Assures Him, When Now Old, of a Son by the Barren Sarah, and Appoints Him the Father of the Nations, and Seals His Faith in the Promise by the Sacrament of Circumcision.

After these things Ishmael was born of Hagar; and Abraham might think that in him was fulfilled what God had promised him, saying, when he wished to adopt his home-born servant, “This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth of thee, he shall be thine heir.”

Gen. xv. 4.

Here there are more distinct promises about the calling of the nations in Isaac, that is, in the son of the promise, by which grace is signified, and not nature; for the son is promised from an old man and a barren old woman.  For although God effects even the natural course of procreation, yet where the agency of God is manifest, through the decay or failure of nature, grace is more plainly discerned.  And because this was to be brought about, not by generation, but by regeneration, circumcision was enjoined now, when a son was promised of Sarah.  And by ordering all, not only sons, but also home-born and purchased servants to be circumcised, he testifies that this grace pertains to all.  For what else does circumcision signify than a nature renewed on the putting off of the old?  And what else does the eighth day mean than Christ, who rose again when the week was completed, that is, after the Sabbath?  The very names of the parents are changed:  all things proclaim newness, and the new covenant is shadowed forth in the old.  For what does the term old covenant imply but the concealing of the new?  And what does the term new covenant imply but the revealing of the old?  The laughter of Abraham is the exultation of one who rejoices, not the scornful laughter of one who mistrusts.  And those words of his in his heart, “Shall a son be born to me that am an hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?” are not the words of doubt, but of wonder.  And when it is said, “And I will give to thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land in which thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession,” if it troubles any one whether this is to be held as fulfilled, or whether its fulfilment may still be looked for, since no kind of earthly possession can be everlasting for any nation whatever, let him know that the word translated everlasting, by our writers is what the Greeks term αἰώ·νιον, which is derived from αἰὼ·ν, the Greek for sæculum, an age.  But the Latins have not ventured to translate this by secular, lest they should change the meaning into something widely different.  For many things are called secular which so happen in this world as to pass away even in a short time; but what is termed αἰω·νιον either has no end, or lasts to the very end of this world.

Chapter 27.—Of the Male, Who Was to Lose His Soul If He Was Not Circumcised on the Eighth Day, Because He Had Broken God’s Covenant.

When it is said, “The male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that soul shall be cut off from his people, because he hath broken my covenant,”

Gen. xvii. 14.

Chapter 28.—Of the Change of Name in Abraham and Sarah, Who Received the Gift of Fecundity When They Were Incapable of Regeneration Owing to the Barrenness of One, and the Old Age of Both.

Now when a promise so great and clear was made to Abraham, in which it was so plainly said to him, “I have made thee a father of many nations, and I will increase thee exceedingly, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall go forth of thee.  And I will give thee a son of Sarah; and I will bless him, and he shall become nations, and kings of nations shall be of him,”

Gen. xvii. 5, 6, 16.

Chapter 29.—Of the Three Men or Angels, in Whom the Lord is Related to Have Appeared to Abraham at the Oak of Mamre.

God appeared again to Abraham at the oak of Mamre in three men, who it is not to be doubted were angels, although some think that one of them was Christ, and assert that He was visible before He put on flesh.  Now it belongs to the divine power, and invisible, incorporeal, and incommutable nature, without changing itself at all, to appear even to mortal men, not by what it is, but by what is subject to it.  And what is not subject to it?  Yet if they try to establish that one of these three was Christ by the fact that, although he saw three, he addressed the Lord in the singular, as it is written, “And, lo, three men stood by him:  and, when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent-door, and worshipped toward the ground, and said, Lord, if I have found favor before thee,”

Gen. xviii. 2, 3.

Chapter 30.—Of Lot’s Deliverance from Sodom, and Its Consumption by Fire from Heaven; And of Abimelech, Whose Lust Could Not Harm Sarah’s Chastity.

After this promise Lot was delivered out of Sodom, and a fiery rain from heaven turned into ashes that whole region of the impious city, where custom had made sodomy as prevalent as laws have elsewhere made other kinds of wickedness.  But this punishment of theirs was a specimen of the divine judgment to come.  For what is meant by the angels forbidding those who were delivered to look back, but that we are not to look back in heart to the old life which, being regenerated through grace, we have put off, if we think to escape the last judgment?  Lot’s wife, indeed, when she looked back, remained, and, being turned into salt, furnished to believing men a condiment by which to savor somewhat the warning to be drawn from that example.  Then Abraham did again at Gerar, with Abimelech the king of that city, what he had done in Egypt about his wife, and received her back untouched in the same way.  On this occasion, when the king rebuked Abraham for not saying she was his wife, and calling her his sister, he explained what he had been afraid of, and added this further, “And yet indeed she is my sister by the father’s side, but not by the mother’s;

Gen. xx. 12.

Chapter 31.—Of Isaac, Who Was Born According to the Promise, Whose Name Was Given on Account of the Laughter of Both Parents.

After these things a son was born to Abraham, according to God’s promise, of Sarah, and was called Isaac, which means laughter.  For his father had laughed when he was promised to him, in wondering delight, and his mother, when he was again promised by those three men, had laughed, doubting for joy; yet she was blamed by the angel because that laughter, although it was for joy, yet was not full of faith.  Afterwards she was confirmed in faith by the same angel.  From this, then, the boy got his name.  For when Isaac was born and called by that name, Sarah showed that her laughter was not that of scornful reproach, but that of joyful praise; for she said, “God hath made me to laugh, so that every one who hears will laugh with me.”

Gen. xxi. 6.

Chapter 32.—Of Abraham’s Obedience and Faith, Which Were Proved by the Offering Up, of His Son in Sacrifice, and of Sarah’s Death.

Among other things, of which it would take too long time to mention the whole, Abraham was tempted about the offering up of his well-beloved son Isaac, to prove his pious obedience, and so make it known to the world, not to God.  Now every temptation is not blame-worthy; it may even be praise-worthy, because it furnishes probation.  And, for the most part, the human mind cannot attain to self-knowledge otherwise than by making trial of its powers through temptation, by some kind of experimental and not merely verbal self-interrogation; when, if it has acknowledged the gift of God, it is pious, and is consolidated by steadfast grace and not puffed up by vain boasting.  Of course Abraham could never believe that God delighted in human sacrifices; yet when the divine commandment thundered, it was to be obeyed, not disputed.  Yet Abraham is worthy of praise, because he all along believed that his son, on being offered up, would rise again; for God had said to him, when he was unwilling to fulfill his wife’s pleasure by casting out the bond maid and her son, “In Isaac shall thy seed be called.”  No doubt He then goes on to say, “And as for the son of this bond woman, I will make him a great nation, because he is thy seed.”

Gen. xxi. 12, 13.

But let us rather hear the divine words spoken through the angel.  For the Scripture says, “And Abraham stretched forth his hand to take the knife, that he might slay his son.  And the Angel of the Lord called unto him from heaven, and said, Abraham.  And he said, Here am I.  And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him:  for now I know that thou fearest God, and hast not spared thy beloved son for my sake.”

Gen. xxii. 10–12.

Chapter 33.—Of Rebecca, the Grand-Daughter of Nahor, Whom Isaac Took to Wife.

Isaac married Rebecca, the grand-daughter of Nahor, his father’s brother, when he was forty years old, that is, in the 140th year of his father’s life, three years after his mother’s death.  Now when a servant was sent to Mesopotamia by his father to fetch her, and when Abraham said to that servant, “Put thy hand under my thigh, and I will make thee swear by the Lord, the God of heaven, and the Lord of the earth, that thou shalt not take a wife unto my son Isaac of the daughters of the Canaanites,”

Gen. xxiv. 2, 3.

Chapter 34.—What is Meant by Abraham’s Marrying Keturah After Sarah’s Death.

What did Abraham mean by marrying Keturah after Sarah’s death?  Far be it from us to suspect him of incontinence, especially when he had reached such an age and such sanctity of faith.  Or was he still seeking to beget children, though he held fast, with most approved faith, the promise of God that his children should be multiplied out of Isaac as the stars of heaven and the dust of the earth?  And yet, if Hagar and Ishmael, as the apostle teaches us, signified the carnal people of the old covenant, why may not Keturah and her sons also signify the carnal people who think they belong to the new covenant?  For both are called both the wives and the concubines of Abraham; but Sarah is never called a concubine (but only a wife).  For when Hagar is given to Abraham, it is written. “And Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her handmaid, after Abraham had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife.”

Gen. xvi. 3.

Chapter 35.—What Was Indicated by the Divine Answer About the Twins Still Shut Up in the Womb of Rebecca Their Mother.

Let us now see how the times of the city of God run on from this point among Abraham’s descendants.  In the time from the first year of Isaac’s life to the seventieth, when his sons were born, the only memorable thing is, that when he prayed God that his wife, who was barren, might bear, and the Lord granted what he sought, and she conceived, the twins leapt while still enclosed in her womb.  And when she was troubled by this struggle, and inquired of the Lord, she received this answer:  “Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall overcome the other people, and the elder shall serve the younger.”

Gen. xxv. 23.

Chapter 36.—Of the Oracle and Blessing Which Isaac Received, Just as His Father Did, Being Beloved for His Sake.

Isaac also received such an oracle as his father had often received.  Of this oracle it is thus written:  “And there was a famine over the land, beside the first famine that was in the days of Abraham.  And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of the Philistines unto Gerar.  And the Lord appeared unto him, and said, Go not down into Egypt; but dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of.  And abide in this land, and I will be with thee, and will bless thee:  unto thee and unto thy seed I will give all this land; and I will establish mine oath, which I sware unto Abraham thy father:  and I will multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all this land:  and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because that Abraham thy father obeyed my voice, and kept my precepts, my commandments, my righteousness, and my laws.”

Gen. xxvi. 1–5.

Chapter 37.—Of the Things Mystically Prefigured in Esau and Jacob.

Isaac’s two sons, Esau and Jacob, grew up together.  The primacy of the elder was transferred to the younger by a bargain and agreement between them, when the elder immoderately lusted after the lentiles the younger had prepared for food, and for that price sold his birthright to him, confirming it with an oath.  We learn from this that a person is to be blamed, not for the kind of food he eats, but for immoderate greed.  Isaac grew old, and old age deprived him of his eyesight.  He wished to bless the elder son, and instead of the elder, who was hairy, unwittingly blessed the younger, who put himself under his father’s hands, having covered himself with kid-skins, as if bearing the sins of others.  Lest we should think this guile of Jacob’s was fraudulent guile, instead of seeking in it the mystery of a great thing, the Scripture has predicted in the words just before, “Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; and Jacob was a simple man, dwelling at home.”

Gen. xxv. 27.

Chapter 38.—Of Jacob’s Mission to Mesopotamia to Get a Wife, and of the Vision Which He Saw in a Dream by the Way, and of His Getting Four Women When He Sought One Wife.

Jacob was sent by his parents to Mesopotamia that he might take a wife there.  These were his father’s words on sending him:  “Thou shall not take a wife of the daughters of the Canaanites.  Arise, fly to Mesopotamia, to the house of Bethuel, thy mother’s father, and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother’s brother.  And my God bless thee, and increase thee, and multiply thee; and thou shalt be an assembly of peoples; and give to thee the blessing of Abraham thy father, and to thy seed after thee; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou dwellest, which God gave unto Abraham.”

Gen. xxviii. 1–4.

Chapter 39.—The Reason Why Jacob Was Also Called Israel.

As I said a little ago, Jacob was also called Israel, the name which was most prevalent among the people descended from him.  Now this name was given him by the angel who wrestled with him on the way back from Mesopotamia, and who was most evidently a type of Christ.  For when Jacob overcame him, doubtless with his own consent, that the mystery might be represented, it signified Christ’s passion, in which the Jews are seen overcoming Him.  And yet he besought a blessing from the very angel he had overcome; and so the imposition of this name was the blessing.  For Israel means seeing God,

Gen. xxxii. 28:  Israel = a prince of God; ver. 30; Peniel = the face of God.

Chapter 41.—Of the Blessing Which Jacob Promised in Judah His Son.

If, on account of the Christian people in whom the city of God sojourns in the earth, we look for the flesh of Christ in the seed of Abraham, setting aside the sons of the concubines, we have Isaac; if in the seed of Isaac, setting aside Esau, who is also Edom, we have Jacob, who also is Israel; if in the seed of Israel himself, setting aside the rest, we have Judah, because Christ sprang of the tribe of Judah.  Let us hear, then, how Israel, when dying in Egypt, in blessing his sons, prophetically blessed Judah.  He says:  “Judah, thy brethren shall praise thee:  thy hands shall be on the back of thine enemies; thy father’s children shall adore thee.  Judah is a lion’s whelp:  from the sprouting, my son, thou art gone up:  lying down, thou hast slept as a lion, and as a lion’s whelp; who shall awake him?  A prince shall not be lacking out of Judah, and a leader from his thighs, until the things come that are laid up for him; and He shall be the expectation of the nations.  Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass’s foal to the choice vine; he shall wash his robe in wine, and his clothes in the blood of the grape:  his eyes are red with wine, and his teeth are whiter than milk.”

Gen. xlix. 8–12.

Chapter 42.—Of the Sons of Joseph, Whom Jacob Blessed, Prophetically Changing His Hands.

Now, as Isaac’s two sons, Esau and Jacob, furnished a type of the two people, the Jews and the Christians (although as pertains to carnal descent it was not the Jews but the Idumeans who came of the seed of Esau, nor the Christian nations but rather the Jews who came of Jacob’s; for the type holds only as regards the saying, “The elder shall serve the younger”

Gen. xxv. 23.

Chapter 43.—Of the Times of Moses and Joshua the Son of Nun, of the Judges, and Thereafter of the Kings, of Whom Saul Was the First, But David is to Be Regarded as the Chief, Both by the Oath and by Merit.

Jacob being dead, and Joseph also, during the remaining 144 years until they went out of the land of Egypt, that nation increased to an incredible degree, even although wasted by so great persecutions, that at one time the male children were murdered at their birth, because the wondering Egyptians were terrified at the too great increase of that people.  Then Moses, being stealthily kept from the murderers of the infants, was brought to the royal house, God preparing to do great things by him, and was nursed and adopted by the daughter of Pharaoh (that was the name of all the kings of Egypt), and became so great a man that he—yea, rather God, who had promised this to Abraham, by him—drew that nation, so wonderfully multiplied, out of the yoke of hardest and most grievous servitude it had borne there.  At first, indeed, he fled thence (we are told he fled into the land of Midian), because, in defending an Israelite, he had slain an Egyptian, and was afraid.  Afterward, being divinely commissioned in the power of the Spirit of God, he overcame the magi of Pharaoh who resisted him.  Then, when the Egyptians would not let God’s people go, ten memorable plagues were brought by Him upon them,—the water turned into blood, the frogs and lice, the flies, the death of the cattle, the boils, the hail, the locusts, the darkness, the death of the first-born.  At last the Egyptians were destroyed in the Red Sea while pursuing the Israelites, whom they had let go when at length they were broken by so many great plagues.  The divided sea made a way for the Israelites who were departing, but, returning on itself, it overwhelmed their pursuers with its waves.  Then for forty years the people of God went through the desert, under the leadership of Moses, when the tabernacle of testimony was dedicated, in which God was worshipped by sacrifices prophetic of things to come, and that was after the law had been very terribly given in the mount, for its divinity was most plainly attested by wonderful signs and voices.  This took place soon after the exodus from Egypt, when the people had entered the desert, on the fiftieth day after the passover was celebrated by the offering up of a lamb, which is so completely a type of Christ, foretelling that through His sacrificial passion He should go from this world to the Father (for pascha in, the Hebrew tongue means transit), that when the new covenant was revealed, after Christ our passover was offered up, the Holy Spirit came from heaven on the fiftieth day; and He is called in the gospel the Finger of God, because He recalls to our remembrance the things done before by way of types, and because the tables of that law are said to have been written by the finger of God.

On the death of Moses, Joshua the son of Nun ruled the people, and led them into the land of promise, and divided it among them.  By these two wonderful leaders wars were also carried on most prosperously and wonderfully, God calling to witness that they had got these victories not so much on account of the merit of the Hebrew people as on account of the sins of the nations they subdued.  After these leaders there were judges, when the people were settled in the land of promise, so that, in the meantime, the first promise made to Abraham began to be fulfilled about the one nation, that is, the Hebrew, and about the land of Canaan; but not as yet the promise about all nations, and the whole wide world, for that was to be fulfilled, not by the observances of the old law, but by the advent of Christ in the flesh, and by the faith of the gospel.  And it was to prefigure this that it was not Moses, who received the law for the people on Mount Sinai, that led the people into the land of promise, but Joshua, whose name also was changed at God’s command, so that he was called Jesus.  But in the times of the judges prosperity alternated with adversity in war, according as the sins of the people and the mercy of God were displayed.

We come next to the times of the kings.  The first who reigned was Saul; and when he was rejected and laid low in battle, and his offspring rejected so that no kings should arise out of it, David succeeded to the kingdom, whose son Christ is chiefly called.  He was made a kind of starting-point and beginning of the advanced youth of God’s people, who had passed a kind of age of puberty from Abraham to this David.  And it is not in vain that the evangelist Matthew records the generations in such a way as to sum up this first period from Abraham to David in fourteen generations.  For from the age of puberty man begins to be capable of generation; therefore he starts the list of generations from Abraham, who also was made the father of many nations when he got his name changed.  So that previously this family of God’s people was in its childhood, from Noah to Abraham; and for that reason the first language was then learned, that is, the Hebrew.  For man begins to speak in childhood, the age succeeding infancy, which is so termed because then he cannot speak.

Infans, from in, not, and fari, to speak.

Chapter 1.—Of the Prophetic Age.

By the favor of God we have treated distinctly of His promises made to Abraham, that both the nation of Israel according to the flesh, and all nations according to faith, should be his seed, and the City of God, proceeding according to the order of time, will point

Has pointed.

Chapter 2.—At What Time the Promise of God Was Fulfilled Concerning the Land of Canaan, Which Even Carnal Israel Got in Possession.

In the preceding book we said, that in the promise of God to Abraham two things were promised from the beginning, the one, name ly, that his seed should possess the land of Canaan, which was intimated when it was said, “Go into a land that I will show thee, and I will make of thee a great nation;”

Gen. xii. 1, 2.

Chapter 3.—Of the Three-Fold Meaning of the Prophecies, Which are to Be Referred Now to the Earthly, Now to the Heavenly Jerusalem, and Now Again to Both.

Wherefore just as that divine oracle to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and all the other prophetic signs or sayings which are given in the earlier sacred writings, so also the other prophecies from this time of the kings pertain partly to the nation of Abraham’s flesh, and partly to that seed of his in which all nations are blessed as fellow-heirs of Christ by the New Testament, to the possessing of eternal life and the kingdom of the heavens.  Therefore they pertain partly to the bond maid who gendereth to bondage, that is, the earthly Jerusalem, which is in bondage with her children; but partly to the free city of God, that is, the true Jerusalem eternal in the heavens, whose children are all those that live according to God in the earth:  but there are some things among them which are understood to pertain to both,—to the bond maid properly, to the free woman figuratively.

Gal. iv. 22–31.

Therefore prophetic utterances of three kinds are to be found; forasmuch as there are some relating to the earthly Jerusalem, some to the heavenly, and some to both.  I think it proper to prove what I say by examples.  The prophet Nathan was sent to convict king David of heinous sin, and predict to him what future evils should be consequent on it.  Who can question that this and the like pertain to the terrestrial city, whether publicly, that is, for the safety or help of the people, or privately, when there are given forth for each one’s private good divine utterances whereby something of the future may be known for the use of temporal life?  But where we read, “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make for the house of Israel, and for the house of Judah, a new testament:  not according to the testament that I settled for their fathers in the day when I laid hold of their hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my testament, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.  For this is the testament that I will make for the house of Israel:  after those days, saith the Lord, I will give my laws in their mind, and will write them upon their hearts, and I will see to them; and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people;”

Heb. viii. 8–10.

Chapter 4.—About the Prefigured Change of the Israelitic Kingdom and Priesthood, and About the Things Hannah the Mother of Samuel Prophesied, Personating the Church.

Therefore the advance of the city of God, where it reached the times of the kings, yielded a figure, when, on the rejection of Saul, David first obtained the kingdom on such a footing that thenceforth his descendants should reign in the earthly Jerusalem in continual succession; for the course of affairs signified and foretold, what is not to be passed by in silence, concerning the change of things to come, what belongs to both Testaments, the Old and the New,—where the priesthood and kingdom are changed by one who is a priest, and at the same time a king, new and everlasting, even Christ Jesus.  For both the substitution in the ministry of God, on Eli’s rejection as priest, of Samuel, who executed at once the office of priest and judge, and the establishment of David in the kingdom, when Saul was rejected, typified this of which I speak.  And Hannah herself, the mother of Samuel, who formerly was barren, and afterwards was gladdened with fertility, does not seem to prophesy anything else, when she exultingly pours forth her thanksgiving to the Lord, on yielding up to God the same boy she had born and weaned with the same piety with which she had vowed him.  For she says, “My heart is made strong in the Lord, and my horn is exalted in my God; my mouth is enlarged over mine enemies; I am made glad in Thy salvation.  Because there is none holy as the Lord; and none is righteous as our God:  there is none holy save Thee.  Do not glory so proudly, and do not speak lofty things, neither let vaunting talk come out of your mouth; for a God of knowledge is the Lord, and a God preparing His curious designs.  The bow of the mighty hath He made weak, and the weak are girded with strength.  They that were full of bread are diminished; and the hungry have passed beyond the earth:  for the barren hath born seven; and she that hath many children is waxed feeble.  The Lord killeth and maketh alive:  He bringeth down to hell, and bringeth up again.  The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich:  He bringeth low and lifteth up.  He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, that He may set him among the mighty of [His] people, and maketh them inherit the throne of glory; giving the vow to him that voweth, and He hath blessed the years of the just:  for man is not mighty in strength.  The Lord shall make His adversary weak:  the Lord is holy.  Let not the prudent glory in his prudence and let not the mighty glory in his might; and let not the rich glory in his riches:  but let him that glorieth glory in this, to understand and know the Lord, and to do judgment and justice in the midst of the earth.  The Lord hath ascended into the heavens, and hath thundered:  He shall judge the ends of the earth, for He is righteous:  and He giveth strength to our kings, and shall exalt the horn of His Christ.”

1 Sam. ii. 1–10.

Do you say that these are the words of a single weak woman giving thanks for the birth of a son?  Can the mind of men be so much averse to the light of truth as not to perceive that the sayings this woman pours forth exceed her measure?  Moreover, he who is suitably interested in these things which have already begun to be fulfilled even in this earthly pilgrimage also, does he not apply his mind, and perceive, and acknowledge, that through this woman—whose very name, which is Hannah, means “His grace”—the very Christian religion, the very city of God, whose king and founder is Christ, in fine, the very grace of God, hath thus spoken by the prophetic Spirit, whereby the proud are cut off so that they fall, and the humble are filled so that they rise, which that hymn chiefly celebrates?  Unless perchance any one will say that this woman prophesied nothing, but only lauded God with exulting praise on account of the son whom she had obtained in answer to prayer.  What then does she mean when she says, “The bow of the mighty hath He made weak, and the weak are girded with strength; they that were full of bread are diminished, and the hungry have gone beyond the earth; for the barren hath born seven, and she that hath many children is waxed feeble?”  Had she herself born seven, although she had been barren?  She had only one when she said that; neither did she bear seven afterwards, nor six, with whom Samuel himself might be the seventh, but three males and two females.  And then, when as yet no one was king over that people, whence, if she did not prophesy, did she say what she puts at the end, “He giveth strength to our kings, and shall exalt the horn of His Christ?”

Therefore let the Church of Christ, the city of the great King,

Ps. xlviii. 2.

Chapter 5.—Of Those Things Which a Man of God Spake by the Spirit to Eli the Priest, Signifying that the Priesthood Which Had Been Appointed According to Aaron Was to Be Taken Away.

But this is said more plainly by a man of God sent to Eli the priest himself, whose name indeed is not mentioned, but whose office and ministry show him to have been indubitably a prophet.  For it is thus written:  “And there came a man of God unto Eli, and said, Thus saith the Lord, I plainly revealed myself unto thy father’s house, when they were in the land of Egypt slaves in Pharaoh’s house; and I chose thy father’s house out of all the sceptres of Israel to fill the office of priest for me, to go up to my altar, to burn incense and wear the ephod; and I gave thy father’s house for food all the offerings made by fire of the children of Israel.  Wherefore then hast thou looked at mine incense and at mine offerings with an impudent eye, and hast glorified thy sons above me, to bless the first-fruits of every sacrifice in Israel before me?  Therefore thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I said thy house and thy father’s house should walk before me for ever:  but now the Lord saith, Be it far from me; for them that honor me will I honor, and he that despiseth me shall be despised.  Behold, the days come, that I will cut off thy seed, and the seed of thy father’s house, and thou shalt never have an old man in my house.  And I will cut off the man of thine from mine altar, so that his eyes shall be consumed, and his heart shall melt away; and every one of thy house that is left shall fall by the sword of men.  And this shall be a sign unto thee that shall come upon these thy two sons, Hophni and Phinehas; in one day they shall die both of them.  And I will raise me up a faithful priest, that shall do according to all that is in mine heart and in my soul; and I will build him a sure house, and he shall walk before my Christ for ever.  And it shall come to pass that he who is left in thine house shall come to worship him with a piece of money, saying, Put me into one part of thy priesthood, that I may eat bread.”

1 Sam. ii. 27–36.

We cannot say that this prophecy, in which the change of the ancient priesthood is foretold with so great plainness, was fulfilled in Samuel; for although Samuel was not of another tribe than that which had been appointed by God to serve at the altar, yet he was not of the sons of Aaron, whose offspring was set apart that the priests might be taken out of it.  And thus by that transaction also the same change which should come to pass through Christ Jesus is shadowed forth, and the prophecy itself in deed, not in word, belonged to the Old Testament properly, but figuratively to the New, signifying by the fact just what was said by the word to Eli the priest through the prophet.  For there were afterwards priests of Aaron’s race, such as Zadok and Abiathar during David’s reign, and others in succession, before the time came when those things which were predicted so long before about the changing of the priesthood behoved to be fulfilled by Christ.  But who that now views these things with a believing eye does not see that they are fulfilled?  Since, indeed, no tabernacle, no temple, no altar, no sacrifice, and therefore no priest either, has remained to the Jews, to whom it was commanded in the law of God that he should be ordained of the seed of Aaron; which is also mentioned here by the prophet, when he says, “Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I said thy house and thy father’s house shall walk before me for ever:  but now the Lord saith, That be far from me; for them that honor me will I honor, and he that despiseth me shall be despised.”  For that in naming his father’s house he does not mean that of his immediate father, but that of Aaron, who first was appointed priest, to be succeeded by others descended from him, is shown by the preceding words, when he says, “I was revealed unto thy father’s house, when they were in the land of Egypt slaves in Pharaoh’s house; and I chose thy father’s house out of all the sceptres of Israel to fill the office of priest for me.”  Which of the fathers in that Egyptian slavery, but Aaron, was his father, who, when they were set free, was chosen to the priesthood?  It was of his lineage, therefore, he has said in this passage it should come to pass that they should no longer be priests; which already we see fulfilled.  If faith be watchful, the things are before us:  they are discerned, they are grasped, and are forced on the eyes of the unwilling, so that they are seen:  “Behold the days come,” he says, “that I will cut off thy seed, and the seed of thy father’s house, and thou shall never have an old man in mine house.  And I will cut off the man of thine from mine altar, so that his eyes shall be consumed and his heart shall melt away.”  Behold the days which were foretold have already come.  There is no priest after the order of Aaron; and whoever is a man of his lineage, when he sees the sacrifice of the Christians prevailing over the whole world, but that great honor taken away from himself, his eyes fail and his soul melts away consumed with grief.

But what follows belongs properly to the house of Eli, to whom these things were said:  “And every one of thine house that is left shall fall by the sword of men.  And this shall be a sign unto thee that shall come upon these thy two sons, Hophni and Phinehas; in one day they shall die both of them.”  This, therefore, is made a sign of the change of the priesthood from this man’s house, by which it is signified that the priesthood of Aaron’s house is to be changed.  For the death of this man’s sons signified the death not of the men, but of the priesthood itself of the sons of Aaron.  But what follows pertains to that Priest whom Samuel typified by succeeding this one.  Therefore the things which follow are said of Christ Jesus, the true Priest of the New Testament:  “And I will raise me up a faithful Priest that shall do according to all that is in mine heart and in my soul; and I will build Him a sure house.”  The same is the eternal Jerusalem above.  “And He shall walk,” saith He, “before my Christ always.”  “He shall walk” means “he shall be conversant with,” just as He had said before of Aaron’s house, “I said that thine house and thy father’s house shall walk before me for ever.”  But what He says, “He shall walk before my Christ,” is to be understood entirely of the house itself, not of the priest, who is Christ Himself, the Mediator and Saviour.  His house, therefore, shall walk before Him.  “Shall walk” may also be understood to mean from death to life, all the time this mortality passes through, even to the end of this world.  But where God says, “Who will do all that is in mine heart and in my soul,” we must not think that God has a soul, for He is the Author of souls; but this is said of God tropically, not properly, just as He is said to have hands and feet, and other corporal members.  And, lest it should be supposed from such language that man in the form of this flesh is made in the image of God, wings also are ascribed to Him, which man has not at all; and it is said to God, “Hide me under the shadow of Thy wings,”

Ps. xvii. 8.

But what is added, “And it shall come to pass that he who is left in thine house shall come to worship him,” is not said properly of the house of this Eli, but of that Aaron, the men of which remained even to the advent of Jesus Christ, of which race there are not wanting men even to this present.  For of that house of Eli it had already been said above, “And every one of thine house that is left shall fall by the sword of men.”  How, therefore, could it be truly said here, “And it shall come to pass that every one that is left shall come to worship him,” if that is true, that no one shall escape the avenging sword, unless he would have it understood of those who belong to the race of that whole priesthood after the order of Aaron?  Therefore, if it is of these the predestinated remnant, about whom another prophet has said, “The remnant shall be saved;”

Isa. x. 21.

What then does he say who comes to worship the priest of God, even the Priest who is God?  “Put me into one part of Thy priesthood, to eat bread.”  I do not wish to be set in the honor of my fathers, which is none; put me in a part of Thy priesthood.  For “I have chosen to be mean in Thine house;”

Ps. lxxxiv. 10.

Chapter 6.—Of the Jewish Priesthood and Kingdom, Which, Although Promised to Be Established for Ever, Did Not Continue; So that Other Things are to Be Understood to Which Eternity is Assured.

While, therefore, these things now shine forth as clearly as they were loftily foretold, still some one may not vainly be moved to ask, How can we be confident that all things are to come to pass which are predicted in these books as about to come, if this very thing which is there divinely spoken, “Thine house and thy father’s house shall walk before me for ever,” could not have effect?  For we see that priesthood has been changed; and there can be no hope that what was promised to that house may some time be fulfilled, because that which succeeds on its being rejected and changed is rather predicted as eternal.  He who says this does not yet understand, or does not recollect, that this very priesthood after the order of Aaron was appointed as the shadow of a future eternal priesthood; and therefore, when eternity is promised to it, it is not promised to the mere shadow and figure, but to what is shadowed forth and prefigured by it.  But lest it should be thought the shadow itself was to remain, therefore its mutation also behoved to be foretold.

Chapter 7.—Of the Disruption of the Kingdom of Israel, by Which the Perpetual Division of the Spiritual from the Carnal Israel Was Prefigured.

Again Saul sinned through disobedience, and again Samuel says to him in the word of the Lord, “Because thou hast despised the word of the Lord, the Lord hath despised thee, that thou mayest not be king over Israel.”

1 Sam. xv. 23.

Chapter 8.—Of the Promises Made to David in His Son, Which are in No Wise Fulfilled in Solomon, But Most Fully in Christ.

And now I see I must show what, pertaining to the matter I treat of, God promised to David himself, who succeeded Saul in the kingdom, whose change prefigured that final change on account of which all things were divinely spoken, all things were committed to writing.  When many things had gone prosperously with king David, he thought to make a house for God, even that temple of most excellent renown which was afterwards built by king Solomon his son.  While he was thinking of this, the word of the Lord came to Nathan the prophet, which he brought to the king, in which, after God had said that a house should not be built unto Him by David himself, and that in all that long time He had never commanded any of His people to build Him a house of cedar, he says, “And now thus shalt thou say unto my servant David, Thus saith God Almighty, I took thee from the sheep-cote that thou mightest be for a ruler over my people in Israel:  and I was with thee whithersoever thou wentest, and have cut off all thine enemies from before thy face, and have made thee a name, according to the name of the great ones who are over the earth.  And I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and will plant him, and he shall dwell apart, and shall be troubled no more; and the son of wickedness shall not humble him any more, as from the beginning, from the days when I appointed judges over my people Israel.  And I will give thee rest from all thine enemies, and the Lord will tell [hath told] thee, because thou shall build an house for Him.  And it shall come to pass when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shall sleep with thy fathers, that I will raise up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will prepare his kingdom.  He shall build me an house for my name; and I will order his throne even to eternity.  I will be his Father, and he shall be my son.  And if he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the sons of men:  but my mercy I will not take away from him, as I took it away from those whom I put away from before my face.  And his house shall be faithful, and his kingdom even for evermore before me, and his throne shall be set up even for evermore.”

2 Sam. vii. 8–16.

He who thinks this grand promise was fulfilled in Solomon greatly errs; for he attends to the saying, “He shall build me an house,” but he does not attend to the saying, “His house shall be faithful, and his kingdom for evermore before me.”  Let him therefore attend and behold the house of Solomon full of strange women worshipping false gods, and the king himself, aforetime wise, seduced by them, and cast down into the same idolatry:  and let him not dare to think that God either promised this falsely, or was unable to foreknow that Solomon and his house would become what they did.  But we ought not to be in doubt here, or to see the fulfillment of these things save in Christ our Lord, who was made of the seed of David according to the flesh,

Rom. i. 3.

Chapter 9.—How Like the Prophecy About Christ in the 89th Psalm is to the Things Promised in Nathan’s Prophecy in the Books of Samuel.

Wherefore also in the 89th Psalm, of which the title is, “An instruction for himself by Ethan the Israelite,” mention is made of the promises God made to king David, and some things are there added similar to those found in the Book of Samuel, such as this, “I have sworn to David my servant that I will prepare his seed for ever.”

Ps. lxxxix. 3, 4.

Chapter 10.—How Different the Acts in the Kingdom of the Earthly Jerusalem are from Those Which God Had Promised, So that the Truth of the Promise Should Be Understood to Pertain to the Glory of the Other King and Kingdom.

That it might not be supposed that a promise so strongly expressed and confirmed was fulfilled in Solomon, as if he hoped for, yet did not find it, he says, “But Thou hast cast off, and hast brought to nothing, O Lord.”

Ps. lxxxix. 38.

Chapter 11.—Of the Substance of the People of God, Which Through His Assumption of Flesh is in Christ, Who Alone Had Power to Deliver His Own Soul from Hell.

But after having prophesied these things, the prophet betakes him to praying to God; yet even the very prayer is prophecy:  “How long, Lord, dost Thou turn away in the end?”

Ps. lxxxix. 46.

Chapter 12.—To Whose Person the Entreaty for the Promises is to Be Understood to Belong, When He Says in the Psalm, “Where are Thine Ancient Compassions, Lord?” Etc.

But the rest of this psalm runs thus:  “Where are Thine ancient compassions, Lord, which Thou swarest unto David in Thy truth?  Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants, which I have borne in my bosom of many nations; wherewith Thine enemies have reproached, O Lord, wherewith they have reproached the change of Thy Christ.”

Ps. lxxxix. 49–51.

Chapter 13.—Whether the Truth of This Promised Peace Can Be Ascribed to Those Times Passed Away Under Solomon.

Whoever hopes for this so great good in this world, and in this earth, his wisdom is but folly.  Can any one think it was fulfilled in the peace of Solomon’s reign?  Scripture certainly commends that peace with excellent praise as a shadow of that which is to come.  But this opinion is to be vigilantly opposed, since after it is said, “And the son of iniquity shall not humble him any more,” it is immediately added, “as from the beginning, from the days in which I appointed judges over my people Israel.”

2 Sam. vii. 10–11.

Chapter 14.—Of David’s Concern in the Writing of the Psalms.

In the progress of the city of God through the ages, therefore, David first reigned in the earthly Jerusalem as a shadow of that which was to come.  Now David was a man skilled in songs, who dearly loved musical harmony, not with a vulgar delight, but with a believing disposition, and by it served his God, who is the true God, by the mystical representation of a great thing.  For the rational and well-ordered concord of diverse sounds in harmonious variety suggests the compact unity of the well-ordered city.  Then almost all his prophecy is in psalms, of which a hundred and fifty are contained in what we call the Book of Psalms, of which some will have it those only were made by David which are in scribed with his name.  But there are also some who think none of them were made by him except those which are marked “Of David;” but those which have in the title “For David” have been made by others who assumed his person.  Which opinion is refuted by the voice of the Saviour Himself in the Gospel, when He says that David himself by the Spirit said Christ was his Lord; for the 110th Psalm begins thus, “The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit Thou at my right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool.”

Ps. cx. 1, quoted in Matt. xxii. 44.

Chapter 15.—Whether All the Things Prophesied in the Psalms Concerning Christ and His Church Should Be Taken Up in the Text of This Work.

And now I see it may be expected of me that I shall open up in this part of this book what David may have prophesied in the Psalms concerning the Lord Jesus Christ or His Church.  But although I have already done so in one instance, I am prevented from doing as that expectation seems to demand, rather by the abundance than the scarcity of matter.  For the necessity of shunning prolixity forbids my setting down all things; yet I fear lest if I select some I shall appear to many, who know these things, to have passed by the more necessary.  Besides, the proof that is adduced ought to be supported by the context of the whole psalm, so that at least there may be nothing against it if everything does not support it; lest we should seem, after the fashion of the centos, to gather for the thing we wish, as it were, verses out of a grand poem, what shall be found to have been written not about it, but about some other and widely different thing.  But ere this could be pointed out in each psalm, the whole of it must be expounded; and how great a work that would be, the volumes of others, as well as our own, in which we have done it, show well enough.  Let him then who will, or can, read these volumes, and he will find out how many and great things David, at once king and prophet, has prophesied concerning Christ and His Church, to wit, concerning the King and the city which He has built.

Chapter 16.—Of the Things Pertaining to Christ and the Church, Said Either Openly or Tropically in the 45th Psalm.

For whatever direct and manifest prophetic utterances there may be about anything, it is necessary that those which are tropical should be mingled with them; which, chiefly on account of those of slower understanding, thrust upon the more learned the laborious task of clearing up and expounding them.  Some of them, indeed, on the very first blush, as soon as they are spoken, exhibit Christ and the Church, although some things in them that are less intelligible remain to be expounded at leisure.  We have an example of this in that same Book of Psalms:  “My heart bubbled up a good matter:  I utter my words to the king.  My tongue is the pen of a scribe, writing swiftly.  Thy form is beautiful beyond the sons of men; grace is poured out in Thy lips:  therefore God hath blessed Thee for evermore.  Gird Thy sword about Thy thigh, O Most Mighty.  With Thy goodliness and Thy beauty go forward, proceed prosperously, and reign, because of Thy truth, and meekness, and righteousness; and Thy right hand shall lead Thee forth wonderfully.  Thy sharp arrows are most powerful:  in the heart of the king’s enemies.  The people shall fall under Thee.  Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever:  a rod of direction is the rod of Thy kingdom.  Thou hast loved righteousness, and hast hated iniquity:  therefore God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the oil of exultation above Thy fellows.  Myrrh and drops, and cassia from Thy vestments, from the houses of ivory:  out of which the daughters of kings have delighted Thee in Thine honor.”

Ps. xlv. 1–9.

Chapter 17.—Of Those Things in the 110th Psalm Which Relate to the Priesthood of Christ, and in the 22d to His Passion.

Just as in that psalm also where Christ is most openly proclaimed as Priest, even as He is here as King, “The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit Thou at my right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool.”

Ps. cx. 1.

Chapter 18.—Of the 3d, 41st, 15th, and 68th Psalms, in Which the Death and Resurrection of the Lord are Prophesied.

About His resurrection also the oracles of the Psalms are by no means silent.  For what else is it that is sung in His person in the 3d Psalm, “I laid me down and took a sleep, [and] I awaked, for the Lord shall sustain me?”

Ps. iii. 5.

Chapter 19.—Of the 69th Psalm, in Which the Obstinate Unbelief of the Jews is Declared.

But when the Jews will not in the least yield to the testimonies of this prophecy, which are so manifest, and are also brought by events to so clear and certain a completion, certainly that is fulfilled in them which is written in that psalm which here follows.  For when the things which pertain to His passion are prophetically spoken there also in the person of Christ, that is mentioned which is unfolded in the Gospel:  “They gave me gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar for drink.”

Ps. lxix. 21; Matt. xxvii. 34, 48.

Chapter 20.—Of David’s Reign and Merit; And of His Son Solomon, and that Prophecy Relating to Christ Which is Found Either in Those Books Which are Joined to Those Written by Him, or in Those Which are Indubitably His.

David therefore reigned in the earthly Jerusalem, a son of the heavenly Jerusalem, much praised by the divine testimony; for even his faults are overcome by great piety, through the most salutary humility of his repentance, that he is altogether one of those of whom he himself says, “Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.”

Ps. xxxii. 1.

But as regards those three books which it is evident are Solomon’s and held canonical by the Jews, to show what of this kind may be found in them pertaining to Christ and the Church demands a laborious discussion, which, if now entered on, would lengthen this work unduly.  Yet what we read in the Proverbs of impious men saying, “Let us unrighteously hide in the earth the righteous man; yea, let us swallow him up alive as hell, and let us take away his memory from the earth:  let us seize his precious possession,”

Prov. i. 11–13.

Chapter 21.—Of the Kings After Solomon, Both in Judah and Israel.

The other kings of the Hebrews after Solomon are scarcely found to have prophesied, through certain enigmatic words or actions of theirs, what may pertain to Christ and the Church, either in Judah or Israel; for so were the parts of that people styled, when, on account of Solomon’s offence, from the time of Rehoboam his son, who succeeded him in the kingdom, it was divided by God as a punishment.  The ten tribes, indeed, which Jeroboam the servant of Solomon received, being appointed the king in Samaria, were distinctively called Israel, although this had been the name of that whole people; but the two tribes, namely, of Judah and Benjamin, which for David’s sake, lest the kingdom should be wholly wrenched from his race, remained subject to the city of Jerusalem, were called Judah, because that was the tribe whence David sprang.  But Benjamin, the other tribe which, as was said, belonged to the same kingdom, was that whence Saul sprang before David.  But these two tribes together, as was said, were called Judah, and were distinguished by this name from Israel which was the distinctive title of the ten tribes under their own king.  For the tribe of Levi, because it was the priestly one, bound to the servitude of God, not of the kings, was reckoned the thirteenth.  For Joseph, one of the twelve sons of Israel, did not, like the others, form one tribe, but two, Ephraim and Manasseh.  Yet the tribe of Levi also belonged more to the kingdom of Jerusalem, where was the temple of God whom it served.  On the division of the people, therefore, Rehoboam, son of Solomon, reigned in Jerusalem as the first king of Judah, and Jeroboam, servant of Solomon, in Samaria as king of Israel.  And when Rehoboam wished as a tyrant to pursue that separated part with war, the people were prohibited from fighting with their brethren by God, who told them through a prophet that He had done this; whence it appeared that in this matter there had been no sin either of the king or people of Israel, but the accomplished will of God the avenger.  When this was known, both parts settled down peaceably, for the division made was not religious but political.

Chapter 22.—Of Jeroboam, Who Profaned the People Put Under Him by the Impiety of Idolatry, Amid Which, However, God Did Not Cease to Inspire the Prophets, and to Guard Many from the Crime of Idolatry.

But Jeroboam king of Israel, with perverse mind, not believing in God, whom he had proved true in promising and giving him the kingdom, was afraid lest, by coming to the temple of God which was in Jerusalem, where, according to the divine law, that whole nation was to come in order to sacrifice, the people should be seduced from him, and return to David’s line as the seed royal; and set up idolatry in his kingdom, and with horrible impiety beguiled the people, ensnaring them to the worship of idols with himself.  Yet God did not altogether cease to reprove by the prophets, not only that king, but also his successors and imitators in his impiety, and the people too.  For there the great and illustrious prophet Elijah and Elisha his disciple arose, who also did many wonderful works.  Even there, when Elijah said, “O Lord, they have slain Thy prophets, they have digged down Thine altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life,” it was answered that seven thousand men were there who had not bowed the knee to Baal.

1 Kings xix. 10, 14, 15.

Chapter 23.—Of the Varying Condition of Both the Hebrew Kingdoms, Until the People of Both Were at Different Times Led into Captivity, Judah Being Afterwards Recalled into His Kingdom, Which Finally Passed into the Power of the Romans.

So also in the kingdom of Judah pertaining to Jerusalem prophets were not lacking even in the times of succeeding kings, just as it pleased God to send them, either for the prediction of what was needful, or for correction of sin and instruction in righteousness;

2 Tim. iii. 16.

Chapter 24.—Of the Prophets, Who Either Were the Last Among the Jews, or Whom the Gospel History Reports About the Time of Christ’s Nativity.

But in that whole time after they returned from Babylon, after Malachi, Haggai, and Zechariah, who then prophesied, and Ezra, they had no prophets down to the time of the Saviour’s advent except another Zechariah, the father of John, and Elisabeth his wife, when the nativity of Christ was already close at hand; and when He was already born, Simeon the aged, and Anna a widow, and now very old; and, last of all, John himself, who, being a young man, did not predict that Christ, now a young man, was to come, but by prophetic knowledge pointed Him out though unknown; for which reason the Lord Himself says, “The law and the prophets were until John.”

Matt. xi. 13.

Chapter 1.—Of Those Things Down to the Times of the Saviour Which Have Been Discussed in the Seventeen Books.

I Promised to write of the rise, progress, and appointed end of the two cities, one of which is God’s, the other this world’s, in which, so far as mankind is concerned, the former is now a stranger.  But first of all I undertook, so far as His grace should enable me, to refute the enemies of the city of God, who prefer their gods to Christ its founder, and fiercely hate Christians with the most deadly malice.  And this I have done in the first ten books.  Then, as regards my threefold promise which I have just mentioned, I have treated distinctly, in the four books which follow the tenth, of the rise of both cities.  After that, I have proceeded from the first man down to the flood in one book, which is the fifteenth of this work; and from that again down to Abraham our work has followed both in chronological order.  From the patriarch Abraham down to the time of the Israelite kings, at which we close our sixteenth book, and thence down to the advent of Christ Himself in the flesh, to which period the seventeenth book reaches, the city of God appears from my way of writing to have run its course alone; whereas it did not run its course alone in this age, for both cities, in their course amid mankind, certainly experienced chequered times together just as from the beginning.  But I did this in order that, first of all, from the time when the promises of God began to be more clear, down to the virgin birth of Him in whom those things promised from the first were to be fulfilled, the course of that city which is God’s might be made more distinctly apparent, without interpolation of foreign matter from the history of the other city, although down to the revelation of the new covenant it ran its course, not in light, but in shadow.  Now, therefore, I think fit to do what I passed by, and show, so far as seems necessary, how that other city ran its course from the times of Abraham, so that attentive readers may compare the two.

Chapter 2.—Of the Kings and Times of the Earthly City Which Were Synchronous with the Times of the Saints, Reckoning from the Rise of Abraham.

The society of mortals spread abroad through the earth everywhere, and in the most diverse places, although bound together by a certain fellowship of our common nature, is yet for the most part divided against itself, and the strongest oppress the others, because all follow after their own interests and lusts, while what is longed for either suffices for none, or not for all, because it is not the very thing.  For the vanquished succumb to the victorious, preferring any sort of peace and safety to freedom itself; so that they who chose to die rather than be slaves have been greatly wondered at.  For in almost all nations the very voice of nature somehow proclaims, that those who happen to be conquered should choose rather to be subject to their conquerors than to be killed by all kinds of warlike destruction.  This does not take place without the providence of God, in whose power it lies that any one either subdues or is subdued in war; that some are endowed with kingdoms, others made subject to kings.  Now, among the very many kingdoms of the earth into which, by earthly interest or lust, society is divided (which we call by the general name of the city of this world), we see that two, settled and kept distinct from each other both in time and place, have grown far more famous than the rest, first that of the Assyrians, then that of the Romans.  First came the one, then the other.  The former arose in the east, and, immediately on its close, the latter in the west.  I may speak of other kingdoms and other kings as appendages of these.

Ninus, then, who succeeded his father Belus, the first king of Assyria, was already the second king of that kingdom when Abraham was born in the land of the Chaldees.  There was also at that time a very small kingdom of Sicyon, with which, as from an ancient date, that most universally learned man Marcus Varro begins, in writing of the Roman race.  For from these kings of Sicyon he passes to the Athenians, from them to the Latins, and from these to the Romans.  Yet very little is related about these kingdoms, before the foundation of Rome, in comparison with that of Assyria.  For although even Sallust, the Roman historian, admits that the Athenians were very famous in Greece, yet he thinks they were greater in fame than in fact.  For in speaking of them he says, “The deeds of the Athenians, as I think, were very great and magnificent, but yet somewhat less than reported by fame.  But because writers of great genius arose among them, the deeds of the Athenians were celebrated throughout the world as very great.  Thus the virtue of those who did them was held to be as great as men of transcendent genius could represent it to be by the power of laudatory words.”

Sallust, Bell. Cat. c. 8.

At Abraham’s birth, then, the second kings of Assyria and Sicyon respectively were Ninus and Europs, the first having been Belus and Ægialeus.  But when God promised Abraham, on his departure from Babylonia, that he should become a great nation, and that in his seed all nations of the earth should be blessed, the Assyrians had their seventh king, the Sicyons their fifth; for the son of Ninus reigned among them after his mother Semiramis, who is said to have been put to death by him for attempting to defile him by incestuously lying with him.  Some think that she founded Babylon, and indeed she may have founded it anew.  But we have told, in the sixteenth book, when or by whom it was founded.  Now the son of Ninus and Semiramis, who succeeded his mother in the kingdom, is also called Ninus by some, but by others Ninias, a patronymic word.  Telexion then held the kingdom of the Sicyons.  In his reign times were quiet and joyful to such a degree, that after his death they worshipped him as a god by offering sacrifices and by celebrating games, which are said to have been first instituted on this occasion.

Chapter 3.—What Kings Reigned in Assyria and Sicyon When, According to the Promise, Isaac Was Born to Abraham in His Hundredth Year, and When the Twins Esau and Jacob Were Born of Rebecca to Isaac in His Sixtieth Year.

In his times also, by the promise of God, Isaac, the son of Abraham, was born to his father when he was a hundred years old, of Sarah his wife, who, being barren and old, had already lost hope of issue.  Aralius was then the fifth king of the Assyrians.  To Isaac himself, in his sixtieth year, were born twin-sons, Esau and Jacob, whom Rebecca his wife bore to him, their grandfather Abraham, who died on completing a hundred and seventy years, being still alive, and reckoning his hundred and sixtieth year.

In the Hebrew text, Gen. xxv. 7, a hundred and seventy-five years.

Chapter 4.—Of the Times of Jacob and His Son Joseph.

In the reign of Balæus, the ninth king of Assyria, and Mesappus, the eighth of Sicyon, who is said by some to have been also called Cephisos (if indeed the same man had both names, and those who put the other name in their writings have not rather confounded him with another man), while Apis was third king of Argos, Isaac died, a hundred and eighty years old, and left his twin-sons a hundred and twenty years old.  Jacob, the younger of these, belonged to the city of God about which we write (the elder being wholly rejected), and had twelve sons, one of whom, called Joseph, was sold by his brothers to merchants going down to Egypt, while his grandfather Isaac was still alive.  But when he was thirty years of age, Joseph stood before Pharaoh, being exalted out of the humiliation he endured, because, in divinely interpreting the king’s dreams, he foretold that there would be seven years of plenty, the very rich abundance of which would be consumed by seven other years of famine that should follow.  On this account the king made him ruler over Egypt, liberating him from prison, into which he had been thrown for keeping his chastity intact; for he bravely preserved it from his mistress, who wickedly loved him, and told lies to his weakly credulous master, and did not consent to commit adultery with her, but fled from her, leaving his garment in her hands when she laid hold of him.  In the second of the seven years of famine Jacob came down into Egypt to his son with all he had, being a hundred and thirty years old, as he himself said in answer to the king’s question.  Joseph was then thirty-nine, if we add seven years of plenty and two of famine to the thirty he reckoned when honored by the king.

Chapter 5.—Of Apis King of Argos, Whom the Egyptians Called Serapis, and Worshipped with Divine Honors.

In these times Apis king of Argos crossed over into Egypt in ships, and, on dying there, was made Serapis, the chief god of all the Egyptians.  Now Varro gives this very ready reason why, after his death, he was called, not Apis, but Serapis.  The ark in which he was placed when dead, which every one now calls a sarcophagus, was then called in Greek σορὸς, and they began to worship him when buried in it before his temple was built; and from Soros and Apis he was called first [Sorosapis, or] Sorapis, and then Serapis, by changing a letter, as easily happens.  It was decreed regarding him also, that whoever should say he had been a man should be capitally punished.  And since in every temple where Isis and Serapis were worshipped there was also an image which, with finger pressed on the lips, seemed to warn men to keep silence, Varro thinks this signifies that it should be kept secret that they had been human.  But that bull which, with wonderful folly, deluded Egypt nourished with abundant delicacies in honor of him, was not called Serapis, but Apis, because they worshipped him alive without a sarcophagus.  On the death of that bull, when they sought and found a calf of the same color,—that is, similarly marked with certain white spots,—they believed it was something miraculous, and divinely provided for them.  Yet it was no great thing for the demons, in order to deceive them, to show to a cow when she was conceiving and pregnant the image of such a bull, which she alone could see, and by it attract the breeding passion of the mother, so that it might appear in a bodily shape in her young, just as Jacob so managed with the spotted rods that the sheep and goats were born spotted.  For what men can do with real colors and substances, the demons can very easily do by showing unreal forms to breeding animals.

Chapter 6.—Who Were Kings of Argos, and of Assyria, When Jacob Died in Egypt.

Apis, then, who died in Egypt, was not the king of Egypt, but of Argos.  He was succeeded by his son Argus, from whose name the land was called Argos and the people Argives, for under the earlier kings neither the place nor the nation as yet had this name.  While he then reigned over Argos, and Eratus over Sicyon, and Balæus still remained king of Assyria, Jacob died in Egypt a hundred and forty-seven years old, after he had, when dying, blessed his sons and his grandsons by Joseph, and prophesied most plainly of Christ, saying in the blessing of Judah, “A prince shall not fail out of Judah, nor a leader from his thighs, until those things come which are laid up for him; and He is the expectation of the nations.”

Gen. xlix. 10.

Chapter 7.—Who Were Kings When Joseph Died in Egypt.

In the reign of Mamitus, the twelfth king of Assyria, and Plemnæus, the eleventh of Sicyon, while Argus still reigned over the Argives, Joseph died in Egypt a hundred and ten years old.  After his death, the people of God, increasing wonderfully, remained in Egypt a hundred and forty-five years, in tranquillity at first, until those who knew Joseph were dead.  Afterward, through envy of their increase, and the suspicion that they would at length gain their freedom, they were oppressed with persecutions and the labors of intolerable servitude, amid which, however, they still grew, being multiplied with God-given fertility.  During this period the same kingdoms continued in Assyria and Greece.

Chapter 8.—Who Were Kings When Moses Was Born, and What Gods Began to Be Worshipped Then.

When Saphrus reigned as the fourteenth king of Assyria, and Orthopolis as the twelfth of Sicyon, and Criasus as the fifth of Argos, Moses was born in Egypt, by whom the people of God were liberated from the Egyptian slavery, in which they behoved to be thus tried that they might desire the help of their Creator.  Some have thought that Prometheus lived during the reign of the kings now named.  He is reported to have formed men out of clay, because he was esteemed the best teacher of wisdom; yet it does not appear what wise men there were in his days.  His brother Atlas is said to have been a great astrologer; and this gave occasion for the fable that he held up the sky, although the vulgar opinion about his holding up the sky appears rather to have been suggested by a high mountain named after him.  Indeed, from those times many other fabulous things began to be invented in Greece; yet, down to Cecrops king of Athens, in whose reign that city received its name, and in whose reign God brought His people out of Egypt by Moses, only a few dead heroes are reported to have been deified according to the vain superstition of the Greeks.  Among these were Melantomice, the wife of king Criasus, and Phorbas their son, who succeeded his father as sixth king of the Argives, and Iasus, son of Triopas, their seventh king, and their ninth king, Sthenelas, or Stheneleus, or Sthenelus,—for his name is given differently by different authors.  In those times also, Mercury, the grandson of Atlas by his daughter Maia, is said to have lived, according to the common report in books.  He was famous for his skill in many arts, and taught them to men, for which they resolved to make him, and even believed that he deserved to be, a god after death.  Hercules is said to have been later, yet belonging to the same period; although some, whom I think mistaken, assign him an earlier date than Mercury.  But at whatever time they were born, it is agreed among grave historians, who have committed these ancient things to writing, that both were men, and that they merited divine honors from mortals because they conferred on them many benefits to make this life more pleasant to them.  Minerva was far more ancient than these; for she is reported to have appeared in virgin age in the times of Ogyges at the lake called Triton, from which she is also styled Tritonia, the inventress truly of many works, and the more readily believed to be a goddess because her origin was so little known.  For what is sung about her having sprung from the head of Jupiter belongs to the region of poetry and fable, and not to that of history and real fact.  And historical writers are not agreed when Ogyges flourished, in whose time also a great flood occurred,—not that greatest one from which no man escaped except those who could get into the ark, for neither Greek nor Latin history knew of it, yet a greater flood than that which happened afterward in Deucalion’s time.  For Varro begins the book I have already mentioned at this date, and does not propose to himself, as the starting-point from which he may arrive at Roman affairs, anything more ancient than the flood of Ogyges, that is, which happened in the time of Ogyges.  Now our writers of chronicles—first Eusebius, and afterwards Jerome, who entirely follow some earlier historians in this opinion—relate that the flood of Ogyges happened more than three hundred years after, during the reign of Phoroneus, the second king of Argos.  But whenever he may have lived, Minerva was already worshipped as a goddess when Cecrops reigned in Athens, in whose reign the city itself is reported to have been rebuilt or founded.

Chapter 9.—When the City of Athens Was Founded, and What Reason Varro Assigns for Its Name.

Athens certainly derived its name from Minerva, who in Greek is called ᾽Αθηνη, and Varro points out the following reason why it was so called.  When an olive-tree suddenly appeared there, and water burst forth in another place, these prodigies moved the king to send to the Delphic Apollo to inquire what they meant and what he should do.  He answered that the olive signified Minerva, the water Neptune, and that the citizens had it in their power to name their city as they chose, after either of these two gods whose signs these were.  On receiving this oracle, Cecrops convoked all the citizens of either sex to give their vote, for it was then the custom in those parts for the women also to take part in public deliberations.  When the multitude was consulted, the men gave their votes for Neptune, the women for Minerva; and as the women had a majority of one, Minerva conquered.  Then Neptune, being enraged, laid waste the lands of the Athenians, by casting up the waves of the sea; for the demons have no difficulty in scattering any waters more widely.  The same authority said, that to appease his wrath the women should be visited by the Athenians with the three-fold punishment—that they should no longer have any vote; that none of their children should be named after their mothers; and that no one should call them Athenians.  Thus that city, the mother and nurse of liberal doctrines, and of so many and so great philosophers, than whom Greece had nothing more famous and noble, by the mockery of demons about the strife of their gods, a male and female, and from the victory of the female one through the women, received the name of Athens; and, on being damaged by the vanquished god, was compelled to punish the very victory of the victress, fearing the waters of Neptune more than the arms of Minerva.  For in the women who were thus punished, Minerva, who had conquered, was conquered too, and could not even help her voters so far that, although the right of voting was henceforth lost, and the mothers could not give their names to the children, they might at least be allowed to be called Athenians, and to merit the name of that goddess whom they had made victorious over a male god by giving her their votes.  What and how much could be said about this, if we had not to hasten to other things in our discourse, is obvious.

Chapter 10.—What Varro Reports About the Term Areopagus, and About Deucalion’s Flood.

Marcus Varro, however, is not willing to credit lying fables against the gods, lest he should find something dishonoring to their majesty; and therefore he will not admit that the Areopagus, the place where the Apostle Paul disputed with the Athenians, got this name because Mars, who in Greek is called ἌΑρης, when he was charged with the crime of homicide, and was judged by twelve gods in that field, was acquitted by the sentence of six; because it was the custom, when the votes were equal, to acquit rather than condemn.  Against this opinion, which is much most widely published, he tries, from the notices of obscure books, to support another reason for this name, lest the Athenians should be thought to have called it Areopagus from the words” Mars” and “field,”

Ἀρης and πάγος.

Chapter 11.—When Moses Led the People Out of Egypt; And Who Were Kings When His Successor Joshua the Son of Nun Died.

Moses led the people out of Egypt in the last time of Cecrops king of Athens, when Ascatades reigned in Assyria, Marathus in Sicyon, Triopas in Argos; and having led forth the people, he gave them at Mount Sinai the law he received from God, which is called the Old Testament, because it has earthly promises, and because, through Jesus Christ, there was to be a New Testament, in which the kingdom of heaven should be promised.  For the same order behoved to be observed in this as is observed in each man who prospers in God, according to the saying of the apostle, “That is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural,” since, as he says, and that truly, “The first man of the earth, is earthly; the second man, from heaven, is heavenly.”

1 Cor. xv. 46, 47.

Chapter 12.—Of the Rituals of False Gods Instituted by the Kings of Greece in the Period from Israel’s Exodus from Egypt Down to the Death of Joshua the Son of Nun.

During this period, that is, from Israel’s exodus from Egypt down to the death of Joshua the son of Nun, through whom that people received the land of promise, rituals were instituted to the false gods by the kings of Greece, which, by stated celebration, recalled the memory of the flood, and of men’s deliverance from it, and of that troublous life they then led in migrating to and fro between the heights and the plains.  For even the Luperci,

The priests who officiated at the Lupercalia.

Chapter 13.—What Fables Were Invented at the Time When Judges Began to Rule the Hebrews.

After the death of Joshua the son of Nun, the people of God had judges, in whose times they were alternately humbled by afflictions on account of their sins, and consoled by prosperity through the compassion of God.  In those times were invented the fables about Triptolemus, who, at the command of Ceres, borne by winged snakes, bestowed corn on the needy lands in flying over them; about that beast the Minotaur, which was shut up in the Labyrinth, from which men who entered its inextricable mazes could find no exit; about the Centaurs, whose form was a compound of horse and man; about Cerberus, the three-headed dog of hell; about Phryxus and his sister Hellas, who fled, borne by a winged ram; about the Gorgon, whose hair was composed of serpents, and who turned those who looked on her into stone; about Bellerophon, who was carried by a winged horse called Pegasus; about Amphion, who charmed and attracted the stones by the sweetness of his harp; about the artificer Dædalus and his son Icarus, who flew on wings they had fitted on; about Œdipus, who compelled a certain four-footed monster with a human face, called a sphynx, to destroy herself by casting herself headlong, having solved the riddle she was wont to propose as insoluble; about Antæus, who was the son of the earth, for which reason, on falling on the earth, he was wont to rise up stronger, whom Hercules slew; and perhaps there are others which I have forgotten.  These fables, easily found in histories containing a true account of events, bring us down to the Trojan war, at which Marcus Varro has closed his second book about the race of the Roman people; and they are so skillfully invented by men as to involve no scandal to the gods.  But whoever have pretended as to Jupiter’s rape of Ganymede, a very beautiful boy, that king Tantalus committed the crime, and the fable ascribed it to Jupiter; or as to his impregnating Danäe as a golden shower, that it means that the woman’s virtue was corrupted by gold:  whether these things were really done or only fabled in those days, or were really done by others and falsely ascribed to Jupiter, it is impossible to tell how much wickedness must have been taken for granted in men’s hearts that they should be thought able to listen to such lies with patience.  And yet they willingly accepted them, when, indeed, the more devotedly they worshipped Jupiter, they ought the more severely to have punished those who durst say such things of him.  But they not only were not angry at those who invented these things, but were afraid that the gods would be angry at them if they did not act such fictions even in the theatres.  In those times Latona bore Apollo, not him of whose oracle we have spoken above as so often consulted, but him who is said, along with Hercules, to have fed the flocks of king Admetus; yet he was so believed to be a god, that very many, indeed almost all, have believed him to be the selfsame Apollo.  Then also Father Liber made war in India, and led in his army many women called Bacchæ, who were notable not so much for valor as for fury.  Some, indeed, write that this Liber was both conquered and bound and some that he was slain in Persia, even telling where he was buried; and yet in his name, as that of a god, the unclean demons have instituted the sacred, or rather the sacrilegious, Bacchanalia, of the outrageous vileness of which the senate, after many years, became so much ashamed as to prohibit them in the city of Rome.  Men believed that in those times Perseus and his wife Andromeda were raised into heaven after their death, so that they were not ashamed or afraid to mark out their images by constellations, and call them by their names.

Chapter 14.—Of the Theological Poets.

During the same period of time arose the poets, who were also called theologues, because they made hymns about the gods; yet about such gods as, although great men, were yet but men, or the elements of this world which the true God made, or creatures who were ordained as principalities and powers according to the will of the Creator and their own merit.  And if, among much that was vain and false, they sang anything of the one true God, yet, by worshipping Him along with others who are not gods, and showing them the service that is due to Him alone, they did not serve Him at all rightly; and even such poets as Orpheus, Musæus, and Linus, were unable to abstain from dishonoring their gods by fables.  But yet these theologues worshipped the gods, and were not worshipped as gods, although the city of the ungodly is wont, I know not how, to set Orpheus over the sacred, or rather sacrilegious, rites of hell.  The wife of king Athamas, who was called Ino, and her son Melicertes, perished by throwing themselves into the sea, and were, according to popular belief, reckoned among the gods, like other men of the same times, [among whom were] Castor and Pollux.  The Greeks, indeed, called her who was the mother of Melicertes, Leucothea, the Latins, Matuta; but both thought her a goddess.

Chapter 15.—Of the Fall of the Kingdom of Argos, When Picus the Son of Saturn First Received His Father’s Kingdom of Laurentum.

During those times the kingdom of Argos came to an end; being transferred to Mycene, from which Agamemnon came, and the kingdom of Laurentum arose, of which Picus son of Saturn was the first king, when the woman Deborah judged the Hebrews; but it was the Spirit of God who used her as His agent, for she was also a prophetess, although her prophecy is so obscure that we could not demonstrate, without a long discussion, that it was uttered concerning Christ.  Now the Laurentes already reigned in Italy, from whom the origin of the Roman people is quite evidently derived after the Greeks; yet the kingdom of Assyria still lasted, in which Lampares was the twenty-third king when Picus first began to reign at Laurentum.  The worshippers of such gods may see what they are to think of Saturn the father of Picus, who deny that he was a man; of whom some also have written that he himself reigned in Italy before Picus his son; and Virgil in his well-known book says,

“That race indocile, and through mountains high

Dispersed, he settled, and endowed with laws,

And named their country Latium, because

Chapter 16.—Of Diomede, Who After the Destruction of Troy Was Placed Among the Gods, While His Companions are Said to Have Been Changed into Birds.

Troy was overthrown, and its destruction was everywhere sung and made well known even to boys; for it was signally published and spread abroad, both by its own greatness and by writers of excellent style.  And this was done in the reign of Latinus the son of Faunus, from whom the kingdom began to be called Latium instead of Laurentum.  The victorious Greeks, on leaving Troy destroyed and returning to their own countries, were torn and crushed by divers and horrible calamities.  Yet even from among them they increased the number of their gods for they made Diomede a god.  They allege that his return home was prevented by a divinely imposed punishment, and they prove, not by fabulous and poetic falsehood, but by historic attestation, that his companions were turned into birds.  Yet they think that, even although he was made a god, he could neither restore them to the human form by his own power, nor yet obtain it from Jupiter his king, as a favor granted to a new inhabitant of heaven.  They also say that his temple is in the island of Diomedæa, not far from Mount Garganus in Apulia, and that these birds fly round about this temple, and worship in it with such wonderful obedience, that they fill their beaks with water and sprinkle it; and if Greeks, or those born of the Greek race, come there, they are not only still, but fly to meet them; but if they are foreigners, they fly up at their heads, and wound them with such severe strokes as even to kill them.  For they are said to be well enough armed for these combats with their hard and large beaks.

Chapter 17.—What Varro Says of the Incredible Transformations of Men.

In support of this story, Varro relates others no less incredible about that most famous sorceress Circe, who changed the companions of Ulysses into beasts, and about the Arcadians, who, by lot, swam across a certain pool, and were turned into wolves there, and lived in the deserts of that region with wild beasts like themselves.  But if they never fed on human flesh for nine years, they were restored to the human form on swimming back again through the same pool.  Finally, he expressly names one Demænetus, who, on tasting a boy offered up in sacrifice by the Arcadians to their god Lycæus according to their custom, was changed into a wolf, and, being restored to his proper form in the tenth year, trained himself as a pugilist, and was victorious at the Olympic games.  And the same historian thinks that the epithet Lycæus was applied in Arcadia to Pan and Jupiter for no other reason than this metamorphosis of men into wolves, because it was thought it could not be wrought except by a divine power.  For a wolf is called in Greek λυκὸς, from which the name Lycæus appears to be formed.  He says also that the Roman Luperci were as it were sprung of the seed of these mysteries.

Chapter 18.—What We Should Believe Concerning the Transformations Which Seem to Happen to Men Through the Art of Demons.

Perhaps our readers expect us to say something about this so great delusion wrought by the demons; and what shall we say but that men must fly out of the midst of Babylon?

Isa. xlviii. 20.

Chapter 19.—That Æneas Came into Italy When Abdon the Judge Ruled Over the Hebrews.

After the capture and destruction of Troy, Æneas, with twenty ships laden with the Trojan relics, came into Italy, when Latinus reigned there, Menestheus in Athens, Polyphidos in Sicyon, and Tautanos in Assyria, and Abdon was judge of the Hebrews.  On the death of Latinus, Æneas reigned three years, the same kings continuing in the above-named places, except that Pelasgus was now king in Sicyon, and Samson was judge of the Hebrews, who is thought to be Hercules, because of his wonderful strength.  Now the Latins made Æneas one of their gods, because at his death he was nowhere to be found.  The Sabines also placed among the gods their first king, Sancus, [Sangus], or Sanctus, as some call him.  At that time Codrus king of Athens exposed himself incognito to be slain by the Peloponnesian foes of that city, and so was slain.  In this way, they say, he delivered his country.  For the Peloponnesians had received a response from the oracle, that they should overcome the Athenians only on condition that they did not slay their king.  Therefore he deceived them by appearing in a poor man’s dress, and provoking them, by quarrelling, to murder him.  Whence Virgil says, “Or the quarrels of Codrus.”

Virgil, Eclogue, v. 11.

Chapter 20.—Of the Succession of the Line of Kings Among the Israelites After the Times of the Judges.

While these kings reigned in the places mentioned, the period of the judges being ended, the kingdom of Israel next began with king Saul, when Samuel the prophet lived.  At that date those Latin kings began who were surnamed Silvii, having that surname, in addition to their proper name, from their predecessor, that son of Æneas who was called Silvius; just as, long afterward, the successors of Cæsar Augustus were surnamed Cæsars.  Saul being rejected, so that none of his issue should reign, on his death David succeeded him in the kingdom, after he had reigned forty years.  Then the Athenians ceased to have kings after the death of Codrus, and began to have a magistracy to rule the republic.  After David, who also reigned forty years, his son Solomon was king of Israel, who built that most noble temple of God at Jerusalem.  In his time Alba was built among the Latins, from which thereafter the kings began to be styled kings not of the Latins, but of the Albans, although in the same Latium.  Solomon was succeeded by his son Rehoboam, under whom that people was divided into two kingdoms, and its separate parts began to have separate kings.

Chapter 21.—Of the Kings of Latium, the First and Twelfth of Whom, Æneas and Aventinus, Were Made Gods.

After Æneas, whom they deified, Latium had eleven kings, none of whom was deified.  But Aventinus, who was the twelfth after Æneas, having been laid low in war, and buried in that hill still called by his name, was added to the number of such gods as they made for themselves.  Some, indeed, were unwilling to write that he was slain in battle, but said he was nowhere to be found, and that it was not from his name, but from the alighting of birds, that hill was called Aventinus.

Varro, De Lingua Latina, v. 43.

“Next came that Procas, glory of the Trojan race.”

Æneid,vi. 767.

That greatest of all kingdoms, the Assyrian, had its long duration brought to a close in his time, the time of Rome’s birth drawing nigh.  For the Assyrian empire was transferred to the Medes after nearly thirteen hundred and five years, if we include the reign of Belus, who begot Ninus, and, content with a small kingdom, was the first king there.  Now Procas reigned before Amulius.  And Amulius had made his brother Numitor’s daughter, Rhea by name, who was also called Ilia, a vestal virgin, who conceived twin sons by Mars, as they will have it, in that way honoring or excusing her adultery, adding as a proof that a she-wolf nursed the infants when exposed.  For they think this kind of beast belongs to Mars so that the she-wolf is believed to have given her teats to the infants, because she knew they were the sons of Mars her lord; although there are not wanting persons who say that when the crying babes lay exposed, they were first of all picked up by I know not what harlot, and sucked her breasts first (now harlots were called lupæ, she-wolves, from which their vile abodes are even yet called lupanaria), and that afterwards they came into the hands of the shepherd Faustulus, and were nursed by Acca his wife.  Yet what wonder is it, if, to rebuke the king who had cruelly ordered them to be thrown into the water, God was pleased, after divinely delivering them from the water, to succor, by means of a wild beast giving milk, these infants by whom so great a city was to be founded?  Amulius was succeeded in the Latian kingdom by his brother Numitor, the grandfather of Romulus; and Rome was founded in the first year of this Numitor, who from that time reigned along with his grandson Romulus.

Chapter 22.—That Rome Was Founded When the Assyrian Kingdom Perished, at Which Time Hezekiah Reigned in Judah.

To be brief, the city of Rome was founded, like another Babylon, and as it were the daughter of the former Babylon, by which God was pleased to conquer the whole world, and subdue it far and wide by bringing it into one fellowship of government and laws.  For there were already powerful and brave peoples and nations trained to arms, who did not easily yield, and whose subjugation necessarily involved great danger and destruction as well as great and horrible labor.  For when the Assyrian kingdom subdued almost all Asia, although this was done by fighting, yet the wars could not be very fierce or difficult, because the nations were as yet untrained to resist, and neither so many nor so great as afterward; forasmuch as, after that greatest and indeed universal flood, when only eight men escaped in Noah’s ark, not much more than a thousand years had passed when Ninus subdued all Asia with the exception of India.  But Rome did not with the same quickness and facility wholly subdue all those nations of the east and west which we see brought under the Roman empire, because, in its gradual increase, in whatever direction it was extended, it found them strong and warlike.  At the time when Rome was founded, then, the people of Israel had been in the land of promise seven hundred and eighteen years.  Of these years twenty-seven belong to Joshua the son of Nun, and after that three hundred and twenty-nine to the period of the judges.  But from the time when the kings began to reign there, three hundred and sixty-two years had passed.  And at that time there was a king in Judah called Ahaz, or, as others compute, Hezekiah his successor, the best and most pious king, who it is admitted reigned in the times of Romulus.  And in that part of the Hebrew nation called Israel, Hoshea had begun to reign.

Chapter 23.—Of the Erythræan Sibyl, Who is Known to Have Sung Many Things About Christ More Plainly Than the Other Sibyls.

The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of prophecies and religious teachings in Greek hexameter under the assumed authority and inspiration of a Sibyl, i.e., a female prophet.  They are partly of heathen, partly of Jewish-Christian origin.  They were used by the fathers against the heathen as genuine prophecies without critical discrimination, and they appear also in the famous Dies iræ alongside with David as witnesses of the future judgment (“teste David cum Sibylla.”)  They were edited by Alexander, Paris, 2d. ed. 1869, and by Friedlieb (in Greek and German), Leipzig, 1852.  Comp. Ewald:  Ueber Entstehung, Inhalt und Werth der sibyll.  Bücher, 1858, and Schürer, Geschichte der jüd.  Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu (Leipzig, 1885), ii. § 33, pp. 700 sqq., Engl. transl. (Hist. of the Jews in the times of Jesus.  Edinburgh and New York, 1886), vol. iii. 271 sqq.—P.S.]

Some say the Erythræan sibyl prophesied at this time.  Now Varro declares there were many sibyls, and not merely one.  This sibyl of Erythræ certainly wrote some things concerning Christ which are quite manifest, and we first read them in the Latin tongue in verses of bad Latin, and unrhythmical, through the unskillfulness, as we afterwards learned, of some interpreter unknown to me.  For Flaccianus, a very famous man, who was also a proconsul, a man of most ready eloquence and much learning, when we were speaking about Christ, produced a Greek manuscript, saying that it was the prophecies of the Erythræan sibyl, in which he pointed out a certain passage which had the initial letters of the lines so arranged that these words could be read in them:  ᾽Ιησοῦς Χριστος Θεοῦ υιὸς σωτηρ, which means, “Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Saviour.”  And these verses, of which the initial letters yield that meaning, contain what follows as translated by some one into Latin in good rhythm:

Ι            Judgment shall moisten the earth with the sweat of its standard,

Η   Ever enduring, behold the King shall come through the ages,

Σ    Sent to be here in the flesh, and Judge at the last of the world.

Ο   O God, the believing and faithless alike shall behold Thee

Υ   Uplifted with saints, when at last the ages are ended.

Σ    Seated before Him are souls in the flesh for His judgment.

Chapter 25.—What Philosophers Were Famous When Tarquinius Priscus Reigned Over the Romans, and Zedekiah Over the Hebrews, When Jerusalem Was Taken and the Temple Overthrown.

When Zedekiah reigned over the Hebrews, and Tarquinius Priscus, the successor of Ancus Martius, over the Romans, the Jewish people was led captive into Babylon, Jerusalem and the temple built by Solomon being overthrown.  For the prophets, in chiding them for their iniquity and impiety, predicted that these things should come to pass, especially Jeremiah, who even stated the number of years.  Pittacus of Mitylene, another of the sages, is reported to have lived at that time.  And Eusebius writes that, while the people of God were held captive in Babylon, the five other sages lived, who must be added to Thales, whom we mentioned above, and Pittacus, in order to make up the seven.  These are Solon of Athens, Chilo of Lacedæmon, Periander of Corinth, Cleobulus of Lindus, and Bias of Priene.  These flourished after the theological poets, and were called sages, because they excelled other men in a certain laudable line of life, and summed up some moral precepts in epigrammatic sayings.  But they left posterity no literary monuments, except that Solon is alleged to have given certain laws to the Athenians, and Thales was a natural philosopher, and left books of his doctrine in short proverbs.  In that time of the Jewish captivity, Anaximander, Anaximenes, and Xenophanes, the natural philosophers, flourished.  Pythagoras also lived then, and at this time the name philosopher was first used.

Chapter 26.—That at the Time When the Captivity of the Jews Was Brought to an End, on the Completion of Seventy Years, the Romans Also Were Freed from Kingly Rule.

At this time, Cyrus king of Persia, who also ruled the Chaldeans and Assyrians, having somewhat relaxed the captivity of the Jews, made fifty thousand of them return in order to rebuild the temple.  They only began the first foundations and built the altar; but, owing to hostile invasions, they were unable to go on, and the work was put off to the time of Darius.  During the same time also those things were done which are written in the book of Judith, which, indeed, the Jews are said not to have received into the canon of the Scriptures.  Under Darius king of Persia, then, on the completion of the seventy years predicted by Jeremiah the prophet, the captivity of the Jews was brought to an end, and they were restored to liberty.  Tarquin then reigned as the seventh king of the Romans.  On his expulsion, they also began to be free from the rule of their kings.  Down to this time the people of Israel had prophets; but, although they were numerous, the canonical writings of only a few of them have been preserved among the Jews and among us.  In closing the previous book, I promised to set down something in this one about them, and I shall now do so.

Chapter 27.—Of the Times of the Prophets Whose Oracles are Contained in Books and Who Sang Many Things About the Call of the Gentiles at the Time When the Roman Kingdom Began and the Assyrian Came to an End.

In order that we may be able to consider these times, let us go back a little to earlier times.  At the beginning of the book of the prophet Hosea, who is placed first of twelve, it is written, “The word of the Lord which came to Hosea in the days of Uzziah, Jothan, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.”

Hos. i. 1.

Chapter 28.—Of the Things Pertaining to the Gospel of Christ Which Hosea and Amos Prohesied.

The prophet Hosea speaks so very profoundly that it is laborious work to penetrate his meaning.  But, according to promise, we must insert something from his book.  He says, “And it shall come to pass that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there they shall be called the sons of the living God.”

Hos. i. 10.

Chapter 29.—What Things are Predicted by Isaiah Concerning Christ and the Church.

The prophecy of Isaiah is not in the book of the twelve prophets, who are called the minor from the brevity of their writings, as compared with those who are called the greater prophets because they published larger volumes.  Isaiah belongs to the latter, yet I connect him with the two above named, because he prophesied at the same time.  Isaiah, then, together with his rebukes of wickedness, precepts of righteousness, and predictions of evil, also prophesied much more than the rest about Christ and the Church, that is, about the King and that city which he founded; so that some say he should be called an evangelist rather than a prophet.  But, in order to finish this work, I quote only one out of many in this place.  Speaking in the person of the Father, he says, “Behold, my servant shall understand, and shall be exalted and glorified very much.  As many shall be astonished at Thee.”

Isa. lii. 13; liii. 13.  Augustin quotes these passages in full.

But let us now hear what follows about the Church.  He says, “Rejoice, O barren, thou that barest not; break forth and cry, thou that didst not travail with child:  for many more are the children of the desolate than of her that has an husband.”

Isa. liv. 1–5.

Chapter 30.—What Micah, Jonah, and Joel Prophesied in Accordance with the New Testament.

The prophet Micah, representing Christ under the figure of a great mountain, speaks thus:  “It shall come to pass in the last days, that the manifested mountain of the Lord shall be prepared on the tops of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall hasten unto it.  Many nations shall go, and shall say, Come, let us go up into the mountain of the Lord, and into the house of the God of Jacob; and He will show us His way, and we will go in His paths:  for out of Zion shall proceed the law, and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem.  And He shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off.”

Mic. iv. 1–3.

The prophet Jonah, not so much by speech as by his own painful experience, prophesied Christ’s death and resurrection much more clearly than if he had proclaimed them with his voice.  For why was he taken into the whale’s belly and restored on the third day, but that he might be a sign that Christ should return from the depths of hell on the third day?

I should be obliged to use many words in explaining all that Joel prophesies in order to make clear those that pertain to Christ and the Church.  But there is one passage I must not pass by, which the apostles also quoted when the Holy Spirit came down from above on the assembled believers according to Christ’s promise.  He says, “And it shall come to pass after these things, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your old men shall dream, and your young men shall see visions:  and even on my servants and mine handmaids in those days will I pour out my Spirit.”

Joel ii. 28, 29.

Chapter 31.—Of the Predictions Concerning the Salvation of the World in Christ, in Obadiah, Nahum, and Habakkuk.

The date of three of the minor prophets, Obadiah, Nahum, and Habakkuk, is neither mentioned by themselves nor given in the chronicles of Eusebius and Jerome.  For although they put Obadiah with Micah, yet when Micah prophesied does not appear from that part of their writings in which the dates are noted.  And this, I think, has happened through their error in negligently copying the works of others.  But we could not find the two others now mentioned in the copies of the chronicles which we have; yet because they are contained in the canon, we ought not to pass them by.

Obadiah, so far as his writings are concerned, the briefest of all the prophets, speaks against Idumea, that is, the nation of Esau, that reprobate elder of the twin sons of Isaac and grandsons of Abraham.  Now if, by that form of speech in which a part is put for the whole, we take Idumea as put for the nations, we may understand of Christ what he says among other things, “But upon Mount Sion shall be safety, and there shall be a Holy One.”

Obad. 17.

As for the prophet Nahum, through him God says, “I will exterminate the graven and the molten things:  I will make thy burial.  For lo, the feet of Him that bringeth good tidings and announceth peace are swift upon the mountains!  O Judah, celebrate thy festival days, and perform thy vows; for now they shall not go on any more so as to become antiquated.  It is completed, it is consumed, it is taken away.  He ascendeth who breathes in thy face, delivering thee out of tribulation.”

Nah. i. 14; ii. 1.

Of what else than the advent of Christ, who was to come, is Habakkuk understood to say, “And the Lord answered me, and said, Write the vision openly on a tablet of boxwood, that he that readeth these things may understand.  For the vision is yet for a time appointed, and it will arise in the end, and will not become void:  if it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, and will not be delayed?”

Hab. ii. 2, 3.

Chapter 32.—Of the Prophecy that is Contained in the Prayer and Song of Habakkuk.

In his prayer, with a song, to whom but the Lord Christ does he say, “O Lord, I have heard Thy hearing, and was afraid:  O Lord, I have considered Thy works, and was greatly afraid?”

Hab. iii. 2.

Chapter 33.—What Jeremiah and Zephaniah Have, by the Prophetic Spirit, Spoken Before Concerning Christ and the Calling of the Nations.

Jeremiah, like Isaiah, is one of the greater prophets, not of the minor, like the others from whose writings I have just given extracts.  He prophesied when Josiah reigned in Jerusalem, and Ancus Martius at Rome, when the captivity of the Jews was already at hand; and he continued to prophesy down to the fifth month of the captivity, as we find from his writings.  Zephaniah, one of the minor prophets, is put along with him, because he himself says that he prophesied in the days of Josiah; but he does not say till when.  Jeremiah thus prophesied not only in the times of Ancus Martius, but also in those of Tarquinius Priscus, whom the Romans had for their fifth king.  For he had already begun to reign when that captivity took place.  Jeremiah, in prophesying of Christ, says, “The breath of our mouth, the Lord Christ, was taken in our sins,”

Lam. iv. 20.

Chapter 34.—Of the Prophecy of Daniel and Ezekiel, Other Two of the Greater Prophets.

Daniel and Ezekiel, other two of the greater prophets, also first prophesied in the very captivity of Babylon.  Daniel even defined the time when Christ was to come and suffer by the exact date.  It would take too long to show this by computation, and it has been done often by others before us.  But of His power and glory he has thus spoken:  “I saw in a night vision, and, behold, one like the Son of man was coming with the clouds of heaven, and He came even to the Ancient of days, and He was brought into His presence.  And to Him there was given dominion, and honor, and a kingdom:  and all people, tribes, and tongues shall serve Him.  His power is an everlasting power, which shall not pass away, and His kingdom shall not be destroyed.”

Dan. vii. 13, 14.

Ezekiel also, speaking prophetically in the person of God the Father, thus foretells Christ, speaking of Him in the prophetic manner as David, because He assumed flesh of the seed of David, and on account of that form of a servant in which He was made man, He who is the Son of God is also called the servant of God.  He says, “And I will set up over my sheep one Shepherd, who will feed them, even my servant David; and He shall feed them, and He shall be their shepherd.  And I the Lord will be their God, and my servant David a prince in the midst of them.  I the Lord have spoken.”

Ezek. xxxiv. 23.

Chapter 35.—Of the Prophecy of the Three Prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.

There remain three minor prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, who prophesied at the close of the captivity.  Of these Haggai more openly prophesies of Christ and the Church thus briefly:  “Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Yet one little while, and I will shake the heaven, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will move all nations, and the desired of all nations shall come.”

Hag. ii. 6.

Chapter 36.—About Esdras and the Books of the Maccabees.

After these three prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, during the same period of the liberation of the people from the Babylonian servitude Esdras also wrote, who is historical rather than prophetical, as is also the book called Esther, which is found to relate, for the praise of God, events not far from those times; unless, perhaps, Esdras is to be understood as prophesying of Christ in that passage where, on a question having arisen among certain young men as to what is the strongest thing, when one had said kings, another wine, the third women, who for the most part rule kings, yet that same third youth demonstrated that the truth is victorious over all.

Esdras iii. and iv.

Chapter 37.—That Prophetic Records are Found Which are More Ancient Than Any Fountain of the Gentile Philosophy.

In the time of our prophets, then, whose writings had already come to the knowledge of almost all nations, the philosophers of the nations had not yet arisen,—at least, not those who were called by that name, which originated with Pythagoras the Samian, who was becoming famous at the time when the Jewish captivity ended.  Much more, then, are the other philosophers found to be later than the prophets.  For even Socrates the Athenian, the master of all who were then most famous, holding the pre-eminence in that department that is called the moral or active, is found after Esdras in the chronicles.  Plato also was born not much later, who far out went the other disciples of Socrates.  If, besides these, we take their predecessors, who had not yet been styled philosophers, to wit, the seven sages, and then the physicists, who succeeded Thales, and imitated his studious search into the nature of things, namely, Anaximander, Anaximenes, and Anaxagoras, and some others, before Pythagoras first professed himself a philosopher, even these did not precede the whole of our prophets in antiquity of time, since Thales, whom the others succeeded, is said to have flourished in the reign of Romulus, when the stream of prophecy burst forth from the fountains of Israel in those writings which spread over the whole world.  So that only those theological poets, Orpheus, Linus, and Musæus, and, it may be, some others among the Greeks, are found earlier in date than the Hebrew prophets whose writings we hold as authoritative.  But not even these preceded in time our true divine, Moses, who authentically preached the one true God, and whose writings are first in the authoritative canon; and therefore the Greeks, in whose tongue the literature of this age chiefly appears, have no ground for boasting of their wisdom, in which our religion, wherein is true wisdom, is not evidently more ancient at least, if not superior.  Yet it must be confessed that before Moses there had already been, not indeed among the Greeks, but among barbarous nations, as in Egypt, some doctrine which might be called their wisdom, else it would not have been written in the holy books that Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians,

Acts vii. 22.

Chapter 38.—That the Ecclesiastical Canon Has Not Admitted Certain Writings on Account of Their Too Great Antiquity, Lest Through Them False Things Should Be Inserted Instead of True.

If I may recall far more ancient times, our patriarch Noah was certainly even before that great deluge, and I might not undeservedly call him a prophet, forasmuch as the ark he made, in which he escaped with his family, was itself a prophecy of our times.

Heb. xi. 7; 1 Pet. iii. 20, 21.