Augustine — The City of God

THE WORKS

OF

AURELIUS AUGUSTINE,

BISHOP OF HIPPO.

_A NEW TRANSLATION._

=Edited by the=

REV. MARCUS DODS, M.A.

VOL. I.

THE CITY OF GOD,

VOLUME I.

EDINBURGH:

T. & T. CLARK, 38, GEORGE STREET.

MDCCCLXXI.

PRINTED BY MURRAY AND GIBB,

FOR

T. & T. CLARK, EDINBURGH.

LONDON, HAMILTON, ADAMS, AND CO.

DUBLIN, JOHN ROBERTSON AND CO.

NEW YORK, C. SCRIBNER AND CO.

THE

CITY OF GOD.

=Translated by the=

REV. MARCUS DODS, M.A.

VOLUME I.

EDINBURGH:

T. & T. CLARK, 38, GEORGE STREET.

MDCCCLXXI.

Of the following Work, Books IV. XVII. and XVIII. have been

translated by the Rev. GEORGE WILSON, Glenluce; Books V. VI. VII. and

VIII. by the Rev. J. J. SMITH.

CONTENTS.

BOOK I.

PAGE

Augustine censures the pagans, who attributed the calamities of the

world, and especially the sack of Rome by the Goths, to the

Christian religion and its prohibition of the worship of the

gods, 1

BOOK II.

A review of the calamities suffered by the Romans before the time

of Christ, showing that their gods had plunged them into

corruption and vice, 48

BOOK III.

The external calamities of Rome, 91

BOOK IV.

That empire was given to Rome not by the gods, but by the One True

God, 135

BOOK V.

Of fate, freewill, and God's prescience, and of the source of the

virtues of the ancient Romans, 177

BOOK VI.

Of Varro's threefold division of theology, and of the inability of

the gods to contribute anything to the happiness of the future

life, 228

BOOK VII.

Of the "select gods" of the civil theology, and that eternal life

is not obtained by worshipping them, 258

BOOK VIII.

Some account of the Socratic and Platonic philosophy, and a

refutation of the doctrine of Apuleius that the demons should

be worshipped as mediators between gods and men, 305

BOOK IX.

Of those who allege a distinction among demons, some being good

and others evil, 353

BOOK X.

Porphyry's doctrine of redemption, 382

BOOK XI.

Augustine passes to the second part of the work, in which the

origin, progress, and destinies of the earthly and heavenly

cities are discussed.--Speculations regarding the creation of

the world, 436

BOOK XII.

Of the creation of angels and men, and of the origin of evil, 481

BOOK XIII.

That death is penal, and had its origin in Adam's sin, 521

EDITOR'S PREFACE.

"Rome having been stormed and sacked by the Goths under Alaric

their king,[1] the worshippers of false gods, or pagans, as we

commonly call them, made an attempt to attribute this calamity to

the Christian religion, and began to blaspheme the true God with

even more than their wonted bitterness and acerbity. It was this

which kindled my zeal for the house of God, and prompted me to

undertake the defence of the city of God against the charges and

misrepresentations of its assailants. This work was in my hands for

several years, owing to the interruptions occasioned by many other

affairs which had a prior claim on my attention, and which I could

not defer. However, this great undertaking was at last completed in

twenty-two books. Of these, the first five refute those who fancy

that the polytheistic worship is necessary in order to secure worldly

prosperity, and that all these overwhelming calamities have befallen

us in consequence of its prohibition. In the following five books I

address myself to those who admit that such calamities have at all

times attended, and will at all times attend, the human race, and

that they constantly recur in forms more or less disastrous, varying

only in the scenes, occasions, and persons on whom they light, but,

while admitting this, maintain that the worship of the gods is

advantageous for the life to come. In these ten books, then, I refute

these two opinions, which are as groundless as they are antagonistic

to the Christian religion.

"But that no one might have occasion to say, that though I had

refuted the tenets of other men, I had omitted to establish my

own, I devote to this object the second part of this work, which

comprises twelve books, although I have not scrupled, as occasion

offered, either to advance my own opinions in the first ten books,

or to demolish the arguments of my opponents in the last twelve. Of

these twelve books, the first four contain an account of the origin

of these two cities--the city of God, and the city of the world.

The second four treat of their history or progress; the third and

last four, of their deserved destinies. And so, though all these

twenty-two books refer to both cities, yet I have named them after

the better city, and called them The City of God."

Such is the account given by Augustine himself[2] of the occasion

and plan of this his greatest work. But in addition to this explicit

information, we learn from the correspondence[3] of Augustine, that

it was due to the importunity of his friend Marcellinus that this

defence of Christianity extended beyond the limits of a few letters.

Shortly before the fall of Rome, Marcellinus had been sent to Africa

by the Emperor Honorius to arrange a settlement of the differences

between the Donatists and the Catholics. This brought him into

contact not only with Augustine, but with Volusian, the proconsul

of Africa, and a man of rare intelligence and candour. Finding that

Volusian, though as yet a pagan, took an interest in the Christian

religion, Marcellinus set his heart on converting him to the true

faith. The details of the subsequent significant intercourse between

the learned and courtly bishop and the two imperial statesmen,

are unfortunately almost entirely lost to us; but the impression

conveyed by the extant correspondence is, that Marcellinus was

the means of bringing his two friends into communication with one

another. The first overture was on Augustine's part, in the shape of

a simple and manly request that Volusian would carefully peruse the

Scriptures, accompanied by a frank offer to do his best to solve any

difficulties that might arise in such a course of inquiry. Volusian

accordingly enters into correspondence with Augustine; and in order

to illustrate the kind of difficulties experienced by men in his

position, he gives some graphic notes of a conversation in which

he had recently taken part at a gathering of some of his friends.

The difficulty to which most weight is attached in this letter, is

the apparent impossibility of believing in the Incarnation. But a

letter which Marcellinus immediately despatched to Augustine, urging

him to reply to Volusian at large, brought the intelligence that

the difficulties and objections to Christianity were thus limited

merely out of a courteous regard to the preciousness of the bishop's

time, and the vast number of his engagements. This letter, in short,

brought out the important fact, that a removal of speculative doubts

would not suffice for the conversion of such men as Volusian, whose

life was one with the life of the empire. Their difficulties were

rather political, historical, and social. They could not see how

the reception of the Christian rule of life was compatible with

the interests of Rome as the mistress of the world.[4] And thus

Augustine was led to take a more distinct and wider view of the whole

relation which Christianity bore to the old state of things,--moral,

political, philosophical, and religious,--and was gradually drawn on

to undertake the elaborate work now presented to the English reader,

and which may more appropriately than any other of his writings be

called his masterpiece[5] or life-work. It was begun the very year

of Marcellinus' death, A.D. 413, and was issued in detached portions

from time to time, until its completion in the year 426. It thus

occupied the maturest years of Augustine's life--from his fifty-ninth

to his seventy-second year.[6]

From this brief sketch, it will be seen that though the accompanying

work is essentially an Apology, the Apologetic of Augustine can be

no mere rehabilitation of the somewhat threadbare, if not effete,

arguments of Justin and Tertullian.[7] In fact, as Augustine

considered what was required of him,--to expound the Christian faith,

and justify it to enlightened men; to distinguish it from, and

show its superiority to, all those forms of truth, philosophical or

popular, which were then striving for the mastery, or at least for

standing-room; to set before the world's eye a vision of glory that

might win the regard even of men who were dazzled by the fascinating

splendour of a world-wide empire,--he recognised that a task was laid

before him to which even his powers might prove unequal,--a task

certainly which would afford ample scope for his learning, dialectic,

philosophical grasp and acumen, eloquence, and faculty of exposition.

But it is the occasion of this great Apology which invests it at once

with grandeur and vitality. After more than eleven hundred years

of steady and triumphant progress, Rome had been taken and sacked.

It is difficult for us to appreciate, impossible to overestimate,

the shock which was thus communicated from centre to circumference

of the whole known world. It was generally believed, not only by

the heathen, but also by many of the most liberal-minded of the

Christians, that the destruction of Rome would be the prelude to

the destruction of the world.[8] Even Jerome, who might have been

supposed to be embittered against the proud mistress of the world by

her inhospitality to himself, cannot conceal his profound emotion

on hearing of her fall. "A terrible rumour," he says, "reaches me

from the West, telling of Rome besieged, bought for gold, besieged

again, life and property perishing together. My voice falters, sobs

stifle the words I dictate; for she is a captive, that city which

enthralled the world."[9] Augustine is never so theatrical as Jerome

in the expression of his feeling, but he is equally explicit in

lamenting the fall of Rome as a great calamity; and while he does not

scruple to ascribe her recent disgrace to the profligate manners,

the effeminacy, and the pride of her citizens, he is not without hope

that, by a return to the simple, hardy, and honourable mode of life

which characterized the early Romans, she may still be restored to

much of her former prosperity.[10] But as Augustine contemplates the

ruins of Rome's greatness, and feels, in common with all the world

at this crisis, the instability of the strongest governments, the

insufficiency of the most authoritative statesmanship, there hovers

over these ruins the splendid vision of the city of God "coming down

out of heaven, adorned as a bride for her husband." The old social

system is crumbling away on all sides, but in its place he seems to

see a pure Christendom arising. He sees that human history and human

destiny are not wholly identified with the history of any earthly

power--not though it be as cosmopolitan as the empire of Rome.[11]

He directs the attention of men to the fact that there is another

kingdom on earth,--a city which hath foundations, whose builder and

maker is God. He teaches men to take profounder views of history,

and shows them how from the first the city of God, or community of

God's people, has lived alongside of the kingdoms of this world and

their glory, and has been silently increasing, "crescit occulto velut

arbor ævo." He demonstrates that the superior morality, the true

doctrine, the heavenly origin of this city, ensure its success; and

over against this, he depicts the silly or contradictory theorizings

of the pagan philosophers, and the unhinged morals of the people,

and puts it to all candid men to say, whether in the presence of

so manifestly sufficient a cause for Rome's downfall, there is

room for imputing it to the spread of Christianity. He traces the

antagonism of these two grand communities of rational creatures,

back to their first divergence in the fall of the angels, and down

to the consummation of all things in the last judgment and eternal

destination of the good and evil. In other words, the city of God is

"the first real effort to produce a philosophy of history,"[12] to

exhibit historical events in connection with their true causes, and

in their real sequence. This plan of the work is not only a great

conception, but it is accompanied with many practical advantages;

the chief of which is, that it admits, and even requires, a full

treatment of those doctrines of our faith that are more directly

historical,--the doctrines of creation, the fall, the incarnation,

the connection between the Old and New Testaments, and the doctrine

of "the last things."[13]

The effect produced by this great work it is impossible to determine

with accuracy. Beugnot, with an absoluteness which we should condemn

as presumption in any less competent authority, declares that its

effect can only have been very slight.[14] Probably its effect

would be silent and slow; telling first upon cultivated minds, and

only indirectly upon the people. Certainly its effect must have

been weakened by the interrupted manner of its publication. It is

an easier task to estimate its intrinsic value. But on this also

patristic and literary authorities widely differ. Dupin admits that

it is very pleasant reading, owing to the surprising variety of

matters which are introduced to illustrate and forward the argument,

but censures the author for discussing very useless questions, and

for adducing reasons which could satisfy no one who was not already

convinced.[15] Huet also speaks of the book as "un amas confus

d'excellents materiaux; c'est de l'or en barre et en lingots."[16]

L'Abbé Flottes censures these opinions as unjust, and cites with

approbation the unqualified eulogy of Pressensé.[17] But probably the

popularity of the book is its best justification. This popularity

may be measured by the circumstance that, between the year 1467 and

the end of the fifteenth century, no fewer than twenty editions

were called for, that is to say, a fresh edition every eighteen

months.[18] And in the interesting series of letters that passed

between Ludovicus Vives and Erasmus, who had engaged him to write a

commentary on the _City of God_ for his edition of Augustine's works,

we find Vives pleading for a separate edition of this work, on the

plea that, of all the writings of Augustine, it was almost the only

one read by patristic students, and might therefore naturally be

expected to have a much wider circulation.[19]

If it were asked to what this popularity is due, we should be

disposed to attribute it mainly to the great variety of ideas,

opinions, and facts that are here brought before the reader's mind.

Its importance as a contribution to the history of opinion cannot be

overrated. We find in it not only indications or explicit enouncement

of the author's own views upon almost every important topic which

occupied his thoughts, but also a compendious exhibition of the

ideas which most powerfully influenced the life of that age. It

thus becomes, as Poujoulat says, "comme l'encyclopédie du cinquième

siècle." All that is valuable, together with much indeed that is

not so, in the religion and philosophy of the classical nations of

antiquity, is reviewed. And on some branches of these subjects it

has, in the judgment of one well qualified to judge, "preserved

more than the whole surviving Latin literature." It is true we

are sometimes wearied by the too elaborate refutation of opinions

which to a modern mind seem self-evident absurdities; but if these

opinions were actually prevalent in the fifth century, the historical

inquirer will not quarrel with the form in which his information is

conveyed, nor will commit the absurdity of attributing to Augustine

the foolishness of these opinions, but rather the credit of exploding

them. That Augustine is a well-informed and impartial critic,

is evinced by the courteousness and candour which he uniformly

displays to his opponents, by the respect he won from the heathen

themselves, and by his own early life. The most rigorous criticism

has found him at fault regarding matters of fact only in some very

rare instances, which can be easily accounted for. His learning

would not indeed stand comparison with what is accounted such in our

day: his life was too busy, and too devoted to the poor and to the

spiritually necessitous, to admit of any extraordinary acquisition.

He had access to no literature but the Latin; or at least he had only

sufficient Greek to enable him to refer to Greek authors on points of

importance, and not enough to enable him to read their writings with

ease and pleasure.[20] But he had a profound knowledge of his own

time, and a familiar acquaintance not only with the Latin poets, but

with many other authors, some of whose writings are now lost to us,

save the fragments preserved through his quotations.

But the interest attaching to the _City of God_ is not merely

historical. It is the earnestness and ability with which he developes

his own philosophical and theological views which gradually fascinate

the reader, and make him see why the world has set this among the few

greatest books of all time. The fundamental lines of the Augustinian

theology are here laid down in a comprehensive and interesting form.

Never was thought so abstract expressed in language so popular.

He handles metaphysical problems with the unembarrassed ease of

Plato, with all Cicero's accuracy and acuteness, and more than

Cicero's profundity. He is never more at home than when exposing

the incompetency of Neoplatonism, or demonstrating the harmony of

Christian doctrine and true philosophy. And though there are in

the _City of God_, as in all ancient books, things that seem to us

childish and barren, there are also the most surprising anticipations

of modern speculation. There is an earnest grappling with those

problems which are continually re-opened because they underlie man's

relation to God and the spiritual world,--the problems which are not

peculiar to any one century. As we read these animated discussions,

"The fourteen centuries fall away

Between us and the Afric saint,

And at his side we urge, to-day,

The immemorial quest and old complaint.

No outward sign to us is given,

From sea or earth comes no reply;

Hushed as the warm Numidian heaven

He vainly questioned bends our frozen sky."

It is true, the style of the book is not all that could be desired:

there are passages which can possess an interest only to the

antiquarian; there are others with nothing to redeem them but

the glow of their eloquence; there are many repetitions; there

is an occasional use of arguments "plus ingenieux que solides,"

as M. Saisset says. Augustine's great admirer, Erasmus, does not

scruple to call him a writer "obscuræ subtilitatis et parum amœnæ

prolixitatis;"[21] but "the toil of penetrating the apparent

obscurities will be rewarded by finding a real wealth of insight and

enlightenment." Some who have read the opening chapters of the _City

of God_, may have considered it would be a waste of time to proceed;

but no one, we are persuaded, ever regretted reading it all. The

book has its faults; but it effectually introduces us to the most

influential of theologians, and the greatest popular teacher; to a

genius that cannot nod for many lines together; to a reasoner whose

dialectic is more formidable, more keen and sifting, than that of

Socrates or Aquinas; to a saint whose ardent and genuine devotional

feeling bursts up through the severest argumentation; to a man whose

kindliness and wit, universal sympathies and breadth of intelligence,

lend piquancy and vitality to the most abstract dissertation.

The propriety of publishing a translation of so choice a specimen

of ancient literature needs no defence. As Poujoulat very sensibly

remarks, there are not a great many men now-a-days who will read a

work in Latin of twenty-two books. Perhaps there are fewer still who

ought to do so. With our busy neighbours in France, this work has

been a prime favourite for 400 years. There may be said to be eight

independent translations of it into the French tongue, though some

of these are _in part_ merely revisions. One of these translations

has gone through as many as four editions. The most recent is that

which forms part of the Nisard series; but the best, so far as we

have seen, is that of the accomplished Professor of Philosophy in the

College of France, Emile Saisset. This translation is indeed all that

can be desired: here and there an omission occurs, and about one or

two renderings a difference of opinion may exist; but the exceeding

felicity and spirit of the whole show it to have been a labour of

love, the fond homage of a disciple proud of his master. The preface

of M. Saisset is one of the most valuable contributions ever made to

the understanding of Augustine's philosophy.[22]

Of English translations there has been an unaccountable poverty. Only

one exists,[23] and this so exceptionally bad, so unlike the racy

translations of the seventeenth century in general, so inaccurate,

and so frequently unintelligible, that it is not impossible it may

have done something towards giving the English public a distaste for

the book itself. That the present translation also might be improved,

we know; that many men were fitter for the task, on the score of

scholarship, we are very sensible; but that any one would have executed

it with intenser affection and veneration for the author, we are not

prepared to admit. A few notes have been added where it appeared to be

necessary. Some are original, some from the Benedictine Augustine, and

the rest from the elaborate commentary of Vives.[24]

THE EDITOR.

GLASGOW, 1871.

FOOTNOTES:

Beugnot, _Histoire de la Destruction du Paganisme_, ii. 83 et sqq.

learned, most correct, and most elaborate work."

exigencies: they were either brief and pregnant statements of the

Christian doctrines; refutations of prevalent calumnies; invectives

against the follies and crimes of Paganism; or confutations of

anti-Christian works like those of Celsus, Porphyry, or Julian,

closely following their course of argument, and rarely expanding into

general and comprehensive views of the great conflict."--MILMAN,

_History of Christianity_, iii. c. 10. We are not acquainted with any

more complete preface to the _City of God_ than is contained in the

two or three pages which Milman has devoted to this subject.

urbs quæ totum cepit orbem."--JEROME, iv. 783.

Empire_, p. 145, etc.

trans.), ii. 160.

Dupin, Bindemann, Böhringer, Poujoulat, Ozanam, and others.

convaincu que cet ouvrage dût exercea tres-peu d'influence sur

l'esprit des païens" (ii. 122); and this though he thinks one cannot

but be struck with the grandeur of the ideas it contains.

of the most accurate and interesting even of French monographs on

theological writers.

Schoenemann's _Bibliotheca Pat._

ut excudantur aliquot centena exemplarium istius operis a reliquo

Augustini corpore separata; nam multi erunt studiosi qui Augustinum

totum emere vel nollent, vel non poterunt, quia non egebunt, seu

quia tantum pecuniæ non habebunt. Scio enim fere a deditis studiis

istis elegantioribus præter hoc Augustini opus nullum fere aliud legi

ejusdem autoris."

never settled question of Augustine's learning will be found in

Nourrisson's _Philosophie de S. Augustin_, ii. 92-100.

(Clark, Edin.).

commentary.

comico-pathetic account of the result of his Augustinian labours on

his health: "Ex quo Augustinum perfeci, nunquam valui ex sententia;

proximâ vero hebdomade et hac, fracto corpore cuncto, et nervis

lassitudine quadam et debilitate dejectis, in caput decem turres

incumbere mihi videntur incidendo pondere, ac mole intolerabili; isti

sunt fructus studiorum, et merces pulcherrimi laboris; quid labor et

benefacta juvant?"

THE CITY OF GOD.

ARGUMENT.

AUGUSTINE CENSURES THE PAGANS, WHO ATTRIBUTED THE CALAMITIES OF THE

WORLD, AND ESPECIALLY THE RECENT SACK OF ROME BY THE GOTHS, TO

THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, AND ITS PROHIBITION OF THE WORSHIP OF

THE GODS. HE SPEAKS OF THE BLESSINGS AND ILLS OF LIFE, WHICH

THEN, AS ALWAYS, HAPPENED TO GOOD AND BAD MEN ALIKE. FINALLY,

HE REBUKES THE SHAMELESSNESS OF THOSE WHO CAST UP TO THE

CHRISTIANS THAT THEIR WOMEN HAD BEEN VIOLATED BY THE SOLDIERS.

PREFACE, EXPLAINING HIS DESIGN IN UNDERTAKING

THIS WORK.

The glorious city of God is my theme in this work, which you, my

dearest son Marcellinus,[25] suggested, and which is due to you by

my promise. I have undertaken its defence against those who prefer

their own gods to the Founder of this city,--a city surpassingly

glorious, whether we view it as it still lives by faith in this

fleeting course of time, and sojourns as a stranger in the midst

of the ungodly, or as it shall dwell in the fixed stability of its

eternal seat, which it now with patience waits for, expecting until

"righteousness shall return unto judgment,"[26] and it obtain, by

virtue of its excellence, final victory and perfect peace. A great

work this, and an arduous; but God is my helper. For I am aware what

ability is requisite to persuade the proud how great is the virtue

of humility, which raises us, not by a quite human arrogance, but

by a divine grace, above all earthly dignities that totter on this

shifting scene. For the King and Founder of this city of which we

speak, has in Scripture uttered to His people a dictum of the divine

law in these words: "God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto

the humble."[27] But this, which is God's prerogative, the inflated

ambition of a proud spirit also affects, and dearly loves that this

be numbered among its attributes, to

"Show pity to the humbled soul,

And crush the sons of pride."[28]

And therefore, as the plan of this work we have undertaken requires,

and as occasion offers, we must speak also of the earthly city,

which, though it be mistress of the nations, is itself ruled by its

lust of rule.

1. _Of the adversaries of the name of Christ, whom the barbarians for

Christ's sake spared when they stormed the city._

For to this earthly city belong the enemies against whom I have to

defend the city of God. Many of them, indeed, being reclaimed from

their ungodly error, have become sufficiently creditable citizens

of this city; but many are so inflamed with hatred against it, and

are so ungrateful to its Redeemer for His signal benefits, as to

forget that they would now be unable to utter a single word to its

prejudice, had they not found in its sacred places, as they fled from

the enemy's steel, that life in which they now boast themselves. Are

not those very Romans, who were spared by the barbarians through

their respect for Christ, become enemies to the name of Christ? The

reliquaries of the martyrs and the churches of the apostles bear

witness to this; for in the sack of the city they were open sanctuary

for all who fled to them, whether Christian or Pagan. To their very

threshold the bloodthirsty enemy raged; there his murderous fury

owned a limit. Thither did such of the enemy as had any pity convey

those to whom they had given quarter, lest any less mercifully

disposed might fall upon them. And, indeed, when even those murderers

who everywhere else showed themselves pitiless came to these spots

where that was forbidden which the licence of war permitted in every

other place, their furious rage for slaughter was bridled, and their

eagerness to take prisoners was quenched. Thus escaped multitudes

who now reproach the Christian religion, and impute to Christ the

ills that have befallen their city; but the preservation of their own

life--a boon which they owe to the respect entertained for Christ

by the barbarians--they attribute not to our Christ, but to their

own good luck. They ought rather, had they any right perceptions, to

attribute the severities and hardships inflicted by their enemies, to

that divine providence which is wont to reform the depraved manners

of men by chastisement, and which exercises with similar afflictions

the righteous and praiseworthy,--either translating them, when they

have passed through the trial, to a better world, or detaining them

still on earth for ulterior purposes. And they ought to attribute

it to the spirit of these Christian times, that, contrary to the

custom of war, these bloodthirsty barbarians spared them, and

spared them for Christ's sake, whether this mercy was actually

shown in promiscuous places, or in those places specially dedicated

to Christ's name, and of which the very largest were selected as

sanctuaries, that full scope might thus be given to the expansive

compassion which desired that a large multitude might find shelter

there. Therefore ought they to give God thanks, and with sincere

confession flee for refuge to His name, that so they may escape

the punishment of eternal fire--they who with lying lips took upon

them this name, that they might escape the punishment of present

destruction. For of those whom you see insolently and shamelessly

insulting the servants of Christ, there are numbers who would not

have escaped that destruction and slaughter had they not pretended

that they themselves were Christ's servants. Yet now, in ungrateful

pride and most impious madness, and at the risk of being punished in

everlasting darkness, they perversely oppose that name under which

they fraudulently protected themselves for the sake of enjoying the

light of this brief life.

2. _That it is quite contrary to the usage of war, that the victors

should spare the vanquished for the sake of their gods._

There are histories of numberless wars, both before the building of

Rome and since its rise and the extension of its dominion: let these

be read, and let one instance be cited in which, when a city had been

taken by foreigners, the victors spared those who were found to have

fled for sanctuary to the temples of their gods;[29] or one instance

in which a barbarian general gave orders that none should be put to

the sword who had been found in this or that temple. Did not Æneas see

"Dying Priam at the shrine,

Staining the hearth he made divine?"[30]

Did not Diomede and Ulysses

"Drag with red hands, the sentry slain,

Her fateful image from your fane,

Her chaste locks touch, and stain with gore

The virgin coronal she wore?"[31]

Neither is that true which follows, that

"Thenceforth the tide of fortune changed,

And Greece grew weak."[32]

For after this they conquered and destroyed Troy with fire and sword;

after this they beheaded Priam as he fled to the altars. Neither did

Troy perish because it lost Minerva. For what had Minerva herself

first lost, that she should perish? Her guards perhaps? No doubt;

just her guards. For as soon as they were slain, she could be stolen.

It was not, in fact, the men who were preserved by the image, but the

image by the men. How, then, was she invoked to defend the city and

the citizens, she who could not defend her own defenders?

3. _That the Romans did not show their usual sagacity when they

trusted that they would be benefited by the gods who had been

unable to defend Troy._

And these be the gods to whose protecting care the Romans were

delighted to entrust their city! O too, too piteous mistake! And

they are enraged at us when we speak thus about their gods, though,

so far from being enraged at their own writers, they part with money

to learn what they say; and, indeed, the very teachers of these

authors are reckoned worthy of a salary from the public purse, and of

other honours. There is Virgil, who is read by boys, in order that

this great poet, this most famous and approved of all poets, may

impregnate their virgin minds, and may not readily be forgotten by

them, according to that saying of Horace,

"The fresh cask long keeps its first tang."[33]

Well, in this Virgil, I say, Juno is introduced as hostile to the

Trojans, and stirring up Æolus, the king of the winds, against them

in the words,

"A race I hate now ploughs the sea,

Transporting Troy to Italy,

And home-gods conquered. "[34]...

And ought prudent men to have entrusted the defence of Rome to these

conquered gods? But it will be said, this was only the saying of

Juno, who, like an angry woman, did not know what she was saying.

What, then, says Æneas himself,--Æneas who is so often designated

"pious?" Does he not say,

"Lo! Panthus, 'scaped from death by flight,

Priest of Apollo on the height,

His conquered gods with trembling hands

He bears, and shelter swift demands?"[35]

Is it not clear that the gods (whom he does not scruple to call

"conquered") were rather entrusted to Æneas than he to them, when it

is said to him,

"The gods of her domestic shrines

Your country to your care consigns?"[36]

If, then, Virgil says that the gods were such as these, and were

conquered, and that when conquered they could not escape except under

the protection of a man, what madness is it to suppose that Rome had

been wisely entrusted to these guardians, and could not have been

taken unless it had lost them! Indeed, to worship conquered gods

as protectors and champions, what is this but to worship, not good

divinities, but evil omens?[37] Would it not be wiser to believe,

not that Rome would never have fallen into so great a calamity had

not they first perished, but rather that they would have perished

long since had not Rome preserved them as long as she could? For who

does not see, when he thinks of it, what a foolish assumption it is

that they could not be vanquished under vanquished defenders, and

that they only perished because they had lost their guardian gods,

when, indeed, the only cause of their perishing was that they chose

for their protectors gods condemned to perish? The poets, therefore,

when they composed and sang these things about the conquered gods,

had no intention to invent falsehoods, but uttered, as honest men,

what the truth extorted from them. This, however, will be carefully

and copiously discussed in another and more fitting place. Meanwhile

I will briefly, and to the best of my ability, explain what I meant

to say about these ungrateful men who blasphemously impute to Christ

the calamities which they deservedly suffer in consequence of their

own wicked ways, while that which is for Christ's sake spared them

in spite of their wickedness they do not even take the trouble to

notice; and in their mad and blasphemous insolence, they use against

His name those very lips wherewith they falsely claimed that same

name that their lives might be spared. In the places consecrated

to Christ, where for His sake no enemy would injure them, they

restrained their tongues that they might be safe and protected; but

no sooner do they emerge from these sanctuaries, than they unbridle

these tongues to hurl against Him curses full of hate.

4. _Of the asylum of Juno in Troy, which saved no one from the

Greeks; and of the churches of the apostles, which protected

from the barbarians all who fled to them._

Troy itself, the mother of the Roman people, was not able, as I have

said, to protect its own citizens in the sacred places of their gods

from the fire and sword of the Greeks, though the Greeks worshipped

the same gods. Not only so, but

"Phœnix and Ulysses fell

In the void courts by Juno's cell

Were set the spoil to keep;

Snatched from the burning shrines away,

There Ilium's mighty treasure lay,

Rich altars, bowls of massy gold,

And captive raiment, rudely rolled

In one promiscuous heap;

While boys and matrons, wild with fear,

In long array were standing near."[38]

In other words, the place consecrated to so great a goddess was

chosen, not that from it none might be led out a captive, but that in

it all the captives might be immured. Compare now this "asylum"--the

asylum not of an ordinary god, not of one of the rank and file

of gods, but of Jove's own sister and wife, the queen of all the

gods--with the churches built in memory of the apostles. Into it were

collected the spoils rescued from the blazing temples and snatched

from the gods, not that they might be restored to the vanquished, but

divided among the victors; while into these was carried back, with

the most religious observance and respect, everything which belonged

to them, even though found elsewhere. There liberty was lost; here

preserved. There bondage was strict; here strictly excluded. Into

that temple men were driven to become the chattels of their enemies,

now lording it over them; into these churches men were led by

their relenting foes, that they might be at liberty. In fine, the

gentle[39] Greeks appropriated that temple of Juno to the purposes

of their own avarice and pride; while these churches of Christ were

chosen even by the savage barbarians as the fit scenes for humility

and mercy. But perhaps, after all, the Greeks did in that victory

of theirs spare the temples of those gods whom they worshipped in

common with the Trojans, and did not dare to put to the sword or

make captive the wretched and vanquished Trojans who fled thither;

and perhaps Virgil, in the manner of poets, has depicted what never

really happened? But there is no question that he depicted the usual

custom of an enemy when sacking a city.

5. _Cæsar's statement regarding the universal custom of an enemy when

sacking a city._

Even Cæsar himself gives us positive testimony regarding this custom;

for, in his deliverance in the senate about the conspirators, he

says (as Sallust, a historian of distinguished veracity, writes[40])

"that virgins and boys are violated, children torn from the embrace

of their parents, matrons subjected to whatever should be the

pleasure of the conquerors, temples and houses plundered, slaughter

and burning rife; in fine, all things filled with arms, corpses,

blood, and wailing." If he had not mentioned temples here, we might

suppose that enemies were in the habit of sparing the dwellings of

the gods. And the Roman temples were in danger of these disasters,

not from foreign foes, but from Catiline and his associates, the most

noble senators and citizens of Rome. But these, it may be said, were

abandoned men, and the parricides of their fatherland.

6. _That not even the Romans, when they took cities, spared the

conquered in their temples._

Why, then, need our argument take note of the many nations who have

waged wars with one another, and have nowhere spared the conquered

in the temples of their gods? Let us look at the practice of the

Romans themselves: let us, I say, recall and review the Romans,

whose chief praise it has been "to spare the vanquished and subdue

the proud," and that they preferred "rather to forgive than to

revenge an injury;"[41] and among so many and great cities which

they have stormed, taken, and overthrown for the extension of their

dominion, let us be told what temples they were accustomed to exempt,

so that whoever took refuge in them was free. Or have they really

done this, and has the fact been suppressed by the historians of

these events? Is it to be believed, that men who sought out with

the greatest eagerness points they could praise, would omit those

which, in their own estimation, are the most signal proofs of piety?

Marcus Marcellus, a distinguished Roman, who took Syracuse, a most

splendidly adorned city, is reported to have bewailed its coming

ruin, and to have shed his own tears over it before he spilt its

blood. He took steps also to preserve the chastity even of his enemy.

For before he gave orders for the storming of the city, he issued

an edict forbidding the violation of any free person. Yet the city

was sacked according to the custom of war; nor do we anywhere read,

that even by so chaste and gentle a commander orders were given that

no one should be injured who had fled to this or that temple. And

this certainly would by no means have been omitted, when neither

his weeping nor his edict preservative of chastity could be passed

in silence. Fabius, the conqueror of the city of Tarentum, is

praised for abstaining from making booty of the images. For when his

secretary proposed the question to him, what he wished done with the

statues of the gods, which had been taken in large numbers, he veiled

his moderation under a joke. For he asked of what sort they were;

and when they reported to him that there were not only many large

images, but some of them armed, "Oh," says he, "let us leave with

the Tarentines their angry gods." Seeing, then, that the writers of

Roman history could not pass in silence, neither the weeping of the

one general nor the laughing of the other, neither the chaste pity of

the one nor the facetious moderation of the other, on what occasion

would it be omitted, if, for the honour of any of their enemy's gods,

they had shown this particular form of leniency, that in any temple

slaughter or captivity was prohibited?

7. _That the cruelties which occurred in the sack of Rome were in

accordance with the custom of war, whereas the acts of clemency

resulted from the influence of Christ's name._

All the spoiling, then, which Rome was exposed to in the recent

calamity--all the slaughter, plundering, burning, and misery--was

the result of the custom of war. But what was novel, was that savage

barbarians showed themselves in so gentle a guise, that the largest

churches were chosen and set apart for the purpose of being filled with

the people to whom quarter was given, and that in them none were slain,

from them none forcibly dragged; that into them many were led by their

relenting enemies to be set at liberty, and that from them none were

led into slavery by merciless foes. Whoever does not see that this is

to be attributed to the name of Christ, and to the Christian temper, is

blind; whoever sees this, and gives no praise, is ungrateful; whoever

hinders any one from praising it, is mad. Far be it from any prudent

man to impute this clemency to the barbarians. Their fierce and bloody

minds were awed, and bridled, and marvellously tempered by Him who so

long before said by His prophet, "I will visit their transgression

with the rod, and their iniquities with stripes; nevertheless my

loving-kindness will I not utterly take from them."[42]

8. _Of the advantages and disadvantages which often indiscriminately

accrue to good and wicked men._

Will some one say, Why, then, was this divine compassion extended

even to the ungodly and ungrateful? Why, but because it was the mercy

of Him who daily "maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good,

and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."[43] For though some

of these men, taking thought of this, repent of their wickedness

and reform, some, as the apostle says, "despising the riches of His

goodness and long-suffering, after their hardness and impenitent

heart, treasure up unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath

and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render to

every man according to his deeds:"[44] nevertheless does the patience

of God still invite the wicked to repentance, even as the scourge of

God educates the good to patience. And so, too, does the mercy of God

embrace the good that it may cherish them, as the severity of God

arrests the wicked to punish them. To the divine providence it has

seemed good to prepare in the world to come for the righteous good

things, which the unrighteous shall not enjoy; and for the wicked

evil things, by which the good shall not be tormented. But as for the

good things of this life, and its ills, God has willed that these

should be common to both; that we might not too eagerly covet the

things which wicked men are seen equally to enjoy, nor shrink with an

unseemly fear from the ills which even good men often suffer.

There is, too, a very great difference in the purpose served both

by those events which we call adverse and those called prosperous.

For the good man is neither uplifted with the good things of

time, nor broken by its ills; but the wicked man, because he is

corrupted by this world's happiness, feels himself punished by its

unhappiness.[45] Yet often, even in the present distribution of

temporal things, does God plainly evince His own interference. For if

every sin were now visited with manifest punishment, nothing would

seem to be reserved for the final judgment; on the other hand, if no

sin received now a plainly divine punishment, it would be concluded

that there is no divine providence at all. And so of the good things

of this life: if God did not by a very visible liberality confer

these on some of those persons who ask for them, we should say that

these good things were not at His disposal; and if He gave them

to all who sought them, we should suppose that such were the only

rewards of His service; and such a service would make us not godly,

but greedy rather, and covetous. Wherefore, though good and bad men

suffer alike, we must not suppose that there is no difference between

the men themselves, because there is no difference in what they both

suffer. For even in the likeness of the sufferings, there remains an

unlikeness in the sufferers; and though exposed to the same anguish,

virtue and vice are not the same thing. For as the same fire causes

gold to glow brightly, and chaff to smoke; and under the same flail

the straw is beaten small, while the grain is cleansed; and as the

lees are not mixed with the oil, though squeezed out of the vat by

the same pressure, so the same violence of affliction proves, purges,

clarifies the good, but damns, ruins, exterminates the wicked. And

thus it is that in the same affliction the wicked detest God and

blaspheme, while the good pray and praise. So material a difference

does it make, not what ills are suffered, but what kind of man

suffers them. For, stirred up with the same movement, mud exhales a

horrible stench, and ointment emits a fragrant odour.

9. _Of the reasons for administering correction to bad and good

together._

What, then, have the Christians suffered in that calamitous period,

which would not profit every one who duly and faithfully considered

the following circumstances? First of all, they must humbly consider

those very sins which have provoked God to fill the world with such

terrible disasters; for although they be far from the excesses of

wicked, immoral, and ungodly men, yet they do not judge themselves so

clean removed from all faults as to be too good to suffer for these

even temporal ills. For every man, however laudably he lives, yet

yields in some points to the lust of the flesh. Though he do not fall

into gross enormity of wickedness, and abandoned viciousness, and

abominable profanity, yet he slips into some sins, either rarely or

so much the more frequently as the sins seem of less account. But not

to mention this, where can we readily find a man who holds in fit and

just estimation those persons on account of whose revolting pride,

luxury, and avarice, and cursed iniquities and impiety, God now smites

the earth as His predictions threatened? Where is the man who lives

with them in the style in which it becomes us to live with them? For

often we wickedly blind ourselves to the occasions of teaching and

admonishing them, sometimes even of reprimanding and chiding them,

either because we shrink from the labour or are ashamed to offend them,

or because we fear to lose good friendships, lest this should stand in

the way of our advancement, or injure us in some worldly matter, which

either our covetous disposition desires to obtain, or our weakness

shrinks from losing. So that, although the conduct of wicked men is

distasteful to the good, and therefore they do not fall with them into

that damnation which in the next life awaits such persons, yet, because

they spare their damnable sins through fear, therefore, even though

their own sins be slight and venial, they are justly scourged with the

wicked in this world, though in eternity they quite escape punishment.

Justly, when God afflicts them in common with the wicked, do they find

this life bitter, through love of whose sweetness they declined to be

bitter to these sinners.

If any one forbears to reprove and find fault with those who are

doing wrong, because he seeks a more seasonable opportunity, or

because he fears they may be made worse by his rebuke, or that other

weak persons may be disheartened from endeavouring to lead a good and

pious life, and may be driven from the faith; this man's omission

seems to be occasioned not by covetousness, but by a charitable

consideration. But what is blameworthy is, that they who themselves

revolt from the conduct of the wicked, and live in quite another

fashion, yet spare those faults in other men which they ought to

reprehend and wean them from; and spare them because they fear to

give offence, lest they should injure their interests in those things

which good men may innocently and legitimately use,--though they use

them more greedily than becomes persons who are strangers in this

world, and profess the hope of a heavenly country. For not only the

weaker brethren, who enjoy married life, and have children (or desire

to have them), and own houses and establishments, whom the apostle

addresses in the churches, warning and instructing them how they

should live, both the wives with their husbands, and the husbands

with their wives, the children with their parents, and parents with

their children, and servants with their masters, and masters with

their servants,--not only do these weaker brethren gladly obtain

and grudgingly lose many earthly and temporal things on account of

which they dare not offend men whose polluted and wicked life greatly

displeases them; but those also who live at a higher level, who are

not entangled in the meshes of married life, but use meagre food and

raiment, do often take thought of their own safety and good name,

and abstain from finding fault with the wicked, because they fear

their wiles and violence. And although they do not fear them to such

an extent as to be drawn to the commission of like iniquities, nay,

not by any threats or violence soever; yet those very deeds which

they refuse to share in the commission of, they often decline to find

fault with, when possibly they might by finding fault prevent their

commission. They abstain from interference, because they fear that,

if it fail of good effect, their own safety or reputation may be

damaged or destroyed; not because they see that their preservation

and good name are needful, that they may be able to influence those

who need their instruction, but rather because they weakly relish

the flattery and respect of men, and fear the judgments of the

people, and the pain or death of the body; that is to say, their

non-intervention is the result of selfishness, and not of love.

Accordingly, this seems to me to be one principal reason why the good

are chastised along with the wicked, when God is pleased to visit

with temporal punishments the profligate manners of a community.

They are punished together, not because they have spent an equally

corrupt life, but because the good as well as the wicked, though

not equally with them, love this present life; while they ought to

hold it cheap, that the wicked, being admonished and reformed by

their example, might lay hold of life eternal. And if they will not

be the companions of the good in seeking life everlasting, they

should be loved as enemies, and be dealt with patiently. For so long

as they live, it remains uncertain whether they may not come to a

better mind. These selfish persons have more cause to fear than

those to whom it was said through the prophet, "He is taken away

in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at the watchman's

hand."[46] For watchmen or overseers of the people are appointed

in churches, that they may unsparingly rebuke sin. Nor is that man

guiltless of the sin we speak of, who, though he be not a watchman,

yet sees in the conduct of those with whom the relationships of this

life bring him into contact, many things that should be blamed,

and yet overlooks them, fearing to give offence, and lose such

worldly blessings as may legitimately be desired, but which he too

eagerly grasps. Then, lastly, there is another reason why the good

are afflicted with temporal calamities--the reason which Job's

case exemplifies: that the human spirit may be proved, and that it

may be manifested with what fortitude of pious trust, and with how

unmercenary a love, it cleaves to God.[47]

10. _That the saints lose nothing in losing temporal goods._

These are the considerations which one must keep in view, that he may

answer the question whether any evil happens to the faithful and godly

which cannot be turned to profit. Or shall we say that the question is

needless, and that the apostle is vapouring when he says, "We know that

all things work together for good to them that love God?"[48]

They lost all they had. Their faith? Their godliness? The possessions

of the hidden man of the heart, which in the sight of God are of great

price?[49] Did they lose these? For these are the wealth of Christians,

to whom the wealthy apostle said, "Godliness with contentment is great

gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can

carry nothing out. And having food and raiment, let us be therewith

content. But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare,

and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction

and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil; which,

while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced

themselves through with many sorrows."[50]

They, then, who lost their worldly all in the sack of Rome, if they

owned their possessions as they had been taught by the apostle, who

himself was poor without, but rich within,--that is to say, if they

used the world as not using it,--could say in the words of Job,

heavily tried, but not overcome: "Naked came I out of my mother's

womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord

hath taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so has it come to pass:

blessed be the name of the Lord."[51] Like a good servant, Job

counted the will of his Lord his great possession, by obedience to

which his soul was enriched; nor did it grieve him to lose, while

yet living, those goods which he must shortly leave at his death.

But as to those feebler spirits who, though they cannot be said to

prefer earthly possessions to Christ, do yet cleave to them with a

somewhat immoderate attachment, they have discovered by the pain

of losing these things how much they were sinning in loving them.

For their grief is of their own making; in the words of the apostle

quoted above, "they have pierced themselves through with many

sorrows." For it was well that they who had so long despised these

verbal admonitions should receive the teaching of experience. For

when the apostle says, "They that will be rich fall into temptation,"

and so on, what he blames in riches is not the possession of them,

but the desire of them. For elsewhere he says, "Charge them that

are rich in this world, that they be not high-minded, nor trust in

uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all

things to enjoy; that they do good, that they be rich in good works,

ready to distribute, willing to communicate; laying up in store for

themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may

lay hold on eternal life."[52] They who were making such a use of

their property have been consoled for light losses by great gains,

and have had more pleasure in those possessions which they have

securely laid past, by freely giving them away, than grief in those

which they entirely lost by an anxious and selfish hoarding of them.

For nothing could perish on earth save what they would be ashamed to

carry away from earth. Our Lord's injunction runs, "Lay not up for

yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt,

and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for yourselves

treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and

where thieves do not break through nor steal: for where your treasure

is, there will your heart be also."[53] And they who have listened

to this injunction have proved in the time of tribulation how well

they were advised in not despising this most trustworthy teacher,

and most faithful and mighty guardian of their treasure. For if

many were glad that their treasure was stored in places which the

enemy chanced not to light upon, how much better founded was the

joy of those who, by the counsel of their God, had fled with their

treasure to a citadel which no enemy can possibly reach! Thus our

Paulinus, bishop of Nola,[54] who voluntarily abandoned vast wealth

and became quite poor, though abundantly rich in holiness, when the

barbarians sacked Nola, and took him prisoner, used silently to pray,

as he afterwards told me, "O Lord, let me not be troubled for gold

and silver, for where all my treasure is Thou knowest." For all his

treasure was where he had been taught to hide and store it by Him who

had also foretold that these calamities would happen in the world.

Consequently those persons who obeyed their Lord when He warned them

where and how to lay up treasure, did not lose even their earthly

possessions in the invasion of the barbarians; while those who are

now repenting that they did not obey Him have learnt the right use

of earthly goods, if not by the wisdom which would have prevented

their loss, at least by the experience which follows it.

But some good and Christian men have been put to the torture, that

they might be forced to deliver up their goods to the enemy. They

could indeed neither deliver nor lose that good which made themselves

good. If, however, they preferred torture to the surrender of the

mammon of iniquity, then I say they were not good men. Rather they

should have been reminded that, if they suffered so severely for

the sake of money, they should endure all torment, if need be, for

Christ's sake; that they might be taught to love Him rather who

enriches with eternal felicity all who suffer for Him, and not

silver and gold, for which it was pitiable to suffer, whether they

preserved it by telling a lie, or lost it by telling the truth. For

under these tortures no one lost Christ by confessing Him, no one

preserved wealth save by denying its existence. So that possibly

the torture which taught them that they should set their affections

on a possession they could not lose, was more useful than those

possessions which, without any useful fruit at all, disquieted

and tormented their anxious owners. But then we are reminded that

some were tortured who had no wealth to surrender, but who were

not believed when they said so. These too, however, had perhaps

some craving for wealth, and were not willingly poor with a holy

resignation; and to such it had to be made plain, that not the actual

possession alone, but also the desire of wealth, deserved such

excruciating pains. And even if they were destitute of any hidden

stores of gold and silver, because they were living in hopes of a

better life,--I know not indeed if any such person was tortured on

the supposition that he had wealth; but if so, then certainly in

confessing, when put to the question, a holy poverty, he confessed

Christ. And though it was scarcely to be expected that the barbarians

should believe him, yet no confessor of a holy poverty could be

tortured without receiving a heavenly reward.

Again, they say that the long famine laid many a Christian low. But

this, too, the faithful turned to good uses by a pious endurance of

it. For those whom famine killed outright it rescued from the ills

of this life, as a kindly disease would have done; and those who were

only hunger-bitten were taught to live more sparingly, and inured to

longer fasts.

11. _Of the end of this life, whether it is material that it be long

delayed._

But, it is added, many Christians were slaughtered, and were put to

death in a hideous variety of cruel ways. Well, if this be hard to

bear, it is assuredly the common lot of all who are born into this

life. Of this at least I am certain, that no one has ever died who

was not destined to die some time. Now the end of life puts the

longest life on a par with the shortest. For of two things which

have alike ceased to be, the one is not better, the other worse--the

one greater, the other less.[55] And of what consequence is it what

kind of death puts an end to life, since he who has died once is

not forced to go through the same ordeal a second time? And as in

the daily casualties of life every man is, as it were, threatened

with numberless deaths, so long as it remains uncertain which of

them is his fate, I would ask whether it is not better to suffer

one and die, than to live in fear of all? I am not unaware of the

poor-spirited fear which prompts us to choose rather to live long in

fear of so many deaths, than to die once and so escape them all; but

the weak and cowardly shrinking of the flesh is one thing, and the

well-considered and reasonable persuasion of the soul quite another.

That death is not to be judged an evil which is the end of a good

life; for death becomes evil only by the retribution which follows

it. They, then, who are destined to die, need not be careful to

inquire what death they are to die, but into what place death will

usher them. And since Christians are well aware that the death of the

godly pauper whose sores the dogs licked was far better than of the

wicked rich man who lay in purple and fine linen, what harm could

these terrific deaths do to the dead who had lived well?

12. _Of the burial of the dead: that the denial of it to Christians

does them no injury._[56]

Further still, we are reminded that in such a carnage as then

occurred, the bodies could not even be buried. But godly confidence

is not appalled by so ill-omened a circumstance; for the faithful

bear in mind that assurance has been given that not a hair of their

head shall perish, and that, therefore, though they even be devoured

by beasts, their blessed resurrection will not hereby be hindered.

The Truth would nowise have said, "Fear not them which kill the body,

but are not able to kill the soul,"[57] if anything whatever that

an enemy could do to the body of the slain could be detrimental to

the future life. Or will some one perhaps take so absurd a position

as to contend that those who kill the body are not to be feared

before death, and lest they kill the body, but after death, lest they

deprive it of burial? If this be so, then that is false which Christ

says, "Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have

no more that they can do;"[58] for it seems they can do great injury

to the dead body. Far be it from us to suppose that the Truth can

be thus false. They who kill the body are said "to do something,"

because the death-blow is felt, the body still having sensation; but

after that, they have no more that they can do, for in the slain

body there is no sensation. And so there are indeed many bodies

of Christians lying unburied; but no one has separated them from

heaven, nor from that earth which is all filled with the presence

of Him who knows whence He will raise again what He created. It is

said, indeed, in the Psalm: "The dead bodies of Thy servants have

they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of Thy

saints unto the beasts of the earth. Their blood have they shed like

water round about Jerusalem; and there was none to bury them."[59]

But this was said rather to exhibit the cruelty of those who did

these things, than the misery of those who suffered them. To the eyes

of men this appears a harsh and doleful lot, yet "precious in the

sight of the Lord is the death of His saints."[60] Wherefore all

these last offices and ceremonies that concern the dead, the careful

funeral arrangements, and the equipment of the tomb, and the pomp of

obsequies, are rather the solace of the living than the comfort of

the dead. If a costly burial does any good to a wicked man, a squalid

burial, or none at all, may harm the godly. His crowd of domestics

furnished the purple-clad Dives with a funeral gorgeous in the eye of

man; but in the sight of God that was a more sumptuous funeral which

the ulcerous pauper received at the hands of the angels, who did not

carry him out to a marble tomb, but bore him aloft to Abraham's bosom.

The men against whom I have undertaken to defend the city of God

laugh at all this. But even their own philosophers[61] have despised

a careful burial; and often whole armies have fought and fallen for

their earthly country without caring to inquire whether they would

be left exposed on the field of battle, or become the food of wild

beasts. Of this noble disregard of sepulture poetry has well said:

"He who has no tomb has the sky for his vault."[62] How much less

ought they to insult over the unburied bodies of Christians, to whom

it has been promised that the flesh itself shall be restored, and

the body formed anew, all the members of it being gathered not only

from the earth, but from the most secret recesses of any other of the

elements in which the dead bodies of men have lain hid!

13. _Reasons for burying the bodies of the saints._

Nevertheless the bodies of the dead are not on this account to be

despised and left unburied; least of all the bodies of the righteous

and faithful, which have been used by the Holy Ghost as His organs

and instruments for all good works. For if the dress of a father,

or his ring, or anything he wore, be precious to his children, in

proportion to the love they bore him, with how much more reason

ought we to care for the bodies of those we love, which they wore

far more closely and intimately than any clothing! For the body

is not an extraneous ornament or aid, but a part of man's very

nature. And therefore to the righteous of ancient times the last

offices were piously rendered, and sepulchres provided for them, and

obsequies celebrated;[63] and they themselves, while yet alive, gave

commandment to their sons about the burial, and, on occasion, even

about the removal of their bodies to some favourite place.[64] And

Tobit, according to the angel's testimony, is commended, and is said

to have pleased God by burying the dead.[65] Our Lord Himself, too,

though He was to rise again the third day, applauds, and commends

to our applause, the good work of the religious woman who poured

precious ointment over His limbs, and did it against His burial.[66]

And the Gospel speaks with commendation of those who were careful to

take down His body from the cross, and wrap it lovingly in costly

cerements, and see to its burial.[67] These instances certainly

do not prove that corpses have any feeling; but they show that

God's providence extends even to the bodies of the dead, and that

such pious offices are pleasing to Him, as cherishing faith in the

resurrection. And we may also draw from them this wholesome lesson,

that if God does not forget even any kind office which loving care

pays to the unconscious dead, much more does He reward the charity

we exercise towards the living. Other things, indeed, which the holy

patriarchs said of the burial and removal of their bodies, they meant

to be taken in a prophetic sense; but of these we need not here speak

at large, what we have already said being sufficient. But if the want

of those things which are necessary for the support of the living,

as food and clothing, though painful and trying, does not break down

the fortitude and virtuous endurance of good men, nor eradicate piety

from their souls, but rather renders it more fruitful, how much less

can the absence of the funeral, and of the other customary attentions

paid to the dead, render those wretched who are already reposing in

the hidden abodes of the blessed! Consequently, though in the sack

of Rome and of other towns the dead bodies of the Christians were

deprived of these last offices, this is neither the fault of the

living, for they could not render them; nor an infliction to the

dead, for they cannot feel the loss.

14. _Of the captivity of the saints, and that divine consolation

never failed them therein._

But, say they, many Christians were even led away captive. This

indeed were a most pitiable fate, if they could be led away to any

place where they could not find their God. But for this calamity also

sacred Scripture affords great consolation. The three youths[68] were

captives; Daniel was a captive; so were other prophets: and God, the

comforter, did not fail them. And in like manner He has not failed

His own people in the power of a nation which, though barbarous, is

yet human,--He who did not abandon the prophet[69] in the belly of

a monster. These things, indeed, are turned to ridicule rather than

credited by those with whom we are debating; though they believe

what they read in their own books, that Arion of Methymna, the

famous lyrist,[70] when he was thrown overboard, was received on a

dolphin's back and carried to land. But that story of ours about the

prophet Jonah is far more incredible,--more incredible because more

marvellous, and more marvellous because a greater exhibition of power.

15. _Of Regulus, in whom we have an example of the voluntary

endurance of captivity for the sake of religion; which yet did

not profit him, though he was a worshipper of the gods._

But among their own famous men they have a very noble example of the

voluntary endurance of captivity in obedience to a religious scruple.

Marcus Attilius Regulus, a Roman general, was a prisoner in the

hands of the Carthaginians. But they, being more anxious to exchange

their prisoners with the Romans than to keep them, sent Regulus as a

special envoy with their own ambassadors to negotiate this exchange,

but bound him first with an oath, that if he failed to accomplish

their wish, he would return to Carthage. He went, and persuaded the

senate to the opposite course, because he believed it was not for

the advantage of the Roman republic to make an exchange of prisoners.

After he had thus exerted his influence, the Romans did not compel

him to return to the enemy; but what he had sworn he voluntarily

performed. But the Carthaginians put him to death with refined,

elaborate, and horrible tortures. They shut him up in a narrow box,

in which he was compelled to stand, and in which finely sharpened

nails were fixed all round about him, so that he could not lean

upon any part of it without intense pain; and so they killed him by

depriving him of sleep.[71] With justice, indeed, do they applaud the

virtue which rose superior to so frightful a fate. However, the gods

he swore by were those who are now supposed to avenge the prohibition

of their worship, by inflicting these present calamities on the

human race. But if these gods, who were worshipped specially in this

behalf, that they might confer happiness in this life, either willed

or permitted these punishments to be inflicted on one who kept his

oath to them, what more cruel punishment could they in their anger

have inflicted on a perjured person? But why may I not draw from my

reasoning a double inference? Regulus certainly had such reverence

for the gods, that for his oath's sake he would neither remain in

his own land, nor go elsewhere, but without hesitation returned

to his bitterest enemies. If he thought that this course would be

advantageous with respect to this present life, he was certainly

much deceived, for it brought his life to a frightful termination.

By his own example, in fact, he taught that the gods do not secure

the temporal happiness of their worshippers; since he himself, who

was devoted to their worship, was both conquered in battle and taken

prisoner, and then, because he refused to act in violation of the

oath he had sworn by them, was tortured and put to death by a new,

and hitherto unheard of, and all too horrible kind of punishment.

And on the supposition that the worshippers of the gods are rewarded

by felicity in the life to come, why, then, do they calumniate the

influence of Christianity? why do they assert that this disaster has

overtaken the city because it has ceased to worship its gods, since,

worship them as assiduously as it may, it may yet be as unfortunate

as Regulus was? Or will some one carry so wonderful a blindness to

the extent of wildly attempting, in the face of the evident truth, to

contend that though one man might be unfortunate, though a worshipper

of the gods, yet a whole city could not be so? That is to say, the

power of their gods is better adapted to preserve multitudes than

individuals,--as if a multitude were not composed of individuals.

But if they say that M. Regulus, even while a prisoner and enduring

these bodily torments, might yet enjoy the blessedness of a virtuous

soul,[72] then let them recognise that true virtue by which a city

also may be blessed. For the blessedness of a community and of an

individual flow from the same source; for a community is nothing

else than a harmonious collection of individuals. So that I am not

concerned meantime to discuss what kind of virtue Regulus possessed:

enough, that by his very noble example they are forced to own that

the gods are to be worshipped not for the sake of bodily comforts or

external advantages; for he preferred to lose all such things rather

than offend the gods by whom he had sworn. But what can we make of

men who glory in having such a citizen, but dread having a city

like him? If they do not dread this, then let them acknowledge that

some such calamity as befell Regulus may also befall a community,

though they be worshipping their gods as diligently as he; and let

them no longer throw the blame of their misfortunes on Christianity.

But as our present concern is with those Christians who were taken

prisoners, let those who take occasion from this calamity to revile

our most wholesome religion in a fashion not less imprudent than

impudent, consider this and hold their peace; for if it was no

reproach to their gods that a most punctilious worshipper of theirs

should, for the sake of keeping his oath to them, be deprived of his

native land without hope of finding another, and fall into the hands

of his enemies, and be put to death by a long-drawn and exquisite

torture, much less ought the Christian name to be charged with the

captivity of those who believe in its power, since they, in confident

expectation of a heavenly country, know that they are pilgrims even

in their own homes.

16. _Of the violation of the consecrated and other Christian

virgins to which they were subjected in captivity, and to which

their own will gave no consent; and whether this contaminated

their souls._

But they fancy they bring a conclusive charge against Christianity,

when they aggravate the horror of captivity by adding that not only

wives and unmarried maidens, but even consecrated virgins, were

violated. But truly, with respect to this, it is not Christian faith,

nor piety, nor even the virtue of chastity, which is hemmed into any

difficulty: the only difficulty is so to treat the subject as to

satisfy at once modesty and reason. And in discussing it we shall not

be so careful to reply to our accusers as to comfort our friends. Let

this, therefore, in the first place, be laid down as an unassailable

position, that the virtue which makes the life good has its throne

in the soul, and thence rules the members of the body, which becomes

holy in virtue of the holiness of the will; and that while the will

remains firm and unshaken, nothing that another person does with the

body, or upon the body, is any fault of the person who suffers it,

so long as he cannot escape it without sin. But as not only pain may

be inflicted, but lust gratified on the body of another, whenever

anything of this latter kind takes place, shame invades even a

thoroughly pure spirit from which modesty has not departed,--shame,

lest that act which could not be suffered without some sensual

pleasure, should be believed to have been committed also with some

assent of the will.

17. _Of suicide committed through fear of punishment or dishonour._

And consequently, even if some of these virgins killed themselves

to avoid such disgrace, who that has any human feeling would refuse

to forgive them? And as for those who would not put an end to their

lives, lest they might seem to escape the crime of another by a sin

of their own, he who lays this to their charge as a great wickedness

is himself not guiltless of the fault of folly. For if it is not

lawful to take the law into our own hands, and slay even a guilty

person, whose death no public sentence has warranted, then certainly

he who kills himself is a homicide, and so much the guiltier of

his own death, as he was more innocent of that offence for which

he doomed himself to die. Do we justly execrate the deed of Judas,

and does truth itself pronounce that by hanging himself he rather

aggravated than expiated the guilt of that most iniquitous betrayal,

since, by despairing of God's mercy in his sorrow that wrought death,

he left to himself no place for a healing penitence? How much more

ought he to abstain from laying violent hands on himself who has

done nothing worthy of such a punishment! For Judas, when he killed

himself, killed a wicked man; but he passed from this life chargeable

not only with the death of Christ, but with his own: for though he

killed himself on account of his crime, his killing himself was

another crime. Why, then, should a man who has done no ill do ill to

himself, and by killing himself kill the innocent to escape another's

guilty act, and perpetrate upon himself a sin of his own, that the

sin of another may not be perpetrated on him?

18. _Of the violence which may be done to the body by another's

lust, while the mind remains inviolate._

But is there a fear that even another's lust may pollute the

violated? It will not pollute, if it be another's: if it pollute,

it is not another's, but is shared also by the polluted. But since

purity is a virtue of the soul, and has for its companion virtue

the fortitude which will rather endure all ills than consent to

evil; and since no one, however magnanimous and pure, has always

the disposal of his own body, but can control only the consent and

refusal of his will, what sane man can suppose that, if his body be

seized and forcibly made use of to satisfy the lust of another, he

thereby loses his purity? For if purity can be thus destroyed, then

assuredly purity is no virtue of the soul; nor can it be numbered

among those good things by which the life is made good, but among the

good things of the body, in the same category as strength, beauty,

sound and unbroken health, and, in short, all such good things as may

be diminished without at all diminishing the goodness and rectitude

of our life. But if purity be nothing better than these, why should

the body be perilled that it may be preserved? If, on the other hand,

it belongs to the soul, then not even when the body is violated is it

lost. Nay more, the virtue of holy continence, when it resists the

uncleanness of carnal lust, sanctifies even the body, and therefore

when this continence remains unsubdued, even the sanctity of the body

is preserved, because the will to use it holily remains, and, so far

as lies in the body itself, the power also.

For the sanctity of the body does not consist in the integrity of

its members, nor in their exemption from all touch; for they are

exposed to various accidents which do violence to and wound them,

and the surgeons who administer relief often perform operations that

sicken the spectator. A midwife, suppose, has (whether maliciously or

accidentally, or through unskilfulness) destroyed the virginity of

some girl, while endeavouring to ascertain it: I suppose no one is so

foolish as to believe that, by this destruction of the integrity of

one organ, the virgin has lost anything even of her bodily sanctity.

And thus, so long as the soul keeps this firmness of purpose which

sanctifies even the body, the violence done by another's lust makes

no impression on this bodily sanctity, which is preserved intact by

one's own persistent continence. Suppose a virgin violates the oath

she has sworn to God, and goes to meet her seducer with the intention

of yielding to him, shall we say that as she goes she is possessed

even of bodily sanctity, when already she has lost and destroyed

that sanctity of soul which sanctifies the body? Far be it from us

to so misapply words. Let us rather draw this conclusion, that while

the sanctity of the soul remains even when the body is violated,

the sanctity of the body is not lost; and that, in like manner,

the sanctity of the body is lost when the sanctity of the soul is

violated, though the body itself remain intact. And therefore a woman

who has been violated by the sin of another, and without any consent

of her own, has no cause to put herself to death; much less has she

cause to commit suicide in order to avoid such violation, for in

that case she commits certain homicide to prevent a crime which is

uncertain as yet, and not her own.

19. _Of Lucretia, who put an end to her life because of the outrage

done her._

This, then, is our position, and it seems sufficiently lucid. We

maintain that when a woman is violated while her soul admits no

consent to the iniquity, but remains inviolably chaste, the sin is

not hers, but his who violates her. But do they against whom we have

to defend not only the souls, but the sacred bodies too of these

outraged Christian captives,--do they, perhaps, dare to dispute

our position? But all know how loudly they extol the purity of

Lucretia, that noble matron of ancient Rome. When King Tarquin's son

had violated her body, she made known the wickedness of this young

profligate to her husband Collatinus, and to Brutus her kinsman,

men of high rank and full of courage, and bound them by an oath to

avenge it. Then, heart-sick, and unable to bear the shame, she put an

end to her life. What shall we call her? An adulteress, or chaste?

There is no question which she was. Not more happily than truly did

a declaimer say of this sad occurrence: "Here was a marvel: there

were two, and only one committed adultery." Most forcibly and truly

spoken. For this declaimer, seeing in the union of the two bodies

the foul lust of the one, and the chaste will of the other, and

giving heed not to the contact of the bodily members, but to the wide

diversity of their souls, says: "There were two, but the adultery was

committed only by one."

But how is it, that she who was no partner to the crime bears the

heavier punishment of the two? For the adulterer was only banished

along with his father; she suffered the extreme penalty. If that was

not impurity by which she was unwillingly ravished, then this is not

justice by which she, being chaste, is punished. To you I appeal,

ye laws and judges of Rome. Even after the perpetration of great

enormities, you do not suffer the criminal to be slain untried. If,

then, one were to bring to your bar this case, and were to prove

to you that a woman not only untried, but chaste and innocent,

had been killed, would you not visit the murderer with punishment

proportionably severe? This crime was committed by Lucretia; that

Lucretia so celebrated and lauded slew the innocent, chaste, outraged

Lucretia. Pronounce sentence. But if you cannot, because there does

not compear any one whom you can punish, why do you extol with such

unmeasured laudation her who slew an innocent and chaste woman?

Assuredly you will find it impossible to defend her before the judges

of the realms below, if they be such as your poets are fond of

representing them; for she is among those

"Who guiltless sent themselves to doom,

And all for loathing of the day,

In madness threw their lives away."

And if she with the others wishes to return,

"Fate bars the way: around their keep

The slow unlovely waters creep,

And bind with ninefold chain."[73]

Or perhaps she is not there, because she slew herself conscious of

guilt, not of innocence? She herself alone knows her reason; but what

if she was betrayed by the pleasure of the act, and gave some consent

to Sextus, though so violently abusing her, and then was so affected

with remorse, that she thought death alone could expiate her sin?

Even though this were the case, she ought still to have held her hand

from suicide, if she could with her false gods have accomplished a

fruitful repentance. However, if such were the state of the case,

and if it were false that there were two, but one only committed

adultery; if the truth were that both were involved in it, one by

open assault, the other by secret consent, then she did not kill an

innocent woman; and therefore her erudite defenders may maintain that

she is not among that class of the dwellers below "who guiltless sent

themselves to doom." But this case of Lucretia is in such a dilemma,

that if you extenuate the homicide, you confirm the adultery: if you

acquit her of adultery, you make the charge of homicide heavier;

and there is no way out of the dilemma, when one asks, If she was

adulterous, why praise her? if chaste, why slay her?

Nevertheless, for our purpose of refuting those who are unable to

comprehend what true sanctity is, and who therefore insult over our

outraged Christian women, it is enough that in the instance of this

noble Roman matron it was said in her praise, "There were two, but

the adultery was the crime of only one." For Lucretia was confidently

believed to be superior to the contamination of any consenting

thought to the adultery. And accordingly, since she killed herself

for being subjected to an outrage in which she had no guilty part,

it is obvious that this act of hers was prompted not by the love of

purity, but by the overwhelming burden of her shame. She was ashamed

that so foul a crime had been perpetrated upon her, though without

her abetting; and this matron, with the Roman love of glory in her

veins, was seized with a proud dread that, if she continued to live,

it would be supposed she willingly did not resent the wrong that had

been done her. She could not exhibit to men her conscience, but she

judged that her self-inflicted punishment would testify her state

of mind; and she burned with shame at the thought that her patient

endurance of the foul affront that another had done her, should be

construed into complicity with him. Not such was the decision of

the Christian women who suffered as she did, and yet survive. They

declined to avenge upon themselves the guilt of others, and so add

crimes of their own to those crimes in which they had no share. For

this they would have done had their shame driven them to homicide, as

the lust of their enemies had driven them to adultery. Within their

own souls, in the witness of their own conscience, they enjoy the

glory of chastity. In the sight of God, too, they are esteemed pure,

and this contents them; they ask no more: it suffices them to have

opportunity of doing good, and they decline to evade the distress of

human suspicion, lest they thereby deviate from the divine law.

20. _That Christians have no authority for committing suicide in any

circumstances whatever._

It is not without significance, that in no passage of the holy

canonical books there can be found either divine precept or

permission to take away our own life, whether for the sake of

entering on the enjoyment of immortality, or of shunning, or ridding

ourselves of anything whatever. Nay, the law, rightly interpreted,

even prohibits suicide, where it says, "Thou shalt not kill." This

is proved specially by the omission of the words "thy neighbour,"

which are inserted when false witness is forbidden: "Thou shalt not

bear false witness against thy neighbour." Nor yet should any one

on this account suppose he has not broken this commandment if he

has borne false witness only against himself. For the love of our

neighbour is regulated by the love of ourselves, as it is written,

"Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." If, then, he who makes

false statements about himself is not less guilty of bearing false

witness than if he had made them to the injury of his neighbour;

although in the commandment prohibiting false witness only his

neighbour is mentioned, and persons taking no pains to understand

it might suppose that a man was allowed to be a false witness to

his own hurt; how much greater reason have we to understand that a

man may not kill himself, since in the commandment, "Thou shalt not

kill," there is no limitation added nor any exception made in favour

of any one, and least of all in favour of him on whom the command is

laid! And so some attempt to extend this command even to beasts and

cattle, as if it forbade us to take life from any creature. But if

so, why not extend it also to the plants, and all that is rooted in

and nourished by the earth? For though this class of creatures have

no sensation, yet they also are said to live, and consequently they

can die; and therefore, if violence be done them, can be killed.

So, too, the apostle, when speaking of the seeds of such things

as these, says, "That which thou sowest is not quickened except

it die;" and in the Psalm it is said, "He killed their vines with

hail." Must we therefore reckon it a breaking of this commandment,

"Thou shalt not kill," to pull a flower? Are we thus insanely to

countenance the foolish error of the Manichæans? Putting aside,

then, these ravings, if, when we say, Thou shalt not kill, we do not

understand this of the plants, since they have no sensation, nor of

the irrational animals that fly, swim, walk, or creep, since they are

dissociated from us by their want of reason, and are therefore by

the just appointment of the Creator subjected to us to kill or keep

alive for our own uses; if so, then it remains that we understand

that commandment simply of man. The commandment is, "Thou shalt not

kill man;" therefore neither another nor yourself, for he who kills

himself still kills nothing else than man.

21. _Of the cases in which we may put men to death without incurring

the guilt of murder._

However, there are some exceptions made by the divine authority to

its own law, that men may not be put to death. These exceptions

are of two kinds, being justified either by a general law, or by a

special commission granted for a time to some individual. And in

this latter case, he to whom authority is delegated, and who is but

the sword in the hand of him who uses it, is not himself responsible

for the death he deals. And, accordingly, they who have waged war

in obedience to the divine command, or in conformity with His laws

have represented in their persons the public justice or the wisdom of

government, and in this capacity have put to death wicked men; such

persons have by no means violated the commandment, "Thou shalt not

kill." Abraham indeed was not merely deemed guiltless of cruelty, but

was even applauded for his piety, because he was ready to slay his

son in obedience to God, not to his own passion. And it is reasonably

enough made a question, whether we are to esteem it to have been in

compliance with a command of God that Jephthah killed his daughter,

because she met him when he had vowed that he would sacrifice to God

whatever first met him as he returned victorious from battle. Samson,

too, who drew down the house on himself and his foes together, is

justified only on this ground, that the Spirit who wrought wonders by

him had given him secret instructions to do this. With the exception,

then, of these two classes of cases, which are justified either by a

just law that applies generally, or by a special intimation from God

Himself, the fountain of all justice, whoever kills a man, either

himself or another, is implicated in the guilt of murder.

22. _That suicide can never be prompted by magnanimity._

But they who have laid violent hands on themselves are perhaps to be

admired for their greatness of soul, though they cannot be applauded

for the soundness of their judgment. However, if you look at the

matter more closely, you will scarcely call it greatness of soul,

which prompts a man to kill himself rather than bear up against some

hardships of fortune, or sins in which he is not implicated. Is it not

rather proof of a feeble mind, to be unable to bear either the pains

of bodily servitude or the foolish opinion of the vulgar? And is not

that to be pronounced the greater mind, which rather faces than flees

the ills of life, and which, in comparison of the light and purity of

conscience, holds in small esteem the judgment of men, and specially

of the vulgar, which is frequently involved in a mist of error? And,

therefore, if suicide is to be esteemed a magnanimous act, none can

take higher rank for magnanimity than that Cleombrotus, who (as the

story goes), when he had read Plato's book in which he treats of the

immortality of the soul, threw himself from a wall, and so passed

from this life to that which he believed to be better. For he was

not hard pressed by calamity, nor by any accusation, false or true,

which he could not very well have lived down: there was, in short,

no motive but only magnanimity urging him to seek death, and break

away from the sweet detention of this life. And yet that this was a

magnanimous rather than a justifiable action, Plato himself, whom he

had read, would have told him; for he would certainly have been forward

to commit, or at least to recommend suicide, had not the same bright

intellect which saw that the soul was immortal, discerned also that to

seek immortality by suicide was to be prohibited rather than encouraged.

Again, it is said many have killed themselves to prevent an enemy

doing so. But we are not inquiring whether it has been done, but

whether it ought to have been done. Sound judgment is to be preferred

even to examples, and indeed examples harmonize with the voice of

reason; but not all examples, but those only which are distinguished

by their piety, and are proportionately worthy of imitation. For

suicide we cannot cite the example of patriarchs, prophets, or

apostles; though our Lord Jesus Christ, when He admonished them to

flee from city to city if they were persecuted, might very well

have taken that occasion to advise them to lay violent hands on

themselves, and so escape their persecutors. But seeing He did not

do this, nor proposed this mode of departing this life, though

He were addressing His own friends for whom He had promised to

prepare everlasting mansions, it is obvious that such examples as

are produced from the "nations that forget God," give no warrant of

imitation to the worshippers of the one true God.

23. _What we are to think of the example of Cato, who slew himself

because unable to endure Cæsar's victory._

Besides Lucretia, of whom enough has already been said, our advocates

of suicide have some difficulty in finding any other prescriptive

example, unless it be that of Cato, who killed himself at Utica. His

example is appealed to, not because he was the only man who did so,

but because he was so esteemed as a learned and excellent man, that

it could plausibly be maintained that what he did was and is a good

thing to do. But of this action of his, what can I say but that his

own friends, enlightened men as he, prudently dissuaded him, and

therefore judged his act to be that of a feeble rather than a strong

spirit, and dictated not by honourable feeling forestalling shame,

but by weakness shrinking from hardships? Indeed, Cato condemns

himself by the advice he gave to his dearly loved son. For if it

was a disgrace to live under Cæsar's rule, why did the father urge

the son to this disgrace, by encouraging him to trust absolutely to

Cæsar's generosity? Why did he not persuade him to die along with

himself? If Torquatus was applauded for putting his son to death,

when contrary to orders he had engaged, and engaged successfully,

with the enemy, why did conquered Cato spare his conquered son,

though he did not spare himself? Was it more disgraceful to be a

victor contrary to orders, than to submit to a victor contrary to the

received ideas of honour? Cato, then, cannot have deemed it to be

shameful to live under Cæsar's rule, for had he done so, the father's

sword would have delivered his son from this disgrace. The truth

is, that his son, whom he both hoped and desired would be spared by

Cæsar, was not more loved by him than Cæsar was envied the glory of

pardoning him (as indeed Cæsar himself is reported to have said[74]);

or if envy is too strong a word, let us say he was _ashamed_ that

this glory should be his.

24. _That in that virtue in which Regulus excels Cato, Christians

are pre-eminently distinguished._

Our opponents are offended at our preferring to Cato the saintly

Job, who endured dreadful evils in his body rather than deliver

himself from all torment by self-inflicted death; or other saints, of

whom it is recorded in our authoritative and trustworthy books that

they bore captivity and the oppression of their enemies rather than

commit suicide. But their own books authorize us to prefer to Marcus

Cato, Marcus Regulus. For Cato had never conquered Cæsar; and when

conquered by him, disdained to submit himself to him, and that he

might escape this submission put himself to death. Regulus, on the

contrary, had formerly conquered the Carthaginians, and in command of

the army of Rome had won for the Roman republic a victory which no

citizen could bewail, and which the enemy himself was constrained to

admire; yet afterwards, when he in his turn was defeated by them, he

preferred to be their captive rather than to put himself beyond their

reach by suicide. Patient under the domination of the Carthaginians,

and constant in his love of the Romans, he neither deprived the one

of his conquered body, nor the other of his unconquered spirit.

Neither was it love of life that prevented him from killing himself.

This was plainly enough indicated by his unhesitatingly returning,

on account of his promise and oath, to the same enemies whom he had

more grievously provoked by his words in the senate than even by his

arms in battle. Having such a contempt of life, and preferring to

end it by whatever torments excited enemies might contrive, rather

than terminate it by his own hand, he could not more distinctly have

declared how great a crime he judged suicide to be. Among all their

famous and remarkable citizens, the Romans have no better man to

boast of than this, who was neither corrupted by prosperity, for he

remained a very poor man after winning such victories; nor broken

by adversity, for he returned intrepidly to the most miserable end.

But if the bravest and most renowned heroes, who had but an earthly

country to defend, and who, though they had but false gods, yet

rendered them a true worship, and carefully kept their oath to them;

if these men, who by the custom and right of war put conquered

enemies to the sword, yet shrank from putting an end to their own

lives even when conquered by their enemies; if, though they had no

fear at all of death, they would yet rather suffer slavery than

commit suicide, how much rather must Christians, the worshippers

of the true God, the aspirants to a heavenly citizenship, shrink

from this act, if in God's providence they have been for a season

delivered into the hands of their enemies to prove or to correct

them! And, certainly, Christians subjected to this humiliating

condition will not be deserted by the Most High, who for their sakes

humbled Himself. Neither should they forget that they are bound by

no laws of war, nor military orders, to put even a conquered enemy

to the sword; and if a man may not put to death the enemy who has

sinned, or may yet sin against him, who is so infatuated as to

maintain that he may kill himself because an enemy has sinned, or is

going to sin, against him?

25. _That we should not endeavour by sin to obviate sin._

But, we are told, there is ground to fear that, when the body is

subjected to the enemy's lust, the insidious pleasure of sense may

entice the soul to consent to the sin, and steps must be taken to

prevent so disastrous a result. And is not suicide the proper mode of

preventing not only the enemy's sin, but the sin of the Christian so

allured? Now, in the first place, the soul which is led by God and

His wisdom, rather than by bodily concupiscence, will certainly never

consent to the desire aroused in its own flesh by another's lust.

And, at all events, if it be true, as the truth plainly declares,

that suicide is a detestable and damnable wickedness, who is such a

fool as to say, Let us sin now, that we may obviate a possible future

sin; let us now commit murder, lest we perhaps afterwards should

commit adultery? If we are so controlled by iniquity that innocence

is out of the question, and we can at best but make a choice of

sins, is not a future and uncertain adultery preferable to a present

and certain murder? Is it not better to commit a wickedness which

penitence may heal, than a crime which leaves no place for healing

contrition? I say this for the sake of those men or women who fear

they may be enticed into consenting to their violator's lust, and

think they should lay violent hands on themselves, and so prevent,

not another's sin, but their own. But far be it from the mind of

a Christian confiding in God, and resting in the hope of His aid;

far be it, I say, from such a mind to yield a shameful consent to

pleasures of the flesh, howsoever presented. And if that lustful

disobedience, which still dwells in our mortal members, follows its

own law irrespective of our will, surely its motions in the body of

one who rebels against them are as blameless as its motions in the

body of one who sleeps.

26. _That in certain peculiar cases the examples of the saints are

not to be followed._

But, they say, in the time of persecution some holy women escaped

those who menaced them with outrage, by casting themselves into

rivers which they knew would drown them; and having died in this

manner, they are venerated in the church catholic as martyrs.

Of such persons I do not presume to speak rashly. I cannot tell

whether there may not have been vouchsafed to the church some divine

authority, proved by trustworthy evidences, for so honouring their

memory: it may be that it is so. It may be they were not deceived

by human judgment, but prompted by divine wisdom, to their act of

self-destruction. We know that this was the case with Samson. And

when God enjoins any act, and intimates by plain evidence that He

has enjoined it, who will call obedience criminal? Who will accuse

so religious a submission? But then every man is not justified in

sacrificing his son to God, because Abraham was commendable in so

doing. The soldier who has slain a man in obedience to the authority

under which he is lawfully commissioned, is not accused of murder by

any law of his state; nay, if he has not slain him, it is then he is

accused of treason to the state, and of despising the law. But if he

has been acting on his own authority, and at his own impulse, he has

in this case incurred the crime of shedding human blood. And thus he

is punished for doing without orders the very thing he is punished

for neglecting to do when he has been ordered. If the commands of

a general make so great a difference, shall the commands of God

make none? He, then, who knows it is unlawful to kill himself,

may nevertheless do so if he is ordered by Him whose commands we

may not neglect. Only let him be very sure that the divine command

has been signified. As for us, we can become privy to the secrets

of conscience only in so far as these are disclosed to us, and so

far only do we judge: "No one knoweth the things of a man, save the

spirit of man which is in him."[75] But this we affirm, this we

maintain, this we every way pronounce to be right, that no man ought

to inflict on himself voluntary death, for this is to escape the ills

of time by plunging into those of eternity; that no man ought to do

so on account of another man's sins, for this were to escape a guilt

which could not pollute him, by incurring great guilt of his own;

that no man ought to do so on account of his own past sins, for he

has all the more need of this life that these sins may be healed by

repentance; that no man should put an end to this life to obtain that

better life we look for after death, for those who die by their own

hand have no better life after death.

27. _Whether voluntary death should be sought in order to avoid sin._

There remains one reason for suicide which I mentioned before, and

which is thought a sound one,--namely, to prevent one's falling into

sin either through the blandishments of pleasure or the violence of

pain. If this reason were a good one, then we should be impelled

to exhort men at once to destroy themselves, as soon as they have

been washed in the laver of regeneration, and have received the

forgiveness of all sin. Then is the time to escape all future sin,

when all past sin is blotted out. And if this escape be lawfully

secured by suicide, why not then specially? Why does any baptized

person hold his hand from taking his own life? Why does any person

who is freed from the hazards of this life again expose himself to

them, when he has power so easily to rid himself of them all, and

when it is written, "He who loveth danger shall fall into it?"[76]

Why does he love, or at least face, so many serious dangers, by

remaining in this life from which he may legitimately depart? But is

any one so blinded and twisted in his moral nature, and so far astray

from the truth, as to think that, though a man ought to make away

with himself for fear of being led into sin by the oppression of one

man, his master, he ought yet to live, and so expose himself to the

hourly temptations of this world, both to all those evils which the

oppression of one master involves, and to numberless other miseries

in which this life inevitably implicates us? What reason, then, is

there for our consuming time in those exhortations by which we seek

to animate the baptized, either to virginal chastity, or vidual

continence, or matrimonial fidelity, when we have so much more simple

and compendious a method of deliverance from sin, by persuading those

who are fresh from baptism to put an end to their lives, and so pass

to their Lord pure and well-conditioned? If any one thinks that such

persuasion should be attempted, I say not he is foolish, but mad.

With what face, then, can he say to any man, "Kill yourself, lest

to your small sins you add a heinous sin, while you live under an

unchaste master, whose conduct is that of a barbarian?" How can he

say this, if he cannot without wickedness say, "Kill yourself, now

that you are washed from all your sins, lest you fall again into

similar or even aggravated sins, while you live in a world which has

such power to allure by its unclean pleasures, to torment by its

horrible cruelties, to overcome by its errors and terrors?" It is

wicked to say this; it is therefore wicked to kill oneself. For if

there could be any just cause of suicide, this were so. And since not

even this is so, there is none.

28. _By what judgment of God the enemy was permitted to indulge

his lust on the bodies of continent Christians._

Let not your life, then, be a burden to you, ye faithful servants of

Christ, though your chastity was made the sport of your enemies. You

have a grand and true consolation, if you maintain a good conscience,

and know that you did not consent to the sins of those who were

permitted to commit sinful outrage upon you. And if you should ask

why this permission was granted, indeed it is a deep providence

of the Creator and Governor of the world; and "unsearchable are

His judgments, and His ways past finding out."[77] Nevertheless,

faithfully interrogate your own souls, whether ye have not been

unduly puffed up by your integrity, and continence, and chastity;

and whether ye have not been so desirous of the human praise that is

accorded to these virtues, that ye have envied some who possessed

them. I, for my part, do not know your hearts, and therefore I make

no accusation; I do not even hear what your hearts answer when you

question them. And yet, if they answer that it is as I have supposed

it might be, do not marvel that you have lost that by which you can

win men's praise, and retain that which cannot be exhibited to men.

If you did not consent to sin, it was because God added His aid

to His grace that it might not be lost, and because shame before

men succeeded to human glory that it might not be loved. But in

both respects even the fainthearted among you have a consolation,

approved by the one experience, chastened by the other; justified

by the one, corrected by the other. As to those whose hearts, when

interrogated, reply that they have never been proud of the virtue of

virginity, widowhood, or matrimonial chastity, but, condescending

to those of low estate, rejoiced with trembling in these gifts of

God, and that they have never envied any one the like excellences

of sanctity and purity, but rose superior to human applause, which

is wont to be abundant in proportion to the rarity of the virtue

applauded, and rather desired that their own number be increased,

than that by the smallness of their numbers each of them should be

conspicuous;--even such faithful women, I say, must not complain

that permission was given to the barbarians so grossly to outrage

them; nor must they allow themselves to believe that God overlooked

their character when He permitted acts which no one with impunity

commits. For some most flagrant and wicked desires are allowed free

play at present by the secret judgment of God, and are reserved to

the public and final judgment. Moreover, it is possible that those

Christian women, who are unconscious of any undue pride on account of

their virtuous chastity, whereby they sinlessly suffered the violence

of their captors, had yet some lurking infirmity which might have

betrayed them into a proud and contemptuous bearing, had they not

been subjected to the humiliation that befell them in the taking

of the city. As, therefore, some men were removed by death, that

no wickedness might change their disposition, so these women were

outraged lest prosperity should corrupt their modesty. Neither those

women, then, who were already puffed up by the circumstance that

they were still virgins, nor those who might have been so puffed up

had they not been exposed to the violence of the enemy, lost their

chastity, but rather gained humility: the former were saved from

pride already cherished, the latter from pride that would shortly

have grown upon them.

We must further notice that some of those sufferers may have

conceived that continence is a bodily good, and abides so long as

the body is inviolate, and did not understand that the purity both

of the body and the soul rests on the stedfastness of the will

strengthened by God's grace, and cannot be forcibly taken from an

unwilling person. From this error they are probably now delivered.

For when they reflect how conscientiously they served God, and when

they settle again to the firm persuasion that He can in nowise

desert those who so serve Him, and so invoke His aid; and when they

consider, what they cannot doubt, how pleasing to Him is chastity,

they are shut up to the conclusion that He could never have permitted

these disasters to befall His saints, if by them that saintliness

could be destroyed which He Himself had bestowed upon them, and

delights to see in them.

29. _What the servants of Christ should say in reply to the

unbelievers who cast in their teeth that Christ did not rescue

them from the fury of their enemies._

The whole family of God, most high and most true, has therefore a

consolation of its own,--a consolation which cannot deceive, and

which has in it a surer hope than the tottering and falling affairs

of earth can afford. They will not refuse the discipline of this

temporal life, in which they are schooled for life eternal; nor will

they lament their experience of it, for the good things of earth they

use as pilgrims who are not detained by them, and its ills either

prove or improve them. As for those who insult over them in their

trials, and when ills befall them say, "Where is thy God?"[78] we may

ask them where their gods are when they suffer the very calamities

for the sake of avoiding which they worship their gods, or maintain

they ought to be worshipped; for the family of Christ is furnished

with its reply: our God is everywhere present, wholly everywhere; not

confined to any place. He can be present unperceived, and be absent

without moving; when He exposes us to adversities, it is either to

prove our perfections or correct our imperfections; and in return

for our patient endurance of the sufferings of time, He reserves for

us an everlasting reward. But who are you, that we should deign to

speak with you even about your own gods, much less about our God, who

is "to be feared above all gods? For all the gods of the nations are

idols; but the Lord made the heavens."[79]

30. _That those who complain of Christianity really desire to

live without restraint in shameful luxury._

If the famous Scipio Nasica were now alive, who was once your pontiff,

and was unanimously chosen by the senate, when, in the panic created

by the Punic war, they sought for the best citizen to entertain the

Phrygian goddess, he would curb this shamelessness of yours, though

you would perhaps scarcely dare to look upon the countenance of such

a man. For why in your calamities do you complain of Christianity,

unless because you desire to enjoy your luxurious licence unrestrained,

and to lead an abandoned and profligate life without the interruption

of any uneasiness or disaster? For certainly your desire for peace,

and prosperity, and plenty is not prompted by any purpose of using

these blessings honestly, that is to say, with moderation, sobriety,

temperance, and piety; for your purpose rather is to run riot in an

endless variety of sottish pleasures, and thus to generate from your

prosperity a moral pestilence which will prove a thousand-fold more

disastrous than the fiercest enemies. It was such a calamity as this

that Scipio, your chief pontiff, your best man in the judgment of the

whole senate, feared when he refused to agree to the destruction of

Carthage, Rome's rival; and opposed Cato, who advised its destruction.

He feared security, that enemy of weak minds, and he perceived that

a wholesome fear would be a fit guardian for the citizens. And he

was not mistaken: the event proved how wisely he had spoken. For

when Carthage was destroyed, and the Roman republic delivered from

its great cause of anxiety, a crowd of disastrous evils forthwith

resulted from the prosperous condition of things. First concord was

weakened, and destroyed by fierce and bloody seditions; then followed,

by a concatenation of baleful causes, civil wars, which brought in

their train such massacres, such bloodshed, such lawless and cruel

proscription and plunder, that those Romans who, in the days of their

virtue, had expected injury only at the hands of their enemies, now

that their virtue was lost, suffered greater cruelties at the hands of

their fellow-citizens. The lust of rule, which with other vices existed

among the Romans in more unmitigated intensity than among any other

people, after it had taken possession of the more powerful few, subdued

under its yoke the rest, worn and wearied.

31. _By what steps the passion for governing increased among

the Romans._

For at what stage would that passion rest when once it has lodged

in a proud spirit, until by a succession of advances it has reached

even the throne? And to obtain such advances nothing avails but

unscrupulous ambition. But unscrupulous ambition has nothing to work

upon, save in a nation corrupted by avarice and luxury. Moreover,

a people becomes avaricious and luxurious by prosperity; and it

was this which that very prudent man Nasica was endeavouring to

avoid when he opposed the destruction of the greatest, strongest,

wealthiest city of Rome's enemy. He thought that thus fear would act

as a curb on lust, and that lust being curbed would not run riot

in luxury, and that luxury being prevented avarice would be at an

end; and that these vices being banished, virtue would flourish and

increase, to the great profit of the state; and liberty, the fit

companion of virtue, would abide unfettered. For similar reasons,

and animated by the same considerate patriotism, that same chief

pontiff of yours--I still refer to him who was adjudged Rome's best

man without one dissentient voice--threw cold water on the proposal

of the senate to build a circle of seats round the theatre, and in

a very weighty speech warned them against allowing the luxurious

manners of Greece to sap the Roman manliness, and persuaded them not

to yield to the enervating and emasculating influence of foreign

licentiousness. So authoritative and forcible were his words, that

the senate was moved to prohibit the use even of those benches

which hitherto had been customarily brought to the theatre for the

temporary use of the citizens.[80] How eagerly would such a man as

this have banished from Rome the scenic exhibitions themselves, had

he dared to oppose the authority of those whom he supposed to be

gods! For he did not know that they were malicious devils; or if he

did, he supposed they should rather be propitiated than despised.

For there had not yet been revealed to the Gentiles the heavenly

doctrine which should purify their hearts by faith, and transform

their natural disposition by humble godliness, and turn them from the

service of proud devils to seek the things that are in heaven, or

even above the heavens.

32. _Of the establishment of scenic entertainments._

Know then, ye who are ignorant of this, and ye who feign ignorance be

reminded, while you murmur against Him who has freed you from such

rulers, that the scenic games, exhibitions of shameless folly and

licence, were established at Rome, not by men's vicious cravings,

but by the appointment of your gods. Much more pardonably might

you have rendered divine honours to Scipio than to such gods as

these. The gods were not so moral as their pontiff. But give me now

your attention, if your mind, inebriated by its deep potations of

error, can take in any sober truth. The gods enjoined that games

be exhibited in their honour to stay a physical pestilence; their

pontiff prohibited the theatre from being constructed, to prevent a

moral pestilence. If, then, there remains in you sufficient mental

enlightenment to prefer the soul to the body, choose whom you will

worship. Besides, though the pestilence was stayed, this was not

because the voluptuous madness of stage-plays had taken possession of

a warlike people hitherto accustomed only to the games of the circus;

but these astute and wicked spirits, foreseeing that in due course

the pestilence would shortly cease, took occasion to infect, not the

bodies, but the morals of their worshippers, with a far more serious

disease. And in this pestilence these gods find great enjoyment,

because it benighted the minds of men with so gross a darkness, and

dishonoured them with so foul a deformity, that even quite recently

(will posterity be able to credit it?) some of those who fled from

the sack of Rome and found refuge in Carthage, were so infected with

this disease, that day after day they seemed to contend with one

another who should most madly run after the actors in the theatres.

33. _That the overthrow of Rome has not corrected the vices of

the Romans._

Oh infatuated men, what is this blindness, or rather madness, which

possesses you? How is it that while, as we hear, even the eastern

nations are bewailing your ruin, and while powerful states in the

most remote parts of the earth are mourning your fall as a public

calamity, ye yourselves should be crowding to the theatres, should

be pouring into them and filling them; and, in short, be playing a

madder part now than ever before? This was the foul plague-spot,

this the wreck of virtue and honour that Scipio sought to preserve

you from when he prohibited the construction of theatres; this was

his reason for desiring that you might still have an enemy to fear,

seeing as he did how easily prosperity would corrupt and destroy you.

He did not consider that republic flourishing whose walls stand, but

whose morals are in ruins. But the seductions of evil-minded devils

had more influence with you than the precautions of prudent men.

Hence the injuries you do, you will not permit to be imputed to you;

but the injuries you suffer, you impute to Christianity. Depraved by

good fortune, and not chastened by adversity, what you desire in the

restoration of a peaceful and secure state, is not the tranquillity

of the commonwealth, but the impunity of your own vicious luxury.

Scipio wished you to be hard pressed by an enemy, that you might not

abandon yourselves to luxurious manners; but so abandoned are you,

that not even when crushed by the enemy is your luxury repressed.

You have missed the profit of your calamity; you have been made most

wretched, and have remained most profligate.

34. _Of God's clemency in moderating the ruin of the city._

And that you are yet alive is due to God, who spares you that you

may be admonished to repent and reform your lives. It is He who has

permitted you, ungrateful as you are, to escape the sword of the

enemy, by calling yourselves His servants, or by finding asylum in

the sacred places of the martyrs.

It is said that Romulus and Remus, in order to increase the

population of the city they founded, opened a sanctuary in which

every man might find asylum and absolution of all crime,--a

remarkable foreshadowing of what has recently occurred in honour of

Christ. The destroyers of Rome followed the example of its founders.

But it was not greatly to their credit that the latter, for the sake

of increasing the number of their citizens, did that which the former

have done, lest the number of their enemies should be diminished.

35. _Of the sons of the church who are hidden among the wicked,

and of false Christians within the church._

Let these and similar answers (if any fuller and fitter answers can be

found) be given to their enemies by the redeemed family of the Lord

Christ, and by the pilgrim city of King Christ. But let this city bear

in mind, that among her enemies lie hid those who are destined to

be fellow-citizens, that she may not think it a fruitless labour to

bear what they inflict as enemies until they become confessors of the

faith. So, too, as long as she is a stranger in the world, the city

of God has in her communion, and bound to her by the sacraments, some

who shall not eternally dwell in the lot of the saints. Of these, some

are not now recognised; others declare themselves, and do not hesitate

to make common cause with our enemies in murmuring against God, whose

sacramental badge they wear. These men you may to-day see thronging the

churches with us, to-morrow crowding the theatres with the godless.

But we have the less reason to despair of the reclamation even of such

persons, if among our most declared enemies there are now some, unknown

to themselves, who are destined to become our friends. In truth, these

two cities are entangled together in this world, and intermixed until

the last judgment effect their separation. I now proceed to speak, as

God shall help me, of the rise, progress, and end of these two cities;

and what I write, I write for the glory of the city of God, that, being

placed in comparison with the other, it may shine with a brighter

lustre.

36. _What subjects are to be handled in the following discourse._

But I have still some things to say in confutation of those who

refer the disasters of the Roman republic to our religion, because

it prohibits the offering of sacrifices to the gods. For this end

I must recount all, or as many as may seem sufficient, of the

disasters which befell that city and its subject provinces, before

these sacrifices were prohibited; for all these disasters they would

doubtless have attributed to us, if at that time our religion had

shed its light upon them, and had prohibited their sacrifices. I

must then go on to show what social well-being the true God, in

whose hand are all kingdoms, vouchsafed to grant to them that their

empire might increase. I must show why He did so, and how their false

gods, instead of at all aiding them, greatly injured them by guile

and deceit. And, lastly, I must meet those who, when on this point

convinced and confuted by irrefragable proofs, endeavour to maintain

that they worship the gods, not hoping for the present advantages of

this life, but for those which are to be enjoyed after death. And

this, if I am not mistaken, will be the most difficult part of my

task, and will be worthy of the loftiest argument; for we must then

enter the lists with the philosophers, not the mere common herd of

philosophers, but the most renowned, who in many points agree with

ourselves, as regarding the immortality of the soul, and that the

true God created the world, and by His providence rules all He has

created. But as they differ from us on other points, we must not

shrink from the task of exposing their errors, that, having refuted

the gainsaying of the wicked with such ability as God may vouchsafe,

we may assert the city of God, and true piety, and the worship of

God, to which alone the promise of true and everlasting felicity is

attached. Here, then, let us conclude, that we may enter on these

subjects in a fresh book.

FOOTNOTES:

on some occasions, did so.

Conington.

inconstancy of the Greeks, it is evidently here used, in opposition

to "immanis" of the following clause, to indicate that the Greeks

were more civilised than the barbarians, and not relentless, but, as

we say, easily moved.

ille sentit, cui et lætitia et gloria omnis in mundo est."

people of Antioch.

marriage acquired great wealth, which, after his conversion in his

thirty-sixth year, he distributed to the poor. He became bishop of

Nola in A.D. 409, being then in his fifty-sixth year. Nola was taken

by Alaric shortly after the sack of Rome.

Antoninus says (ii. 14): "Though thou shouldest be going to live

3000 years, and as many times 10,000 years, still remember that no

man loses any other life than this which he now lives, nor lives any

other than this which he now loses. The longest and the shortest are

thus brought to the same."

tract, _De cura pro mortuis gerenda_.

Tranq._ c. 14, and _Epist._ 92; and in Cicero's _Tusc. Disp._ i. 43,

the answer of Theodorus, the Cyrenian philosopher, to Lysimachus, who

threatened him with the cross: "Threaten that to your courtiers; it

is of no consequence to Theodorus whether he rot in the earth or in

the air."

buried after the battle of Pharsalia.

tells his well-known story (_Clio._ 23, 24).

peremerunt"), who refers to Regulus, _in Pisonem_, c. 19. Aulus

Gellius, quoting Tubero and Tuditanus (vi. 4), adds some further

particulars regarding these tortures.

Livy, _Ep._ xlviii.) the old custom was restored.

ARGUMENT.

IN THIS BOOK AUGUSTINE REVIEWS THOSE CALAMITIES WHICH THE ROMANS

SUFFERED BEFORE THE TIME OF CHRIST, AND WHILE THE WORSHIP OF

THE FALSE GODS WAS UNIVERSALLY PRACTISED; AND DEMONSTRATES

THAT, FAR FROM BEING PRESERVED FROM MISFORTUNE BY THE GODS, THE

ROMANS HAVE BEEN BY THEM OVERWHELMED WITH THE ONLY, OR AT LEAST

THE GREATEST, OF ALL CALAMITIES--THE CORRUPTION OF MANNERS, AND

THE VICES OF THE SOUL.

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,"[81] and are incorrigibly vain. Now, if we were to propose

to confute their objections as often as they with brazen face chose

to disregard our arguments, and as often as they could by any means

contradict our statements, you see how endless, and fruitless, and

painful a task we should be undertaking. And therefore I do not wish my

writings to be judged even by you, my son Marcellinus, nor by any of

those others at whose service this work of mine is freely and in all

Christian charity put, if at least you intend always to require a reply

to every exception which you hear taken to what you read in it; for so

you would become like those silly women of whom the apostle says that

they are "always learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of

the truth."[82]

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 endeavour to reply to those who attribute

the wars by which the world is being devastated, and specially 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

labours 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.

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."[83]

There are indeed some among them who are thoroughly well educated

men, and have a taste for history, in which the things I speak of are

open to their observation; but in order to irritate the uneducated

masses against us, they feign ignorance of these events, and do what

they can to make the vulgar believe that those disasters, which in

certain places and at certain times uniformly befall mankind, are

the result of Christianity, which is being everywhere diffused, and

is possessed of a renown and brilliancy which quite eclipse their

own gods.[84] Let them then, along with us, call to mind with what

various and repeated disasters the prosperity of Rome was blighted,

before ever Christ had come in the flesh, and before His name had

been blazoned among the nations with that glory which they vainly

grudge. Let them, if they can, defend their gods in this article,

since they maintain that they worship them in order to be preserved

from these disasters, which they now impute to us if they suffer in

the least degree. For why did these gods permit the disasters I am

to speak of to fall on their worshippers before the preaching of

Christ's name offended them, and put an end to their sacrifices?

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 practised._

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 evildoers, 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 honour of gods and goddesses, of the virgin

Cœlestis,[85] and Berecynthia,[86] the mother of all the gods. And on

the holy day consecrated to her purification, there were sung before

her couch productions so obscene and filthy for the ear--I do not say

of the mother of the gods, but of the mother of any senator or honest

man--nay, so impure, that not even the mother of the foul-mouthed

players themselves could have formed one of the audience. For natural

reverence for parents is a bond which the most abandoned cannot

ignore. And, accordingly, the lewd actions and filthy words with

which these players honoured the mother of the gods, in presence of

a vast assemblage and audience of both sexes, they could not for

very shame have rehearsed at home in presence of their own mothers.

And the crowds that were gathered from all quarters by curiosity,

offended modesty must, I should suppose, have scattered in the

confusion of shame. If these are sacred rites, what is sacrilege? If

this is purification, what is pollution? This festivity was called

the Tables,[87] as if a banquet were being given at which unclean

devils might find suitable refreshment. For it is not difficult to

see what kind of spirits they must be who are delighted with such

obscenities, unless, indeed, a man be blinded by these evil spirits

passing themselves off under the name of gods, and either disbelieves

in their existence, or leads such a life as prompts him rather to

propitiate and fear them than the true God.

5. _Of the obscenities practised in honour 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 honours

adjudged to her; as the Greeks and Romans and other nations have

decreed divine honours 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.[88] Surely he would desire

that his mother should enjoy such felicity were it possible. But if

we proceeded to ask him whether, among the honours paid to her, he

would wish such shameful rites as these to be celebrated, would he

not at once exclaim that he would rather his mother lay stone-dead,

than survive as a goddess to lend her ear to these obscenities? Is it

possible that he who was of so severe a morality, that he used his

influence as a Roman senator to prevent the building of a theatre in

that city dedicated to the manly virtues, would wish his mother to

be propitiated as a goddess with words which would have brought the

blush to her cheek when a Roman matron? Could he possibly believe

that the modesty of an estimable woman would be so transformed by her

promotion to divinity, that she would suffer herself to be invoked

and celebrated in terms so gross and immodest, that if she had heard

the like while alive upon earth, and had listened without stopping

her ears and hurrying from the spot, her relatives, her husband, and

her children would have blushed for her? Therefore, the mother of

the gods being such a character as the most profligate man would be

ashamed to have for his mother, and meaning to enthral the minds of

the Romans, demanded for her service their best citizen, not to ripen

him still more in virtue by her helpful counsel, but to entangle

him by her deceit, like her of whom it is written, "The adulteress

will hunt for the precious soul."[89] Her intent was to puff up this

high-souled man by an apparently divine testimony to his excellence,

in order that he might rely upon his own eminence in virtue, and

make no further efforts after true piety and religion, without which

natural genius, however brilliant, vapours into pride and comes to

nothing. For what but a guileful purpose could that goddess demand

the best man, seeing that in her own sacred festivals she requires

such obscenities as the best men would be covered with shame to hear

at their own tables?

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[90] (well called Fugalia, since

they banish modesty and right feeling), the people were commanded

in the name of the gods to restrain avarice, bridle impurity, and

conquer ambition; where, in short, they might learn in that school

which Persius vehemently lashes them to, when he says: "Be taught,

ye abandoned creatures, and ascertain the causes of things; what we

are, and for what end we are born; what is the law of our success in

life, and by what art we may turn the goal without making shipwreck;

what limit we should put to our wealth, what we may lawfully desire,

and what uses filthy lucre serves; how much we should bestow upon our

country and our family; learn, in short, what God meant thee to be,

and what place He has ordered you to fill."[91] Let them name to us

the places where such instructions were wont to be communicated from

the gods, and where the people who worshipped them were accustomed to

resort to hear them, as we can point to our churches built for this

purpose in every land where the Christian religion is received.

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.[92] However, if the philosophers have

made any discoveries which are sufficient to guide men to virtue and

blessedness, would it not have been greater justice to vote divine

honours to them? Were it not more accordant with every virtuous

sentiment to read Plato's writings in a "Temple of Plato," than to be

present in the temples of devils to witness the priests of Cybele[93]

mutilating themselves, the effeminate being consecrated, the raving

fanatics cutting themselves, and whatever other cruel or shameful,

or shamefully cruel or cruelly shameful, ceremony is enjoined by the

ritual of such gods as these? Were it not a more suitable education,

and more likely to prompt the youth to virtue, if they heard public

recitals of the laws of the gods, instead of the vain laudation of the

customs and laws of their ancestors? Certainly all the worshippers of

the Roman gods, when once they are possessed by what Persius calls "the

burning poison of lust,"[94] prefer to witness the deeds of Jupiter

rather than to hear what Plato taught or Cato censured. Hence the young

profligate in Terence, when he sees on the wall a fresco representing

the fabled descent of Jupiter into the lap of Danaë in the form of a

golden shower, accepts this as authoritative precedent for his own

licentiousness, and boasts that he is an imitator of God. "And what

God?" he says. "He who with His thunder shakes the loftiest temples.

And was I, a poor creature compared to Him, to make bones of it? No; I

did it, and with all my heart."[95]

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

honour. 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.[96]

9. _That the poetical licence 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 licence, 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

endeavouring 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 licence 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.

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.

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 honours. In the above-mentioned book of the _De Republica_,

it is mentioned that Æschines, 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 honours?

On what plea could they honour 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,[97] whose

learning makes him an authority on such points, is of opinion that

the distinction between good and evil deities should find expression

in a difference of worship; that the evil should be propitiated by

bloody sacrifices and doleful rites, but the good with a joyful and

pleasant observance, as, _e.g._ (as he says himself), with plays,

festivals, and banquets.[98] All this we shall, with God's help,

hereafter discuss. At present, and speaking to the subject on hand,

whether all kinds of offerings are made indiscriminately to all the

gods, as if all were good (and it is an unseemly thing to conceive

that there are evil gods; but these gods of the pagans are all evil,

because they are not gods, but evil spirits), or whether, as Labeo

thinks, a distinction is made between the offerings presented to the

different gods, the Greeks are equally justified in honouring alike

the priests by whom the sacrifices are offered, and the players by

whom the dramas are acted, that they may not be open to the charge of

doing an injury to all their gods, if the plays are pleasing to all

of them, or (which were still worse) to their good gods, if the plays

are relished only by them.

12. _That the Romans, by refusing to the poets the same licence 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 honourable 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 licence 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

Nævius 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.

13. _That the Romans should have understood that gods who desired

to be worshipped in licentious entertainments were unworthy of

divine honour._

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 honour." 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

honour 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

honours 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 thoroughgoing

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 honours, while plays are counted among the honours due to

the gods? For a long while the virtue of Rome was uncontaminated

by theatrical exhibitions;[99] and if they had been adopted for

the sake of gratifying the taste of the citizens, they would have

been introduced hand in hand with the relaxation of manners. But

the fact is, that it was the gods who demanded that they should be

exhibited to gratify them. With what justice, then, is the player

excommunicated by whom God is worshipped? On what pretext can you at

once adore him who exacts, and brand him who acts these plays? This,

then, is the controversy in which the Greeks and Romans are engaged.

The Greeks think they justly honour players, because they worship the

gods who demand plays: the Romans, on the other hand, do not suffer

an actor to disgrace by his name his own plebeian tribe, far less

the senatorial order. And the whole of this discussion may be summed

up in the following syllogism. The Greeks give us the major premiss:

If such gods are to be worshipped, then certainly such men may be

honoured. The Romans add the minor: But such men must by no means be

honoured. The Christians draw the conclusion: Therefore such gods

must by no means be worshipped.

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-dishonouring effusions

be branded, while their authors are honoured? Must we not here award

the palm to a Greek, Plato, who, in framing his ideal republic,[100]

conceived that poets should be banished from the city as enemies of the

state? He could not brook that the gods be brought into disrepute,

nor that the minds of the citizens be depraved and besotted, by the

fictions of the poets. Compare now human nature as you see it in

Plato, expelling poets from the city that the citizens be uninjured,

with the divine nature as you see it in these gods exacting plays in

their own honour. Plato strove, though unsuccessfully, to persuade the

light-minded and lascivious Greeks to abstain from so much as writing

such plays; the gods used their authority to extort the acting of the

same from the dignified and sober-minded Romans. And not content with

having them acted, they had them dedicated to themselves, consecrated

to themselves, solemnly celebrated in their own honour. To which, then,

would it be more becoming in a state to decree divine honours,--to

Plato, who prohibited these wicked and licentious plays, or to the

demons who delighted in blinding men to the truth of what Plato

unsuccessfully sought to inculcate?

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

pronounces a wholesale condemnation of poetical fictions, while the

former restrain the licence 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 stage-plays in their own honour; the Romans exclude

the players from all civic honours:[101] the former commanded that

they should be celebrated by the scenic representation of their own

disgrace; the latter commanded that no poet should dare to blemish

the reputation of any citizen. But that demigod Plato resisted the

lust of such gods as these, and showed the Romans what their genius

had left incomplete; for he absolutely excluded poets from his ideal

state, whether they composed fictions with no regard to truth, or

set the worst possible examples before wretched men under the guise

of divine actions. We for our part, indeed, reckon Plato neither a

god nor a demigod; we would not even compare him to any of God's

holy angels, nor to the truth-speaking prophets, nor to any of the

apostles or martyrs of Christ, nay, not to any faithful Christian

man. The reason of this opinion of ours we will, God prospering

us, render in its own place. Nevertheless, since they wish him to

be considered a demigod, we think he certainly is more entitled to

that rank, and is every way superior, if not to Hercules and Romulus

(though no historian could ever narrate nor any poet sing of him that

he had killed his brother, or committed any crime), yet certainly

to Priapus, or a Cynocephalus,[102] or the Fever,[103]--divinities

whom the Romans have partly received from foreigners, and partly

consecrated by home-grown rites. How, then, could gods such as these

be expected to promulgate good and wholesome laws, either for the

prevention of moral and social evils, or for their eradication where

they had already sprung up?--gods who used their influence even to

sow and cherish profligacy, by appointing that deeds truly or falsely

ascribed to them should be published to the people by means of

theatrical exhibitions, and by thus gratuitously fanning the flame of

human lust with the breath of a seemingly divine approbation. In vain

does Cicero, speaking of poets, exclaim against this state of things

in these words: "When the plaudits and acclamation of the people,

who sit as infallible judges, are won by the poets, what darkness

benights the mind, what fears invade, what passions inflame it!"[104]

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 ardour of his fellow-citizens

had given Romulus a seat among the gods, they gave him this new name

Quirinus). And thus by this honour 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 honour, is this not rather for Romulus' sake than to honour Mars?

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 endeavoured

to improve and amend them.[105] Although Lycurgus pretended that

he was authorized by Apollo to give laws to the Lacedemonians, the

sensible Romans did not choose to believe this, and were not induced

to borrow laws from Sparta. Numa Pompilius, who succeeded Romulus

in the kingdom, is said to have framed some laws, which, however,

were not sufficient for the regulation of civic affairs. Among these

regulations were many pertaining to religious observances, and yet

he is not reported to have received even these from the gods. With

respect, then, to moral evils, evils of life and conduct,--evils

which are so mighty, that, according to the wisest pagans,[106] by

them states are ruined while their cities stand uninjured,--their

gods made not the smallest provision for preserving their worshippers

from these evils, but, on the contrary, took special pains to

increase them, as we have previously endeavoured to prove.

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."[107] I presume it is to this inborn equity and goodness of

disposition we are to ascribe the rape of the Sabine women. What,

indeed, could be more equitable and virtuous, than to carry off by

force, as each man was fit, and without their parents' consent,

girls who were strangers and guests, and who had been decoyed and

entrapped by the pretence of a spectacle! If the Sabines were wrong

to deny their daughters when the Romans asked for them, was it not

a greater wrong in the Romans to carry them off after that denial?

The Romans might more justly have waged war against the neighbouring

nation for having refused their daughters in marriage when they first

sought them, than for having demanded them back when they had stolen

them. War should have been proclaimed at first: it was then that Mars

should have helped his warlike son, that he might by force of arms

avenge the injury done him by the refusal of marriage, and might also

thus win the women he desired. There might have been some appearance

of "right of war" in a victor carrying off, in virtue of this right,

the virgins who had been without any show of right denied him;

whereas there was no "right of peace" entitling him to carry off

those who were not given to him, and to wage an unjust war with their

justly enraged parents. One happy circumstance was indeed connected

with this act of violence, viz., that though it was commemorated

by the games of the circus, yet even this did not constitute it a

precedent in the city or realm of Rome. If one would find fault with

the results of this act, it must rather be on the ground that the

Romans made Romulus a god in spite of his perpetrating this iniquity;

for one cannot reproach them with making this deed any kind of

precedent for the rape of women.

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.

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?

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 enamoured 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.

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 neighbour, or injure his property,

family, or person, let him be actionable; but in his own affairs

let every one 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,[108] dissipate. Let there be everywhere heard

the rustling of dancers, the loud, immodest laughter of the theatre;

let a succession of the most cruel and the most voluptuous pleasures

maintain a perpetual excitement. If such happiness is distasteful

to any, let him be branded as a public enemy; and if any attempt to

modify or put an end to it, let him be silenced, banished, put an end

to. Let these be reckoned the true gods, who procure for the people

this condition of things, and preserve it when once possessed. Let

them be worshipped as they wish; let them demand whatever games they

please, from or with their own worshippers; only let them secure

that such felicity be not imperilled by foe, plague, or disaster of

any kind. What sane man would compare a republic such as this, I

will not say to the Roman empire, but to the palace of Sardanapalus,

the ancient king who was so abandoned to pleasures, that he caused

it to be inscribed on his tomb, that now that he was dead, he

possessed only those things which he had swallowed and consumed by

his appetites while alive? If these men had such a king as this, who,

while self-indulgent, should lay no severe restraint on them, they

would more enthusiastically consecrate to him a temple and a flamen

than the ancient Romans did to Romulus.

21. _Cicero's opinion of the Roman republic._

But if our adversaries do not care how foully and disgracefully

the Roman republic be stained by corrupt practices, so long only

as it holds together and continues in being, and if they therefore

pooh-pooh the testimony of Sallust to its "utterly wicked and

profligate" condition, what will they make of Cicero's statement,

that even in his time it had become entirely extinct, and that there

remained extant no Roman republic at all? He introduces Scipio (the

Scipio who had destroyed Carthage) discussing the republic, at a time

when already there were presentiments of its speedy ruin by that

corruption which Sallust describes. In fact, at the time when the

discussion took place, one of the Gracchi, who, according to Sallust,

was the first great instigator of seditions, had already been put to

death. His death, indeed, is mentioned in the same book. Now Scipio,

in the end of the second book, says: "As, among the different sounds

which proceed from lyres, flutes, and the human voice, there must be

maintained a certain harmony which a cultivated ear cannot endure

to hear disturbed or jarring, but which may be elicited in full and

absolute concord by the modulation even of voices very unlike one

another; so, where reason is allowed to modulate the diverse elements

of the state, there is obtained a perfect concord from the upper,

lower, and middle classes as from various sounds; and what musicians

call harmony in singing, is concord in matters of state, which is the

strictest bond and best security of any republic, and which by no

ingenuity can be retained where justice has become extinct." Then,

when he had expatiated somewhat more fully, and had more copiously

illustrated the benefits of its presence and the ruinous effects

of its absence upon a state, Pilus, one of the company present at

the discussion, struck in and demanded that the question should be

more thoroughly sifted, and that the subject of justice should be

freely discussed for the sake of ascertaining what truth there was

in the maxim which was then becoming daily more current, that "the

republic cannot be governed without injustice." Scipio expressed

his willingness to have this maxim discussed and sifted, and gave

it as his opinion that it was baseless, and that no progress could

be made in discussing the republic unless it was established, not

only that this maxim, that "the republic cannot be governed without

injustice," was false, but also that the truth is, that it cannot

be governed without the most absolute justice. And the discussion

of this question, being deferred till the next day, is carried on

in the third book with great animation. For Pilus himself undertook

to defend the position that the republic cannot be governed without

injustice, at the same time being at special pains to clear himself

of any real participation in that opinion. He advocated with great

keenness the cause of injustice against justice, and endeavoured

by plausible reasons and examples to demonstrate that the former

is beneficial, the latter useless, to the republic. Then, at the

request of the company, Lælius attempted to defend justice, and

strained every nerve to prove that nothing is so hurtful to a state

as injustice; and that without justice a republic can neither be

governed, nor even continue to exist.

When this question has been handled to the satisfaction of the

company, Scipio reverts to the original thread of discourse, and

repeats with commendation his own brief definition of a republic,

that it is the weal of the people. "The people" he defines as being

not every assemblage or mob, but an assemblage associated by a common

acknowledgment of law, and by a community of interests. Then he shows

the use of definition in debate; and from these definitions of his

own he gathers that a republic, or "weal of the people," then exists

only when it is well and justly governed, whether by a monarch, or an

aristocracy, or by the whole people. But when the monarch is unjust,

or, as the Greeks say, a tyrant; or the aristocrats are unjust, and

form a faction; or the people themselves are unjust, and become, as

Scipio for want of a better name calls them, themselves the tyrant,

then the republic is not only blemished (as had been proved the day

before), but by legitimate deduction from those definitions, it

altogether ceases to be. For it could not be the people's weal when a

tyrant factiously lorded it over the state; neither would the people

be any longer a people if it were unjust, since it would no longer

answer the definition of a people--"an assemblage associated by a

common acknowledgment of law, and by a community of interests."

When, therefore, the Roman republic was such as Sallust described

it, it was not "utterly wicked and profligate," as he says, but had

altogether ceased to exist, if we are to admit the reasoning of

that debate maintained on the subject of the republic by its best

representatives. Tully himself, too, speaking not in the person

of Scipio or any one else, but uttering his own sentiments, uses

the following language in the beginning of the fifth book, after

quoting a line from the poet Ennius, in which he said, "Rome's severe

morality and her citizens are her safeguard." "This verse," says

Cicero, "seems to me to have all the sententious truthfulness of

an oracle. For neither would the citizens have availed without the

morality of the community, nor would the morality of the commons

without outstanding men have availed either to establish or so long

to maintain in vigour so grand a republic with so wide and just an

empire. Accordingly, before our day, the hereditary usages formed

our foremost men, and they on their part retained the usages and

institutions of their fathers. But our age, receiving the republic as

a _chef-d'œuvre_ of another age which has already begun to grow old,

has not merely neglected to restore the colours of the original, but

has not even been at the pains to preserve so much as the general

outline and most outstanding features. For what survives of that

primitive morality which the poet called Rome's safeguard? It is

so obsolete and forgotten, that, far from practising it, one does

not even know it. And of the citizens what shall I say? Morality

has perished through poverty of great men; a poverty for which we

must not only assign a reason, but for the guilt of which we must

answer as criminals charged with a capital crime. For it is through

our vices, and not by any mishap, that we retain only the name of a

republic, and have long since lost the reality."

This is the confession of Cicero, long indeed after the death of

Africanus, whom he introduced as an interlocutor in his work _De

Republica_, but still before the coming of Christ. Yet, if the

disasters he bewails had been lamented after the Christian religion

had been diffused, and had begun to prevail, is there a man of our

adversaries who would not have thought that they were to be imputed

to the Christians? Why, then, did their gods not take steps then to

prevent the decay and extinction of that republic, over the loss of

which Cicero, long before Christ had come in the flesh, sings so

lugubrious a dirge? Its admirers have need to inquire whether, even

in the days of primitive men and morals, true justice flourished in

it; or was it not perhaps even then, to use the casual expression

of Cicero, rather a coloured painting than the living reality?

But, if God will, we shall consider this elsewhere. For I mean in

its own place to show that--according to the definitions in which

Cicero himself, using Scipio as his mouthpiece, briefly propounded

what a republic is, and what a people is, and according to many

testimonies, both of his own lips and of those who took part in that

same debate--Rome never was a republic, because true justice had

never a place in it. But accepting the more feasible definitions

of a republic, I grant there was a republic of a certain kind, and

certainly much better administered by the more ancient Romans than by

their modern representatives. But the fact is, true justice has no

existence save in that republic whose founder and ruler is Christ,

if at least any choose to call this a republic; and indeed we cannot

deny that it is the people's weal. But if perchance this name, which

has become familiar in other connections, be considered alien to our

common parlance, we may at all events say that in this city is true

justice; the city of which Holy Scripture says, "Glorious things are

said of thee, O city of God."

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 honour, 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."[109]

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?

23. _That the vicissitudes of this life are dependent not on

the favour 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 favoured

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.

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, recognised 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 truly woful 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.

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, recognised 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 ardour 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.

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 honour 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 honour left in him. So that, unless the devil

sometimes transformed himself, as Scripture says, into an angel of

light,[110] he could not compass his deceitful purpose. Accordingly,

in public, a bold impurity fills the ear of the people with noisy

clamour; in private, a feigned chastity speaks in scarce audible

whispers to a few: an open stage is provided for shameful things, but

on the praiseworthy the curtain falls: grace hides, disgrace flaunts:

a wicked deed draws an overflowing house, a virtuous speech finds

scarce a hearer, as though purity were to be blushed at, impurity

boasted of. Where else can such confusion reign, but in devils'

temples? Where, but in the haunts of deceit? For the secret precepts

are given as a sop to the virtuous, who are few in number; the wicked

examples are exhibited to encourage the vicious, who are countless.

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 shamefaced mimes, no actress overburdened 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 demeanour 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?

27. _That the obscenities of those plays which the Romans

consecrated in order to propitiate their gods, contributed

largely to the overthrow of public order._

Cicero, a weighty man, and a philosopher in his way, when about to

be made edile, wished the citizens to understand[111] that, among

the other duties of his magistracy, he must propitiate Flora by

the celebration of games. And these games are reckoned devout in

proportion to their lewdness. In another place,[112] and when he was

now consul, and the state in great peril, he says that games had been

celebrated for ten days together, and that nothing had been omitted

which could pacify the gods: as if it had not been more satisfactory

to irritate the gods by temperance, than to pacify them by debauchery;

and to provoke their hate by honest living, than soothe it by such

unseemly grossness. For no matter how cruel was the ferocity of those

men who were threatening the state, and on whose account the gods

were being propitiated: it could not have been more hurtful than

the alliance of gods who were won with the foulest vices. To avert

the danger which threatened men's bodies, the gods were conciliated

in a fashion that drove virtue from their spirits; and the gods did

not enrol themselves as defenders of the battlements against the

besiegers, until they had first stormed and sacked the morality of

the citizens. This propitiation of such divinities,--a propitiation

so wanton, so impure, so immodest, so wicked, so filthy, whose actors

the innate and praiseworthy virtue of the Romans disabled from civic

honours, erased from their tribe, recognised as polluted and made

infamous;--this propitiation, I say, so foul, so detestable, and alien

from every religious feeling, these fabulous and ensnaring accounts

of the criminal actions of the gods, these scandalous actions which

they either shamefully and wickedly committed, or more shamefully and

wickedly feigned, all this the whole city learned in public both by

the words and gestures of the actors. They saw that the gods delighted

in the commission of these things, and therefore believed that they

wished them not only to be exhibited to them, but to be imitated by

themselves. But as for that good and honest instruction which they

speak of, it was given in such secrecy, and to so few (if indeed given

at all), that they seemed rather to fear it might be divulged, than

that it might not be practised.

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.

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[113] of its

own in the true remission of sins. Do not listen to those degenerate

sons of thine who slander Christ and Christians, and impute to them

these disastrous times, though they desire times in which they may

enjoy rather impunity for their wickedness than a peaceful life. Such

has never been Rome's ambition even in regard to her earthly country.

Lay hold now on the celestial country, which is easily won, and in

which you will reign truly and for ever. For there shalt thou find no

vestal fire, no Capitoline stone, but the one true God

"No date, no goal will here ordain:

But grant an endless, boundless reign."[114]

No longer, then, follow after false and deceitful gods; abjure them

rather, and despise them, bursting forth into true liberty. Gods

they are not, but malignant spirits, to whom your eternal happiness

will be a sore punishment. Juno, from whom you deduce your origin

according to the flesh, did not so bitterly grudge Rome's citadels

to the Trojans, as these devils whom yet ye repute gods, grudge an

everlasting seat to the race of mankind. And thou thyself hast in no

wavering voice passed judgment on them, when thou didst pacify them

with games, and yet didst account as infamous the men by whom the

plays were acted. Suffer us, then, to assert thy freedom against the

unclean spirits who had imposed on thy neck the yoke of celebrating

their own shame and filthiness. The actors of these divine crimes

thou hast removed from offices of honour; supplicate the true

God, that He may remove from thee those gods who delight in their

crimes,--a most disgraceful thing if the crimes are really theirs,

and a most malicious invention if the crimes are feigned. Well done,

in that thou hast spontaneously banished from the number of your

citizens all actors and players. Awake more fully: the majesty of God

cannot be propitiated by that which defiles the dignity of man. How,

then, can you believe that gods who take pleasure in such lewd plays,

belong to the number of the holy powers of heaven, when the men by

whom these plays are acted are by yourselves refused admission into

the number of Roman citizens even of the lowest grade? Incomparably

more glorious than Rome, is that heavenly city in which for victory

you have truth; for dignity, holiness; for peace, felicity; for life,

eternity. Much less does it admit into its society such gods, if thou

dost blush to admit into thine such men. Wherefore, if thou wouldst

attain to the blessed city, shun the society of devils. They who

are propitiated by deeds of shame, are unworthy of the worship of

right-hearted men. Let these, then, be obliterated from your worship

by the cleansing of the Christian religion, as those men were blotted

from your citizenship by the censor's mark.

But, so far as regards carnal benefits, which are the only blessings

the wicked desire to enjoy, and carnal miseries, which alone they

shrink from enduring, we will show in the following book that the

demons have not the power they are supposed to have; and although

they had it, we ought rather on that account to despise these

blessings, than for the sake of them to worship those gods, and

by worshipping them to miss the attainment of these blessings

they grudge us. But that they have not even this power which is

ascribed to them by those who worship them for the sake of temporal

advantages, this, I say, I will prove in the following book; so let

us here close the present argument.

FOOTNOTES:

similar replies may be seen in the celebrated passage of Tertullian's

_Apol._ c. 40, and in the eloquent exordium of Arnobius, _C. Gentes_.

accused the Christians in his address to the Emperor Valentinianus

in the year 384. At Augustine's request, Paulus Orosius wrote his

history in confutation of Symmachus' charges.

worshipped in Africa. Augustine mentions her again in the 26th

chapter of this book, and in other parts of his works.

(xxix. 11) relates that the image of Cybele was brought to Rome the

day before the ides of April, which was accordingly dedicated as

her feast-day. The image, it seems, had to be washed in the stream

Almon, a tributary of the Tiber, before being placed in the temple

of Victory; and each year, as the festival returned, the washing

was repeated with much pomp at the same spot. Hence Lucan's line

(i. 600), 'Et lotam parvo revocant Almone Cybelen,' and the elegant

verses of Ovid, _Fast._ iv. 337 et seq.

Censorinus understands him to refer to a feast celebrating the

expulsion of the kings from Rome. This feast, however (celebrated on

the 24th February), was commonly called "Regifugium."

the river Gallus, in Phrygia, the water of which was supposed to

intoxicate or madden those who drank it. According to Vitruvius

(viii. 3), there was a similar fountain in Paphlagonia. Apuleius

(_Golden Ass_, viii.) gives a graphic and humorous description of

the dress, dancing, and imposture of these priests; mentioning,

among other things, that they lashed themselves with whips and cut

themselves with knives till the ground was wet with blood.

Aristoph. _Clouds_, 1033-4. It may be added that the argument of this

chapter was largely used by the wiser of the heathen themselves.

Dionysius Hal. (ii. 20) and Seneca (_De Brev. Vit._ c. xvi.) make

the very same complaint; and it will be remembered that his adoption

of this reasoning was one of the grounds on which Euripides was

suspected of atheism.

he bewails in his _Confessions_.

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.

on pillows in the streets, and all kinds of food set before them.

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.

(viii. 832) _semicanes deos_.

Cicero, _De Nat. Deor._ iii. 25, and Ælian, _Var. Hist._ xii. 11.

c. ii.

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.

regarding the chastity of the Germans: "Plusque ibi boni mores

valent, quam alibi bonæ leges" (_Germ._ xix.).

the well-known mode of renewing the appetite in use among the Romans.

early days.

ARGUMENT.

AS IN THE FOREGOING BOOK AUGUSTINE HAS PROVED REGARDING MORAL AND

SPIRITUAL CALAMITIES, SO IN THIS BOOK HE PROVES REGARDING

EXTERNAL AND BODILY DISASTERS, THAT SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF

THE CITY THE ROMANS HAVE BEEN CONTINUALLY SUBJECT TO THEM; AND

THAT EVEN WHEN THE FALSE GODS WERE WORSHIPPED WITHOUT A RIVAL,

BEFORE THE ADVENT OF CHRIST, THEY AFFORDED NO RELIEF FROM SUCH

CALAMITIES.

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?[115] But that I may not be prolix, I will be silent regarding

the heavy calamities that have been suffered by any other nations,

and will speak only of what happened to Rome and the Roman empire, by

which I mean Rome properly so called, and those lands which already,

before the coming of Christ, had by alliance or conquest become, as

it were, members of the body of the state.

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[116]), conquered, taken, and destroyed by the Greeks,

though it esteemed and worshipped the same gods as they? Priam, some

answer, paid the penalty of the perjury of his father Laomedon.[117]

Then it is true that Laomedon hired Apollo and Neptune as his

workmen. For the story goes that he promised them wages, and then

broke his bargain. I wonder that famous diviner Apollo toiled at so

huge a work, and never suspected Laomedon was going to cheat him of

his pay. And Neptune too, his uncle, brother of Jupiter, king of the

sea, it really was not seemly that he should be ignorant of what was

to happen. For he is introduced by Homer[118] (who lived and wrote

before the building of Rome) as predicting something great of the

posterity of Æneas, who in fact founded Rome. And as Homer says,

Neptune also rescued Æneas in a cloud from the wrath of Achilles,

though (according to Virgil[119])

"All his will was to destroy

His own creation, perjured Troy."

Gods, then, so great as Apollo and Neptune, in ignorance of the cheat

that was to defraud them of their wages, built the walls of Troy for

nothing but thanks and thankless people.[120] There may be some doubt

whether it is not a worse crime to believe such persons to be gods,

than to cheat such gods. Even Homer himself did not give full credence

to the story; for while he represents Neptune, indeed, as hostile to

the Trojans, he introduces Apollo as their champion, though the story

implies that both were offended by that fraud. If, therefore, they

believe their fables, let them blush to worship such gods; if they

discredit the fables, let no more be said of the "Trojan perjury;" or

let them explain how the gods hated Trojan, but loved Roman perjury.

For how did the conspiracy of Catiline, even in so large and corrupt a

city, find so abundant a supply of men whose hands and tongues found

them a living by perjury and civic broils? What else but perjury

corrupted the judgments pronounced by so many of the senators? What

else corrupted the people's votes and decisions of all causes tried

before them? For it seems that the ancient practice of taking oaths has

been preserved even in the midst of the greatest corruption, not for

the sake of restraining wickedness by religious fear, but to complete

the tale of crimes by adding that of perjury.

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."[121] If, then, the gods were of opinion that the

adultery of Paris should be punished, it was chiefly the Romans, or

at least the Romans also, who should have suffered; for the adultery

was brought about by Æneas' mother. But how could they hate in Paris

a crime which they made no objection to in their own sister Venus,

who (not to mention any other instance) committed adultery with

Anchises, and so became the mother of Æneas? Is it because in the

one case Menelaus[122] was aggrieved, while in the other Vulcan[123]

connived at the crime? For the gods, I fancy, are so little jealous

of their wives, that they make no scruple of sharing them with men.

But perhaps I may be suspected of turning the myths into ridicule,

and not handling so weighty a subject with sufficient gravity. Well,

then, let us say that Æneas is not the son of Venus. I am willing

to I admit it; but is Romulus any more the son of Mars? For why

not the one as well as the other? Or is it lawful for gods to have

intercourse with women, unlawful for men to have intercourse with

goddesses? A hard, or rather an incredible condition, that what

was allowed to Mars by the law of Venus, should not be allowed to

Venus herself by her own law. However, both cases have the authority

of Rome; for Cæsar in modern times believed no less that he was

descended from Venus,[124] than the ancient Romulus believed himself

the son of Mars.

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.

5. _That it is not credible that the gods should have punished the

adultery of Paris, seeing they showed no indignation at the

adultery of the mother of Romulus._

But whether Venus could bear Æneas to a human father Anchises, or

Mars beget Romulus of the daughter of Numitor, we leave as unsettled

questions. For our own Scriptures suggest the very similar question,

whether the fallen angels had sexual intercourse with the daughters

of men, by which the earth was at that time filled with giants,

that is, with enormously large and strong men. At present, then, I

will limit my discussion to this dilemma: If that which their books

relate about the mother of Æneas and the father of Romulus be true,

how can the gods be displeased with men for adulteries which, when

committed by themselves, excite no displeasure? If it is false,

not even in this case can the gods be angry that men should really

commit adulteries, which, even when falsely attributed to the gods,

they delight in. Moreover, if the adultery of Mars be discredited,

that Venus also may be freed from the imputation, then the mother

of Romulus is left unshielded by the pretext of a divine seduction.

For Sylvia was a vestal priestess, and the gods ought to avenge this

sacrilege on the Romans with greater severity than Paris' adultery

on the Trojans. For even the Romans themselves in primitive times

used to go so far as to bury alive any vestal who was detected in

adultery, while women unconsecrated, though they were punished,

were never punished with death for that crime; and thus they more

earnestly vindicated the purity of shrines they esteemed divine, than

of the human bed.

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; a crime this latter 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 villany 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

repeopled these lands; while at Rome, by a wider exercise of their

malignant arts, they exulted in more abundant honours.

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.[125] For when the Greeks

took it many escaped, and many who did not escape were suffered to

live, though in captivity. But Fimbria from the first gave orders

that not a life should be spared, and burnt up together the city and

all its inhabitants. Thus was Ilium requited, not by the Greeks, whom

she had provoked by wrong-doing; but by the Romans, who had been

built out of her ruins; while the gods, adored alike of both sides,

did simply nothing, or, to speak more correctly, could do nothing.

Is it then true, that at this time also, after Troy had repaired

the damage done by the Grecian fire, all the gods by whose help the

kingdom stood, "forsook each fane, each sacred shrine?"

But if so, I ask the reason; for in my judgment, the conduct of

the gods was as much to be reprobated as that of the townsmen to

be applauded. For these closed their gates against Fimbria, that

they might preserve the city for Sylla, and were therefore burnt

and consumed by the enraged general. Now, up to this time, Sylla's

cause was the more worthy of the two; for till now he used arms to

restore the republic, and as yet his good intentions had met with no

reverses. What better thing, then, could the Trojans have done? What

more honourable, what more faithful to Rome, or more worthy of her

relationship, than to preserve their city for the better part of the

Romans, and to shut their gates against a parricide of his country?

It is for the defenders of the gods to consider the ruin which this

conduct brought on Troy. The gods deserted an adulterous people, and

abandoned Troy to the fires of the Greeks, that out of her ashes a

chaster Rome might arise. But why did they a second time abandon this

same town, allied now to Rome, and not making war upon her noble

daughter, but preserving a most stedfast and pious fidelity to Rome's

most justifiable faction? Why did they give her up to be destroyed, not

by the Greek heroes, but by the basest of the Romans? Or, if the gods

did not favour Sylla's cause, for which the unhappy Trojans maintained

their city, why did they themselves predict and promise Sylla such

successes? Must we call them flatterers of the fortunate, rather than

helpers of the wretched? Troy was not destroyed, then, because the gods

deserted it. For the demons, always watchful to deceive, did what they

could. For, when all the statues were overthrown and burnt together

with the town, Livy tells us that only the image of Minerva is said to

have been found standing uninjured amidst the ruins of her temple; not

that it might be said in their praise, "The gods who made this realm

divine," but that it might not be said in their defence, They are "gone

from each fane, each sacred shrine:" for that marvel was permitted to

them, not that they might be proved to be powerful, but that they might

be convicted of being present.

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.

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[126] during war. And it is supposed he was thus requited for

appointing many religious observances among the Romans. Certainly that

king would have commanded our congratulations for so rare a leisure,

had he been wise enough to spend it on wholesome pursuits, and,

subduing a pernicious curiosity, had sought out the true God with true

piety. But as it was, the gods were not the authors of his leisure; but

possibly they would have deceived him less had they found him busier.

For the more disengaged they found him, the more they themselves

occupied his attention. Varro informs us of all his efforts, and of the

arts he employed to associate these gods with himself and the city;

and in its own place, if God will, I shall discuss these matters.

Meanwhile, as we are speaking of the benefits conferred by the gods,

I readily admit that peace is a great benefit; but it is a benefit of

the true God, which, like the sun, the rain, and other supports of

life, is frequently conferred on the ungrateful and wicked. But if this

great boon was conferred on Rome and Pompilius by their gods, why did

they never afterwards grant it to the Roman empire during even more

meritorious periods? Were the sacred rites more efficient at their

first institution than during their subsequent celebration? But they

had no existence in Numa's time, until he added them to the ritual;

whereas afterwards they had already been celebrated and preserved, that

benefit might arise from them. How, then, is it that those forty-three,

or as others prefer it, thirty-nine years of Numa's reign, were passed

in unbroken peace, and yet that afterwards, when the worship was

established, and the gods themselves, who were invoked by it, were the

recognised guardians and patrons of the city, we can with difficulty

find during the whole period, from the building of the city to the

reign of Augustus, one year--that, viz., which followed the close of

the first Punic war--in which, for a marvel, the Romans were able to

shut the gates of war?[127]

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 covetousness; every one was sufficiently satisfied

with his own!"[128] Was it requisite, then, for Rome's prosperity,

that the state of things which Virgil reprobates should succeed:

"At length stole on a baser age,

And war's indomitable rage,

And greedy lust of gain?"[129]

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 neighbouring 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 favours."[130] This was to build up Rome's greatness by

honourable means. But, in Numa's reign, I would know whether the long

peace was maintained in spite of the incursions of wicked neighbours,

or if these incursions were discontinued that the peace might be

maintained? For if even then Rome was harassed by wars, and yet did

not meet force with force, the same means she then used to quiet her

enemies without conquering them in war, or terrifying them with the

onset of battle, she might have used always, and have reigned in

peace with the gates of Janus shut. And if this was not in her power,

then Rome enjoyed peace not at the will of her gods, but at the will

of her neighbours round about, and only so long as they cared to

provoke her with no war, unless perhaps these pitiful gods will dare

to sell to one man as their favour what lies not in their power to

bestow, but in the will of another man. These demons, indeed, in so

far as they are permitted, can terrify or incite the minds of wicked

men by their own peculiar wickedness. But if they always had this

power, and if no action were taken against their efforts by a more

secret and higher power, they would be supreme to give peace or the

victories of war, which almost always fall out through some human

emotion, and frequently in opposition to the will of the gods, as is

proved not only by lying legends, which scarcely hint or signify any

grain of truth, but even by Roman history itself.

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 succour._

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 favourable 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,[131] and Hercules wept for Pallas doomed to die.[132]

This is perhaps the reason why Numa Pompilius, too, when, enjoying

prolonged peace, but without knowing or inquiring from whom he

received it, he began in his leisure to consider to what gods he

should entrust the safe keeping and conduct of Rome, and not dreaming

that the true, almighty, and most high God cares for earthly affairs,

but recollecting only that the Trojan gods which Æneas had brought

to Italy had been able to preserve neither the Trojan nor Lavinian

kingdom founded by Æneas himself, concluded that he must provide

other gods as guardians of fugitives and helpers of the weak, and add

them to those earlier divinities who had either come over to Rome

with Romulus, or when Alba was destroyed.

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.[133] The mother of the gods, too, came I know not whence from

Pessinuns; it being unseemly that, while her son presided on the

Capitoline hill, she herself should lie hid in obscurity. But if she

is the mother of all the gods, she not only followed some of her

children to Rome, but left others to follow her. I wonder, indeed,

if she were the mother of Cynocephalus, who a long while afterwards

came from Egypt. Whether also the goddess Fever was her offspring,

is a matter for her grandson Æsculapius[134] to decide. But of

whatever breed she be, the foreign gods will not presume, I trust, to

call a goddess base-born who is a Roman citizen. Who can number the

deities to whom the guardianship of Rome was entrusted? Indigenous

and imported, both of heaven, earth, hell, seas, fountains, rivers;

and, as Varro says, gods certain and uncertain, male and female:

for, as among animals, so among all kinds of gods are there these

distinctions. Rome, then, enjoying the protection of such a cloud of

deities, might surely have been preserved from some of those great

and horrible calamities, of which I can mention but a few. For by

the great smoke of her altars she summoned to her protection, as by

a beacon-fire, a host of gods, for whom she appointed and maintained

temples, altars, sacrifices, priests, and thus offended the true and

most high God, to whom alone all this ceremonial is lawfully due.

And, indeed, she was more prosperous when she had fewer gods; but

the greater she became, the more gods she thought she should have, as

the larger ship needs to be manned by a larger crew. I suppose she

despaired of the smaller number, under whose protection she had spent

comparatively happy days, being able to defend her greatness. For

even under the kings (with the exception of Numa Pompilius, of whom I

have already spoken), how wicked a contentiousness must have existed

to occasion the death of Romulus' brother!

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,"[135]

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 neighbours." Yes; but with what wounds on both sides, and with

what sad slaughter of relatives and neighbours! 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[136]

exclaim: "I sing that worse than civil war waged in the plains of

Emathia, and in which the crime was justified by the victory!"

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 valour

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.

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

neighbours), 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[137]) over the enemy cut down even by his own

hand? Why did Marcellus shed tears over the city of Syracuse, when he

recollected, just before he destroyed, its magnificence and meridian

glory, and thought upon the common lot of all things? I demand, in

the name of humanity, that if men are praised for tears shed over

enemies conquered by themselves, a weak girl should not be counted

criminal for bewailing her lover slaughtered by the hand of her

brother. While, then, that maiden was weeping for the death of her

betrothed inflicted by her brother's hand, Rome was rejoicing that

such devastation had been wrought on her mother state, and that she

had purchased a victory with such an expenditure of the common blood

of herself and the Albans.

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."[138]

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;"[139] and so on, as I need not

now quote. This lust of sovereignty disturbs and consumes the human

race with frightful ills. By this lust Rome was overcome when she

triumphed over Alba, and praising her own crime, called it glory.

For, as our Scriptures say, "the wicked boasteth of his heart's

desire, and blesseth the covetous, whom the Lord abhorreth."[140]

Away, then, with these deceitful masks, these deluding whitewashes,

that things may be truthfully seen and scrutinized. Let no man tell

me that this and the other was a "great" man, because he fought

and conquered so and so. Gladiators fight and conquer, and this

barbarism has its meed of praise; but I think it were better to take

the consequences of any sloth, than to seek the glory won by such

arms. And if two gladiators entered the arena to fight, one being

father, the other his son, who would endure such a spectacle? who

would not be revolted by it? How, then, could that be a glorious war

which a daughter-state waged against its mother? Or did it constitute

a difference, that the battlefield was not an arena, and that the

wide plains were filled with the carcases not of two gladiators, but

of many of the flower of two nations; and that those contests were

viewed not by the amphitheatre, but by the whole world, and furnished

a profane spectacle both to those alive at the time, and to their

posterity, so long as the fame of it is handed down?

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."[141]

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.

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."[142] By

these words, "he suddenly disappeared," we are to understand that he

was mysteriously made away with by the violence either of the tempest

or of a murderous assault. For their other writers speak not only of an

eclipse, but of a sudden storm also, which certainly either afforded

opportunity for the crime, or itself made an end of Romulus. And of

Tullus Hostilius, who was the third king of Rome, and who was himself

destroyed by lightning, Cicero in the same book says, that "he was

not supposed to have been deified by this death, possibly because the

Romans were unwilling to vulgarize the promotion they were assured or

persuaded of in the case of Romulus, lest they should bring it into

contempt by gratuitously assigning it to all and sundry." In one of his

invectives,[143] too, he says, in round terms, "The founder of this

city, Romulus, we have raised to immortality and divinity by kindly

celebrating his services;" implying that his deification was not real,

but reputed, and called so by courtesy on account of his virtues. In

the dialogue _Hortensius_, too, while speaking of the regular eclipses

of the sun, he says that they "produce the same darkness as covered the

death of Romulus, which happened during an eclipse of the sun." Here

you see he does not at all shrink from speaking of his "death," for

Cicero was more of a reasoner than an eulogist.

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 neighbouring 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.

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 fulfil 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."[144]

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[145] of Tarquin.

But Collatinus had the misfortune to bear not only the blood, but the

name of Tarquin. To change his name, then, not his country, would have

been his fit penalty: to abridge his name by this word, and be called

simply L. Collatinus. But he was not compelled to lose what he could

lose without detriment, but was stripped of the honour of the first

consulship, and was banished from the land he loved. Is this, then, the

glory of Brutus--this injustice, alike detestable and profitless to

the republic? Was it to this he was driven by "his country's love, and

unextinguished thirst of praise?"

When Tarquin the tyrant was expelled, L. Tarquinius Collatinus,

the husband of Lucretia, was created consul along with Brutus. How

justly the people acted, in looking more to the character than the

name of a citizen! How unjustly Brutus acted, in depriving of honour

and country his colleague in that new office, whom he might have

deprived of his name, if it were so offensive to him! Such were the

ills, such the disasters, which fell out when the government was

"ordered with justice and moderation." Lucretius, too, who succeeded

Brutus, was carried off by disease before the end of that same year.

So P. Valerius, who succeeded Collatinus, and M. Horatius, who

filled the vacancy occasioned by the death of Lucretius, completed

that disastrous and funereal year, which had five consuls. Such was

the year in which the Roman republic inaugurated the new honour and

office of the consulship.

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."[146] But why should I

spend time in writing such things, or make others spend it in reading

them? Let the terse summary of Sallust suffice to intimate the misery

of the republic through all that long period till the second Punic

war,--how it was distracted from without by unceasing wars, and torn

with civil broils and dissensions. So that those victories they boast

were not the substantial joys of the happy, but the empty comforts of

wretched men, and seductive incitements to turbulent men to concoct

disasters upon disasters. And let not the good and prudent Romans be

angry at our saying this; and indeed we need neither deprecate nor

denounce their anger, for we know they will harbour none. For we speak

no more severely than their own authors, and much less elaborately and

strikingly; yet they diligently read these authors, and compel their

children to learn them. But they who are angry, what would they do to

me were I to say what Sallust says? "Frequent mobs, seditions, and at

last civil wars, became common, while a few leading men on whom the

masses were dependent, affected supreme power under the seemly pretence

of seeking the good of senate and people; citizens were judged good

or bad, without reference to their loyalty to the republic (for all

were equally corrupt); but the wealthy and dangerously powerful were

esteemed good citizens, because they maintained the existing state of

things." Now, if those historians judged that an honourable freedom of

speech required that they should not be silent regarding the blemishes

of their own state, which they have in many places loudly applauded in

their ignorance of that other and true city in which citizenship is an

everlasting dignity; what does it become us to do, whose liberty ought

to be so much greater, as our hope in God is better and more assured,

when they impute to our Christ the calamities of this age, in order

that men of the less instructed and weaker sort may be alienated from

that city in which alone eternal and blessed life can be enjoyed? Nor

do we utter against their gods anything more horrible than their own

authors do, whom they read and circulate. For, indeed, all that we have

said we have derived from them, and there is much more to say of a

worse kind which we are unable to say.

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 honour of the gods, which accounts for the name of this sacred

rite, or rather sacrilege?[147] Where were they when, during ten

successive years of reverses, the Roman army suffered frequent and

great losses among the Veians, and would have been destroyed but

for the succour of Furius Camillus, who was afterwards banished by

an ungrateful country? Where were they when the Gauls took, sacked,

burned, and desolated Rome? Where were they when that memorable

pestilence wrought such destruction, in which Furius Camillus too

perished, who first defended the ungrateful republic from the Veians,

and afterwards saved it from the Gauls? Nay, during this plague they

introduced a new pestilence of scenic entertainments, which spread

its more fatal contagion, not to the bodies, but the morals of the

Romans? Where were they when another frightful pestilence visited

the city--I mean the poisonings imputed to an incredible number of

noble Roman matrons, whose characters were infected with a disease

more fatal than any plague? Or when both consuls at the head of the

army were beset by the Samnites in the Caudine Forks, and forced to

strike a shameful treaty, 600 Roman knights being kept as hostages;

while the troops, having laid down their arms, and being stripped of

everything, were made to pass under the yoke with one garment each?

Or when, in the midst of a serious pestilence, lightning struck the

Roman camp and killed many? Or when Rome was driven, by the violence

of another intolerable plague, to send to Epidaurus for Æsculapius

as a god of medicine; since the frequent adulteries of Jupiter in

his youth had not perhaps left this king of all who so long reigned

in the Capitol, any leisure for the study of medicine? Or when, at

one time, the Lucanians, Brutians, Samnites, Tuscans, and Senonian

Gauls conspired against Rome, and first slew her ambassadors, then

overthrew an army under the prætor, putting to the sword 13,000

men, besides the commander and seven tribunes? Or when the people,

after the serious and long-continued disturbances at Rome, at last

plundered the city and withdrew to Janiculus; a danger so grave,

that Hortensius was created dictator,--an office which they had

recourse to only in extreme emergencies; and he, having brought back

the people, died while yet he retained his office,--an event without

precedent in the case of any dictator, and which was a shame to those

gods who had now Æsculapius among them?

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.[148]

Pyrrhus, king of Greece, and at that time of wide-spread renown, was

invited by the Tarentines to enlist himself against Rome. It was to

him that Apollo, when consulted regarding the issue of his enterprise,

uttered with some pleasantry so ambiguous an oracle, that whichever

alternative happened, the god himself should be counted divine. For he

so worded the oracle,[149] that whether Pyrrhus was conquered by the

Romans, or the Romans by Pyrrhus, the soothsaying god would securely

await the issue. And then what frightful massacres of both armies

ensued! Yet Pyrrhus remained conqueror, and would have been able now

to proclaim Apollo a true diviner, as he understood the oracle, had

not the Romans been the conquerors in the next engagement. And while

such disastrous wars were being waged, a terrible disease broke out

among the women. For the pregnant women died before delivery. And

Æsculapius, I fancy, excused himself in this matter on the ground that

he professed to be arch-physician, not midwife. Cattle, too, similarly

perished; so that it was believed that the whole race of animals was

destined to become extinct. Then what shall I say of that memorable

winter in which the weather was so incredibly severe, that in the

Forum frightfully deep snow lay for forty days together, and the Tiber

was frozen? Had such things happened in our time, what accusations we

should have heard from our enemies! And that other great pestilence,

which raged so long and carried off so many; what shall I say of it?

Spite of all the drugs of Æsculapius, it only grew worse in its second

year, till at last recourse was had to the Sibylline books,--a kind of

oracle which, as Cicero says in his _De Divinatione_, owes significance

to its interpreters, who make doubtful conjectures as they can or as

they wish. In this instance, the cause of the plague was said to be

that so many temples had been used as private residences. And thus

Æsculapius for the present escaped the charge of either ignominious

negligence or want of skill. But why were so many allowed to occupy

sacred tenements without interference, unless because supplication had

long been addressed in vain to such a crowd of gods, and so by degrees

the sacred places were deserted of worshippers, and being thus vacant,

could without offence be put at least to some human uses? And the

temples, which were at that time laboriously recognised and restored

that the plague might be stayed, fell afterwards into disuse, and were

again devoted to the same human uses. Had they not thus lapsed into

obscurity, it could not have been pointed to as proof of Varro's great

erudition, that in his work on sacred places he cites so many that were

unknown. Meanwhile, the restoration of the temples procured no cure of

the plague, but only a fine excuse for the gods.

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 Carthaginians

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 honour, 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[150] in which they had been received,

Metellus the priest, forgetful of his own safety, rushed in and

rescued the sacred things, though he was half roasted in doing so.

For either the fire did not recognise even him, or else the goddess

of fire was there,--a goddess who would not have fled from the fire

supposing she had been there. But here you see how a man could be of

greater service to Vesta than she could be to him. Now if these gods

could not avert the fire from themselves, what help against flames or

flood could they bring to the state of which they were the reputed

guardians? Facts have shown that they were useless. These objections

of ours would be idle if our adversaries maintained that their idols

are consecrated rather as symbols of things eternal, than to secure

the blessings of time; and that thus, though the symbols, like all

material and visible things, might perish, no damage thereby resulted

to the things for the sake of which they had been consecrated,

while, as for the images themselves, they could be renewed again

for the same purposes they had formerly served. But with lamentable

blindness, they suppose that, through the intervention of perishable

gods, the earthly well-being and temporal prosperity of the state can

be preserved from perishing. And so, when they are reminded that even

when the gods remained among them this well-being and prosperity were

blighted, they blush to change the opinion they are unable to defend.

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 freedmen 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?

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 honourably 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 favoured 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 favour, 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.

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

valour 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 proconsul

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 unfavourable auspices.

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.

23. _Of the internal disasters which vexed the Roman republic, and

followed a portentous madness which seized all the domestic

animals._

But let us now mention, as succinctly as possible, those disasters

which were still more vexing, because nearer home; I mean those

discords which are erroneously called civil, since they destroy civil

interests. The seditions had now become urban wars, in which blood

was freely shed, and in which parties raged against one another,

not with wrangling and verbal contention, but with physical force

and arms. What a sea of Roman blood was shed, what desolations and

devastations were occasioned in Italy by wars social, wars servile,

wars civil! Before the Latins began the social war against Rome, all

the animals used in the service of man--dogs, horses, asses, oxen,

and all the rest that are subject to man--suddenly grew wild, and

forgot their domesticated tameness, forsook their stalls and wandered

at large, and could not be closely approached either by strangers or

their own masters without danger. If this was a portent, how serious

a calamity must have been portended by a plague which, whether

portent or no, was in itself a serious calamity! Had it happened in

our day, the heathen would have been more rabid against us than their

animals were against them.

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 elder 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.

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.[151] I

suppose it was that the monument of the Gracchi's punishment might

strike the eye and affect the memory of the pleaders. But what was

this but to deride the gods, by building a temple to that goddess who,

had she been in the city, would not have suffered herself to be torn

by such dissensions? Or was it that Concord was chargeable with that

bloodshed because she had deserted the minds of the citizens, and was

therefore incarcerated in that temple? For if they had any regard to

consistency, why did they not rather erect on that site a temple of

Discord? Or is there a reason for Concord being a goddess while Discord

is none? Does the distinction of Labeo hold here, who would have made

the one a good, the other an evil deity?--a distinction which seems to

have been suggested to him by the mere fact of his observing at Rome

a temple to Fever as well as one to Health. But, on the same ground,

Discord as well as Concord ought to be deified. A hazardous venture the

Romans made in provoking so wicked a goddess, and in forgetting that

the destruction of Troy had been occasioned by her taking offence. For,

being indignant that she was not invited with the other gods [to the

nuptials of Peleus and Thetis], she created dissension among the three

goddesses by sending in the golden apple, which occasioned strife in

heaven, victory to Venus, the rape of Helen, and the destruction of

Troy. Wherefore, if she was perhaps offended that the Romans had not

thought her worthy of a temple among the other gods in their city, and

therefore disturbed the state with such tumults, to how much fiercer

passion would she be roused when she saw the temple of her adversary

erected on the scene of that massacre, or, in other words, on the scene

of her own handiwork! Those wise and learned men are enraged at our

laughing at these follies; and yet, being worshippers of good and bad

divinities alike, they cannot escape this dilemma about Concord and

Discord: either they have neglected the worship of these goddesses, and

preferred Fever and War, to whom there are shrines erected of great

antiquity, or they have worshipped them, and after all Concord has

abandoned them, and Discord has tempestuously hurled them into civil

wars.

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 endeavoured 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?

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."[152] For of this vengeance, which

was more destructive than if the crimes which it punished had been

committed with impunity, Lucan says: "The cure was excessive, and too

closely resembled the disease. The guilty perished, but when none but

the guilty survived: and then private hatred and anger, unbridled

by law, were allowed free indulgence."[153] In that war between

Marius and Sylla, besides those who fell in the field of battle, the

city, too, was filled with corpses in its streets, squares, markets,

theatres, and temples; so that it is not easy to reckon whether the

victors slew more before or after victory, that they might be, or

because they were, victors. As soon as Marius triumphed, and returned

from exile, besides the butcheries everywhere perpetrated, the head

of the consul Octavius was exposed on the rostrum; Cæsar and Fimbria

were assassinated in their own houses; the two Crassi, father and

son, were murdered in one another's sight; Bebius and Numitorius were

disembowelled by being dragged with hooks; Catulus escaped the hands

of his enemies by drinking poison; Merula, the flamen of Jupiter, cut

his veins and made a libation of his own blood to his god. Moreover,

every one whose salutation Marius did not answer by giving his hand,

was at once cut down before his face.

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 prescription 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.

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.

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 Catiline, 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 honours, 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 favoured 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.

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;"[154] the priests were clothed with honour, the shrines

were maintained in splendour; sacrifices, games, sacred ecstasies,

were common in the temples; while the blood of the citizens was

being so freely shed, not only in remote places, but among the

very altars of the gods. Cicero did not choose to seek sanctuary

in a temple, because Mucius had sought it there in vain. But they

who most unpardonably calumniate this Christian era, are the very

men who either themselves fled for asylum to the places specially

dedicated to Christ, or were led there by the barbarians that they

might be safe. In short, not to recapitulate the many instances I

have cited, and not to add to their number others which it were

tedious to enumerate, this one thing I am persuaded of, and this

every impartial judgment will readily acknowledge, that if the human

race had received Christianity before the Punic wars, and if the

same desolating calamities which these wars brought upon Europe and

Africa had followed the introduction of Christianity, there is no one

of those who now accuse us who would not have attributed them to our

religion. How intolerable would their accusations have been, at least

so far as the Romans are concerned, if the Christian religion had

been received and diffused prior to the invasion of the Gauls, or to

the ruinous floods and fires which desolated Rome, or to those most

calamitous of all events, the civil wars! And those other disasters,

which were of so strange a nature that they were reckoned prodigies,

had they happened since the Christian era, to whom but to the

Christians would they have imputed these as crimes? I do not speak

of those things which were rather surprising than hurtful,--oxen

speaking, unborn infants articulating some words in their mothers'

wombs, serpents flying, hens and women being changed into the other

sex; and other similar prodigies which, whether true or false, are

recorded not in their imaginative, but in their historical works,

and which do not injure, but only astonish men. But when it rained

earth, when it rained chalk, when it rained stones--not hailstones,

but real stones--this certainly was calculated to do serious damage.

We have read in their books that the fires of Etna, pouring down from

the top of the mountain to the neighbouring shore, caused the sea to

boil, so that rocks were burnt up, and the pitch of ships began to

run,--a phenomenon incredibly surprising, but at the same time no

less hurtful. By the same violent heat, they relate that on another

occasion Sicily was filled with cinders, so that the houses of the

city Catina were destroyed and buried under them,--a calamity which

moved the Romans to pity them, and remit their tribute for that

year. One may also read that Africa, which had by that time become a

province of Rome, was visited by a prodigious multitude of locusts,

which, after consuming the fruit and foliage of the trees, were

driven into the sea in one vast and measureless cloud; so that when

they were drowned and cast upon the shore the air was polluted, and

so serious a pestilence produced that in the kingdom of Masinissa

alone they say there perished 800,000 persons, besides a much greater

number in the neighbouring districts. At Utica they assure us that,

of 30,000 soldiers then garrisoning it, there survived only ten. Yet

which of these disasters, suppose they happened now, would not be

attributed to the Christian religion by those who thus thoughtlessly

accuse us, and whom we are compelled to answer? And yet to their own

gods they attribute none of these things, though they worship them

for the sake of escaping lesser calamities of the same kind, and do

not reflect that they who formerly worshipped them were not preserved

from these serious disasters.

FOOTNOTES:

Sanct._ 19.

in pronouncing a funeral oration in praise of his aunt Julia, Cæsar

claimed for the Julian gens to which his family belonged a descent

from Venus, through Iulus, son of Eneas.

gates of a passage called Janus, which was used only for military

purposes; shut therefore in peace, open in war.

"But when Anchises' son surveyed

The fair, fair face so ghastly made,

He groaned, by tenderness unmanned,

And stretched the sympathizing hand," etc.

"Vecordiæ opus ædem facit Concordiæ"--The work of discord makes the

temple of Concord.

ARGUMENT.

IN THIS BOOK IT IS PROVED THAT THE EXTENT AND LONG DURATION OF THE

ROMAN EMPIRE IS TO BE ASCRIBED, NOT TO JOVE OR THE GODS OF THE

HEATHEN, TO WHOM INDIVIDUALLY SCARCE EVEN SINGLE THINGS AND THE

VERY BASEST FUNCTIONS WERE BELIEVED TO BE ENTRUSTED, BUT TO

THE ONE TRUE GOD, THE AUTHOR OF FELICITY, BY WHOSE POWER AND

JUDGMENT EARTHLY KINGDOMS ARE FOUNDED AND MAINTAINED.

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 honour 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 honour 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.

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.[156] For, to use his own words, by

excessive earthquakes the ground has burst asunder, and cities with

their inhabitants have been clean destroyed: by sudden rains whole

regions have been washed away; those also which formerly had been

continents, have been insulated by strange and new-come waves, and

others, by the subsiding of the sea, have been made passable by the

foot of man: by winds and storms cities have been overthrown; fires

have flashed forth from the clouds, by which regions in the East being

burnt up have perished; and on the western coasts the like destructions

have been caused by the bursting forth of waters and floods. So,

formerly, from the lofty craters of Etna, rivers of fire kindled by God

have flowed like a torrent down the steeps. If I had wished to collect

from history wherever I could, these and similar instances, where

should I have finished what happened even in those times before the

name of Christ had put down those of their idols, so vain and hurtful

to true salvation? I promised that I should also point out which of

their customs, and for what cause, the true God, in whose power all

kingdoms are, had deigned to favour to the enlargement of their empire;

and how those whom they think gods can have profited them nothing, but

much rather hurt them by deceiving and beguiling them; so that it seems

to me I must now speak of these things, and chiefly of the increase of

the Roman empire. For I have already said not a little, especially in

the second book, about the many evils introduced into their manners by

the hurtful deceits of the demons whom they worshipped as gods. But

throughout all the three books already completed, where it appeared

suitable, we have set forth how much succour God, through the name of

Christ, to whom the barbarians beyond the custom of war paid so much

honour, has bestowed on the good and bad, according as it is written,

"Who maketh His sun to rise on the good and the evil, and giveth rain

to the just and the unjust."[157]

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 honourably, 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 splendour, 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 secure,

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

neighbours 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 tranquillity

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 licence 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."[158]

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."[159]

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 villanies; 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?[160] As if,

indeed, the life of any man whatever lasted long. In that case, too,

the gods aid no one to reign, since all individuals quickly die; nor

is sovereign power to be reckoned a benefit, because in a little time

in every man, and thus in all of them one by one, it vanishes like

a vapour. For what does it matter to those who worshipped the gods

under Romulus, and are long since dead, that after their death the

Roman empire has grown so great, while they plead their causes before

the powers beneath? Whether those causes are good or bad, it matters

not to the question before us. And this is to be understood of all

those who carry with them the heavy burden of their actions, having

in the few days of their life swiftly and hurriedly passed over the

stage of the imperial office, although the office itself has lasted

through long spaces of time, being filled by a constant succession

of dying men. If, however, even those benefits which last only for

the shortest time are to be ascribed to the aid of the gods, these

gladiators were not a little aided, who broke the bonds of their

servile condition, fled, escaped, raised a great and most powerful

army, obedient to the will and orders of their chiefs and much feared

by the Roman majesty, and remaining unsubdued by several Roman

generals, seized many places, and, having won very many victories,

enjoyed whatever pleasures they wished, and did what their lust

suggested, and, until at last they were conquered, which was done

with the utmost difficulty, lived sublime and dominant. But let us

come to greater matters.

6. _Concerning the covetousness of Ninus, who was the first who

made war on his neighbours, 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 neighbours, 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 neighbours, 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 neighbours,

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?

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 skilful 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?

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;[161]

or to Volupia, who has her appellation from voluptuousness; or to

Libentina, who has her name from lust; or to Vaticanus, who presides

over the screaming of infants; or to Cunina, who rules over their

cradles. But how is it possible to recount in one part of this

book all the names of gods or goddesses, which they could scarcely

comprise in great volumes, distributing among these divinities their

peculiar offices about single things? They have not even thought

that the charge of their lands should be committed to any one god:

but they have entrusted their farms to Rusina; the ridges of the

mountains to Jugatinus; over the downs they have set the goddess

Collatina; over the valleys, Vallonia. Nor could they even find one

Segetia so competent, that they could commend to her care all their

corn crops at once; but so long as their seed-corn was still under

the ground, they would have the goddess Seia set over it; then,

whenever it was above ground and formed straw, they set over it

the goddess Segetia; and when the grain was collected and stored,

they set over it the goddess Tutilina, that it might be kept safe.

Who would not have thought that goddess Segetia sufficient to take

care of the standing corn until it had passed from the first green

blades to the dry ears? Yet she was not enough for men, who loved

a multitude of gods, that the miserable soul, despising the chaste

embrace of the one true God, should be prostituted to a crowd of

demons. Therefore they set Proserpina over the germinating seeds;

over the joints and knots of the stems, the god Nodotus; over

the sheaths enfolding the ears, the goddess Volutina; when the

sheaths opened that the spike might shoot forth, it was ascribed

to the goddess Patelana; when the stems stood all equal with new

ears, because the ancients described this equalizing by the term

_hostire_, it was ascribed to the goddess Hostilina; when the grain

was in flower, it was dedicated to the goddess Flora; when full of

milk, to the god Lacturnus; when maturing, to the goddess Matuta;

when the crop was runcated,--that is, removed from the soil,--to the

goddess Runcina. Nor do I yet recount them all, for I am sick of all

this, though it gives them no shame. Only, I have said these very few

things, in order that it may be understood they dare by no means say

that the Roman empire has been established, increased, and preserved

by their deities, who had all their own functions assigned to them

in such a way, that no general oversight was entrusted to any one of

them. When, therefore, could Segetia take care of the empire, who was

not allowed to take care of the corn and the trees? When could Cunina

take thought about war, whose oversight was not allowed to go beyond

the cradles of the babies? When could Nodotus give help in battle,

who had nothing to do even with the sheath of the ear, but only with

the knots of the joints? Every one sets a porter at the door of his

house, and because he is a man, he is quite sufficient; but these

people have set three gods, Forculus to the doors, Cardea to the

hinge, Limentinus to the threshold.[162] Thus Forculus could not at

the same time take care also of the hinge and the threshold.

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."[163] Varro believes

that this god is worshipped, although called by another name, even

by those who worship one God alone without any image. But if this

is so, why has he been so badly used at Rome (and indeed by other

nations too), that an image of him should be made?--a thing which

was so displeasing to Varro himself, that although he was overborne

by the perverse custom of so great a city, he had not the least

hesitation in both saying and writing, that those who have appointed

images for the people have both taken away fear and added error.

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 yokefellow?"[164] Because, say they, we have Jove in the

ether, Juno in the air; and these two elements are united, the one

being superior, the other inferior. It is not he, then, of whom it is

said, "All things are full of Jove," if Juno also fills some part.

Does each fill either, and are both of this couple in both of these

elements, and in each of them at the same time? Why, then, is the ether

given to Jove, the air to Juno? Besides, these two should have been

enough. Why is it that the sea is assigned to Neptune, the earth to

Pluto? And that these also might not be left without mates, Salacia

is joined to Neptune, Proserpine to Pluto. For they say that, as Juno

possesses the lower part of the heavens,--that is, the air,--so Salacia

possesses the lower part of the sea, and Proserpine the lower part of

the earth. They seek how they may patch up these fables, but they find

no way. For if these things were so, their ancient sages would have

maintained that there are three chief elements of the world, not four,

in order that each of the elements might have a pair of gods. Now, they

have positively affirmed that the ether is one thing, the air another.

But water, whether higher or lower, is surely water. Suppose it ever

so unlike, can it ever be so much so as no longer to be water? And

the lower earth, by whatever divinity it may be distinguished, what

else can it be than earth? Lo, then, since the whole physical world

is complete in these four or three elements, where shall Minerva be?

What should she possess, what should she fill? For she is placed in

the Capitol along with these two, although she is not the offspring of

their marriage. Or if they say that she possesses the higher part of

the ether,--and on that account the poets have feigned that she sprang

from the head of Jove,--why then is she not rather reckoned queen of

the gods, because she is superior to Jove? Is it because it would be

improper to set the daughter before the father? Why, then, is not that

rule of justice observed concerning Jove himself toward Saturn? Is it

because he was conquered? Have they fought then? By no means, say they;

that is an old wife's fable. Lo, we are not to believe fables, and

must hold more worthy opinions concerning the gods! Why, then, do they

not assign to the father of Jove a seat, if not of higher, at least

of equal honour? Because Saturn, say they, is length of time.[165]

Therefore they who worship Saturn worship Time; and it is insinuated

that Jupiter, the king of the gods, was born of Time. For is anything

unworthy said when Jupiter and Juno are said to have been sprung from

Time, if he is the heaven and she is the earth, since both heaven and

earth have been made, and are therefore not eternal? For their learned

and wise men have this also in their books. Nor is that saying taken by

Virgil out of poetic figments, but out of the books of philosophers,

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

Into his spouse's glad bosom, making it fertile,"[166]

--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 honour, and, as it were, chastity, they do not blush

sometimes even to call Vesta Venus, so that honoured virginity may

vanish in her handmaidens? 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.[167] Which of these is the wife of Vulcan?

Certainly not the virgin, since she has a husband. Far be it from

us to say it is the harlot, lest we should seem to wrong the son of

Juno and fellow-worker of Minerva. Therefore it is to be understood

that she belongs to the married people; but we would not wish them

to imitate her in what she did with Mars. "Again," say they, "you

return to fables." What sort of justice is that, to be angry with us

because we say such things of their gods, and not to be angry with

themselves, who in their theatres most willingly behold the crimes of

their gods? And,--a thing incredible, if it were not thoroughly well

proved,--these very theatric representations of the crimes of their

gods have been instituted in honour of these same gods.

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,"[168]--

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 corn-fields; 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; Camœna, 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 honour; 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.

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.

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 lascivious, 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?

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 favours

and is propitious, and always goes to those whom she wishes to be

victorious? With this goddess favourable 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 neighbours who are peaceable and do no wrong, in order to enlarge

a kingdom? If they feel thus, I entirely approve and praise them.

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 favours the growth of a kingdom, which would

certainly have been small if the peace and justice of neighbours 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 neighbourly 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 neighbour 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 co-operated

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 recognised and

worshipped, not as a stone in the Capitol, but as the true King of

kings and Lord of lords.

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?"

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.

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.

19. _Concerning Fortuna Muliebris._[169]

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.

20. _Concerning Virtue and Faith, which the pagans have honoured

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."[170] But if Faith is a goddess, I wonder why these keen

lovers of a multitude of gods have wronged so many other goddesses,

by passing them by, when they could have dedicated temples and altars

to them likewise. Why has temperance not deserved to be a goddess,

when some Roman princes have obtained no small glory on account of

her? Why, in fine, is fortitude not a goddess, who aided Mucius

when he thrust his right hand into the flames; who aided Curtius,

when for the sake of his country he threw himself headlong into the

yawning earth; who aided Decius the sire, and Decius the son, when

they devoted themselves for the army?--though we might question

whether these men had _true_ fortitude, if this concerned our present

discussion. Why have prudence and wisdom merited no place among the

gods? Is it because they are all worshipped under the general name

of Virtue itself? Then they could thus worship the true God also, of

whom all the other gods are thought to be parts. But in that one name

of virtue is comprehended both faith and chastity, which yet have

obtained separate altars in temples of their own.

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 ἀρετὴ, 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 favour 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 Rumina 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 honoured; 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?

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 anything. 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?

23. _Concerning Felicity, whom the Romans, who venerate many gods,

for a long time did not worship with divine honour, 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, Tiberinus, 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 honour, 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 honourable way than the

rest? For is it not intolerable that Felicity is placed neither among

the gods _Consentes_,[171] whom they allege to be admitted into the

council of Jupiter, nor among the gods whom they term _Select_? Some

temple might be made for her which might be pre-eminent, both in

loftiness of site and dignity of style. Why, indeed, not something

better than is made for Jupiter himself? For who gave the kingdom

even to Jupiter but Felicity? I am supposing that when he reigned

he was happy. Felicity, however, is certainly more valuable than

a kingdom. For no one doubts that a man might easily be found who

may fear to be made a king; but no one is found who is unwilling

to be happy. Therefore, if it is thought they can be consulted by

augury, or in any other way, the gods themselves should be consulted

about this thing, whether they may wish to give place to Felicity.

If, perchance, the place should already be occupied by the temples

and altars of others, where a greater and more lofty temple might

be built to Felicity, even Jupiter himself might give way, so that

Felicity might rather obtain the very pinnacle of the Capitoline

hill. For there is not any one who would resist Felicity, except,

which is impossible, one who might wish to be unhappy. Certainly, if

he should be consulted, Jupiter would in no case do what those three

gods, Mars, Terminus, and Juventas, did, who positively refused to

give place to their superior and king. For, as their books record,

when king Tarquin wished to construct the Capitol, and perceived that

the place which seemed to him to be the most worthy and suitable was

preoccupied by other gods, not daring to do anything contrary to

their pleasure, and believing that they would willingly give place

to a god who was so great, and was their own master, because there

were many of them there when the Capitol was founded, he inquired by

augury whether they chose to give place to Jupiter, and they were

all willing to remove thence except those whom I have named, Mars,

Terminus, and Juventas; and therefore the Capitol was built in such a

way that these three also might be within it, yet with such obscure

signs that even the most learned men could scarcely know this.

Surely, then, Jupiter himself would by no means despise Felicity as

he was himself despised by Terminus, Mars, and Juventas. But even

they themselves who had not given place to Jupiter, would certainly

give place to Felicity, who had made Jupiter king over them. Or if

they should not give place, they would act thus not out of contempt

of her, but because they chose rather to be obscure in the house of

Felicity, than to be eminent without her in their own places.

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 honour this goddess above

other gods, even by dignity of place. For, as we read in their own

authors, the ancient Romans paid greater honours 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.

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 honour; 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.

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.

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."[172] The poet, by ascribing such crimes to the gods, has justly

displeased the grave man. Why, then, are the scenic plays, where

these crimes are habitually spoken of, acted, exhibited, in honour

of the gods, reckoned among things divine by the most learned men?

Cicero should exclaim, not against the inventions of the poets, but

against the customs of the ancients. Would not they have exclaimed in

reply, What have we done? The gods themselves have loudly demanded

that these plays should be exhibited in their honour, have fiercely

exacted them, have menaced destruction unless this was performed,

have avenged its neglect with great severity, and have manifested

pleasure at the reparation of such neglect. Among their virtuous

and wonderful deeds the following is related. It was announced in a

dream to Titus Latinius, a Roman rustic, that he should go to the

senate and tell them to recommence the games of Rome, because on the

first day of their celebration a condemned criminal had been led to

punishment in sight of the people, an incident so sad as to disturb

the gods who were seeking amusement from the games. And when the

peasant who had received this intimation was afraid on the following

day to deliver it to the senate, it was renewed next night in a

severer form: he lost his son, because of his neglect. On the third

night he was warned that a yet graver punishment was impending, if

he should still refuse obedience. When even thus he did not dare to

obey, he fell into a virulent and horrible disease. But then, on the

advice of his friends, he gave information to the magistrates, and

was carried in a litter into the senate, and having, on declaring

his dream, immediately recovered strength, went away on his own

feet whole.[173] The senate, amazed at so great a miracle, decreed

that the games should be renewed at fourfold cost. What sensible

man does not see that men, being put upon by malignant demons, from

whose domination nothing save the grace of God through Jesus Christ

our Lord sets free, have been compelled by force to exhibit to such

gods as these, plays which, if well advised, they should condemn as

shameful? Certain it is that in these plays the poetic crimes of the

gods are celebrated, yet they are plays which were re-established

by decree of the senate, under compulsion of the gods. In these

plays the most shameless actors celebrated Jupiter as the corrupter

of chastity, and thus gave him pleasure. If that was a fiction, he

would have been moved to anger; but if he was delighted with the

representation of his crimes, even although fabulous, then, when he

happened to be worshipped, who but the devil could be served? Is

it so that he could found, extend, and preserve the Roman empire,

who was more vile than any Roman man whatever, to whom such things

were displeasing? Could he give felicity who was so infelicitously

worshipped, and who, unless he should be thus worshipped, was yet

more infelicitously provoked to anger?

27. _Concerning the three kinds of gods about which the pontiff

Scævola has discoursed._

It is recorded that the very learned pontiff Scævola[174] had

distinguished about three kinds of gods--one introduced by the poets,

another by the philosophers, another by the statesmen. The first kind

he declares to be trifling, because many unworthy things have been

invented by the poets concerning the gods; the second does not suit

states, because it contains some things that are superfluous, and

some, too, which it would be prejudicial for the people to know. It

is no great matter about the superfluous things, for it is a common

saying of skilful lawyers, "Superfluous things do no harm."[175]

But what are those things which do harm when brought before the

multitude? "These," he says, "that Hercules, Æsculapius, Castor and

Pollux, are not gods; for it is declared by learned men that these

were but men, and yielded to the common lot of mortals." What else?

"That states have not the true images of the gods; because the true

God has neither sex, nor age, nor definite corporeal members." The

pontiff is not willing that the people should know these things; for

he does not think they are false. He thinks it expedient, therefore,

that states should be deceived in matters of religion; which Varro

himself does not hesitate even to say in his books about things

divine. Excellent religion! to which the weak, who requires to be

delivered, may flee for succour; and when he seeks for the truth by

which he may be delivered, it is believed to be expedient for him

that he be deceived. And, truly, in these same books, Scævola is not

silent as to his reason for rejecting the poetic sort of gods,--to

wit, "because they so disfigure the gods that they could not bear

comparison even with good men, when they make one to commit theft,

another adultery; or, again, to say or do something else basely and

foolishly; as that three goddesses contested (with each other) the

prize of beauty, and the two vanquished by Venus destroyed Troy; that

Jupiter turned himself into a bull or swan that he might copulate

with some one; that a goddess married a man, and Saturn devoured his

children; that, in fine, there is nothing that could be imagined,

either of the miraculous or vicious, which may not be found there,

and yet is far removed from the nature of the gods." O chief pontiff

Scævola, take away the plays if thou art able; instruct the people

that they may not offer such honours to the immortal gods, in which,

if they like, they may admire the crimes of the gods, and, so far as

it is possible, may, if they please, imitate them. But if the people

shall have answered thee, You, O pontiff, have brought these things

in among us, then ask the gods themselves at whose instigation you

have ordered these things, that they may not order such things to

be offered to them. For if they are bad, and therefore in no way to

be believed concerning the majority of the gods, the greater is the

wrong done the gods about whom they are feigned with impunity. But

they do not hear thee, they are demons, they teach wicked things,

they rejoice in vile things; not only do they not count it a wrong if

these things are feigned about them, but it is a wrong they are quite

unable to bear if they are not acted at their stated festivals. But

now, if thou wouldst call on Jupiter against them, chiefly for that

reason that more of his crimes are wont to be acted in the scenic

plays, is it not the case that, although you call him god Jupiter, by

whom this whole world is ruled and administered, it is he to whom the

greatest wrong is done by you, because you have thought he ought to

be worshipped along with them, and have styled him their king?

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 honours, 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

honourably 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 honour. 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 Æsculanus; 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.

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 honourable 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."[176] The help of this true God was necessary

to send holy and truly pious men, who would die for the true religion

that they might remove the false from among the living.

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.[177] But

it will be said that an academic philosopher, who argues that all

things are uncertain, is unworthy to have any authority in these

matters. In the second book of his _De Natura Deorum_,[178] he

introduces Lucilius Balbus, who, after showing that superstitions

have their origin in physical and philosophical truths, expresses

his indignation at the setting up of images and fabulous notions,

speaking thus: "Do you not therefore see that from true and useful

physical discoveries the reason may be drawn away to fabulous and

imaginary gods? This gives birth to false opinions and turbulent

errors, and superstitions well-nigh old-wifeish. For both the forms

of the gods, and their ages, and clothing, and ornaments, are made

familiar to us; their genealogies, too, their marriages, kinships,

and all things about them, are debased to the likeness of human

weakness. They are even introduced as having perturbed minds; for

we have accounts of the lusts, cares, and angers of the gods. Nor,

indeed, as the fables go, have the gods been without their wars and

battles. And that not only when, as in Homer, some gods on either

side have defended two opposing armies, but they have even carried

on wars on their own account, as with the Titans or with the Giants.

Such things it is quite absurd either to say or to believe: they are

utterly frivolous and groundless." Behold, now, what is confessed by

those who defend the gods of the nations. Afterwards he goes on to

say that some things belong to superstition, but others to religion,

which he thinks good to teach according to the Stoics. "For not only

the philosophers," he says, "but also our forefathers, have made a

distinction between superstition and religion. For those," he says,

"who spent whole days in prayer, and offered sacrifice, that their

children might outlive them, are called superstitious."[179] Who does

not see that he is trying, while he fears the public prejudice, to

praise the religion of the ancients, and that he wishes to disjoin

it from superstition, but cannot find out how to do so? For if

those who prayed and sacrificed all day were called superstitious

by the ancients, were those also called so who instituted (what

he blames) the images of the gods of diverse age and distinct

clothing, and invented the genealogies of gods, their marriages,

and kinships? When, therefore, these things are found fault with

as superstitious, he implicates in that fault the ancients who

instituted and worshipped such images. Nay, he implicates himself,

who, with whatever eloquence he may strive to extricate himself and

be free, was yet under the necessity of venerating these images;

nor dared he so much as whisper in a discourse to the people what

in this disputation he plainly sounds forth. Let us Christians,

therefore, give thanks to the Lord our God,--not to heaven and earth,

as that author argues, but to Him who has made heaven and earth;

because these superstitions, which that Balbus, like a babbler,[180]

scarcely reprehends, He, by the most deep lowliness of Christ, by

the preaching of the apostles, by the faith of the martyrs dying

for the truth and living with the truth, has overthrown, not only

in the hearts of the religious, but even in the temples of the

superstitious, by their own free service.

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.[181]

And by this, it appears, that although he did not attain to the

truth,--for the true God is not a soul, but the maker and author

of the soul,--yet if he could have been free to go against the

prejudices of custom, he could have confessed and counselled others

that the one God ought to be worshipped, who governs the world by

design and reason; so that on this subject only this point would

remain to be debated with him, that he had called Him a soul, and

not rather the creator of the soul. He says, also, that the ancient

Romans, for more than a hundred and seventy years, worshipped the

gods without an image.[182] "And if this custom," he says, "could

have remained till now, the gods would have been more purely

worshipped." In favour of this opinion, he cites as a witness among

others the Jewish nation; nor does he hesitate to conclude that

passage by saying of those who first consecrated images for the

people, that they have both taken away religious fear from their

fellow-citizens, and increased error, wisely thinking that the gods

easily fall into contempt when exhibited under the stolidity of

images. But as he does not say they have transmitted error, but that

they have increased it, he therefore wishes it to be understood that

there was error already when there were no images. Wherefore, when

he says they alone have perceived what God is who have believed Him

to be the governing soul of the world, and thinks that the rites

of religion would have been more purely observed without images,

who fails to see how near he has come to the truth? For if he had

been able to do anything against so inveterate an error, he would

certainly have given it as his opinion both that the one God should

be worshipped, and that He should be worshipped without an image;

and having so nearly discovered the truth, perhaps he might easily

have been put in mind of the mutability of the soul, and might thus

have perceived that the true God is that immutable nature which made

the soul itself. Since these things are so, whatever ridicule such

men have poured in their writings against the plurality of the gods,

they have done so rather as compelled by the secret will of God to

confess them, than as trying to persuade others. If, therefore, any

testimonies are adduced by us from these writings, they are adduced

for the confutation of those who are unwilling to consider from how

great and malignant a power of the demons the singular sacrifice of

the shedding of the most holy blood, and the gift of the imparted

Spirit, can set us free.

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?

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.

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.

FOOTNOTES:

towards the end of the year 415, he mentions that this fourth book

and the following one were begun and finished during that same year.

iii.

Cyprian (_De Idol. vanit._), and Augustine (_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.

movements of these gods.

lawyers, and the best skilled lawyer among eloquent men.

Cicero, see Lact. _Inst. Div._ iv. 28.

ARGUMENT.

AUGUSTINE FIRST DISCUSSES THE DOCTRINE OF FATE, FOR THE SAKE OF

CONFUTING THOSE WHO ARE DISPOSED TO REFER TO FATE THE POWER AND

INCREASE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, WHICH COULD NOT BE ATTRIBUTED

TO FALSE GODS, AS HAS BEEN SHOWN IN THE PRECEDING BOOK. AFTER

THAT, HE PROVES THAT THERE IS NO CONTRADICTION BETWEEN GOD'S

PRESCIENCE AND OUR FREE WILL. HE THEN SPEAKS OF THE MANNERS OF

THE ANCIENT ROMANS, AND SHOWS IN WHAT SENSE IT WAS DUE TO THE

VIRTUE OF THE ROMANS THEMSELVES, AND IN HOW FAR TO THE COUNSEL

OF GOD, THAT HE INCREASED THEIR DOMINION, THOUGH THEY DID NOT

WORSHIP HIM. FINALLY, HE EXPLAINS WHAT IS TO BE ACCOUNTED THE

TRUE HAPPINESS OF THE CHRISTIAN EMPERORS.

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.

1. _That the cause of the Roman empire, and of all kingdoms, is

neither fortuitous nor consists in the position of the stars._[184]

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, honours, 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?

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.[185] Posidonius the Stoic, who was much given to astrology,

used to explain the fact by supposing that they had been born

and conceived under the same constellation. In this question the

conjecture of the physician is by far more worthy to be accepted,

and approaches much nearer to credibility, since, according as the

parents were affected in body at the time of copulation, so might the

first elements of the fœtuses have been affected, so that all that

was necessary for their growth and development up till birth having

been supplied from the body of the same mother, they might be born

with like constitutions. Thereafter, nourished in the same house, on

the same kinds of food, where they would have also the same kinds of

air, the same locality, the same quality of water,--which, according

to the testimony of medical science, have a very great influence,

good or bad, on the condition of bodily health,--and where they

would also be accustomed to the same kinds of exercise, they would

have bodily constitutions so similar that they would be similarly

affected with sickness at the same time and by the same causes. But,

to wish to adduce that particular position of the stars which existed

at the time when they were born or conceived as the cause of their

being simultaneously affected with sickness, manifests the greatest

arrogance, when so many beings of most diverse kinds, in the most

diverse conditions, and subject to the most diverse events, may have

been conceived and born at the same time, and in the same district,

lying under the same sky. But we know that twins do not only act

differently, and travel to very different places, but that they

also suffer from different kinds of sickness; for which Hippocrates

would give what is in my opinion the simplest reason, namely, that,

through diversity of food and exercise, which arises not from the

constitution of the body, but from the inclination of the mind, they

may have come to be different from each other in respect of health.

Moreover, Posidonius, or any other asserter of the fatal influence of

the stars, will have enough to do to find anything to say to this,

if he be unwilling to impose upon the minds of the uninstructed in

things of which they are ignorant. But, as to what they attempt to

make out from that very small interval of time elapsing between

the births of twins, on account of that point in the heavens where

the mark of the natal hour is placed, and which they call the

"horoscope," it is either disproportionately small to the diversity

which is found in the dispositions, actions, habits, and fortunes

of twins, or it is disproportionately great when compared with the

estate of twins, whether low or high, which is the same for both of

them, the cause for whose greatest difference they place, in every

case, in the hour on which one is born; and, for this reason, if the

one is born so immediately after the other that there is no change

in the horoscope, I demand an entire similarity in all that respects

them both, which can never be found in the case of any twins. But if

the slowness of the birth of the second give time for a change in the

horoscope, I demand different parents, which twins can never have.

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_.[186] For,

having whirled round the potter's wheel with all his strength, he

marked it with ink, striking it twice with the utmost rapidity, so

that the strokes seemed to fall on the very same part of it. Then,

when the rotation had ceased, the marks which he had made were found

upon the rim of the wheel at no small distance apart. Thus, said

he, considering the great rapidity with which the celestial sphere

revolves, even though twins were born with as short an interval

between their births as there was between the strokes which I gave

this wheel, that brief interval of time is equivalent to a very great

distance in the celestial sphere. Hence, said he, come whatever

dissimilitudes may be remarked in the habits and fortunes of twins.

This argument is more fragile than the vessels which are fashioned

by the rotation of that wheel. For if there is so much significance

in the heavens which cannot be comprehended by observation of the

constellations, that, in the case of twins, an inheritance may fall

to the one and not to the other, why, in the case of others who

are not twins, do they dare, having examined their constellations,

to declare such things as pertain to that secret which no one can

comprehend, and to attribute them to the precise moment of the birth

of each individual? Now, if such predictions in connection with the

natal hours of others who are not twins are to be vindicated on the

ground that they are founded on the observation of more extended

spaces in the heavens, whilst those very small moments of time which

separated the births of twins, and correspond to minute portions

of celestial space, are to be connected with trifling things about

which the mathematicians are not wont to be consulted,--for who would

consult them as to when he is to sit, when to walk abroad, when and

on what he is to dine?--how can we be justified in so speaking, when

we can point out such manifold diversity both in the habits, doings,

and destinies of twins?

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 honour 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