transgressors, who indeed pay the penalties worthy of their crimes. But if nature commands children to fight for their parents, and servants for their masters, and citizens for their cities, and bodyguards for kings, how much more holy and just it is that those who have both been created and saved by God should not only fight for God with words, but even choose the most extreme death. For He is closer to us than our parents, since it is through Him that they are called parents; and He is more sovereign than any masters, for in His case, the lordship over servants is according to nature and not by virtue of misfortune. He is also safer than any wall; for even if a wall were of adamant, it is still man-made, and even if it could escape the power of siege engines, it could never escape the hands of time. But He is eternal and everlasting, and sufficient for all guardianship and security. B And He is as much more kingly than kings as that which is eternal, when compared to that which is created and perishable, reveals the immeasurable gulf of its superiority. For He is eternal, and possesses power connatural with His very being; whereas the [earthly king] possesses his existence and his authority as something received from Him, and that too for a short time and over few, not over all who partake of the same nature. Since, therefore, He is closer to us than parents, more sovereign than masters, more provident than all benefactors, safer than any wall, and immeasurably more kingly than all kings, it is fitting for us—who have received from Him both the fact of our being and the blessing of our well-being—to set our own tongues against those which dare to blaspheme Him, and with pious arguments to strike down their impious words. Not that we bring support to one who has need of it; C for the Creator of all has no need, and He has no need of the patronage of a clay-born tongue, though He approves of it when it celebrates His praises, and He rewards it when it fights on His behalf, and He crowns it when it refutes falsehood. Rather, we do this so that we might demonstrate our own affection toward Him, and if possible, break the boldness of our fellow servants; but if that is not possible, let us at least refute them and make the truth manifest to those who have remained ignorant hitherto.
D There are many and varied swarms of those who choose to live impiously, and they have diverse arrows of blasphemy; for falsehood is multi-faceted and complex, but the grace of truth is simple. The phalanx of poets, by dividing the Divine being into many parts in their discourse and seasoning falsehood with the pleasure of myths, mixing it like some sort of potion out of many different herbs, has intoxicated the minds of men with the delusion of a multitude of gods. But that other school, which measures philosophy by a white cloak, the length of a beard, and the hair of the head, seeing the ridiculous nature of the poets' theology, has devised other paths of error,
which lead nonetheless to the same abyss of poetic ruin. A For some, with the elegant style of their discourse and the formidable force of their arguments, have veiled that shameful fiction of the poets concerning the gods. Others have dared to attribute the names of the gods to the very passions of men, and have called pleasure Venus, anger Mars, drunkenness Bacchus, theft Mercury, and prudence Minerva. And while they pour forth such things with haughty arrogance and Attic fluency (not without the utter admiration of their listeners), they have led many men into another kind of error: so much so that those who professed philosophy—adorned by all with the honor that comes from their outward appearance—while they bade men to master their passions, actually became the authors of their worship of them, and foolishly persuaded men to sacrifice to desire, anger, theft, drunkenness, and the other passions, rather than to lead the sovereign mind as the charioteer of the passions.
Other, again, being unable to conceive of anything beyond what is seen, but confining their mind to the contemplation of sensible things, have declared these external and visible objects to be gods. And that august name, which strikes the ears of men with awe, some have deigned to assign to the elements, and others to parts of them. And some have dreamt with a foolish imagination that the world was made by chance, others that there are many gods instead of one. Some have said that the Divine does not exist at all, others that it does exist but has no care for anything that is in the nature of things; others again have said that it does indeed care for the things of the world, but does so very sparingly and negligently, limiting providence to the bounds of the moon, and declaring that the rest of the world is compelled to serve the necessity of fate and is borne along by chance.
C There are some, moreover, who bear the name of Christians, but who openly fight against the dogmas of the truth. For some divide the Unbegotten into three, and call one Good, another Evil, and the third Just. Others portray in their discourse two unbegotten principles, diametrically opposed to each other. Others again, while promising to fight against these impious dogmas, devise another path of impiety. For although they confess the only-begotten Word of God to be the Son, they nevertheless count Him as a creature among created things, and set the Creator on a par with the creation. And with their impious argument, they exclude the Holy Spirit from the divine nature. Others have lost the straight path in other ways, and, unwilling to follow in the footsteps of those who have gone before, have wandered very far from the truth. Some of these have utterly denied the incarnation that took place for our sake; D others indeed confess that God the Word became man, but that He assumed only a body. Others call the flesh that was taken human, but say that a logical and intellectual soul did not come to be within it—perhaps having their own lack of intelligence as proof of this. But we know of no other soul of man than the logical and immortal one. But let us leave all the others for the present; for the argument cannot release the arrows of its refutations against all of them at once, as if in battle array. Therefore, let the rest of the host of the impious be silent, and let those who...
watch attend the struggle A. For it is likely that none of those ranks will need to be engaged individually; rather, they will defect to the truth, having beheld the defeat of those others and having reflected upon the power of the truth. But perhaps, if the discourse lingers and proceeds too slowly, it will weary both those who are listening now and those who will encounter it later. Having, therefore, girt ourselves with the whole armor of the Spirit, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and having girded our loins with truth, and shod our feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace, and above all, having taken up the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, let us join the battle, and let the divine trumpet sound, supporting our weakness B.
As for us, let us ask the adversaries right at the starting line why they speak against the doctrine of providence, even while they acknowledge that He is their Creator. For it is to them that our discourse shall be directed for the present. Whence have you been driven to this impiety? What among the things seen appears to you to be without order? What among the things that have come to be is observed to be disordered? What part of creation is lacking in harmony? What stands in need of beauty or magnitude? What is it that, not being moved in a well-ordered way, has given birth to C this impiety in you? Consider now, at any rate, if you have not done so before, the nature, the position, the order, the stability, the motion, the rhythm, the harmony, the season, the beauty, the magnitude, the utility, the pleasure, the variety, the alteration, the return back to the same state, and the duration within corruptible things of the things that are seen. Behold the providence of God itself, peering through every part of creation, appearing, speaking, and through the very things themselves, as it were, crying out and stopping your unbridled mouths and reining in your unrestrained tongues. Behold it in heaven, and in the luminaries in heaven—I mean the sun, the moon, and the stars; in the air and in the clouds, in the earth and in the sea, and in all things that are around the earth; in plants, herbs, and seeds; in animals—rational and irrational, D those that walk and those that fly, those that swim, and those that creep, amphibious creatures, both tame and wild, those that are manageable and those that are untamable. Consider...
with yourselves, who is it that holds together the heavenly vaults? How, in so many thousands of years, has the heaven remained ageless, having received no alteration from time, even though it possesses a nature subject to passion, as the blessed David teaches: "They (the heavens)," he says, "shall perish, but thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment, and as a vesture shalt thou fold them, and they shall be changed; but thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail." Yet, although it possesses a nature that is subject to passion and corruption, it has nevertheless remained whole and sound until now, preserved by nothing other than the word of its Creator. For the Word that created it is the very same that preserves it, and grants it stability and firmness for as long as He wills. For this reason, although such a great fire revolves around it—I mean the sun, the moon, and the other luminaries—in these cycles of years it does not melt, nor does it wither, nor does it burn up; for the nature of fire received these activities from the One who created it. For it melts and dissolves gold, silver, iron, bronze, lead, tin, wax, pitch, and whatever else is of this kind, and shifts them into a flowing nature; but as for clay and marshy, waterlogged places, it dries them out, consuming the moisture. It cooks stones, peels away their hardness, and converts their most solid nature into dust; and it burns wood, hay, and stubble very easily and quickly. But the heaven undergoes none of these things. For neither does its crystalline [nature] melt and dissolve, even though there is such an B abundance of fire present there, nor does it harm its smoothness, nor does it make its spherical shape uneven; but the station it was allotted from the beginning, this it preserves to the end. For He who set it up like a vault, and stretched it out like a tent to dwell in, brought opposing natures into friendship. And neither is the nature of fire extinguished by the abundance of the waters, nor does that crystalline, or airy, or cloudy heavenly body melt or perish by the most abundant essence of the fire. But although they dwell as neighbors to one another, they conceal their hostile forces and, persuaded by the word of the Creator, have struck a league of eternal friendship. And this is so, even though they are inanimate and lack C a governing mind; yet they remain, keeping the boundary that was established for them from the beginning. For the Creator governs the creation, and He has not left the ship He constructed without a governor, but He Himself is its shipwright and the creator of its matter, and at the same time, having created the matter and having woven the ship, He continues to hold fast the rudder. And the cycle of so many years and the long span of time bear witness to this, not having corrupted the ship, but showing it safe and sound, not only to the first men but also to those born later. Since, therefore, you have seen, O friend, the providence D of God appearing in the heaven, come, let us lead you to the remaining parts of creation; and...
just as with infants 16 who begin to take their first steps, we take you by the right hand and prepare you to walk through and examine creation little by little. Descend, therefore, from the heavens, as if to a first step, namely the sun, and do not fear being scorched, but step upon it and look around. For it will not scorch you if you are well-disposed toward the Creator, but rather will point out to you the Demiurge, who commands it to use its natural energy in a manner contrary to its nature. For fire, by nature, loves an upward motion, just as water loves a downward course. And it is not possible for a person to lead the latter from the foothills to the summit, nor to persuade the former to send its flame downward. Even if someone were to strive a thousand times, holding a lamp or a torch, to transfer it downward with his hand, the flame moves again to the heights and darts against the hand holding it; it does not depart from the impetus it received from the beginning, but stands upon the boundaries of nature. But to the Creator, all things are easy. For that which does not obey your right hand yields to the nods of the Creator. And one may see the sun and the moon, and the chorus of the stars, turning their backs to the sky and sending their rays downward; for they are servants of their Controller, and their nature is the limit set by Him who created them. B For the nature of fire does not obey you, nor does it depart from its own operation, for it is your fellow-servant; but, obeying the nods of the Creator, it is transformed 17, and the upward-moving nature becomes downward-moving. In this way, He leads and carries the nature of the waters, though it be boisterous and loose, to the heights, and drawing it up from below, He stands it in the midst of the heaven and the earth, supported by no foundation, but sustained and suspended by the Word alone. But for a while, do not desire to hear about the clouds, nor do you wish to run before you have learned to walk; but journeying through creation little by little, learn the path of piety. Behold, therefore, here too the providence of God, standing over the sun, the moon, and the other luminaries, and as if by a voice commanding them to act as torchbearers for mankind, and not merely to provide light, but to do so according to the distribution of time. For the rising sun creates the day, and by setting and as if hiding itself, it yields to the night, whose darkness the Demiurge tempers through the moon and the stars 18. And one may see, as it were, sisters—I mean the day and the night—borrowing time from one another for the needs 19 of men C and again returning it with gratitude. For when winter comes to an end and spring shines forth, at the time when many toils for men arise concerning their work—travels and journeys abroad, and departures from harbors—and the sea is calmed and stripped of the ruggedness of winter, and the earth, teeming with crops, calls the farmer to care for it, and the plants call the cultivator to pruning, cleansing, and irrigation, and [when the Creator] scatters...
increase the labor period for men, it receives it gradually, so that it may not harm those using it by a sudden increase. For labor that becomes excessive all at once badly damages bodies that have remained idle for a long time. For this reason, it receives its increase little by little. When summer is already in its middle, it ceases borrowing, but immediately begins repayment, not delaying the payment even for a single day. Yet, little by little, just as it received, it gives back what it received. Then, in the autumn, becoming equal in measure, it is not ashamed to become smaller, nor does it endure cheating its sister and spouse of her due; but it does not cease diminishing until it has paid back the entire debt, and even then it provides a long opportunity for rest, by which men can be restored.
B For when we are forced to stay at home because of the annoyance of cold, rains, mud, and mire, the night is much more pleasant to us than the day. There are even those who, when the night is extended to such a length, do not obtain their fill of rest and sleep, but are annoyed when they see the dawn beginning to shine. Thus, in turn, the night, having recovered its debt, does not refuse the loan. Thus our whole life proceeds through these cycles, and the night provides no less utility to men than the day. For, first of all, the variety of darkness and light makes the light more pleasant and delightful to us; hence the dawn is more desirable to us than midday. For when we have had our fill of light during the day, we have need of nocturnal rest; then, having obtained this, we put aside our satiety, and the light becomes desirable to us once again. So too, being sated with the day's tasks, we give the body, wearied by labors, rest at night; and when it has been properly restored by bed, sleep, and quiet, we bring it forth anew for work at dawn.
C Of such and so great utility is the night the author. By its benefit the hireling rests, and the servant finds an end to his labors and repose. For the darkness of the night compels even the most hardworking to cease from their labors. This same night even those who are warring and fighting have often desired—namely, those who, having won a victory, have pursued the fleeing enemy; and seeing this approaching, they have put an end to the pursuit, and have granted the fugitives a safer and more secure flight. It gathers people home and brings sweet sleep to them; but it leads out the wild beasts for pasture, and gives them a free and safe time for grazing. D Concerning these things, the great David cried out, celebrating God, the Lord of all: "Thou hast appointed the moon for seasons; the sun knoweth his going down. Thou makest darkness, and it is night: wherein all the beasts of the forest do creep forth, the young lions roaring after their prey, and seeking their meat from God. The sun ariseth, and they gather themselves together, and lie them down in their dens. Man goeth forth unto his work and to his labor until the evening." So, the night also provides this need, and...
for it shelters men in repose and offers wild beasts the opportunity to seek their food safely. But perhaps one of those who deny providence might object: “Why did the Lord create wild beasts? And what utility comes to men from them?” Let him wait for the answer to these questions until our discourse arrives at the wild beasts; for now, let our discourse proceed in order. That the requirement of night is necessary and most beneficial to men is, I think, sufficiently taught by what has already been said. A Nevertheless, our discourse shall add others that confirm those prior arguments with their own testimony. Since we possess a mortal nature and live a life circumscribed by fixed limits, it was necessary for us to be taught the measures of time. Night, therefore, intervening between the days, establishes the measures of time. For if a light had remained continuous, without any intervening medium, we certainly would not have learned the cycles of years, nor would we have been taught the number of months; rather, that one continuous day would have seemed the measure of the entire present age—and we believe that the expected age to come B will possess this characteristic, for we have been taught that that day will be without evening and entirely without succession. For such an age is fitting for those who are to be immortal. But in the present life, since we lack many things on account of our mortal and fragile nature, it was necessary to know the measures of time, so that, seeing it flowing away, we might take care of ourselves and prepare for our departure from this world. Night, therefore, succeeding the day, becomes a measure of time, and when it has done this seven times, it completes the span of a week. We derive the measure of the month from the moon, from which it also derives its name; for the Greeks are accustomed to call the moon *mene*. C For as it grows and wanes, becoming crescent-shaped, half-full, gibbous, and full, then transitioning back to the gibbous shape, and thence to the half, and to the crescent, it fills again the number of thirty days, lacking only a few hours. We learn the annual cycle not only from the months, but also from the days. For when spring begins to shine, the sun, traveling through the middle of the sky, brings about the equality of day and night. D From there, reaching the more northerly parts of the horizon, and rising from there, it shortens the nights and lengthens the days; and falling upon the earth with more heat, it ripens its fruits. And having traveled until the accustomed limits, it returns from the northern parts toward the south, and again, in autumn, having acted as the arbiter of equality for night and day, it becomes more southerly, and restores to the nights what it had taken from them and given to the days; and it permits the air to thicken, to be filled with clouds, and to irrigate the entire continent. From there, returning to the equinoctial turn, it completes the annual cycle. Since, therefore, you have seen the usefulness of the sun and the moon, and of night and
day, along with the fruit that returns to men from them, consider now also the most pleasant and most useful succession of the four seasons A of the year. For the Creator did not divide the annual cycle in two, nor did He give us only summer and winter, nor do we pass from extremes to extremes without an intermediary; but spring and autumn, which possess a certain moderate temperament, are the middle between cold and heat. And indeed, a summer that is extremely dry and hot does not succeed a winter that is extremely moist and cold; but spring, which partakes of the heat of the B latter and the cold of the former, produces an excellent mixture of those that were standing apart. As if by certain hands holding the opposites—by the cold of winter on one side, and the heat of summer on the other—it leads those things that are utterly hostile into concord and friendship. For this reason, as we proceed from winter to summer, we proceed without any distress. For by departing little by little from the cold of the one and approaching the heat of the other, we suffer no harm from an abrupt change. Similarly, we pass from summer to winter, with autumn again serving as a middle path, which does not allow us C to come suddenly upon the extremes; but by mixing the highest heat with the highest cold, and producing a different temperament, it leads us little by little to that other extreme. Such is the care that the supreme Creator of all things has for us, who in this way, through the successions of the parts of the year, not only frees us from distress but also delights us with pleasure.
But perhaps some ungrateful person might arise, wishing to blame even those things which have been done well and beautifully, and which are simultaneously administered wisely and conveniently, saying: "Why, pray, do these D conversions of the year happen? And what utility comes to us from these successions of the parts of the year?" But oh! most wise and most powerful accuser of Providence, what goods do we not obtain by the benefit of these? For when winter begins, we entrust seeds to the lands: but He who taught us this art nourishes and cherishes them, drawing up the seawater by His word to the heights, carrying it aloft, changing that salty quality into a sweet one, and separating the drops, which He sends down sometimes small, and other times larger and rushing like a torrent, as if separating the offspring of the clouds with a sieve. Therefore, the winter season was ordained for this use: to nourish you, the ungrateful one, and to provide the need of necessities to you, the most unreasonable judge. But when spring begins again, some of the husbandmen prune the vines, while others plant others, and as the earth is softened by the heat of the air
the shoots are compelled to bud. Then, when summer has flourished, and the sun thoroughly heats the air, the corn calls the husbandman to the harvest, the grapes darken, the olive trees swell with the fruit already nourished, and the kinds of autumn fruits reach maturity. Thereafter, autumn arriving, it delivers these fully ripe to the husbandmen; and they, having performed the harvest, return to their seeds. A Cease, therefore, from being ungrateful, and from attempting to slander Providence with the gifts of Providence, and from hurling back the good things given to you like darts against the Giver of them. In all the things mentioned, perceive the providence of God, which guides and steers you, and prepares for you the abundance of all good things. Look also at the nature of the stars, their position, order, the variety of their shapes, the delight, the utility, the movement, the risings, and the settings; the Creator of all has made these not only to illuminate the darkness of the night and to provide the need of light to men in a moonless night, but also to escort the traveler and to guide those who sail. For the mariners, looking toward these, follow a precise path and, attending to their position, direct the ship and steer toward whatever harbors they wish. B For since the nature of waters admits neither the tracks of horses, nor of asses, nor of mules, nor of wayfarers, nor the lines of wagons and carriages, by attending to which travelers may undoubtedly make their journey, the Master of all has given to those who traverse the great seas the position of the stars as if they were certain tracks of marine paths. Oh, that ineffable love for mankind! Oh, that inexpressible wisdom! Who could worthily admire the goodness of God’s providence, its power, its resourcefulness in perplexities, its facility in difficulties, its magnitude of works, its wealth? Truly, “Your knowledge has been made wonderful by me; it has been strengthened, I shall not be able to attain to it,” C I also cry out. If you would be persuaded by me, you shall utter this voice with me as well; you shall praise the Benefactor to the best of your ability, and, being benefited by infinite works, you shall return grateful words to Him. But, lest we should now cause distress to you, who are beginning to take your first steps, by the length of a longer road, we bid you rest here, leaving you to contemplate the providence of God which appears in heaven and in the heavenly luminaries. For I believe that you, who have been led thus far, will yourself increase this contemplation and, from what we have said, easily infer the things omitted in this discourse for the sake of brevity, and will finally cry out with the Prophet: “How magnified are Your works, O Lord! In wisdom You have made them all.” To Him be glory, and honor, and worship, unto the ages. Amen.
exclaims: "How magnificent are thy works, O Lord! In wisdom hast thou made them all." To thee be glory, honor, and adoration for ever. Amen.
ORATION II. Demonstration (of Providence) from the air, the earth, the sea, the rivers, and the springs.
A Those who do not wish to have faith in Providence, and who assert with extreme imprudence that this world, which consists of heaven and earth, is carried along with such harmony and order without a governor, appear to me to act just as if someone, sitting in a ship and traversing the deep, seeing the pilot holding the tiller and moving the rudders as is necessary—now turning them to the right, now to the left—and guiding the ship to whatever ports he chooses, were nonetheless, while manifestly striving to oppose the truth with lies, to deny that the pilot is standing at the stern, or that the ship itself is equipped with oars or guided by the motion of the tiller, but were to claim that it is carried along of its own accord, and by itself surmounts the storms of the waves, and contends against the incursions of the winds, and to maintain further that there is no need of the sailors' assistance, nor of a captain who, providing for the common good, commands the rowers what must be done.
For these men, since they see clearly and more brightly than the light that the Lord of all things governs the world which He has created, and directs and moves all things conveniently and in just order, and since they perceive in all things that come to pass a fitting proportion, and in all this machine of the world—as well as in its individual parts—both beauty and utility evidently appearing, they are nevertheless voluntarily blind; or rather, they behave shamelessly even while seeing, and, while receiving the gifts of Providence, they assail those very things which they receive, and through that which they enjoy, they make war upon their Governor. B Yet what was said yesterday concerning the heaven, the sun, the moon, and the other luminaries might be sufficient to persuade willing and well-disposed hearers both to judge more wisely and to celebrate their benefactor with worthy praises. C But lest any of those who have set the moon as the limit for Providence, and who have said that its powers extend only to its sphere, and have thus portrayed it as too restricted, should seize upon the brevity of our discourse as a pretext for blasphemy, come now, O friend, we shall lead you again from there, through the air, down to the earth; and, as we did yesterday, so now too, guiding your steps step by step, we shall demonstrate that Providence extends itself even into the smallest parts of the world to those who are willing to attend; nay, we shall show that it is simply present always and attends to all things that have been made or generated, both commonly and privately. D Moving forward, then, in the right path, let us examine the nature of the air, how it is most thin and slippery, and so easily vanishing, as when other mediums hold it...
A in a most secure enclosure. Wherefore the Maker of all things, after creating heaven and earth, willed that air should be poured out between them; he built for it a most firm wall by means of these two bodies, and at the same time rendered it a helper of life for all living beings that exist between them. For by breathing this, we humans live, and also all brute beasts, as many as are winged, and creeping things, and amphibious animals; each uses this as a helper of its life. This, when moved, provides us with the breezes of the winds; this, when condensed, sends down to the earth the irrigation from the clouds; the light, using this as a vehicle, feasts the eyes of those who see. This, acting as a mediator between the sun and the earth, tempers the violence of the ray, and with its own inherent moisture and cold, soothing that element's dryness and heat, it brings it about that we may enjoy the light without hardship or pain. B And lest you should think the air to be the cause of these goods, learn how the heat of the sun regulates the intemperance even of this. For no one would be able to endure the cold of the air in its pure state; witness the winter season. For in that season, the sun running to the southern parts of the pole, and leaving the northern and middle regions of the sky, gives the air freedom to use its own nature; on account of which, since it is no longer consumed similarly by the sun's heat, but is condensed and becomes frequent, it lets fall both heavy rain, and, roughening it with the more violent assault of the winds, congeals it into snow and hail, and the dew distilling in clear, open skies, the air, by freezing it with its cold, works into hoarfrost; and yet these things, even if [they seem to come] from afar, are nevertheless cast off through being warmed by the sun. It is possible, therefore, to discern from this also, with precision, the providence of God. For since there is great and manifold utility in the elements, and along with this utility, great beauty, and an ineffable grace, the all-wise One dispensed those things which seem to be C troublesome, so that we might believe these things to be not gods, but the works of God, being directed and governed wherever He guides them. For this reason the air, our helper in life, which we all live by breathing—this common treasure of those who are poor and those who pride themselves on their wealth, of servants and masters, of private citizens and kings, which those adorned in purple breathe no more than the poor man, but rather human nature as a whole has been honored by the impartial equality regarding the need for it—this air not only gladdens us with its inhalations, and with breezes, and with the provision of rain, but it also causes distress with cold, teaching us that it alone does not suffice for the generation of life and the care of the living. Thus the sun not only gladdens us with the incidence of its rays, and teaches us the distinction of D visible bodies, both in terms of bulk and color, but also causes distress with the warmer incidence of its rays; and even if the sun, having stirred the air...
A to bring us cooling breezes, were not governed by that supreme ruler of all things, this sun, which the foolish are wont to worship, would utterly consume everything, and the living would be deprived of life. Therefore, none of the elements by itself is capable of producing life, nor can they all, even when blended together, be the cause of any good without that power which governs all things. For one can see, again, that when the air has been tempered, and rain has been granted 52 to the earth at the right time, and the sun has used its rays gently, and the breezes of the winds have moved in order, and farmers have diligently tilled the earth 53 and duly cast the seeds 54, yet the earth does not gratefully yield its fruits, nor does the human race remain free from disease. The Governor of all things brings these things about, persuading us not to trust in creation, nor to attribute the cause of good things to it, but to believe in its Creator 55. Since, therefore, you have seen that the air also enjoys the governance of God’s providence, and because of that has sufficed for so many thousands of years, and has neither been exhausted by the breathing of animals nor flowed out beyond the bounds of the bodies that contain it, come, let us lead you to the earth, the common nurse of all, mother and tomb; from which your body is made of clay, and that mouth of yours which speaks great things against the Creator, according to the vision of Daniel.
Consider, before all things, the position of this earth B and the variety of its forms. For it is not all flat or level or even steep, but the whole earth is divided into mountains, wooded vales, and plains. For one might see in the most expansive plains hills rising to a height, and between the mountains some sloping and level places, resembling in their shape certain bays of the sea. And the Creator even divided those mountains for the use and utility of men, and, having separated them with deep ravines, fashioned paths for the winter waters, and crafted easy ways for men in difficult and rough places. Moreover, the mountains provide material for the craft of building, while the plains provide an abundance of grain for those who cultivate the mountains. But this varied position does not only nourish, but also marvelously delights the eyes of those who behold it; for things that have one and the same form are wont to quickly bring about satiety. Tell me, therefore, who is it who disposed these things so beautifully? Who endowed them with such faculties C, so that so many 57 cycles of years have not been able to exhaust the treasure? Who is it that preserves the things that exist firm and unmoved? Who impels the streams of the rivers? Who drives the throes of the springs? Behold them here, on the one hand, gushing forth on the peaks of the mountains, and 58 pouring down their currents from above; and there, not even in the
A lowest roots of the mountains do they appear, but offer the use of water to men from the deepest wells. For lest you think that it is the nature of water to dart upward of its own accord, the Creator teaches you by the facts themselves that water, obeying the word of God, easily occupies the highest peaks of the mountains, and even if you wished to force it with your art, it would never return to the level plain; but there you dig and deepen wells, and enjoy the water by drawing it up from below: for you are a fellow-servant of the elements, not their creator. But to the Creator it is easy to bring up the nature of water not only to the mountaintops, but even into the mid-air, B and to make the bitter sweet, and to solidify that which is melted, and to melt that which is frozen, and to divide the continuous, and to hold back the flowing, and to show that which is naturally accustomed to flow downwards running upwards, and to warm that which is cold without fire. And these things He does for your sake, O ungrateful one, so that you may have the benefit of heated springs not made by hands, in order to heal the maladies of your body. And these again He has set before you in varied forms, and adapted to contrary needs. For some relax the stiffness of the nerves; others tighten and strengthen those that are relaxed; some fight against phlegm, others cure black bile, and others dry up ulcers. Such utility, too, has the Guardian of all provided for you C in the hot springs. But nothing convinces you not to blaspheme; rather, you remain ungrateful and abusive, and suffering from the disease of Mani, who, while enjoying food and drink, lashes out with abuse at those who provide these things for him: nay, he even attacks the reapers and the bakers, and curses those who cut the bread, himself not daring to cut it, but not at all fearing to eat what was cut. In the same way, you too, while you receive these infinite and numberless good things which the Creator of the universe offers you every day through creation, show yourself ungrateful to the Giver, and you revile and blaspheme, saying that He does not care for the things He has made. See how much injustice you charge Him with, slandering Him in such ways. For why, pray, did He create them if He did D not want to take care of them? And for what reason does He refuse to care for them? Is it because He could do so but does not want to, or does He want to but cannot? Yet all these things which have been created testify that He can. For how could He have created the magnitude of these visible things, their beauty, and their harmony, if He did not possess power corresponding to His design? Or how, likewise, could He have brought together into fellowship and connection things that are disparate—water and fire, day and night—and fashioned one harmony and symphony out of all, if He were unable to provide for them? For it is a much greater thing to have brought from non-being into being, than to provide for those things that exist. But that He can is testified by creation; and that He also wishes to, it itself bears witness again. For He did not come to the work of creation because someone else compelled Him, nor did He bring forth the creation as if He were in need of it; but being good, and to goodness
having possessed more than any measure, He wished to grant existence even to those things which did not exist. A He who exercised such goodness toward things that were not, how could He neglect those things that have already come into being? For it is not possible to say that He envied things that have come to be; for He possesses a nature that is free from envy and devoid of every passion. But in order that we may strip away 66 the weakness of impiety from an abundance of evidence, let us ask them a few short questions.
For what cause, tell me, do you say that God envied the creation which received its being from Him? Is it because of its magnitude? But He Himself is uncreated and infinite, having neither had a beginning nor ever having received an end, holding all things, yet being encompassed by nothing; 68 for in His hand are the ends of the earth, and He Himself measured the waters with His hand, and the heaven with a span, and all the earth with His fist. But is it because of its beauty? Yet even that has been made by Him. And no one, not even among the most envious of men, having built an elegant and splendid house, ever envies it; but rather he delights in it, and prides himself on it, and such a one rejoices, and points it out to those who have not seen it. But what human speech will ever worthily weigh how much the beauty of that intelligible Light, by whose virtue all these things were founded, surpasses the entire form and beauty of this world? See, therefore, to what point impiety finally leads. For since even the most wicked of men not only do not envy the houses built by themselves, but even take the greatest pride in them, if you say that the affect of envy falls upon the fountain of all goodness, whose nature is to be troubled by no passion, what degree of impiety more sublime than this is left for us? C Since, therefore, God is able to hold the rudders of the creation, and wills that it enjoy all good things, it is manifest that He both cares for it and presides over it; indeed, having grasped its reins, like some skilled charioteer, He governs all the nature created by Him, and leaves nothing uncared for.
Furthermore, that these things may be more fully clear to you, turn yourself again to the sea, and observe its depth, its amplitude, the intervals of its straits, its shores, its harbors, and the islands situated in its midst, and likewise the kinds, species, forms, and variety of its fish, and the love with which they seek the land. At the same time, consider also the leaping of its waves and the bridle of providence which has been cast upon them, by which, of course, they are prevented from being able to flood the lands; but while they are carried impetuously against the sand, they fear the boundaries set for them, and seeing the law written there by God, like some refractory horse, D pulled back by the bit of a horse-breaker, it bends back its neck and retreats, as if it regretted the fact that it had even touched the sand. By means of this, we see the continents divided and, though seated far from one another, brought together into friendship. For harmony
A wishing to implant it in the human race, the Lord bound them together by the necessity of mutual labor and aid. Through the sea we make long journeys, and we borrow from one another the things we need, and recompense others with what is necessary for them. For the supreme Administrator of all things did not allow any part of the earth to provide all things necessary for human life to its inhabitants, lest a lack of need should harm friendship; for satiety is an insolent thing and the parent of disorder. Therefore, the sea lies in the midst of the inhabited world, divided into countless bays, like the marketplace of a great city, providing an abundance of all necessities, receiving many sellers and buyers, and both sending those from here to there B and bringing those from there to here. For because travel by land is laborious—and not only laborious, but also impossible for supplying every deficiency—the back of the sea is laid out, receiving both small and large vessels, and carrying much necessary freight to those in need. For it is possible to see the cargo of a single merchant ship carrying the equivalent of many thousands of pack animals. But so that those who travel upon it might not grow weary, the Creator fixed the islands like certain stations, in which, having put in, and having rested, and having purchased necessary supplies, they set sail again for wherever they have their course. Be ashamed, therefore, of the multitude of benefits, said the sea. For the words of the prophet fit you better C than they did Sidon. The latter, indeed, ignorant of the Creator, divided the Divine into many gods, and splitting the one worship, offered it to those who were not gods, not denying Providence, but attributing it to them. For she would not have sacrificed to those she deemed gods if she had not strongly persuaded herself that they both provide benefits and avert harm. You, however, liberated from the error of polytheism, and confessing that all visible things are creations, and worshipping the Creator of them, cast Him out from what He has made, and seat Him far from creation, and say that so great a world is without a pilot, and is carried along like a ship without ballast D just as it happens. Be ashamed, therefore, of the benefits through the sea, those from the earth, those from the air, those from the sun, and the heaven that lies over you as a roof. Stand in awe of the tribute which you receive from creation; for each of the things mentioned pays you a tax, and offers to your need a kind of tribute. The sun, for instance, gives light, warms, and ripens the fruits from the earth. The moon gives you light by night. The stars, while remaining above the earth, show you the time of night and signify the changes of the seasons, and for those traveling by sea, they become guides toward the mainland. The air, when inhaled, cools your innate heat; when it rains, it nourishes the fruits of agriculture; when it produces cold, it checks the upward growth of plants and seeds.
they indicate, and they mark the flux of time; for those sailing across the sea, they are guides to the land. The air, too, inhaled by you, recreates the heat that is innate to you. Rains nourish the fruits of agriculture. And while the Creator of nature induces cold, He prevents plants and seeds from germinating upward and distributes the vegetative force into the roots, and—by a kind of scourge—drives that which was carried upward down into the depths. He destroys the bodies of reptiles, which are also harmful to plants and seeds; and at the same time, He reveals to you the genuses of the birds that you have reared. But what is the point of enumerating these fruits, which come from the earth, from springs, from rivers, and from the sea? While you enjoy all these things, do you forget the Giver? And while you perceive the fruits of created things, do you nevertheless grow insane, rage, and play the fool against the Creator? Indeed, do you not even feel the gifts that you carry in your hands, but instead labor under a madness of contradiction? For I know your objections, but I have decided neither to add those same objections to this discourse nor to weave in their solutions. But since another discourse remains for me whereby I may be assisted, I wished to support, with these reasonings, the Providence which you attack. In the meantime, having dismissed you here, I bid you to spend your time with pleasure in the consideration of those things which have been said and, from every side, to seek your salvation, while I myself shall sing the praises of the Governor of all, to whom glory is due for ever and ever. Amen.
ORATION III
ADemonstration B(of Providence) from the construction of the human body.Those who are well in body have no need for the care of physicians, for health that is sound and intact has no need of the assistance of medicines. Those, however, who are afflicted by some disease are accustomed to call physicians to their aid, and, using the arts and weapons as auxiliaries against diseases, they attempt to drive them out of their bodies as though they were actual enemies. For the medical art provides aid to bodies and lays snares for diseases. Similarly, those who are well in their souls, and who have them adorned with sound and integral piety, have no need of the medicines of doctrine. But those who are held by some depraved opinion, and who have contracted the disease of profane dogmas, and who, with the passage of time, have acquired a habit of disease from the affection, have need of many purgative remedies—remedies capable of uprooting that wicked substance and rendering souls pure—and they have need of many other medicines, which by their power may close and obstruct the genital passages C of the erring substance and calm the harmful pains. Since, therefore, the disease of those who attempt to strip the world of the care of Providence is very dangerous and difficult, we have already offered them two medicines, prepared from the parts of the world. But in order that we may pull the disease up by the roots and completely free them from this troublesome and difficult infirmity, we shall also endeavor to prepare and offer a third. The substance for preparing this, however, D not from heaven, or earth, or sea, nor from the sun, or moon, or the rest of the stars, nor likewise from the air, or clouds, or winds, nor even from rivers, or fountains, or wells, but from...
those very persons who attempt to utter such blasphemies shall we obtain our proofs. A For having received a mouth from the Creator, that they might offer praise to the Giver for the good things they enjoy, not only do they refuse to praise Him, but they defile their tongue with blasphemies (80) and treat with contumely that noble instrument of speech. Yet this single member of man is sufficient to demonstrate not only the wisdom of the Maker, but also His insatiable philanthropy. 81 For it resembles a musical instrument constructed of bronze pipes, blown by bellows, moved by the fingers of a craftsman, and producing that harmonious sound. But nature was not taught this mechanism of delightful sound by art; rather, art learned from nature. For nature is the archetype of art, and art is an imitation of nature.
Consider therefore, O man, who, having received the gift of speech from God, yet despoil the One who honored you with such great honor of His own proper honor, how the lung is situated like a bellows, and is squeezed—not by the feet of a man, but by the muscles surrounding the thorax, which contract and expand it. It sends forth the breath through the trachea; and this, being impelled, opens the epiglottis and is carried through the pharynx to the mouth. B Logic, or the faculty of speech, taking hold of the tongue as if it were a kind of right hand, presents it to the teeth as if to those bronze pipes, and contrives for it to run up and down and to slip and slide easily and very readily. The gland situated beneath it assists it toward this ease of motion, like a spring bubbling over with moisture. For since the frequent motion dries it out, it needed a moderate amount of moisture, cooling it and smoothing it, and making its movement very easy. Thus, therefore, when the discourse interacts with the teeth through the tongue, and the breath, as I said, is carried, and the lips are folded, and the air is harmoniously struck by the force of the breath, the articulate voice is completed, and the breath being carried out from within becomes the vehicle of speech; and nature expels the sooty [vapor] as superfluous. For since the Creator has made the heart the source of innate heat, and the entire body derives its quality of heat from this organ, and since it is also bound by much heat, it needed some small relief; therefore, the Creator of nature has brought it about that the heart is cooled by the breathing of the lung. C For this [the lung] receives the pure breath from without through the trachea, and transmits it through the smooth [artery] to the left ventricle of the heart; for from there, as those who have accurately investigated such things say, it has its outlet. While this lung transmits the pure breath, it receives the sooty breath in exchange, and shoves this, as something superfluous, out again through the trachea; D and that which seemed superfluous and entirely useless becomes, when the mind wills it and moves the tongue in rhythm and harmony,
A a vehicle of speech; and that which 83 the lungs expel from the heart as noxious, becomes an assistant to articulate voice. Truly! “O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!” [Rom. xi, 33] Truly! “Who shall declare the mighty acts of the Lord, and make all his praises heard?” [Psal. cv, 2] Truly, I say, we exclaim: “How magnified are thy works, O Lord! in wisdom hast thou made them all.” [Psal. civ, 24] And what speech is sufficient for the hymns of the Creator? What speech is sufficient for the narration of one’s own creation? Who is a speaker capable of explaining the organs of speech? Who has arrived at such wisdom as to perceive exactly the wisdom of the Fashioner? Yet you, while seeing these things and enjoying their use, refuse to celebrate the Author of them, nay, you accuse of negligence the One who exercises the most diligent care over everything He has made. And indeed, this single part (of the human body) could most fully demonstrate the Creator’s concern, by which He is bound toward this living creature of His. For since He has gifted us with the use of speech, He has also given organs suitable for speech. From these, art taking the handle for imitation, has fashioned flutes, B and indeed has composed lyres and citharas. For, in place of teeth, the strings are stretched, and in place of lips, the bronze is inserted; the tongue becomes the plectrum for the strings, and the passage of the hand from high to low sound imitates the reason which regulates the tongue running up and down. But even so, though such great diligence is apparent in art, those who listen admire the rhythm and the harmony of the melody, but they do not hear an articulate voice or speech. For art is an imitator of nature, but nature produces articulate voice, inasmuch as it was founded by God, the Creator of all. And just as art is accustomed to imitate the figure of an animal—and either from a mass of bronze or from stone fashions a human form, and adds eyes, and nostrils 84, and mouth, and ears, and neck, and hands, and chest, and belly, and thighs, and legs, and feet—but is unable to gift it with sensation, and reason, and the capacity for voluntary movement: so too the lyre and the cithara, and the instrument consisting of brass pipes, renders an harmonious sound and rhythm through breathings or pluckings, but only that living organ, which is the archetype of these, produces articulate voice. For this, indeed, is the C work of the Creator Himself, while all those are (the work) of the image of the Creator. For man, being the image of the Creator, contends to imitate the Creator. And the things that come to be are like shadows contending with the truth itself, which indeed possess the form of things, but are deprived of the power of acting. Seeing, therefore, such great providence of the Creator of all in these organs, cease, I beseech you, to cast the charge of negligence upon Him. But that you may learn, also from the other members, the care of the One who made us, come, let us lead you back again to the heart itself. D
A This, therefore, because it is the most vital part and has been entrusted with the government of the body, He fortifies on all sides like some king, and surrounds it with a strong rampart, the chest, so that nothing of those things which fall upon it from without may easily harm the heart. And since it is perpetually in motion (for it is the source of the arteries), He has spread out beneath it a soft bedding, as it were, the porous, spongy, and manifold body of the lung, which is full of arteries; but above, He has fashioned its conical part to be stronger, and has placed around it a tunic which is membranous, yet tight and strong. He supplies it with the substance of its nourishment, not only spirit, but also blood; and it draws this, as if through some conduit of the vena cava, from the parts of the liver. The liver, in turn, draws this substance from the belly. B The belly, by means of the stomach, draws in the food which has been cut by the teeth and thinned and smoothed by the grinders. Upon drawing it in, it first holds it, turns it into juice, alters and transforms it, and makes it like to itself; then, when it has been well digested and properly altered, it distributes it justly, and allows the liver to strain and draw from it the pure part, while it pushes away the superfluous part and sends it on to the intestines, using the pushing power as a co-worker. In this way the liver, having received the pure part of the nourishment, is not content with that purification and discrimination which has occurred, but, as if through certain sieves, it divides and cleanses it again; and the denser and most thick sediment, the spleen drawing it in for certain reasons, makes this its nourishment; but that which has been cooked beyond measure, and has taken on a bilious quality, and has turned into a pale-colored body, the vessel which receives the bile takes; while that which is flowing and very thin, and devoid of nourishment, goes into the reservoir for fluid waste. Thus, the nourishment having become purely clean and having been assimilated to the liver and passed into the nature of blood, the vena cava, having received it, supplies the heart with its need, and rises upward, and dividing into many veins, it nourishes the chest, it nourishes the shoulders and hands, and reaches as far as the nails, wraps around the neck, C occupies the head, descends to the buttocks, and thighs, and knees, and shins, and feet, and, in a word, travels around every part of the body, and deprives none of the living limbs of this irrigation. For the veins resemble certain conduits and channels, to which the duty of irrigating the body has been entrusted; wherefore they also have a thin and sparse tunic, so that the adjacent parts may easily draw their nourishment from them; but the arteries have tunics that are not only tight, but also double; for they are vessels of spirit, not of blood; and spirit is thin and flows out easily. Understand, therefore, even in this, the providence of the Creator. For the veins, inasmuch as they carry blood to the parts of the body, He has made of thin membranes, and as if of something sparse...
A in that aperture, He has overlaid them with coverings. For the blood is thick, and requires larger pores for its excretion. Therefore, so that it might not all flow out at once, but might supply a kind of moisture to the neighboring parts, He fashioned the nature of the vessels in this way.
As for the arteries, through which that vital spirit is carried throughout the body (which is something thin, and easily vanishes, and is easily emitted B through the very smallest parts), the Fashioner did not weave them in a similar manner, nor did He make them of one single tunic, but of two, which are dense and very solid. For He placed the arteries alongside the veins, so that the blood, excited by the commotion of the hot spirit, might run through everywhere; for stagnation is known to cause coagulation. For this reason, in certain parts, He has grafted these into one another through certain minute pores, so that the blood might partake of a little of the spirit, which pushes it and forces it to move, and the spirit might enjoy some moisture, which soaks and wets it, and does not allow it to dry up C completely.
For who among those who are most ambitious and most wealthy, when building a house, ever makes provision for water-ducts with such providence, or arranges for a sufficient supply of water for their springs, or builds fountains and basins for such great delight, as the Creator of all, when fashioning this rational house, has surrounded it with such and so many vessels, which serve it for every necessity? And who is such an architect, who, wishing for a house to be blown through by the breezes of the west wind, so widens the paths of the winds as the all-artful God; and Who has contrived that the smoky and sooty spirit should exit the body, and the pure spirit should enter and run through all the arteries? D And who, when planting herbs or trees, so conducts the nature of the waters, and provides irrigation to the roots of the plants, as He Who planted this living being, and created all of creation, in an ineffable way brings irrigation through the veins to the limbs of the body?
For we human beings do not differ at all from inanimate trees in regard to nourishment; for we are in need of this just as they are. For the tree that is not nourished becomes withered and dry, and the human being, pressed by hunger, similarly empties out all liquid and is handed over to death. Just as, therefore, trees—whether they have received the rain sent down from the clouds or the streams of rivers and fountains—draw moisture through their roots, and in this manner nourish the branches, the bark, and the pith, which at once produces leaves, and blossoms, and finally ripens its fruits toward maturity; so too this animal receives food in the mouth, which is to it like a spring, and the esophagus imitates a conduit, which we are accustomed to call the stomach; and the belly, like a sort of root, receiving this, acts as a foundation for the branches and sends it on to the liver. It does not permit itself merely to enjoy the need for this, but to all the parts of the body
it offers irrigation through the veins. A Thus the body, being nourished, grows in infants, lengthens, and widens, and gradually assumes the appropriate bulk. But when it has reached the defined measure, at that point it ceases from growth and is only nourished. So does the Creator of all things provide for our nature; He does not merely form it, but continues to sustain it, and He does not merely sustain it, but provides all our other care.
But I am at a loss: how shall I praise the Creator? For the variety of His providence over us overcomes the mind, every word yields to the wisdom of creation, no one is able to fathom the construction of our bodies. Let this alone suffice for you to sing the praises of the Creator. You do not look down at the earth like the irrational animals, nor do you grovel on your belly like swine; look up B only, and see His providence. He created you alone among animals upright, supported on two feet. And each of these He has not made of one limb, but joined together from three parts, and bound them with three joints. He fitted one to the hip, joined the second to the knees, and entrusted the third to the ankles. He bound the joints with strong tendons, and implanted muscles for voluntary movements. He made the bonds neither too loose nor, again, too taut; for if they were totally loose, they would completely remove movement, and if too taut, they would cause the joints to slip and slide away from one another. Because of this providence of His, you walk and run when you wish, and you have the power of standing and sitting.
Observe also another form of His care. For so that you might not be distressed by sitting on bare joints, but rather that you might remain free from pain while sitting on the ground or a stone, He has placed upon you, as it were, C a natural cushion, the flesh of the buttocks. Yet you, in the same way, are ungrateful. For you do not perceive these gifts, but you are mad and rage against the wisdom that provides for you so kindly. A dog recognizes its feeder, stays beside him when present, longs for him when absent, and shows its joy when he returns by lowering its ears, wagging its tail, signaling its submission, acknowledging its servitude, and demonstrating the favor it has received—and this while being a slave to irrationality, deprived of all reason, yet learning the difference between a stranger and an acquaintance, between a friend and a plotter, through time, habit, and frequent favors. But you, who share in reason and have received the mind as your leader—that winged one, faster even than all D things seen. For the sun traverses the circuit of the inhabited world in a single day, but the mind, the moment it wishes, travels around the inhabited world, attains the heavens in its imagination, goes beyond them, contemplates God as much as it is able, and sees the infinite myriads of angels and faster than the archangels—all things that are seen and all things that are winged.
And because it explores even the things beneath the earth, it strives to exceed these, but it cannot; for it has its limit of imagination, which is the knowledge of the things which it has learned to exist. Having such a guide, and pilot, and charioteer, you do not perceive the divine benefits, nor do you consider the multitude of these favors, but you persist in the vice of ingratitude. And though so many teachers are present to you, you do not wish to learn the elements of Providence. Beware, therefore, lest He abandon you altogether neglected, and you learn by experience how great the difference is between the protection and care of Providence and its deprivation. Come therefore, my friend, and let us lead you to another A part of the body.
Consider the spine, which begins from the sacrum—as they call the bone that lies near the buttocks—and extends all the way to the neck, composed like a strong, watertight column of many vertebrae, supporting the belly, the shoulders, the hands, the neck, and the head. For because the Creator added no bony strength to the outer part of the belly, so that it might easily expand when food is taken in, and swell with sufficient size to receive sustenance, He willed that it should be supported on the posterior part of the body by the fulcrum of the spine. God constructed this spine from many bones so that when a man wishes to bend himself, he may be bent more easily, and the bending may not break it. The spinal marrow, which has its source in the brain, nourishes it. What need is there for me to speak of the hands, whose utility all the arts proclaim? But we shall make mention of them in a later B discourse; hence, let us reserve the explanation of their use for that place. Ascend then to the neck and consider its formation. And here you will recall the water-towers, which are perforated from the bottom upwards with many holes, yet receive one central one that is largest and widest, through which the water-conduits draw in a great quantity of water, and then distribute and emit it through other diverse pipes, sending one part to the southern part of the city, another toward the east, another to the west, and another to the north. The neck provides this same service to the human body. For art, as I said before, is accustomed to imitate nature, and fashions its own inventions in the likeness of nature's works. The neck, indeed, extends to the orifice of the stomach and transmits food and drink to the belly. It also has the C trachea, rising from the lungs to the larynx; it has also the veins and the smooth arteries through which the brain receives blood and spirit, and being nurtured and increased, it sends the spinal marrow through the connected bones to the spine; from which is nourished all the
nature of the bones, and at the same time the strongest nerves arise, both thick and thin, broad and round, by whose bonds the joints are secured and the muscles receive the power of movement. A Since we have come to the head, behold it as a certain acropolis of this city of the body, sitting on high, and guarding, as it were, a certain wealth and treasure, the brain, in a most secure fortress. For the skull is like a rampart and a helmet; for the helmet is named after this, being fashioned in its likeness; surrounding the brain, it wards off as much as possible any injury coming from without. And in order that the brain, which is very soft and altogether porous, might not receive any harm by being bruised by the bones, which are hard and resistant, the Creator placed around it two tunics, which the pupils of the physicians call meninges. B But the finest one, called the choroid, He caused to grow together with it, and made it to touch it closely, such that it is able to hold it together, even though it has no power to strike, due to its extreme thinness; the other one, however, He made dense and strong, and assigned it the middle space between the brain and the skull, so that it might neither injure the brain by having a harder substance, nor be injured by the bones, having a nature softer than them. The brain, therefore, as I said, is stored in the head as if in an acropolis, like a treasure. C Since, however, the ruler of the fortress, the mind, needed also scouts to foresee both hostile and friendly things, the Creator gave these also, and did not entrust this lookout to one, but set up two guards, and ordained for the one to watch and look out for things on the right, and for the other to do the same for things on the left. And since these also needed guards, and battlements, and bulwarks, and trenches, the Creator of this city was not negligent of these either; but He placed upon the eyes, to which He entrusted the faculty of vision, as it were battlements and bulwarks, the projections of the eyebrows, under which, being hidden, they can safely look out at things from afar. D And upon these battlements, as a sort of roof against things sent down from above, He caused to grow certain fine hairs, leaning towards the outside of the face, which receive the sweat flowing down from the forehead, passing it along to each other, and distilling it through the temples, and freeing the eyes from this harm. Since the guards also needed armor, He clothed them with the tunics of the eyelids, and as if they were spears and javelins, He arranged the eyelashes, not leaning in the same way as the eyebrows, lest they become enemies instead of defenders; nor stretched out in a straight line, lest they rub against each other in the closing of the eyelids, but leaning a little towards the outside, so that they might push away the harm of even the finest particles. For when a wind blows more strongly, and dust, not only fine but also thicker
is stirred up, as are straws and other similar things; nay, even gnats and suchlike small living creatures fly into the eyes—but when they perceive the eyelashes fixed there like stakes and pales, they flee back. A Similarly, the supreme Creator of all things has armed the ears of corn. For, by placing awns upon the capsules of the grain, He does not permit the seed-gathering birds to do excessive harm to the fruit; but, as if with some spear-points, He frightens them away and makes them flee.
But you might perhaps say, o most ungrateful man: "What, then, has He granted me more than the ears of corn?" But, o most stupid man, even the ears of corn He fashioned for your own use. Why then are you ungrateful, if those things which are yours He has armed with His own weapons for your sake? You, most ungrateful of men, commit the seeds of the crops to the earth, but He Himself waters, warms, nourishes, guards, and preserves them, and offers them to you ripe. And you, when the harvest is finished and you have brought the crops into the threshing-floor, and with skill have separated them from the chaff, and crushed them with the mill, and winnowed them of the bran, and kneaded them with your hands, and consigned them to the oven or furnace, you enjoy the baked bread, yet you are ignorant of the Giver of these things. B But let us return to the eye. Contemplate, therefore, its nature: see how many tunics it is protected by; see how great is its exterior beauty. See, moreover, the thinness of the pupil, the iris poured around it, which we are accustomed to call the crown; see also the horny circle, the uvea tunic, and the crystalline sphere which lies beneath this and looks out through its middle; furthermore, the vitreous humor which is diffused around it, and indeed the other tunic, which derives its name from the shape of a fishing net. Inspect also its glandular seat, upon which it wholly reposes, and the nourishment which is provided to it from the brain C through a very thin vessel, and the discharge of superfluous humor through the corners of the eye. See, besides, into how many species of color the blood is changed. For this was first food, which, crushed by the force of the teeth, was transmitted to the stomach. That organ changed it to its own proper hue and rendered it white; the liver, receiving this, again changes it into its own proper color. After the nature of the blood has been perfected in this way, a part of it ascends into the brain and becomes white again; it is condensed into bones, and is transformed into nerves—dense, indeed, and firm, but flexible and pliable. But perhaps I shall do the same as those who try to count the sands, if I wish to set forth all the providence of God that appears in our bodies. D Do you, therefore, privately run through all the remaining senses—taste, smell, and hearing—with the contemplation of your mind. So that, for instance, the sense of smell might perceive odors, and indeed admit the sweet ones but repel the fetid—and it is entrusted with the excretions of the wastes from the head. For since it receives all the vapors sent up from below, as if from a superincumbent source...
of the body, the flooding of these [fluids] would have caused great damage to the most sovereign part, namely the brain. But the Creator of all things did not neglect even this; rather, having fashioned within them certain passages—making them spongy and porous—He directed the moist and thick excrements toward the palate and the nostrils, and assigned two A members for these excretions, so that what is harmful might be swiftly carried away. And the vaporous and soot-like excrement He caused to be dispersed and forced out from above through the sutures of the skull. B Observe also the operation of the sense of hearing; see how, though it receives myriads of voices, it is not sated nor filled, nor does it receive all in the same way, but it knows the difference between a sharp and a heavy voice; it delights in harmonious sound and turns away from discord. Through this we hear the divine oracles, and through this nature teaches all human instruction: grammar, rhetoric, sophistry, arithmetic, medicine, mechanics, and whatever other thing human nature has discovered. Subject this same hearing to our words; receive it as a medicine that cleanses the soul, and free it from that wicked blasphemy. Set gates for it—reason—and add a gatekeeper—the fear of God—and become a judge of the discourses offered to you. Let the gatekeeper open the gates to the pious, but send away the blasphemous, the profane, and the God-hating; let him shut the gates and, as it were, place a C solid and unbreakable bar against them, the strength of faith. For thus it is possible to be delivered from enemies, and for those who listen to the friendly and beneficial discourses to keep their souls in health: not having itching ears, according to the divine Paul, nor subjecting them to discourses that, while pleasing, harm the rational faculty; but becoming upright and just judges of what is said, selecting those that bring profit, and, according to the prophet, keeping God before them always, both night and day, and while walking and sitting, and in all that they do or suffer. To Him be the glory, and the honor, and the adoration unto the ages. Amen.
ORATION IV.
A proof from human hands and the arts invented [by them].
I heard the prophetic voice singing and crying aloud: D "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament proclaimeth the work of His hands." But as for that voice, which the spirit, borne through the windpipe to the mouth, and speech, gracefully applying the tongue to the teeth, and the contraction of the lips, and the striking of the air, and the reverberation produce, no one amongst men ever on earth
has heard. A Yet while it appears and displays both its magnitude and its beauty, and provides to men the utility of a roof, it silently proclaims its Maker, and stirs the tongues of all to the singing of praises. And just as when we see a house built with great skill, and resting upon a firm foundation, and joined together with right-angled corners, and possessing a width and length and height that preserves the appropriate proportion to these, and illuminated by windows arranged properly and in order, and adorned with all those things that tend to brighten such houses, we immediately admire the architect, and paint his image in our minds while he is absent, and attribute the beauty of all the elegance seen in the building to his art; so too when we gaze at the sky, and at the useful and convenient motions of the heavenly bodies, we do not worship these things, but rather we extol their Maker with the hymns that are in our power, and by the magnitude and beauty of the creatures we contemplate the Creator in a manner that is fitting. B For we reason rightly and justly: If the magnitude and excellence of the works is so great, how great is the Maker of the works himself? And if such elegance is inherent in created things, how great must the beauty of that most wise artisan and Creator of all be? Thus, I say, "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims the work of his hands"; thus, "Day unto day pours forth speech, and night unto night declares knowledge," not indeed by any emission of voice or speaking of tongue, but by that mutual succession and vicissitude, through which they succeed one another, and through which they serve the utility of men: by which they cry out so loudly, in a manner, that the whole race of men hears their voice. "For there are no speeches," he says, "nor words, whose voices are not heard." For every nation and every tongue hears the proclamations of the day and of the night. C For while languages indeed differ from one another by some distinction, one nature, however, derives the same utility from them. Whence the same one who spoke these things, celebrating the Creator in another psalm, said: "Thy knowledge has become wonderful from me; it has been strengthened, I shall not be able to attain to it." For, he says, having turned to myself, and having come to be within myself, and having been freed from all external cares, I wished to contemplate the nature of myself, and to look more diligently upon that rational power of the soul, namely, the sciences of which it is capable, and the arts by which it has filled all of life, by the benefit of which it leads a life that is sweeter and more pleasant, and then that immense abundance of words which it both produces and at the same time receives, so that finally it stores up the same, and distinctly guards each thing, how easily it brings forth whatever it wishes from those things that have been stored up, D and how it directs the body, and commits the discernment of bulks and colors to the eyes; and to the tongue it entrusted the judgment of tastes, and appointed it as the minister of its own inner stirrings; and it manifested the nostrils as the judge of odors, and opened the ears to words brought from without.
and extended the sense of touch throughout the entire body; and as it grants to these [senses] the power of perception, it itself receives from them the feeling of either pain or joy. B Reflecting on these things, and all such matters as these—and seeing the concurrence of these opposites in the construction of a single animal, and the union and conjunction of the mortal and the immortal nature—I am overcome by the wonder; and since I cannot grasp the theory, I acknowledge my defeat, and proclaiming the victory of the Creator’s wisdom, and praising the Maker, I cry out: "Thy knowledge is become wonderful from me; it is strengthened, I shall not be able to attain to it" (Ps. cxxxviii. 6). And these words suit us in the present business, for we endeavor to inspect the wisdom that appears in the members of the human body, though we experience our own weakness in the very act.
Yet we have derived no small profit even from that dim contemplation; for we have beheld, even in the smallest particle of the body, the providence of God shining forth. For what is more worthless than hair? What in all the parts of the body is more devoid of every sense? Nevertheless, our argument shows the necessary use of these things as well. The eyebrows and the hairs of the eyelids bear witness to this; so do the hairs that adorn and at the same time cover the head. For the need for these is taught by those who have been shorn of them. For, first, they blush as though despoiled of their proper beauty; and then they devise other coverings to fulfill the need that those served. C And as it seems, for this reason the Creator allowed some heads to be stripped of these, so that we might learn how the Maker—having taken care even of these—formed the animal in this way. Thus, those who finally reach manhood, and cross the threshold of youth, He adorns with a beard, and with a portion of the cheeks alongside the chin. For at first, down blooms, and after that, moderate hair covers it, so that by this addition He might teach the difference between the ages, and persuade one through this appearance to refrain from childish trifles and to gird oneself for serious tasks. But since, for women, the pangs of childbirth are sufficient for such a lesson, He crowned only the cheeks of men in this way.
But if anyone, having learned only to contradict the truth, were to put forward the growth of hair in other parts of the body, let him learn that he is being ungrateful in vain regarding these as well. For nature has provided a natural covering for those parts for which we are eager to stitch up artificial ones. For this reason, for those whose rational faculty does not yet know how to distinguish virtue from vice, nature has not provided the covering of hair; but for those who have already begun to possess knowledge, and have learned the need for each of its members, He has adorned them very well and most beautifully with this garment—covering them as though they were blushing for things about which they had no need to blush; for our progenitor Adam, in paradise, had not this shame. For they were, he says,
A both naked, both Adam and his wife, and they did not blush. But after the transgression of the law, having come to an awareness of their offenses, and having heard the divine voice, they sewed fig leaves and made themselves loin-coverings. B Observe, therefore, O bitter accuser of both creation and providence, and in these members behold the Creator’s care. Regarding them, you blush even to hear, while the Creator, even as He fashions them, rejoices. For God saw, He says, all that He had made, and behold, it was very good; and, Let us make for him a helper like unto him. And the first blessing of God: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it. Since, however, the discourse has wandered C as if by some force to those members of the body which, by the testimony of the divine Paul, are considered more unseemly, observe again the ineffable philanthropy of the Creator. For the mouth, whose duty is to serve speech, to receive food, and to transmit it entrusted to the stomach, He placed near the eyes; but the passage for evacuations, which could offend the sight, and cause loathing of food and provoke nausea, He not only made far removed from these, but even rendered it completely hidden from view, by turning the rectum toward the back parts of the body, and opening the passage between the buttocks, and for their projection He even devised a natural covering. Reverence, therefore, the immeasurable nature of God’s philanthropy; shudder at His ineffable care, seeing Him creating things that you are ashamed to name, seeing Him providing for things the very mention of which makes you blush. For since that which is seen in a living creature is mortal, and, being mortal, has need of food, he necessarily supplied both a mouth and a passage for evacuations, and fashioned the many-coiled circles of the intestines, which receive the muddy part of the food, and do not discharge it by a straight path, lest the necessity for food should constantly annoy us, with evacuation always demanding replenishment.
And what need is there to recount all the miracles of nature? For it is time now to pass on to the hands, D the mention of which we omitted yesterday, promising to explain their use today. Behold them, therefore: they are not stretched out beyond what is needed, lest they should become a burdensome weight to the rest of the body, nor again are they contracted into a smaller length than is required, but they have received a measure matching the labors for the execution of which they were destined. For this reason...
A the Creator of all things also divided them in three ways, and inserted the first joint into the shoulders, and fitted the arm and forearm to the elbow, and by joining the remaining extremity of the forearm to the wrist, and appending the metacarpus to this, He caused the five fingers to spring forth from it. And each of these He composed of three phalanges; and having hollowed out the beginnings of some, and fashioned the others into a spherical shape, and inserted the spherical end into the hollow cavity, He bound them together with firm sinews, and, having granted to the muscles the power of voluntary movement, He clothed them with soft skin, lest hardness should obstruct their contraction. B And having fashioned the tips of the fingers to be hollow on the inside, He also took thought for their safety on the outside. For He placed upon them thin and broad nails, having rounded projections on the outside; and He made them thin so that they would not weigh down the soft flesh that is at the tips of the fingers, becoming an unnecessary burden; but broad, so that they might resist in arduous labors, supporting from the outside the softness of the flesh lying beneath; and He fashioned their projections to be rounded, contriving that they be less susceptible to injury by means of this shape. For in thin bodies, the angles of triangular and quadrangular shapes are fragile. To lions C and bears and leopards and other wild beasts, the Creator inserted sharp, thick, long, and very strong nails, and covered them with a natural panoply, since their lack of reason prevents them from partaking of the assistance afforded by art. But man, having created him rational, and having implanted in him a mind that is the inventor of myriad sciences and arts, He fashioned devoid of natural panoply; and He neither gave him bestial nails, nor covered his feet with hoofs or claws; for how else would he have climbed ladders? Or how would he have stood upon thin walls, weaving stones or bricks and constructing a house? Or how would he have stood on the tops of roofs if he had been using hoofs or claws? But as it is, the soft and elongated shape of the feet, and the flexibility D of the fingers, make for him a movement that is easy, and a stance that is secure. And using his bare feet, he walks with great ease even upon logs, and dares [to climb] thin ladders, and performs ten thousand things of this kind with great agility. But the use of hoofs or claws man procures from elsewhere. For having taken hides from the domestic cattle subjected to his rule, and using the tanning and shoemaking arts as his assistants, he mimics the position and bulk, the length and breadth of his feet, and thus covers them so that they might both ward off the danger that threatens him from hard bodies while walking, and blunt the sharpness of the cold. For this reason the Creator granted to man alone the limbs of the hands, as instruments befitting a rational being. For by means of these, people plow the earth, and cut furrows, and cast in seeds, and by using a spade or a pickaxe, they dig pits, and plant trees, and sharpening sickles, they now [prune] the vines towards
germination, and remove the superfluous part of the shoots: but now they harvest the crops, and pluck the rewards of their labors by the benefit of their hands, and tie up the sheaves, and carry them to the threshing floors, and separate the wheat from the chaff, and using their hands as if they were fellow-workers, they send the former [the chaff] to its own heaps, but store the latter in barns and granaries. At the same time, with these same hands, they perform the vintage, and gather olives, press wine, plant all kinds of herbs, and, contriving myriad species of fruits through the variety of their arts, both pluck them and offer them to those who wish to enjoy them. By the means of the hands, the human mind not only adorns the land with flowery meadows, luxuriant fields, and vast forests, but it has also finished the sea itself with many paths, and has rendered that which was impassable to all on foot such that it receives many travelers. B For when, by the divinely granted gift of wisdom, it had discovered the art of ship-building, having taken from the blacksmiths—whose art it had devised before this—an axe, a saw, an adze, and whatever other instruments of this art exist, and having borrowed from its elder sister, namely agriculture, the unfruitful trees, it cut them down with those carpenter’s tools; and having laid the keel as a kind of foundation, then weaving the planks upon this like walls, and fitting them most excellently with nails, and smearing them with the fattiness of pitch, and by this method walling off the influx of the waters, it manifested the hull as a sea-going vehicle. And since there was need of horses and mules for this carriage, yet the fluid substance of the waters did not bear them, the captain of the ship wisely consults for this also, using the ministry of the hands. For in place of a pole he erects a mast, to which he hangs the sails as if they were a yoke, and capturing the gusts of the winds, he uses them as if they were horses or mules, and attaches them to the yoke just like horses. Furthermore, since there was also need of reins for the ship, the rudders imitate these; and taking hold of the tillers, the governor, like some charioteer, sitting at the stern as if on the circumference of a chariot, easily moves the ship hither and thither. C And he knows not only how to guide the ship skillfully when favorable winds are blowing, but also how to dissolve the turbulent squalls of the winds, and as if they were untamed and unbridled horses, to restrain them with the bridle; and the human mind contrives these things, using the hands as servants. Through these means, the sailor rows, and the captain guides, and the merchant unloads the cargo he has bought, and every fisherman exercises his craft, and hunts the invisible prey with the ingenious weaving of nets. But come, let us descend from the sea to the land. For time does not suffice for the exact exposition of each art. D Look, therefore, how the arts [take] from one another
the art of building from the blacksmith the use of tools, and the blacksmith in turn from the art of building the house; and both of them receive food from agriculture. And agriculture, in its turn, receives from them both the construction of houses and what can cooperate toward agriculture. But rather, consider from the beginning how the Creator indicated to this animal the necessary needs. For whence did it know how to mine iron, and bronze, and lead, and tin? Who pointed out to it the veins of silver? Who taught it to dig the earth rich in gold, and indicated how to collect the small grains of gold? Whence did it learn the nature of glass? Who trained it in the discernment of sand? Who besides taught it what kind of sand must be entrusted to the fire, and how, and to what extent; and how the continuous is to be separated, and how the separable is to be transformed into an inseparable continuum? How did it know how to form from this, using fire and breath as assistants, myriad kinds of cups, vials, and goblets, and bombs, and small jars, and furniture, and other vessels suitable for every need of food and drink? It is evident, therefore, that it received the knowledge of all these things from Him who made it, and that the Creator implanted in nature the powers of intelligence and the discoveries of the arts.
Wherefore, also, conversing with the great Job, He said: "Who gave to women the wisdom of weaving, and the science of embroidery?" B For truly this beauty of art is also a gift of divine goodness. By the passage of time it has indeed become despised, and knowledge of the operation has stripped the inventors of their fame. But if anyone should wish to examine each detail precisely, he would greatly admire this art also. For the wool, when shorn and cleansed in waters, is first combed and divided into thin [strands]; then the teaseled wool becomes a fleece; next, the spinning [process] taking it, separates the pure [part], which has as it were straight fibers, C from the rest; and assembling what is left, it prepares the woof for the warp. Then the hands of women, taking these, spin thin threads, and stretching these first, like certain chords, in order upon the looms, they insert the woof, and with the shuttles distinguish the warps, and of the inserted threads, some they slacken, others they stretch; then, with the instruments fashioned for this purpose, as if pushing and packing the woof, they thus complete the fabric. Who would be able to admire fittingly the wisdom given to [this] animal? How, by one color of the underlying [materials], of wool or silken threads, are woven in the types of all kinds of animals, D and likenesses of men—some hunting, others praying—and images of trees, and myriad other things.
Revera igitur laudate Dominum, A all nations, who have been deemed worthy of such great wisdom, and who are nurtured in such great blessings. Who, I ask you, decreed that a sea-fish should provide dye for wool? Who again became the inventor of this art, which is accustomed to clothe the appearance of wool in infinite kinds of colors? Perhaps, suffering from the vice of ingratitude, you will say that there are also found worms which are accustomed to draw out threads finer than men can. But this, too, is a work of divine providence towards you. For that you might not be puffed up with pride over the wisdom of multifarious arts, nor exult too youthfully in the abundance of riches, the Artificer, in taking care of you, teaches through the worms B that these are by no means works of your own virtue, but gifts of that divine benevolence which He exercises toward us. But although He instructs you in this way, He at the same time consoles you, lest you grieve (more heavily than is fitting) while you see yourself surpassed by them: for He offers you their labors, and subjects the makers of these things to your commands. You alone out of the number of all animals have built cities with splendor, fortified them with towers and walls, constructed elegant forms of lodging-houses and upper chambers, and joined the sea itself to the continent with harbors.
Since, however, God, who created you mortal in this life, knew that you would also have to be exercised by diseases (for what is mortal is also subject to sicknesses), He at the same time taught you the medical art, and opposed the knowledge of it to the incursions of diseases. Hence you have learned to discern C the difference between diseases that are not apparent, and through the movement of the pulses to recognize the intensities and remissions of fevers, and to judge the time of onset, and when it is at its height or on the wane, and to foresee the signs of death; furthermore, to detect the species of the material that is causing the disturbance (or aberration), and to apply those things which are naturally fitted to overcome it: to dry up the moist, to quench the hot, to warm the cold with sudden heat, and to drain out the excess by emetics or expulsive drugs, or even by the incision of veins. Furthermore, what speech could worthily explain the abundance of either diseases or remedies? For many are the things contrary to the natural health of bodies, but at the same time very many and various are the drugs by which these things can be warded off. For art has indeed discovered many things D that are naturally fitted to oppose individual diseases. On this account the Creator ordered the earth to produce also many species of herbs, not only for eating, but also those that are useless for food: inasmuch as we humans have need not only of nourishment, but also of care for our health. And some of these we prepare for food, while others the herbivorous animals graze upon; others, again, the disciples of physicians gather, and out of them they compose drugs that ward off diseases, so that what brings destruction when eaten becomes an antidote by which the diseases of the body are driven away. Wherefore there is no reason that these things should move you to an accusation of Providence. For each of these calls the tongue of the grateful to praise. But
I seem to myself to be doing what those do who swim in the sea and, being overwhelmed from all sides by the waves, desire to reach the shore; as I, having dared to enter the vast sea of the wisdom which concerns the arts, and seeking to escape the onslaught of the arguments coming upon me from all sides as if they were waves, desire to run to the end and to reach that as if it were a marine coast. Leaving, therefore, all other things, let our discourse turn to the art of grammar, which is more rational than the rest and appropriate to the reasoning animal. B This [art], then, discovered elements, delimited them by a certain number, joined them to each other, and produced combinations of syllables; then, having linked together two or three syllables at the same time, it taught the reading of words; having composed and woven these together, it produced a single harmony of discourse. Hence, countless books were filled with the sayings of the ancients; some, however, contain the mysteries of religion, oracles, and heavenly things; others explain profane disciplines. Which, indeed, by the variety of meters, the elegance of words, and the fitting structure of their composition, veils mythic narratives; it both charms the ear and becomes a weapon for the pious against the students of impiety. Through this science, we converse with those who are absent, and we who dwell at a distance of many days' journey, and have many stations intervening to wall us off, we send to each other through our hands the fruits C of our intellects. And the tongue, the primary organ of discourse, is at rest, but the right hand serves the discourse, and, taking up the reed, inscribes upon the paper the conversation with a friend; and it becomes the vehicle of the discourse—no longer the tongue and mouth, but the hand, having practiced the art over time and having precisely learned the composition of elements. For this reason the Creator fashioned our hands in such a way, divided into five fingers, and set the thumb in opposition to the four. For it would not have been possible for one to execute work of every kind if the fingers were arranged in an equal row. But now, with the great [finger] placed opposite the others, we very easily hold both the stylus, and the spade, and the mattock, the saw, the adze, D the hammer, and the tongs, and all the tools that belong to art. Having considered, therefore, through this account, how much you have enjoyed the providence concerning your creation, how many arts and sciences the Creator has gifted you—not only for living, but also for living well—and with what great liberality He has treated your care, and how great a multitude of good things He has bestowed upon you gratis, so that He might make life more pleasant for you through the use of the arts, since He has provided for you not only necessary things, but also those that exceed common use, in a copious and abundant manner, cast away the ingratitude of the tongue, teach it to speak well, submit yourself to the Lord, and entreat Him. Learn to cry out with the Prophet: "Thy knowledge has been made wonderful from me,
it has been strengthened, I shall not be able to attain to it" (Ps. cxxxviii, 6). To Him be glory now and always, and unto the ages. Amen.
ORATION V. A demonstration of Providence from the authority committed to man over brute animals.
A How great is the care of the Creator and Artificer of all things for our nature, you already know clearly, O friends and companions, and you have no need of teaching through words. For since you constantly behold the sources of benefits flowing from Him, you offer praises to the Bestower of these according to your ability. But since one may find some who, seized by great stupidity, do not perceive these divine gifts, but while they luxuriate in the goods divinely granted, they nevertheless belch forth most ungrateful words against the Creator, it was entirely necessary that our discourse, traversing this whole world with a swift course and placing human nature in the midst, should clearly and openly demonstrate God's providence in every part of both the world and our own nature. At the same time, it has also declared the wisdom and use of some of the arts which have been discovered by the industry of the human mind. B Yet those which the desire for ambition and pleasure discovered—I mean painting, plastic art, sculpture, goldsmithing, the culinary art, and the countless inventions of pastries—it has intentionally passed over. In addition to these, it has also remained silent about those whose curiosity exceeds the limit—I mean astronomy, geometry, arithmetic, and music, whose function is to soothe and move the ear, to change the affections of the soul according to its own will, and to resolve the sorrowful into joy, but to render the dissolute more courageous and manly. These, I say, and those similar to them, the discourse has intentionally omitted, both to avoid the vice of excessive verbosity and to strive for brevity, and to allow the minds of the hearers a more exact contemplation of each individual art. For it is very easy, having seized the opportunity from what we have said, to arrive at the contemplation of those we have omitted.
C But there will perhaps be some among those who, while they know not how to celebrate God, have learned well how to slander Him, who will say that the Creator did not bestow the discovery of the arts upon the nature and genius of men alone. For, they say, one may see that smallest genus of winged creatures, the bees, for instance, which diligently follow the laws of a political and social life. On account of their weakness, they are armed with a sting; they fly out from their hives in turns and ranks, traversing the air, and they fly around groves and meadows and plains, and they alight upon flowers, leaves, and fruits, and they gather whatever is downy and useful to them, and storing it up...
ORATIO V
A load themselves, and place these burdens upon their necks and shoulders, and then, thus laden, return to their hives. Furthermore, they build their honeycombs, needing neither ruler nor compass, and they create angles equal to one another, superior to any mathematical science. But they also weave the textures of the walls and the interstices for the honey, being very fine and membranous, as if made of threads and certain thin membranes; and by confining the moist nature of the honey very well with these thin but frequent partitions, they are accustomed to fill their vessels in this way with the sweetest honey-liquors. And what, they say, has been invented by human nature—which is divided into students and teachers, and which, with much labor and time, has fully corrected its knowledge of an art—that equals what that industrious and beauty-loving species of bees has fashioned, which is not divided into teachers and students, nor has learned the art through straps and rods, but having a knowledge of constructing such difficult work that is innate and planted in it by nature, weaves honeycombs, and without needing measures, centers, or angles, fills its vessels? It fills its vessels, I say, while neither pressing clusters B nor harming any fruits, but by drawing only the thin part of the dew, it ingeniously produces the substance of honey. Come then, let us weave our defense from the very accusation itself; for it will be very easily solved by itself. For the bees offer that copious and ingenious labor, and the best and sweetest fruit of that labor, to the human race. And like servants, compelled by the law of rightful lordship, they go forth from their homes, collect what contributes to their work, strive to carry their burdens, build studiously, and as if for a treasure, place signs and seals upon their honey-liquors, and continually provide them to humans, as to their kings, like a tax and tribute. What then, O miserable one, do you slander, and while enjoying this tribute, do you abuse its collector, and while filling your own pleasure with the labors of others, do you attack their provider with ungrateful darts of speech? C And not only do you reap the fruits of their industry, but you also harvest another benefit from this. For first, you learn what great goods concord bestows upon men, and what sweet fruits it produces. For the swarms of bees imitate a political life. Nothing among them is private, but wealth is common and possession is undivided. They do not have lawsuits, nor courts; for they do not wrong one another, nor do they desire more, but are persistently disposed only toward their work; for which reason they also drive the drones out from the gates, as those who do not endure to work, but lazily devour the labor of others. They hate polyarchy and democracy; they have one leader, and to obey him is pleasing to them. And each of these things they do and experience alike, without listening to speeches, nor reading volumes of laws, nor visiting the schools of teachers; for no one among them is wiser than another, D nor does the elder know more than the younger; but all of them likewise go about each of the things mentioned, not by rational knowledge,
but because they have received from the Creator of all A that industrious and beauty-loving labor in the storehouses of nature. For you, the rational being, learn from the irrational: to loathe an idle life as harmful, to pursue the labors of virtue with a ready spirit, and to gather its treasure from every side; B to seek by no means a position of authority that does not belong to you, but to administer rightly and justly that which comes to you; to regard wealth as common, and to permit the enjoyment of it to those in need. For as for those who are endowed with true wisdom and preserve the character of their nature unimpaired, the innate reason suffices for training and instruction; but for those who have corrupted this and have chosen a beastly life, the rapacious and bloodthirsty one, the well-ordered society of the irrational animals stands as a true indictment.
For the sake of your benefit, the Fashioner of all things adorned the races of the irrational animals with certain natural prerogatives, that you might reap some profit even from them. And Solomon is witness to this, exhorting you and saying: “Go to the ant, O sluggard, and emulate her ways. C Or go to the bee, and learn how industrious she is, and how she makes her work honorable; whose labors both kings and private persons employ for the preservation of health.” The God of all also bears witness himself, saying through the prophet: “The turtledove and the cicada and the swallow, the birds of the field, have known the times of their coming; but my people have not known the judgments of the Lord.” And again through Isaiah: “The ox known its owner, and the ass the manger of its master; but Israel has not known me, and my people have not understood me.”
Consequently, the natural advantages of the irrational animals accuse those who have been honored with reason. For this reason the Prophet, grieving and lamenting the transition of men to an irrational condition, cried out: “Man, being in honor, did not understand; he was compared to the senseless beasts, and became like them.” D On account of this, the prophets call some men wolves, others lurking lions, others dogs barking at their own feeders, others heifers goaded by a gadfly, others serpents and the offspring of vipers, others asps that stop their ears and do not hear the charms. And just as they have imposed the names of wild beasts upon corrupt human characters, so too have they adorned simple and maliciousness-free souls with the names of praised animals. For it is possible to find a soul adorned with the simplicity of faith that is called by the name of a dove or a turtledove. By this designation, the bridegroom in the mystical Song of Songs calls the Church.
He is also accustomed to calling those who are obedient and lovers of the shepherd "sheep." "For my sheep," he says, "hear my voice, and I know my sheep, and I am known by my own." B And again: "I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." And elsewhere: "He will set the lambs on his right hand, but the kids on the left." In a similar manner, he also honored those who fly high, who have been freed from all earthly cares, who possess a pure eye of the soul, and who desire to touch the mystical body, with the name of eagles in the holy Gospels. For when discussing the saints who are to be snatched up into the heavens at the time of the resurrection, he eventually adds: "Wherever the corpse is, there the eagles will be gathered together."
It is evident, therefore, from what has been said, that for our sake the Creator has given and distributed to the bees, and to all other irrational creatures, certain natural advantages, so that we might gather benefit from every quarter. We immediately reap another gain from the bees. For we are taught not to be arrogant in our discovery of sciences and arts, nor to think highly of ourselves, nor to be ignorant of nature; but to know the Creator, and to refer the causes of good things to Him. But lest we be dejected C and discouraged in our minds because we have irrational creatures as partners in our craft, and are no different from them, God has handed over to us the entire fruit of that laborious honey-making: so that He might at once repress our stubborn necks by this partnership in craft, and, by the service of these associates, console us and drive away our sorrow. Why, therefore, do you grieve, O man, when you see the bees displaying their craft? For their labor is your fruit; and while they toil, you enjoy the luxury that comes from their toils. And the Creator has also instilled in the spider the art of spinning those fine and invisible threads, that He might teach you how one must hunt the various species of birds. For that creature weaves its nets, not having learned the art through reason, but having nature as its teacher. But you, possessing indwelling reason and beholding the example set before you, have devised a myriad kinds of nets. And that tiny little creature restrains your pride and arrogance, having provided you—without the use of language—the service of an example. You are also entertained by the variety of the nets; for there is one archetype, but a myriad of imitations. For you have fashioned for the birds certain misty and aerial nets, and by setting these D in shady places, by the resemblance of the nets to the air, you steal away the birds'
' A sense. And you take as a collaborator in your hunting the fear caused by pursuit: for the birds that are being hunted, driven and crowded together from here and there into the traps, and terrified by those who pursue them, are unable to see the nets clearly; and then, flying against the nets that are invisibly stretched, they fall into the snares. And these you hunt by hanging them in the air.
But again, other machines more solid than these have been devised by you for the capturing of these same animals: some you spread out upon the ground, while for a pit dug for this purpose you fill it with water, and you place tame birds on the nets, so that by their sight and voice they may attract their own kind. Then, when the others see the water and the bird is heard and seen calling, they fly toward it, and you, using your skill, pull them within the nets.
Another machine has again been invented by you for the hunting of quadrupeds. For by nooses, shackles, and foot-traps B deer are hunted, while by hunting-nets, wild boars, fallow deer, and hares are caught; and by pits and similar machines, the wildest of beasts. Nor has the nature of birds and cattle sufficed you for prey, but you have even dared to pursue sea animals, and by constructing weirs, creels, casting-nets, seines, and all such instruments, you hunt the swimming species, and by your skill you bring into the upper air those whom nature willed to spend their lives beneath the waters, and you hunt the nurslings of the waters; and though you yourself are terrestrial, you draw to yourself those whose home is the depth of the sea, and the myriad kinds of fish lie before you for your enjoyment, the fisherman’s art providing you with their use.
Do not, therefore, feel annoyed when you see the spider weaving its thin threads; for you gain from that C the lesson not to think highly of yourself, but to praise the common Creator of all. And you find comfort again in observing that while the spider hunts gnats and flies and other such tiny creatures, yet by your own industry the swiftest of birds is overcome, and that aquatic genus of swimmers yields to your machines, and land animals are made subject to your laws.
Do not, therefore, grieve because you are deprived of wings; for you have obtained the gift of wisdom, which is able to subject the winged nature to your-self. And you possess a mind faster than all birds, nay, even than the winds themselves: for wherever it turns, there it arrives in an instant; and though it is confined in the prison of the body and bound to the earth, yet it traverses the heaven and the beauties that are in heaven, and it ascends above the heaven, and envisions the things that are beyond it, and it wanders over the whole world, and meets with D myriad nations, and holds converse with friends who are far away. Why, then, does the lack of visible wings pain and weary you, when you possess such intellectual wings?
which so easily surpass those of birds? You lack a winged body, but by the power of wisdom you catch birds of the air. Using this as your ally, you bring the bull, armed with strength and horns, under the yoke, compel it to serve, and submit it to continuous labors, to plow the field, to pull the wagon, to transport burdens too heavy for other beasts of burden, and to carry materials to builders. And you, indeed, give the command, while the animal submits to the yoke and endures the collar, forgets the utility of its horns, trembles at your voice, and though it does not understand the difference in strength between you and itself, it consents to serve a creature far weaker than itself. So much better is reason than physical strength! B Reason commands the donkey, the mule, and the camel to carry burdens; and each of these, when commanded, crouches down to submit itself, and again, when ordered and relieved of the burden, it rises. Furthermore, when they are exhausted by long journeys, they endure what harms them, obey those who weigh them down, accept the fodder offered to them, and when afflicted by hunger, they do not cry out against their owners; for as nature is their teacher, they have learned what the limits or laws of servitude are. For this reason, the voice of their masters alone strikes terror into the strongest of animals. You, however, despise the Lord of all creation, and while you find an occasion for your own benefit and even for your salvation in the likeness of these brute animals, you do not deign to be subject to the Lord, nor to become a suppliant to Him, nor to bear the burdens of virtue properly (for the Lord has laid these upon you to be borne); C but you kick, you breathe defiance, and like a wild calf unbroken to the yoke, you flee it; you do not endure the bridle, but breaking it, you flee and rush headlong down precipices, dragging down your innate guide. But as many as have loved this noble servitude and have been wounded with this fervent and generous love for their Master, have derived the greatest benefit even from the brute animals themselves. Wherefore, in the Psalms, through the voice of one, they all cry out: "I became as a beast of burden before thee, and I am always with thee" (Ps. LXXII, 22, 23). For, he says, like a beast of burden led by another, I follow thee, not being over-curious as to the path along which thou leadest me, nor inquiring too closely as to whether it be short or long or laborious, nor do I unjustly complain of its narrowness, its steep ascent, or its precipices. For I have persuaded myself D that since Thou art good, Thou wilt also be the best guide for the way. For this reason, in all other matters I am searching and rational in my judgment of things, and I know how to discern what is necessary; nay more, I clearly know how to flee what harms me; yet when Thou art leading, I bid farewell to that rationalistic spirit, and I imitate the docility of the beast of burden; and though in other things I am rational, towards Thee I become as a beast of burden. For this reason I do not separate myself from Thy company, but am always with Thee; since I follow in Thy footsteps, and obey the bridle, and as Thou leadest, I am led.
whether Thou guidest me through smooth, or rough, or narrow, or broad ways. A For I trust in Thy wisdom, I believe in Thy goodness; for I know that what Thou Thyself willest is in truth honorable and good. So much do those who know how to profit draw from the irrational nature. Therefore, seeing that the races of irrational animals obey thee, do thou obey Him Who made them subservient to thee.
He Himself subjected the herds of horses to thee, and when thou hast found a spirited horse that does not yet know how to admit a rider, thou dost transform it by thy art, B thou freest it of its boldness, thou checkest its caperings, thou bendest down its neck that is stretched on high in a curved shape, and thou causest its face to look toward the ground. Furthermore, thou teachest it a measured gait and the harmonious movement of its hooves, and speed in running when there is need; and finally, thou makest the herd-mate tame, and persuadest it to endure thy voice and hand. It endures thee and thy scourges, though it is far superior to thee in both strength and speed. It bears thy threats and fears them, and by the very things it does, it confesses its servitude. This same creature hunts with thee when thou art hunting, provides assistance when thou art fighting, and rushes with impetus against thy adversaries. But when thou desirest to consult thy safety in flight, it too, immediately struck with fear, sets aside its bold spirit, turns, takes to flight, and by the immense swiftness of its running, frees thee from the hands of those who pursue. Furthermore, if it is ordered to rush against the front of a hostile line, it does not show itself disobedient, nor, if thou enjoinest flight upon it, does it gainsay thee, but recognizes the law of its rider as the sole limit of its safety.
Why, indeed, do I speak of the horse, the ass, and the camel? For now the elephant, C the largest of land animals, which is able to uproot the greatest trees with the strength of its trunk, even deigns to obey thee; it does not weigh how great its strength is, nor does it consider its powers in its mind, nor look at the bulk of its body, which in size imitates even hills, but it supports thy rule. And thou, indeed, sitting upon it, givest orders (for I call thee "Nature"), and it does what is commanded; and if it receives the wages of its performance from the onlookers, it offers them to thee, using its trunk as a pair of pincers. D This same creature also provides thee with assistance when thou art at war, and taking many archers upon its back, it enables them to shoot at the enemy as if from a tower; and attacking their phalanxes, it easily terrifies them, breaks through, and scatters the armed men. Do not, therefore, grieve that thou art endowed with a small body, but rather consider how great are the animals that deign to serve thee, and praise with a ready mind Him Who subjected these to thy rule, and through this very thing testify to thy gratitude to thy Creator. For, providing for the salvation of thy soul, He has not clothed thee in an exceedingly large body, so that, not becoming arrogant on both accounts, thou mightest fall into the devilish pride. For even if
while thy body is small, thou ragest and art furious against thy Creator, what wouldst thou not have done if thou hadst received this magnitude as well? B But now, thy shortness teaches thee to be wise and to recognize thy Maker; and the gift of reason consoles thee for the smallness of thy body. For by means of this, thou drivest and leadest the nature of irrational creatures—flocks of sheep, herds of goats, droves of swine, herds of horses, nomadic camels that carry burdens, and the mixed nature of birds and mules. Some of these are placed before thee for feasting, and render thy table sumptuous, and cater to thy every luxury, and provide the materials for all kinds of clothing; while others provide corn and carry wood, and fulfill the needs of other necessities. Among dogs, some hunt with thee, others graze together with the sheep, and others become guardians of the house; trusting in whose vigilance, the shepherds enjoy sleep. Having these as fellow-workers, a few are able to tend many sheep; for they endure to face danger not only for their masters, but also for the sheep, and fight on behalf of the shepherds, and contend eagerly with wolves, and even when wounded do not bear to flee ignobly, but by barking summon the shepherds to their aid. And the dog does these things, not having reason as his teacher, but endowed with a certain natural excellence. This creature, when ordered by the hunter to track prey, perceives the scents, and by following these as if they were tracks with precision, does not desist before he finds the quarry. And having found it, he grips it with his teeth and claws, but does not partake of the prey; rather, he keeps it unharmed for the one who sent him, and though enslaved to irrationality, he recognizes the lordship, and does not attempt to share the prey with its owner. But if he finds a larger beast, one surpassing his own strength, such as a wild boar or a bear or something of that kind, he cautiously avoids the strike of its tusks, yet fights courageously; and by constantly moving about its back, he attempts to hold the prey securely, and by his fierce struggle does not allow it to flee; for by his continuous assault he forces the beast to turn about constantly, makes it stay in one place, and wait for the hunter. Then the latter, coming up, and using the tools of his art as helpers, captures the prey very easily and readily. And let no one of those who are prone to contradictions bring forward here into our midst mad dogs, or kicking donkeys, C or biting camels, or goring bulls; for only a few out of many succumb to these afflictions, and that quite necessarily. For thou acknowledgest through this that it is not by chance that their nature is subject to thee, but by obeying the beckoning of the Creator. And those that rebel against thy authority bear witness to this—the camel that bites, and the bull that gores, and D
whatsoever else is like to these—these provide the most manifest testimony to this fact. For similarly, all those would have escaped thy dominion, had they not been restrained by the divine law. Whence their rebellion is to thee the author of right order; and their unruly leaps curb thy leaps, and being tyrannized by them, thou learnest not to play the tyrant, but to acknowledge the Master. A For all such things, in like manner, would have escaped thy dominion, had the divine law not restrained them. So that their disorder becomes for thee the harbinger of order, and their capers put a stop to thy own capers; and being tyrannized by them, thou learnest not to play the tyrant, but to recognize the Master.
For this cause the Creator fashioned also wild beasts and kinds of reptiles, that He might school thy youthful and bold spirit toward virtue, and through the terror of the beasts, force thee to feel the need of divine aid. B For the fear of them, hanging over thee and pricking and goading thee unceasingly, rouses thee to prayer and compels thee to summon the Helper to thy aid. And being ordered by necessity to seek aid, thou art eager to honor Him who is able to defend thee, and art forced to be constant at His side so that thou mayest escape the harm of those lying in wait. For thou lookest up, and seekest for a protector, longing for deliverance from the things that afflict thee. And this fear becomes for thee a guide toward God. C But that thou mightest not, being continually struck by this fear, live a life full of sorrow, He has removed these things to a greater distance from thee. For He hid the nature of venomous creatures in certain fissures, and ordered them to dwell in recesses under the earth, not allowing them to move boldly against men, but—commanding them to be ever hidden, and to appear but seldom, and when they appear, to flee from the sight of men, as if from their masters—He laid down a law that they should injure very few and only rarely, and this not when they themselves initiate the fight, but defending themselves when provoked. For never would the fear of them have affected us, if our nature had never experienced their power. D As for the kinds of four-footed beasts, the supreme Governor of all commanded them to inhabit thickets and crags and cavernous places entirely remote from the society of men; and for their feeding He assigned the night as their time. "For Thou hast set," He says, "darkness, and it became night; in it all the beasts of the forest shall prowl about. The lion's whelps roaring to snatch, and to seek their food from God. The sun arose, and they were gathered together, and in their dens they shall lie down. Man shall go forth to his work, and to his labor until evening." Then, having marveled at the divine dispensation, the Prophet cries out: "How magnified are thy works, O Lord! In wisdom hast thou made them all."
That, however, after the entry of sin, even these renounced the dominion of men, whereas previously they were subject and acknowledged their servitude, Adam, the progenitor of the human race, bears witness, as he gave names to all—
A that were placed under his charge, and neither fearing nor fleeing, nor receiving any injury from them. The second leader of men, too, the spark and tinder of the whole human race, the blessed Noah, bears witness, who became the shepherd, not only of tame animals, but also of the most savage ones in the ark, and for a whole year 15 pastured both these and those in one place, and compelled the flesh-eaters to feed on grass. The number of clean animals, kept safe and sound 14, also bears witness. The great Daniel likewise bears witness, who, being delivered to the lions, terrified them with the radiance of his virtue, and struck them with the character of the divine image; for when they saw in the image a likeness of the archetype most pure and 15 preserved, they acknowledged their servitude, laid aside their ferocity, and supposed they were seeing that Adam who, before the Fall, had imposed names upon them. B A similar thing befell the Apostle Paul. For when he was bringing a bundle of sticks to provide fuel for the fire, and was tempering the chill of the air with the aid of the fire, the viper that was concealed in the wood fled from the fire as from something destructive, but laid hold of the Apostle’s hand, as though intending to take vengeance for what it was about to suffer 17; yet when it found not the softness and yielding of sin, but the firm and unbreakable armor of virtue, it instantly recoiled like a javelin which, upon being hurled against a hard object, is accustomed to fly back against the one who threw it; and it went into the burning pyre, as if exacting upon itself the punishment for its rashness, because it had attacked with fury a C hand of the Master. The species of wild beasts, therefore, are like thongs, rods, and pedagogic disciplines. These are extremely contemptible to those who are already perfected and have passed beyond the age of childhood, but to those who are still infants in mind, they are exceedingly necessary and useful. And just as the law is not laid down for the righteous man, according to the divine Apostle, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers, and such like; so too the nature of wild beasts is set before men as a kind of discipline, terrifying and frightening those who are inclined toward sin, while by those who are nurtured in virtue, it is regarded as a mere trifle. Therefore, having discovered from this the providential care of God, and having learned of His manifold providence, cease, O friend, from your slanders, and repay the Benefactor with hymns. For how is it not absurd to praise the schoolmaster, who at the proper time scourges children, and with the rod drives out laziness, and with the strap fixes a firm memory of the letters, and to confess one's gratitude to a physician, not only when he provides food and drink to the afflicted, but also when he cuts, burns, fights against the disease, and checks its forward spread D; yet to blaspheme God, who with greater wisdom...
and provides for the salvation of souls with more abundant wisdom and more diligent care, and instructs us in the elements of virtue through the bestowal of good things and the fear of scourges, and tears the disease of wickedness up by the roots, and works for the soul’s true health? A “Refrain,” therefore, “your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking guile. Depart from evil, and do good.” Contemplate the care He has for you, and give praise to Him who provides for you by His providence, so that, having beheld your gratitude for the benefits bestowed upon you, He may now shower you with benefits and deem you worthy of the promised good things; which may we also attain in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.
ORATION VI.
That both wealth and poverty are useful to human life.
Often, indeed, I have already said with the Prophet to the wicked: “Do no iniquity;” and to those who sin: “Lift not up the horn, lift not up your horn on high, and speak not iniquity against God,” B while you say that the world which He created is devoid of all governance by Him. But the heavens, which declare the glory of God, as the Prophet testifies, are unable to persuade such ungrateful men, C nor the sun, which comes forth from his chamber like a bridegroom and penetrates to the ends of the earth with its brightness and heat; neither the moon, which shines with its changing phases and measures the periods of time; nor the rising and setting of the stars, which are guides for those who sail and stir the farmers to harvest and the sowing of seeds; nor the succession of the seasons, nor the changes of the solstices, nor the timely and alternate bringing forth of the clouds, nor the concord of earth and sea, nor the flow of rivers, nor the springs of waters, nor the most abundant produce of fruits, nor the variety and useful service of animals, nor the construction of this body adapted to reason, nor the immortality of the soul and the wisdom that governs the body, nor the variety of arts, both many and countless, which provide not only what is necessary, but also things outside of necessary use, D nor any other gifts, whatever the magnificent Giver bestows daily upon the human race. And yet, though they enjoy all these things, they rage and rant, and they slander this zealous care of God with the title of negligence, and by casting wealth and poverty in our faces, they complain of the inequality of life. Come then, taking as an aid to our discourse the One who wisely steers the ship of this world, let us meet their objections, dissolve the arguments arrayed against us, and demonstrate that the accusation they have woven is but a spider’s web.
Why, they say, do the most wicked of men abound in wealth and overflow on every side with infinite good things,
A and complete the navigation of this life with favorable winds, and receive the abundance of wealth as provisions for iniquity? For opulence becomes the material for the flame of greed; and malice, having found wealth as its assistant, kindles a great fire, and as power is added to the will, it makes evil unbearable. But those who care for virtue live in poverty, are miserably tossed by hardships, suffer from a scarcity even of necessities, are squalid, filthy, bowed towards the earth, are treated with insolence, are abused, and endure a myriad of painful things.
Therefore, let us first ask them what they say the definition of happiness is. And if they say wealth, we shall immediately refute their falsehood. For how could the provider of happiness be the collaborator in iniquity, as they themselves have said? For if, because of this, those who live in wickedness raise their eyebrows and puff out their cheeks, and being carried on horses and in chariots, strut through the marketplace, despising others as much as it is fitting for them to be despised themselves; if, in short, because of these things they act unjustly, defraud, claim what is not theirs, covet what does not belong to them, take away the property of their neighbor B and revel in the goods of others, and trade in the misfortunes of the poor—and do all these things using the power of wealth as a helper—how then is wealth the definition of happiness and the subject of renown?
But if they should say that virtue is the most beautiful and best of goods, and confess that its most ardent lover and diligent worker is established at the highest summit of all good things, why on earth do they look towards C wealth and call those who are rich enviable? For the abundance of riches and a wealth of virtuous deeds are diametrically opposed to one another. But let us examine this, conducting a common inquiry, taking the light of truth as our helper, as to what the species of virtue are, and how the possession of them might easily fall to anyone. Therefore, by the name of virtue, we define Prudence, Temperance, Fortitude, Justice, and the parts of philosophy that are born from these or are contained within them. Let us inquire, therefore, what each of these things signifies, what is their meaning, or interpretation, or power.
Prudence, indeed, is the wakefulness of the rational part within us, just as, naturally, derangement and folly are, in turn, its drunkenness, born from the passions, and becoming like a certain cloud, and thickening, and obstructing, and not allowing D it to perceive what is needful. Therefore, the health of the rational part is called Prudence. Moreover, we designate as Temperance the constitution of the reason that is free from the passions. For when this sense is sound and whole, the passions grow slack, languish, and are dissipated, and that which is swollen in them with heat is dissolved; and the mind of man, as a charioteer, is borne appropriately by its horses. Therefore, the good order of the passions, and the health of the charioteer, we call Temperance.
A We call Fortitude that just movement of the irascible faculty, just as, on the other hand, we name audacity that which is unjust and disorderly. But Justice we call the right governance of the soul, and the symmetry of the obedient passions. For the harmony of the concupiscible and irascible faculties toward the rational, and their well-tempered state toward one another, effects for us the acquisition of justice. Since, therefore, we have learned what the parts of virtue are, and what concept and power each possesses, come, let us again inquire how it is possible for anyone who wills to attain these rightly, whether by using wealth as an assistant, or by taking poverty as a helper in their acquisition.
B Now wealth, having many turmoils and anxieties and infinite species of fluctuations and storms, is a conspirator against, and an enemy of, virtue, not a helper. For how could one attain and maintain temperance if he is constantly serving his belly, and wasting away in drinking parties, and preparing banquets, and occupied with couches and tables, and carrying about in his mind bakers, cooks, pastry-makers, fragrant wines, bowls, cups, and various kinds of drinking vessels, and a variety of delicacies, drinking unmixed wine greedily, and burdening his belly more than nature can bear? Who, finally, extinguishes the spark of reason, but kindles the fire of the passions all the more with this fuel? C And it inflames the intemperate pursuit of pleasure to the highest degree, sharpens anger through those things which serve its fervor, and subjects the man’s guiding reason to the servitude of the passions, rendering the one who was established as mistress a servant of the belly; and it drags down that which received the man’s sovereignty from the Creator to the desires of slaves, hands over the prince as a captive to his subjects, offers the charioteer to be torn asunder by his horses, and causes the helmsman no longer to hold the tiller, nor to be able to steer the whole ship, but to surrender it to the storms of the passions, which snatch the ship headlong and permit it to be sunk by the waves? Whoever, therefore, is such a man, is not only destitute of prudence, but also addicted to every kind of intemperance. He is not only despoiled of fortitude, but has also been reduced to slavery by the hostile passions. D As for justice, what need is there to speak here, when even the adversaries themselves admit that he who desires to possess many things is unwilling to recognize the difference between the unjust and the just? For to such men all things are disorderly, infinite, and indistinguishable. That those, therefore, who use the aid of riches can only with difficulty attain virtue, it is permitted to learn even for the most contentious from the things just said. But that poverty is a helper of philosophy, and that one cannot otherwise attain the most perfect virtue, we shall presently learn.
For, first of all, the scarcity of necessities compels the passions to be subjected to the rational, and forces them neither to swell up, nor
A to rebel against the guiding mind, as usually happens to those who live in luxury and serve their bellies. Then the soul, once it is freed from superfluous burdens and delivered from external disturbances, and enjoys complete quiet and serenity, looks into itself, contemplates its own proper dignity, and recognizes the servitude of the passions that are subject to it. It then takes up the command, prescribes laws of order to its subjects, and punishes and represses the rebellion of both (that is, of anger and of desire) by turns. Now it rouses desire by means of the swelling affect of anger, and dissolves the vehemence of the latter with the softness of the former; now, changing the duty of punishment, it uses the affect of anger against desire, and with the lash of anger restrains the more vehement motion of concupiscence.
Furthermore, hardships also contribute to the rational soul for the moderation of the passions. For the necessity of need rouses one to the pursuit of labor, and the scarcity of things essential produces labors; the hardship of these labors, however, causes the passions to wither away, and by consuming their substance, it does not permit them to swell. Why, then, do you show yourself ungrateful when you see poverty joined to the just, and why do you slander the instrument of virtue, acting like a man who might praise thrones, and steps, and couches, and gateways, and all the elegance of a structure, but who berates the tools of the builder and carpenter, and casts reproaches at the axe, the drill, and the other things B by which each of those things is made?
That virtue can be attained more easily through poverty than through wealth, even the followers of impiety themselves bear witness. These also testify who were esteemed as sages among the Greeks, and who followed the law of nature alone. For through poverty all of them attained moral virtue, and this even though they had not heard the divine oracles, which openly cry out: "If any man does not renounce all that he possesses, he cannot be my disciple." Nevertheless, nature sufficed for them for instruction. For the divine Word does not bring forward new teachings, but calls to mind the laws of nature, and the letters of nature, which the length of time had corrupted through the negligence of men, the Creator of nature writes out again through His own heralds. If, therefore, even Socrates, and Diogenes, and Anaxarchus, and those similar to them, moved by the desire for moral virtue, rejected the wealth which they possessed, and used poverty as an assistant C for the most excellent attainment of virtue—and this while they were blind to the truth of the doctrine, and did not await the kingdom of heaven, nor possess the realization of that true and highest Good—why, my friend, do you accuse poverty, through which the course of virtue is made easy, and that rugged and steep way is rendered clear and smooth for those who travel by it? D
A We say this, not because we accuse wealth, nor that we seek to repel evil with evil (for if riches were said to be evil of themselves, the blasphemy would revert back to their Giver). Rather, we say that wealth and poverty are set before men by the Creator as a sort of material or tools, and that men, as if they were craftsmen, fashion through these either an image of virtue or carve out a statue of vice. Furthermore, through wealth, one can scarcely carve out a few small members of virtue with elegance, whereas, aided by poverty, many are able to construct them all at once. Let us not, therefore, disparage poverty, which is the parent of virtue, nor let us lacerate wealth with reproaches; rather, let us accuse those who use them wrongly. For iron also is given to men as a helper for builders, farmers, and shipwrights, and to assist in the other arts of human life. But those who rage against one another do not allow it to serve only for necessary needs, but even contrive the slaughter of one another by means of it. Yet we do not on this account blame the iron, but we detest the wickedness of those who abuse it. B Similarly, the use of wine was given to men for the gladness of the heart, not for the senselessness of the mind. But those who are eager for intemperance and are given to drunkenness make the generator of gladness the cause of senselessness. We, however, rendering a righteous judgment, call those who use the divine gift ill "wine-bibbers," "drunkards," and "wicked," but we admire wine itself as a gift bestowed by God. Let us, therefore, render the same judgment concerning wealth and its possessors: let us free wealth from all blame, but those who possess it—if they prove to be its just stewards—let us adorn with the highest praises. If, however, they have inverted the order of things and have become servants to wealth, by following its commands in all things and undertaking every evil service, let us bring against them a charge of wickedness: for, having been appointed masters, they have corrupted their lordship and exchanged a master's authority for servility. C But perhaps someone might say this—one of those who know nothing but how to cavil at good words: "Why did the Creator not bestow the possession of wealth upon all men, but instead heaped riches upon some, while assigning poverty to others by lot, and arranged this life with such unequal conditions?" I, in turn, would gladly ask that person: Why did the Creator of all things not bestow one and the same power upon all the members of our body? D Instead, He entrusted the judgment of colors and shapes to the eyes, but willed that the ears should know the differences of voices and sounds; the nostrils He instituted to receive vapors and to discern a sweet odor from a stench; the tongue to judge flavors by taste, and to detect the difference between sweet and sour, sharp and bitter, and oily; to the feet He granted the power of walking, but to the hands He assigned the many-sided work, and to the belly a receptacle for food,
A the liver, moreover, a purgatory for the same; the brain a treasury of marrow; and the heart He constituted the source of heat. To the arteries He enclosed the spirit, and the veins He manifested as channels for the blood, and to one member He implanted one operation, and to another, another. And yet all the things that have been mentioned, and those which have been passed over in silence, contribute to the perfect fabrication of a single body; yet each one is entrusted with some peculiar function, and they contribute to the common whole. For sight indeed guides the feet, and shows them the smooth path, and averts them from rougher places, yet it is itself carried by the feet. Hearing also, taking in sounds, stirs the sight to contemplation, and by means of the sight it learns the makers of the sounds. And that we may confirm the things said with Apostolic testimony: "The eye cannot say to the hand: I have no need of thee; nor again the head to the feet: I have no need of you; but much more those that seem to be the more feeble members of the body are necessary, and those that we think to be the less honorable, upon these we bestow more abundant honor." B And no one ever felt indignant, seeing a diverse operation in the members, unless he were utterly deranged; but rather he loves and admires the Creator, who so wisely distinguished each thing, and assigned to each its fitting need, and made that which was its own, common to the whole body. For neither does sight alone enjoy the sense of visible things, nor hearing alone delight in sounds, nor the mouth in tastes, nor the nose in odors, nor the feet in walking, nor the hands in work, nor the belly in food, nor the heart in heat, nor the brain in the affection of sense; but each has indeed a peculiar power, but contributes all utility in common. And this indeed warms the whole body, that nourishes the whole, while another brings some other tribute to the living creature; and the variety of operation is divided into all the parts of the body, but all enjoy one another, and the need becomes common. And neither does hearing feel indignant at not seeing, nor does the eye feel aggrieved at not hearing, but each zealously observes the limits of nature, and renders the tribute which from the beginning it was commanded to pay. C But you feel great indignation, because not all men are flooded with the waves of wealth, and inhabit splendid houses, and adorn the body with the splendor of tunics and cloaks, and ride on horses and mules, and have many to lead them and D followers, and a swarm of servants attending to their service, and gold-embroidered couches, and a soft and flowing bed, and the enchantments of cooks, and inventions of pleasures, and luxury brought from every side, and things that kindle pleasures. And how could anyone have acquired temperance, rousing as many enemies against it, and driving it out from all the parts of the soul and body? Or how could a man come to be in a state of prudence, with so many
burdens overwhelming his reason? But what is the point of speaking here of temperance, justice, fortitude, and prudence, when these people cannot even endure to hear their names? B And how, likewise, could all possess wealth at the same time, if they were of the same condition and lot? How, finally, if all were equal and all were similarly to abound in riches, could men supply the need of necessities? Or who, if he were provided with the same abundance as the rest, would want to serve another? Who, I ask, would sit by the hearth and prepare food; who would bake bread, or grind wheat in a mill, and sift the flour through a sieve, and knead [(50)], and cook [(51)], and endure the heat of a burning fire [(52)], if need did not compel him? Who indeed would have brought oxen to the plow beneath the yoke, and cut the earth with new furrows, and sown the seed [(53)], and, when it had sprouted and come to maturity, reaped it, transferred it to the threshing floor, and separated it from the chaff, if poverty did not impel him to sustain such labors? Who, moreover, would ever have sat by the stone quarries, and brought forth the material of stones for the building of edifices, and built houses well and elegantly fitted together, if need had not pricked him and moved him to work? Who would have pursued the nautical art? Who the maritime commerce, and the nautical diligence in labors? Who weaving and cobbling? Who pottery [(54)] and smithing? For if the possession of wealth were equal, it would in no way allow one man to serve another; but of two things, one would necessarily happen: either each man would have had to pursue every art with great zeal, or we would all together have perished from a scarcity of necessities. C That it is impossible for one man to master all the arts, there is no need of arguments, as experience itself is witness. For if anyone should attempt to learn even two things at the same time, he loses both, since one harms the other. For the mind, distracted into the pursuit of different parts and unable to grasp both simultaneously, derives a few fragments from each, but achieves an exact and perfect knowledge of not even one. It remained, therefore, that if all had been gifted with an equal abundance of wealth, that same thing must have become the cause of destruction; and the same thing would have happened to us that befalls those who lose the pleasure of eating through excessive surfeit. For those men weaken their appetites by the continuous eating of food; and these men, because of the love of wealth, desire to procure for themselves a scarcity of necessities, and prefer the death joined to riches over a life joined with poverty. But let us leave these people to their ravings; we, however, shall demonstrate here also God’s care for us, and show that what they call inequality is the cause of a most pleasant life, and the foundation of an excellent social order. For the Sovereign of all will be shown to have provided in the highest degree for the equality of these things.
A For in the first place, He gave the earth as a common foundation for all, a common dwelling, nurse, mother, and tomb; He gave one origin of creation for all men, dust—the common ancestor—and He stretched out the heaven as a common roof for all. He bestowed the sun, the moon, and the other luminaries as common, just like light-bearers; He poured out the air in the midst, setting this forth as a common treasure for all alike. For the rich do not inhale it more than the poor, but poverty there also receives an equal share, or rather, a greater one; for her foster children are more numerous, and their senses are stronger and freed from such superfluous burdens. Rivers and springs, in turn, gush forth waters common to all. He fashioned bodies B equal for these and those; or rather, even in this regard the poor have the advantage, for their bodies are stronger. For want is the mother of health, according to the wisest of physicians; and labors and exercises are the allies of health, according to this same teacher. And the souls of both these and those have the same nature; there is one origin of conception for these and those, the result of one creation of marriage, and an equal number of months for the pregnancy. For time does not revere the abundance of money, nor does it yield, out of respect for wealth, to send the infant forth before the appointed limits C or to keep it longer in the womb, but the fetus of both the rich and the poor emerge in a similar manner. Pains bring both of them into the light; in fact, if you trust in experience, the birth of the poor woman is far easier, and the pains are fewer. For the habit of labor produces ease. Wherefore physicians likewise impose the necessary labor upon more delicate women before the time of birth arrives. Thus they conceive in a similar way, but they do not give birth in a similar way; rather, where there is the consolation of wealth, the difficulty is greater, but where there is a lack of the necessities of life, nature assists with ease. Or rather, the Creator of nature, so tempering this unequal condition of life, applies the consolation of physicians and drugs to the difficulty of childbirth which arises from a more delicate way of life, while to that D which, due to poverty, is destitute of this aid, He provides the help of nature. Observe the scales of the just Judge, and move your tongue to praise. Observe also the newborn infants, who alike come forth naked; for the infant of the rich is not wrapped in purple, nor is that of the poor covered in rags, but both come forth naked, the Creator Himself proclaiming equality. In a similar way they draw in the air, in a similar way they pull at the breast; the infant of the poor is not fed with one milk, and the infant of the rich provided with another, but this one and that one enjoy one and the same nourishment. And we not only have one and the same entry into life, all of us, but also an equal exit. For death receives us all; for it does not fear the rich man, nor does it shrink from those who guard him, nor does it tremble at the purple robe.
A Indeed, it despises walls, and towers, and the palaces of kings, and penetrates even into the bedchambers; it does not pity the weeping, nor does it show mercy to the supplicant, nor is it corrupted by gifts; it does not heed the medical art, it shows the powers of drugs to be ineffectual, and often does not even permit one to give final instructions, or to record an heir to one's wealth, but it snatches, it drags, and it separates the soul from the body. Therefore, both those who pride themselves on riches and those who struggle with poverty have a common end to this life. And when they have departed from this life, they undergo the same pilgrimage from this world. For in a similar way, putrefaction follows, and ichor flows out, and worms are spawned, and that terrible countenance is extinguished and decays: then that insatiable mouth and the rabid tongue are given over to be gnawed by worms. Furthermore, the haughty neck is not only bent but dissolved; that swollen cheek is not only dissolved but passes into fine dust; the bloom of the cheeks languishes and vanishes altogether; and the fingers that wrote wickedness lie scattered in their whole structure. Therefore, all these things are common B to both the rich and the poor. It remains, then, to show that wealth itself and poverty, which you indeed consider to belong to certain specific individuals, are actually common to all, a fact which our discourse, with the favor of the Divine Will, will demonstrate. For those who live in poverty share equally in the resources of the rich. For the Creator of both the one and the other has adorned poverty with manifold crafts, on account of which the rich come to the doors of the poor, and in return for money, receive from them the necessities they require; and since, on account of their wealth, they are in need of more, they suffer from a scarcity of all necessary things. And from these they buy bread, and from those they buy side-dishes; some fashion shoes for the feet, others prepare tunics, togas, and cloaks; others weave carpets, headbands, and wrappers; and some build houses and thrones, while others provide countless kinds of vegetables and fruits; others bring forth wheat, barley, and the other riches of agriculture, C without which it is impossible to pass through life, even if one should possess the gold of Croesus or Midas. But for the poor man, even bread made of millet or bran suffices, and he is content with common food. Whom, therefore, if you wish to speak rightly and justly, will you call needy and poor, and lacking in necessities—the one who needs a few things, or the one who needs many? The one who holds in his hands the provisions for life, or the one who trusts in treacherous gold, which also D surpasses seals and signets, and, though he has fortified himself by closing doors and bolts, yet he falls victim to the hands of housebreakers? And no robber would gain the craft of the poor man, but the riches of the wealthy are taken away not only by a robber but also by a false accuser. And the poor man sits in the marketplace, cobbling, or refining gold, or silver, or clothing, or selling some other of the necessities. But he who, in his wealth, is haughty
who puffs himself up to the very crown of his head, carrying his hands about, A surrounded by a great crowd of retainers, comes to this man. And the latter, as is proper, sits, either sewing leather, or engraving silver, or performing some other work of the craft which he professes: but the former stands by, engaging in conversation with him, and by his presence indicating his need and his use for it. Why then are you indignant and why do you accuse poverty, seeing that wealth is in great need B of it, and that those who possess wealth cannot live without it? Marvel rather at Him who so wisely ordained these things: who grants money to some, and arts to others, and unites them into concord and friendship through need. For the one provides money, while the other offers the fruits of his craft. For poverty vies in honor and excels wealth with its gifts. For what the rich man possesses as useless, poverty, by means of art, transforms and shows to be necessary and suited for every need. And if one were to examine it precisely, poverty even gathers the very material of wealth: for it is poverty that mines C the gold and the silver, the bronze and the iron, through which wealth is established. For wealth is born by gathering from every craft, but the crafts are the property of poverty. And this formless material of wealth poverty takes, shapes, and forms, and out of its makes rings, ear-pendants, necklaces, furniture, circular ornaments, drinking cups, and all the other things that inflate the vanity of the rich. If, then, wealth itself is established through poverty, and poverty has wealth as an assistant in its crafts, why do you accuse a state of such equality of being unequal? Why do you call things that are most friendly to one another D opposites? Why do you slander the social order, through which life is more pleasant for both the poor and the rich? For by receiving necessary things from one another, they both satisfy their need.
But perhaps you might say: "Why is it that the majority of the wealthy live in injustice? Why are not all of them followers of righteousness?" But here again you divest man of free will, and you rob this most excellent animal of the honor which he received from his Creator. Besides, the workers of wickedness would have a very wide field for defense if the Judge had distributed wealth in this present life only to the righteous. For they would say exactly what their master spoke against Job: "Because you have hedged about the things inside and outside their house, and have multiplied grain and wine for them; but put forth your hand and touch all that they have, will they not curse you to your face?" (Job 1, 10, 11). These things, I say,
A they say, those who live in wickedness, if only those who are nourished in virtue received the gift of wealth. B Since, however, the Creator has set forth poverty and wealth in our midst, as it were certain raw materials, and some use these for the acquisition of virtue, while others use them as a pretext for vice, there remains no room for excuse or pardon for either rich or poor who spend their lives in wickedness. For those who manage wealth well and honorably, and who do not increase it through the miseries of others, and who take the needy as partners in their abundance, these are sufficient to accuse those who make unjust and greedy use of wealth; and those who have tempered poverty with philosophy, and have borne its attacks with endurance and nobility, will become true accusers of those who have learned malice in poverty.
Consider also the other dispensation of the Governor, so that you may sing His praises more fervently. For since He saw that the rich have much concern devoted to their health, He has allotted bodily soundness to poverty. The one is carried about, while the other walks, having no need of another’s feet. And the one desires the health of the poor man, while the other pities the infirmity of the rich. C It is possible to see even in times of illness: the one is cared for by a multitude, yet is bitterly pained, and unable to bear the onset of the disease. In the season of winter, he lies in warm houses, rolling about on a soft bed, wrapped in many warm garments, having hearths set around him to ward off the force of the cold, countless medicines fighting against the disease, hearing promises from doctors full of consolation, and enjoying the presence of friends who break or beguile the strength of the disease with pleasant conversations. But if the summer season arrives, other houses then receive him, more open, of course, which easily admit breaths of wind, and when these have ceased, servants diligently create a breeze with moving fans. Boughs are fixed round about, imitating a garden, and rendering the house like a grove. They contrive fountains of water in the upper stories, wishing to impose sleep upon his eyelids. Yet though such great care is provided from every side, he is nevertheless tormented, D throwing himself hither and thither, naked, and by the tossing of his hands indicating the hidden fever. The poor man, however, has a single little house, and that often rented. There are even those who, being unable to pay rent, use the marketplace as their house; for them the ground serves as a bed, and a mat provides the use of a softer quilt; and there stands by them neither doctor, nor cook serving the doctor's commands, nor manservant, nor maidservant, and perhaps not even a wife. But God’s providence becomes everything to him, blunting the stings of his passions, dimming the pains, and extinguishing with the medicine
apart from the flame of the fire, while warding off the injury—that from cold, that from heat, that from the underlying moisture. No one teaches him which of the foods nourishes the disease, or which contends for his health, but he eats whatever chance offers without definition or discernment; and what is harmful becomes beneficial, and cold water consumed appears as a medicine, and dry bread extinguishes the heat and flame of the disease. He requires neither the softening agents from above A nor the purgatives injected from below. For nature replenishes the deficiency and itself offers the assistance of physicians to the sufferer. And one may see him who is cast upon the ground bearing the disease more easily than those who are nurtured with all the care we mentioned before. Seeing, therefore, the providence of God in each of the things that occur, do not be overly curious about each of the events. But if you wish to do even this, take piety as a companion to your curiosity. Let this lead your path, let this guide you toward the investigation of the things being sought. Obeying this, take every opportunity for the hymn-singing of the Creator; imitate those three children who, having been delivered into the furnace, B even called upon the inanimate creation into the communion of their doxology, and drew the tyrant who had cruelly delivered them to the furnace into a contemplation of the miracle, and compelled him by the miracle to worship the God against whom he had warred. Those ones, truly, neither furnace nor fire compelled to move their tongues to blasphemy, but even when delivered to such a flame, they were honoring the benefactor with hymns. But as for you, neither furnace nor lions compel you to blaspheme; rather, while you are accustomed to revel in the God-given good things, you do not perceive the gifts. But if you would obey C me, you will adorn your tongue with piety, and you will praise creation, but you will hymn the Creator, and you will worship His providence that is everywhere present, for to Him be glory and power, now and always, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
ORATIO VII. That servitude and masterly power are useful for life.
The Creator of all has no need of a human tongue for the provision of hymns; for He does not receive even the doxology offered to Him by the angels as one in need of it, but, seeing their goodwill, He approves their gratitude; and when those who offered the legal sacrifices used to offer them, they D did not offer them as if providing for a need, but on behalf of the myriad benefits which
they received, endeavoring to repay the grace that was within their power.
A Straightway, therefore, one may see that they did not all offer one and the same sacrifice. For one sacrificed a calf, another a lamb, and another a kid; and one offered more victims, another fewer; and he who lacked these, and lived in poverty, offered a pair of turtledoves or young pigeons; and he who was in want even of these, a little fine flour and a small amount of incense. From this, then, we are surely taught to attend to the quality of the mind, not the quantity of the gifts, in the righteous Judge. And we, too, offer these humble discourses, not indeed so that we might increase the abyss of wisdom with the smallest drop, but endeavoring to demonstrate the goodwill appropriate to servants, to refute the boldness of our fellow-servants, and to subject them to the yoke of the Master. For a great and bitter grief torments us when we see the wisdom of God, which governs all things, slandered by them; for the sake of which we have taken up this present labor of speaking, and we attempt to check their blasphemous words with arguments. That they blame the perceived inequality of life very foolishly, and in their derangement do not discern what is necessary, the preceding discourse has sufficiently taught, having both demonstrated the useful purpose of poverty and refuted the dearth of riches.
Since, however, they not only accuse poverty, but also lament slavery, and bewail the royal tax exactions, along with countless other things that are in the first instance C appropriate to this life: come, let us run through these things also in a few words, and let us imitate the most excellent of physicians, who, when they see that patients abstain from food and loathe all the edibles offered to them, cleverly beguile their moroseness with certain medical arts. For they mix the more arid and bitter things with sweeter flavorings, and make that which seemed loathsome to the patient most pleasant. And these men, likewise, like the others, find fault with all things that are seen and come to pass. But while for those others the sickness occurs contrary to their will, and, tormented by sharp pains, they abstain from food, and though they desire to partake, they are prevented by the sickness; these men, however, are attacked by voluntary perturbations of the soul, and they labor from loathing, not for food or delicacies, but for all those things which are both wisely and justly dispensed by divine providence. D And while they are sowing, they desire rains; but when they are traveling, they accuse the same. Furthermore, so that the fruit of the seeds may be ripened to maturity, they have need of a warmer heat from the sun’s rays; yet they bear the same with annoyance, and revile the heat. They undertake every labor for the sake of the belly—namely, the cultivation of fields, voyages, and long journeys—and yet, in turn, they become bitter complainers against it; as if they were not intended to serve the impulses of the soul, but were meant to rule. They complain of thunderbolts, and hail, and such-like chastenings,
but on the other hand, they find fault with the long-suffering of God, and are touched by reverence for neither His justice nor His long-suffering. Yet they themselves, even if they commit the greatest of crimes, still pray that they might enjoy God's long-suffering; but against those by whom they themselves have been offended, they desire that the absolute rigor of justice be exercised. They see a poor man, and immediately move their tongue against Providence, and overwhelm poverty with a great many reproaches. And when, on the contrary, they perceive a rich man walking on tiptoe, looking with a lion’s gaze, swinging his shoulders hither and thither, or being carried on vehicles and surrounded by a multitude of servants and guards, they immediately pour out their blasphemy against wealth. They bear life most miserably, as if it were full of inequality; but they pursue with hatred death, which removes inequality and brings about an equal condition for all bodies. And yet it would behoove those who revile death to love life, or those who complain of life to praise death. For death and life are diametrically opposed to one another. But these people senselessly tear everything to pieces with insults all at once, and revile all things indiscriminately. When they are children, they judge men happy; but having reached a manly age, they call children blessed. But why is there a need to enumerate all the calumnies which this wicked disease begets? For there is nothing in the number of all things that happen that does not receive some shaft of reproach sent from their tongue. B Come, then, using medical methods, let us demonstrate to them those things which have hitherto offended them as being most pleasant. Concerning wealth and poverty, and the inequality that seems to be in these, we have sufficiently discoursed in the preceding discourse, demonstrating the useful purpose of both this and that. But that the Maker himself did not from the beginning distinguish nature into servitude and mastery, we shall demonstrate immediately. C Come, then, to this first creation of ours, and see that while one man was fashioned from the earth, the woman who is like him was not fashioned from the earth in the same way. For the Creator, taking one rib from him, D fashioned this sex in such a way so that it might not seem to be of another nature on account of the difference in form. Therefore, one was fashioned from the earth, and from the man the woman, and from both of them the entire nature of human beings. For the Creator did not from the beginning assign to some servitude and to others mastery, but He created one race of us all. Furthermore, when He had ordered Noah to prepare an ark, and had provided for him salvation as a reward for his righteousness, He commanded him and his spouse, together with his sons and their wives, to enter the constructed ark, and not a single slave entered. For human nature had not yet accepted that division; but
it only received those which are truly servile, namely, the kinds of brute animals, which for this very reason the universal Creator of all things brought into this life. A But when, in the events that followed, He saw much disorder occurring from anarchy and every lawlessness being perpetrated without fear, He divided the human race into rulers and ruled, so that the fear of rulers might diminish the multitude of sins. For fear is accustomed to bridle the impulses of the irrational passions and to blunt the soul’s inclination toward the worse; and often what reason could not accomplish, fear performed admirably. For since nature slipped toward the worse, and the mind, overwhelmed by the passions and having become submerged like a vessel without ballast, left the body to be carried along in disorder, we necessarily had need of laws, like an anchor, to steady the ship and halt its headlong rush, and to allow the pilot to emerge once more and seize the helm. B Yet it was not possible for these laws to be established if there was an isocracy and equality prevailing in the administration. For not even in those cities governed by democracy, where the people held authority over what was to be done, did all men share in equal conditions; but some were *thesmothetae*, some legislators, some generals, and others filled the rank of the subjects; and the demagogue ruled both over the magistrates and the leaders. And even in cities governed by an oligarchy, while the majority belonged to the catalog of subjects, the few—those who excelled in prudence and were distinguished by their virtues—held the administration of public affairs and the power. And these were ephors, others were navarchs, others in turn governors, and they steered the populace as seemed most useful to them. C Therefore, sin introduced the need for laws, but the laws required the authority of those who established them—and not only those who established them, but also those who had the power to punish transgressors. And while sin brought in confusion and disorder, the Governor of all things imposed order upon this disorder and, with laws like a bridle, restrained the unchecked course of sin; and the reins of this bridle He entrusted to the magistrates, as to charioteers. By them, D both cities, and villages, and armies are rightly governed. For who could endure the hands of the unjust, if the fear of the laws did not hold back the forward rush of their greed-driven flame? For the greater would have devoured the lesser after the manner of fish, had not the law displayed the sharpened sword, the burning pyre, and all the other things devised by magistrates for the punishment of those living in wickedness. For if, even when the laws threaten and the magistrates punish, there are some more savage than any beast in their disposition toward their neighbors, and they dart about like scorpions, and bite like snakes, and rage like dogs, and roar against those of their own kind as lions do against those of a different kind—what would they not have done had laws
not existed, and no magistrate exacted penalties? Now, however, although some dare to act iniquitously, they still study to remain hidden, because they fear the laws and attempt to veil their injustice with the power of words. And he who has suffered injury approaches the judges fearlessly, and institutes an action for the injury, and fears neither the power of the man who did him wrong, nor does he dread the splendor of his wealth. But he hastens into the forum, as if into a harbor, enumerates the forms of the injury, and beseeches that the laws be brought into the midst, and prays the judge to deliver a verdict according to them. He then brings forth his judgment, and commands that the plundered house, or field, or chattel be returned to him who suffered the injury; often he also exacts a monetary penalty from him who has dared to commit the injustice. B Because of this fear, both wall-breakers and thieves pursue their injustice not openly but secretly, and by the very fact that they attempt to lie hidden, they proclaim their fear; for otherwise, having seized daggers, they would have slaughtered all they encountered and divided their possessions among themselves. But since they are afraid, while many abstain entirely, those who do dare to commit wickedness either lie in wait in the more desolate roads, or perpetrate their iniquity by night in the cities, aided by the darkness, sleep, and the quiet of all, to which everyone indulges. But if two or three of their number are caught and punished according to the laws, they become a sufficiently useful example to the rest; for when they see the punishments of their associates, they pursue with hatred [that same] wickedness, as the mother of such punishments. But I know not how I have digressed into these words, since I intended to set forth the cause of servitude; wherefore, the time requires that I return whence I digressed.
On the Providence of God.
C That, therefore, from the beginning the Creator of all things made one nature for all men, and from one man and one woman filled the whole inhabited world with this race, the divine Scripture testifies; but nature also testifies to the divine Scripture. For whoever have received the parts toward the rising and setting sun, and the southern and northern regions, and whoever inhabit the middle of this [earth], possess the same form of formation and the same number of sensory organs, differing only in characters and colors. D Yet character is produced by customs and the self-determination of the soul. And it is even possible to find this difference among ourselves. The difference of colors, however, is brought about by the position of regions. For those who dwell farther from the solar ray have a whiter surface of the body. But those who have been allotted to dwell in the eastern and western sections, according to the southern part of the pole, being nearer to the ray, contract a blackness of the body, just as wood
A that has been treated with the application of more fire becomes charred and clothed in a black color. Therefore, there is one nature for all mankind, both for rulers and the ruled, for subjects and kings, and for slaves and masters. Yet, this nature, being one, proclaims the justice of the Creator; but having been divided by time into slavery and lordship, and having kept the same character in both the one and the other, it accuses sin, which introduced this necessity, while at the same time it demonstrates in this matter the equity of the Maker. For He maintained the identity of the essence until the end, and by the order of government He drove out the disorder of sin B and regulated its greed by the rule of legislation, just as a shipbuilder straightens planks with a cord and removes what is superfluous. Do not, therefore, accuse the Creator when you see slavery, but flee from sin and the blasphemy on account of which the human race was divided into the condition of slave and master. But as for you, when you see a ship carried by favorable winds, and the passengers sitting safely and quietly, while the sailors either row with oars, or pull the ropes, or perform some other task they are commanded to do, while the lookout watches for cliffs and reefs and shoals and signals them to the pilot, and the pilot stands over all and steers the C ship with the rudder, you admire this order, and you do not order there to be many pilots, nor do you entrust the command of the ship to everyone. And as you see some sitting quietly, others performing the commands, one predicting what is coming, and another presiding over all together, you are not indignant, nor do you blame it as disorder, but rather you continue to admire the order. Yet you do not want houses to be governed similarly to ships, but you are resentful when you see one person steering the whole house and all the others being ruled by him. And yet, regarding administration, there is a very great similarity between a ship and a house. For the master, like some pilot, having taken hold of the tiller of the house, presides D over all things. And the one who is first among the household servants, to whom the care of all the others has been entrusted, imitating the lookout, teaches the master what he thinks is beneficial for him. As for the rest of the domestic staff, some perform the commands, having responsibilities distributed among them, just like sailors; the rest, like passengers, are in the midst of them, being directed by them and obtaining through them the things that are necessary. Why then do you praise a ship that is governed in this way, but continue to mock a house that has the same method of administration? I certainly think you also approve of the organization of an army, whose leader is a supreme commander; the captains oversee the companies, the lieutenants bring the ranks into order, while the centurions and chiliarchs transmit the signals from the general to these, and sometimes they station the army in a phalanx, and at other times in a square,
A and at other times they arrange the army in the shape of a horn. It also happens that when they have extended each horn as widely as possible, they surround the enemy, not allowing them even to flee, but shooting their arrows from all sides alike, and destroying everyone completely. Now, none of this would have happened if the army were not divided into those who command and those who are commanded; for in an army, a multiplicity of leaders is the most harmful thing of all, cutting it up into many pieces, tearing apart its concord, and attempting to guide it with many counsels, but harming it more than governing it. How, then, is it not absurd that you, who admire the oversight of the one in a ship and praise the order of an army which the laws of the generals create, should blame a household that is governed in the same way?
“But it is bitter,” one says, B “to be a slave, and to receive one’s daily ration or satisfy one’s needs at the whim of masters, and to be worn out by constant labors.” But if you were willing to examine each of the things said with a love of truth, bidding farewell to those contentious arguments, you will find some to be full of sadness, but others full of great benefit. For the master of the house is besieged by many cares, considering how he may provide necessities for his household, how he may pay the taxes prescribed by the kings, how he may sell the surplus of his revenues, and how he may buy what is lacking. The earth becomes thankless toward the farmers, in this way imitating the ingratitude of men toward the Creator; and the master is distressed, and looks about for creditors, and writes out loan agreements, C and drags upon himself a voluntary servitude. The earth has brought forth its fruits, and is heavy with its yield, and is covered with crops, and because it is burdened with the mass of produce, it compels the branches of the trees to bend down toward it; but he, on the other hand, is pricked by different goads: for, looking for buyers for his produce, he finds none, and the abundance of the harvest becomes for him a little more unbearable. And it is not only during the day that cares beset them and surround and disturb their soul, but they also attack them even more grievously at night. For the soul, existing in quiet and being liberated from external affairs, perceives its own concerns, whether they be good or bad, more sharply. But the slave, although serving with his body, possesses a soul that is free D and exempt from all these things. For he does not grieve over the barrenness of the earth, nor does he lament a lack of buyers for goods; he is not pained as he looks upon a creditor, nor does he fear a swarm of tax collectors, nor is he compelled to wait upon the courts, nor does he fear the voice of the herald, nor a judge showing a fierce countenance; he receives his ration by measure, but it is free from anxiety.
A He sleeps prostrate upon the ground, yet no anxiety drives away his sleep; rather, it is poured so sweetly upon his eyelids that it does not allow him to feel the hardness of the ground. The Wise Man also, in accordance with the laws of nature, gave utterance to this: "Sweet is the sleep of the servant" (Eccl. V, 11). He covers his body with a single garment, yet he possesses a body more vigorous than his master's. He eats bran-bread, and enjoys no relish with it; yet he enjoys his food much more sweetly than the master himself. For the latter, continually subserving his belly and transgressing the bounds of satiety, forces food down and sends it to his stomach by necessity; whereas the former, measuring his portion by his need, and distributing with prudence B the allotted ration, receives his food with an appetite, and digests it easily, having labor as his helper. But you see the servitude, while you do not see the health of his body; you perceive the ministry, but you do not discern the consolation that underlies it; you condemn the toil, but you do not praise the life free from anxiety; you calumniously attack the servitude, but you do not notice that sweetest sleep. And yet, from this point, one ought to have perceived the providence of God and the equality of His governance. For since the necessity of sin divided the human race into the condition of master and servant, He joined cares to those in authority, and assigned wakefulness to them, and allotted them more numerous diseases; but to the servant, He granted better health, and a sweeter enjoyment of food, and a sleep that is sweeter and longer, which is able to refresh the body from toil and render it stronger for the labors of the following day. C Do not, therefore, look only at the toils, but also behold the consolations of those toils, and praise the Governor of all things through everything. And why do you slander the toils, you who easily attack everything with calumny? What human good is accomplished correctly without toil? What prosperity do human beings enjoy without first reaping it through toils? We reap the benefits of agriculture through toils, and the fruits of commerce; we build cities, constructing them with toil; under the guidance of toil we inhabit homes, cover the body with clothing, place footwear upon our feet, and partake of all sorts of food. And what need is there to recount all the necessary uses of things, whose utility is established for us through toils? D But you seem to be a kind of drone, reared in idleness, who reaps the fruits of others' toils, while contributing nothing yourself to the common life, save only a tongue which knows how to carp at everything. Yet this idle prattle and excessive garrulity have been brought forth by abundance of leisure. For he who applies himself to labors speaks few words, but performs many deeds. If, therefore, each of the goods is accomplished correctly and properly through toil, do not, O my friend, because of the toils.
blame servitude. But rather see how many of the masters labor no less than the servants, nay, even much more, if you also include their cares along with their labors. Therefore, look at those who are considered industrious in our present time; but I will show you, for your part, the ancients who have labored even more than the servants.
Behold the blessed Noah, who both cuts wood, and cleans it with an adze, and levels it to right angles, and constructs the ark, as he was commanded, out of square timbers, and fastens the joints with ship-nails, and in this way weaves the whole thing together, and smears it with asphalt and pitch, and walls off the inflow of the waters A.
Furthermore, look at the great patriarch Abraham, the master of three hundred and eighteen house-born slaves, himself undertaking the work, ministering to the guests, running to the herds, pulling the calf, and urging his yoke-fellow toward the making of bread; and she, in the same way, kneading the flour, and baking the hearth-cakes, and not entrusting the service to the handmaids; and that admirable old man himself standing by the guests, and not reclining at the table, but fulfilling the entire service B.
Look at Rebecca, the daughter of Bethuel, the granddaughter of Nahor, who was already of marriageable age and radiant in her bloom, and who did not endure to linger in her chambers, but (41) was a self-worker and water-carrier, and ran to the spring before the city; and not only carrying the water (42) home, but also providing service to those who arrived, and drawing up the water, and offering it both to them and to the camels, and keeping the beautiful possession of temperance safe, and preserving her virginity unblemished, and choosing labors with all readiness, and being adorned by these even more than she was made brilliant by her beauty C.
In these labors, his son, and truly his son, the great Jacob, spent twenty years, pasturing and struggling with wild beasts, and enduring the painful rays of the sun, and not even able to be satisfied with sleep at night. And we read in the histories that his wives, for whose sake he endured these labors, also pastured sheep. But his sons also were livestock-rearers, and manual laborers, and shepherds, sustaining a labor manifold greater than that of the servants D.
And the most divine Moses also spent forty years of his life living in this way. And his wife, being the daughter of a priest, pastured sheep, and having been delivered from the wicked shepherds through his help, she accepted the betrothal. But it would be superfluous to lengthen the speech, and to bring into the middle of the discussion all those from the divine Scripture who finished the course of this life through toils. If, then, it is the property of not only servants but also masters to labor, for what reason do you blame servitude because of the toils? For the servants have the masters themselves as companions in their labors, but they themselves do not participate in the cares of their masters. But if indeed labor
is common to servants and masters, yet care is the peculiar possession of the masters, why do we not deem those who are exempt from cares blessed, but rather enroll them among the miserable? Since, therefore, the providence of the Governor of all things has been demonstrated clearly even here, let us gather up each of the things said into one, and let us summarize them, and make their contemplation clearer.
It has been demonstrated, therefore, that the Creator from the beginning created one nature, and honored it with the capacity of free will; then, that this nature, by using the free choice of the mind otherwise than it ought, declined for the worse, and plunged into infinite species of transgressions. It was necessary, therefore, to restrain the rush of sin with laws, and the laws required lawgivers. Thus, the human race was necessarily divided into two: some were ordained to rule, and others to obey the rulers, so that the fear of laws and the dread of magistrates might check the excessive progress of wickedness. Therefore, B governors preside over cities, curators over villages, generals over armies, and over these and those are kings. Over a ship, the pilot; over athletes, the trainers; the teacher, over boys; the tanner, over his own students, and in the same way the blacksmith, over those who wish to learn the craft from him. For this reason, the head of the house also presides over the home. For it is not possible for any house to be safe and unharmed without a head of the family: which these very houses testify, for when they are destitute of such, they seem almost entirely desolate. The peoples of the angels also have a similar government. For we have learned from the sacred Scriptures that the heaven which is above our heads has not only angels as inhabitants, but archangels as well. And these indeed preside, while those obey. But if even that place which is free from all iniquity, and that nature which is superior, as it is in condition to bodies, so also is superior to all passions, does not in any way reject this order, but some obey submissively and others rule rightly and decently, why then do you fret, O man, when you see among men, where there is a very great propensity toward evil, both the power of magistrates and those subject to them who obey it? For the Creator of all things has imposed the government of C magistrates as a kind of medicinal remedy for the ulcers of sin. Furthermore, a father rules over his children, and corrects those living more boisterously, and praises those who are studious of modesty. Likewise, a teacher presides over boys, and a man over his wife, and the head of the family over servants, and he approves those who are more obedient and more industrious among the rest, and often bestows upon them honors, and care, and liberty; but he chastises the slothful and wicked, and instructs them with honest precepts. The God who is common to all willed that the same order should exist among the priests as well: and D some He judged worthy of the priesthood, while to others He entrusted the government of these, and He has made other forms of ranks under them. But if you see some of the masters too cruel, and excessively dissolute,
even those of the rulers who sell justice for gifts, you stumble and give birth to contradiction. I anticipate this wicked thought of your mind and say that it is not God who entrusted the leadership to such men, but the wickedness of the subjects that drew their rule upon themselves. For since they were unwilling to draw any benefit from those who had guided them well and honorably, but rather insulted the teaching of those men through the depravity of their own conduct, they deprived themselves of divine care; and then, stripped of divine governance, they enjoyed such rulers, so that by the experience of worse men they might come to a remembrance of the better ones and be reminded of that good and noble B education. We find, however, that the God of all, because of the excess of human wickedness, often allows the reins to go slack and permits the human race to be carried along as it wishes. And God himself, teaching us this through the prophet, said to Israel: "And I said, I will not shepherd you; let that which is dying die, and that which is perishing perish, and let the rest eat each one the flesh of his neighbor." It behooves us, therefore, when wicked rulers preside and cruel and bitter masters govern our households, to supplicate the Governor of all, and by a change of life and a transformation of our ways to make Him merciful, move Him to our aid, and fervently entreat Him to change the difficulty of the times. For He obeys those who beseech Him sincerely with ease, since He is good and naturally inclined to mercy—or rather, is the very fountain of mercy—and He himself is a witness to those who supplicate Him in this way, promising and saying: "You shall call, and I will answer you; while you are yet speaking, I will say, Behold, I am here." That not even those who are utterly lawless and strive to surpass all others in impiety are able to harm those who are firmly established in reason and are lovers of piety, we shall show, God willing, in the speech that follows. But for the present, let us praise Him who bestows both common and private gifts upon mankind and overwhelms our race with innumerable good things. To Him be the glory unto the ages. Amen.
ORATION VIII
C That those who are of sound mind are not harmed by serving wicked masters.I know well, indeed, that a great tongue and intellect are necessary for one who attempts to take up so great a subject for discourse; for the glory of matters is somehow naturally wont to be endangered in words, since those who desire to pay attention not to the nature of the things themselves, but to the cleverness of the words, are accustomed to judge the matters according to the weakness or strength of the latter. But I, trusting in the power of the subject, did not measure its D
A products of thought, nor did I weigh its small and fleeting pangs, but I only considered—as is manifest to those who wish to know the light of the truth, just as the sun is for those healthy of eye—that even if no one advocates for it, the providence of our Creator and Savior cries out. Therefore, I deemed it neither absurd nor worthy of reproach to provide my tongue for the service of the voice which resounds from every side, and to echo this into the stopped ears of the ungrateful. That both poverty and wealth are necessary and useful to our life, and that the Physician of souls has applied a certain servitude and lordship as medicines to the ulcers of sin, we have, with the aid of divine grace, sufficiently demonstrated. B That servitude, however, brings no harm to those who are subject to its yoke, but rather greatly benefits those who desire it, will, God willing, be demonstrated immediately; for this we promised yesterday we would say. For it is possible, if one wishes, even leaving aside the examples of the ancients, to examine those who serve together, and to observe many who are eager for virtue, who adorn their servitude with good will, and not needing compulsion, perform what is necessary by their own choice, and prefer the care of their masters; and for this reason, they are judged worthy of freedom, become masters of great wealth, and reap the rewards of faithfully performed servitude. C Yet, it would perhaps not be foreign to our purpose to bring forward a few of those who once served, and to uncover the treasure of piety which they gathered, for the reproof of those who attempt to slander servitude, and who make of it a cause for greater blasphemy, while they dare from this point to launch missiles against the providence of God.
Oration VIII
Therefore, let the primary servant of the patriarch Abraham come forward first of all. For this man, when the patriarch was already seized by old age, and, knowing the limit of nature and seeing the end of life (for old age is the prelude to death), gave instructions concerning his son, and exhorted him to bring a wife for him from his own (or his father's) people, D and to flee the kinship of the Canaanites, believing in the ancient curses and blessings—at that time this admirable servant, first, indeed, diligently examines each of his master's words, and fearing the sanctity of the oath by which he was bound, and revering the eye which is the overseer of all, he asks first whether he ought to bring the son back to his paternal home, should the woman refuse the journey. And when Abraham forbade it, and said that he must not take him away, but rather trust in God who had called him, and believe in His pilotage, the servant departs from his master's house, and having traveled many stages, arrives at the necessities.
He arrives at Charras towards evening; and he makes his camels lie down, A offering rest as a remedy for their toils, while he himself, bidding a long farewell to the gifts he was carrying and to all the splendor of wealth, stretches out his hands to heaven, and beseeches God to be the matchmaker for his master’s son, and to deign to betroth to him a maiden who corresponds to his master's character. It is worth hearing those pious words themselves: "O Lord," he says, "God of my master Abraham, behold I stand by the fountain of water; and the daughters of the inhabitants of the city are coming out to draw water; and it shall be that the virgin to whom I shall say, 'Incline your pitcher that I may drink,' and she shall say to me, 'Drink, and I will water your camels,' until they cease drinking, her have You prepared for Your servant Isaac; and by this I shall know that You have shown mercy to my master Abraham." Who would not admire the man for this piety? Or rather, who would rightly B laud each of the things he said? For it is possible to see his prayer adorned simultaneously with faith, and wisdom, and piety. For to declare to all that he is relying on the providence of God as the cause of his journey, who would not say that this is a work of both piety and transcendent wisdom? And in that he trusts in the righteousness of his master, and calls the Lord, who is the common God of all, the God of this man, and hopes that on his account his prayers will receive a happy end and his request will be brought to completion, does he not bear witness to the most excellent degree of faith? And that he obtained what he asked for demonstrates that he was a friend of God. For he could not have obtained it so easily, had he not been most grateful to the Giver; and the virtue of his soul produced this gratitude. And that he was at once made a partaker of his desire, history teaches. For before his prayers were finished, Rebecca arrives and shows a sign of hospitality. For when a little water was requested of her, she promises to water all the camels; and drawing the water with much effort, she quenches the thirst of the beasts and the man alike, by which act, both exhibiting a specimen of fortitude and C humanity, she fully expressed the prototype of the maiden who had been painted in the words of his prayer, and showed herself worthy of the Abrahamic house, inasmuch as she possessed a mind that perfectly suited her hospitable father-in-law. For this is what that faithful servant had requested: not beauty, not stature, not the flower of the cheeks, not the loveliness of the eyes, not the elegant lines of the eyebrows, not the splendor of lineage, not an abundance of wealth: but a hospitable mind, gentle manners, mild and moderate speech, an equitable and humane disposition of soul, and one worthy of the master's house, which was open to all strangers, which received diverse forms of men, and which offered appropriate things to all. These things he asked for, these things he received. And not even
then did he A receive them without examination; but by examining each of the events that were taking place, he wished to see, he says, if the Lord had prospered his way or not. B And when he had seen all the signs for which he had asked, not even then did he give the tokens of betrothal before the hymn of thanksgiving; nor, overcome by pleasure, did he forget the Giver. But as he looked upon the gift, he believed he was also looking upon the Giver of the gift; and first he praised Him according to his ability, and only then did he accept the gift. For having inquired who she was and from whom she was sprung, and having learned that she was the daughter of Bathuel, and that she possessed both a lodging and fodder sufficient for the camels, “Hastening,” he says, “the servant worshipped and said: Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His mercy and His truth from my master, and has led me by a prosperous way into the house of the brother of my master.” For because he had received more than he had requested—for the girl had not given him only water, but had also promised of her own accord to provide a lodging, and had pledged to supply food both for him and for the camels; and he saw the kinship, which he had not requested, brought forward together with those things for which he had requested—he made return with the hymns that he could to the Giver of grace, and bore witness to the veracity of the divine promises. “For blessed,” he says, “is the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His mercy and His truth from my master Abraham.” For, he says, Thou art just, showing greater care for the pious, and deeming thy willing servant—my own kind master—worthy of every care. And the facts themselves proclaim the truth of Thy words; for Thou dost confirm with offspring the promises which Thou didst give to my master. Thus having hymned the Bountiful One, he offers to the girl the tokens of betrothal. And he adorns her ears with gold, as they received the requests of guests so easily and so quickly; and he adorns her hands likewise, as they served so well in the magnanimity of her disposition. C But when he had entered into the house, and had seen her parents, and had revealed the commands of his master, and had made known the help of God, and had enjoyed every sort of attention, as one well-known, did he forget his master, and, stung by cares, did he neglect the Lord, or prefer his own rest to the service that was owed to Him? By no means. But when both the father and mother of the maiden, and he also who had shared in the sorrows of her birth, were D earnestly requesting him to remain, so that they might enjoy her presence for at least a few days as she was about to depart for a foreign land, he said: “Do not detain me, because the Lord has prospered my way; send me away, that I may go to my master.” And everywhere he accompanies his words with the divine appellation
A and draws the supply of good things from thence, and attributes everything that concerns him to that providence. Tell me, what did slavery harm this man? Or did any of those who were reared in liberty and who boast of free ancestors show such an outstanding specimen of virtue? Who, I ask, did not attain to this degree of supreme piety? B But perhaps someone of those who know how to weave false accusations and to slander all good things might say that the master’s philosophy had trained him in this way from boyhood, and that, looking to him as to a certain mirror, he drew from there the features of virtue. But those who have evil masters, they say, also express the form of their own exemplar, and, having taken the first fruits of malice from there, they become workers of wickedness, C showing their teachers within themselves. Come, then, let us refute their lie, and show that the possession of both virtue and vice is a matter of our own choice, and that no evil master could force a servant who does not wish to live in malice to do so.
Let the most divine Joseph be brought into the middle, the grandson of that woman, and the great-grandson of the patriarch Abraham, who in spring, in his prime, in the season—for the most vigorous part of the year is spring—who, I say, was in the spring of his age, and possessed the flower of time, and while shining in the season regarding his body, he possessed a soul far more radiant than his body. D He was most dear and uniquely beloved to his father, not only because he was born in his old age, but because he was entirely in harmony with his character, being the very image of his father’s virtue. After this man saw those dreams, and narrated them to his father while his brothers were listening, he is immediately attacked by envy, and is targeted by the darts of abuse which envy had brought forth. But not long after, when they caught sight of the youth coming toward them, those who could not bear the happy promises of his dreams rush toward him like wild beasts toward a lamb that has been separated from the flock and abandoned by the aid of its shepherd. They neither revered the grey hairs of their father, nor pitied his old age, supported by this youth as by a staff; nor did they respect the law of nature, nor the right of kinship, nor the unity of the root, nor the immaturity of his age, which was inexperienced in all malice, nor his rule, which was unwillingly offered as in a dream and at the time was more uncertain than any shadow; they attempted at once to deliver him to slaughter and to stain their hands with kindred blood. But when Ruben argued against the slaughter and urged them to flee from this stain, having hidden him for a short time in a certain cistern, they sell him a little later to Ishmaelite merchants, and by the sale they mitigate the slaughter, since they could not even deign to look upon the one who was to reign in his dreams. Such, therefore,
A is the penalty for dreams that Joseph paid, being led into Egypt, where he was sold again to Pentaphris; for he was the chief cook of the king. Yet even when he arrived there, he guarded his ancestral freedom and preserved his noble lineage unblemished, nor did he change his mind with the passage of time, nor did a change in his way of life follow upon these calamities, nor did he change his intention like a color; but though he had undergone a different condition of life and had fallen from freedom into slavery, he remained firmly fixed upon his previous judgment, and in everything he said or did, he wore modesty shining on his brow. For this reason, he was immediately deemed worthy of all honor and was entrusted with the stewardship of his master’s house. He continued to show benevolence to his masters and equity to his fellow servants. And being grateful towards those who had gifted him with honors, he also took appropriate care of those who were to be governed by his counsel. Whence he was held dear by both the one and the other. For he had received from God grace responding to his virtue, or rather, he was reaping manifold fruits of his labors. For this reason, whatever he did, the Lord made prosperous in his hands. But soon another storm took him from there, and a second, more difficult tempest of slavery followed; and while one wave left him, another seized him. Yet, journeying through such great storms of waves and winds, he kept his vessel free B from all inundation of the waves. For the youth, as has just been said, was shining in the vigor of his age, like a flower just emerging from its calyx or buds, having a first down creeping over his cheeks, and clothing them like a crown, and displaying a beauty of form mixed with grace and tempered by nobleness, bearing modesty fixed upon his brow and persuasion sitting on his lips. His mistress, seeing this daily, instead of needing to draw some benefit from it, fell into the pit of licentiousness. And when the flame of desire was stirred high within by the material for contemplation via her gaze, and reason did not at once extinguish the spark, she could no longer extinguish the fire which had later grown into a conflagration. Then, taking shamelessness as an ally for her attempt, she endeavored to ensnare the youth with words. But when this beast was stronger than any net, and he easily leapt over the fixed hunting-nets woven for him, and the speeches which she had brought forth, colored with harlot-like and pleasurable enticements—which were not spoken without adjurations—departed fruitless and useless, then she bade farewell to words C and studied to test the matter by deed. And taking the solitude of the bedchamber as an aid to the act, she seized the youth, whom she thought to be a slave to passions, and not a master. But he did not trust in the absence of men, but beheld the eye of God D present everywhere, and neither willed to be of servile condition in his soul, nor did he fear that woman’s lordship, nor…
having calculated the magnitude of the calamity he was enduring, did he B wish to give free rein to his passions, as though no one were watching human affairs and demanding punishment from those who choose to commit injustice. But he set his reason in opposition to his servitude, and his lordship, and the change in his life, and the impulse of desire, and the inflammation of his age, and the persuasive and wheedling words which the mistress was offering to her slave, and the absence of accusers, and the calumny that was to be expected, and the myriad calamities arising therefrom. And first, having said goodbye to the laws of servitude and taken on the role of advisor and teacher, he becomes an advocate of temperance and an accuser of licentiousness. And the young man to his elder, the slave to his mistress, and he who had not yet accepted the yoke of marriage—though receiving the violent assaults of desire—to her who was yoked to a husband and able to satisfy her desire lawfully, offers an exhortation concerning temperance. It is worth hearing those holy words of that chaste man: “If my master,” he says, “knows nothing because of me in his house, and everything that is his he has given into my hands, and there is nothing in this house that is withheld C from me except you, because you are his wife, how then shall I do this wicked thing? I will have sinned before God.” “Do you not see,” he says, “the One whom I see? For you indeed are drunk with passion, but I have not accepted this drunkenness; rather, I see the Pilot of this whole universe, who beholds each one of the things that come to pass. For neither does a roof, nor a wall, nor closed doors hinder that eye from seeing what it wills to see, nor does the darkness of night become an obstacle to His vision. He knows clearly even the offspring of the mind, and he discerns precisely the words still being conceived before their birth pangs. Seeing Him, I tremble and am afraid, and I cannot bear to insult marriage—the fountain of our nature, the door of entrance into this life, through which the race of men has not failed, which has not allowed our nature to be extinguished by death, but overcomes the hands of the cutter by its planting, and prevails D over the scythe of the reaper by its burgeoning; which imitates the season of spring appearing after the robbery of winter, and clothes again those things that were stripped by it. You have accepted a yoke, O mistress; cherish the yoke; do not tear apart the traces, nor look about at what is outside, but attend to your yoke-fellow. With him you were ordained to draw the plow of husbandry. Do not dishonor the laws of marriage and the bounds of nature, nor insult a bed honored by God. You were ordained to rule over others; do not become a slave of pleasures, do not
A invert the order, do not remove the rule of reason, and do not hand over the reins to the passions. I, for my part, desire that you too be freed from this passion. But if you do not obey, and do not wish to be freed from this drunkenness, I still refuse to commit any wickedness here; for I was made a slave in body, but not in soul. Moreover, I abhor the injustice of the matter in another way. Being indebted to you for many benefits, O mistress, I will certainly never endure to repay my master with the opposite. For although I was bought with money, I have been preferred over those born in your house; and I who entered your house only a short time ago, have now received the administration of everything. The master has appointed me curator of all that is in the house, and he has ordered me, a newly bought servant, to have authority over all. Only you, revering the laws of marriage, has he willed to remain within the limits of his own authority. With what eyes, then, shall I look upon the author of such great honor, if I were to repay him with this favor? It is abominable, O mistress, and very abominable, to be forgetful of received favors and to have a soul unmindful of benefits. But graver than these, and indeed by far the most grievous, is injustice, and especially that which is committed against a benefactor. I was ordered to guard the riches and goods of my master, not to steal them. I will not, therefore, allow myself to become a brigand instead of a faithful guardian. I do not touch those things which are excluded by the law of my office; nor do I imitate my forefather Adam, who, when he had received power over all plants and trees, stretched his hand toward that which was not of his own right and dominion, and while wishing for that one thing, fell from all at once. With such words did that slave plead before that wicked mistress. And neither his slavery nor the malice of his mistress brought him any harm; rather, he showed himself to be more splendid, like gold or some precious stone. But after he did not persuade her by speaking, and was assailed by force, he fled and, casting away his cloak, emerged naked, clothed only with the garment of temperance or chastity. For he was not ashamed, as was Adam after the transgression, but he departed with the same disposition C regarding the nakedness of the body that he had possessed before the transgression. Then she indeed devises slanders, and persuades her husband, and calls the one who had been her defender a plotter against chastity. But he silently receives the sentence of his master, and does not wish to expose the wickedness of his mistress; rather, he prefers to confirm the slander with his silence, than to expose the whole tragedy of her plots and openly to convict his mistress of incontinence. For he indeed offered the counsel he should have offered; however, he did not press the suit he could have pressed: but like one condemned as a defendant in a defaulted bail, being neither present to the judge nor hearing the accusation, he accepted the sentence passed against him, inhabited the prison, and was bound with criminals, yet he endured all these adversities with a noble spirit. For that constant, and by turns succeeding, storm of various calamities neither took away the strength of his soul, nor converted his fortitude into timidity. Moreover, such [strength] in...
A joy and cheerfulness did he possess even in the midst of his tribulations, that he would even bring consolation to the other prisoners, and if he saw them distressed, he would ever seek to comfort them. For the state of a person’s soul is often evidenced by the disposition of their features, which harmonize with the movements of the mind—not merely the color of the face, but also the movement of the eyes, and the contraction or relaxation of the brows. The terrifying gaze of the eyes marks the uprising of a passionate temper; the folds of the eyelids, creating a smile, reveal the relaxing effect of despondency; the gathering of the brows at the center hints at anxieties; and the upward curving of the same signifies pride. Since, therefore, most movements of the soul are revealed in the face, that admirable athlete, using these features as it were B as messengers of the soul, was constant in cheering those who were despondent. And having once seen two of the king’s servants in a dejected state—namely, the chief butler and the chief baker, who had been imprisoned there on account of certain offenses—he approached them both, questioned them, and inquired into the cause of their sadness. A man overwhelmed by such waves of calamity—the great-grandson of Abraham, the grandson of Isaac, the son of Jacob, held by them all to be the most beloved, viewed as a light, and having been the unique source of joy—having fallen into slavery and endured that disaster, not through being taken captive by some wild barbarians in war, but having been sold into servitude by the envy of his brothers (who had convicted him of no crime, but had seized upon dreams as the cause for their enmity): he, I say, harboring none of these things in his mind, nor the misfortunes that followed his slavery, nor the contests he had undergone for the sake of chastity, nor the condemnation that followed his victory, nor the punishment imposed upon him in place of crowns, nor the prison cell returned to him instead of proclamations of praise—he, I say, approached to comfort others who were overcome by sorrow of soul, and questioned his fellow-prisoners, saying: "Why are your faces sad today?" (Gen. XL, 7). And when they said they had seen dreams and were troubled in mind by ignorance of their interpretation, that divine man did not break forth into miserable lamentations upon the mention of dreams, nor did he weep while remembering his own calamities, nor did he shed base tears, nor did he wail, nor did he bring the tragedy of his emotions into view; indeed, he did not even laugh aloud after they spoke to him about the dreams, the vanity of which he had already perceived to be manifest, nor did he say to those prisoners: C "You are ignorant, it seems, my friends, of the vanity of dreams, and, as is likely, never having experienced their deception before, you desire their interpretation; but I, D taught by experience as my mistress, command you to laugh at these things: for they predict nothing true, but are accustomed to announce everything contrary to the truth."
A I hoped to rule over my brothers and to be prince of my father's house, having once trusted in dreams; and not only did I not obtain the rule, but, fallen from my freedom, I became a miserable slave. And not even while serving did I sail on favorable winds, but even there, having fallen into myriads of storms, I am forced to inhabit a prison. Let not, therefore, night-time fantasies disturb you; the race of dreams falls far short of the truth. That noble man said none of these things, nor indeed did he think them, but he says to them: "Is not their interpretation from God? Tell it to me." And everywhere he carries around the divine name, and with this he adorns both his soul and his words at once. And in saying that the interpretation is of God, he takes courage in it, inasmuch as he had fashioned himself into a divine temple. They were telling, then, and he was interpreting, and he was clarifying those things that presented the appearance of riddles and were more obscure. And after he finished the interpretation, he says to the chief cupbearer: "Only remember me when it is well with you, because I was stolen by theft from the land of the Hebrews, and here I have done nothing evil, and they cast me into the pit of this house." And B not even when necessity demanded did he expose the wickedness of his brothers, but he puts forward the pretext of theft, and he does not pursue with words even those who had subjected him to the yoke of slavery, but out of an innate sense of shame he conceals their injustice: and he not only did not wish to bring forward the record of his brothers, but he did not make the wickedness of his mistress known to those who were ignorant of it; and although he was aware of such wantonness, licentiousness, falsehood, calumny, and treachery in her, he brought forward none of these things into the open, but offered only a simple defense for himself. "For," he says, "I was stolen by theft from the land of the Hebrews, and here I have done nothing evil, and they cast me into the pit of this prison." See the wisdom of his words, see the magnanimity of his mind, see a spirit free and unterrified, see a soul always the same to itself, neither puffed up by prosperity C nor humbled by hardships, but laughing at all the things of this life, both the grievous and the pleasant, admiring only virtue, and striving to pursue it. What did the abominable wickedness of that mistress harm this man? What did her iniquity injure him? By no means conclude, therefore, that the iniquity of masters harms their servants. For it is possible for one who serves evil masters to escape the imitation of wickedness with all his might. But in order that you may understand that neither is masterly power a teacher of malice, nor wealth the creator of vices, observe that man himself, being already manumitted and made second to the king, who is not puffed up by the majesty of the throne, but tempers his rule with meekness, and teaches that D power is nothing but care. He who, I say, [did not wish even to mention his brothers' desire for] his death—
seeing them conspiring against him, yet not feeling bitter toward them—remembers the dreams, but forgets the envy that the dreams sparked. For while the famine drew his brothers into Egypt, the necessity of the situation forced them to bow down to one they did not recognize; yet the dreams, which had been fought against, received their fulfillment through the designs of those very men who had sought to thwart them. And those who sold their brother on account of his dreams, so that they might not bow down to him as the dreams had predicted, actually brought about that bowing down by the very act of selling him. A For, having been sold, he served, and after serving, he abhorred his mistress's intemperance; having abhorred it, he suffered false accusation; having been accused, he dwelt in prison; and having been imprisoned, he interpreted the dreams of the king's servants. From there, he became known to the king, and relieved him of the agitation caused by his dreams; having interpreted these clearly and advised what must be done, he was subsequently appointed steward of the things he had counselled. He tempers the expected barrenness of the land with the abundance of the grain, and guards the plenty as a medicine against the famine; and he becomes the provider, not only of the Egyptians, but also of his own brothers, who had exposed him to be devoured by others. Therefore, those who had envied the dreams bowed down to him in truth, and those who would not accept the bowing down as it appeared in the dreams, performed the true bowing down. And he accepts the bowing down, but does not repay his brothers in kind; rather, he feeds them, cares for them, and bestows the grain upon them for free. And finally, having seen his own brother of the same mother, and having woven the drama of the conspiracy, when he saw them contending for the boy and preferring the safety of their aged father to their own liberty, he cast off the mask of threat, and ordered everyone to depart from the courthouse, saying, "I am Joseph your brother, whom you sold into Egypt." And so that they might not be immediately thunderstruck by fear and suffer the destruction of a fit of apoplexy, he immediately added, saying: "And now do not be afraid, nor let it seem harsh to you; for God sent me before you for life." B For because he knew that they were stripped of every defense and that their tongues were bound by the consciousness of sin, he himself, having suffered those ten thousand evils, sets aside the accusation and instead provides the defense. "For God sent me before you for life, that a great people might be sustained." It is not your work, he says, but God's. Do not be grieved at my enslavement, which is a divine dispensation. Lay aside your fear; nothing difficult has resulted from this. Through slavery, I obtained the rule of all Egypt; C through this I hold the second place from the king, and the reins of so great a nation have been entrusted to me. Such was this man while serving and while ruling; such [was he] in both prosperous and adverse fortune; such [was he] when he was suffering and when he was faring well. Therefore, neither riches, nor command, nor poverty, nor slavery produce malice, but everywhere the choice of the mind reigns. D
A That the malice of masters does not injure the virtue of servants is easy to learn from other examples as well. Who among those instructed in the sacred Scriptures is ignorant of the malice of Ahab and the impiety of Jezebel, and their madness conceived against God? And yet, B Obadiah, serving under these same people and having been entrusted with a certain administrative role by them, not only did not follow the footprints of his masters, but continued, in fact, on the path opposite to theirs. For they, raging against the prophets of God, had ordered all of them to be put to the sword and considered the destruction of the ministers of God a delight, contending thoroughly to extinguish the spark of piety. He, on the other hand, fought against the impious attempts of his masters and was zealous to keep the torch of piety safe, and having hidden one hundred prophets in two caves, he fed them, while in the meantime a very grievous famine of the season, which the great Elijah had brought upon the people, exacting from them the penalty for their impiety, had occupied the whole remainder of the land. C And yet, neither the beastly mind of his masters terrified him, nor did the slaughter of the pious strike him with fear, nor did the tyranny of the famine and the scarcity of provisions make him more parsimonious in his care for the prophets; but, detesting the cruelty of those people, he brought sufficient sustenance to these, preferring their salvation to his own safety and considering life that would have to be passed without them to be a place of death. And in those matters in which God was not in any way fought against, he rendered the due service to his masters; but regarding the laws promulgated against the universal Creator of all as laughable, he hated the authors of these, while he had pity on those who were forced to execute the commands. And since he thought that such obedience was the uttermost destruction, he deemed those whom he had been ordered to destroy worthy of salvation, judging death joined with piety to be more honorable than an impious life. Therefore, the abominable impiety of his masters in no way harmed him, but rather the malice of those same men rendered him distinguished and conspicuous to all. For nothing is firmer than a soul destined for the study of piety, nothing more robust than a soul that does not wish to serve vices. D But I know not what happens to me, as the virtue of excellent men pressures the discourse and forces it to extend further than is fitting. Come, then, let us draw this to a close and pass on to another example.
Sedecias was the last king of the Jews, who himself also labored under a grave disease of impiety and could not endure to hear the oracles of the divine word. This man, when the most divine Jeremiah was at that time acting as a prophet and delivering the oracles of God to men, cast him into a cistern
A into a foul and stinking mire, because he had predicted very sorrowful and painful fates. But Abdemelech, a certain servant, an Ethiopian eunuch, not revolving in his mind the pride of the royal court, nor the impiety of the reigning king, nor the fury conceived against the prophet, nor the miserable condition of his slavery, reprimands the unjust sentence of the king, accuses the most wicked deed perpetrated against the prophet, and points out the supreme overseer of all things, and terrifies the king with the prospect of just punishment. And so the servant becomes the king's counselor; the eunuch becomes the advisor to the man, the foreigner to the native, the Ethiopian to the Israelite—he whose lineage descended from Ham, the son of Shem. And he persuades the king with pious words, and leads the prophet up out of that bitter, dark, and foul prison, and provides him with necessary sustenance for the whole time of the siege. And he receives from God the reward of his piety, the blessing; and when the city was captured and those inhabiting the palace were slaughtered, he enjoys salvation according to the divine promise. B
It is clear, therefore, from what has been said, that wicked masters not only do not harm good servants, but that these servants also reap great benefit from them. And this in turn may be understood from another source. For after that city was devastated on account of much iniquity, and many were destroyed by war and many were killed by famine, the king of the Chaldeans led the rest away as captives to Babylon. Then, choosing those who were born of noble lineage, who were radiant in the beauty of their bodies and flourishing in the prime of their youth, he ordered them to live inside the royal palace, destined to perform royal services. But first he ordered them to put off the exhaustion they had contracted from the siege and the journey, with a sumptuous diet, and with food and delicacies brought from the royal table. C Here, behold with me the nobility of those divine youths. For neither the destruction of the city, nor the burning of the divine temple, nor the desolation of the holy of holies and the most sacred places, nor the sacred vessels snatched by the hands of barbarians, nor the slaughter of kings, nor the massacre of the priests, nor being settled so far from the sanctuary, nor the pilgrimage in a foreign land, nor the lack of teachers, nor the impiety of the rulers, nor the necessity of slavery, nor the heavy yoke of the king, nor tender age, nor desire of life, nor fear of death, nor anything else of this kind persuaded them to wish to transgress in the slightest, or to break the commands of the law. But they entreat the overseer set over them to grant them food from seeds, abominating the royal feast and detesting those various luxuries of the banquet. For they saw them contaminated by the designation of idols. And they were possessed of such fortitude of mind, and likewise love and faith toward their ancestral God, that they promised their procurator that lentils would make them shine
A brighter than those nourished on royal food. And they were not disappointed in their hope, but reaped the fruits of their faith. For they appeared, as they had promised, healthier and more robust than all who had been sumptuously feasting, and glowing with greater vitality, decorated by the strength of their bodies.
When time progressed and brought them to manhood, where they gave proof of their own virtue, those who had been taken in war were established as rulers of the locals; then another stadium was opened to them. For that arrogant man, imitating his father in the pride of his madness, set up that magnificent statue, constructed of material and gold, and ordered everyone to worship the image as God; and for those who did not wish to worship it, he decreed as punishment that furnace, which he increased to the utmost with an insatiable frenzy for fuel. B Then, indeed, many, wishing to gratify the king, did what was commanded; many, however, continuing what they were accustomed to do, offered this worship as they did to some other idol; there were also those who, through fear of the fire, cast away their souls, and though agitated by the stings of conscience, nonetheless transferred their divine worship to the image.
But those noble and high-minded ones—Ananias, Azarias, and Misael, I say, the pupils of the Law, the heirs of the Abrahamic faith, the athletes of piety, the precursors of grace, the champions of faith, servants in body but free in spirit, those captives, yet superior in soul to the kings themselves—not only did they not willingly worship the image, but when they were accused of not having done what was ordered, they offered no excuse whatever, but openly denied that they would worship it, and cried out with a loud voice: "There is a God in heaven whom we worship, who is able to deliver us from the furnace of burning fire, and from your hands, O king, He will deliver us. But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods, nor worship the golden image which you have set up." C For we do not serve the Creator for a reward, nor do we purchase salvation through piety, nor do we desire to preserve our life at any cost, but we love the will of the Lord; if He delivers us from adversities, we give thanks, and if He permits us to fall into them, we worship. That He is able to render us superior to the punishments you threaten, we know well and do not in any way doubt; but whether He wills it, we do not know. For the abyss of divine Providence cannot be investigated. Do not hesitate, therefore, but hand us over to the prepared punishments. For to us, death joined with piety is sweeter than a life with impiety.
And these men indeed said these things; but he did not delay, but cast the bound youths into the furnace. Furthermore, the fire dissolved the iron chains, but preserved the hairs themselves, which are nevertheless easily burned, as unscathed; nor did it dare to touch the provided fuel, but fled and turned back, and attacked its own worshippers, while guarding the servants of God unharmed. And indeed
A a new and strange spectacle came to pass, beyond all expectation. For those who were in the midst of the pile of wood and walking upon the coals felt no power of the fire at all. But those who stood outside and provided fuel for the furnace were consumed by the fire. And these, while burning and being consumed, were lamenting, while those others, singing hymns, were dancing, and were calling upon all of creation to join in their song of praise, and were bidding the elements, which were worshipped by the senseless, to praise their Benefactor. So great, however, was the power of that miracle, that the arrogant and raving tyrant himself ran to them, and worshipped those who had refused to worship the image, and sent out a decree to all his subjects to honor the God of these men.
In like manner, B the great Daniel, who endured the same calamity as these, although captured in war and forced to live his life among barbarians, nevertheless diligently kept the law of his fathers. Living according to it, he kept his soul pure and unadulterated, and emitted such a radiance of virtue that he struck even the savage tyrant with its glow: first, he revealed dreams that were unknown, and then he showed and advised what was necessary to do, and what was going to be useful. And why is it necessary to recount all that was gloriously accomplished by him? How the king prohibited anyone from praying and supplicating to God; how this man, whereas previously he had prayed lawfully and in secret, once the impious law was enacted, continued to pray to God openly, mocking the law and despising the lawgiver. How he was cast to the lions; how he struck even them with the rays of piety, and bound their raging mouths with the features of the divine image, C as if with some sort of bridle. How he drew the impious king to the contemplation of the miracle. How he taught him that the God of the Hebrews is the Creator and Lord of all. How, furthermore, he exposed the deceit of the idols. For it is permitted to learn each of these things from the histories, and to understand clearly that it is possible for those serving evil masters to contract no malice from them, but rather to arrive at the highest peak of virtue, and to free these men too from error, and lead them to the knowledge of the truth, and be set forth as an archetype of salvation to many others.
Let no one, therefore, blame servitude, nor deem that the evil authority and dominion of masters can overcome the virtue of slaves; rather, let him observe the providence of God in all things. But perhaps someone might say: For what reason did the God of all D hand over those who had lived in lawlessness to the king of the Babylonians, and allow the righteous also to be taken captive? What work of providence is this? What example of just judgment? What is there not
is there any disorder, confusion, or perversion in these things? A But those who are ignorant of the abyss of divine governance attempt to say such things. Those, however, who have been initiated and have tasted some portion of the divine mysteries know the cause and root of these matters. For that most merciful God cares for those who transgress and disciplines them, and He desires to leave no one among mortals neglected. Therefore, when He sent the wicked into captivity, He sent with them, as it were, pedagogues and teachers, men devoted to virtue, so that, being enlightened and led by a kind of lamp—namely, their life and conversation—they might in some way enter upon the straight path. And that this captivity was the cause of salvation not only for their fellow tribesmen but also enlightened the foreigners with the light of the knowledge of God, history bears abundant witness. If, therefore, they themselves shone through their struggles, became conspicuous and renowned, left behind an example of salvation for posterity, were the cause of salvation for their fellow captives, and even benefited the barbarians by carefully keeping their piety and performing great miracles through it, why do you accuse Providence for instituting these things so wisely? Why do you not rather celebrate with hymns the Steward of souls and the Governor of the world, who directs all things so wisely and fittingly? I have, therefore, demonstrated from the divine oracles that it is B possible for one who serves a wicked master to flee wickedness, attain virtue, and also provide such masters with many opportunities for salvation. But you, observe those who now serve as fellow servants, and you will see many who serve intemperate masters but who abhor intemperance and cultivate self-control, and who do not acquire any vice from their masters but imitate the life of those men whom we have just mentioned. And since, from both what has been said and what is seen, you have been taught of the free will of our nature and have learned the wisdom of divine Providence, sing a palinode. Convert the blasphemy which you just uttered into an anthem, and let the sounds of your tongue, which were just now produced against God, serve instead for the glory of God and sing of the providence of the Creator, of Christ our God, to whom be glory forever. Amen.
ORATION IX
That the pursuit of justice is not fruitless, even if no fruit of it appears in the present life; furthermore, the resurrection is proven by arguments drawn from nature.If all were worthy to hear that wholesome admonition which cries out plainly: "Seek not things that are too difficult for you, and do not search out things that are higher than you; think upon those things which have been commanded you," there would truly have been no need for many words, while D the [providence] of God, which concerns all things,
A should demonstrate itself. For it was very easy and quite simple for those who have been delivered from that superfluous and vain curiosity, to behold this providence taking hold of the rudders of the universe and wisely governing all things. But since many of those who are men are unwilling to see, though they are able, but even close their eyes and stop their ears, and refuse to listen to the voice that is brought from every side, and mock, blaspheme, slander, and weave together countless false accusations against each of the things that are well and beautifully done by God, B it is reasonable, I think, that we have taken up the argument against this accusation, wishing to demonstrate that it is a calumny and not a just charge. And having called upon Providence—which is being attacked by them—as our ally, and having set it at the head of our defense, we have already gone through eight discourses, refuting the blasphemy of the ungrateful. And we have produced at once the accusers and the witnesses of their ingratitude: the heaven, the earth, the sea, the air, and all the bodies contained within them, animate and inanimate, rational and irrational, winged and land-dwelling, swimming and amphibious. In addition to these, we have discussed the construction of human bodies, and the wisdom and providence of God that shines forth in each of the members. C Then that god-given gift of reason, by whose benefit the nature of mankind discovered agriculture, navigation, medicine, and the science of grammar, and all the other arts and sciences which make the life of men more pleasant. We have also demonstrated, God willing, the use of animals both tame and wild, the usefulness of wealth and poverty, and the necessity of slavery and mastership; then, in addition to these, that those who serve suffer no harm from masters who live in wickedness, if they themselves wish to be wise. And we have brought forth the demonstrations of these things from the inner shrines of the holy Scriptures; but as for those bitter accusers of Providence, we have left the examination of those who are currently in slavery. For it is possible even now to see ten thousand D serving wicked masters, and not only not imitating the master’s wickedness, but even utterly loathing it, embracing nobility of character, and walking a path contrary to their masters. But perhaps they will again take from this another opportunity for accusation against divine Providence, and will say that the fosterlings of virtue labor in vain, and sow upon rocks, as the saying goes, and draw water with a sieve, and do such things, enjoying no good fruits from them. For some, they say, live in poverty and, being allotted much hardship, pass through their life; others drag the heavy yoke of slavery and are subject to constant labors; and what is more grievous than all these, many who hate wickedness are compelled to serve wicked masters. What reward, therefore, do these have, he says? What are the returns for their virtue? What are the prizes for their labors? What is [the reward] for their [...]
A toils? For it is not possible to see all those who have fallen into slavery enjoying freedom, nor do we see those who have been allotted poverty but have become diligent in virtue passing over into the company of the wealthy; rather, it is plain that most remain in that former misery. But you, O wretched and low-minded man, you measure happiness by your belly, by your cheeks, and by your eyebrows, and you deem the end of blessedness to be riding in a high chariot, having bodyguards, a splendid robe, horses trained for beauty and adorned with frontlets and breastplates, a shouting herald, a house rising to a great height, guest chambers decorated with Euboean and Thessalian stones and variegated with the art of painting, and finally couches, tables, furnishings, goblets, fragrant wines, a Sicilian and Sybaritic feast, and all other things that characterize a soft, idle, and luxurious life. B Yet everyone who is truly wise is accustomed to call all these things not only not happiness, but the most extreme unhappiness and misfortune. For the Ruler of all things did not give riches to mankind to this end, that they might squander them on intemperance and make them an incentive to wickedness, but so that, by administering them rightly, they might themselves enjoy the necessary things and, by bestowing from their abundance upon the needy, make them the material for temperance and justice. And not only has God, the Ruler of all, ordained these things in this way, and the divine men, following the Lord, willingly contain themselves within the boundaries set for them, but even you, who are afflicted with the most extreme ingratitude, are accustomed to blame those who use wealth so badly; and rather, you deem them worthy of pardon, C while you spew blasphemies against the supreme Governor of all things, as one who has granted the abundance of wealth to wicked men. Therefore, it is your own opinion too that such luxury ought by no means to be called happiness, but that the just and temperate life is worthy of praise and to be judged worthy of the highest commendation, and that whether one appears in poverty or in abundance, one must be deemed worthy of equal crowns. But I suppose that you, for your part, will crown with double wreaths those who in poverty apply themselves to virtue, as they demonstrate greater endurance.
But those who have been eager to serve God do not have this as their reward, nor do those who are intent upon the divine laws look to this recompense. For praise often harms many of mankind. It makes their alacrity more sluggish and hinders them in their course; and when someone considers that he has reached the goal of the course (for this is what praise is wont to persuade one), he ceases running D and misses the victory. The Lord of all things, indicating this very thing through the prophet, said: "My people, those who call you blessed lead you astray, and disturb the path of your feet" (Isa. III, 12). For with praises they dissolve intense alacrity and do not allow one to grasp the goal. And thus that blessed Paul ran, yielding his ears neither to those who praised him nor to those who reviled him.
A Forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, he pressed toward the mark for the prize of the high calling. Therefore, the guardians of the divine laws do not define the praise of men as the reward for their labors; rather, they await the divine promises, expecting the Umpire of their contests, awaiting the incorruptible crowns, looking for the divinely-given prizes, and awaiting the judgment of the just Judge: the resurrection of the body, the ascension into the heavens, the chorus with the angels—and before all these things, the continuous and unceasing sight of Him whom they have pursued with such great love, for whose sake they, having traversed the sea of this life, have overcome the waves of wickedness, and though swimming through many labors, have refused to be submerged, but by joining the desire for the harbor to their labors, they have sustained their weakness. B For those who have reached the pinnacle of virtue have for a harbor not life, nor resurrection, nor any other of the things to be desired, but the very One who is yearned for, for whose sake they deemed hardship to be luxury, and painful toil to be the sweetest sleep, and life in the desert to be more pleasant than life in cities, and life in poverty to be more brilliant than that which is passed in riches, and bitter servitude to be sweeter than any tyranny. This is the reward which the workers of virtue await. C "For it is an inheritance to those who serve the Lord," as the prophet Isaiah cries out. The blessed David also bears witness, weaving a hymn of thanksgiving to the Giver of good things and saying: "Thou hast given an inheritance to those who fear Thy name, O Lord." And how many such things the Master Christ Himself recounts in the holy Gospels! "Blessed," He says, "are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven; blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth," and the rest of the things that follow these, which anyone who wishes may easily learn by unfolding the divine Books. For he will find these same things also in the distribution of the talents, and in the parable of the ten virgins, and in the figurative division of the sheep and the goats, and in the field sown with seed which received the tares, and in the net which those who cast it into the sea let down, though they caught the fish without distinction, and only afterward D separated them appropriately. But countless things of this kind may also be found in the apostolic teachings. Leaving these things, therefore, for the studious to investigate, as they would extend the discourse beyond its due measure, I proceed to the continuous matter of my oration. For it is otherwise superfluous, and most alien to my design, to discuss in further detail the reward of virtue.
A For those who believe that God cares for all men have no need of our words, but are content with the eyes of faith and the teaching of the divinely inspired oracles. But the infidels, obsessed by the darkness of unbelief and suffering from the disease of ingratitude toward the Creator, disdain to hear the oracles of the divine Scripture. Wherefore, omitting those arguments which can be drawn from thence, let us confute them with physical reasonings.
Let us ask them, therefore, whether they consider temperance and justice, and the other parts of virtue, to be good and the causes of good things, or whether they count them among the vices? But not even the father of vice himself would ever dare to say this. For with what face would he say so, who daily opposes the practitioners of these virtues, and always opposes intemperance to temperance, and injustice to justice? It is necessary, therefore, that they themselves confess the same as their master, and not attempt to surpass in malice the one who begat it. For the disciple is not above his master, according to the voice of the Lord. B
Let us ask them again, therefore: If these things are honorable, and the most honorable of honorable things, and good, and the best of all good things—and no one, unless he is raving mad and devoid of reason, would contradict that this is so—then it is surely fitting that those who cultivate them should be called honorable and good, and that they should have a fruit not only equal to their labors, but also much more abundant. For how would it not seem absurd for a farmer who commits seeds to the earth to bring back a manifold yield of fruits from thence, and likewise for a gardener who plants trees to have the fruits that are produced as a source of consolation, while those who are devoted to virtue and are the cultivators of this divine paradise, and who contribute much sweat, very many labors, and diligent care to these plants, should alone undergo fruitless labor and endure their sweat lacking its reward? And that those who exercise either their body or their voice in singing should enjoy crowns, and receive prizes, and be adorned with the applause of the spectators, C but that virtue should appear less honored than the art of athletics and boxing; and that this greatest of all contests should have neither spectators, nor a president to appoint the prizes, nor honor, nor prize, nor crown? Yet the actors of tragedies and comedies have that for the sake of which they practice their art, and they endure labors in the hope of crowns; and then the charioteers of the races boldly undergo dangers while they hope for victory and await the praise of the spectators, and at the same time receive a reward from the horse-breeders. But even the pilot, looking toward the harbors, dares to brave the waves, waiting for [the prize of his labors. And the helmsman, looking to the harbors, dares the waves,]
and being refreshed by the desire for gain, he bears the onslaughts of the storms. Moreover, the cobbler, and the coppersmith, and everyone practicing some craft, looks forward to the end of their toils, and by yoking together the hope of benefit with the suffering involved in their craft, they have a pleasure mingled with their sweat. A Shall we then assume, as it seems, that the possession of virtue—whether one wishes to call it a craft, or a science for contests and struggles, or agriculture and planting (for all these names can fit it)—has no good end that is able to provide refreshment during the time of toils? But do the temperate struggle in vain, and do they fight against many and various passions, striving to extinguish the fire of these? And do the workers of justice strive in vain against injustice, abstaining from the things of others and giving away their own? Is the acquisition of fortitude useless to those who pursue it? For though they nobly bear the painful things that befall them, do they have no umpire? B But these things are not so, they are not. For the possession of virtue is admirable and worthy of acquisition. And this you too would say, driven by the necessity of conscience. For this knowledge is innate in men, and no one of those who have attained this possession has need of lessons brought in from elsewhere, whether borne from God or offered by men; for the innate reason is sufficient for the teaching of these things. The workers of vice themselves testify to this, both practicing it in secret, and, if they are caught, contriving excuses for themselves. For indeed, wall-breakers, and grave-robbers, and thieves, and adulterers, and murderers, and those who dare to practice things akin to these, having used darkness as an accomplice, attempt to do these things. But if anyone should try to do any of these things during the day, he takes solitude as his ally among men. Therefore, in that they try to hide, they show what discernment they have regarding the things that are done. For they would not have hidden if they had assumed that they were doing good things; but by trying to hide, and fearing to be caught, they confess that the things being done are evil. Therefore you too, O most ungrateful men, know that the possession of virtue is good, and that it has very many toils joined to it. It is fitting, therefore, that what is praised by all—both by friends and by adversaries—and what is enjoyed not without many toils, should have worthy rewards. C But we see in this present life that many pursue it, and many endure toils for its sake, yet not all enjoy any praise and honor because of it; but some, as lovers of it, are heralded on the tongues of all and become notorious, and after death leave behind an indelible glory for themselves; while others remain completely unknown and hidden, looking like a pearl still concealed in the deep, and shut up in an oyster. D Wherefore, since we see these things, let us consider within ourselves for what reason, of those who value divine things, some are indeed very famous, while others are
A entirely obscure. Then let us reflect that, since the Creator and Judge of all is just, He will justly assign the prizes to His own athletes, and the scales of the Just One will not suffer justice to be perverted. Then, too, when we see both these and those having completed their lives, some with great glory and others very meanly, like mere ordinary men, let us consider again that He has prepared another life in which He rewards according to their desert those who have lived well. For by the fact that He has honored some with glory, He wished to manifest that crowns are laid up for virtue; but by not rendering all in this life clear and illustrious, He reveals that future life. Indeed, the honor shown to some becomes a sign of divine justice; but the fact that not all who are zealous in the same works receive equal rewards here intimates the future life and confirms the hope of those things which are expected. For this reason, the Sovereign of all does not proclaim all who have lived well and honorably in this age, nor does He punish all who have lived with wickedness in the same way; but some He delivers to punishment, both demonstrating the justice of judgment and by these things terrifying the rest, and calling them to repentance. But B by not destroying all who work evils, He again signifies to us the future life. But if there is no other life after the departure from here, then those who have been chastised here have suffered injustice, while the others have escaped justice; and those who embrace the pursuit of philosophy have most clearly suffered injustice, since they enjoy no reward or honor from it, while others, having accomplished similar things in life, have passed through life in great glory. But to name the Fountain of justice unjust surpasses every blasphemy and exceeds every type of madness. If He is just—as He truly is—the supreme Inspector of all, who sees the things that are done and judges justly, and holds the balance of justice, and if He should wish to incline it in any way, He adds a vote of loving-kindness, but not of injustice; there is another life in which both those who have escaped punishment here will pay the deserved penalties, and those who have received no honor in the present life for the labors of virtue will receive the recompenses for their toils. But perhaps you also will agree. For even the Greeks, though they had not received prophet, apostle, or evangelist as a herald, and were led by nature alone, perceived that things are in this way, even if they were detained by much error C while they mixed myths with their true opinions; since both poets and philosophers believed that there would be punishments for wicked men and honors for righteous men after the departure from this life, and they handed this down and left the doctrine committed to writing for the memory of posterity. So it is fitting that you too, being persuaded and taught by the reasonings of nature, and also moved by the things we have just said, should concur with our opinion, and that you should hold these things to be so.
B But that one should suspect only the souls will receive rest or punishment, while the body is thrown away as something thoroughly useless and irrational to be delivered to corruption—how could this be reasonable? For after the soul has struggled together with the body and been victorious, would it be reasonable that it alone be crowned, or, deprived of the body, it alone be delivered to punishment? For the one under punishment might reasonably say to the Judge: "Not alone, O Master, have I transgressed thy laws, but together with the body I have been cast upon the rocks of wickedness; or rather, to speak the truth, it has dragged me into the pit of sin. Enticed by its eyes, I have plundered the marriage beds of others; I have eagerly sought a beauty belonging to another; I have coveted wealth and money, because it forced me to look upon these things. From this I have fallen into the abyss of injustice; for its affections have subjected me to servitude and taken away the freedom thou didst give me. For I was compelled to serve it as a kinsman and fellow-slave, and to minister to its needs. The belly drove me to gluttony, and gluttony induced voracity, and voracity gave birth in me to the thoughts of injustice. Often, unwilling and bearing it with difficulty, I yielded to the necessities of the flesh, and anxious and grieving greatly, I was compelled to serve its concupiscences. And often, indeed, I resisted and bravely beat back its impulses; but the persistence of the war often overcame me, and I was taken, miserable as I am, obeying my sister C and vexing her in this. For I received the pain again, and while nourishing it, I was being ensnared; for I received the goads from it again, and I did not know what to do; for the wretchedness of this caused me great grief, and the remedy made the battle more violent and fanned the struggle. Do not therefore, O Master, deliver me alone to punishment, but either free me along with it from these difficulties, or deliver it with me to the punishment." And the body, too, which has rightly served the counsels of the soul, might in like manner say to the just Judge, if it had some use of voice: "As soon as thou didst create me, O Master, thou didst breathe in the soul. But if it is necessary to argue the whole path of nature from the beginning, I was created first, and then thou didst bestow upon me the vital power of the soul. Together with it I was a partner in the life spent in paradise. We passed the same time of conception in the womb together. Together we issued forth into this life when the pangs of labor were loosed, D and participated in the splendor of this light...
A and drew the need of air; in common we traversed life. It never performed any good thing by itself, but using me, the flesh, as a fellow worker, it gathered the wealth of virtue. I, having received the wasting away that comes from fasting, vigils, and sleeping on the ground, and of all other hardship, gathered for it the wealth that comes from these. I provided tears for it as it prayed; I offered my heart to it to labor in the service of the Spirit, when it was hastening to groan. Through my tongue it ceased not to hymn Thee; using my lips as instruments, it offered up requests to Thee; stretching my hands into heaven, it harvested the fruits of Thy philanthropy; carried upon my feet, it ran to Thy holy shrines. I provided it with hearing for the reception of Thy oracles; using my eyes, beholding the sun and the moon, and the B choir of the stars, and heaven, and earth, and sea, and all the visible creation, it was led toward the contemplation of Thee, and from the greatness and the beauty of the things seen, it imagined Thee, the Creator. Through my eyes, it plundered the treasure hidden in the Scriptures. Using my fingers as instruments, it engraved Thy divine teachings in letters, and left behind an immortal memory of them. Through my hands, which erected houses of prayer throughout the whole world, it used my cooperation to fulfill the laws of charity; with my hands it washed the feet of the saints; with my hands it succored the necessity of the afflicted, and cherished sick bodies with care. Do not, therefore, O Master, separate me from my yoke-fellow joined to me from above, nor dissolve the union, which was not formed simply or rashly, but was decreed from above by Thy creation; but grant one and the same crown to those who have C traversed the same danger. For this is proper to Thy equity; this befits Thy just judgment. These things, I say, the body also would say—which provided useful labor in the struggles for the soul—if it were to receive any use of a voice. But neither will the body say these things, nor that other soul which has served iniquity. For the Judge has no need of such supplication; but just as He rules wisely, so He judges justly; and when He restores bodies to souls, He likewise apportends according to the dignity of each. For how would it not be absurd, if a very brave soldier, who has brought back victory from the battle line, and to whom the honor of a statue has been paid by his own kin, should be either painted, or molded, or sculpted—whether stone, or bronze, or wood be the material of the image—with that armor with which he put the enemies to flight; and if he conquered with a bow, to be represented with a bow, and if D indeed with a spear, and helmet, and shield, to be sculpted again with these same weapons; but the soul, which accomplished the struggle while the body helped it, and brought back victory by overcoming invisible enemies, and which has for its painter the universal Creator of all, should stand naked and despoiled of all armor? Nor do we see only the leader of an army honored in this way, but also the athlete, and the boxer, and the runner, and the actor of tragedies, and the charioteer holding the reins of the chariot. For each of these is exhibited in statues in the habit in which they conquered. And this one indeed stands with cothurns and imperial chlamys, bearing the character of someone like Oenomaus or Creon, saying to all all but this: that he acted the characters of these, and with these having attained the prize of victory
Another runs naked, teaching the type of contest; another seems to struggle, or holds the crown, and teaches those who do not know what kind of contest he has fought; another boxes and strikes his opponent; another shows by his posture and his whip what art he was pursuing when he won the victory. B Do not, therefore, deem the nature C through which each of these things is accomplished more dishonorable than these things themselves; nor assume that God, who is the fountain of justice, is more unjust than men; nor suspect that He honors His own victors in the manner of men. For if men, who often do not value justice and equity, but rather even neglect them entirely, are accustomed to honor the victors of such base and useless contests in this way, how much more will the Lawgiver and Agonothetes of this virtue honor and crown these illustrious and great athletes of virtue, and overcome justice itself with the magnificence of His gifts! But I know whence you have drifted into this blasphemy: for from your own D weakness you infer the divine, and you make your own weakness the limit of divine power, and you think that things that are utterly impossible for you are likewise impossible for God. But these things are not so; they are not. For the clay cannot do the same thing as the potter, and yet both exist of the same nature; for both this and that are from the earth. And the man who is conversing with Job is a witness, saying: “Thou art fashioned of the same clay as I.” Yet, although the clay and the potter are of one nature, it is not possible to find equal power in both. For the one moves, but the clay is moved; and the one fashions, but the other is fashioned; the one steeps, and the other is steeped; the one forms, and the other is formed, and it changes into whatever shape the potter wishes. If, however, where the nature is one and the same, the power is not equal, how much more where the nature is different will the power also be different? But indeed, it is not even possible to compare things that are incomparable. For how could that which was made from nothing be compared with that which has always been? That which had a beginning in time with that which is eternal? That which was made from clay with the Creator of heaven and earth?
Do not, therefore, D consider things that are utterly impossible for you to be impossible for God as well. For all things are possible and very easy for that nature. Therefore, God is able to gather together the nature of the body that has once flowed away into corrupt matter, and then become dust, and been scattered everywhere—in rivers, in seas, in birds, in wild beasts, in fire, in water (for I am bringing forth all the suggestions of your unbelief into the midst)—and you
should desire to gather them together again, and to restore them to their former magnitude and form. For He only willed it, and the heaven was made; and it was arched as much as He willed. He willed it, and the earth was spread out, and hangs there, having as its foundation nothing else but the limit prescribed by God. A “He said, and light was made.” He commanded, and the nature of the waters was brought forth; He gave the order, and it was separated from the earth; He nodded, and the earth was adorned with meadows, and groves, and fields of every kind; He said, and infinite species of animals were brought forth, terrestrial, aquatic, and aerial. He who made these things by His word, much more easily raises up the nature of the body from these; for it is much easier to renew that which has been consumed by age than to create things that are not out of nothing without matter.
But if you disbelieve this, Paul, the great teacher of the world, will say to you: B “Fool, that which you sow is not quickened unless it die.” And that which you sow, you do not sow the body that shall be, but a bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or some of the others; but God gives it a body as He willed. If, however, you think the teaching of this also to be some delirium or fable, behold, accept nature herself, who teaches and proclaims the resurrection. For the farmer first cuts the furrows, and digs as it were certain graves, then he casts in the seeds, and as if delivering bodies to burial, he covers them; and he can do C nothing more than these things, except that if he has an abundance of water, he can only provide that. But God, whether He rains from heaven or provides from fountains and rivers water for the seeds—then, by irrigating and moistening them, and by decomposition, as it were, resolving them like human bodies, He makes them indeed useless for men to eat henceforth, but most useful for the bodies that are to be produced from them. For when they have received the moisture, and have expanded and putrefied, they bring forth fibers of roots, by which they apprehend the earth nearest to them; then they draw the moisture from this through the roots, as if through certain pipes, toward themselves, and bring forth the herb growing upward; and they are nourished in the way we have mentioned, and send the stalk up to height, and bring forth the ear, containing in itself the fruit, and surrounded by the beards as by certain spearmen. D Do not, therefore, persist in denying the resurrection, when you daily see the examples of the resurrection and continually hear its proclamations.
Furthermore, that you may conceive a firm faith concerning the resurrection, return again with me to the history of plants, and examine the shoots of vines, or the slips torn from trees, or the offshoots born from the roots; for they undergo, as it were, death by amputation; but when they are buried, they are committed, as it were, to burial; then, covered by the earth and putrefied, by the will of God they send their roots downward, and
shoot forth sprouts upward, and thrive, and lift themselves to a height, and grow heavy with fruit, and the things that are born appear more beautiful than the buried vines.
But why speak of vines, and trees, and seeds? Come to the workshop of your own nature. Look at the material of your formation, how A vile it is, and small, and differing little from mucus. Nevertheless, this so vile and small thing, which is also inanimate, lacking spirit and sense, becomes a man by the nod of God. And although it has one and the same form, it is transformed into infinite variations: some parts are shell-like and resistant, others yielding and soft; some porous and full of holes, others thick and dense; some thick and smooth, others thin, reticulated, and membranous; some pipe-like and hollow, others solid and devoid of any cavity. And indeed, we see that from that small matter are born the vessels of blood, the conduits of breath, the solid ligaments, the softness of the flesh, the hardness of the bones, B the brightness of the eyes, the purity of the pupil, the smoothness of the cheeks, the fineness of the hairs, and countless other things that the human race possesses. Many indeed of those skilled in such matters have attempted to explain their use and function, but being vanquished by the wisdom of the Creator, they ended their discourse in a hymn—and these were not even from our own fold, but were of the number of the sheep wandering outside. Nevertheless, grazing in these pleasant pastures, moved and taught by nature alone, they celebrated the Shepherd, Governor, and Creator of all to the best of their ability.
But you, besides nature, have also the Law as your teacher, and the prophets who instruct in divine things, and the choir of the apostles who teach about present things and proclaim the future—receive from every side the gift of salvation offered to you. The very nature of the embryo C alone, and the first formation of men in the womb, can teach you with sufficient demonstration the resurrection of the bodies that lie in the grave. Believe that the earth is the maternal womb, the tomb the matrix, and the seed simply that very small and downy trifle of the body's remains—that which is altogether obscure to all men, but is seen by God, and that eye escapes no one. "For in his hand are the ends of the earth." And, "He measured the waters with his hand, and the heaven with a span, and the whole earth with his fist." And it is easy for him to see what is in his hand. For it is very easy for you too: even if you wish to mix together millet and lentils, and D wheat and barley, you can easily discern them again;
y for him to see what is in his hand. For it is very easy for you too: even if you wish to mix together millet and lentils, and wheat and barley, you can easily discern them again; A for if the ends of the earth are in the hand of God, it is most easy for him to render even those things that are utterly commingled distinct. Believe, therefore, that the grave is the womb, the remains lying there are the seed, the Creator is the Creator, the final day of life is the birth pangs, and the terrible voice of the archangel is [the delivery]. For the trumpet shall sound, he says, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible. Then the account for the things we have done in life will be demanded of us; then we shall render an account of the things we have done well or ill; then the hidden thoughts of our mind shall be made manifest to all. Then shall we all B be set before the tribunal of Christ, that each one may receive according to what he has done through the body, whether good or evil. Fearing these things, O men, put away your hostile spirits against Providence; flee this wicked hatred; abstain from blasphemy that is devoid of any excuse. Pledge friendship to the Creator, so that he may govern us as friends, and not, as enemies, cast us out of the vessel. Celebrate with praises the rudders of Providence, that governed by them, you may escape the waves of the present life, and attain those tranquil and safe harbors, in Christ Jesus our Lord, for to him is fitting all glory forever. Amen.
ORATION X. That God from the beginning cared not only for the Jews, but also for all mankind: and concerning the incarnation of the Savior.
The sea of divine wisdom and Providence is, I know clearly, C unfathomable. I remember also the most holy Prophet crying out: "Thy judgments are a great abyss." I remember also that great herald of truth, the divine Paul, who uttered this cry once again: "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!" We do not, however, recklessly attempt those things which cannot be penetrated, but we admire the divine things to the best of our ability, and we praise them as much as can be perceived by the powers of our intellect. For we know that those who attempt to gaze upon the sun more than they ought, neither perceive the things they desire, but even impair their sight, and not only draw no light from it, but gather darkness for themselves. D It is easy to see that the human mind undergoes this same thing. For a man, seduced by folly, desires to scrutinize what it is that sustains the earth, and what again is its foundation, and upon what that same thing in turn is carried, or what are the things that are above the heavens, or what are the things outside the entire world, and he not only finds nothing of what he seeks, but also
returns filled with great darkness and B doubt. Understanding such to be the infirmity of the mind, the blessed Paul exhorts us, saying: "If anyone thinks that he knows anything, he does not yet know anything as he ought to know." And again: "For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when the perfect comes, that which is in part will be abolished." And elsewhere: "Now I see as in a mirror and in a riddle, but then face to face: now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also have been known." And again: "When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man, I abolished the things that were of a child." The divine man recounts all these things, wishing to persuade everyone both to curb the insatiable desire of the mind, so it does not attack impossible things, and to await the accurate understanding of things in the life to come. For this reason, he calls the knowledge currently given to us "childish." And comparing it to the legal teaching, he calls it perfect, but comparing it to the impassible and immortal life, he calls it "infantile." And this is truly an argument for divine Providence. For He who wisely administers all things, knowing the swelling of our arrogance, did not give even to the saints the accurate knowledge of divine things. For knowledge, as it seemed to blessed Paul and to the truth, puffs up. But He has proposed it as the prize of virtue so that, after we have struggled well in the present life, and have stripped off our passions entirely, and have put on a body C free from corruption and passions, then we may also receive perfect knowledge: receiving no damage in the future—inasmuch as we are liberated from passions and placed outside the danger of battle. Let us not, therefore, attempt to penetrate those things to which one cannot attain; but let us embrace those things which we have received, and as we are able, let us hymn our good Master, and with those things which we have, let us exalt our Benefactor with praises. Do we see men who are workers of virtue living in glory and honor and care? Let us worship the legislator of virtue and the judge of the contest, who proclaims it rightly and justly. Do we see others occupied with the same zeal for life, who yet do not receive the same rewards from people? Let us not be vexed, O friend, but let us believe that they indeed are struggling well the contest of patience, for this reason, however, that they are to be celebrated only in the future age, as we have explained D in the preceding discourse. And let us not shoot blasphemous words against Providence. For it is absurd, and comes from much
foolishness—or rather, from the utmost madness A — that those who navigate through waves and are pummeled by storms, and who spend their lives in deep distress, should praise the pilot, while those who are beyond the range of arrows (as the proverb says), having been positioned as spectators rather than contestants, should assail the president of the games with blasphemous words, since they cannot do so with deeds. But the foster-children of piety, not only when they are carried by favorable winds, but even when they struggle against waves and storms, praise the God of all. We may hear the blessed B David exclaiming this, a man who spent his whole life in wars and struggled against countless misfortunes: "What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me?" (Ps. CXVII, 20). One may also hear the divine Daniel and those holy young men, who in the very assault of those dangers praised God, and brought to mind the sins of which they were not the doers, and confessed that they were paying the penalty for the things wherein they had transgressed, not calling themselves worthy of crowns, nor complaining of the scales of justice. Great Abraham the patriarch, who had received those promises from God, C when pressed by famine, bore the assault of the famine with a noble spirit. Twice deprived of his wife, and seeing her among barbarian men, he nevertheless persevered in giving thanks to him who had called him, and awaiting the end of the promises, he gladly sailed over the waves. And what speech could equal his magnanimity? And who could admire his supreme philosophy as it deserves? Leaving the reading of the history to those who are fond of learning, so that they may accurately understand his courage, his endurance, his temperance, his justice, his endurance of labors, his love for God, and in short, the height of his virtue, I shall turn my discourse to the men of the New Testament. D Look, then, upon Peter and John, the towers of piety, the pillars of truth, who were shoring up the edifice of the Church, being scourged by the Jews, yet rejoicing and glad, "that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for the name of Christ" (Act. V, 41). For he who wrote these things, when he had said that they were beaten with rods, did not say that they had patiently and bravely endured the stripes, but that they had departed rejoicing and exulting. And yet, there is a great difference between rejoicing and enduring. For one often endures the onset of adverse things, but while grieving and sad. But he who rejoices proclaims the comfort of his soul. Thus also the blessed Paul, that greatest trumpet of the preaching, cried out: "I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake" (II Cor. XII, 10). He did not say, I endure,
or I suffer patiently, but "I take pleasure," which signifies a great intensification of delight. And elsewhere he says: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for Christ" (Coloss. I, 24). And again: "The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us" (Rom. VIII, 18). And again: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?" (Rom. VIII, 35). And a little later: "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. VIII, 38). But the day would fail me if I wished to collect all B the sayings of that great trainer of the athletes of piety. If, therefore, those who have obtained every kind of virtue and have reached its highest peak not only do not resent the storm of this life—which is a sea—but even when the heat rises, when the winds and storms dash against them, and the whirlwind churns the deep, they continue to rejoice as if they were being carried along by favorable winds, and their only concern was not to investigate too curiously what was happening, but to celebrate the Governor with worthy praises; why is it that you, being outside the waves and being land-dwellers rather than sea-farers, criticize what happens, and praise the combatants, but blame the judge of the contest? And yet, it is fitting that those who admire the virtue of the athletes should also embrace their judgment. For they received as the C greatest benefit the misery that had to be undergone for the sake of the proclamation of the Word: the slaughters, the stonings, the burnings, the stripes, the revilings, the prisons, the dangers—those on land, those at sea, those in cities, those in the fields, those from kinsmen, and those from strangers.
Since we have diverged into these topics, come, let us also say a few words about the incarnation of our Savior, which is indeed the greatest head of God's care for men. For neither the heaven, nor the earth, nor the sea, nor the air, nor the sun, nor the moon, nor the stars, nor that whole visible and invisible creation, which was created by a word alone, or rather, was brought forth by the Word according D to His will, demonstrates His immeasurable goodness as does the fact that He, the only-begotten Son of God (who was in the form of God, the splendor of glory, the character of the substance, who was in the beginning, and was with God, and was indeed Himself God, through whom all things were made), assumed the form of a servant, in order that in the likeness of man
and to be found in fashion as a man, to be seen upon A the earth, to converse with men, to take upon Himself our infirmities, and to bear our diseases. And blessed Paul also recognized this as the greatest proof of God's love toward men, and he cries out, saying: "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." And again: "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" The divine John also agrees that these things are so: "For God," he says, "so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." He does not, therefore, merely care for men, but cares for them as one who loves them. Such is the excellence of this love, that He determined to appoint as our Physician and Savior the only begotten Son, consubstantial with Him, begotten from the womb before the morning star—He whom He used as a fellow-worker in creating the world—and through Him to bestow upon us the gift of adoption as sons of God. B
For when the Creator saw our nature voluntarily deserting to a bitter tyrant, and falling into the very pit of wickedness, and at the same time boldly violating the laws of nature—and saw that this visible creation, in speaking and proclaiming its Creator, was unable to persuade those who had fallen into extreme indifference—He worked out our salvation both wisely and justly. For He did not desire to bestow freedom upon us by power alone, nor did He wish to arm mercy alone against the adversary of the human race, lest he should call this mercy unjust; instead, He fashioned a way full of love and beautifully adorned with justice. For by uniting the defeated nature to Himself, He guides it into the struggle, and prepares it to retrieve its defeat, to overcome the one who had formerly won a wicked victory, and to dissolve the tyranny of the one who had subjected us to bitter servitude, C and to recover its former freedom. On this account, the Lord Christ is born of a woman just as we are; however, this birth had something more and unique, namely, virginity. For she who conceived and brought forth the Lord Christ was a virgin. But when you hear "Christ," understand the only begotten Son of God, the Word born of the Father before the ages, clothed with human nature, and do not consider this dispensation which is proclaimed to be a squalor of God; for nothing can pollute that most pure nature. For if the sun, which is a body (for it is visible and subject to corruption), passes through dead corpses and foul-smelling mud, and through many other D filthy things...
things that emit a bad odor, it A is not in the least empowered to be defiled; much more can the Creator of the sun and the Maker of all things—the incorporeal, the invisible, the unchangeable, He who is always the same—not be defiled by any such things. And that these things are so, let us understand in this way. We say and believe that His nature is infinite. For I heard Him who says: "Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord." And: "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool." And: "Who has measured the water with his hand, and the heaven with a span, and all the earth with a handful?" and whatever other such testimonies there are. And the blessed David cried out: "In his hand are the ends of the earth." And the divine Paul: "For in him we live and move and have our being." If, therefore, we live and move and have our being in Him, according to the voice of the Apostle, no part of creation is bereft of God. But within creation, some things are holy and others profane; some things are full of good fragrance, while others abound in stench. And among men, some are adorned with piety, while others are engulfed in profane impiety. But He who fills all things "is well pleased with those who fear him, but hates all who work iniquity, and will destroy all who speak a lie, and the Lord detests the man of blood and deceit, and the evildoer does not dwell with him." B Nothing, therefore, harms Him who is immortal. For if those who practice the medical art do not themselves receive wounds while they heal wounds, but rather procure good health for the infirm, and derive no harm from it, how much more does God, that supreme artisan, who possesses a nature impassible and superior to all change, and who admits of no alteration, contract absolutely no stain from our healing while He provides us a remedy. Let us, therefore, admire Him, who did not entrust our healing to angels, but Himself undertook the healing of men.
In this way, therefore, the Lord Christ, having been born, draws the maternal breast similarly to us, but is placed in a manger, the table of brute animals, both accusing the brutish and irrational nature of men and manifesting His own love for mankind; because, being the Nourisher as God, He becomes food according to His humanity C for men who were suffering from great irrationality. But now that human nature has cast off its irrationality and taken up the use of reason, the mystical table receives it, becoming a type of that manger and teaching men that, "When man was in honor, he did not understand, but he was compared to the senseless beasts and became like unto them." Manger, that divine... D
it received that divine and spiritual food. But after nature returned to itself and clearly recognized that the divine image resided within it, then afterward that food passed onto the rational table. He also accepted circumcision and offered sacrifices; for He was man, and it was necessary that nature should yield the victory to the observance of the Law. Then, as a man, He fled into Egypt, A He who is present everywhere as God and stands by all, as the divine Scripture says. He came, moreover, to John the Baptist, who had not received the stains of sin, yet He suffers Himself to be baptized, that He might fulfill all righteousness. And He is proclaimed from heaven by the Father, and pointed out by the Holy Spirit. For the Father cried out from above: «This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.» But the Holy Spirit, appearing in the form of a dove, drew the voice to Himself, and taught those standing by who He was who had received the testimony from the Father. Hence He proceeds to the struggles against the tyrant: the desert becomes the stadium of the contests, the hosts of angels the spectators, and the adversary the one who is the adversary of truth; who, having heard the voice at first and having remembered the prophetic oracles, feared the battle; and although he could not endure the radiance of His virtue itself, yet he was compelled to fight against Him, B though he feared the contest, mindful of that voice. But the creator of our nature, and its champion, crown-giver, and judge of the games, does not fear the antagonist, nor does He drive away the beast, but gives him confidence and incites him to the struggle, that He might take away his former victory. And He allows the body, which had fasted for the space of forty days, to feel hunger; yet He does not suffer it to exceed the limit of those who had fasted in times past, so that His true humanity might be believed. The wretched enemy saw the hunger and hoped for victory, and confidently attacked the battle. And he thought he was seeing Adam, C when he perceived the suffering of hunger. Truly he approached as if to Adam, but he found the Creator of Adam clothed in the nature of Adam, and he said to Him: «If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.» And he brings into the midst the confirmation of the voice brought down from heaven, but he requests that it be confirmed by the making of bread. From this it is possible to learn accurately how that enemy seizes from us ourselves the occasion for error. For having observed hunger, he casts his missiles from it as if from a high place. But our Savior, although His body was hungry and in need of food, does not wish to work a miracle. But He attacks the tyrant with the word of Scripture, and says: «Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds through the mouth of God.» D And as man He gave the answer, and hiding His divinity for a time, He procured victory for men in a like manner. For, He says, not only is bread the sustainer of life for man, but every word from God
suffices to provide life for hungry men. A We believe, therefore, that God willing, human nature can preserve life even without bread. When He had in this way dissolved the machinations of the adversary, and demonstrated that his second and third assault were vain, and having used demonstrations as a man, in order to recover the victory lost to men, He put that harmful enemy to flight and stripped the common destroyer of men of his tyranny; He is proclaimed victor by the angels, who had been spectators of the victory. "For drawing near," Scripture says, "the angels were ministering to Him" (Matt. iv, 11).
From that point, He performed myriad miracles. He made wine from water without vines or soil; with five loaves He fed many thousands; by His word He rendered the lame swift-footed, cleansed the leprosy of lepers, made languid hands agile, and restored the full sense of sight to eyes that had been deprived of it. Opening the tomb, He made the dead man—who was already bound in wrappings and putrid—run, escaping the hands of death and hastening toward the Creator who called him, hindered neither by the gates of death nor by its bonds. Having performed these and countless other works, He is envied by the Jews, but He voluntarily sustains their treachery, foreseeing the salvation that would come to men from this. And He had predicted these things long before through the prophet: B "And I," He says, "am not disobedient, nor do I gainsay; but I gave my back to the scourging, and my cheeks to blows, and I did not turn away my face from the shame of spitting" (Isa. l, 5, 6). Having predicted these things, and having suffered them, He is nailed to the cross, not paying the penalty for sins (for "He did no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth" [Isa. liii, 9; 1 Pet. ii, 22]), but paying the debt of our nature. For it was this nature which, having transgressed, owed the laws of the Creator. And because it was unable to pay the debt by which it was held, the Lord Himself wisely contrives the payment of that debt: taking human members as if they were currency or wealth, and disposing of them wisely and justly, C He satisfies the debt and frees our nature. Witnesses to these things are Isaiah and Paul—the one having prophesied these things before the passion, the other having interpreted the prophecy after the event; but the same Spirit spoke in both. Isaiah indeed cries out from afar: "A man in a stroke of affliction, and knowing how to bear infirmity" (Isa. liii, 3). For he gives Him that name from what he had seen, inasmuch as what he beheld, He was suffering. "He," he says, "bears our infirmities and is deeply affected for us in our pains; and we thought Him to be in labor and in a stroke from God, and in affliction" (Isa. liii, 4). For those who saw Him fixed to the wood thought that He was being punished for many sins and paying the penalty for His own crimes. D Therefore [He was counted] in the midst of two evildoers.
wishing to create a wicked reputation for Him. But the Holy Spirit teaches through the prophet that He was wounded for our sins and has become weak for our iniquities. And He shows this more clearly by what follows: "For the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; by His stripe we were healed." For we were enemies of God, as we had offended Him, and we owed chastisement and punishment. But we have not experienced this, for our Savior endured it Himself; and by enduring it, He bestowed upon us peace with God. And what follows shows this more clearly: "For all we," he says, "like sheep have gone astray; everyone has gone astray in his own way. Therefore He was led as a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before its shearer is dumb." B For it was fitting for Him to heal like by like, and through the sheep to recall the error of the sheep. He becomes a sheep, not by being transformed into a sheep, nor by undergoing any conversion, nor by failing of His own substance, but by most clearly clothing Himself in the nature of the sheep, and becoming, as the ram that leads the flock, the bellwether of the flock, and preparing all the sheep to follow Him. As a sheep, therefore, He became also a sacrificial victim, and was offered as a sacrifice for the whole race. And the prophet did not mention both the slaughter and the shearing without cause. C But since He was God and man, and the divine nature remained impassible while the body was being slaughtered, the inspired Isaiah necessarily demonstrated to us both the slaughter of the sheep and the shearing of the lamb. For not only, he says, was He slaughtered, but He was also shorn. For according to His humanity He endured death, but as God living and remaining impassible, He gave the wool of His body to the shearers. Thus the blessed Isaiah also pointed out these saving passions to us and taught the causes of the passions. And the most divine Paul cries out directly: D "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. For it is written: Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree." By saying "for us," he showed that since He was blameless and free from all sin, He paid our debt, and judged us worthy of freedom, even though we were weighed down by countless debts and on that account compelled to be slaves—redeeming us and depositing His own blood as the price. Therefore the same [apostle] cries out elsewhere: "We were bought with a price." And again: "The weak brother will perish in your knowledge, for whom Christ has died." For this reason He also endured the death of the cross, since this type of death was a curse according to the law; at the same time, our nature was cursed as having transgressed the law.
A “For cursed is everyone,” he says, “who does not remain in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.” For this reason He takes upon Himself the common curse, and dissolves it by an unjust slaughter. For as He was not subject to the curse (for He did no sin, nor was guile found in His mouth), yet He endured the death of sinners, and pleads His case against the enemy, the common foe of our nature, having become the champion and advocate of our nature at once, and says with good reason to our bitter tyrant: “You are caught, O most wicked one, and have been snared in your own nets; and your sword has entered into your own heart, and your bows have been broken; you dug a pit and fell into it; the snares you spread have bound your own hands. Tell me, why did you nail my body to the cross and consign it to death? What kind of sin did you discern in me? What violation of the law did you perceive? B Search now at least more diligently, beholding this body naked upon the wood. Look at a tongue free from all defilement; and ears free from all injury; look also at eyes that have received no corruption from without; and hands indeed most foreign to injustice, but adorned with every righteousness; and feet that did not run to evil—to use prophetic language—but that traversed the course of virtue. Examine most carefully all the parts of the body; examine the movements of the soul; if but the smallest transgression is found, you hold me well and most justly; for death is the penalty for those who have sinned. But if you find nothing of those things which the divine law forbids, but rather everything that it enjoins, I shall not allow you to hold that which it is impious to hold. C Rather, I shall open the prison of death to all others, but I shall shut you in alone, as one who has transgressed the divine decree. For the divine decree handed over those who sinned to death, but you gave over even the one innocent of sin to the bonds of death; and your own insatiability has become the cause of your ultimate cruelty. Having taken one unjustly, you are justly stripped of all those you held in subjection; and having eaten food not to be eaten, you will vomit up all that you had already swallowed, and you shall teach all to be content with what they have, and to abstain from what does not belong to them. Remember the reason for which the progenitor of the human race, Adam, was handed over to death. He, when the abundance of all the trees of paradise was made available to him, was not content with those things that had been given, and, when it was not enough for him to enjoy the richness of all things, he dared to touch the tree of knowledge, whose fruit the Creator had forbidden. D Hence, laboring with insatiable craving and desiring forbidden things, he was deprived of the whole of paradise. To these same punishments I shall subject you as well. For it would be unjust that he who was seduced should have suffered such a penalty, but the seducer should not suffer the same.
you had received against sinners, you invaded a body guilty of no sin; depart from your power, desist from your tyranny. A I will free all from death: not simply using mercy, but just mercy: and not using lordly power, but just power. For I paid the debt for the human race. I who did not owe death, endured death: and I who was not subject to death, took on death. Being innocent, I was enrolled among the guilty: and I who was free from all debts, was placed in the order of debtors. Therefore I paid the debt of nature, and while I endured an undeserved death, I dissolve the deserved one: and those who had been justly detained, I, having been unjustly seized, release from the prison. Behold the handwriting of nature deleted, O bitter avenger of sin. Behold that very thing nailed to the cross, and see the marks of sins taken away from it. See how it did not accept the subscription of malice. Therefore, the eyes of this body paid the debt of the eyes that had looked evilly; its ears satisfied for the defiled ears: likewise also the tongue for the tongues that had been moved iniquitously, and the hands for those hands that had committed unjust deeds: and the remaining members for the members that had committed whatever sins. The debt therefore being paid, it is fitting that those who were enclosed in prison on account of it should be freed from it, and enjoy their former liberty, and return to their ancestral places. B
Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrrhus
Saying these things, the Lord raised up His own body, and sowed in the nature of men the hopes C of the resurrection, having given to all a pledge in the resurrection of His own body. And let no one think that we are speaking vainly; for from the holy Gospels and apostolic teachings we have been instructed that these things are so. For we heard the Lord Himself saying: “The prince of this world comes, and in Me he finds nothing” (John xiv, 30). For I have, He says, no marks of sin; I have a body free from all transgression. But nevertheless, although he finds nothing, as though it were liable to countless debts, he will deliver it to death; yet I endure it, wishing to cast him justly out of his tyranny. Wherefore, in another place, He also says: “Now is the judgment of this world; now the prince of this world shall be cast out” (John xii, 31). For when the judgment and discussion have taken place, he will be condemned, and D shall be cast out from his tyranny, as one who has dared to pass an unjust sentence against Me. Teaching then, that not only his own
body shall be freed from the power of death, but the whole nature of mankind together, He immediately added, saying: “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself.” For I will not endure that only the body which I assumed should rise again, but I will procure the resurrection for all men; for this sake I have come, and have taken the form of a servant. For this cause I was led to the slaughter, and as a lamb before its shearer was dumb. B These things the blessed Paul also says, writing to the Colossians, and through them to all men: “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all trespasses, having blotted out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.” Hence, therefore, we have been taught that He paid the debt for us, and blotted out the handwriting against us, and nailed it to the cross, and made a public display of the principalities and powers—that is, the opposing forces—by triumphing over them openly in Himself. That is to say, having shown to them His own body and soul to be sinless, and having exposed the unjust sentence passed against Him by them; and having done these things, He made alive together with Himself all human nature. And it is possible to find countless other testimonies in the divine Scripture, which teach that these things are so. But if we wished to collect them all, and to provide for each one a suitable interpretation, we would be undertaking an infinite labor. Leaving the task of collecting these to those who are lovers of learning, I shall pass on to the established order of the discourse. C In this way, therefore, Christ the Lord, having dissolved the powers of death, and having procured our salvation, has ascended into the heavens, and has left to the foster-children of piety the hope of the same ascension. “For when,” He says, “I am lifted up, I will draw all men unto Myself.” So great was the care of God, the Lord of all things, toward men. So great a providence did the Creator exercise toward an ungrateful work. Such was the providence of that first Archetype toward His own image. In the beginning, He created it, He deigned to honor it with His own likeness; but it became ungrateful toward its Maker, and, corrupting the divine image, it received the characters of wild beasts, and from divine it was changed into a brutish and wild nature. But the Artificer did not neglect it, even though it had now put on a beastly form: but He renewed it, and brought it back to its pristine decorum, and restored its ancient beauty, and adopted as His children those who were not even worthy to be His slaves.
sons those who were not even worthy to be slaves. A But there are some who, as the blessed Paul says, do nothing but are busybodies, prying into what is not lawful, and who contend to measure the abyss of divine wisdom with their own reasoning, saying: "For what reason did the Lord not ordain these things from the beginning, but only after many thousands of years?" That to pry into such matters is far too bold and daring, and beyond all madness, even those who investigate such things might admit. But in order to show that God did not ordain these things out of a repentance for an error, but that He had so arranged them from above and from the beginning, come, let us bring the divine Scripture into the midst, and let us listen first to the Lord Christ Himself, who says in the Gospels: "Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." B If, before the foundation of the world, He prepared the kingdom for the apostles and for those who have believed through them, it is clear that God willed these things from above, and that He does not think one thing now and another different thing then; rather, He brings about what is beneficial in each timeframe, and He measures His teachings by the capacity of human beings. For this reason, He prescribes to Adam, as if he were a newborn infant, the commandment concerning the tree. For every law forbidding adultery, murder, false testimony, and injustice would have been superfluous for him. For with whom would he have committed adultery, when there was only one woman at that time? Whom would he have murdered, when there was no one to provoke him? Against whom, also, would he have fabricated false testimony or practiced injustice? C For this reason, he receives only the commandment concerning the tree, a thing childlike and suitable for infants newly born. Again, when the human race had already increased after a number of many years, He gave laws to Noah concerning foods, and ordered him to partake freely of all meat—of the clean ones, that is (for He had instructed him in the distinction between these as well)—only forbidding the consumption of blood. Then, after the passage of a long time, He calls Abraham and commands him to leave his ancestral house, and leads him into the country that was of old called the land of the Canaanites, but is now called the land of the Palestinians, and gives him the commandment of circumcision, so that the people who were to be born from him might have the removal of the superfluous as a sign of piety. D By bringing about the necessity of famine, He leads about the herald of piety everywhere, showing His own worshipper to both the Egyptians and the Palestinians. And He permits his wife to be seized by the
barbarians, yet He defends the one who was seized, and He scourged the rapers; and those who had become hunters of the woman He did not allow to enjoy their quarry, but those who were within their own nets, which they had spread, they could not enjoy. They themselves, however, were caught in invisible nets, and through experience as their teacher, they learned that their guest was a friend of God and acceptable to Him. And those who were kings of those nations send for the guest, the newcomer, the foreigner, and they become suppliants to the guest. B He, taking the opportunity, offered the teachings of piety to those who were ignorant of them; and injustice opened the way for piety, and unlawful greed became the harbinger of the knowledge of God. In this way He ordered the affairs concerning Isaac and Jacob. For the former bestowed benefits upon Abimelech, and the latter pointed out the true God to Laban, and exposed the weakness of those who were not gods, but only appeared to be. In the same way He administered the affairs concerning Joseph. And having permitted him to become a slave first, through servitude and false accusations and chains, He handed over to him the reins of the Egyptian kingdom. And he first proclaims one God to the cupbearer; then he brings this same teaching to the king himself. Having taken the helm from there, he wisely steers the whole ship. Thus, wishing to rescue Israel, which had increased greatly, from the Egyptian servitude, He liberates it through many and great wonders, thereby accomplishing their distinction. For He appointed this nation as teacher of the knowledge of God for all nations. And just as for the care of this nation, He chose now Moses, now Joshua, and again Samuel, and at other times another of the prophets, and through one man who practiced philosophy, He benefited all who were of the same race; so too, through one nation, Israel, He called all nations, which have the same nature, to a communion of piety. And that these things are so, Raab the harlot bears witness, who, being a foreigner and a harlot, yet content with the report alone, and through this having received piety, she abandoned her own kin and entrusted herself to those who were outsiders. "For we have heard," she says, "what the Lord your God did to the Egyptians, and your fear has fallen upon us." For this reason, she makes a covenant with the spies, and confirms these with an oath. D The Philistines also bear witness, fearing the presence of the ark, and saying to one another: "This is the God who struck Egypt; woe to us, Philistines." For this reason God delivers the ark to the Philistines, rebuking the transgression of the people; for it was not right to make the law a champion for those who had openly transgressed the law. Yet by delivering it, He preserves His majesty, teaching the Philistines that they had not conquered God, but the transgression of men. For this reason, Dagon, whom they worshipped as a god,
m transgressi fuerant); traditæ autem majestatem tuetur, Allophylos docens, quod non Deum vicissent, sed hominum iniquitatem. Propterea Dagonem quoque, quem illi ceu deum adorabant A (though this idol was mute and devoid of sense), He caused to fall before the Ark, and displayed to them the posture of those who worship, that the Philistines might learn the difference. But they, in their folly, set it up again, only to see it once more fallen and, as it were, worshipping. Then, led by great stupidity and refusing to see the difference, they were taught to be wise by experience; and being chastened, they came to their senses, shook off the drunkenness of their ignorance, sent the Ark to those who were its proper ministers as was fitting, honored it with gifts, proclaimed the punishments they had received, and taught those who were to receive it the manner of its return.
God did the same thing in the case of Balthasar. For since B the people, having slipped into great impiety, had been sent captive into Babylon and the sacred vessels had become spoils of the enemy, Nabuchodonosor, for his part, as became divine and sacred things, removed them far from profane uses and brought them into the temples of those whom he regarded as gods. His son, however—I speak of Balthasar—not sufficiently taught by his father’s calamities, nor considering how great were the penalties he paid for his arrogance, even though he had honored these vessels as he deemed them sacred, brought into the open what had once been consecrated to God; the wretched man drank from them and offered to his feast companions things which it was unlawful to touch. But as these things were happening, a sentence was pronounced against the impious one, and the hand of someone invisible inscribed the judgment of God upon the wall. He was seized with perplexity, C being able neither to read nor to understand the meaning of what was written. His mother brought forward Daniel, who had frequently delivered the father from such perplexities. He read and interpreted, and taught the cause of the punishment, saying: "Just as we, paying the penalties for our sins, have been made captive, so too did God deliver these vessels, which had been consecrated by us, to the captor, teaching us that He did not accept sacrifices as though He were in need of them. But as long as we practiced piety, He accepted these offerings from us, wishing to care for us; but when we plunged into impiety, He rejected even the gifts offered by us." "But your father, in his own way chastened by these things, honored them as he supposed, removing them far from human use and dedicating them to those whom he mistakenly thought were gods. You, however, not even considering the honor that had been bestowed by him, have fallen into the abyss of arrogance and have revelled D with these sacred cups. For this reason, the Lord of these things teaches what the end of arrogance is—not caring for the inanimate objects, but providing for human beings, and through your punishment setting before many men an example of modesty." These things he said, and the other paid the penalty that very night. See, therefore, how He always has care for all men [(95)]
and not only of those who trace their lineage from Abraham, but of all who are from Adam; and through the one nation, He guided all nations toward the knowledge of God. Nor did He offer their teaching to all men only when they were practicing piety, but even when He was exacting penalties for lawlessness. A Indeed, concerning that Nebuchadnezzar, the arrogant tyrant who erected the golden image and ordered all to worship it, who said: "I will set my throne above the stars, and I will ascend above the clouds, and I will be like the Most High, and I will take in my hand the whole world as a nest, and as eggs that have been left I will take them," the God of all did not chasten him that he might become wise through angels, but through those who had been taken captive by him. For when he saw the three youths, who had not fulfilled the royal decree, despising that terrible fire as though it were a toy, and walking upon those coals as upon roses, and those who were surrendered to such a flame praising God, he is amazed at the miracle, and stricken, he fears the author of the miracle, and he commands all to worship their God, and he terms Him the Most High, and calls Him the God and King of all. B Thus, that Assyrian who raged against Him, and used those insane words: "For the Lord God will not deliver you out of my hand, and where are the gods of the nations?" He chastened, so that he might recognize his own weakness, and He forced him merely to flee, delivering those many thousands of men, in whom he exulted, to death in a short moment of time by one angel. Thus He sent Jonah to the Ninevites as a herald of repentance; and when he did not wish to carry out what was commanded, but foolishly attempted to flee, He binds him with the waves, as though in a prison, and delivers him to the sea-monster. C The irrational fish then brought the rational man to where he had been ordered to preach. But when that great mystery of the dispensation was about to be fulfilled, and the proclamation concerning the divine incarnation was to be sown throughout the entire world, then at last this people, which He had chosen from the beginning from all peoples for the benefit of all nations, He dispersed into the entire world, so that all who were possessed by the error of polytheism might become accustomed to hearing that there is one God, the Maker of heaven and earth, and that from this the proclamation might become easier and more direct for the divine apostles. But perhaps someone might say that the Jews not only did not assist in the teaching concerning Christ, but even greatly opposed it, and became a hindrance to those from the nations who were willing to believe. D But if someone wishes to examine the matter carefully, he will find that the opposition of the Jews greatly assisted the faith of the nations. For the disputation with the Jews, and the demonstration taken from the Law and the prophets, manifestly refuted their madness—
but also demonstrated that the Christian religion had been preached long ago. And the testimony which was borne by the enemies rendered the word that was preached worthy of faith. For the heralds of this word brought into the midst Abraham the patriarch, who received the same promises; and Isaac, the fruit of the promise; and Jacob, who brought back the same blessing from his father; and Judah, who succeeded to the paternal lot of the blessing; and Moses, who foretold these things; and King David, who prophesied the same; and Isaiah and Jeremiah, who predicted them; and Ezekiel and Daniel, who preached these things through the Spirit; and, furthermore, the whole choir of the prophets, who most clearly showed forth these things of ours beforehand. B Those who heard them, seeing the Jews confess that these were divine voices, and observing the benefits which were being conferred in the name of Christ, and receiving the signs as hostages and pledges of the words, received the preaching easily, believed in the God who was preached, and loathed the impious nonsensicalities of the Jews. Consequently, the unbelief of the Jews was not only not an obstacle to the divine preaching, but it actually brought authority to the word of faith for those against whom they tried to resist. For the contradiction compelled the testimonies of the Lord to be brought into the midst; and they confuted the falsehood and showed forth the light of the truth. Formerly, therefore, that universal God of all men zealously administered the salvation of men, and applied the fitting care at each time. C And teaching this, the blessed Paul said: “As long as the heir is a child, he differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all; but is under tutors and governors until the time appointed by the father. Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” And that He did not come to this dispensation out of repentance for a former plan, but had ordained it so from eternity, let the same witness teach, writing to the Corinthians and saying: “Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought: but we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory: which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, D they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” For they did not, in their envy of the happiness of men, provide them with the occasion for the highest blessedness; but, being ignorant of the end of the mystery, they raged against the Savior of our souls, and yet, inadvertently, they...