Tertullian: ad Scapulam

CAP. I. 1. Nos quidem neque expauescimus, neque pertimescimus ea quae ab ignorantibus patimur, cum ad hanc sectam, utique suscepta condicione eius pacti, uenerimus, ut etiam animas nostras exauctorati in has pugnas accedamus, ea quae Deus repromittit consequi optantes, et ea quae diuersae uitae comminatur pati timentes. 2. Denique cum omni saeuitia uestra concertamus, etiam ultro erumpentes, magisque damnati quam absoluti gaudemus.

CHAPTER 1. 1. We indeed neither grow pale with fear, nor do we dread
the things we suffer at the hands of the ignorant, since to this sect, having in any case
accepted the condition of its pact, we have come, in order that even our lives,
as men discharged, we may bring into these combats, wishing to attain the things that God
promises, and fearing to suffer the things which he threatens to a contrary life.
2. Finally, we contend with all your savagery, even breaking forth of our own accord,
and we rejoice more when condemned than when acquitted.

Itaque hunc libellum non nobis timentes misimus, sed uobis et omnibus inimicis nostris, nedum amicis. 3. Ita enim disciplina iubemur diligere inimicos quoque et orare pro iis qui nos persequuntur, ut haec sit perfecta et propria bonitas nostra, non communis. Amicos enim diligere omnium est, inimicos autem solorum Christianorum.

Therefore we have sent this little book not
in fear for ourselves, but to you and to all our enemies,
let alone friends. 3. For by our discipline we are commanded to love enemies
as well and to pray for those who persecute us, so that this may be
our perfect and proper goodness, not a common one. To love friends
indeed is everyone’s part, but to love enemies is the part of Christians alone.

4. Qui ergo dolemus de ignorantia uestra, et misere mur erroris humani, et futura prospicimus, et signa eorum cottidie intentari uidemus, necesse est uel hoc modo erumpere ad proponenda uobis ea quae palam non uultis audire.

4. Therefore we, who grieve over your ignorance, and pity the error of humankind, and foresee the things to come, and see their signs being threatened every day, are compelled even in this way to burst forth to set before you those things which you do not wish to hear openly.

CAP. II. 1. Nos unum Deum colimus, quem omnes naturaliter nostis, ad cuius fulgura et tonitrua contremiscitis, ad cuius beneficia gaudetis. Ceteros et ipsi putatis deos esse, quos nos daemonas scimus.

CHAPTER 2. 1. We worship one God, whom you all by nature
know, at whose lightnings and thunders you tremble, at whose
benefits you rejoice. The others you yourselves suppose to be gods, whom we
know to be daemons.

2. Tamen humani iuris et naturalis potestatis est unicuique quod putauerit colere; nec alii obest aut prodest alterius religio. Sed nec religionis est cogere religionem, quae sponte suscipi debeat, non ui, cum et hostiae ab animo libenti expostulentur. Ita etsi nos compuleritis ad sacrificandum, nihil praestabitis diis uestris: ab inuitis enim sacrificia non desiderabunt, nisi si contentiosi sunt; contensiosus autem Deus non est.

2. Nevertheless, it belongs to human law and natural power that each one worship what he has thought; nor does one person’s religion either harm or profit another. But neither is it the part of religion to coerce religion, which ought to be undertaken spontaneously, not by force, since even sacrifices are demanded from a willing mind. Thus even if you should compel us to sacrifice, you will furnish nothing to your gods: for from the unwilling they will not desire sacrifices, unless they are contentious; but God is not contentious.

3. Denique qui est uerus, omnia sua ex aequo et profanis et suis praestat. Ideoque et iudicium constituit aeternum de gratis et ingratis. Tamen nos, quos sacrilegos existimatis, nec in furto unquam deprehendistis, nedum in sacrilegio.

3. Finally, he who is true grants all his own things equally
both to the profane and to his own. And therefore he has also established an eternal judgment
concerning the grateful and the ungrateful. Yet us, whom you consider sacrilegious,
you have never caught even in theft, much less in sacrilege.

4. Omnes autem qui templa despoliant, et per deos iurant, et eosdem colunt, et Christiani non sunt, et sacrilegi tamen deprehenduntur. Longum est si retexamus, quibus aliis modis et derideantur et contemnantur omnes dii ab ipsis cultoribus suis. 5. Sic et circa maiestatem imperatoris infamamur; tamen nunquam Albiniani, nec Nigriani, uel Cassiani inueniri potuerunt Christiani, sed idem ipsi qui per genios eorum in pridie usque iurauerant, qui pro salute eorum hostias et fecerant et uouerant, qui Christianos saepe damnauerant, hostes eorum sunt reperti.

4. But all who despoil temples,
and swear by the gods, and worship those same, and are not Christians,
and yet are apprehended as sacrilegious. It would be long if we were to retell,
in what other ways all the gods are both mocked and despised
by their own worshipers. 5. Likewise we are defamed concerning the majesty of the emperor; yet never
could Christians be found among the Albiniani, nor the Nigriani,
or the Cassiani, but those very same men who
had sworn by their genii right up to the day before, who for their safety
had both offered and vowed victims, who had often
condemned Christians, were discovered to be their enemies.

6. Christianus nullius est hostis, nedum imperatoris, quem sciens a Deo suo constitui, necesse est ut et ipsum diligat et reuereatur et honoret et saluum uelit, cum toto Romano imperio, quousque saeculum stabit: tamdiu enim stabit. 7. Colimus ergo et imperatorem sic quomodo et nobis licet et ipsi expedit, ut hominem a Deo secundum; et quicquid est a Deo consecutum est, solo tamen Deo minorem. Hoc et ipse uolet.

6. The Christian is an enemy of no one,
much less of the emperor, whom, knowing to be appointed by his God, it is necessary that he also love and revere and honor
and wish safe, together with the whole Roman empire, as long as the age
shall stand: for so long indeed it shall stand. 7. Therefore we also honor the emperor
in such manner as is permitted to us and is expedient for him, as a man second from God;
and whatever he is he has obtained from God, yet inferior to God alone.
This even he himself will wish.

Sic enim omnibus maior est, dum solo Deo minor est. Sic et ipsis diis maior est, dum et ipsi in potestate eius sunt. 8. Itaque et sacrificamus pro salute imperatoris, sed Deo nostro et ipsius, sed quomodo praecepit Deus, pura prece.

For thus he is greater than all,
while he is less only than God. Thus he is greater even than the gods themselves, since they too
are in his power. 8. Therefore we also sacrifice for the safety
of the emperor, but to our God and his, but as God has prescribed,
with pure prayer.

Non enim eget Deus, conditor uniuersitatis, odoris aut sanguinis alicuius. Haec enim daemoniorum pabula sunt. 9. Daemonas autem non tantum respuimus, uerum et reuincimus, et cottidie traducimus, et de hominibus expellimus, sicut plurimis notum est.

For God, the creator of the universe,
has no need of any odor or blood. For these are the fodder of daemons.
9. But the daemons we not only repudiate, indeed we also refute and overcome,
and we daily hold them up to disgrace, and we expel them from human beings, as is known to very many.

Ita nos magis oramus pro salute imperatoris, ab eo eam postulantes qui praestare potest. 10. Et utique ex disciplina patientiae diuinae agere nos, satis manifestum esse uobis potest, cum tanta hominum multitudo, pars paene maior ciuitatis cuiusque, in silentio et modestia agimus, singuli forte noti magis quam omnes, nec aliunde noscibiles quam de emendatione uitiorum pristinorum. Absit enim ut indigne feramus ea nos pati quae optamus, aut ultionem a nobis aliquam machinemur, quam a Deo exspectamus.

Thus we rather pray for the safety of the emperor, asking it from him who can grant it.
10. And assuredly that we act according to the discipline of divine patience can be sufficiently manifest to you, since so great a multitude of men, almost the greater part of every city, we conduct ourselves in silence and modesty, each perhaps more known singly than all together, and knowable from no other source than by the emendation of former vices. Far be it that we should take it amiss to suffer the things we desire, or
to contrive any vengeance on our part, which we await from God.

CAP. III. 1. Tamen, sicut supra diximus, doleamus necesse est, quod nulla ciuitas impune latura sit sanguinis nostri effusio nem; sicut et sub Hilariano praeside, cum de areis sepultura rum nostrarum acclamassent: 'Areae non sint!' Areae ipsorum non fuerunt: messes enim suas non egerunt.

CHAPTER 3. 1. Nevertheless, as we said above, we must grieve, that no city will bear with impunity the effusion of our blood; just as also under the governor Hilarianus, when they had shouted concerning the areas of our burials: 'Let there be no areas!' The areas were not theirs: for they did not bring in their harvests.

2. Ceterum et imbres anni praeteriti quid commemorauerint genus humanum apparuit, cataclysmum scilicet et retro fuisse propter incredulitates et iniquitates hominum; et ignes qui super moenia Carthaginis proxime pependerunt per noctem, quid minati sint, sciunt qui uiderunt; et pristina tonitrua quid sonuerint, sciunt qui obduruerunt. 3. Omnia haec signa sunt imminentis irae Dei, quam necesse est, quoquo modo possumus, ut et nuntiemus et praedicemus, et deprecemur interim localem esse. Vniuersalem enim et supremam suo tempore sentient, qui exempla eius aliter interpretantur.

2. Moreover, even
the rains of the past year have made apparent to the human race what they have recalled—namely, that there was in times past a cataclysm on account of the incredulities and iniquities of men; and the fires which most recently hung over the walls of Carthage through the night, what they threatened, those who saw know; and what the former thunders sounded, those who have hardened themselves know. 3. All these are signs of the imminent
wrath of God, which it is necessary, in whatever way we can, both that we announce and that we proclaim, and that we deprecate meanwhile to be local. For the universal and supreme one, in its own time they will feel, who interpret its examples otherwise.

Nam et sol ille in conuentu Vticensi extincto paene lumine adeo portentum fuit, ut non potuerit ex ordinario deliquio hoc pati, positus in suo hypsomate et domicilio. Habetis astrologos. 4. Possumus aeque et exitus quorumdam praesidum tibi proponere, qui in fine uitae suae recordati sunt deliquisse, quod uexassent Christianos.

For even that sun at the assembly of Utica, its light almost extinguished, was so much a portent
that it could not have suffered this by an ordinary eclipse, being set in its own hypsoma and domicile.
You have astrologers. 4. We can likewise set before you the deaths of certain governors,
who at the end of their life remembered that they had transgressed, because they had vexed Christians.

Vigellius Saturninus, qui primus hic gladium in nos egit, lumina amisit. Claudius Lucius Herminianus in Cappodocia, cum indigne ferens uxorem suam ad hanc sectam transisse, Christianos crudeliter tractasset, solusque in praetorio suo uastatus peste, conuiuis uermibus ebulisset: 'Nemo sciat, aiebat, ne gaudeant Christiani aut sperent Christianae.' Postea cognito errore suo, quod tormentis quosdam a proposito suo excidere fecisset, paene Christianus decessit. Caecilius Capella in illo exitu Byzantino: 'Christiani gaudete!' exclamauit.

Vigellius Saturninus, who first here drove the sword against us, lost his eyes. Claudius Lucius Herminianus in Cappadocia, when, taking it indignantly that his wife had passed over to this sect, he had treated Christians cruelly, and he alone in his praetorium laid waste by pestilence, burst forth with worms before his dinner‑guests: “Let no one know,” he used to say, “lest the Christians rejoice or the Christian women hope.” Afterwards, having recognized his error, that by torments he had caused certain persons to fall away from their purpose, he died almost a Christian. Caecilius Capella at that Byzantine end: “Christians, rejoice!” he exclaimed.

5. Sed qui sibi uidentur impune tulisse, uenient in diem diuini iudicii. Tibi quoque optamus admonitionem solam fuisse, quod, cum Adrumeticum Mauilum idem Caecilius ad bestias damnasset, statim haec uexatio subsecuta est, nunc ex eadem causa interpellatio sanguinis. Sed memento de cetero.

5. But as for those who seem to themselves to have carried it off with impunity, they will come into the day of divine judgment. For you also we hope that it has been a mere admonition, that, when that same Caecilius had condemned Mavilus of Hadrumetum to the beasts, immediately this vexation followed, and now, from the same cause, an interpellation of blood. But remember for the future.

CAP. IV. 1. Non te terremus, qui nec timemus; sed uelim, ut omnes saluos facere possimus, monendo mh_ qeomaxei=n. Potes et officio iurisdictionis tuae fungi et humanitatis meminisse, uel quia et uos sub gladio estis. 2. Quid enim amplius tibi mandatur quam nocentes confessos damnare, negantes autem ad tormenta reuocare?

CHAPTER 4. 1. We do not terrify you, we who do not fear; but I would wish, that we may be able to make all safe, by admonishing not to theomachize. You can both discharge the duty of your jurisdiction and remember humanity, even because you too are under the sword. 2. For what more is enjoined upon you than to condemn the guilty who have confessed, but to remand those denying to torture?

Videtis ergo quomodo ipsi uos contra mandata faciatis, ut confessos negare cogatis. Adeo confitemini innocentes esse nos, quos dannare statim ex confessione non uultis. Si autem contenditis ad elidendos nos, iam ergo innocentiam expugnatis.

You see therefore how you yourselves act against the mandates, in that you compel the confessed to deny. To such a degree you admit that we are innocent, whom you are unwilling to condemn at once from the confession. But if you contend to crush us, then already you are assailing innocence.

3. Quanti autem praesides, et constantiores et crudeliores, dissimulauerunt ab huiusmodi causis ! ut Cincius Seuerus, qui Thysdri ipse dedit remedium, quomodo responderent Christiani ut dimitti possent; ut Vespronius Candidus, qui Christianum quasi tumultuosum ciuibus suis satisfacere dimisit; ut Asper, qui modice uexatum hominem et statim deiectum, nec sacrificium compulit facere, ante professus inter aduocatos et adsessores, dolere se incidisse primum in hanc causam. Pudens etiam missum ad se Christianum, in elogio concussione eius intellecta, dimisit, scisso eodem elogio, sine accusatore negans se auditurum hominem secundum mandatum. 4. Haec omnia tibi et de officio suggeri possunt, et ab eisdem aduocatis, qui et ipsi beneficia habent Christianorum, licet acclament, quae uolunt.

3. And how many governors, both more steadfast and more cruel, have refrained from cases of this kind! as Cincius Severus, who at Thysdrus himself gave a remedy for how Christians should respond so that they might be dismissed; as Vespronius Candidus, who dismissed a Christian, as though tumultuous, to satisfy his fellow-citizens; as Asper, who, having only moderately vexed the man and immediately sent him down, did not even compel him to perform sacrifice, having previously professed among the advocates and assessors that he was pained to have fallen for the first time into this case. Pudens also, when a Christian had been sent to him, upon understanding in the docket the extortion involved in it, dismissed him, the same docket torn up, denying that without an accuser he would hear the man, according to the mandate. 4. All these things can be suggested to you both on the ground of office and by those same advocates, who themselves also have the benefactions of Christians, although they shout what they please.

5. Nam et cuiusdam notarius, cum a daemone praecipitaretur, liberatus est; et quorumdam propinquus et puerulus; et quanti honesti uiri (de uulgaribus enim non dicimus) aut a daemoniis aut ualetudinibus remediati sunt ! Ipse etiam Seuerus, pater Antonini, Christianorum memor fuit. Nam et Proculum Christianum qui Torpacion cognominabatur, Euhodiae procuratorem, qui eum per oleum aliquando curauerat, requisiuit et in palatio suo habuit usque ad mortem eius; quem et Antoninus optime nouerat, lacte Christiano educatus. 6. Sed et clarissimas feminas et clarissimos uiros Seuerus, sciens huius sectae esse, non modo non laesit, uerum et testimonio exornauit, et populo furenti in nos palam restitit.

5. For
even the notary of a certain man, when he was being driven headlong by a demon, was freed; and the kinsman of certain persons and a little boy; and how many
honorable men (for we are not speaking of the vulgar sort) either from demons
or from illnesses have been remedied ! Severus himself, the father
of Antoninus, was mindful of the Christians. For he even sought out Proculus,
a Christian who was surnamed Torpacion, the procurator of Euhodia, who at some time had cured him through oil,
and he kept him in his palace until his death; whom also
Antoninus knew very well, nourished with Christian milk. 6. But
even the most illustrious women and the most illustrious men, Severus, knowing
to be of this sect, not only did he not harm, but he also adorned with testimony, and he openly resisted the people raging against us.

Marcus quoque Aurelias in Germanica expeditione Christianorum militum orationibus ad Deum factis imbres in siti illa impetrauit. Quando non geniculationibus et ieiunationibus nostris etiam siccitates sunt depulsae? Tunc et populus acclamans Deo deorum, qui solus potens.

Marcus
Aurelius also, on the Germanic expedition, by the prayers of Christian
soldiers made to God, obtained rains in that drought. When have not by our geniculations and fastings
even droughts been driven away? Then too the people, acclaiming
the God of gods, who alone is powerful.

In Iouis nomine Deo nostro testimonium reddidit. 7. Praeter haec depositum non abnegamus, matrimonium nullius adulteramus, pupillos pie tractamus, indigentibus refrigeramus, nulli malum pro malo reddimus. Viderint, qui sectam mentiuntur, quos et ipsi recusamus.

In Jove’s name he rendered testimony to our God. 7. Besides these things, we do not deny a deposit, we adulterate the matrimony of no one, we piously treat wards, we refresh the indigent, we render evil to no one in return for evil. Let those see to it who pretend the sect, whom we ourselves also refuse.

Quis denique de nobis allo nomine queritur? Quod aliud negotium patitur Christianus, nisi suae sectae, quam incestam, quam crudelem tanto tempore nemo probauit? 8. Pro tanta innocentia, pro tanta probitate, pro iustitia, pro pudicitia, pro fide, pro ueritate, pro Deo uiuo, cremamur; quod nec sacrilegi, nec hostes publici, uerum nec tot maiestatis rei pati solent.

Who, finally, complains of us under any name? What other business does a Christian undertake, except that of his own sect— which, as incestuous, as cruel, no one has proved in so long a time? 8. For such great innocence, for such great probity, for justice, for pudicity, for faith, for truth, for the living God,
we are burned; which not even sacrilegious men, nor public enemies, indeed not even so many charged with treason, are wont to suffer.

Nam et nunc a praeside Legionis, et a praeside Mauritaniae uexatur hoc nomen, sed gladio tenus, sicut et a primordio mandatum est animaduerti in huiusmodi. Sed maiora certamina maiora sequuntur praemia.

For even now this Name is vexed by the governor of Legio and by the governor of Mauretania, but only up to the sword, just as from the beginning it has been mandated to punish such persons. But greater prizes follow greater contests.

CAP. V. 1. Crudelitas uestra gloria est nostra. Vide tantum ne hoc ipso, quod talia sustinemus, ad hoc solum uideamur erumpere, ut hoc ipsum probemus, nos haec non timere, sed ultro uocare.

CHAPTER 5. 1. Your cruelty is our glory. Only take care lest by this very fact, that we endure such things, we seem to break out for this sole purpose, to prove this very thing: that we do not fear these things, but call for them of our own accord.

Arrius Antoninus in Asia cum persequeretur 5 instanter, omnes illius ciuitatis Christiani ante tribunalia eius se manu facta obtulerunt. Tum ille, paucis duci iussis, reliquis ait: ]W dei=loi, ei0 qe/lete a)poqnh&skein, krhmnou_j h@ bro&xouj e!xete. 2. Hoc si placuerit et hic fieri, quid facies de tantis milibus hominum, tot uiris ac feminis, omnis sexus, omnis aetatis, omnis dignitatis, offerentibus se tibi?

Arrius Antoninus in Asia, when he was persecuting
5 earnestly, all the Christians of that city, with a band formed, offered themselves before his tribunals. Then he, after ordering a few to be led away, said to the rest: 'Cowards, if you want to die, you have cliffs or nooses.' 2. If it should be pleasing that this be done here as well, what will you do about so many thousands of human beings, so many men and women, of every sex, of every age, of every rank, presenting themselves to you?

Quantis ignibus, quantis gladiis opus erit ! Quid ipse Carthago passura est, decimata a te, cum propinquos, cum contubernales suos illic unusquisque cognouerit, cum uiderit illic fortasse et tui ordinis uiros et matronas, et principales quasque personal, et amicorum tuorum uel propinquos uel amicos? 3. Parce ergo tibi, si non nobis. Parce Carthagini, si non tibi.

How great
the fires, how great the swords there will be need of ! What will Carthage itself be about to suffer,
decimated by you, when each person there has recognized his kinsmen, his contubernals,
when he has seen there perhaps even men of your order and matrons,
and all the principal persons, and, of your friends, either kinsmen or friends? 3. Spare
therefore yourself, if not us. Spare Carthage, if not yourself.

Parce prouinciae, quae uisa intentione tua obnoxia facta est concussionibus et militum et inimicorum suorum cuiusque. 4. Magistrum neminem habemus, nisi solum Deum. Hic ante te est, nec abscondi potest, sed cui nihil facere possis.

Spare
the province, which, as it seems by your intention, has been made subject to exactions both of the soldiers and of each of its enemies. 4. We have no master, except God alone. He is before
you, nor can he be hidden, but against whom you can do nothing.

Ceterum quos putas tibi magistros, homines sunt et ipsi morituri quandoque. Nec tamen deficiet haec secta, quam tunc magis aedificari scias, cum caedi uidetur. Quisque enim tantam tolerantiam spectans, ut aliquo scrupulo percussus et inquirere accenditur, quid sit in causa, et ubi cognouerit ueritatem et ipse statim sequitur.

Moreover,
those whom you suppose your masters are men, and they too are themselves destined to die
someday. Nor, however, will this sect fail, which you should know is then more
edified—built up—when it seems to be cut down. For each person, beholding such
tolerance, being struck by some scruple and kindled to inquire what the cause is, and when he has come to know the truth,
he himself immediately follows.

TERTVLLIANI AD SCAPVLAM EXPLICIT

HERE ENDS TERTULLIAN'S TO SCAPULA