Augustine: DE CIVITATE DEI

[I] Si rationi perspicuae ueritatis infirmus humanae consuetudinis sensus non auderet obsistere, sed doctrinae salubri languorem suum tamquam medicinae subderet, donec diuino adiutorio fide pietatis inpetrante sanaretur, non multo sermone opus esset ad conuincendum quemlibet uanae opinationis errorem his, qui recte sentiunt et sensa uerbis sufficientibus explicant. Nunc uero quoniam ille est maior et taetrior insipientium morbus animorum, quo inrationabiles motus suos, etiam post rationem plene redditam, quanta homini ab homine debetur, siue nimia caecitate, qua nec aperta cernuntur, siue obstinatissima peruicacia, qua et ea quae cernuntur non feruntur, tamquam ipsam rationem ueritatemque defendunt, fit necessitas copiosius dicendi plerumque res claras, uelut eas non spectantibus intuendas, sed quodam modo tangendas palpantibus et coniuentibus offeramus. Et tamen quis disceptandi finis erit et loquendi modus, si respondendum esse respondentibus semper existimemus?

[1] If the infirm sense of human custom did not dare to withstand the reason of perspicuous truth, but would submit its languor to healthful doctrine as to a medicine, until by divine aid, faith of piety obtaining it, it were healed, there would be no need of much discourse to convict the error of any vain opinion for those who think rightly and explicate their thoughts with sufficient words. But now, since that disease of souls in the foolish is greater and more loathsome, whereby they defend their irrational motions—even after a reason has been fully rendered, as much as is owed from a human being to a human being—either through excessive blindness, by which even things open are not discerned, or through most obstinate pervicacity, by which even those things that are discerned are not endured, as though they were defending reason and truth themselves, there arises the necessity of speaking more copiously, for the most part about clear matters, as if we offered them, not to spectators to be looked upon, but to those who are groping and shutting their eyes, to be in some manner touched. And yet what end of disputing will there be and what measure of speaking, if we always suppose that there must be a reply to those who reply?

Nam qui uel non possunt intellegere quod dicitur, uel tam duri sunt aduersitate mentis, ut, etiamsi intellexerint, non oboediant, respondent, ut scriptum est, et loquuntur iniquitatem atque infatigabiliter uani sunt. Quorum dicta contraria si totiens uelimus refellere, quotiens obnixa fronte statuerint non cogitare quid dicant, dum quocumque modo nostris disputationibus contradicant, quam sit infinitum et aerumnosum et infructuosum uides. Quam ob rem nec te ipsum, <mi> fili Marcelline, nec alios, quibus hic labor noster in Christi caritate utiliter ac liberaliter seruit, tales meorum scriptorum uelim iudices, qui responsionem semper desiderent, cum his quae leguntur audierint aliquid contradici, ne fiant similes earum muliercularum, quas commemorat apostolus semper discentes et numquam ad ueritatis scientiam peruenientes.

For those who either cannot understand what is said, or are so hard by a contrariety of mind that, even if they have understood, they do not obey, they answer, as it is written, and they speak iniquity and are indefatigably vain. If we should wish to refute as often as their contrary sayings, as often as with a stubborn brow they resolve not to consider what they say, provided that in any way they contradict our disputations, you see how infinite and toilsome and unfruitful that would be. Wherefore neither you yourself, <mi> my son Marcellinus, nor others for whom this our labor, in the charity of Christ, serves usefully and liberally, would I wish to be such judges of my writings as always to desire a response, when, to the things that are read, they have heard something contradicted—lest they become like those little women whom the Apostle mentions, always learning and never coming to the knowledge of the truth.

[II] Superiore itaque libro, cum de ciuitate Dei dicere instituissem, unde hoc uniuersum opus illo adiuuante in manus sumptum est, occurrit mihi resistendum esse primitus eis, qui haec bella, quibus mundus iste conteritur, maximeque Romanae urbis recentem a barbaris uastationem Christianae religioni tribuunt, qua prohibentur nefandis sacrificiis seruire daemonibus, cum potius hoc deberent tribuere Christo, quod propter eius nomen contra institutum moremque bellorum eis, quo confugerent, religiosa et amplissima loca barbari libera praebuerunt, atque in multis famulatum deditum Christo non solum uerum, sed etiam timore confictum sic honorauerunt, ut, quod in eos belli iure fieri licuisset, inlicitum s.ibi esse iudicarent. Inde incidit quaestio, cur haec diuina beneficia et ad impios ingratosque peruenerint, et cur illa itidem dura, quae hostiliter facta sunt, pios cum impiis pariter adflixerint? Quam quaestionem per multa diffusam (in omnibus enim cotidianis uel Dei muneribus uel hominum cladibus, quorum utraque bene ac male uiuentibus permixte atque indiscrete saepe accidunt, solet multos mouere) ut pro suscepti operis necessitate dissoluerem, aliquantum inmoratus sum maxime ad consolandas sanctas feminas et pie castas, in quibus ab hoste aliquid perpetratum est, quod intulit uerecundiae dolorem, etsi non abstulit pudicitiae firmitatem, ne paeniteat eas uitae, quas non est unde possit paenitere nequitiae.

[II] Therefore in the preceding book, when I had set out to speak about the City of God, whence this whole work, with His aid, was undertaken into my hands, it occurred to me that I must first make a stand against those who attribute these wars, by which this world is shattered, and especially the recent devastation of the Roman city by barbarians, to the Christian religion, by which they are prohibited to serve daemons with unspeakable sacrifices—whereas rather they ought to attribute this to Christ: that on account of His name, contrary to the established institution and custom of wars, the barbarians provided free the religious and most ample places to which they might flee, and in many so honored service devoted to Christ, not only true but even fashioned from fear, that what might have been permitted to be done to them by the right of war, they judged to be illicit for themselves. Thence the question arose why these divine benefits have even come to the impious and ungrateful, and why likewise those harsh things that were done in a hostile manner have afflicted the pious together with the impious. Which question, diffused through many points (for in all the daily either gifts of God or calamities of men—both of which often befall, mixedly and indiscriminately, those living well and badly—it is wont to move many), that I might resolve it according to the necessity of the undertaken work, I lingered somewhat, chiefly to console holy women, piously chaste, in whom something was perpetrated by the enemy which brought the pain of modesty, although it did not take away the firmness of chastity, lest they come to regret lives for which there is no wickedness whence repentance could arise.

Deinde pauca dixi in eos, qui Christianos aduersis illis rebus adfectos et praecipue pudorem humiliatarum feminarum quamuis castarum atque sanctarum proteruitate inpudentissima exagitant, cum sint nequissimi et inreuerentissimi, longe ab eis ipsis Romanis degeneres, quorum praeclara multa laudantur et litterarum memoria celebrantur, immo illorum gloriae uehementer aduersi. Romam quippe partam ueterum auctamque laboribus foediorem stantem fecerant quam ruentem, quando quidem in ruina eius lapides et ligna, in istorum autem uita omnia non murorum, sed morum munimenta atque ornamenta ceciderunt, cum funestioribus eorum corda cupiditatibus quam ignibus tecta illius urbis arderent. Quibus dictis primum terminaui librum.

Then I said a few things against those who, the Christians having been affected by those adverse events, and especially the modesty of women humiliated, although chaste and holy, they assail with most shameless insolence, while they are most nefarious and most irreverent, degenerate far from those very Romans whose many illustrious deeds are praised and celebrated by the memory of letters—nay, vehemently hostile to their glory. For indeed they had made Rome, won and augmented by the labors of the ancients, more foul standing than falling; since, in her ruin, stones and timbers fell, but in these men’s life all the fortifications and ornaments not of walls but of morals fell, while the roofs of that city burned with fires, their hearts burned with cupidities more death-bringing than the fires. With these things said, I finished the first book.

Deinceps itaque dicere institui, quae mala ciuitas illa perpessa sit ab origine sua siue apud se ipsam siue in prouinciis sibi iam subditis, quae omnia Christianae religioni tribuerent, si iam tunc euangelica doctrina aduersus falsos et fallaces deos eorum testificatione liberrima personaret.

Accordingly, I have set myself next to speak of what evils that city endured from its origin, whether within itself or in the provinces already subjected to it, all of which they would attribute to the Christian religion, if already then the Evangelical doctrine were sounding forth with most free testimony against their false and fallacious gods.

[III] Memento autem me ista commemorantem adhuc contra inperitos agere, ex quorum inperitia illud quoque ortum est uulgare prouerbium: Pluuia defit, causa Christiani sunt. Narn qui eorum studiis liberalibus instituti amant historiam, facillime ista nouerunt; sed ut nobis ineruditorum turbas infestissimas reddant, se nosse dissimulant atque hoc apud uulgus confirmare nituntur, clades, quibus per certa interualla locorum et temporum genus humanum oportet adfligi, causa accidere nominis Christiani, quod contra deos suos ingenti fama et praeclarissima celebritate per cuncta diffunditur. Recolant ergo nobiscum, antequam Christus uenisset in carne, antequam eius nomen ea, cui frustra inuident, gloria populis innotesceret, quibus calamitatibus res Romanae multipliciter uarieque contritae sint, et in his defendant, si possunt, deos suos, si propterea coluntur, ne ista mala patiantur cultores eorum; quorum si quid nunc passi fuerint, nobis inputanda esse contendunt.

[III] Remember, moreover, that as I am recounting these things I am still arguing against the unskilled, from whose ignorance there also arose that vulgar proverb: “Rain is lacking; Christians are the cause.” For those of them who, trained by liberal studies, love history, know these things most easily; but, in order to render against us the most pestilent mobs of the unlearned, they dissimulate their knowing and strive to confirm among the common crowd this: that the disasters with which, at fixed intervals of places and times, the human race must be afflicted, happen because of the Christian name, which, to the prejudice of their gods, is being diffused through all quarters with vast fame and most illustrious celebrity. Let them therefore recollect with us, before Christ had come in the flesh, before His name had become known among the peoples by that glory at which they envy in vain, by what calamities the Roman State was manifoldly and diversely crushed; and in these let them defend, if they can, their gods—if for this reason they are worshiped, that their worshipers may not suffer such evils—of which, if they have suffered anything now, they contend it is to be imputed to us.

Cur enim ea, quae dicturus sum, permiserunt accidere cultoribus suis, antequam eos declaratum Christi nomen offenderet eorumque sacrificia prohiberet?

For why did they permit those things, which I am about to say, to befall their worshipers, before the declared name of Christ offended them and prohibited their sacrifices?

[IV] Primo ipsos mores ne pessimos haberent, quare dii eorum curare noluerunt? Deus enim uerus eos, a quibus non colebatur, merito neglexit; dii autem illi, a quorum cultu se prohiberi homines ingratissimi conqueruntur, cultores suos ad bene uiuendum quare nullis legibus adiuuerunt? Vtique dignum erat, ut, quo modo isti illorum sacra, ita illi istorum facta curarent.

[4] First, that they might not have most wicked morals, why were their gods unwilling to see to it? For the true God deservedly neglected those by whom He was not worshiped; but those gods, from whose worship the most ungrateful men complain that they are being prohibited, why did they, by no laws, aid their worshipers to live well? Surely it was fitting that, just as these cared for their sacred rites (sacra), so those should care for these men’s deeds.

Sed respondetur, quod uoluntate propria quisque malus est. Quis hoc negauerit? Verum tamen pertinebat ad consultores deos uitae bonae praecepta non occultare populis cultoribus suis, sed clara praedicatione praebere, per uates etiam conuenire atque arguere peccantes, palam minari poenas male agentibus, praemia recte uiuentibus polliceri.

But it is answered that each person is wicked by his own proper will. Who would deny this? Yet it did pertain to the consulted gods not to occult the precepts of a good life from the peoples their worshipers, but to provide them by clear preaching, to come to and even reprove the sinners through prophets, openly to menace penalties to those doing ill, to promise rewards to those living rightly.

Quid umquam tale in deorum illorum templis prompta et eminenti uoce concrepuit? Veniebamus etiam nos aliquando adulescentes ad spectacula ludibriaque sacrilegiorum, spectabamus arrepticios, audiebamus symphoniacos, ludis turpissimis, qui diis deabusque exhibebantur, oblectabamur, Caelesti uirgini et Berecynthiae matri omnium, ante cuius lecticam die sollemni lauationis eius talia per publicum cantitabantur a nequissimis scaenicis, qualia, non dico matrem deorum, sed matrem qualiumcumque senatorum uel quorumlibet honestorum uirorum, immo uero qualia nec matrem ipsorum scaenicorum deceret audire. Habet enim quiddam erga parentes humana uerecundia, quod nec ipsa nequitia possit auferre.

What ever such a thing has ever rung out in those gods’ temples with a prompt and eminent voice? We too in our youth used to come to the spectacles and mockeries of sacrileges; we used to watch the possessed, we listened to symphonists; we were amused by the most shameful games which were exhibited to the gods and goddesses. To the Virgin Caelestis and to the Berecynthian Mother of all, before whose litter on the solemn day of her bathing such things were being chanted through the public by most wicked stage-players—such things as it would not be fitting, I do not say for the mother of the gods, but for the mother of whatever senators or of any honorable men, nay indeed such as it would not be fitting even for the mother of those very actors themselves, to hear. For human modesty has a certain something toward parents, which not even wickedness itself can take away.

Illam proinde turpitudinem obscenorum dictorum atque factorum sca e nicos ipsos domi suae proludendi causa coram matribus suis agere puderet, quam per publicum agebant coram deum matre spectante atque audiente utriusque sexus frequentissima multitudine. Quae si inlecta curiositate adesse potuit circumfusa, saltem offensa castitate debuit abire confusa. Quae sunt sacrilegia, si illa sunt sacra?

Accordingly, that turpitude of obscene sayings and deeds the stage-actors would be ashamed to perform at home before their own mothers for the sake of rehearsal, which they performed in public before the Mother of the gods looking on and listening, with a most thronged multitude of both sexes. She who, if enticed by curiosity, could be present, surrounded by the crowd, at least, offended in chastity, ought to have departed abashed. What are sacrileges, if those are sacred rites?

aut quae inquinatio, si illa lauatio? Et haec fercula appellabantur, quasi celebraretur conuiuium, quo uelut suis epulis inmunda daemonia pascerentur. Quis enim non sentiat cuius modi spiritus talibus obscenitatibus delectentur, nisi uel nesciens, utrum omnino sint ulli inmundi spiritus deorum nomine decipientes, uel talem agens uitam, in qua istos potius quam Deum uerum et optet propitios et formidet iratos?

or what defilement, if that is a lavation? And these were called fercula, as though a banquet were being celebrated, by which, as it were with their own feasts, unclean demons might be fed. For who does not perceive of what sort spirits are delighted by such obscenities, unless either not knowing whether there exist at all any unclean spirits deceiving under the name of gods, or leading such a life in which he both wishes these, rather than the true God, to be propitious and fears them angry?

[V] Nequaquam istos, qui flagitiosissimae consuetudinis uitiis oblectari magis quam obluctari student, sed illum ipsum Nasicam Scipionem, qui uir optimus a senatu electus est, cuius manibus eiusdem daemonis simulacrum susceptum est in Vrbemque peruectum, habere de hac re iudicem uellem. Diceret nobis, utrum matrem suam tam optime de re publica uellet mereri, ut ei diuini honores decernerentur; sicut et Graecos et Romanos aliasque gentes constat quibusdam decreuisse mortalibus, quorum erga se beneficia magnipenderant, eosque inmortales factos atque in deorum numerum receptos esse crediderant. Profecto ille tantam felicitatem suae matri, si fieri posset, optaret.

[5] By no means those men, who strive to be delighted by rather than to wrestle against the vices of a most flagitious custom, but that very Nasica Scipio—who was chosen a most excellent man by the senate, in whose hands the simulacrum of that same demon was taken up and conveyed into the City—I would wish to have as judge in this matter. He would tell us whether he would wish his mother to deserve so well of the commonwealth that divine honors should be decreed to her; just as it is agreed that both the Greeks and the Romans and other nations have decreed to certain mortals, whose benefits toward themselves they highly esteemed, and believed that they had been made immortal and received into the number of the gods. Surely he would desire so great a felicity for his mother, if it could be done.

Porro si ab illo deinde quaereremus, utrum inter eius diuinos honores uellet illa turpia celebrari: nonne se malle clamaret, ut sua mater sine ullo sensu mortua iaceret, quam ad hoc dea uiueret, ut illa libenter audiret? Absit, ut senator populi Romani ea mente praeditus, qua theatrum aedificari in urbe fortium uirorum prohibuit, sic uellet coli matrem suam, ut talibus dea sacris propitiaretur, qualibus matrona uerbis offenderetur. Nec ullo modo crederet uerecundiam laudabilis feminae ita in contrarium diuinitate mutari, ut honoribus eam talibus aduocarent cultores sui, qualibus conuiciis in quempiam iaculatis, cum inter homines uiueret, nisi aures clauderet seseque subtraheret, erubescerent pro illa et propinqui et maritus et liberi.

Moreover, if we then were to ask him whether he would wish those shameful things to be celebrated among his divine honors: would he not cry out that he would rather his mother lay dead without any sensation, than live as a goddess for this end, that she should willingly listen to such things? Far be it that a senator of the Roman people, endowed with that mind by which he forbade a theater to be built in a city of brave men, should so wish his mother to be cultivated, that as a goddess she should be propitiated by such sacred rites as a matron would be offended at even in words. Nor would he in any way believe that the modesty of a laudable woman would by divinity be so changed into its contrary, that her own worshipers should summon her to such honors as—if such invectives were hurled at someone, when she lived among men—unless she closed her ears and withdrew herself, both her kin and her husband and her children would blush on her behalf.

Proinde talis mater deum, qualem habere matrem puderet quemlibet etiam pessimum uirum, Romanas occupatura mentes quaesiuit optimum uirum, non quem monendo et adiuuando faceret, sed quem fallendo deciperet, ei similis de qua scriptum est: Mulier aottem uirorum pretiosas animas captat, ut ille magnae indolis animus hoc uelut diuino testimonio sublimatus et uere se optimum existimans ueram pietatem religionemque non quaereret, sine qua omne quamuis laudabile ingenium superbia uanescit et decidit. Quo modo igitur nisi insidiose quaereret dea illa optimum uirum, cum talia quaerat in suis sacris, qualia uiri optimi abhorrent suis affiibere conuiuiis?

Accordingly, such a mother of the gods, such as any man—even the worst—would be ashamed to have as a mother, being about to occupy Roman minds, sought out the best man, not one whom she would make by admonishing and aiding, but one whom by beguiling she would deceive, like to her of whom it is written: But a woman captures the precious souls of men; so that that spirit of great natural endowment, exalted as it were by this divine testimony and truly deeming himself the best, might not seek true piety and religion, without which every talent, however laudable, by pride vanishes and falls. How then, save insidiously, would that goddess seek the best man, since in her sacred rites she seeks such things as the best of men abhor to admit to their own banquets?

[VI] Hinc est quod de uita et moribus ciuitatum atque populorum a quibus colebantur illa numina non curarunt, ut tam horrendis eos et detestabilibus malis non in agro et uitibus, non in domo atque pecunia, non denique in ipso corpore, quod menti subditur, sed in ipsa mente, in ipso rectore carnis animo, eos impleri ac pessimos fieri sine ulla sua terribili prohibitione permitterent. Aut si prohibebant, hoc ostendatur potius, hoc probetur. Nec nobis nescio quos susurros paucissimorum auribus anhelatos et arcana uelut religione traditos iactent, quibus uitae probitas castitasque discatur; sed demonstrentur uel commemorentur loca talibus aliquando conuenticulis consecrata, non ubi ludi agerentur obscenis uocibus et motibus histrionum, nec ubi Fugalia celebrarentur effusa omni licentia turpitudinem (et uere Fugalia, sed pudoris et honestatis); sed ubi populi audirent quid dii praeciperent de cohibenda auaritia, ambitione frangenda, luxuria refrenanda, ubi discerent miseri, quod discendum Persius increpat dicens: Discite, o miseri, et causas cognoscite rerum, Quid sumus et quidnam uicturi gignimur, ordo Quis datus aut metae qua mollis flexus et unde, Quis modus argenti, quid fas optare, quid asper Vtile nummus habet, patriae carisque propinquis Quautum largiri deceat, quem te Deus esse Iussit et humana qua parte locatus es in re. Dicatur in quibus locis haec docentium deorum solebant praecepta recitari et a cultoribus eorum populis frequenter audiri, sicut nos ostendimus ad hoc ecclesias institutas, quaqua uersum religio Christiana diffunditur.

[6] Hence it is that, concerning the life and morals of the cities and peoples by whom those numina were worshiped, they did not care, so that with such horrendous and detestable evils they allowed them to be filled and to become most wicked, not in the field and the vines, not in house and money, not, finally, in the very body which is subject to the mind, but in the mind itself, in the very ruler of the flesh, the soul, without any terrible prohibition of theirs. Or if they were forbidding them, let this rather be shown, let this be proved. And let them not vaunt to us I know not what whispers breathed into the ears of a very few and handed down as though by an arcane religion, whereby probity of life and chastity are learned; but let places be pointed out or recalled which at some time were consecrated to gatherings of such a sort— not where plays were performed with obscene voices and motions of actors, nor where the Fugalia were celebrated with all license of turpitude let loose (and truly “Fugalia,” but of modesty and honesty); but where peoples might hear what the gods enjoined about restraining avarice, breaking ambition, bridling luxury, where the wretched might learn that which, to be learned, Persius rebukes, saying: Learn, O wretches, and know the causes of things, what we are and for what end we are born to live, what order has been given, or what the soft bend of the goal is, and whence, what the measure of silver, what it is lawful to desire, what harsh utility money has, for fatherland and dear kinsfolk how much it is fitting to bestow, whom God has ordered you to be and in what part of the human affair you are placed. Let it be said in what places these precepts of teaching gods were wont to be recited and by their worshipers to be frequently heard by peoples, just as we have shown that churches have been instituted for this, whithersoever the Christian religion is diffused.

[VII] An forte nobis philosophorum scholas disputationesque memorabunt? Primo haec non Romana, sed Graeca sunt; aut si propterea iam Romana, quia et Graecia facta est Romana prouincia, non deorum praecepta sunt, sed hominum inuenta, qui utcumque conati sunt ingeniis acutissimis praediti ratiocinando uestigare, quid in rerum natura latitaret, quid in moribus adpetendum esset atque fugiendum, quid in ipsis ratiocinandi regulis certa conexione traheretur, aut quid non esset consequens uel etiam repugnaret. Et quidam eorum quaedam magna, quantum diuinitus adiuti sunt, inuenerunt; quantum autem humanitus impediti sunt, errauerunt, maxime cum eorum superbiae iuste prouidentia diuina resisteret, ut uiam pietatis ab humilitate in superna surgentem etiam istorum comparatione monstraret; unde postea nobis erit in Dei ueri Domini uoluntate disquirendi ac disserendi locus.

[VII] Or will they perchance recall for us the schools and disputations of the philosophers? First, these are not Roman but Greek; or, if therefore now Roman because Greece too has been made a Roman province, they are not the precepts of the gods but the inventions of men, who, endowed with most acute talents, endeavored by ratiocination to investigate what lay hidden in the nature of things, what in morals ought to be sought and shunned, what in the very rules of ratiocination would be drawn by a fixed connexion, or what would not be consequent or even would repugn. And certain of them discovered certain great things, inasmuch as they were helped divinely; but inasmuch as they were hindered humanly, they erred—especially since divine providence justly resisted their pride, so as to point out, even by comparison with these men, the way of piety rising from humility into the things above; whence afterwards there will be for us, by the will of God the true Lord, a place for inquiring and discoursing.

Verum tamen si philosophi aliquid inuenerunt, quod agendae bonae uitae beataeque adipiscendae satis esse possit: quanto iustius talibus diuini honores decernerentur! Quanto melius et honestius in Platonis templo libri eius legerentur, quam in templis daemonum Galli absciderentur, molles consecrarentur, insani secarentur, et quidquid aliud uel crudele uel turpe, uel turpiter crudele uel crudeliter turpe in sacris talium deorum celebrari solet! Quanto satius erat ad erudiendam iustitia iuuentutem publice recitari leges deorum quam laudari inaniter leges atque instituta maiorum!

Nevertheless, if the philosophers have discovered anything which could be sufficient for the conducting of a good life and the attaining of a blessed one: how much more justly would divine honors be decreed to such men! How much better and more honest it would be that in the temple of Plato his books be read, than that in the temples of daemons the Galli be castrated, the effeminate be consecrated, the mad be cut, and whatever else either cruel or base, or basely cruel or cruelly base, is wont to be celebrated in the rites of such gods! How much more advisable it were, for educating the youth in justice, that the laws of the gods be publicly recited, than that the laws and institutions of the ancestors be vainly praised!

Omnes enim cultores talium deorum, mox ut eos libido perpulerit feruenti, ut ait Persius, tincta ueneno, magis intuentur quid luppiter fecerit, quam quid docuerit Plato uel censuerit Cato. Hinc apud Terentium flagitiosus adulescens spectat tabulam quandam pictam in pariete, ubi inerat pictura haec, Iouem Quo pacto Danaae misisse aiunt quondam in gremium imbrem aureum, atque ab hac tanta auctoritate adhibet patrocinium turpitudini suae, cum in ea se iactat imitari deum. At quem deum!

For all worshipers of such gods, as soon as lust, heated, as Persius says, tinged with poison, has driven them on, they look more to what Jupiter has done than to what Plato has taught or what Cato has decreed. Hence in Terence a flagitious adolescent looks at a certain painted panel on a wall, wherein there was this picture: Jupiter in what manner they say he once sent into Danae’s lap a golden shower, and from this so great an authority he brings in patronage for his own turpitude, since in this he boasts that he imitates a god. But what god!

inquit; qui templa caeli summo sonitu concutit. Ego hcmuncio id non facerem? Ego uero illud feci ac libens.

he says; who shakes the temples of heaven with the greatest crash. I, a homunculus, would not do this? Indeed I did that, and gladly.

[VIII] At enim non traduntur ista sacris deorum, sed fabulis poetarum. Nolo dicere illa mystica quam ista theatrica esse turpiora; hoc dico, quod negantes conuincit historia, eosdem illos ludos, in quibus regnant figmenta poetarum, non per inperitum obsequium sacris deorum suorum intulisse Romanos, sed ipsos deos, ut sibi sollemniter ederentur et honori suo consecrarentur, acerbe imperando et quodam modo extorquendo fecisse; quod in primo libro breui commemoratione perstrinxi.Nam ingrauescente pestilentia ludi scaenici auctoritate pontificum Romae primitus instituti sunt. Quis igitur in agenda uita non ea sibi potius sectanda arbitretur¡ quae actitantur ludis auctoritate diuina institutis, quam ea, quae scriptitantur legibus humano consilio promulgatis?

[8] But, you say, these things are not handed down by the sacred rites of the gods, but by the fables of the poets. I do not wish to say that those mystical things are more shameful than these theatrical ones; this I say, which history convicts those denying: that those same games, in which the figments of the poets reign, the Romans did not introduce into the rites of their gods through unskilled obsequium, but the gods themselves, by bitterly commanding and in a certain way extorting, brought it about that they be solemnly performed for themselves and consecrated to their honor; which in the first book I have just touched upon with a brief commemoration. For, as a pestilence grew worse, scenic games were first instituted at Rome by the authority of the pontiffs. Who, therefore, in the conduct of life, would not judge that those things are rather to be followed which are acted in games instituted by divine authority, than those which are written out in laws promulgated by human counsel?

Adulterum Iouem si poetae fallaciter prodiderunt, dii utique casti, quia tantum nefas per humanos ludos confictum est, non qui a neglectum, irasci ac uindicare debuerunt. Et haec sunt scaenicorum tolerabiliora ludorum, comoediae scilicet et tragoediae, hoc est fabulae poetarum agendae in spectaculis multa rerum turpitudine, sed nulla saltem, sicut alia multa, uerborum obscenitate compositae; quas etiam inter studia, quae honesta ac liberalia uocantur, pueri legere et discere coguntur a senibus.

If the poets have fallaciously portrayed Jove as an adulterer, the gods, to be sure, are chaste—since so great a nefarious deed was fabricated through human plays—not to have neglected it, but they ought to have been angry and to avenge it. And these are the more tolerable of the scenic games, namely comedies and tragedies, that is, the fables of the poets to be performed in spectacles, with much turpitude of things, yet at least composed with no obscenity of words, as many others are; which even among the studies that are called honorable and liberal, boys are compelled by elders to read and to learn.

[IX] Quid autem hinc senserint Romani ueteres, Cicero testatur in libris, quos de re publica scripsit, ubi Scipio disputans ait: m Numquam comoediae, nisi consuetudo uitae pateretur¡ probare sua theatris flagitia potuissent. "Et Graeci quidem antiquiores uitiosae suae opinionis quandam conuenientiam seruarunt, apud quos fuit etiam lege concessum, ut quod uellet comoedia, de quo uellet, nominatim diceret. Itaque, sicut in eisdem libris loquitur Africanus," quem illa non adtigit, uel potius quem non uexauit, cui pepercit?

[9] But what the old Romans thought about this, Cicero bears witness in the books which he wrote on the Republic, where Scipio, disputing, says: m Never could comedies have been able to display to the theaters their own disgraces, unless the custom of life permitted it¡ "And the earlier Greeks indeed kept a certain congruity with their own vicious opinion, among whom it was even granted by law that comedy should say by name whatever it wished, about whom it wished. "Accordingly, as the African speaks in these same books," whom did it not touch, or rather whom did it not vex; whom did it spare?

Esto, populares homines inprobos, in re publica seditiosos, Cleonem, Cleophontem, Hyperbolum laesit. Patiamur, inquit, etsi eius modi ciues a censore melius est quam a poeta notari. Sed Periclen, cum iam suae ciuitati maxima auctoritate plurimos annos domi et belli praefuisset, uiolari uersibus et eos agi in scaena non plus decuit, quam si Plautus, inquit, noster uoluisset aut Naeuius Publio et Gn. Scipioni aut Caecilius Marco Catoni maledicere.

Granted: he injured Cleon, Cleophon, Hyperbolus—popular leaders, depraved, seditious in the Republic. Let us tolerate it, he says, although citizens of such a kind are better to be censured by a censor than by a poet. But that Pericles, when he had already presided over his own city with the greatest authority for very many years in peace and in war, should be violated by verses, and that these be acted on the stage, was no more fitting than if Plautus, he says, our own, had wished, or Naevius, to speak ill of Publius and Gnaeus Scipio, or Caecilius of Marcus Cato.

"Dein paulo post:" Nostrae, inquit, contra duodecim tabulae cum perpaucas res capite sanxissent, in his hanc quoque sanciendam putauerunt, si quis occentauisset siue carmen condidisset, quod infamiam faceret flagitiumue alteri. Praeclare. Iudiciis enim magistratuum, disceptationibus legitimis propositam uitam, non poetarum ingeniis habere debemus, nec probrum audire nisi ea lege, ut respondere liceat et iudicio defendere.

"Then a little later: 'Our Twelve Tables,' he says, 'although they had sanctioned by capital statute very few matters, thought that this also should be sanctioned: if anyone should chant against or compose a song that would make infamy or a scandal for another.' Excellent. For we ought to have our life, set forth to view, governed by the judgments of magistrates and by lawful disputations, not by the talents of poets; nor should we hear reproach except on this condition, that it be permitted to reply and to defend oneself in judgment."

"Haec ex Ciceronis quarto de re publica libro ad uerbum excerpenda arbitratus sum, nonnullis propter faciliorem intellectum uel praetermissis uel paululum commutatis. Multum enim ad rem pertinet, quam molior explicare, si potero. Dicit deinde alia et sic concludit hunc locum, ut ostendat ueteribus displicuisse Romanis uel laudari quemquam in scaena uiuum hominem uel uituperari.

"These things from Cicero’s fourth book On the Republic I have judged should be excerpted verbatim, with some items, for the sake of easier understanding, either omitted or slightly altered. For it pertains much to the matter which I am laboring to explicate, if I can. Then he says other things and thus concludes this passage, so as to show that it displeased the Romans of old that any living man be either lauded on the stage or vituperated.

Sed, ut dixi, hoc Graeci quamquam inuerecundius, tamen conuenientius licere uoluerunt, cum uiderent diis suis accepta et grata esse opprobria non tantum hominum, uerum et ipsorum deorum in scaenicis fabulis, siue a poetis essent illa conficta, siue flagitia eorum uera commemorarentur et agerentur in theatris atque ab eorum cultoribus utinam solo risu, ac non etiam imitatione d i gn a uiderentur. Nimis enim superbum fuit famae parcere pnncipum ciuitatis et ciuium, ubi suae famae parci numina noluerunt.

But, as I said, the Greeks, although more shamelessly, yet more suitably, wished this to be permitted, when they saw that reproaches were acceptable and pleasing to their gods, not only of men, but even of the gods themselves, in scenic plays—whether those things had been fabricated by poets, or their disgraces were truly commemorated and enacted in the theaters—and by their worshipers would that they seemed only for laughter, and not also w o r t h y of imitation. For it was too proud to spare the fame of the princes of the commonwealth and of the citizens, when the divinities were unwilling that their own fame be spared.

[X] Nam quod adfertur pro defensione, non illa uera in deos dici, sed falsa atque conficta, id ipsum est scelestius, si pietatem consulas religionis; si autem malitiam daemonum cogites, quid astutius ad decipiendum atque callidius? Cum enim probrum iacitur in principem patriae bonum atque utilem, nonne tanto est indignius, quanto a ueritate remotius et a uita illius alienius? Quae igitur supplicia sufficiunt, cum deo fit ista tam nefaria, tam insignis iniuria?

[X] For what is brought forward for defense—that not truths are spoken about the gods, but false and fabricated things—that very thing is more criminal, if you consult the piety of religion; but if you consider the malice of the daemons, what could be more astute for deceiving and more crafty? For when opprobrium is hurled at the chief of the fatherland, good and useful, is it not so much the more outrageous, the more it is removed from truth and more alien from his life? What punishments, then, suffice, when to a god there is done so nefarious, so signal an injury?

Sed maligni spiritus, quos isti deos putant, etiam flagitia, quae non admiserunt, de se dici uolunt, dum tamen humanas mentes his opinionibus uelut retibus induant et ad praedestinatum supplicium secum trahant, siue homines ista commiserint, quos deos haberi gaudent, qui humanis erroribus gaudent, pro quibus se etiam colendos mille nocendi fallendique artibus interponunt; siue etiam non ullorum hominum illa crimina uera sint, quae tamen de numinibus fingi libenter accipiunt fallacissimi spiritus, ut ad scelesta ac turpia perpetranda uelut ab ipso caelo traduci in terras satis idonea uideatur auctoritas. Cum igitur Graeci talium numinum seruos se esse sentirent, inter tot et tanta eorum theatrica opprobria parcendum sibi a poetis nullo modo putauerunt, uel diis suis etiam sic consimilari adpetentes, uel metuentes, ne honestiorem famam ipsi requirendo et eis se hoc modo praeferendo illos ad iracundiam prouocarent.

But malignant spirits, whom those people suppose to be gods, even want crimes which they have not committed to be said of themselves, provided only that they enwrap human minds with these opinions as if with nets and drag them with themselves to the predestined punishment—whether men have perpetrated those things, whom they rejoice to have reckoned as gods, who rejoice in human errors, on account of whom they also thrust themselves in to be worshiped by a thousand arts of harming and deceiving; or even if those accusations are true of no men at all, yet the most deceitful spirits gladly receive that these be fabricated about the divinities, so that for committing wicked and base deeds, an authority may seem sufficiently fit as if translated down from heaven itself into the lands. Therefore, since the Greeks felt themselves to be servants of such numina, amid so many and so great theatrical reproaches of theirs they by no means thought they should be spared by the poets—either seeking thus even to be made similar to their gods, or fearing lest, by demanding a more honorable reputation for themselves and by thus preferring themselves to them, they should provoke those gods to irascibility.

[XI] Ad hanc conuenientiam pertinet, quod etiam scaenicos actores earundem fabularum non paruo ciuitatis honore dignos existimarunt, si quidem, quod in eo quoque de re publica libro commemoratur, et Aeschines Atheniensis, uir eloquentissimus, cum adulescens tragoedias actitauisset, rem publicam capessiuit et Aristodemum, tragicum item actorem, maximus de rebus pacis ac belli legatum ad Philippum Athenienses saepe miserunt. Non enim consentaneum putabatur, cum easdem artes eosdemque scaenicos ludos etiam diis suis acceptos uiderent, illos, per quos agerentur, infamium loco ac numero deputare. Haec Graeci turpiter quidem, sed sane diis suis omnino congruenter, qui nec uitam ciuium lacerandam linguis poetarum et histrionum subtrahere ausi sunt, a quibus cernebant deorum uitam eisdem ipsis diis uolentibus et libentibus carpi, et ipsos homines, per quos ista in theatris agebantur, quae numinibus quibus subditi erant grata esse cognouerant, non solum minime spernendos in ciuitate, uerum etiam maxime honorandos putarunt.

[11] To this congruence pertains the fact that they even judged the stage-actors of those same fables worthy of no small civic honor—since indeed, as is also recorded in that book On the Republic, both Aeschines the Athenian, a most eloquent man, after he had as a youth performed tragedies, entered the service of the Republic; and the Athenians often sent Aristodemus, likewise a tragic actor, as principal legate to Philip on the greatest matters of peace and war. For it was not thought consistent, when they saw that the same arts and the same scenic games were acceptable even to their gods, to reckon those through whom they were performed among the class and number of the infamous. These things the Greeks did shamefully, to be sure, yet altogether congruently with their gods—who did not dare to withdraw the lives of their citizens from being lacerated by the tongues of poets and actors, by whom they saw the life of the gods, with the gods themselves willing and gladly consenting, being torn to shreds—and they judged that the very men through whom those things were enacted in the theaters, which they had come to know were pleasing to the numina to whom they were subject, ought not only by no means to be despised in the state, but even to be most highly honored.

Quid enim causae reperire possent, cur sacerdotes honorarent, quia per eos uictimas diis acceptabiles offerebant, et scaenicos probrosos haberent, per quos illam uoluptatem siue honorem diis exhiberi petentibus et, nisi fieret, irascentibus eorum admonitione didicerant? cum praesertim Labeo, quem huiusce modi rerum peritissimum praedicant, numina bona a numinibus malis ista etiam cultus diuersitate distinguat, ut malos deos propitiari caedibus et tristibus supplicationibus asserat, bonos autem obsequiis laetis atque iucundis, qualia sunt, ut ipse ait, ludi conuiuia lectisternia. Quod totum quale sit, postea, si Deus iuuerit, diligentius disseremus.

For what cause, indeed, could they find why they should honor the priests, because through them they offered victims acceptable to the gods, and hold the stage-actors disgraceful, through whom that pleasure or honor was being exhibited to the gods—who, by the gods’ own admonition, they had learned were requesting it and would grow angry if it were not done? especially since Labeo, whom they proclaim most skilled in matters of this sort, distinguishes good numina from evil numina even by this diversity of cult, so as to assert that evil gods are to be propitiated by slaughters and gloomy supplications, but good ones by cheerful and pleasant observances, such as, as he himself says, games, banquets, and lectisternia. What the whole of this amounts to we shall discuss more carefully hereafter, if God shall aid.

Nunc ad rem praesentem quod adtinet, siue omnibus omnia tamquam bonis permixte tribuantur (neque enim esse decet deos malos, cum potius isti, quia inmundi sunt spiritus, omnes sint mali), siue certa discretione, sicut Labeoni uisum est, illis illa, istis ista distribuantur obsequia, competentissime Graeci utrosque honori ducunt, et sacerdotes, per quos uictimae ministrantur, et scaenicos, per quos ludi exhibentur, ne uel omnibus diis suis, si et ludi omnibus grati sunt, uel, quod est indignius, his, quos bonos putant, si ludi ab eis solis amantur, facere conuincantur iniuriam.

Now, as concerns the present matter, whether all things are, as to good beings, indiscriminately attributed to all (for it is not seemly that gods be evil, since rather these, because they are unclean spirits, are all evil), or whether, with a certain discrimination, as Labeo thought, those services be distributed to those and these to these, most fittingly the Greeks hold both in honor—both the priests, through whom the sacrificial victims are ministered, and the scenic performers, through whom the games are exhibited—lest they be convicted of doing injury either to all their gods, if the games are pleasing to all, or, what is more unworthy, to those whom they deem good, if the games are loved by them alone.

[XII] At Romani, sicut in illa de re publica disputatione Scipio gloriatur, probris et iniuriis poetarum subiectam uitam famamque habere noluerunt, capite etiam sancientes, tale carmen condere si quis auderet. Quod erga se quidem satis honeste constituerunt, sed erga deos suos superbe et inreligiose; quos cum scirent non solum patienter, uerum etiam libenter poetarum probris maledictisque lacerari, se potius quam illos huiusce modi iniuriis indignos esse duxerunt seque ab eis etiam lege munierunt, illorum autem ista etiam sacris sollemnitatibus miscuerunt. Itane tandem, Scipio, laudas hanc poetis Romanis negatam esse licentiam, ut cuiquam opprobrium infligerent Romanorum, cum uideas eos nulli deorum pepercisse uestrorum?

[12] But the Romans, as Scipio boasts in that disputation on the Republic, did not wish to have their life and fame subjected to the reproaches and injuries of poets, even sanctioning by capital penalty, if anyone should dare to compose such a poem. Which with respect to themselves indeed they established quite honorably, but with respect to their own gods arrogantly and irreligiously; since they knew that those were not only patiently, but even gladly, torn by the poets’ reproaches and revilings, they judged that they themselves rather than they were unworthy of injuries of this sort, and even by law they fortified themselves against them, but they mixed those very things of theirs also into sacred solemnities. So then, Scipio, do you praise that this license was denied to Roman poets, that they should inflict opprobrium upon any of the Romans, when you see that they spared none of your gods?

Itane pluris tibi habenda uisa est existimatio curiae uestrae quam Capitolii, immo Romae unius quam caeli totius, ut linguam maledicam in ciues tuos exercere poetae etiam lege prohiberentur, et in deos tuos securi tanta conuicia nullo senatore nullo censore, nullo principe nullo pontifice prohibente iacularentur? Indignum uidelicet fuit, ut Plautus aut Naeuius Publio et Gn. Scipioni aut Caecilius M. Catoni malediceret, et dignum fuit, ut Terentius uester flagitio louis optimi maximi adulescentium nequitiam concitaret?

So then did the estimation of your Curia seem to you to be to be held of more value than that of the Capitol, nay, that of Rome alone than of the whole heaven, to the point that poets were even by law forbidden to exercise an abusive tongue against your citizens, while, secure, they might hurl such revilings against your gods, with no senator, no censor, no princeps, no pontiff forbidding? It was, forsooth, unworthy that Plautus or Naevius should speak ill of Publius and Gnaeus Scipio, or that Caecilius should revile Marcus Cato, and it was worthy that your Terence should, by the scandal of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, incite the profligacy of adolescents?

[XIII] Sed responderet mihi fortasse, si uiueret: Quo modo nos ista inpunita esse nollemus, quae ipsi dii sacra esse uoluerunt, cum ludos scaenicos, ubi talia celebrantur dictitantur actitantur, et Romanis moribus inuexerunt et suis honoribus dicari exhiberique iusserunt? Cur non ergo hinc magis ipsi intellecti sunt non esse dii ueri nec omnino digni, quibus diuinos honores deferret illa res publica? Quos enim coli minime deceret minimeque oporteret, si ludos expeterent agendos conuiciis Romanorum, quo modo quaeso colendi putati sunt, quo modo non detestandi spiritus intellecti, qui cupiditate fallendi inter suos honores sua celebrari crimina poposcerunt?

[13] But he would perhaps answer me, if he were alive: In what way should we be unwilling that those things be left unpunished which the gods themselves have willed to be sacred, since the theatrical games, where such things are celebrated, bandied about, and acted, they both brought into Roman morals and ordered to be dedicated to and exhibited for their own honors? Why, then, were they not rather from this understood to be not true gods and in no way worthy for that commonwealth to defer divine honors to them? For those whom it would least befit and least be proper to be worshiped, if they were to demand games to be performed with the revilings of Romans, how, I ask, were they thought to be worshiped—how not understood to be detestable spirits, who, through a lust of deceiving, demanded that among their honors their own crimes be celebrated?

Itemque Romani, quamuis iam superstitione noxia premerentur, ut illos deos colerent, quos uidebant sibi uoluisse scaenicas turpitudines consecrari, suae tamen dignitatis memores ac pudoris actores talium fabularum nequaquam honorauerunt more Graecorum, sed, sicut apud Ciceronem idem Scipio loquitur," cum artem iudicram scaenamque totam in probro ducerent, genus id hominum non modo honore ciuium reliquorum carere, sed etiam tribu moueri notatione censoria uoluerunt. "Praeclara sanc et Romanis laudibus adnumeranda prudentia; sed uellem se ipsa sequeretur, se imitaretur. Ecce enim recte, quisquis ciuium Romanorum esse scaenicus elegisset, non solum ei nullus ad honorem dabatur locus, uerum etiam censoris nota tribum tenere propriam minime sinebatur.

Likewise the Romans, although already they were pressed by noxious superstition, so that they worshiped those gods whom they saw to have wished scenic turpitudes to be consecrated to themselves, yet, mindful of their own dignity and modesty, by no means honored the actors of such plays after the manner of the Greeks, but, just as in Cicero the same Scipio speaks," when they counted the ludic art and the whole stage as a disgrace, they wished that that kind of men not only lack the honor of the rest of the citizens, but even be removed from their tribe by a censorial notation. "Outstanding indeed, and prudence to be numbered among Roman praises; but I would that it should follow itself, imitate itself. For behold, rightly, whoever of the Roman citizens had chosen to be a stage-player, not only was no place given to him for honor, but also by the note of the censor he was by no means allowed to hold his own tribe.

O animum ciuitatis laudis auidum germaneque Romanum! Sed respondeatur mihi: qua consentanea ratione homines scaenici ab omni honore repelluntur, et ludi scaenici deorum honoribus admiscentur? Illas theatricas artes diu uirtus Romana non nouerat, quae si ad oblectamentum uoluptatis humanae quaererentur, uitio morum inreperent humanorum.

O spirit of the state, avid for praise and truly Roman! But let an answer be given me: by what consistent reason are scenic performers repelled from every honor, and scenic games are admixed to the honors of the gods? Those theatrical arts Roman virtue for a long time did not know, which, if they were sought for the oblectation (entertainment) of human pleasure, would creep in by a vice of human morals.

Dii eas sibi exhiberi petierunt: quo modo ergo abicitur scaenicus, per quem colitur Deus? et theatricae illius turpitudinis qua fronte notatur actor, si adoratur exactor? In hac controuersia Graeci Romanique concertent.

The gods requested that they be exhibited to them: how then is the stage-player cast off, through whom a deity is worshiped? and with what face is the actor branded for that theatrical turpitude, if the exactor is adored? In this controversy let Greeks and Romans contend.

Graeci putant recte se honorare homines scaenicos, quia colunt ludorum scaenicorum flagitatores deos; Romani uero hominibus scaenicis nec plebeiam tribum, quanto Ininus senatoriam curiam dehonestari sinunt. In hac disceptatione huiusce modi ratiocinatio summam quaestionis absoluit. Proponunt Graeci: Si dii tales colendi sunt, profecto etiam tales homines honorandi.

The Greeks think that they rightly honor stage-people, because they worship the gods who are demanders of scenic games; but the Romans indeed [grant] to stage-people not even a plebeian tribe, how much less do they allow the senatorial curia to be dishonored. In this disceptation, a ratiocination of this sort resolves the sum of the question. The Greeks propose: If such gods are to be worshiped, surely such men are also to be honored.

Adsumunt Romani: Sed nullo modo tales homines honorandi sunt. Concludunt Christiani: Nullo modo igitur dii tales colendi sunt.

The Romans assume: But in no way are such men to be honored. The Christians conclude: In no way, therefore, are such gods to be worshiped.

[XIV] Deinde quaerimus, ipsi poetae talium fabularum compositores, qui duodecim tabularum lege prohibentur famam laedere ciuium, tam probrosa in deos conuicia iaculantes cur non ut scaenici habeantur inhonesti. Qua ratione rectum est, ut poeticorum figmentorum et ignominiosorum deorum infamentur actores, honorentur auctores? An forte Graeco Platoni potius palma danda est, qui cum ratione formaret, qualis esse ciuitas debeat, tamquam aduersarios ueritatis poetas censuit urbe pellendos?

[14] Then we inquire why the poets themselves, composers of such fables, who by the law of the 12 Tables are forbidden to injure the reputation of citizens, as they hurl such opprobrious contumelies against the gods, are not held dishonorable like stage-players. By what reasoning is it right that the actors of poetic figments and of ignominious gods are defamed, while the authors are honored? Or perhaps the palm should rather be given to the Greek Plato, who, as he was with rational method shaping what a commonwealth ought to be, judged that poets, as adversaries of truth, should be expelled from the city?

Iste uero et deorum iniurias indigne tulit et fucari corrumpique figmentis animos ciuium noluit. Confer nunc Platonis humanitatem a ciuibus decipiendis poetas urbe pellentem cum deorunI diuinitate honori suo ludos scaenicos expetente. Ille, ne talia uel scriberentur, etsi non persuasit disputando, tamen suasit leuitati lasciuiaeque Graecorum; isti, ut talia etiam agerentur, iubendo extorserunt grauitati et modestiae Romanorum.

This man indeed both bore with indignation the injuries done to the gods and was unwilling that the minds of the citizens be painted over and corrupted by figments. Compare now the humanity of Plato—driving the poets out of the city to keep the citizens from being deceived—with the divinity of the gods seeking scenic games for its own honor. He, lest such things even be written, although he did not persuade by disputation, yet persuaded even the levity and wantonness of the Greeks; they, that such things might even be acted, by commanding wrung it from the gravity and modesty of the Romans.

Nec tantum haec agi uoluerunt, sed sibi dicari, sibi sacrari, sibi sollemniter exhiberi. Cui tandem honestius diuinos honores decerneret ciuitas? utrum Platoni haec turpia et nefanda prohibenti, an daemonibus hac hominum deceptione gaudentibus, quibus ille uera persuadere non potuit?

Nor did they wish only that these things be done, but that they be dedicated to themselves, consecrated to themselves, solemnly exhibited to themselves. To whom, then, would the commonwealth more honorably decree divine honors? Whether to Plato, prohibiting these shameful and nefarious things, or to the daemons rejoicing in this deception of men, to whom he could not persuade truths?

Hunc Platonem Labeo inter semideos commemorandum putauit, sicut Herculem, sicut Romulum. Semideos autem heroibus anteponit; sed utrosque inter numina conlocat. Verum tamen istum, quem appellat semideum, non heroibus tantum, sed etiam diis ipsis praeferendum esse non dubito.

Labeo thought that this Plato was to be commemorated among semigods, just like Hercules, just like Romulus. Moreover, he sets semigods before heroes; but he places both among the divine powers. Yet, nevertheless, this man, whom he calls a semigod, I do not doubt is to be preferred not only to the heroes, but even to the gods themselves.

Propinquant autem Romanorum leges disputationibus Platonis, quando ille cuncta poetica figmenta condemnat, isti autem poetis adimunt saltem in homines maledicendi licentiam; ille poetas ab urbis ipsius habitatione, isti saltem actores poeticarum fabularum remouent a societate ciuitatis; et si contra deos ludorum scaenicorum expetitores aliquid auderent, forte undique remouerent. Nequaquam igitur leges ad instituendos bonos aut corrigendos malos mores a diis suis possent accipere seu sperare Romani, quos legibus suis uincunt atque conuincunt. Illi enim honori suo deposcunt ludos scaenicos, isti ab honoribus omnibus repellunt homines scaenicos; illi celebrari sibi iubent figmentis poeticis opprobria deorum, isti ab opprobriis hominum deterrent inpudentiam poetarum.

But the laws of the Romans draw near to Plato’s disputations, inasmuch as he condemns all poetic figments, while these take away from the poets at least the license of slandering men; he removes poets from the habitation of the city itself, they at least remove the actors of poetic plays from the society of the commonwealth; and if they dared anything against the gods who demand scenic games, perhaps they would remove them utterly. By no means, therefore, could the Romans receive or hope to receive from their gods laws for establishing good morals or correcting bad ones—gods whom they bind and convict by their own laws. For those demand scenic games for their own honor; these repel men of the stage from all honors. Those command that the disgraces of the gods be celebrated for them by poetic figments; these deter the shamelessness of poets from opprobrious attacks upon men.

Semideus autem ille Plato et talium deorum libidini restitit, et ab indole Romanorum quid perficiendum esset ostendit, qui poeta s ipsos uel pro arbitrio mentientes uel hominibus miseris quasi deorum facta pessima imitanda proponentes omnino in ciuitate bene instituta uiuere noluit. Nos quidem Platonem nec deum nec semideum perhibemus, nec ulli sancto angelo summi Dei nec ueridico prophetae nec apostolo alicui nec cuilibet Christi martyri nec cuiquam Christiano homini comparamus; cuius nostrae sententiae ratio Deo prosperante suo loco explicabitur. Sed eum tamen, quando quidem ipsi uolunt fuisse semideum, praeferendum esse censemus, si non Romulo et Herculi (quamuis istum nec fratrem occidisse, nec aliquod perpetrasse flagitium quisquam historicorum uel poetarum dixit aut finxit), certe uel Priapo uel alicui Cynocephalo, postremo uel Febri, quae Romani numina partim peregrina receperunt, paffim sua propria sacrauerunt.

But that semigod Plato resisted the libido of such gods, and showed from the indoles of the Romans what ought to be brought to completion: he did not wish poets themselves—either lying at their own discretion, or proposing to wretched men the very worst deeds of the gods as things to be imitated—at all to live in a well-instituted civitas. We, for our part, declare Plato neither god nor semigod, nor do we compare him to any holy angel of the Most High God, nor to any truthful prophet, nor to any apostle, nor to any martyr of Christ, nor to any Christian man; the rationale of which our judgment, God prospering, will be explained in its proper place. Yet we judge that he, since they themselves are willing that he was a semigod, is to be preferred, if not to Romulus and Hercules (although of this man neither that he killed a brother nor that he perpetrated any flagitious crime did any historian or poet say or feign), certainly at least to Priapus or to some Cynocephalus, and finally even to Fever, numina which the Romans received in part as foreign, and everywhere consecrated their own homegrown ones.

Quo modo igitur tanta animi et morum mala bonis praeceptis et legibus uel inminentia prohiberent, uel insita extirpanda curarent dii tales, qui etiam seminanda et augenda flagitia curauerunt, talia uel sua uel quasi sua facta per theatricas celebritates populis innotescere cupientes, ut tamquam auctoritate diuina sua sponte nequissima libido accenderetur humana, frustra hoc exclamante Cicerone, qui cum de poetis ageret: "Ad quos cum accessit, inquit, clamor et adprobatio populi quasi cuiusdam magni et sapientis magistri, quas illi obducunt tenebras, quos inuehunt metus, quas inflammant cupiditates!"

How, then, could such gods—who even took care that flagitious crimes be sown and increased, desiring that such deeds, whether their own or as if their own, become known to the peoples through theatrical celebrations—either by good precepts and laws prevent great evils of mind and morals when impending, or see to the extirpation of those inborn; in order that, as though by divine authority, the most nefarious libido in humankind would of its own accord be kindled—while Cicero cries this out in vain, who, when he was treating of the poets, says: "When there has been added to them," he says, "the clamor and approbation of the people, as of some great and wise magister, what darknesses they draw over, what fears they import, what cupidities they inflame!"

[XV] Quae autem illic eligendorum deorum etiam ipsorum falsorum ratio ac non potius adulatio est? quando istum Platonem, quem semideum uolunt, tantis disputationibus laborantem, ne animi malis, quae praecipue cauenda sunt, mores corrumperentur humani, nulla sacra aedicula dignum putarunt, et Romulum suum diis multis praetulerunt, quamuis et ipsum semideum potius quam deum ueIut secretior eorum doctrina commendet. Nam etiam flaminem illi instituerunt, quod sacerdotii genus adeo in Romanis sacris testante apice excelluit, ut tres solos flamines haberent tribus numinibus institutos, Dialem loui, Martialem Marti, Quirinalem Romulo.

[15] But what, there, is the rationale for selecting gods—even those false ones themselves—and not rather adulation? since this Plato, whom they want to have been a demigod, laboring with such disputations lest by the evils of the mind, which are especially to be guarded against, human morals be corrupted, they judged worthy of no sacred aedicule, and they preferred their Romulus to many gods, although even him their more esoteric doctrine commends as a demigod rather than a god. For they even instituted for him a flamen—a genus of priesthood which, with the apex as witness, so excelled in the Roman sacred rites—that they had only three flamines established for three numina: the Dialis for Jupiter, the Martialis for Mars, the Quirinalis for Romulus.

Nam beneuolentia ciuium uelut receptus in caelum Quirinus est postea nominatus. Ac per hoc et Neptuno et Plutoni, fratribus louis, et ipsi Saturno, patri eorum, isto Romulus honore praelatus est, ut pro magno sacerdotium, quod loui tribuerant, hoc etiam huic tribuerent, et Marti tamquam patri eius forsitan propter ipsum.

For by the benevolence of the citizens he was, as it were, received into heaven, and afterward was named Quirinus. And through this Romulus was preferred in this honor even to Neptune and Pluto, the brothers of Jupiter, and to Saturn himself, their father, so that, as a great distinction, the priesthood which they had assigned to Jupiter they also assigned to him, and to Mars as if his father, perhaps on account of him.

[XVI] Si autem a diis suis Romani uiuendi leges accipere potuissent, non aliquot annos post Romam conditam ab Atheniensibus mutuarentur leges Solonis, quas tamen non ut acceperunt , sed meliores et emendatiores facere conati sunt, quamuis Lycurgus Lacedaemoniis leges ex Apollinis auctoritate se instituisse confinxerit, quod prudenter Romani credere noluerunt, propterea non inde acceperunt. Numa Pompilius, qui Romulo successit in regnum, quasdam leges, quae quidem regendae ciuitati nequaquam sufficerent, condidisse fertur, qui eis multa etiam sacra constituit; non tamen perhibetur easdem leges a numinibus accepisse. Mala igitur animi, mala uitae, mala morum, quae ita magna sunt, ut his doctissimi eorum uiri etiam stantibus urbibus res publicas perire confirment, dii eorum, ne suis cultoribus acciderent, minime curarunt; immo uero ut augerentur, sicut supra disputatum est, omni modo curarunt.

[16] But if the Romans had been able to receive laws for living from their gods, they would not, some years after Rome was founded, have borrowed the laws of Solon from the Athenians, which, however, they did not hold as they received them, but tried to make them better and more emended, although Lycurgus fabricated the claim that he had established laws for the Lacedaemonians by the authority of Apollo—a thing the Romans prudently were unwilling to believe, and therefore did not receive them from there. Numa Pompilius, who succeeded Romulus in the kingdom, is reported to have enacted certain laws, which indeed were by no means sufficient for governing the commonwealth, and he also established many sacred rites for them; yet he is not said to have received those same laws from the divinities. Therefore the evils of the mind, the evils of life, the evils of morals—which are so great that their most learned men affirm that by these the commonwealths perish even while the cities stand—their gods took no care to prevent from befalling their worshipers; nay rather, as was discussed above, they took care in every way that they be increased.

[XVII] An forte populo Romano propterea leges non sunt a numinibus constitutae, quia, sicut Sallustius ait," ius bonumque apud eos non legibus magis quam natura ualebat w? Ex hoc iure ac bono credo raptas Sabinas. Quid enim iustius et melius quam filias alienas fraude spectaculi inductas non a parentibus accipi, sed ui, ut quisque poterat, auferri? Nam si inique facerent Sabini negare postulatas, quanto fuit iniquius rapere non datas!

[XVII] Or perhaps for this reason laws were not constituted for the Roman people by the divinities, because, as Sallust says, "right and the good prevailed among them not so much by laws as by nature w?" From this right and good, I suppose, the Sabine women were seized. For what is more just and better than that other men’s daughters, lured in by the fraud of a spectacle, should not be received from their parents, but be carried off by force, each man as he was able? For if the Sabines were acting unjustly in refusing the ones requested, how much more unjust was it to snatch those not granted!

Iustius autem bellum cum ea gente geri potuit, quae filias suas ad matrimonium conregionalibus et confinalibus suis negasset petitas, quam cum ea, quae repetebat ablatas. Illud ergo potius fierit; ibi Mars filium suum pugnantem iuuaret, ut coniugiorum negatorum armis ulcisceretur iniuriam, et eo modo ad feminas, quas uoluerat, perueniret. Aliquo enim fortasse iure belli iniuste negatas iuste uictor auferret; nullo autem iure pacis non datas rapuit et iniustum bellum cum earum parentibus iuste suscensentibus gessit.

But a war could more justly have been waged with that people who had denied their daughters, sought in marriage, to their conregional and confinal neighbors, than with that people which was demanding back those carried off. Therefore that rather should have been done; there Mars would have aided his son as he fought, so that he might avenge by arms the injury of the marriages denied, and in that way might attain to the women whom he had desired. For by some law of war perhaps a victor would justly carry off those unjustly refused; yet by no law of peace did he seize those not given, and he waged an unjust war with their parents, who were justly resentful.

Hoc sane utilius f e licius q ue successit, quod, etsi ad memoriam fraudis illius circensium spectaculum mansit, facinoris tamen in illa ciuitate et imperio non placuit exemplum, faciliusque Romani in hoc errauerunt, ut post illam iniquitatem deum sibi Romulum consecrarent, quam ut in feminis rapiendis factum eius imitandum lege ulla uel more permitterent. Ex hoc iure ac bono post expulsum cum liberis suis regem Tarquinium, cuius filius Lucretiam stupro uiolenter oppresserat, Iunius Brutus consul Lucium Tarquinium Collatinum, maritum eiusdem Lucretiae, collegam suum, bonum atque innocentem uirum, propter nomen et propinquitatem Tarquiniorum coegit magistratu se abdicare nec uiuere in ciuitate permisit. Quod scelus fauente uel patiente populo fecit, a quo populo consulatum idem Collatinus sicut etiam ipse Brutus acceperat.

This indeed turned out more usefully and more felicitously, because, although the circus spectacle remained as a memorial of that fraud, nevertheless in that city and empire the example of the deed did not find favor; and the Romans more readily erred in this, that after that iniquity they consecrated Romulus as a god for themselves, than that in the seizing of women they should permit his act to be imitated by any law or custom. From this “right and good” it followed that, after King Tarquin had been expelled with his children—whose son had violently overpowered Lucretia by rape—Junius Brutus, the consul, compelled Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus, the husband of that same Lucretia, his colleague, a good and innocent man, on account of the name and kinship of the Tarquins, to abdicate his magistracy, nor did he permit him to live in the city. This crime he perpetrated with the people favoring or tolerating it, by which same people Collatinus, just as Brutus himself, had received the consulship.

Ex hoc iure ac bono Marcus Camillus, illius temporis uir egregius, qui Veientes, grauissimos hostes populi Romani, post decennale bellum, quo Romanus exercitus totiens male pugnando grauiter adflictus est, iam ipsa Roma de salute dubitante atque trepidante facillime superauit eorumque urbem opulentissimam cepit, inuidia obtrectatorum uirtutis suae et insolentia tribunorum plebis reus factus est tamque ingratam sensit quam liberauerat ciuitatem, ut de sua damnatione certissimus in exilium sponte discederet et decem milia aeris absens etiam damnaretur, mox iterum a Gallis uindex patriae futurus ingratae. Multa commemorare iam piget foeda et iniusta, quibus agitabatur illa ciuitas, cum potentes plebem sibi subdere conarentur plebsque illis subdi recusaret, et utriusque partis defensores magis studiis agerent amore uincendi, quam aequum et bonum quicquam cogitarent.

From this right and good, Marcus Camillus, an outstanding man of that time, who, after a decennial war in which the Roman army, by fighting ill, had so often been grievously afflicted, with Rome herself now doubting for her safety and trembling, very easily overcame the Veientes, most weighty enemies of the Roman people, and captured their most opulent city, was made a defendant through the envy of the detractors of his virtue and the insolence of the tribunes of the plebs, and he felt the city he had freed to be so ungrateful that, being most certain of his condemnation, he voluntarily departed into exile, and even while absent was condemned to ten thousand asses, soon thereafter again to be the avenger of his ungrateful fatherland from the Gauls. It now wearies me to recount many foul and unjust things by which that city was tossed, when the powerful were trying to subject the plebs to themselves and the plebs refused to be subjected to them, and the defenders of each party were driven more by partisanship with a love of winning than were thinking anything fair and good.

[XVIII] Itaque habebo modum et ipsum Sallustium testem potius adhibebo, qui cum in laude Romanorum dixisset, unde nobis iste sermo ortus est:" lus bonumque apud eos non legibus. magis quam natura ualebat, "praedicans illud tempus, quo expulsis regibus incredibiliter ciuitas breui aetatis spatio plurimum creuit, idem tamen in primo historiae suae libro atque ipso eius exordio fatetur etiam tunc, cum ad consules a regibus esset translata res publica, post paruum interuallum iniurias ualidiorum et ob eas discessionem plebis a patribus aliasque in Vrbe dissensiones fuisse. Nam cum optimis moribus et maxima concordia populum Romanum inter secundum et postremum bellum Carthaginiense commemorasset egisse causamque huius boni non amorem iustitiae, sed stante Carthagine metum pacis infidae fuisse dixisset nunde et Nasica ille ad reprimendam nequitiam seruandosque istos mores optimos, ut metu uitia cohiberentur, Carthaginem nolebat euertiJ: continuo subiecit idem Sallustius et ait:" At discordia et auaritia atque ambitio et cetera secundis rebus oriri sueta mala post Carthaginis excidium maxime aucta sunt, w ut intellegeremus etiam anteka et/ oriri solere et augeri.

[18] Therefore I will keep measure and will rather employ Sallust himself as witness, who, when in praise of the Romans he had said—whence this discourse of ours has arisen—"the right and the good among them prevailed not by laws so much as by nature," proclaiming that time when, the kings having been expelled, the city in an incredibly short span of years grew exceedingly; yet the same man, in the first book of his History and in its very beginning, confesses that even then, when the commonwealth had been transferred from kings to consuls, after a small interval there were injustices of the stronger and, on account of these, a secession of the plebs from the fathers (the patricians) and other dissensions in the City. For when he had recalled that the Roman people conducted itself with the best morals and the greatest concord between the Second and the last Punic War, and had said that the cause of this good was not love of justice, but—while Carthage stood—the fear of a faithless peace (whence also that Nasica, for the repressing of wickedness and the preserving of those best morals, in order that vices might be restrained by fear, did not wish Carthage to be overthrown), immediately the same Sallust subjoined and says: "But discord and avarice and ambition, and the other evils wont to arise in prosperous circumstances, were especially increased after the destruction of Carthage, so that we might understand that even before they are wont both to arise and to be augmented."

Vnde subnectens cur hoc dixerit:" Nam iniuriae, inquit, ualidiorum et ob eas discessio pleb is a patribus aliaeque dissensiones domi fuere iam inde a principio, neque amplius quam regibus exactis, dum metus a Tarquinio et bellum graue cum Etruria positum est, aequo et modesto iure agitatum. "Vides quem ad modum etiam illo tempore breui, ut regibus exactis, id est eiectis, aliquantum aequo et modesto iure ageretur, metum dixit fuisse causam, quoniam metuebatur bellum, quod rex Tarquinius regno atque Vrbe pulsus Etruscis sociatus contra Romanos gerebat. Adtende itaque quid deinde contexat: "Dein, inquit, seruili imperio patres plebem exercere, de uita atque tergo regio more consulere, agro pellere et ceteris expertibus soli in imperio agere.

Whence subjoining why he said this: "For the injuries of the stronger, he says, and on account of them the secession of the plebs from the patres and other dissensions at home were already from the beginning, nor, for more than when the kings were driven out, while fear from Tarquinius and a grave war with Etruria was posed, was it managed by fair and modest right." You see in what manner even at that time, briefly, when the kings had been driven out, that is, cast out, things were conducted somewhat by fair and modest right; he said fear was the cause, since war was feared, which King Tarquinius, expelled from his kingdom and from the City, waged against the Romans in league with the Etruscans. Attend therefore to what he then interweaves: "Then, he says, with a servile imperium the patres exercised the plebs, concerning life and back they deliberated in a regal manner, they drove them from their land, and with the rest left out, they alone acted in imperium."

Quibus saeuitiis et maxime faenore oppressa plebes cum assiduis bellis tributum et militiam simul toleraret, armata montem sacrum atque Auentinum insedit, tumque tribunos plebis et alia iura sibi parauit. Discordiarum et certaminis utrimque finis fuit secundum bellum Punicum. "Cernis ex quo tempore, id est paruo interuallo post reges exactos, quales Romani fuerint, de quibus ait: "Ius bonumque apud eos non legibus magis quam natura ualebat." Porro si illa tempora talia reperiuntur, quibus pulcherrima atque optima fuisse praedicatur Romana res publica, quid iam de consequenti aetate dicendum aut cogitandum arbitramur, cum" paulatim mutata, ut eiusdem historici uerbis utar, ex pulcherrima atque optima pessima ac flagitiosissima facta est, "post Carthaginis uidelicet, ut commemorauit, excidium?

By these savageries, and most of all by usury, the plebs, while with continual wars it was at once enduring the tribute and the military service, took up arms and occupied the Sacred Mount and the Aventine, and then procured for itself tribunes of the plebs and other rights. The end of discords and of contest on both sides was the Second Punic War. “You see from what time, that is, a small interval after the kings were driven out, of what sort the Romans were, of whom he says: ‘Right and good among them prevailed not so much by laws as by nature.’” Moreover, if those times are found to be such, during which the Roman res publica is proclaimed to have been most beautiful and best, what now do we think ought to be said or thought about the subsequent age, when “gradually changed, to use the words of the same historian, from most beautiful and best it became worst and most flagitious,” “after, namely, the destruction of Carthage, as he has recalled?”

Quae tempora ipse Sallustius quem ad modum breuiter recolat et describat, in eius historia legi potest; quantis malis morum, quae secundis rebus exorta sunt, usque ad bella ciuilia demonstret esse peruentum." Ex quo tempore, ut ait, maiorum mores non paulatim ut antea, sed torrentis modo praecipitati, adeo iuuentus luxu a tque au a ritia corrupta, ut merito dicatur genitos esse, qui neque ipsi habere possent res familiares neque alios pati. "Dicit deinde plura Sallustius de Sullae uitiis ceteraque foeditate rei publicae, et alii scriptores in haec consentiunt, quamuis eloquio multum impari. Cernis tamen, ut opinor, et q uisquis aduerterit, facillime perspicit, conluuie morum pess i mor u "quo illa ciuitas prolapsa fuerit ante nostri superni regis aduentum.

Which times Sallust himself briefly recollects and describes can be read in his history; he shows that, through how great evils of morals, which arose from prosperous circumstances, it came even to the civil wars. From that time, as he says, the customs of the ancestors were not, little by little as before, but in the manner of a torrent, precipitated; to such a degree was the youth corrupted by luxury and avarice, that it may rightly be said there were born those who could neither themselves hold private property nor allow others to do so. Sallust then says more about Sulla’s vices and the other foulness of the commonwealth, and other writers agree in these matters, although with eloquence very unequal. You see, however, as I suppose, and whoever attends easily perceives, by what deluge of the worst morals that state had lapsed before the advent of our supernal king.

Haec enim gesta sunt non solum antequam Christus in carne praesens docere coepisset, uerum etiam antequam de uirgine natus esset. Cum igitur tot et tanta mala temporum illorum uel tolerabiliora superius, uel post euersam Carthaginem intoleranda et horrenda diis suis inputare non audeant, opiniones humanis mentibus, unde talia uitia siluescerent, astutia maligna inserentibus: cur mala praesentia Christo inputant, qui doctrina saluberrima et falsos ac fallaces deos coli uetat et istas hominum noxias flagitioSasque cupiditates diuina auctoritate detestans atque condemnans his malis tabescenti ac labenti mundo ubique familiam suam sensim subtrahit, qua condat aeternam et non plausu uanitatis, sed iudicio ueritatis gloriosissimam ciuitatem?

For these things were done not only before Christ, present in the flesh, began to teach, but even before he was born of a virgin. Therefore, since they do not dare to impute to their gods so many and so great evils of those times—either the earlier, more tolerable ones mentioned above, or, after Carthage was overthrown, the intolerable and horrendous ones—while, with malignant cunning, they are inserting into human minds opinions by which such vices grow wild: why do they impute present evils to Christ, who, with a most salubrious doctrine, forbids false and fallacious gods to be worshiped, and, detesting and condemning by divine authority those noxious and flagitious desires of men, everywhere gradually withdraws his own household from a world that, in these evils, is wasting away and sliding into ruin, so that by it he may found an eternal city, most glorious not by the applause of vanity but by the judgment of truth?

[XIX] Ecce Romana res publica nquod non ego primus dico, sed auctores eorum, unde haec mercede didicimus, tanto ante dixerunt ante Christi aduentum/ "paulatim mutata ex pulcherrima atque optima pessima ac flagitiosissima facta est. w Ecce ante Christi aduentum, post deletam Carthaginem m maiorum mores non paulatim, ut antea, sed torrentis modo praecipitati, adeo iuuentus luxu atque auaritia corrupta est. w Legant nobis contra Iuxum et auaritiam praecepta deorum suorum populo Romano data; cui utinam tantum casta et modesta reticerent, ac non etiam ab illo probrosa et ignominiosa deposcerent, quibus per falsam diuinitatem perniciosam conciliarent auctoritatem.

[19] Behold the Roman republic—which not I am the first to say, but their authorities, from whom we learned these things for a fee, said so long before—before Christ’s advent/ "little by little it was changed from most beautiful and best into worst and most flagitious. w Behold before Christ’s advent, after Carthage was destroyed m the mores of the ancestors not little by little, as before, but in the manner of a torrent were precipitated, to such a degree was the youth corrupted by luxury and avarice. w Let them read to us against luxury and avarice the precepts given by their gods to the Roman people; would that they had only kept back chaste and modest things, and had not also demanded from them disgraceful and ignominious things, by which through a false divinity they might procure a pernicious authority.

Legant nostra et per prophetas et per sanctum euangelium, et per apostolicos actus et per epistulas tam multa contra auaritiam atque luxuriam ubique populis ad hoc congregatis quam excellenter, quam diuine non tamquam ex philosophorum concertationibus strepere, sed tamquam ex oraculis et Dei nubibus intonare. Et tamen luxu atque auaritia saeuisque ac turpibus moribus ante aduentum Christi rem publicam pessimam ac flagitiosissimam factam non inputant diis suis; adflictionem uero eius, quamcumque isto tempore superbia deliciaeque eorum perpessae fuerint, religioni increpitant Christianae. Cuius praecepta de iustis probisque moribus si simul audirent atque curarent reges terrae et omnes populi, principes et omnes iudices terrae, iuuenes et uirgines, seniores cum iunioribus, aetas omnis capax et uterque sexus, et quos baptista lohannes adloquitur, exactores ipsi atque milites: et terras uitae praesentis ornaret sua felicitate res publica, et uitae aeternae culmen beatissime regnatura conscenderet.

Let them read our writings both through the prophets and through the holy Gospel, and through the apostolic Acts and through the Epistles—so many things against avarice and luxury, with peoples everywhere gathered for this—how excellently, how divinely, not to clatter as from the contentions of philosophers, but to thunder as from the oracles and clouds of God. And yet they do not impute to their gods that, before the advent of Christ, by luxury and avarice and by savage and base morals the commonwealth was made most evil and most flagitious; but the affliction of it, whatever in this time their pride and delights may have suffered, they upbraid to the Christian religion. If the precepts of which concerning just and honest morals the kings of the earth and all peoples, the princes and all the judges of the earth, youths and virgins, elders with the juniors, every age that is capable and both sexes, and those whom John the Baptist addresses—the tax collectors themselves and the soldiers—were at once to hear and to heed, both would the commonwealth adorn the lands of the present life with its felicity, and it would mount the summit of eternal life, to reign most blessedly.

Sed quia iste audit, ille contemnit, pluresque uitiis male blandientibus quam utili uirtutum asperitati sunt amiciores: tolerare Christi famuli iubentur, siue sint reges siue principes siue iudices, siue milites siue prouinciales, siue diuites siue pauperes, siue liberi siue serui, utriuslibet sexus, etiam pessimam, si ita necesse est, flagitiosissimamque rem publicam et in illa angelorum quadam sanctissima atque augustissima curia caelestique re publica, ubi Dei uoluntas lex est, clarissimum sibi locum etiam ista tolerantia comparare.

But because this man hearkens, that man contemns, and more are more friendly to vices ill-flattering than to the useful asperity of virtues, the servants of Christ are commanded to tolerate, whether they be kings or princes or judges, whether soldiers or provincials, whether rich or poor, whether free or slaves, of either sex, even the worst, if thus it is necessary, and most flagitious commonwealth; and in that certain most holy and most august curia of the angels and heavenly commonwealth, where the will of God is law, to procure for themselves by this very tolerance a most illustrious place.

[XX] Verum tales cultores et dilectores deorum istorum, quorum etiam imitatores in sceleribus et flagitiis se esse laetantur, nullo modo curant pessimam ac flagitiosissimam unonJ esse rem publicam. "Tantum stet, inquiunt, tantum fioreat copiis referta, uictoriis gloriosa, uel, quod est felicius, pace secura sit. Et quid ad nos?

[20] Yet such worshipers and lovers of those gods, who even rejoice that they are imitators in crimes and disgraces, in no way care that the commonwealth be most wicked and most flagitious. "Only let it stand, they say, only let it flourish, stuffed with resources, glorious with victories, or, what is happier, let it be secure with peace. And what is it to us?

Immo id ad nos magis pertinet, si diuitias quisque augeat semper, quae cotidianis effusionibus suppetant, per quas sibi etiam infirmiores subdat quisque potentior. Obsequantur diuitibus pauperes causa saturitatis atque ut eorum patrociniis quieta inertia perfruantur, diuites pauperibus ad clientelas et ad ministerium sui fastus abutantur. Populi plaudant non consultoribus utilitatum suarum, sed largitoribus uoluptatum.

Rather, this pertains to us more, if each man always augment his riches, which may be on hand for daily effusions, through which each more powerful may also subject the more infirm to himself. Let the poor be obsequious to the rich for the sake of satiety, and that by their patronages they may enjoy quiet inertia; let the rich abuse the poor for clientage and for the ministry of their haughtiness. Let the peoples applaud not the counselors of their interests, but the largitors of pleasures.

Non dura iubeantur, non prohibeantur inpura. Reges non curent quam bonis, sed quam subditis regnent. Prouinciae regibus non tamquam rectoribus morum, sed tamquam rerum dominatoribus et deliciarum suarum prouisoribus seruiant, eosque non sinceriter honorent, sed knequiter ac/ seruiliter timeant.

Let not harsh things be commanded, let not impure things be prohibited. Let kings care not that they reign over good men, but that they reign over subjects. Let the provinces serve their kings not as directors of morals, but as dominators of things and purveyors of their pleasures, and let them not honor them sincerely, but wickedly and/ slavishly fear them.

Quid alienae uineae potius quam quid suae uitae quisque noceat, legibus aduertatur. Nullus ducatur ad iudicem, nisi qui alienae rei domui saluti uel cuiquam inuito fuerit inportunus aut noxius; ceterum de suis uel cum suis uel cum quibusque uolentibus faciat quisqu e quod libet. Abundent publica scorta uel propter omnes, quibus frui placuerit, uel propter eos maxime, qui habere priuata non possunt.

Let the laws take notice rather of what harm each does to another’s vineyard than of what he does to his own life. Let no one be led to the judge, unless he who has been importunate or noxious to another’s property, domicile, safety, or to anyone unwilling; but as to his own things, either with his own, or with whomever are willing, let each do what he pleases. Let public prostitutes abound either for all to whom it has pleased to enjoy them, or especially for those who cannot have private ones.

Exstruantur amplissimae atque ornatissimae domus, opipara conuiuia frequententur, ubi cuique libuerit et potuerit, diu noctuque ludatur bibatur, uomatur diffluatur. Saltationes undique concrepent, theatra inhonestae laetitiae uocibus atque omni genere siue crudelissimae siue turpissimae uoluptatis exaestuent. Ille sit publicus inimicus, cui haec felicitas displicet; quisquis eam mutare uel auferre temptauerit, eum libera multitudo auertat ab auribus, euertat a sedibus, auferat a uiuentibus.

Let most ample and most ornate houses be erected, let sumptuous banquets be frequented; wherever it has pleased anyone and he has been able, let there be gaming and drinking by day and by night, let there be vomiting and a flowing‑away in dissipation. Let saltations resound on every side, let the theaters seethe with the voices of dishonorable joy and with every kind of pleasure, whether most cruel or most shameful. Let him be a public enemy to whom this felicity is displeasing; whoever shall have attempted to change or take it away, let the free multitude turn him away from their ears, overturn him from their seats, take him away from the living.

Illi habeantur dii ueri, qui hanc adipiscendam populis procurauerint adeptamque seruauerint. Colantur ut uoluerint, ludos exposcant quales uoluerint, quos cum suis uel de suis possint habere cultoribus: tantum efficiant, ut tali felicitati nihil ab hoste, nihil a peste, nihil ab ulla clade timeatur. "Quis hanc rem publicam sanus, non dicam Romano imperio, sed domui Sardanapali comparauerit?

Let those be held as true gods who have procured for the peoples the acquisition of this felicity and, once acquired, have preserved it. Let them be cultivated as they have willed; let them demand games of whatever sort they have willed, which they can have with their own, or from among their own, worshipers: only let them bring it about that for such felicity nothing be feared from an enemy, nothing from pestilence, nothing from any calamity. "Who in his senses would compare this commonwealth, I will not say with the Roman empire, but with the house of Sardanapalus?"

qui quondam rex ita fuit uoluptatibus deditus, ut in sepulcro suo scribi fecerit ea sola se habere mortuum, quae libido eius, etiam cum uiueret, hauriendo consumpserat. Quem regem si isti haberent sibi in talibus indulgentem nec in eis cuiquam ulla seueritate aduersantem, huic libentius quam Romani ueteres Romulo templum et flaminem consecrarent.

who once, a king, was so given over to pleasures that he had it written on his sepulchre that, as a dead man, he possesses only those things which his lust, even while he lived, had consumed by draining. If these people had such a king, indulgent to them in such matters and in them opposing no one with any severity, they would more willingly consecrate to him a temple and a flamen than the ancient Romans did to Romulus.

[XXI] Sed si contemnitur qui Romanam rem publicam pessima" ac flagitiosissimam dixit, nec curant isti quanta morum pessimorum ac flagitiosorum labe ac dedecore impleatur, sed tantummodo ut consistat et maneat: audiant eam non, ut Sallustius narrat, pessimam ac flagitiosissimam factam, sed, sicut Cicero disputat, iam tunc prorsus perisse et nullam omnino remansisse rem publicam. Inducit enim Scipionem, eum ipsum qui Carthaginem extinxerat, de re publica disputantem, quand o pr a esentiebatur ea corruptione, quam describit Sallustius, iam iamque peritura. Eo quippe tempore disputatur, quo iam unus Gracchorum occisus fuit, a quo scribit seditiones graues coepisse Sallustius.

[21] But if he is despised who declared the Roman republic the worst and most flagitious, and these men do not care with what stain and disgrace of the worst and most flagitious morals it is filled, but only that it should stand and remain, let them hear that it had not, as Sallust relates, become the worst and most flagitious, but, as Cicero argues, had already at that time utterly perished and that no republic at all remained. For he brings in Scipio—the very man who had extinguished Carthage—disputing about the republic, when that corruption which Sallust describes was being anticipated, now and again on the very point of perishing. For indeed the discussion is set at that time when already one of the Gracchi had been slain, from which Sallust writes that grave seditions began.

Nam mortis eius fit in eisdem libris commemoratio. Cum autem Scipio in secundi libri fine dixisset, "ut in fidibus aut tibiis atque cantu ipso ac uocibus concentus est quidam tenendus ex distinctis sonis, quem inmutatum aut discrepantem aures eruditae ferre non possunt, isque concentus ex dissimillimarum uocum moderatione concors tamen efficitur et congruens: sic ex summis et infimis et mediis interiectis ordinibus, ut sonis, moderata ratione ciuitatem consensu dissimillimorum concinere, et quae harmonia a musicis dicitur in cantu, eam esse in ciuitate concordiam, artissimum atque optimum omni in re publica uinculum incolumitatis, eamque sine iustitia nullo pacto esse posse, "ac deinde cum aliquanto latius et uberius disseruisset, quantum prodesset iustitia ciuitati quantumque obesset, si afuisset, suscepit deinde Philus, unus eorum qui disputationi aderant, et poposcit, ut haec ipsa quaestio diligentius tractaretur ac de iustitia plura dicerentur, propter illud, quod iam uulgo ferebatur rem publicam regi sine iniuria non posse. Hanc proinde quaestionem discutiendam et enodandam esse adsensus est Scipio responditque nihil esse, quod adhuc de re publica dictum putaret, quo possent longius progredi, nisi esset confirmatum non modo falsum esse illud, sine iniuria non posse, sed hoc uerissimum esse, sine summa iustitia rem publicam regi non posse.

For mention of his death is made in those same books. But when Scipio at the end of the second book had said, “just as on lyres or pipes, and in the very singing and voices, a certain consonance must be maintained out of distinct sounds, which, if altered or discrepant, educated ears cannot bear, and this consonance, from the moderation of voices most dissimilar, is nevertheless made concordant and congruent: so from the highest and the lowest and the middle orders interposed, as from sounds, by moderated reason the civic body should harmonize through the consensus of the most dissimilar; and what is called harmony by the musicians in song, that in the commonwealth is concord, the closest and best bond of safety in every commonwealth, and that without justice it can by no means exist,” and then, when he had with somewhat more breadth and abundance discoursed how much justice profits the commonwealth and how much it harms if it is absent, Philus then took it up, one of those present at the disputation, and demanded that this very question be handled more diligently and that more be said about justice, on account of that saying which was already commonly circulated, that the commonwealth cannot be ruled without injustice. Accordingly Scipio agreed that this question ought to be discussed and unraveled, and replied that he thought there was nothing that had yet been said about the commonwealth by which they could go further, unless it were established not only that that statement—“that it cannot be done without injustice”—is false, but that this is most true: that without the highest justice the commonwealth cannot be governed.

Cuius quaestionis explicatio cum in diem consequentem dilata esset, in tertio libro magna conflictione res acta est. Suscepit enim Philus ipse disputationem eorum, qui sentirent sine iniustitia geri non posse rem publicam, purgans praecipue, ne hoc ipse sentire crederetur, egitque sedulo pro iniustitia contra iustitiam, ut hanc esse utilem rei publicae, illam uero inutilem, ueri similibus rationibus et exemplis uelut conaretur ostendere. Tum Laelius rogantibus omnibus iustitiam defend ere a dgressus est adseruitque, quantum potuit, nihil tam inimicum quam iniustitiam ciuitati nec omnino nisi magna iustitia geri aut stare posse rem publicam.

When the explanation of this question had been deferred to the following day, in the third book the matter was carried on with great contention. For Philus himself took up the disputation of those who felt that the commonwealth could not be managed without injustice, especially clearing himself, lest he be believed to hold this view, and he argued sedulously for injustice against justice, as though he were trying to show by plausible reasons and examples that this thing was useful to the commonwealth, but that one indeed useless. Then Laelius, at the request of all, began to defend justice and asserted, as much as he could, that nothing is so inimical to the city as injustice, and that the commonwealth can by no means be managed or stand except by great justice.

Qua quaestione, quantum satis uisum est, pertractata Scipio ad intermissa reuertitur recolitque suam atque commendat breuem rei publicae definitionem, qua dixerat eam esse rem populi. Populum autem non omnem coetum multitudinis, sed coetum iuris consensu et utilitatis communione sociatum esse determinat. Docet deinde quanta sit in disputando definitionis utilitas, atque ex illis suis definitionibus colligit tunc esse rem publicam, id e st rem populi, cum bene ac iuste geritur siue ab uno rege siue a paucis optimatibus siue ab uniuerso populo.

With this question handled, as far as seemed sufficient, Scipio returns to what had been interrupted and recalls and commends his brief definition of the republic, by which he had said that it is the thing of the people. The people, moreover, he determines to be not every gathering of a multitude, but a gathering associated by consensus of right (ius) and by a communion of utility. He then shows how great is the utility of definition in disputation, and from those his definitions he gathers that then there is a republic, that is, a thing of the people, when it is conducted well and justly, whether by one king, or by a few optimates, or by the entire people.

Cum uero iniustus est rex, quem tyrannum more Graeco appellauit, aut iniusti optimates, quorum consensum dixit esse factionem, aut iniustus ipse populus, cui nomen usitatum non repperit, nisi ut etiam ipsum tyrannum uocaret: non iam uitiosam, sicut pridie fuerat disputatum, sed, sicut ratio ex illis definitionibus conexa docuisset, omnino nullam esse rem publicam, quoniam non esset res populi, cum tyrannus eam factioue capesseret, n ec ipse populus iam po p ul u s esset, si esset iniustus, quoniam non esset multitudo iuris consensu et utilitatis communione sociata, sicut populus fuerat definitus. Quando ergo res publica Romana talis erat, qualem illam describit Sallustius, non iam pessima ac flagitiosissima, sicut ipse ait, sed omnino nulla erat secundum istam rationem, quam disputatio de re publica inter magnos eius tum principes habita patefecit. Sicut etiam ipse Tullius no n Sc i pi oni s nec cuiusquam alterius, sed suo sermone loquens in prJncipio quinti libri commemorato prius Enni poetae uersu, quo dixerat: Moribus antiquis res stat Romana uirisque.

But when the king is unjust, whom he called a tyrant in the Greek manner, or the nobles are unjust, whose consensus he said is a faction, or the people themselves are unjust, for which he found no customary name, except even to call the people itself a tyrant: then the republic is not now merely vitiated, as had been argued the day before, but, as reasoning linked from those definitions had taught, there is absolutely no republic, since it would not be a thing of the people when a tyrant or a faction seizes it; nor would the people itself any longer be a people, if it were unjust, since it would not be a multitude associated by a consensus of right and a communion of utility, as the people had been defined. When therefore the Roman republic was such as Sallust describes it, it was no longer the worst and most flagitious, as he himself says, but altogether none at all, according to that rationale which the discussion about the republic, held among its great leaders of that time, laid open. Just so Tullius himself, speaking not in Scipio’s person nor in anyone else’s, but in his own discourse at the beginning of Book Five, after first recalling the verse of the poet Ennius, in which he had said: “By ancient customs and by men the Roman state stands.”

m Quem quidem ille uersum, inquit, uel breuitate uel ueritate tamquam e x o raculo quodam mihi esse effatus uidetur. Nam neque uiri, nisi ita morata ciuitas fuisset, neque mores, nisi hi uiri praefuissent, aut fundare aut tam diu tenere potuissent tantam et tam uaste lateque imperantem rem publicam. Itaque ante nostram memoriam et mos ipse patrius praestantes uiros adhibebat, et ueterem morem ac maiorum instituta retinebant excellentes uiri.

m He said, “That verse, indeed, seems to me to have been uttered, as if from some o r a c l e, either for its brevity or for its truth. For neither would the men, unless the community had been so moral in character, nor the mores, unless these men had presided, have been able either to found or for so long to hold so great a commonwealth ruling so vastly and so broadly. And so, before our memory, both the ancestral custom itself was calling upon preeminent men, and excellent men were maintaining the ancient custom and the institutes of the ancestors.”

Nostra uero aetas cum rem publicam sicut picturam accepisset egregiam, sed euanescentem uetustate, non modo eam coloribus isdem quibus fuerat renouare neglexit, sed ne id quidem curauit, ut formam saltem eius et extrema tamquam liniamenta seruaret. Quid enim manet ex antiquis moribus, quibus ille dixit rem stare Romanam, quos ita obliuione obsoletos uidemus, ut non modo non colantur, sed iam ignorentur? Nam de uiris quid dicam?

Our age indeed, when it had received the Republic like a painting, excellent yet evanescent with old age, not only neglected to renovate it with the same colors with which it had been, but did not even care to preserve at least its form and its outermost, as it were, lineaments. For what remains of the ancient customs, by which he said the Roman state stands, which we see so made obsolete by oblivion that not only are they not cultivated, but are now unknown? As for the men, what am I to say?

Mores enim ipsi interierunt uirorum penuria, cuius tanti mali non modo reddenda ratio nobis, sed etiam tamquam reis capitis quodam modo dicenda causa est. Nostris enim uitiis, non casu aliquo, rem publicam uerbo retinemus, re ipsa uero iam pridem amisimus. w Haec Cicero fatebatur, longe quidem post mortem Africani, quem in suis libris fecit de re publica disputare, adhuc tamen ante aduentum Christi; quae si diffamata et praeualescente religione Christiana sentirentur atque dicerentur, quis non istorum ea Christianis inputanda esse censeret?

For the morals themselves have perished through a penury of men, of which so great an evil not only must an account be rendered by us, but also, in a certain manner, a case must be pleaded as though we were defendants on a capital charge. For by our vices, not by some chance, we retain the commonwealth in word, but in the thing itself we long since have lost it. w This Cicero was confessing, indeed long after the death of Africanus—whom he made in his books to dispute about the commonwealth—yet still before the Advent of Christ; which things, if they were felt and said when the Christian religion was bruited abroad and prevailing, who of these would not judge them to be imputable to Christians?

Quam ob rem cur non curarunt dii eorum, ne tunc periret atque amitteretur illa res publica, quam Cicero longe, antequam Christus in carne uenisset, tam lugubriter deplorat amissam? Viderint laudatores eius etiam illis antiquis uiris et moribus qualis fuerit, utrum in ea uiguerit uera iustitia an forte nec tunc fuerit uiua moribus, sed picta coloribus; quod et ipse Cicero nesciens, cum eam praeferret, expressit. Sed alias, si Dneus uoluerit, hoc uidebimus.

Wherefore why did their gods not take care that that commonwealth should not then perish and be lost, which Cicero, long before Christ had come in the flesh, so mournfully laments as lost? Let his panegyrists see what sort it was even with those ancient men and mores, whether in it true justice flourished, or perhaps not even then was it alive in mores, but painted with colors; which Cicero himself also, not knowing, expressed when he was holding it forth. But at another time, if God wills, we shall consider this.

Enitar enim suo loco, ut ostendam secundum definitiones ipsius Ciceronis, quibus quid sit res publica et quid sit populus loquente Scipione breuiter posuit (adtestantibus etiam multis siue ipsius siue eorum quos loqui fecit in eadem disputatione sententiis), numquam illam fuisse rem publicam, quia numquam in ea fuerit uera iustitia. Secundum probabiliores autem definitiones pro suo modo quodam res publica fuit, et melius ab antiquioribus Romanis quam a posterioribus administrata est; uera autem iustitia non est nisi in ea re publica, cuius conditor rectorque Christus est, si et ipsam rem publicam placet dicere, quoniam eam rem populi esse negare non possumus. Si autem hoc nomen, quod alibi aliterque uulgatum est, ab usu nostrae locutionis est forte remotius, in ea certe ciuitate est uera iustitia, de qua scriptura sancta dicit: Gloriosa dicta sunt de te, ciuitas Dei.

For I shall strive, in its proper place, to show, according to the definitions of Cicero himself—by which, with Scipio speaking, he briefly set down what a commonwealth is and what a people is (many opinions also attesting, whether his own or those of the persons he made to speak in the same disputation)—that that was never truly a commonwealth, because true justice was never in it. Yet according to the more probable definitions, it was in a certain manner a commonwealth, and it was administered better by the more ancient Romans than by the later; but true justice is only in that commonwealth whose founder and ruler is Christ, if it also pleases to call it a commonwealth, since we cannot deny that it is a thing of the people. But if this name, which elsewhere and otherwise has been made current, is perhaps more remote from the usage of our locution, certainly in that city is true justice of which Holy Scripture says: Glorious things are spoken of you, City of God.

[XXII] Sed quod pertinet ad praesentem quaestionem, quamlibet laudabilem dicant istam fuisse uel esse rem publicam, secundum eorum auctores doctissimos iam longe ante Christi aduentum pessima ac f lagitio s issima facta erat; immo uero nulla erat atque omnino perierat perditissimis moribus. Vt ergo non periret, dii custodes eius populo cultori suo dare praecipue uitae ac morum praecepta debuerunt, a quo tot templis, tot sacerdotibus et sacrificiorum generibus, tam multiplicibus uariisque sacris, tot festis sollemnitatibus, tot tantorumque ludorum celebritatibus colebantur; ubi nihil daemones nisi negotium suum egerunt, non curantes quem ad modum illi uiuerent, immo curantes ut etiam perdite uiuerent, dum tamen honori suo illa omnia metu subditi ministrarent. Aut si dederunt, proferatur ostendatur legatur, quas deorum leges illi ciuitati datas contempserint Gracchi, ut seditionibus cuncta turbarent, quas Marius et Cinna et Carbo, ut in bella etiam progrederentur ciuilia causis iniquissimis suscepta et crudeliter gesta crudeliusque finita, quas denique SmIa ipse, cuius uitam mores facta describente Sallustio aliisque scriptoribus historiae quis non exhorreat?

[22] But as it pertains to the present question, however laudable they say that commonwealth to have been or to be, according to their most learned authorities it had already long before the advent of Christ become most wicked and most flagitious; nay rather, it was no commonwealth at all and had utterly perished through most depraved morals. Therefore, that it might not perish, the gods, its guardians, ought especially to have given to their worshiping people precepts of life and morals—by whom they were cultivated with so many temples, so many priests and kinds of sacrifices, such manifold and various sacred rites, so many festive solemnities, so many celebrations of such great games—where the demons did nothing except transact their own business, not caring how those men lived, indeed caring that they should live even profligately, provided only that, subjected by fear, they ministered all those things to their honor. Or if they did give them, let it be brought forward, shown, read: which laws of the gods did the Gracchi despise, so as to throw everything into turmoil by seditions; which did Marius and Cinna and Carbo despise, so as to advance even into civil wars undertaken on most iniquitous causes and conducted cruelly and finished more cruelly; which, finally, did Sulla himself despise—Sulla, whose life, morals, and deeds, as Sallust and other writers of history describe them, who does not shudder at?

quis illam rem publicam non tunc perisse fateatur? An forte propter huiusce modi ciuium mores ¡Vergilianam illam sententiam, sicut solent, pro defensione deorum suorum opponere audebunt: Discessere omnes adytis arisque relictis Di, quibus imperium hoc steterat? Primum si ita est, non habent cur querantur de religione Christiana, quod hac offensi eos dii sui deseruerint, quoniam quidem maiores eorum iam pridem moribus suis ab Vrbis altaribus tam multos ac minutos deos tamquam muscas abegerunt.

Who would not then confess that that commonwealth had perished? Or perhaps, on account of citizens’ morals of this kind, will they dare, as they are wont, to oppose, for the defense of their gods, that Vergilian sentiment: “All have departed from the adyta and the altars left behind, the gods by whom this dominion had stood?” First, if it is so, they have no cause to complain of the Christian religion, that, being offended by it, their gods deserted them, since indeed their ancestors long ago by their morals drove away from the City’s altars so many and so minute gods as though they were flies.

Sed tamen haec numinum turba ubi erat, cum longe antequam mores corrumperentur antiqui a Gallis Roma capta et incensa est? An praesentes forte dormiebant? Tunc enim tota Vrbe in hostium potestatem redacta solus collis Capitolinus remanserat, qui etiam ipse caperetur, nisi saltem anseres diis dormientibus uigilarent.

But yet where was this throng of divinities, when long before the ancient morals were corrupted Rome was captured and burned by the Gauls? Or, though present, were they perchance sleeping? For then, with the whole City reduced into the power of the enemies, the Capitoline hill alone remained, and even it would have been taken, unless at least the geese had kept watch while the gods were sleeping.

Vnde paene in superstitionem Aegyptiorum bestias auesque colentium Roma deciderat, cum anseri sollemnia celebrabant. Verum de his aduenticiis et corporis potius quam animi malis, quae uel ab hostibus uel alia clade accidunt, nondum interim disputo: nunc ago de labe morum, quibus primum paulatim decoloratis, deinde torrentis modo praecipitatis tanta quamuis integris tectis moenibusque facta est ruina rei publicae, ut magni auctores eorum eam tunc amissam non dubitent dicere. Recte autem abscesserant, ut amitteretur, omnes adytis arisque relictis di, si eorum de bona uita atque iustitia ciuitas praecepta contempserat.

Whence Rome had almost fallen into the superstition of the Egyptians worshipping beasts and birds, when they were celebrating the solemnities of the goose. But of these adventitious evils, and of the body rather than of the soul, which happen either from enemies or from some other disaster, I am not yet meanwhile disputing: now I deal with the stain of morals, by which, first little by little discolored, then, after the manner of a torrent, headlong precipitated, so great a ruin of the commonwealth was wrought, although the roofs and walls were intact, that their great authors do not hesitate to say it was then lost. And rightly had all the gods withdrawn, the shrines and altars left, so that it might be lost, if the city had despised their precepts concerning good life and justice.

Nunc uero quales, quaeso, dii fuerunt, si noluerunt cum populo cultore suo uiuere, quem male uiuentem non docuerant bene uiuere?

Now indeed, of what sort, I ask, were the gods, if they were unwilling to live with their worshiping people, whom, living badly, they had not taught to live well?

[XXIII] Quid quod etiam uidentur eorum adfuisse cupiditatibus implendis, et ostenduntur non praefuisse kreVfrenandis, qui enim Marium nouum hominem et ignobilem, cruentissimum auctorem bellorum ciuilium atque gestorem, ut septiens consul fieret adiuuerunt atque ut in septimo suo consulatu moreretur, senex ne in manus Sullae futuri mox uictoris inrueret. Si enim ad haec eum dii eorum non iuuerunt, non parum est quod fatentur etiam non propitiis diis suis posse accidere homini istam temporalem, quam nimis diligunt, tantam felicitatem et posse homines, sicut fuit Marius, salute uiribus, opibus honoribus, dignitate longaeuitate cumulari et perfrui diis iratis; posse etiam homines, sicut fuit Regulus, captiuitate seruitute inopia, uigiliis doloribus excruciari et emori diis amicis. Quod si ita esse concedunt, compendio nihil eos prodesse et coli superfluo confitentur.

[XXIII] What of the fact that they even seem to have been present to the fulfilling of their cupidities, and are shown not to have presided over restraining them? for they aided Marius, a “new man” and ignoble, the bloodiest author and executor of civil wars, that he might become consul seven times, and that in his seventh consulship he might die, an old man, lest he fall into the hands of Sulla, soon to be the victor. For if in these matters their gods did not help him, it is no small thing that they admit that even with their own gods not propitious there can befall a man that temporal felicity—which they love too much—and that men, as was Marius, can be piled up and enjoy salvation, strengths, wealth, honors, dignity, longevity with the gods angry; and that men, as was Regulus, can be excruciated by captivity, servitude, want, vigils, pains, and die with the gods friendly. But if they concede it to be so, they confess that, in compendium, those gods profit nothing and are worshiped superfluously.

Nam si uirtutibus animi et probitati uitae, cuius praernia post mortem speranda sunt, magis contraria ut popuIus disceret institerunt; si nihil etianI in his transeuntibus et temporalibus bonis uel eis quos oderunt nocent, uel eis quos diligunt prosunt, ut quid coluntur, ut quid tanto studio colendi requiruntur? Cur laboriosis tristibusque temporibus, tamquam offensi abscesserint, murmuratur et propter eos Christiana religio conuiciis indignissimis laeditur? Si autem habent in his rebus uel beneficii uel maleficii potestatem, cur in eis adfuerunt pessimo uiro Mario, et optimo Regulo defuerunt?

For if they have pressed that the people should learn things contrary to the virtues of the mind and the probity of life—whose rewards are to be hoped for after death; if also in these passing and temporal goods they neither harm those whom they hate nor benefit those whom they love, why are they worshiped, why are they sought with so great a zeal of worship? Why, in toilsome and sad times, is there murmuring as though, being offended, they had withdrawn, and on their account is the Christian religion wounded with most unworthy revilings? But if they have in these matters a power either of beneficence or of maleficence, why were they present to the worst man, Marius, and failed the best, Regulus?

An ex hoc ipsi intelleguntur iniustissimi et pessimi? Quod si propterea magis timendi et colendi putantur: neque hoc putentur; neque enim minus eos inuenitur ReguIus coluisse q uam M arius. Nec ideo uita pessima eligenda uideatur, quia magis Mario quam Regulo dii fauisse existimantur.

Or from this are they themselves understood to be most unjust and most wicked? But if on that account they are thought to be the more to be feared and worshiped, let not this be thought either; for Regulus is found to have worshiped them no less than Marius. Nor, therefore, should a very bad life seem to be chosen, because the gods are thought to have favored Marius more than Regulus.

Metellus enim Romanorum laudatissimus, qui habuit quinque filios consulares, etiam rerum temporalium felix fuit, et Catilina pessimus oppressus inopia et in bello sui sceleris prostratus infelix, et uerissima atque certissima felicitate praepollent boni Deum colentes, a quo solo conferri potest. Illa igitur res publica malis moribus cum periret, nihil dii eorum pro dirigendis uel pro corrigendis egerunt moribus, ne periret; immo deprauandis et corrumpendis addiderunt moribus, ut periret. Nec se bonos fingant, quod uelut offensi ciuium iniquitate discesserint.

For Metellus, indeed, the most lauded of the Romans, who had five sons who were consuls, was even fortunate in temporal affairs; and Catiline, a most wicked man, crushed by want and, in war, laid low by his own crime, was unlucky; and with the truest and most certain felicity the good, worshipping God—by whom alone it can be conferred—preponderate. Therefore, when that commonwealth was perishing through evil morals, their gods did nothing for the directing or for the correcting of morals, that it might not perish; nay rather, they added to the depraving and corrupting of morals, that it might perish. Nor let them feign themselves good on the pretext that, as if offended by the iniquity of the citizens, they withdrew.

Prorsus ibi erant; produntur, conuincuntur; nec subuenire praecipiendo nec latere tacendo potuerunt. Omitto quod Marius a miserantibus Minturnensibus Maricae deae in luco eius commendatus est, ut ei omnia prosperaret, et ex summa desperatione reuersus incolumis in Vrbem duxit crudelem crudelis exercitum; ubi quam cruenta, quam inciuilis hostilique inmanior eius uictoria fuerit, eos qui scripserunt legant qui uolunt. Sed hoc, ut dixi, omitto, nec Maricae nescio cui tribuo Marii sanguineam felicitatem, sed occultae potius prouidentiae Dei ad istorum ora claudenda eosque ab errore liberandos, qui non studiis agunt, sed haec prudenter aduertunt, quia, etsi aliquid in his rebus daemones possunt, tantum possunt, quantum secreto omnipotentis arbitrio permittuntur, ne magnipendamus terrenam felicitatem, quae sicut Mario malis etiam plerumque conceditur, nec eam rursus quasi malam arbitremur, cum ea multos etiam pios ac bonos unius ueri Dei cultores inuitis daemonibus praepolluisse uideamus, nec eosdem inmundissimos spiritus uel propter haec ipsa bona malaue terrena propitiandos aut timendos existimemus, quia, sicut ipsi mali homines in terra, sic etiam illi non omnia quae uolunt facere possunt, nisi quantum illius ordinatione sinitur, cuius plene iudicia nemo conprehendit, iuste nemo reprehendit.

They were absolutely there; they are betrayed, they are convicted; nor could they come to the rescue by giving precepts, nor lie hidden by keeping silence. I omit that Marius, by the pitying Minturnians, was commended to the goddess Marica in her grove, that she might prosper all things for him, and, having returned from utmost desperation safe, he led into the City a cruel army of a cruel man; where how bloody, how uncivil, and more monstrous than an enemy his victory was, let those who wish read those who have written. But this, as I said, I omit, nor do I ascribe Marius’s sanguine felicity to Marica, I know not whom, but rather to the hidden providence of God, for the shutting of those men’s mouths and for the freeing from error of those who are not driven by partisanships, but prudently take note of these things; because, even if the demons can do something in these matters, they can only so much as they are permitted by the secret arbitrium of the omnipotent, that we may not set a great price on earthly felicity, which, as with Marius, is for the most part granted even to the wicked, nor yet judge it in turn as if evil, since we see that by it many pious and good worshipers of the one true God have prevailed, the demons being unwilling; nor should we think that those same most unclean spirits are to be propitiated or feared on account either of these very earthly goods or evils, because, just as evil men themselves on earth, so also they cannot do all the things they wish, except insofar as it is permitted by His ordination, whose judgments no one fully comprehends, and no one justly reproves.

[XXIV] Sulla certe ipse, cuius tempora talia fuerunt, ut superiora, quorum uindex esse uidebatur, illorum comparatione quaererentur, cum primum ad Vrbem contra Marium castra mouisset, adeo laeta exta immolanti fuisse scribit Liuius, ut custodiri se Postumius haruspex uoluerit capitis supplicium subiturus, nisi ea, quae in animo Sulla haberet, diis iuuantibus impleuisset. Ecce non discesserant adytis atque aris relictis di, quando de rerum euentu praedicebant nihilque de ipsius Sullae correctione curabant. Promittebant praesagando felicitatem magnam nec malam cupiditatem minando frangebant.

[24] Sulla himself, assuredly, whose times were such that the earlier times, of which he seemed to be the avenger, were sought after by comparison with them, when first he had moved his camp to the City against Marius, Livy writes that the entrails were so joyful to him as he was sacrificing, that Postumius the haruspex wished to have himself kept in custody, about to undergo capital punishment, unless Sulla, with the gods helping, had fulfilled the things he had in mind. Behold, the gods had not departed, with the inner shrines (adyta) and altars left behind, when they were foretelling the outcome of affairs, and they were caring nothing for Sulla’s own correction. By presaging they were promising great felicity, nor were they breaking evil cupidity by menacing.

Deinde cum esset in Asia bellum Mithridaticum gerens, per Lucium Titium ei mandatum est a loue, quod esset Mithridatem superaturus, et factum est. Ac postea molienti redire in Vrbem et suas amicorumque iniurias ciuili sanguine ulcisci, iterum mandatum est ab eodem loue per militem quendam legionis sextae, prius se de Mithridate praenuntiasse uictoriam, et tunc promittere daturum se potestatem, qua recuperaret ab inimicis rem publicam non sine multo sanguine. Tum percontatus Sulla, quae forma militi uisa fuerit, cum ille indicasset, eam recordatus est, quam prius ab illo audierat, qui de Mithridatica uictoria ab eodem mandata pertulerat.

Then, when he was in Asia waging the Mithridatic war, it was commanded to him by Jove through Lucius Titius that he would overcome Mithridates, and so it came to pass. And afterwards, as he was attempting to return to the City and to avenge his and his friends’ injuries with civil blood, again a mandate was given by the same Jove through a certain soldier of the sixth legion: that previously he had foretold victory over Mithridates, and that then he promised he would grant the power by which he might recover the commonwealth from his enemies, not without much blood. Then Sulla, having inquired what form had appeared to the soldier, when he had indicated it, recalled the very one which he had earlier heard from that man who had borne mandates from the same regarding the Mithridatic victory.

Quid hic responderi potest, quare dii curauerint ueIut felicia ista nuntiare, et nullus eorum curauerit Sullam monendo corrigere mala tanta facturum scelestis annis ciuilibus, qualia non foedarent, sed auferrent omnino rem pubficam? Nempe intelleguntur daemones, sicut saepe dixi notumque nobis est in litteris sacris resque ipsae satis indicant, negotium suum agere, ut pro diis habeantur et colantur, ut ea illis exhibeantur, quibus hi qui exhibent sociati unam pessimam causam cum eis habeant in iudicio Dei. Deinde cum uenisset Tarentum Sulla atque ibi sacrificasset, uidit in capite uitulini iecoris similitudinem coronae aureae.

What can be answered here as to why the gods took care to announce, as it were, those felicitous things, and none of them took care, by admonishing, to correct Sulla, who would in those wicked civil years do such great evils as would not merely defile but utterly take away the commonwealth? Clearly the daemons are understood—just as I have often said and as is known to us in the sacred letters, and the things themselves sufficiently indicate—to be prosecuting their own business: namely, that they may be held as gods and be worshiped, that there be exhibited to them those things, by which those who exhibit them, being associated with them, may have one and the same most-evil cause with them in the judgment of God. Then, when Sulla had come to Tarentum and had sacrificed there, he saw on the head of a calf’s liver the likeness of a golden crown.

Tunc Postumius haruspex ille respondit praeclaram significare uictoriam iussitque ut extis illis solus uesceretur. Postea paruo interuallo seruus cuiusdam Luci Pontii uaticinando clamauit: "A Bellona nuntius uenio, uictoria tua est, Sulla. w Deinde adiecit arsurum esse Capitolium.

Then that haruspex Postumius replied that it signified a splendid victory, and ordered that he alone should eat of those entrails. After a short interval, the slave of a certain Lucius Pontius, vaticinating, shouted: "From Bellona I come as a messenger; the victory is yours, Sulla." w Then he added that the Capitol would burn.

Hoc cum dixisset, continuo egressus e castris postero ffie concitatior reuersus est et Capitolium arsisse clamauit. Arserat autem re uera Capitolium. Quod quidem daemoni et praeuidere facile fuit et celerrime nuntiare.

When he had said this, he immediately egressed from the camp; on the next day, having returned more agitated, he shouted that the Capitol had burned. But in truth the Capitol had burned. Which indeed it was easy for the demon both to foresee and to announce most swiftly.

Illud sane intende, quod ad causam maxime pertinet, sub qualibus diis esse cupiant, qui blasphemant Saluatorem uoluntates fidelium a dominatu daemonum liberantem. Clamauit homo uaticinando: "Victoria tua est, Sulla, "atque ut id diuino spiritu clamare crederetur, nuntiauit etiam aliquid et prope futurum et mox factum, unde longe aberat per quem ille spiritus loquebatur; non tamen clamauit: m Ab sceleribu s parce, Sulla w, quae illic uictor tam horrenda commisit, cui corona aurea ipsius uictoriae inlustrissimum signum in uitulino iecore apparuit, qualia signa si dii iusti dare solerent ac non daemones impii, profecto illis extis nefaria potius atque ipsi Sullae grauiter noxia mala futura monstrarent. Neque enim eius dignitati tantum profuit illa uictoria, quantum nocuit cupiditati; qua factum est, ut inmoderatis inhians et secundis rebus elatus ac praecipitatus magis ipse periret in moribus, quam inimicos in corporibus perderet.

Do truly attend to this, which pertains most to the cause: under what sort of gods they desire to be, who blaspheme the Savior, the one liberating the wills of the faithful from the dominion of demons. A man cried out in vaticination: "Victory is yours, Sulla," and, in order that he might be believed to cry that by a divine spirit, he also announced something both near to happen and soon afterward done, from which the one through whom that spirit was speaking was far distant; yet he did not cry: "m From crime s refrain, Sulla w," such crimes as the victor committed there so horrendous, for whom the golden crown, the most illustrious sign of the victory itself, appeared in a calf’s liver—such signs, if just gods were wont to give and not impious demons, surely in those entrails they would rather have shown wicked evils to come, and grievously harmful to Sulla himself. For that victory did not so much profit his dignity, as it harmed his cupidity; whereby it came about that, gaping after immoderate things and, by favorable circumstances, exalted and cast headlong, he himself perished more in morals than he destroyed enemies in their bodies.

Haec illi dii uere tristia uereque lugenda non extis, non auguriis, non cuiusquam somnio uel uaticinio praenuntiabant. Magis enim timebant ne corrigeretur quam ne uinceretur. Immo satis agebant, ut uictor ciuium gloriosus uictus atque captiuus nefandis uitiis et r haec ipsis etiam daemonibus multo obstrictius subderetur.

These things, truly sad and truly to be lamented, those gods did not preannounce by entrails, not by auguries, not by anyone’s dream or vaticination. For they feared more lest he be corrected than lest he be conquered. Nay rather, they took pains enough that, a glorious victor of citizens, he might be vanquished and captive to nefarious vices, and that he might be subjected, much more tightly bound, to those very demons.

[XXV] Illinc uero quis non intellegat, quis non uideat, nisi qui tales deos imitari magis elegit quam diuina gratia ab eorum societate separari, quantum moliantur maligni isti spiritus exemplo suo uelut diuinam auctoritatem praebere sceleribus? quod etiam in quadam Campaniae lata planitie, ubi non multo p ost ciuiles acies nefario proelio conflixerunt, ipsi inter se prius pugnare uisi sunt. Namque ibi auditi sunt primum ingentes fragores, moxque multi se uidisse nuntiarunt per aliquot dies duas acies proeliari.

[25] From there indeed, who does not understand, who does not see—except one who has chosen rather to imitate such gods than to be separated from their fellowship by divine grace—how greatly those malignant spirits strive, by their example, to offer as it were divine authority to crimes? Which also on a certain broad plain of Campania, where not long after the civil battle-lines clashed in a nefarious battle, they themselves were seen first to fight among themselves. For there were heard at first huge crashes, and soon many reported that they had seen, for several days, two battle-lines fighting.

Quae pugna ubi destitit, uestigia quoque uelut hominum et equorum, quanta de illa conflictatione exprimi poterant, inuenerunt. Si ergo ueraciter inter se numina pugnauerunt, iam bella ciuilia excusantur humana; consideretur tamen quae sit talium deorum uel malitia uel miseria: si autem se pugnasse finxerunt, quid aliud egerunt, nisi ut sibi Romani bellando ciuiliter tamquam deorum exemplo nullum nefas admittere uiderentur? Iam enim coeperant bella ciuilia, et aliquot nefandorum proeliorum strages execranda praecesserat.

Which battle, when it ceased, they also found traces as if of men and of horses, as great as could be impressed from that conflict. If therefore the divine powers truly fought among themselves, already human civil wars are excused; yet let it be considered what either malice or misery belongs to such gods: but if they feigned that they had fought, what else did they accomplish, except that the Romans, by warring civilly, as by the example of the gods, might seem to themselves to admit no impiety? For already the civil wars had begun, and the execrable slaughter of several unspeakable battles had preceded.

Iam multos mouerat, quod miles quidam, dum occiso spolia detraheret, fratrem nudato cadauere agnouit ac detestatus bella ciuilia se ipsum ibi perimens fraterno corpori adiunxit. Vt ergo huius tanti mali minime taederet, sed armorum scelestorum magis magisque ardor incresceret, noxii daemones, quos illi deos putantes colendos et uenerandos arbitrabantur, inter se pugnantes hominibus apparere uoluerunt, ne imitari tales pugnas ciuica trepidaret affectio, sed potius humanum scelus diuino excusaretur exemplo. Hac astutia maligni spiritus etiam ludos, unde multa iam dixi, scaenicos sibi dicari sacrarique iusserunt, ubi tanta deorum flagitia theatricis canticis atque fabularum actionibus celebrata et quisquis eos fecisse crederet et quisquis non crederet, sed tamen illos libentissime sibi talia exhiberi cerneret, securus imitaretur.

It had already moved many, that a certain soldier, while he was stripping the spoils from the slain, recognized his brother in the bared corpse, and, having detested civil wars, killing himself there, joined himself to his brother’s body. Therefore, in order that there should be no weariness at all of so great an evil, but that the ardor of nefarious arms should increase more and more, the noxious demons—whom they, thinking them gods, judged ought to be cultivated and venerated—willed to appear to men fighting among themselves, lest a civic disposition should tremble to imitate such combats, but rather that human crime should be excused by a divine example. By this astutia the malign spirits also ordered that the scenic games, about which I have already said many things, be dedicated and consecrated to themselves, where so great disgraces of the gods, celebrated by theatrical songs and by the performances of plays, both whoever would believe that they had done them and whoever would not believe it, but nevertheless would see that such things were most gladly exhibited to them, would imitate securely.

Ne quis itaque existimaret in deos conuicia potius quam eis dignum aliquid scriptitasse, ubicumque illos inter se pugnasse poetae commemorarunt, ipsi ad decipiendos homines poetarum carmina firmauerunt, pugnas uidelicet suas non solum per scaenicos in theatro, uerum etiam per se ipsos in campo humanis oculis exhibentes. Haec dicere compulsi sumus, quoniam pessimis moribus ciuium Romanam rem publicam iam antea perditam fuisse nullamque remansisse ante aduentum Christi Jesu domini nostri auctores eorum dicere et scribere minime dubitarunt. Quam perditionem diis suis non inputant, qui mala transitoria, quibus boni, seu uiuant seu moriantur, perire non possunt, Christo nostro inputant: cum Christus noster tanta frequentet pro moribus optimis praecepta contra perditos mores; dii uero ipsorum nullis talibus praeceptis egerint aliquid cum suo cultore populo pro illa re publica, ne periret; immo eosdem mores uelut suis exemplis auctoritate noxia corrumpendo egerunt potius, ut periret.

Lest anyone, therefore, should suppose that I have written railing against the gods rather than something worthy of them, wherever the poets have commemorated that they fought among themselves, they themselves, for the deceiving of men, confirmed the poets’ songs, namely by exhibiting their battles to human eyes not only through stage-players in the theater, but even by themselves in the field. We have been compelled to say these things, since their own authorities did not hesitate to say and to write that, by the worst morals of the citizens, the Roman republic had already beforehand been ruined, and that nothing remained before the advent of Christ Jesus our Lord. That perdition they do not impute to their gods; they impute it to our Christ on account of the transitory evils, by which the good, whether they live or die, cannot perish; whereas our Christ furnishes so many precepts for the best morals against ruined morals; but their own gods, by no such precepts, did anything with their worshiping people for that commonwealth, lest it should perish; nay rather, by corrupting those same morals with a noxious authority, as if by their own examples, they acted so that it would perish.

Quam non ideo tunc perisse quisquam, ut arbitror, iam dicere audebit, quia "discessere omnes adytis arisque relictis di", uelut amici uirtutibus, cum uitiis hominum offenderentur; quia tot signis extorum auguriorum uaticiniorum, quibus se tamquam praescios futurorum adiutoresque proeliorum iactare et commendare gestiebant, conuincuntur fuisse praesentes; qui si uere abscessissent, mitius Romani in bella ciuilia suis cupiditatibus quam illorum instigationibus exarsissent.

Which no one, as I think, will now dare to say then perished for this reason, namely because “all the gods departed, the adyta and altars left behind,” as though friends to virtues, when they were offended by the vices of men; since by so many signs of entrails, auguries, vaticinations—by which they were eager to vaunt and commend themselves as prescient of the future and helpers of battles—they are convicted to have been present; who, if they had truly withdrawn, the Romans would have blazed up into civil wars more mildly by their own desires than by their instigations.

[XXVI] Quae cum ita sint, cum palam aperteque turpitudines crudelitatibus mixtae, opprobria numinum et crimina, siue prodita siue conficta, ipsis exposcentibus et nisi fieret irascentibus etiam certis et statutis sollemnitatibus consecrata illis et dicata claruerint atque ad omnium oculos, ut imitanda proponerentur, spectanda processerint: quid est, quod idem ipsi daemones, qui se huiusce modi uoluptatibus inmundos esse spiritus confitentur, qui suis flagitiis et facinoribus, siue indicatis siue simulatis, eorumque sibi celebratione petita ab inpudentibus, extorta a pudentibus auctores se uitae scelestae inmundaeque testantur, perhibentur tamen in adytis suis secretisque penetralibus dare quaedam bona praecepta de moribus quibusdam uelut electis sacratis suis? Quod si ita est, hoc ipso callidior aduertenda est et conuincenda malitia spirituum noxiorum. Tanta enim uis est probitatis et castitatis, ut omnis uel paene omnis eius laude moueatur humana natura, nec usque adeo sit turpitudine uitiosa, ut totum sensum honestatis amiserit.

[26] Since these things are so—since turpitudes openly and plainly mixed with cruelties, the opprobria and crimes of the deities, whether betrayed or concocted, at their own demand, and with them growing angry if it were not done, have shone forth as consecrated and dedicated to them even in fixed and appointed solemnities, and have advanced before the eyes of all to be gazed upon, so that they might be proposed as things to be imitated—what is the reason that these very same demons, who confess themselves to be unclean spirits in pleasures of this sort, who by their own disgraces and crimes, whether disclosed or feigned, and by the celebration of these demanded for themselves by the shameless, wrung from the modest, bear witness that they are authors of a criminal and unclean life, are nevertheless reported in their adyta and secret inner penetralia to give certain good precepts about certain morals to, as it were, their elect, their consecrated ones? But if it is so, by this very fact the more crafty malice of the noxious spirits is to be noticed and convicted. For so great is the force of probity and chastity, that every—or almost every—human nature is moved by its praise, nor is it so vicious with turpitude as to have lost the whole sense of honesty.

Proinde malignitas daemonum, nisi alicubi se, quem ad modum scriptum in nostris litteris nouimus, transfjguret in angelos lucis, non implet negotium deceptionis. Foris itaque populis celeberrimo strepitu impietas impura circumsonat, et intus paucis castitas simulata uix sonat; praebentur propatula pudendis et secreta laudandis; decus latet et dedecus patet; quod malum geritur omnes conuocat spectatores, quod bonum dicitur uix aliquos inuenit auditores, tamquam honesta erubescenda sint et inhonesta glorianda. Sed ubi hoc nisi in daemonum templis?

Accordingly the malignity of the demons, unless it somewhere, as we know written in our Scriptures, transfigures itself into angels of light, does not fulfill the business of deception. Outside, therefore, for the peoples, with the most thronged uproar, impure impiety resounds all around, and inside, for a few, simulated chastity scarcely sounds; open display is afforded for things to be ashamed of, and secrecy for things to be praised; honor lies hidden and dishonor lies open; what evil is done summons all spectators, what good is spoken of scarcely finds any hearers, as though honorable things were to be blushed at and dishonorable to be gloried in. But where is this, if not in the temples of the demons?

ubi nisi in fallaciae diuersoriis? Illud enim fit, ut honestiores, qui pauci sunt, capiantur; hoc autem, ne plures, qui sunt turpissimi, corrigantur. Vbi et quando sacrati Caelestis audiebant castitatis praecepta, nescimus; ante ipsum tamen deIubrum, ubi simulacrum illud locatum conspiciebamus, uniuersi undique confluentes et ubi quisque poterat stantes ludos qui agebantur intentissime spectabamus, intuentes alternante conspectu hinc meretriciam pompam, illinc uirginem deam; illam suppliciter adorari, ante illam turpia celebrari; non ibi pudibundos mimos, nullam uerecundiorem scaenicam uidimus; cuncta obscenitatis implebantur officia.

Where, if not in the lodgings of deception? For this comes about, that the more honorable, who are few, are captured; but that, the more numerous, who are most base, be not corrected. Where and when those consecrated to Caelestis were hearing precepts of chastity, we do not know; yet before the very shrine itself, where we beheld that simulacrum set up, we all, flowing together from every side and standing wherever each one could, most intently were watching the games that were being performed, looking with alternating gaze now upon the meretricial pomp, now upon the virgin goddess; that one was devoutly adored, and before that one shameful things were celebrated; we saw there no bashful mimes, no more modest actress; all the offices of obscenity were being filled.

Sciebatur uirginali numini quid placeret, et exhibebatur quod de templo domum matrona doJctior reportaret. Nonnullae pudentiores auertebant faciem aIu impuris motibus scaenicorum et artem flagitii furtiua intentione discebant. Hominibus namque uerecundabantur, ne auderent impudicos gestus ore libero cernere; sed multo minus audebant sacra eius, quam uenerabantur, casto corde damnare.

It was known what pleased the virginal divinity, and there was exhibited what a more learned matron might carry home from the temple. Certain more modest women turned their face away from the impure motions of the stage-performers and learned the art of flagitiousness by a furtive intention. For they were ashamed before human beings, so that they did not dare to behold the impudent gestures with a free countenance; but much less did they dare to condemn with a chaste heart the sacred rites of her whom they venerated.

Hoc tamen palam discendum praebebatur in templo, ad quod perpetrandum saltem secretum quaerebatur in domo, mirante nimium, si ullus ibi erat, pudore mortalium, quod humana flagitia non libere homines committerent, quae apud deos etiam religiose discerent iratos habituri, nisi etiam exhibere curarent. Quis enim alius spiritus occulto instinctu nequissimas agitans mentes et instat faciendis adulteriis et pascitur factis, nisi qui etiam sacris talibus oblectatur, constituens in templis simulacra daemonum, amans in ludis simulacra uitiorum, susurrans in occulto uerba iustitiae ad decipiendos etiam paucos bonos, equentans in aperto inuitamenta nequitiae ad possidendos innumerabiles malos?

This, however, was being offered to be learned openly in the temple, for the perpetrating of which at least secrecy was sought in the house, the modesty of mortals, if there was any there, marveling exceedingly that men did not freely commit human disgraces which before the gods they even learned religiously—gods whom they would have as angry unless they also took care to exhibit them. For what other spirit, by a hidden instigation stirring the most wicked minds, both presses for adulteries to be done and is fed by the deeds, if not the one who likewise is delighted by such rites: setting up in the temples simulacra of daemons, loving in the games simulacra of vices, whispering in secret words of justice to deceive even the few good, parading in the open invitations of iniquity to possess innumerable wicked men?

[XXVII] Vir grauis et philosophaster Tullius aedilis futurus clamat in auribus ciuitatis, inter cetera sui magistratus officia sibi Floram matrem ludorum celebritate placandam; qui ludi tanto deuotius, quanto turpius celebrari solent. Dicit alio loco iam consul in extremis periculis ciuitatis, et ludos per decem dies factos, neque rem ullam quae ad placandos deos pertineret praetermissam; quasi non satius erat tales deos inritare temperantia quam placare luxuria, et eos honestate etiam ad inimicitias prouocare quam tanta deformitate lenire. Neque enim grauius fuerant quamlibet crudelissima inmanitate nocituri homines, propter quos placabantur, quam nocebant ipsi, cum uitiositate foedissima placarentur.

[27] The weighty man and philosophaster Tullius, being about to be aedile, cries in the ears of the city that, among the other duties of his magistracy, Flora, mother of the Games, must be placated by the celebration of games; which games are wont to be celebrated all the more devoutly the more turpidly. Elsewhere he says, now as consul, in the extreme perils of the commonwealth, that games were held for ten days, and that not any thing which pertained to appeasing the gods was omitted; as though it were not better to irritate such gods by temperance than to placate them by luxury, and to provoke them even to enmities by honesty rather than to soothe them by so great deformity. For the men on whose account they were appeased would not have been about to do harm more grievously by however most cruel inhumanity, than those gods themselves did harm, when they were appeased by most foul viciousness.

Quando quidem ut auerteretur quod metuebatur ab hoste in corporibus, eo modo dii conciliabantur, quo uirtus debellaretur in mentibus, qui non opponerentur defensores oppugnatoribus moenium, nisi prius fierent expugnatores morum bonorum. Hanc talium numinum placation em petulantissimam inpurissimam inpudentissimam nequissimam inmundissimam, cuius actores laudanda Romanae uirtutis indoles honore priuauit tribu mouit, agnouit turpes fecit infames, hanc, inquam, pudendam ueraeque religioni auersandam et detestandam talium numinum placationem, fabulas in deos inlecebrosa atque criminosas, haec ignominiosa deorum uel scelerate turpiterque facta uel sceleratius turpiusque conficta oculis et auribus publicis ciuitas tota discebat, haec commissa numinibus placere cernebat, et ideo non solum illis exhibenda, sed sibi quoque imitanda credebat, non illud nescio quid uelut bonum et honestum, quod tam paucis et tam occulte dicebatur (si tamen dicebatur), ut magis ne innotesceret, quam ne non fieret, timeretur.

Since, indeed, in order that what was feared from the enemy in their bodies might be averted, the gods were conciliated in that manner by which virtue was warred down in minds—men would not be set up as defenders against the besiegers of the walls, unless they first became stormers of good morals. This propitiation of such numina—most petulant, most impure, most impudent, most nefarious, most unclean—its performers the native character of Roman virtue deprived of honor, removed from their tribe, acknowledged as base, made infamous; this, I say, this placation of such deities, shameful, and to true religion to be turned away from and detested—the city as a whole was learning with public eyes and ears these tales about the gods, enticing and criminous, these ignominious things of the gods, either criminally and foully done or, more criminally and more foully, fabricated; it saw that these things, being committed, pleased the numina, and therefore believed that they must not only be exhibited to them, but also imitated by itself, not that I-know-not-what as if good and honorable which was said to so few and so secretly (if indeed it was said), such that it was feared more lest it become known than lest it not be done.

[XXVIII] Ab istarum inmundissimarum potestatum tartareo iugo et societate poenali erui per Christi nomen homines et in lucem saluberrimae pietatis ab illa perniciosissimae impietatis nocte transferri queruntur et murmurant iniqui et ingrati et illo nefario spiritu altius obstrictiusque possessi, quia populi confluunt ad ecclesiam casta celebritate, honesta utriusque sexus discretione, ubi audiant quam bene hic ad tempus uiuere debeant, ut post hanc uitam beate semperque uiuere mereantur, ubi sancta scriptura iustitiaeque doctrina de superiore loco in conspectu omnium personante et qui faciunt audiant ad praemium, et qui non faciunt audiant ad iudicium. Quo etsi ueniunt quidam talium praeceptorum inrisores, omnis eorum petulantia aut repentina mutatione deponitur, aut timore uel pudore comprimitur. Nihil enim eis turpe ac flagitiosum spectandum imitandumque proponitur, ubi ueri Dei aut praecepta insinuantur aut miracula narrantur, aut dona laudantur aut beneficia p ostulantur.

[XXVIII] From the Tartarean yoke and penal fellowship of those most unclean powers men are being rescued through the name of Christ and are transferred into the light of most health-giving piety from that night of most pernicious impiety; the unjust and ungrateful complain and murmur, being by that nefarious spirit more deeply and more tightly possessed, because peoples flock to the church with chaste solemnity, with honorable distinction of both sexes, where they may hear how well they ought to live here for a time, that after this life they may merit to live blessedly and forever; where Holy Scripture and the doctrine of justice, resounding from a higher place in the sight of all, make it so that they who do hear unto a reward, and they who do not do hear unto judgment. And although certain mockers of such precepts come there, all their petulance is either laid aside by a sudden change, or is restrained by fear or by shame. For nothing base and flagitious is set before them to gaze at and imitate, where either the precepts of the true God are insinuated or miracles are recounted, or gifts are praised or benefits are p ostulated.

[XXIX] Haec potius concupisce, o indoles Romana laudabilis, o progenies Regulorum Scaeuolarum, Scipionum Fabriciorum; haec potius concupisce, haec ab illa turpissima uanitate et fallacissima daemonum malignitate discerne. Si quid in te laudabile naturaliter eminet, non nisi uera pietate purgatur atque perficitur, impietate autem disperditur et punitur. Nunc iam elige quid sequaris, ut non in te, sed in Deo uero sine ullo errore lauderis.

[29] Desire this rather, O praiseworthy Roman indoles, O progeny of the Reguli and the Scaevolae, of the Scipios and the Fabricii; desire this rather; distinguish this from that most shameful vanity and the most fallacious malignity of demons. If anything laudable naturally stands out in you, it is cleansed and perfected only by true piety, but by impiety it is ruined and punished. Now choose what you will follow, that you may be praised not in yourself, but in the true God, without any error.

Tunc enim tibi gloria popularis adfuit, sed occulto iudicio diuinae prouidentiae uera religio quam eligeres defuit. Expergiscere, dies est, sicut experrecta es in quibusdam, de quorum uirtute perfecta et pro fide uera etiam passionibus gloriamur, qui usquequaque aduersus potestates inimicissimas confligentes easque fortiter moriendo uincentes m sanguine nobis hanc patriam peperere suo w. Ad quam patriam te inuitamus et exhortamur, ut eius adiciaris numero ciuium, cuius quodam modo asylum est uera remissio peccatorum. Non audias degeneres tuos Christo Christianisue detrahentes et accusantes uelut tempora mala, cum quaerant tempora, quibus non sit quieta uita, sed potius secura nequitia.

For then indeed popular glory was present to you, but by the hidden judgment of divine providence the true religion which you might choose was lacking. Awake; it is day—just as you have awakened in certain matters—of whose perfected virtue, and for the true faith even in passions, we glory: who everywhere, contending against most inimical powers and bravely conquering them by dying, have with their own blood begotten for us this fatherland. To which fatherland we invite and exhort you, that you be added to its number of citizens, whose asylum, as it were, is the true remission of sins. Do not listen to your degenerates detracting from Christ and Christians and accusing, as though the times were evil, when they seek times in which life would not be quiet, but rather in which iniquity is secure.

Haec tibi numquam nec pro terrena patria placuerunt. Nunc iam caelestem arripe, pro qua minimum laborabis, et in ea ueraciter semperque regnabis. Illic enim tibi non Vestalis focus, non lapis Capitolinus, sed Deus unus et uerus nec metas rerum nec tempora ponit, Imperium sine fine dabit.

These things have never pleased you, not even for an earthly fatherland. Now seize the heavenly one, for which you will labor the least, and in it you will truly and forever reign. For there for you, not the Vestal hearth, not the Capitoline stone, but the one true God sets neither limits of things nor times, he will give an empire without end.

Noli deos falsos fallacesque requirere; abice potius atque contemne in ueram emicans libertatem. Non sunt dii, maligni sunt spiritus, quibus aeterna tua felicitas poena est. Non tam luno Troianis, a quibus carnalem originem ducis, arces uidetur inuidisse Romanas, quam isti daemones, quos adhuc deos putas, omni generi hominum sedes inuident sempiternas.

Do not seek false and fallacious gods; rather cast them away and contemn them, leaping forth into true liberty. They are not gods; they are malignant spirits, to whom your eternal felicity is a punishment. Not so much did Juno seem to have envied the Roman citadels to the Trojans, from whom you draw carnal origin, as these demons, whom you still think to be gods, envy the everlasting seats to the whole race of humankind.

Et tu ipsa non parua ex parte de talibus spiritibus iudicasti, quando ludis eos placasti, et per quos homines eosdem Iudos fecisti, infames esse uoluisti. Patere asseri libertatem tuam aduersus inmundos spiritus, qui tuis ceruicibus inposuerant sacrandam sibi et celebrandam ignominiam suam. Actores criminum diuinorum remouisti ab honoribus tuis: supplica Deo uero, ut a te remoueat illos deos, qui delectantur criminibus suis, seu ueris, quod ignominiosissimum est, seu falsis, quod malitiosissimum <est>. Bene, quod tua sponte histrionibus et scaenicis societatem ciuitatis patere noluisti; euigila plenius!

And you yourself have judged not in small part about such spirits, when by games you appeased them, and you wished the very men through whom you put on those same games to be infamous. Allow your freedom to be asserted against unclean spirits, who had imposed upon your necks that their own ignominy should be consecrated to themselves and celebrated. You have removed the actors of divine crimes from your honors: supplicate the true God, that he may remove from you those gods who take delight in their crimes—whether true, which is most ignominious, or false, which is most malicious. Good, that of your own accord you did not wish the fellowship of the commonwealth to be open to actors and stage-players; keep more fully awake!

Nullo modo his artibus placatur diuina maiestas, quibus humana dignitas inquinatur. Quo igitur pacto deos, qui talibus delectantur obsequiis, haberi putas in numero sanctarum caelestium potestatum, cum homines, per quos eadem aguntur obsequia, non putasti habendos in numero qualiumcumque ciuium Romanorum? Incomparabiliter superna est ciuitas clarior, ubi uictoria ueritas, ubi dignitas saanctitas, ubi pax felicitas, ubi uita aeternitas.

In no way is the divine majesty appeased by these arts, by which human dignity is defiled. In what manner, then, do you think that gods who take delight in such services are to be held in the number of the holy celestial powers, when the men through whom the same services are performed you have not thought to be held in the number of Roman citizens of whatever sort? Incomparably the supernal city is more illustrious, where victory is truth, where dignity is sanctity, where peace is felicity, where life is eternity.

Multo minus habetin sua societate tales deos, si tu in tua tales homines habere erubuisti. Proinde si ad beatam peruenire desideras ciuitatem, deuita daemonum societatem. Indigne ab honestis coluntur, qui per turpes placantur.

Much less does it have such gods in its society, if you were ashamed to have such men in yours. Therefore, if you desire to reach the blessed city, avoid the society of daemons. Unworthily are they worshiped by honorable men, who are appeased through disgraceful things.

Sic isti a tua pietate remoueantur purgatione Christiana, quo modo illi a tua dignitate remoti sunt notatione censoria. De bonis autem carnalibus, quibus solis mali perfrui uolunt, et de malis carnalibus, quae sola perpeti nolunt, quod neque in his habeant quam putantur habere isti daemones potestatem (quamquam si haberent, deberemus potius etiam ista contemnere, quam propter ista illos colere et eos colendo ad illa, quae nobis inuident, peruenire non posse), — tamen nec in istis eos hoc ualere, quod hi putant, qui propter haec eos coli oportere contendunt, deinceps uidebimus, ut hic sit huius uoluminis.

Thus let these be removed from your piety by Christian purgation, in the same way as those were removed from your dignity by censorial notation. But as to carnal goods, which alone the wicked wish to enjoy, and carnal evils, which alone they are unwilling to undergo, namely that not even in these do those demons have the power which they are thought to have (although if they did have it, we ought rather even to despise these things, than on account of these things to worship them, and by worshiping them to be unable to attain to those things at which they are envious of us), — nevertheless, not even in these do they avail for that which those suppose, who contend that on account of these they ought to be worshiped; we shall see this in what follows, so that here be the end of this volume.