Tertullian: Apologeticum

[1] Si non licet vobis, Romani imperii antistites, in aperto et edito, in ipso fere vertice civitatis praesidentibus ad iudicandum palam dispicere et coram examinare, quid sit liquido in causa Christianorum, si ad hanc solam speciem auctoritas vestra de iustitiae diligentia in publico aut timet aut erubescit inquirere, si denique, quod proxime accidit, domesticis iudiciis nimis operata infestatio sectae huius obstruit defensioni: liceat veritati vel occulta via tacitarum litterarum ad aures vestras pervenire.

[1] If it is not permitted to you, presidents of the Roman empire, when you are sitting to judge in the open and on an eminence, almost on the very summit of the city, to discern openly and to examine face to face what is clear in the case of the Christians, if for this sole appearance your authority, from diligence for justice, either fears or blushes to inquire in public, if finally, as has most recently happened, the over-wrought infestation against this sect, busied in domestic judgments, blocks the defense: let it be permitted for truth, even by a hidden way of silent letters, to come to your ears.

[2] Nihil de causa sua deprecatur, quia nec de condicione miratur. Scit se peregrinam in terris agere, inter extraneos facile inimicos invenire, ceterum genus, sedem, spem, gratiam, dignitatem in caelis habere. Unum gestit interdum, ne ignorata damnetur.

[2] She pleads nothing about her own case, because she does not marvel at her condition. She knows that she acts as a peregrine upon earth, that among strangers she readily finds enemies; but that her race, seat, hope, grace, and dignity she has in the heavens. She sometimes longs for one thing: lest, being unknown, she be condemned.

[3] Quid hic deperit legibus in suo regno dominantibus, si audiatur? An hoc magis gloriabitur potestas earum, quo etiam auditam damnabunt veritatem? Ceterum inauditam si damnent, praeter invidiam iniquitatis etiam suspicionem merebuntur alicuius conscientiae, nolentes audire, quod auditum damnare non possint.

[3] What do the laws, ruling in their own realm, lose here if it be heard? Or will their power glory the more, in that they will even condemn the truth after it has been heard? But if they condemn it unheard, besides the odium of iniquity they will also incur the suspicion of some conscience, being unwilling to hear what, once heard, they would not be able to condemn.

[4] Hanc itaque primam causam apud vos collocamus iniquitatis odii erga nomen Christianorum. Quam iniquitatem idem titulus et onerat et revincit, qui videtur excusare, ignorantia scilicet. Quid enim iniquius, quam ut oderint homines quod ignorant, etiam si res meretur odium?

[4] This, therefore, we place with you as the first cause of the iniquity of hatred toward the name of the Christians. Which iniquity the same title both aggravates and refutes, which seems to excuse it—namely, ignorance. For what is more iniquitous than that men should hate what they are ignorant of, even if the matter deserves hatred?

Tunc etenim meretur, cum cognoscitur an mereatur.

For then indeed it deserves it, when it is learned whether it deserves it.

[5] Vacante autem meriti notitia, unde odii iustitia defenditur, quae non de eventu, sed de conscientia probanda est? Cum ergo propterea oderunt homines, quia ignorant, quale sit quod oderunt, cur non liceat eiusmodi illud esse, quod non debeant odisse? Ita utrumque ex alterutro redarguimus, et ignorare illos, dum oderunt, et iniuste odisse, dum ignorant.

[5] But with the knowledge of the merit being vacant, whence is the justice of the hatred defended, which must be proved not from the event, but from conscience? Since therefore men for that reason hate, because they are ignorant of what sort that is which they hate, why should it not be permitted that it be of such a kind as they ought not to hate? Thus we refute both by the other: both that they are ignorant while they hate, and that they hate unjustly while they are ignorant.

[6] Testimonium ignorantiae est, quae iniquitatem dum excusat, condemnat, cum omnes, qui retro oderant, quia ignorabant, quale sit quod oderant, simul desinunt ignorare, cessant et odisse. Ex his fiunt Christiani, utique de comperto, et incipiunt odisse quod fuerant et profiteri quod oderant; et sunt tanti, quanti et denotamur:

[6] It is a testimony of ignorance, which, while it excuses iniquity, condemns, since all who formerly hated, because they were ignorant what sort the thing is which they hated, at once as they cease to be ignorant, they also cease to hate. From these are made Christians, assuredly on the basis of what has been ascertained, and they begin to hate what they had been and to profess what they had hated; and they are as many as we are denoted as being:

[7] Obsessam vociferantur civitatem; in agris, in castellis, in insulis Christianos; omnem sexum, aetatem, condicionem, etiam dignitatem transgredi ad hoc nomen quasi detrimento maerent.

[7] They vociferate that the city is besieged; in the fields, in the forts, on the islands—Christians; they mourn, as if to a detriment, that every sex, age, condition, even dignity, is passing over to this name.

[8] Nec tamen hoc ipso ad aestimationem alicuius latentis boni promovent animos. Non licet rectius suspicari, non libet prop[r]ius experiri. Hic tantum curiositas humana torpescit: Amant ignorare, cum alii gaudeant cognovisse.

[8] Nor yet by this very fact do they advance their minds toward an estimation of some hidden good. It is not permitted to suspect more rightly, it is not their pleasure to test more closely. Here alone human curiosity grows torpid: They love to be ignorant, while others rejoice to have come to know.

Quanto magis hos Anacharsis denotasset imprudentes de prudentibus iudicantes quam immusicos de musicis!

How much more would Anacharsis have denoted these men—imprudent people judging about the prudent—than unmusical men about musicians!

[9] Malunt nescire, quia iam oderunt. Adeo quod nesciant, praeiudicant id esse, quod, si sciant, odisse non poterant — quando, si nullum odii debitum deprehendatur, optimum utique sit desinere iniuste odisse, si vero de merito constet, non modo nihil odii detrahatur, sed amplius adquiratur ad perseverantiam, etiam iustitiae ipsius auctoritate.

[9] They prefer not to know, because they already hate. To such a degree they prejudge that what they do not know is that which, if they knew it, they could not hate — since, if no debt of hatred is discovered, it is certainly best to cease unjustly hating; but if it is established on the score of merit, not only should nothing of hatred be subtracted, but more should be acquired for perseverance, even by the very authority of justice.

[10] "Sed non ideo", inquit, "bonum, quia multos convertit; quanti enim ad malum performantur! Quanti transfugae in perversum!" Quis negat? Tamen quod vere malum est, ne ipsi quidem, quos rapit, defendere pro bono audent.

[10] "But not on that account," he says, "is it good, because it converts many; for how many are trained unto evil! How many defectors into perversity!" Who denies it? Nevertheless, that which is truly evil, not even those whom it seizes dare to defend as a good.

Omne malum aut timore aut pudore natura perfudit.

Nature has suffused every evil either with fear or with shame.

[11] Denique malefici gestiunt latere, devitant apparere; trepidant deprehensi, negant accusati, ne torti quidem facile aut semper confitentur, certe damnati maerent: Dinumerant in semet ipsos mentis malae impetus, vel fato vel astris imputant; nolunt enim suum esse, quod malum agnoscunt.

[11] Finally, malefactors are eager to lie hidden, they avoid appearing; when caught they tremble, when accused they deny; not even when tortured do they easily or always confess; certainly, when condemned, they lament. They enumerate, with respect to themselves, the impulses of an evil mind; they impute either to fate or to the stars; for they do not wish that to be their own which they acknowledge to be evil.

[12] Christianus vero quid simile? Neminem pudet, neminem paenitet, nisi plane retro non fuisse; si denotatur, gloriatur; si accusatur, non defendit; interrogatus vel ultro confitetur; damnatus gratias agit.

[12] But as for the Christian, what is anything like it? No one is ashamed, no one repents—unless plainly of not having been earlier; if he is marked out, he glories; if he is accused, he does not defend himself; questioned, or even of his own accord, he confesses; condemned, he gives thanks.

[13] Quid hoc mali est, quod naturalia mali non habet, timorem, pudorem, tergiversationem, paenitentiam deplorationem? Quod hoc malum est, cuius reus gaudet, cuius accusatio votum est et poena felicitas? Non potes dementiam dicere, qui revinceris ignorare.

[13] What kind of evil is this, which does not have the natural properties of evil—fear, shame, tergiversation, penitence, deploration? What kind of evil is this, in which the accused rejoices, whose accusation is a vow and whose penalty a felicity? You cannot call it madness, you who are convicted of ignorance.

II.

[1] Si certum est denique nos nocentissimos esse, cur a vobis ipsis aliter tractamur quam pares nostri, id est ceteri nocentes, cum eiusdem noxae eadem tractatio deberet intervenire?

[1] If, finally, it is certain that we are the most guilty, why are we by you yourselves treated otherwise than our peers, that is, the other guilty, since for the same offense the same treatment ought to intervene?

[2] Quodcumque dicimur, cum alii dicuntur, et proprio ore et mercennaria advocatione utuntur ad innocentiae suae commendationem; respondendi, altercandi facultas patet, quando nec liceat indefensos et inauditos omnino damnari.

[2] Whatever we are charged with, when others are charged, they make use both of their own mouth and of mercenary advocation for the commendation of their innocency; the faculty of responding and of altercating lies open, since it is not permitted that the undefended and unheard be altogether condemned.

[3] Sed Christianis solis nihil permittitur loqui quod causam purget, quod veritatem defendat, quod iudicem non faciat iniustum; sed illud solum expectatur, quod odio publico necessarium est: Confessio nominis, non examinatio criminis —

[3] But to Christians alone nothing is permitted to speak that would purge the case, that would defend the truth, that would not make the judge unjust; but only that is expected which is necessary to the public hatred: Confession of the name, not examination of the crime —

[4] quando, si de aliquo nocente cognoscatis, non statim confesso eo nomen homicidae vel sacrilegi vel incesti vel publici hostis, ut de nostris elogiis loquar, contenti sitis ad pronuntiandum, nisi et consequentia exigatis, qualitatem facti, numerum, locum, tempus, conscios, socios.

[4] For when, if you take cognizance about some offender, you are not at once, even with his confession, satisfied to pronounce sentence on the mere name of “murderer” or “sacrilegious person” or “incestuous” or “public enemy,” to speak in terms of our headings of charge, unless you also demand the consequents—the quality of the deed, the number, the place, the time, those privy to it, the associates.

[5] De nobis nihil tale, cum aeque extorqueri oporteret quod cum falso iactatur, quot quisque iam infanticidia degustasset, quot incesta contenebrasset, qui coqui, qui canes affuissent. O quanta illius praesidis gloria, si eruisset aliquem, qui centum iam infantes comedisset!

[5] As for us, nothing of the sort, though it ought equally to be extorted, since that which is bruited about, albeit falsely, is how many infanticides each had already tasted, how many acts of incest he had shrouded in darkness, what cooks, what dogs had been present. O how great would be that governor’s glory, if he had unearthed someone who had already eaten a hundred infants!

[6] Atquin invenimus inquisitionem quoque in nos prohibitam. Plinius enim Secundus, cum provinciam regeret, damnatis quibusdam Christianis, quibusdam gradu pulsis, ipsa tamen multitudine perturbatus, quid de cetero ageret, consuluit tunc Traianum imperatorem, adlegans praeter obstinationem non sacrificandi nihil aliud se de sacramentis eorum comperisse quam coetus antelucanos ad canendum Christo ut deo et ad confoederandam disciplinam, homicidium adulterium fraudem perfidiam et cetera scelera prohibentes.

[6] And yet we find that an inquisition against us too was prohibited. For Pliny Secundus, when he was governing a province, having condemned certain Christians and driven others from their grade, nevertheless, disturbed by the very multitude, consulted then the emperor Trajan what he should do for the rest, alleging that, besides the obstinacy of not sacrificing, he had discovered nothing else of their sacraments than pre-dawn gatherings to sing to Christ as to a god and to confederate their discipline, forbidding homicide, adultery, fraud, perfidy, and the other crimes.

[7] Tunc Traianus rescripsit hoc genus inquirendos quidem non esse, oblatos vero puniri oportere.

[7] Then Trajan replied by rescript that people of this kind are not to be inquired into, but those presented ought to be punished.

[8] O sententiam necessitate confusam! Negat inquirendos ut innocentes et mandat puniendos ut nocentes. Parcit et saevit, dissimulat et animadvertit.

[8] O judgment confounded by necessity! He denies that they be inquired into as innocents and commands that they be punished as guilty. He spares and he rages, he dissimulates and he punishes.

Quid temet ipsam, censura, circumvenis? Si damnas, cur non et inquiris? Si non inquiris, cur non et absolvis?

Why do you, censure, circumvent your very self? If you condemn, why do you not also inquire? If you do not inquire, why do you not also absolve?

Latronibus vestigandis per universas provincias militaris statio sortitur, in reos maiestatis et publicos hostes omnis homo miles est: Ad socios, ad conscios usque inquisitio extenditur.

For tracking brigands throughout all the provinces a military post is allotted, against defendants of treason and public enemies every man is a soldier: To associates, to accomplices, the inquisition extends even.

[9] Solum Christianum inquiri non licet, offerri licet, quasi aliud esset actura inquisitio quam oblationem. Damnatis itaque oblatum, quem nemo voluit requisitum; qui, puto, iam non ideo meruit poenam, quia nocens est, sed quia non requirendus inventus est.

[9] Only the Christian it is not permitted to be inquired into; it is permitted that he be offered, as though the inquisition were going to do anything other than an offering. Accordingly you condemn the one offered up, whom no one wished to have sought out; who, I think, has now not for this reason deserved punishment, that he is guilty, but because he was found to be one not to be inquired after.

[10] Itaque nec in illo ex forma malorum iudicandorum agitis erga nos, quod ceteris negantibus tormenta adhibetis ad confitendum, solis Christianis ad negandum, cum, si malum esset, nos quidem negaremus, vos vero confiteri tormentis compelleretis. Neque enim ideo non putaretis requirenda quaestionibus scelera, quia certi essetis admitti ea ex nominis confessione, qui hodie de confesso homicida, scientes homicidium quid sit, nihilominus ordinem extorquetis admissi.

[10] And so neither in this do you act toward us according to the form of judging evils: that to others who deny you apply tortures for confessing, but to Christians alone for denying; since, if it were an evil, we indeed would deny, but you would compel to confess by tortures. For neither would you therefore judge that crimes are not to be sought by inquisitions, because you are certain that they are admitted by confession of the name—seeing that today, with a homicida from whom a confession has been obtained, knowing what a homicide is, nonetheless you wring out the order of what has been committed.

[11] Quo perversius, cum praesumatis de sceleribus nostris ex nominis confessione, cogitis tormentis de confessione decedere, ut negantes nomen pariter utique negemus et scelera, de quibus ex confessione nominis praesumpseratis.

[11] All the more perverse, when you presume concerning our crimes from the confession of the name, you compel us by torments to depart from the confession, so that, denying the name, we likewise of course deny the crimes about which you had presumed from the confession of the name.

[12] Sed, opinor, non vultis nos perire, quos pessimos creditis. Sic enim soletis dicere homicidae: "Nega", laniari iubere sacrilegum, si confiteri perseveraverit. Si non ita agitis circa [nos] nocentes, ergo nos innocentissimos iudicatis, cum quasi innocentissimos non vultis in ea confessione perseverare, quam necessitate, non iustitia damnandam a vobis sciatis.

[12] But, I suppose, you do not want us to perish, whom you believe to be the worst. For thus you are accustomed to say to a homicide: "Deny," and to order a sacrilegious man to be torn to pieces, if he shall have persisted in confessing. If you do not act so toward [us] as offenders, therefore you judge us most innocent, since, as though most innocent, you do not want us to persevere in that confession which you know is to be condemned by you by necessity, not by justice.

[13] Vociferatur homo: "Christianus sum." Quod est dicit; tu vis audire quod non est. Veritatis extorquendae praesides de nobis solis mendacium elaboratis audire. "Hoc sum", inquit, "quod quaeris an sim.

[13] The man cries aloud: "I am a Christian." He says what he is; you want to hear what he is not. You presiding magistrates for the extortion of truth, you labor to hear a lie from us alone. "This I am," he says, "which you ask whether I am.

Quid me torques in perversum? Confiteor et torques; quid faceres, si negarem?" Plane aliis negantibus non facile fidem accommodatis: nobis, si negaverimus, statim creditis.

Why do you torture me into perversity? I confess and you torture; what would you do, if I denied?" Clearly, to others who deny you do not easily accommodate faith; to us, if we should deny, you immediately believe.

[14] Suspecta sit vobis ista perversitas, ne qua vis lateat in occulto, quae vos adversus formam, adversus naturam iudicandi, contra ipsas quoque leges ministret. Nisi fallor enim, leges malos erui iubent, non abscondi, confessos damnari praescribunt, non absolvi. Hoc senatus consulta, hoc principum mandata definiunt.

[14] Let this perversity be suspect to you, lest some force lie hidden in the occult, which may minister you against the form, against the nature of judging, and even against the laws themselves. For unless I am mistaken, the laws bid that the wicked be brought out, not hidden; they prescribe that those who have confessed be condemned, not absolved. This the decrees of the Senate, this the mandates of the princes define.

Hoc imperium, cuius ministri estis, civilis, non tyrannica dominatio est.

This authority, of which you are ministers, is a civil, not a tyrannical, domination.

[15] Apud tyrannos enim tormenta etiam pro poena adhibebantur, apud vos soli quaestioni temperatur. Vestram illis servate legem usque ad confessionem necessariis, et iam, si confessione praeveniantur, vacabunt, sententia opus est; debito poenae nocens expungendus est, non eximendus. Denique nemo illum gestit absolvere.

[15] For among tyrants, tortures were even applied as a penalty; among you they are tempered for interrogation alone. Keep for them your law in what is necessary up to confession; and now, if they are forestalled by a confession, the tortures will be idle—what is needed is a sentence; the guilty man must be expunged by the debt of the penalty, not exempted. Finally, no one is eager to absolve him.

[16] Non licet hoc velle; ideo nec cogitur quisquam negare. Christianum hominem omnium scelerum reum, deorum, imperatorum, legum, morum, naturae totius inimicum existimas, et cogis negare, ut absolvas quem non poteris absolvere, nisi negaverit.

[16] It is not permitted to will this; therefore no one is compelled to deny. You deem the Christian man guilty of all crimes, an enemy of the gods, of emperors, of laws, of morals, of the whole of nature, and you coerce him to deny, so that you may absolve one whom you will not be able to absolve, unless he has denied.

[17] Praevaricaris in leges: Vis ergo neget se nocentem, ut eum facias innocentem, et quidem invitum, iam nec de praeterito reum. Unde ista perversitas, ut etiam illud non recogitetis, sponte confesso magis credendum esse quam per vim neganti? Vel ne compulsus negare non ex fide negarit et absolutus ibidem post tribunal de vestra rideat aemulatione iterum Christianus?

[17] You prevaricate against the laws: You wish, therefore, that he deny that he is guilty, in order that you may make him innocent, and indeed unwilling, now not even a defendant for what is past. Whence this perversity, that you do not even reconsider this—that one who has confessed of his own accord is to be believed more than one denying under force? Or lest the one compelled to deny has denied not from faith, and, once acquitted, there in the same place, after the tribunal, he laughs at your zeal, being a Christian again?

[18] Cum igitur in omnibus nos aliter disponitis quam ceteros nocentes, ad unum contendendo, ut de eo nomine excludamur — excludimur enim, si faciamus quae faciunt non Christiani —, intellegere potestis non scelus aliquod in causa esse, sed nomen, quod quaedam ratio aemulae operationis insequitur, hoc primum agens, ut homines nolint scire pro certo, quod se nescire pro certo sciunt.

[18] Since therefore in all things you dispose us otherwise than the other guilty, pressing to the one point, that we be excluded on account of that name
— for we are excluded, if we do the things that non-Christians —, you can understand that not some crime is at issue, but the name, which a certain rationale of emulous operation pursues, effecting this first: that people are unwilling to know for certain what they know for certain that they do not know.

[19] Ideo et credunt de nobis quae non probantur et nolunt inquiri, ne probentur non esse quae malunt credidisse, ut nomen illius aemulae rationis inimicum praesumptis, non probatis criminibus de sua sola confessione damnetur. Ideo torquemur confitentes et punimur perseverantes et absolvimur negantes, quia nominis proelium est.

[19] Therefore they also believe about us things which are not proved, and they do not want them to be inquired into, lest it be proved that those things are not which they have preferred to have believed, so that the name, an enemy to that emulous reasoning, may be condemned by presumed, not proved crimes, on its own confession alone. Therefore we are racked when confessing, and punished when persevering, and absolved when denying, because it is a battle of the name.

[20] Denique quid de tabella recitatis illum "Christianum"? Cur non et "homicidam"? Si homicida Christianus? Cur non et "incestum" vel quodcumque aliud esse nos creditis? In nobis solis pudet aut piget ipsis nominibus scelerum pronuntiare?

[20] Finally, why do you read off from the docket that he is "a Christian"? Why not also "a homicide"? Is "Christian" the same as "homicide"? Why not also "incest" or whatever else you believe us to be? Is it with us alone that you are ashamed or reluctant to pronounce the very names of the crimes?

"Christianus" si nullius criminis nomine [reus] est, valde ineptum, si solius nominis crimen est.

"Christian"—if he is a defendant on the charge of no crime, it is very absurd if the crime is that of the name alone.

III.

[1] Quid quod ita plerique clausis oculis in odium eius impingunt, ut bonum alicui testimonium ferentes admisceant nominis exprobrationem? "Bonus vir Gaius Seius, tantum quod Christianus." Item alius: "Ego Titium, sapientem virum, repente factum Christianum." Nemo retractat, ne ideo bonus Gaius et prudens Lucius, quia Christianus, aut ideo Christianus, quia prudens et bonus.

[1] What of the fact that so many, with eyes shut, dash into hatred of it, such that, while bearing a good testimony for someone, they mix in a reproach of the name? "A good man, Gaius Seius, only that he is a Christian." Likewise another: "I Titius, a wise man, suddenly made a Christian." No one reconsiders whether therefore Gaius is good and Lucius prudent because he is a Christian, or therefore a Christian because he is prudent and good.

[2] Laudant quae sciunt, vituperant quae ignorant, et id quod sciunt eo quod ignorant irrumpunt, cum sit iustius occulta de manifestis praeiudicare quam manifesta de occultis praedamnare.

[2] They praise the things they know, they vituperate the things they are ignorant of, and they break into what they know with that which they are ignorant of, since it is more just to prejudge the occult by the manifest than to pre-condemn the manifest by the occult.

[3] Alii, quos retro ante hoc nomen vagos, viles, improbos noverant, ex ipso denotant, quod laudant: Caecitate odii in suffragium impingunt: "Quae mulier! Quam lasciva, quam festiva! Qui[s] iuvenis!

[3] Others, those whom formerly before this name they had known as vagrant, vile, wicked, they point out by the very thing which they praise: In the blindness of hatred they stumble into support: "What a woman! How lascivious, how festive! Wha[t] a young man!

Quam lusius, quam amasius! Facti sunt Christiani." Ita nomen emendationi imputatur.

How playful, how amorous! They have become Christians." Thus the name is imputed to emendation.

[4] Nonnulli etiam de utilitatibus suis cum odio isto paciscuntur, contenti iniuria, dum ne domi habeant quod oderunt. Uxorem iam pudicam maritus iam non zelotypus , filium subiectum pater retro patiens abdicavit, servum iam fidelem dominus olim mitis ab oculis relegavit; ut quisque hoc nomine emendatur, offendit. Tanti non est bonum, quanti odium Christianorum.

[4] Some even make a bargain concerning their own interests with that hatred, content with the injury, provided that they do not have at home what they hate. The husband, now no longer jealous, has a wife now chaste; the father, formerly long-suffering, has disowned a son now submissive; the master, once mild, has relegated from his eyes a slave now faithful; in proportion as each is amended by this name, he offends. Good is not of so high a price as is the hatred of Christians.

[5] Nunc igitur, si nominis odium est, quis nominum reatus, quae accusatio vocabulorum, nisi si aut barbarum sonat aliqua vox nominis aut infaustum aut maledicum aut impudicum? "Christianus" vero, quantum interpretatio est, de unctione deducitur. Sed et cum perperam "Chrestianus" pronuntiatur a vobis — nam nec nominis certa est notitia penes vos —, de suavitate vel benignitate compositum est.

[5] Now therefore, if it is a hatred of the name, what charge of names, what accusation of vocables, unless either some sound of the name is barbarous, or ill-omened, or maledicent, or impudent? "Christianus" indeed, so far as interpretation goes, is deduced from unction. But also when, wrongly, "Chrestianus" is pronounced by you — for there is not even certain knowledge of the name among you —, it is composed from suavity or benignity.

Oditur itaque in hominibus innocuis etiam nomen innocuum.

Therefore, even an innocent name is hated in innocent men.

[6] At enim secta oditur in nomine utique sui auctoris. Quid novi, si aliqua disciplina de magistro cognomentum sectatoribus suis inducit? Nonne philosophi de auctoribus suis nuncupantur Platonici, Epicurei, Pythagorici?

[6] But indeed a sect is hated in the very name of its author. What is new, if some discipline introduces for its followers a cognomen from its master? Are not philosophers named from their authors—Platonics, Epicureans, Pythagoreans?

Etiam a locis conventiculorum et stationum suarum Stoici, Academici? Aeque medici ab Erasistrato et grammatici ab Aristarcho, coqui etiam ab Apicio?

Even from the places of their conventicles and their own stations—the Stoics, the Academics? Likewise the physicians from Erasistratus and the grammarians from Aristarchus, the cooks even from Apicius?

[7] Nec tamen quemquam offendit professio nominis cum institutione transmissi ab institutore. Plane, si qui probabit malam sectam et ita malum et auctorem, is probabit et nomen malum, dignum odio de reatu sectae et auctoris; ideoque ante odium nominis competebat prius de auctore sectam recognoscere vel auctorem de secta.

[7] Nor yet does anyone take offense at the profession of the name together with the institution transmitted by its institutor. Clearly, if someone shall prove the sect to be evil and thus the author evil as well, he will also prove the name evil, worthy of hatred on account of the guilt of the sect and of the author; and therefore, before the hatred of the name, it was fitting first to examine the sect from the author, or the author from the sect.

[8] At nunc utriusque inquisitione et agnitione neglecta nomen detinetur, nomen expugnatur, et ignotam sectam, ignotum et auctorem vox sola praedamnat, quia nominantur, non quia revincuntur.

[8] But now, with the inquiry and the recognition of both neglected, the name is detained, the name is assaulted, and an unknown sect and an unknown author are pre-condemned by a mere utterance, because they are named, not because they are refuted.

IV.

[1] Atque adeo quasi praefatus haec ad suggillandam odii erga nos publici iniquitatem, iam de causa innocentiae consistam, nec tantum refutabo quae nobis obiciuntur, sed etiam in ipsos retorquebo, qui obiciunt, ut ex hoc quoque sciant homines in Christianis non esse quae in se nesciunt esse, simul uti erubescant accusantes, non dico pessimi optimos, se iam, ut volunt, compares suos.

[1] And indeed, as though having prefaced these things to stigmatize the iniquity of the public hatred toward us, I will now take my stand on the cause of innocence, and I will not only refute the things that are objected against us, but I will also retort them upon those very ones who object, so that from this too men may know that in Christians there are not the things which they do not know to be in themselves, and at the same time that the accusers may blush, accusing—not, I do not say, the worst men against the best—but now, as they wish, their equals, their own peers.

[2] Respondebimus ad singula, quae in occulto admittere dicimur — quae illos palam admittentes invenimus —, in quibus scelesti, in quibus vani, in quibus damnandi, in quibus irridendi deputamur.

[2] We will respond to each point, which we are said to admit in secret — which we find them admitting openly —, in which we are reckoned wicked, in which vain, in which to be condemned, in which to be ridiculed.

[3] Sed quoniam, cum ad omnia occurrit veritas nostra, postremo legum obstruitur auctoritas adversus eam, ut aut nihil dicatur retractandum esse post leges aut ingratis necessitas obsequii praeferatur veritati, de legibus prius concurram vobiscum ut cum tutoribus legum.

[3] But since, although our truth meets all things, at last the authority of the laws is set up against it, so that either it is said that nothing ought to be re-examined after the laws, or, however unwelcome, the necessity of obedience is preferred to truth, I will first contend with you about the laws, as with the guardians of the laws.

[4] Iam primum, cum dure definitis dicendo: "Non licet esse vos!" et hoc sine ullo retractatu humaniore praescribitis, vim profitemini et iniquam ex arce dominationem, si ideo negatis licere, quia vultis, non quia debuit non licere.

[4] First of all, when you harshly decree by saying, "It is not permitted for you to exist!" and you prescribe this without any more humane reconsideration, you profess force and unjust domination from the citadel, if for that reason you deny it to be permitted—because you want it, not because it ought not to have been permitted.

[5] Quodsi, quia non debet, ideo non vultis licere, sine dubio id non debet licere quod bene fit. Si bonum invenero esse quod lex tua prohibuit, nonne ex illo praeiudicio prohibere me non potest, quod, si malum esset, iure prohiberet? Si lex tua erravit, puto, ab homine concepta est; neque enim de caelo ruit.

[5] But if, because it ought not, for that reason you do not want it to be permitted, without doubt that ought not to be permitted which is done well. If I shall have found good to be that which your law has prohibited, can it not, on the basis of that prejudgment, forbid me—which, if it were evil, it would rightly forbid? If your law has erred, I suppose it was conceived by a man; for it did not fall from heaven.

[6] Miramini hominem aut errare potuisse in lege condenda aut resipuisse in reprobanda? Non enim et ipsius Lycurgi leges a Lacedaemoniis emendatae tantum auctori suo doloris incusserunt, ut in secessu inedia de semet ipso iudicarit?

[6] Do you marvel that a man could have erred in framing a law, or have come to his senses in reprobating it? For did not even the laws of Lycurgus himself, emended by the Lacedaemonians, strike so much grief into their own author that, in seclusion, by starvation he passed judgment upon himself?

[7] Nonne et vos cottidie experimentis illuminantibus tenebras antiquitatis totam illam veterem et squalentem silvam legum novis principalium rescriptorum et edictorum securibus truncatis et caeditis?

[7] Do not you also daily, by experiments illuminating the darkness of antiquity, lop and fell that whole old and squalid forest of laws with the new axes of imperial rescripts and edicts?

[8] Nonne vanissimas Papias leges, quae ante liberos suscipi cogunt quam Iuliae matrimonium contrahi, post tantae auctoritatis senectutem heri Severus, constantissimus principum, exclusit?

[8] Did not Severus, most constant of princes, only yesterday exclude the most vain Papian laws, which compel that children be had before the Julian marriage is contracted, after the senescence of so great an authority?

[9] Sed et iudicatos in partes secari a creditoribus leges erant; consensu tamen publico crudelitas postea erasa est, in pudoris notam capitis poena conversa est. Bonorum adhibita proscriptio suffundere maluit hominis sanguinem quam effundere.

[9] But there were also laws that those adjudicated be cut into parts by their creditors; however, by public consensus the cruelty was afterward erased, the capital penalty was converted into a mark of shame. With a proscription of goods applied, it chose rather to suffuse a man’s blood than to pour it out.

[10] Quot adhuc vobis repurgandae latent leges! Quas neque annorum numerus neque conditorum dignitas commendat, sed aequitas sola, et ideo, cum iniquae recognoscuntur, merito damnantur, licet damnent. Quomodo iniquas dicimus?

[10] How many laws still lie latent for you to be repurged! Which neither the number of years nor the dignity of their founders commends, but equity alone; and therefore, when they are recognized as iniquitous, they are deservedly condemned, though they condemn. How do we call them iniquitous?

[11] Immo, si nomen puniunt, etiam stultas; si vero facta, cur de solo nomine puniunt facta, quae in aliis de admisso, non de nomine probata defendunt? Incestus sum: Cur non requirunt? Infanticida: Cur non extorquent?

[11] Nay rather, if they punish the name, even foolish; but if indeed the deeds, why do they punish deeds on the sole basis of the name—deeds which in others they adjudge as proven from the admitted offense, not from the name? I am incestuous: Why do they not inquire? A child-murderer: Why do they not extort a confession?

In deos, in Caesares aliquid committo: Cur non audior qui habeo quo purger?

I commit something against the gods, against the Caesars: Why am I not heard, I who have the means by which to purge myself?

[12] Nulla lex vetat discuti quod prohibet admitti, quia neque iudex iuste ulciscitur, nisi cognoscat admissum esse quod non licet, neque civis fideliter legi obsequitur ignorans, quale sit quod ulciscitur lex.

[12] No law forbids the examination of what it prohibits to be admitted, because neither does a judge justly avenge, unless he knows that what is not licit has been admitted, nor does a citizen faithfully obey the law while ignorant of what sort of thing it is that the law avenges.

[13] Nulla lex sibi soli conscientiam iustitiae suae debet, sed eis, a quibus obsequium expectat. Ceterum suspecta lex est, quae probari se non vult, improba autem, si non probata dominetur.

[13] No law owes to itself alone the conscience of its own justice, but to those from whom it expects obedience. Otherwise, a law is suspect which does not wish to be proved; reprobate, however, if, not proved, it domineers.

[1] Ut de origine aliquid retractemus eiusmodi legum, vetus erat decretum, ne qui deus ab imperatore consecraretur nisi a senatu probatus. Scit M. Aemilius de deo suo Alburno. Facit et hoc ad causam nostram, quod apud vos de humano arbitratu divinitas pensitatur.

[1] That we may reconsider something about the origin of laws of this kind, there was an old decree, that no god be consecrated by the emperor unless approved by the senate. Marcus Aemilius knows about his god Alburnus. This too makes for our cause, that among you divinity is weighed by human arbitrement.

Nisi homini deus placuerit, deus non erit; homo iam deo propitius esse debebit.

Unless a god has pleased a man, he will not be a god; a man will now have to be propitious toward the god.

[2] Tiberius ergo, cuius tempore nomen Christianum in saeculum introivit, adnuntiatum sibi ex Syria Palaestina, quod illic veritatem ipsius divinitatis revelaverat, detulit ad senatum cum praerogativa suffragii sui. Senatus, quia non ipse probaverat, respuit; Caesar in sententia mansit, comminatus periculum accusatoribus Christianorum.

[2] Therefore Tiberius, in whose time the Christian name entered into the age, when it had been announced to him from Syria Palaestina that there the truth of that divinity had been revealed, brought it before the Senate with the prerogative of his own suffrage. The Senate, because it had not itself approved, rejected it; Caesar remained in his opinion, threatening danger to the accusers of the Christians.

[3] Consulite commentarios vestros; illic reperietis primum Neronem in hanc sectam cum maxime Romae orientem Caesariano gladio ferocisse. Sed tali dedicatore damnationis nostrae etiam gloriamur. Qui enim scit illum, intellegere potest non nisi grande aliquod bonum a Nerone damnatum.

[3] Consult your commentaries; there you will find that Nero was the first to have raged with the Caesarian sword against this sect, when it was just then arising in Rome. But with such a dedicator of our damnation we even glory. For whoever knows that man can understand that nothing except some great good was condemned by Nero.

[4] Temptaverat et Domitianus, portio Neronis de crudelitate; sed, qua et homo, facile coeptum repressit, restitutis etiam quos relegaverat. Tales semper nobis insecutores, iniusti, impii, turpes, quos et ipsi damnare consuestis, a quibus damnatos restituere soliti estis.

[4] Domitian too had attempted it, a portion of Nero in respect to cruelty; but, inasmuch as he too was a man, he easily repressed the undertaking, even restoring those whom he had relegated. Such have always been our persecutors—unjust, impious, base—whom you yourselves are accustomed to condemn, and those condemned by whom you are accustomed to restore.

[5] Ceterum de tot exinde principibus ad hodiernum divinum humanumque sapientibus edite aliquem debellatorem Christianorum!

[5] But from so many emperors thereafter down to the present, wise in things divine and human, produce some conqueror of the Christians!

[6] At nos e contrario edimus protectorem, si litterae Marci Aurelii, gravissimi imperatoris, requirantur, quibus illam Germanicam sitim Christianorum forte militum precationibus impetrato imbri discussam contestatur. Sicut non palam ab eiusmodi hominibus poenam dimovit, ita alio modo palam dispersit, adiecta etiam accusatoribus damnatione, et quidem taetriore.

[6] But we, on the contrary, produce a protector, if the letters of Marcus Aurelius, the gravest emperor, be consulted, in which he attests that that German thirst was broken up by a rain obtained through the prayers of soldiers who happened to be Christians. Just as he did not openly remove the penalty from men of this sort, so in another way he openly dispersed it, with condemnation added even upon the accusers, and indeed a more foul one.

[7] Quales ergo leges istae, quas adversus nos soli exercent impii iniusti, turpes truces, vani dementes, quas Traianus ex parte frustratus est vetando inquiri Christianos, quas nullus Hadrianus, quamquam omnium curiositatum explorator, nullus Vespasianus, quamquam Iudaeorum debellator, nullus Pius, nullus Verus impressit.

[7] What sort of laws then are these, which only the impious and unjust enforce against us—base, truculent, vain, demented—laws which Trajan in part frustrated by forbidding Christians to be inquired after; which no Hadrian, although an explorer of all curiosities, no Vespasian, although the conqueror of the Jews, no Pius, no Verus imposed.

[8] Facilius utique pessimi ab optimis quibusque, ut ab aemulis, quam a suis sociis eradicandi iudicarentur.

[8] Most readily, to be sure, the worst would be judged to be eradicated by the best—as by rivals—rather than by their own associates.

VI.

[1] Nunc religiosissimi legum et paternorum institutorum protectores et ultores respondeant velim de sua fide et honore et obsequio erga maiorum consulta, si a nullo desciverunt, si in nullo exorbitaverunt, si non necessaria et aptissima quaeque disciplinae oblitteraverunt.

[1] Now let the most religious protectors and avengers of the laws and of paternal institutions answer, I would wish, concerning their faith and honor and obedience toward the decrees of the ancestors: whether they have defected from none, whether in nothing they have exorbitated, whether they have not obliterated whatever things are necessary and most apt for discipline.

[2] Quon[i]am illae leges abierunt sumptum et ambitionem comprimentes, quae centum aera non amplius in cenam subscribi iubebant, nec amplius quam unam inferri gallinam, et eam non saginatam, quae patricium, quod decem pondo argenti habuisset, pro magno ambitionis titulo senatu submovebant, quae theatra stuprandis moribus orientia statim destruebant, quae dignitatum et honestorum natalium insignia non temere nec impune usurpari sinebant?

[2] Since those laws have departed, compressing expense and ambition, which ordered that not more than 100 asses be entered for a dinner, nor more than one hen be brought in, and that not a fattened one; which used to remove from the senate a patrician who had possessed 10 pounds of silver, as a great title of ambition; which immediately destroyed theaters arising for the debauching of morals; which did not allow the insignia of dignities and of honorable birth to be usurped rashly nor with impunity?

[3] Video enim et centenarias cenas a centenis iam sestertiis dicendas, et in lances — parum est, si senatorum et non libertinorum vel adhuc flagra rumpentium — argentaria metalla producta. Video et theatra nec singula satis esse nec nuda. Nam ne vel hieme voluptas impudica frigeret, primi Lacedaemonii paenulam ludis excogitaverunt.

[3] For I see even hundred-course dinners now to be billed at hundreds of sesterces, and onto the platters — it is too little, unless they are of senators, and not of freedmen or even of those still breaking from the lash — silver mines brought forth. I also see that theaters are neither sufficient single nor naked. For lest shameless pleasure grow cold even in winter, the Lacedaemonians were the first to devise the paenula for the games.

Video et inter matronas atque prostibulas nullum de habitu discrimen relictum.

I also see that among matrons and prostitutes no distinction in habit has been left.

[4] Circa feminas quidem etiam illa maiorum instituta ceciderunt quae modestiae, quae sobrietati patrocinabantur, cum aurum nulla norat praeter unico digito, quem sponsus oppignerasset pronubo anulo; cum mulieres usque adeo vino abstinerentur, ut matronam ob resignatos cellae vinariae loculos sui inedia necarint, sub Romulo vero quae vinum attigerat impune a Metennio marito trucidata sit.

[4] About women indeed, even those ancestral institutions have fallen which championed modesty and sobriety, when a woman knew no gold except on a single finger, which her fiancé had pledged with a pronubial ring; when women were kept from wine to such a degree that their own people killed a matron by starvation on account of the unsealed compartments of the wine-cellar, and, under Romulus indeed, she who had touched wine was butchered with impunity by her husband Metennius.

[5] Idcirco et oscula propinquis offerre etiam necessitas erat, ut spiritu iudicarentur.

[5] Therefore even to offer kisses to relatives was a necessity, so that they might be judged by their breath.

[6] Ubi est illa felicitas matrimoniorum de moribus utique prosperata, qua[e] per annos ferme sescentos ab urbe condita nulla repudium domus scripsit? At nunc in feminis prae auro nullum leve est membrum, prae vino nullum liberum est osculum, repudium vero iam et votum est, quasi matrimonii fructus.

[6] Where is that felicity of marriages, assuredly prospered by morals, by which for almost 600 years from the founding of the city no household inscribed a repudiation (divorce)? But now, in women, with respect to gold no limb is light; with respect to wine no kiss is free; and repudiation is even the vow, as if the fruit of marriage.

[7] Etiam circa ipsos deos vestros quae prospecte decreverant patres vestri, idem vos obsequentissimi rescidistis. Liberum Patrem cum mysteriis suis consules senatus auctoritate non modo urbe, sed universa Italia eliminaverunt.

[7] Even concerning your very gods, the things which your fathers had decreed with foresight, you likewise, most obsequiously, have rescinded. Father Liber, with his mysteries, the consuls by the authority of the senate eliminated not only from the city, but from the whole of Italy.

[8] Serapidem et Isidem et Arpocratem cum suo Cynocephalo Capitolio prohibitos inferri, id est curia deorum pulsos, Piso et Gabinius consules, non utique Christiani, eversis etiam aris eorum abdicaverunt, turpium et otiosarum superstitionum vitia cohibentes. His vos restitutis summam maiestatem contulistis.

[8] Serapis and Isis and Harpocrates, with their Cynocephalus, being forbidden to be brought into the Capitol—that is, driven from the senate-house of the gods—Piso and Gabinius, consuls, certainly not Christians, disowned them, even their altars having been overturned, restraining the vices of base and idle superstitions. By restoring these, you have conferred the highest majesty upon them.

[9] Ubi religio, ubi veneratio maioribus debita a vobis? Habitu, victu, instructu, sensu, ipso denique sermone proavis renuntiastis. Laudatis semper antiquitatem, et nove de die vivitis.

[9] Where is the religion, where the veneration owed to your ancestors by you? In habit (attire), in victuals, in equipment, in sense, and finally in speech itself, you have renounced your forefathers. You always praise antiquity, and you live in a new fashion from day to day.

Per quod ostenditur, dum a bonis maiorum institutis deceditis, ea vos retinere et custodire, quae non debuistis, cum quae debuistis non custodistis.

Whereby it is shown that, while you depart from the good institutions of the ancestors, you retain and guard those things which you ought not, whereas the things which you ought, you have not guarded.

[10] Adhuc quod videmini fidelissime tueri a patribus traditum, in quo principaliter reos transgressionis Christianos destinastis, studium dico deorum colendorum, de quo maxime erravit antiquitas, licet Serapidi eam Romano aras restruxeritis, licet Baccho iam Italico furias vestras immol[ar]etis, suo loco ostendam proinde despici et neglegi et destrui a vobis adversus maiorum auctoritatem.

[10] Moreover, that which you seem most faithfully to guard as handed down by the fathers—in which, principally, you have designated the Christians as guilty of transgression—I mean the zeal for worshiping the gods, in which antiquity most greatly erred, although you have rebuilt altars to Serapis in Roman soil, although to Bacchus now Italian you immolate your frenzies, I will show in its proper place to be accordingly despised and neglected and destroyed by you, against the authority of the ancestors.

[11] Nunc enim ad illam occultorum facinorum infamiam respondebo, ut viam mihi ad manifestiora purgem.

[11] Now indeed I will respond to that infamy of occult crimes, so that I may purge a path for myself to more manifest matters.

VII.

[1] Dicimur sceleratissimi de sacramento infanticidii et pabulo inde et post convivium incesto, quod eversores luminum canes, lenones scilicet tenebrarum, libidinum impiarum in verecundiam procurent.

[1] We are called most criminal on account of a sacrament of infanticide and the pabulum from it, and, after the banquet, incest, which the dogs that overturn the lamps—the pimps, namely, of the darkness—procure, to put modesty to the blush, for impious lusts.

[2] Dicimur tamen semper, nec vos quod tamdiu dicimur eruere curatis. Ergo aut eruite, si creditis, aut nolite credere, qui non eruistis! De vestra vobis dissimulatione praescribitur non esse quod nec ipsi audetis eruere.

[2] We are nevertheless always alleged, and you do not take care to unearth that which we have been said for so long. Therefore either unearth it, if you believe, or do not believe, you who have not unearthed it! From your own dissimulation it is pleaded in advance that there is no such thing as that which you yourselves do not dare to unearth.

Longe aliud munus carnifici in Christianos imperatis, non ut dicant quae faciunt, sed ut negent quod sunt.

Far different a duty you command to the executioner against Christians: not that they should say what they do, but that they should deny what they are.

[3] Census istius disciplinae, ut iam edidimus, a Tiberio est. Cum odio sui coepit veritas; simul atque apparuit, inimica est. Tot hostes eius quot extranei, et quidem proprie ex aemulatione Iudaei, ex concussione milites, ex natura ipsi etiam domestici nostri.

[3] The census of this discipline, as we have already set forth, is from Tiberius. Truth began with hatred of itself; as soon as it appeared, it is an enemy. It has as many enemies as it has outsiders, and indeed, specifically: the Jews from emulation, the soldiers from disturbance, by nature even our very domestics.

[4] Cottidie obsidemur, cottidie prodimur, in ipsis plurimum coetibus et congregationibus nostris opprimimur. Quis umquam taliter vagienti infanti supervenit?

[4] Every day we are besieged, every day we are betrayed; most of all we are oppressed in our very meetings and congregations. Who has ever come upon a wailing infant in such a manner?

[5] Quis cruenta, ut invenerat, Cyclopum et Sirenum ora iudici reservavit? Quis vel in uxoribus aliqua immunda vestigia deprehendit? Quis talia facinora, cum invenisset, celavit aut vendidit, ipsos trahens homines?

[5] Who has reserved for the judge, just as he found them, the blood-stained faces of the Cyclopes and the Sirens? Who has even detected any unclean vestiges upon the wives? Who, when he had found such crimes, has concealed or sold them out, dragging the very persons themselves?

Si semper latemus, quando proditum est quod admittimus?

If we always lie hidden, when has what we commit been betrayed?

[6] Immo a quibus prodi potuit? Ab ipsis enim reis non utique, cum vel ex forma omnibus mysteriis silentii fides debeatur. Samothracia et Eleusinia reticentur: Quanto magis talia, quae prodita interim etiam humanam animadversionem provocabunt, dum divina serva[n]tur!

[6] Nay rather, by whom could they have been betrayed? By the defendants themselves, assuredly not, since by the very form of all mysteries a pledge of silence is owed. The Samothracian and Eleusinian rites are kept unspoken: how much more such things as these, which, if betrayed meanwhile, would even provoke human punishment, while the divine is reserved!

[7] Si ergo non ipsi proditores sui, sequitur ut extranei. Et unde extraneis notitia, cum semper etiam [in]piae initiationes arceant profanos et arbitris caveant? Nisi si impii minus metuunt.

[7] If therefore they themselves are not the betrayers of themselves, it follows that outsiders are. And whence the knowledge to outsiders, since even [im]pious initiations always ward off the profane and take precautions witnesses? Unless, indeed, the impious fear less.

[8] Natura famae omnibus nota est. Vestrum est: "Fama malum, qua non aliud velocius ullum." Cur malum fama? Quia velox?

[8] The nature of rumor is known to all. It is yours: "Rumor, an evil than which no other is swifter." Why is rumor an evil? Because it is swift?

Quia index? An quia plurimum mendax? Quae ne tunc quidem, cum aliquid veri affert, sine mendacii vitio est, detrahens, adiciens, demutans de veritate.

Because an informer? Or because most mendacious? Which not even then, when it brings something of truth, is without the vice of mendacity, detracting, adding, altering from the truth.

[9] Quid quod ea illi condicio est, ut non nisi cum mentitur, perseveret, et tamdiu vivit, quamdiu non probat? Siquidem, ubi probavit, cessat esse et quasi officio nuntiandi functa rem tradit; et exinde res tenetur, res nominatur.

[9] What of the fact that its condition is this: that it does not persist except when it lies, and it lives only so long as it does not prove? Since indeed, when it has proved, it ceases to be, and, as if having discharged the office of announcing, it hands over the matter; and thereafter the fact is held, the fact is named.

[10] Nec quisquam dicit verbi gratia: "Hoc Romae aiunt factum", aut: "Fama est illum provinciam sortitum", sed: "Sortitus est ille provinciam", et: "Hoc factum est Romae".

[10] Nor does anyone say, for example: "They say this was done at Rome," or: "Rumor is that he drew a province," but: "He drew that province," and: "This was done at Rome."

[11] Fama, nomen incerti, locum non habet, ubi certum est. An vero famae credat nisi inconsideratus? Quia sapiens non credit incerto.

[11] Rumor, the name of the uncertain, has no place where what is certain exists. Indeed, would anyone believe rumor except a reckless man? Because the wise man does not believe the uncertain.

Omnium est aestimare, quantacumque illa ambitione diffusa sit, quantacumque adseveratione constructa, quod ab uno aliquando principe exorta sit necesse est.

It is for all to estimate, however greatly it has been diffused by that ambition, however greatly constructed with asseveration, that it must have arisen at some time from a single prince.

[12] Exinde in traduces linguarum et aurium serpit, et ita modici seminis vitium cetera rumoris obscurat, ut nemo recogitet, ne primum illud os mendacium seminaverit, quod saepe fit aut ingenio aemulationis aut arbitrio suspicionis aut non nova, sed ingenita quibusdam mentiendi voluptate.

[12] Thereafter it creeps into the traductions of tongues and ears, and thus the defect of the slight seed the rest of the rumor obscures, so that no one thinks back whether that first mouth had seminated the lie, which often happens either by the ingenium of emulation or by the arbitrium of suspicion or—no novelty, but ingenerate in certain persons—by a pleasure of lying.

[13] Bene autem quod omnia tempus revelat, testibus etiam vestris proverbiis atque sententiis, ex dispositione naturae, quae ita ordinavit, ut nihil diu lateat, etiam quod fama non distulit.

[13] Well said, moreover, that time reveals all things, with even your own proverbs and sentences as witnesses, by the disposition of nature, which has so ordered that nothing lies hidden for long, even what rumor has not diffused.

[14] Merito igitur fama tamdiu conscia sola est scelerum Christianorum; hanc indicem adversus nos profertis, quae quod aliquando iactavit tantoque spatio in opinionem corroboravit, usque adhuc probare non valuit.

[14] Deservedly, therefore, rumor has for so long been the sole conscious witness of the crimes of the Christians; this informer you bring forward against us, which, what it once bandied about and by so long a span has corroborated into opinion, has up to now been unable to prove.

VIII.

[1] Ut fidem naturae ipsius appellem adversus eos, qui talia credenda esse praesumunt, ecce proponimus horum facinorum mercendem: Vitam aeternam repromittunt. Credite interim! De hoc enim quaero, an et qui credideris tanti habeas ad eam tali conscientia pervenire.

[1] That I may appeal to the testimony of nature herself against those who presume that such things are to be believed, behold, we set forth the wage of these crimes: They promise anew Eternal Life. Believe meanwhile! For about this I inquire, whether even you, once you have believed, deem it of such worth to arrive at it with such a conscience.

[2] Veni, demerge ferrum in infantem nullius inimicum, nullius rerum, omnium filium; vel, si alterius officium est, tu modo adsiste morienti homini, antequam vixit; fugientem animam novam expecta, excipe rudem sanguinem, eo panem tuum satia, vescere libenter!

[2] Come, plunge the iron into the infant, enemy of no one, of no thing, the son of all; or, if it is another’s office, do you only stand by the dying human, before he lived; await the fleeing new soul, catch the raw blood, with it satiate your bread, eat gladly!

[3] Interea discumbens dinumera loca, ubi mater, ubi soror; nota diligenter, ut, cum tenebrae ceciderint caninae, non erres! Piaculum enim admiseris, nisi incestum feceris.

[3] Meanwhile, reclining, enumerate the places—where the mother, where the sister; mark them diligently, so that, when the canine darkness has fallen, you may not err! For you will have admitted a piacular offense, unless you have committed incest.

[4] Talia initiatus et consignatus vivis in aevum. Cupio respondeas, si tanti aeternitas; aut si non, ideo nec credenda. Etiamsi credideris, nego te velle; etiamsi volueris, nego te posse.

[4] Thus initiated and consigned, you live forever. I desire you to answer whether eternity is worth so much; or if not, then for that reason it is not to be believed. Even if you have believed, I deny that you will want to; even if you will have wanted, I deny that you are able.

Cur ergo alii possint, si vos non potestis? cur non possitis, si alii possunt?

Why therefore can others, if you cannot? Why can you not, if others can?

[5] Alia nos, opinor, natura, Cynopennae aut Sciapodes; alii ordines dentium, alii ad incestam libidinem nervi. Qui ista credis de homine, potes et facere; homo es et ipse, quod et Christianus. Qui non potes facere, non debes credere.

[5] Are we of another nature, I suppose—Cynopennae or Sciapodes; other orders of teeth, other nerves for incestuous libido. You who believe such things about a human can also do them; you too are a human, as is the Christian. You who cannot do them ought not to believe them.

Homo est enim et Christianus, et quod et tu.

For he is a man and a Christian, and what you are too.

[6] "Sed ignorantibus subicitur et imponitur. Nihil enim tale de Christianis adseverari sciebant, observandum utique sibi et omni vigilantia investigandum."

[6] "But it is foisted upon and imposed upon the ignorant. For they knew nothing of such a kind to be asseverated concerning Christians, something assuredly to be observed by themselves and to be investigated with all vigilance."

[7] Atquin volentibus initiari moris est, opinor, prius patrem illum sacrorum adire, quae praeparanda sint describere. Tum ille: "Infans tibi necessarius adhuc tener, qui nesciat mortem, qui sub cultro tuo rideat; item panis, quo sanguinis iurulentiam colligas; praeterea candelabra et lucernae et canes aliqui et offulae, quae illos ad eversionem luminum extendant; ante omnia cum matre et sorore tua venire debebis."

[7] But indeed, for those willing to be initiated it is the custom, I suppose, first to approach that father of the rites, to set down what things must be prepared. Then he: "A baby is necessary for you, still tender, who does not know death, who will laugh under your knife; likewise bread, with which you may collect the gravy of the blood; moreover candelabra and lamps and some dogs and little morsels, which may stretch them out to the eversion of the lights; before all, you will have to come with your mother and your sister."

[8] Quid si noluerint vel nullae fuerint? Quid denique singulares Christiani? Non erit, opinor, legitimus Christianus nisi frater aut filius.

[8] What if they should be unwilling, or there should be none? What, finally, of Christians who are single? He will not be, I suppose, a legitimate Christian unless a brother or a son.

[9] Quid nunc, et si ista omnia ignaris praeparantur? Certe postea cognoscunt et sustinent et ignoscunt. "Timent plecti, si proclament." Qui defendi merebuntur, qui etiam ultro perire malint quam sub tali conscientia vivere?

[9] What now, even if all those things are prepared unbeknownst to them? Surely afterward they come to know and sustain and forgive. "They fear to be punished, if they proclaim it." Who will deserve to be defended, they who would even of their own accord prefer to perish rather than live under such a conscience?

Age nunc, timeant; cur etiam perseverant? Sequitur enim, ne ultra velis id te esse quod, si prius scisses, non fuisses.

Come now, let them fear; why do they even persevere? For it follows that you should no longer will to be that which, if you had known earlier, you would not have been.

IX.

[1] Haec quo[que] magis refutaverim, a vobis fieri ostendam partim in aperto, partim in occulto, per quod forsitan et de nobis credidistis.

[1] These things also I would rather refute; I will show them to be done by you, partly in the open, partly in secret, by reason of which perhaps you even believed them about us.

[2] Infantes penes Africam Saturno immolabantur palam usque ad proconsulatum Tiberii, qui eosdem sacerdotes in eisdem arboribus templi sui obumbratricibus scelerum votivis crucibus exposuit, teste militia patriae nostrae, quae id ipsum munus illi proconsuli functa est.

[2] Infants in Africa were immolated to Saturn openly right up to the proconsulship of Tiberius, who exposed those same priests upon votive crosses on the same trees of his temple, overshadowing their crimes, with the soldiery of our fatherland as witness, which performed that very duty for that proconsul.

[3] Sed et nunc in occulto perseveratur hoc sacrum facinus. Non soli vos contemnunt Christiani, nec ullum scelus in perpetuum eradicatur, aut mores suos aliqui deus mutat.

[3] But even now in secret this sacred crime is persisted in. Not Christians alone contemn you, nor is any crime eradicated in perpetuity, nor does any god change his own mores.

[4] Cum propriis filiis Saturnus non pepercit, extraneis utique non parcendo perseverabat, quos quidem ipsi parentes sui offerebant; et libentes respondebant et infantibus blandiebantur, ne lacrimantes immolarentur. Et tamen multum homicidio parricidium differt.

[4] Since Saturn did not spare his own sons, he certainly kept on not sparing strangers, whom indeed their very own parents themselves were offering; and they willingly assented and coaxed the infants, so that they might not be immolated crying. And yet parricide differs much from homicide.

[5] Maior aetas apud Gallos Mercurio prosecatur. Remitto fabulas Tauricas theatris suis. Ecce in illa religiosissima urbe Aeneadarum piorum est Iuppiter quidam, quem ludis suis humano sanguine proluunt.

[5] The mature age among the Gauls pays honor to Mercury. I remit the Tauric fables to their own theaters. Behold, in that most religious city of the pious Aeneadae there is a certain Jupiter, whom they bathe at their games with human blood.

"Sed bestiarii", inquitis. Hoc, opinor, minus quam hominis! An hoc turpius, quod mali hominis?

“But ‘bestiarii,’ you say. This, I suppose, is something less than a man’s! Or is it the more shameful because it is that of an evil man?”

certe tamen de homicidio funditur. O Iovem Christianum et solum patris filium de crudelitate!

yet surely it is poured out from homicide. O Jove, Christian—and the only son of his father—in cruelty!

[6] Sed quoniam de infanticidio nihil interest, sacro an arbitrio perpetretur, licet parricidium homicidio intersit, convertar ad populum. Quot vultis ex his circumstantibus et in Christianorum sanguinem hiantibus, ex ipsis etiam vobis iustissimis et severissimis in nos praesidibus apud conscientias pulsem, qui natos sibi liberos enecent?

[6] But since, as to infanticide, it makes no difference whether it be perpetrated as a sacred rite or at discretion—although parricide differs from homicide—I will turn to the people. How many of these bystanders, gaping for Christian blood, and even from you yourselves, the most righteous and most severe governors over us, would you have me cite before their consciences—those who kill their own children born to them?

[7] Si quid[em] et de genere necis differt, utique crudelius in aqua spiritum extorquetis aut frigori et fami et canibus exponitis; ferro enim mori aetas quoque maior optaverit.

[7] If indeed it even makes a difference as to the kind of killing, assuredly you more cruelly wrench out the breath in water or expose them to cold and hunger and dogs; for to die by iron even a more advanced age would have chosen.

[8] Nobis vero semel homicidio interdicto etiam conceptum utero, dum adhuc sanguis in hominem delib[er]atur, dissolvere non licet. Homicidii festinatio est prohibere nasci, nec refert, natam quis eripiat animam an nascentem disturbet. Homo est et qui est futurus; etiam fructus omnis iam in semine est.

[8] But for us, once homicide has been interdicted, it is not permitted even to dissolve what has been conceived in the uterus, while as yet the blood is being shaped into a human being. It is a hastening of homicide to prohibit being born; nor does it matter whether one snatches away a soul that has been born or disturbs one that is being born. A human is also he who is going to be; indeed every fruit is already in its seed.

[9] De sanguinis pabulo et eiusmodi tragicis ferculis legite, necubi relatum sit — est apud Herodotum, opinor — defusum brachiis sanguinem ex alterutro degustatum nationes quasdam foederi comparasse. Nescio quid et sub Catilina degustatum est. Aiunt et apud quosdam gentiles Scytharum defunctum quemque a suis comedi.

[9] On the pabulum of blood and such tragic dishes, read, in case it is recorded anywhere — it is in Herodotus, I think — that certain nations prepared for a treaty by tasting blood poured from their arms, from either party. Something or other too, in Catiline’s time, was tasted. They also say that among certain gentiles each defunct Scythian is eaten by his own.

[10] Longe excurro. Hodie istic Bellonae sacratus sanguis de femore proscisso in palmulam exceptus et sui datus signat.

[10] I digress far. Today there, the blood consecrated to Bellona, received from a gashed thigh into the little palm, and given for use, marks.

[11] Item illi, qui munere in arena noxiorum iugulatorum sanguinem recentem, de iugulo decurrentem [exceptum], avida siti comitiali morbo medentes hauserunt, ubi sunt? Item illi qui de arena ferinis obsoniis cenant, qui de apro, qui de cervo petunt? Aper ille quem cruentavit colluctando detersit, cervus ille in gladiatoris sanguine iacuit.

[11] Likewise those who at a spectacle in the arena quaffed the fresh blood of condemned men who had been throat-cut, running down from the jugular, [caught], treating the comitial disease with avid thirst—where are they? Likewise those who dine from the arena on ferine viands, who seek it from the boar, who from the stag? That boar, whom grappling made bloody, has wiped it off; that stag lay in a gladiator’s blood.

Ipsorum ursorum alvei appetuntur cruditantes adhuc de visceribus humanis; ructatur proinde ab homine caro pasta de homine.

The very bears’ bellies are craved, still indigest from human viscera; accordingly, flesh fed on man is belched by a man.

[12] Haec qui editis, quantum abestis a conviviis Christianorum? Minus autem et illi faciunt, qui libidine fera humanis membris inhiant, quia vivos vorant? minus humano sanguine ad spurcitiam consecrantur, quia futurum sanguinem lambunt?

[12] You who eat these things, how far are you from the banquets of Christians? Do those, moreover, do less, who with feral lust gape after human members, because they devour the living? Are they less consecrated to filth by human blood, because they lick blood that is to be?

Non edunt infantes plane, sed magis puberes.

They do not eat infants, plainly, but rather the pubescent.

[13] Erubescat error vester Christianis, qui ne animalium quidem sanguinem in epulis esculentis habemus, qui propterea suffocatis quoque et morticinis abstinemus, ne quo [modo] sanguine contaminemur vel intra viscera sepulto.

[13] Let your error blush before the Christians, who do not even have the blood of animals at esculent banquets, who for that reason also abstain from the suffocated and from carrion, lest we be contaminated by any blood, even [in any way] buried within the viscera.

[14] Denique inter temptamenta Christianorum botulos etiam cruore distensos admovetis, certissimi scilicet illicitum esse penes illos, per quod exorbitare eos vultis. Porro quale est, ut quos sanguinem pecoris horrere confiditis, humano inhiare credatis, nisi forte suaviorem eum experti?

[14] Finally, among the temptations of the Christians you even set before them sausages distended with gore, being most certain, of course, that it is illicit among them—by which you want them to go off course. Moreover, what sort of sense is it, that those whom you are confident shudder at the blood of cattle, you believe to gape after human blood—unless perhaps you, having tried it, have found it sweeter?

[15] Quem quidem et ipsum proinde examinatorem Christianorum adhiberi oportebat, ut foculum, ut acerram. Proinde enim probarentur sanguinem humanum appetendo, quemadmodum sacrificium respuendo; alioquin negandi, si non gustassent, quemadmodum si immolassent. Et utique non deesset vobis in auditione custodiarum et damnatione sanguis humanus.

[15] That very thing too ought likewise to have been employed as an examiner of Christians, like the little brazier, like the incense-box: for in that way they would be proven by appetency for human blood, just as they are by spurning sacrifice; otherwise, they are to be classed among the deniers if they had not tasted, just as if they had immolated. And assuredly human blood would not be lacking for you at the hearing of the custodies and at the condemnation.

[16] Proinde incesti qui magis quam quos ipse Iuppiter docuit? Persas cum suis matribus misceri Ctesias refert. Sed et Macedones suspecti, quia, cum primum Oedipum tragoediam audissent, ridentes incesti dolorem: "Ἤλαυνε ", dicebant, "εἰς τὴν μητέρα !".

[16] Accordingly, who are more incestuous than those whom Jupiter himself taught? Ctesias reports that the Persians have intercourse with their own mothers. But the Macedonians too are suspect, because, when they first heard the tragedy of Oedipus, laughing at the grief of incest: "He was driving ", they used to say, "to his mother !".

[17] Iam nunc recognitate, quantum liceat erroribus ad incesta miscenda, suppeditante materias passivitate luxuriae. Inprimis filios exponitis suscipiendos ab aliqua praetereunte misericordia extranea, vel adoptandos melioribus parentibus emancipatis. Alienati generis necesse est quandoque memoriam dissipari; et simul error impegerit, exinde iam tradux proficient incesti serpente genere cum scelere.

[17] Now recognize how much license errors have for commingling incest, with the passivity of lust supplying the materials. In the first place you expose your children to be taken up by some passing stranger’s compassion, or—once emancipated—to be adopted by “better” parents. For a lineage thus alienated it is inevitable that at some point the memory be dissipated; and as soon as a mistake has struck, from then on an offshoot will proceed—of incest, serpentine in kind, along with crime.

[18] Tunc deinde quocumque in loco, domi, peregre, trans freta, comes est libido, cuius ubique saltus facile possunt alicubi ignaris filios pangere vel ex aliqua seminis portione, ut ia sparsum genus per commercia humana concurrat in memorias suas, neque eas caecus incesti sangui[ni]s agnoscat.

[18] Then thereafter, wherever—at home, abroad, across the straits—libido is a companion, whose leaps everywhere can easily beget sons somewhere upon the unknowing, or from some portion of semen, so that thus the scattered stock, through human commerce, may run together into its own remembrances, nor does the blind blood of incest recognize them.

[19] Nos ab isto eventu diligentissima et fidelissima castitas saepsit, quantumque ab stupris et ab omni post matrimonium excessu, tantum et ab incesti casu tuti sumus. Quidam multo securiores totam vim huis erroris virgine continentia depellunt, senes pueri.

[19] From that outcome the most diligent and most faithful chastity has fenced us off, and inasmuch as we stand back from debaucheries and from every excess beyond marriage, so far are we safe also from the case of incest. Some, much more secure, drive off the whole force of this error by virgin continence—boys grown old.

[20] Haec in vobis esse si consideraretis, proinde in Christianis non esse perspiceretis. Idem oculi renuntiassent utrumque. Sed caecitatis duae species facile concurrunt, ut qui non vident quae sunt, videre videantur quae non sunt.

[20] If you were to consider that these things are in you, you would accordingly perceive that they are not in Christians. The same eyes would have reported both. But two species of blindness readily concur, so that those who do not see the things that are, seem to see the things that are not.

Sic per omnia ostendam. Nunc de manifestioribus dicam.

Thus I will show through all things. Now I will speak about the more manifest things.

10.

[1] "Deos", iniquitis, "non colitis et pro imperatoribus sacrificia non penditis." Sequitur, ut eadem ratione pro aliis non sacrificemus, qu[i]a nec pro nobis ipsis, semel deos non colendo. Itaque sacrilegii et maiestatis rei convenimur. Summa haec causa, immo tota est et utique digna cognosci, si non praesumptio aut iniquitas iudicet, altera quae desperat, altera quae recusat veritatem.

[1] "The gods," you unjustly say, "you do not worship, and you do not pay sacrifices on behalf of the emperors." It follows that by the same reasoning we do not sacrifice for others, since neither for our own selves, once we do not worship the gods. And so we are arraigned as defendants on the charge of sacrilege and of majesty. This is the sum of the case—nay, the whole of it—and assuredly worthy to be known, if only presumption or iniquity do not judge, the former which despairs of the truth, the latter which refuses it.

[2] Deos vestros colere desinimus, ex quo illos non esse cognoscimus. Hoc igitur exigere debetis, uti probemus non esse illos deos, et idcirco non colendos, quia tunc demum coli debuissent, si dei fuissent. Tunc et Christiani puniendi, si, quos non colerent, quia putarent non esse, constaret illos deos esse.

[2] We cease to worship your gods, from the time we come to know that they are not. Therefore this you ought to require, that we prove those are not gods, and for that reason not to be given cult, because only then ought they to have been worshiped, if they had been gods. Then Christians too would be punishable, if it were established that those whom they did not worship, because they thought them not to exist, were gods.

[3] "Sed nobis", inquitis, "dei sunt." Appellamus et provocamus a vobis ad conscientiam vestram; illa nos iudicet, illa nos damnet, si poterit negare omnes istos deos vestros homines fuisse.

[3] "But for us," you say, "they are gods." We appeal and we call upon your conscience from your own selves; let that judge us, let that condemn us, if it can deny that all those your gods were men.

[4] Si et ipsa infitias ierit, de suis antiquitatum instrumentis revincetur, de quibus eos didicit, testimonium perhibentibus ad hodiernum et civitatibus, in quibus nati sunt, et regionibus, in quibus aliquid operati vestigia reliquerunt, in quibus etiam sepulti demonstrantur.

[4] If even it should go into denial, it will be refuted by its own instruments of antiquity, from which it learned about them—bearing testimony to this day both the cities in which they were born, and the regions in which, having wrought something, they left vestiges, in which also they are shown to be buried.

[5] Nunc ergo per singulos decurram, tot ac tantos, novos veteres, barbaros Graecos, Romanos peregrinos, captivos adoptivos, proprios communes, masculos feminas, rusticos urbanos, nauticos militares?

[5] Now then, shall I run through them one by one—so many and so great: new and old, barbarians and Greeks, Romans and foreigners, captives and adopted, one’s own and common, males and females, rustic and urban, nautical and military?

[6] Otiosum et etiam titulos persequi. Ut colligam in compendium, et hoc non quo cognoscatis, sed recognoscatis — certe enim oblitos agitis —, ante Saturnum deus penes vos nemo est; ab illo census totius vel potioris et notioris divinitatis. Itaque quod de origine constiterit, id et de posteritate conveniet.

[6] It is idle even to pursue the titles. To gather into a compendium—and this not that you may cognize, but that you may recognize — for surely you act as forgetful —, before Saturn there is no god in your keeping; from him dates the census of the whole, or at least of the more potent and better-known, divinity. And so what shall have been established about the origin will likewise be agreed about the posterity.

[7] Saturnum itaque, si quantum litterae docent, neque Diodorus Graecus aut Thallus neque Cassius Severus aut Cornelius Nepos neque ullus commentator eiusmodi antiquitatum aliud quam hominem promulgaverunt; si quantum rerum argumenta, nusquam invenio fideliora quam apud ipsam Italiam, in qua Saturnus post multas expeditiones postque Attica hospitia consedit, exceptus a Iano, vel Iane, ut Salii volut.

[7] Saturn, therefore, if so far as the letters teach, neither Diodorus the Greek nor Thallus, neither Cassius Severus nor Cornelius Nepos, nor any commentator of antiquities of this sort, have promulgated him as anything other than a man; if so far as the evidences of things, nowhere do I find more faithful ones than with Italy herself, in which Saturn, after many expeditions and after Attic hospitalities, settled, welcomed by Janus, or by Iane, as the Salii would have it.

[8] Mons, quem incoluerat, Saturnius dictus; civitas, quam depalaverat, Saturnia usque nunc est, tota denique Italia post Oenotriam Saturnia cognominabatur. Ab ipso primum tabulae et imagine signatus nummus, et inde aerario praesidet.

[8] The mountain which he had inhabited was called Saturnian; the city which he had staked out is Saturnia even to this day; finally, the whole of Italy, after Oenotria, was surnamed Saturnia. From him first came a coin stamped with a tablet and an image, and from that he presides over the treasury.

[9] Tamen, si homo Saturnus, utique ex homine, et quia ab homine, non utique de Caelo et Terra. Sed cuius parentes ignoti erant, facile fuit eorum filium dici, quorum et omnes possumus videri. Quis enim non caelum ac terram matrem ac patrem venerationis et honoris gratia appellet vel ex consuetudine humana, qua ignoti vel ex inopinato apparentes de caelo supervenisse dicuntur?

[9] Yet, if Saturn is a man, then assuredly from a man; and because from a man, assuredly not from Heaven and Earth. But since his parents were unknown, it was easy for him to be called the son of those of whom we all can seem to be. For who does not call heaven and earth mother and father for the sake of veneration and honor, or from human custom, by which the unknown, or those appearing unexpectedly, are said to have come down from heaven?

[10] Proinde Saturno repentino ubique caelitem contigit dici; nam et terrae filios vulgus vocat, quorum genus incertum est. Taceo quod ita rudes adhuc homines agebant, ut cuiuslibet novi viri adspectu quasi divino commoverentur, cum hodie iam politi, quos ante paucos dies luctu publico mortuos sint confessi, in deos consecrent.

[10] Accordingly, it befell Saturn, suddenly, to be called everywhere a celestial; for the vulgar also call “sons of the earth” those whose origin is uncertain. I pass over the fact that men, still so rude, used to conduct themselves thus, that at the sight of any new man they were stirred as if by a divine one, whereas today, already polished, they consecrate into gods those whom a few days before they have confessed, with public mourning, to be dead.

[11] Satis iam de Saturno, licet paucis. Etiam Iovem ostendemus tam hominem quam ex homine, et deinceps totum generis examen tam mortale quam seminis sui par.

[11] Enough now about Saturn, though in few words. We will show Jove also to be both a man and from man, and thereafter the whole line of the stock, as mortal as it is on a par with its own seed.

XI.

11.

[1] Et quoniam, sicut illos homines fuisse non audetis negare, ita post mortem deos factos instituistis adseverare, causas, quae hoc exegerint, retractemus.

[1] And since, just as you do not dare to deny that those were men, so you have established the assertion that after death they were made gods, let us re-examine the causes which have brought this about.

[2] Inprimis quidem necesse est concedatis esse aliquem sublimiorem deum et mancipem quendam divinitatis, qui ex hominibus deos fecerit. Nam neque sibi illi sumere potuissent divinitatem, quam non habebant, nec alius praestare eam non habentibus, nisi qui proprie possidebat.

[2] In the first place indeed it is necessary that you grant there is some more sublime god and a certain holder of divinity, who made gods out of men. For neither could those men have taken to themselves divinity, which they did not have, nor could another bestow it on those not having it, except one who properly possessed it.

[3] Ceterum si nemo esset, qui deos faceret, frustra praesumitis deos factos, auferendo factorem. Certe quidem, si ipsi se facere potuissent, numquam homines fuissent, possidentes scilicet condicionis melioris potestatem.

[3] Moreover, if there were no one to make gods, you presume gods to have been made in vain, by removing the maker. Certainly indeed, if they themselves could have made themselves, they would never have been men, manifestly possessing the power of a better condition.

[4] Igitur si est qui faciat deos, revertor ad causas examinandas faciendorum ex hominibus deorum, nec ullas invenio, nisi si ministeria et auxilia officiis divinis desideravit ille magnus deus. Primo indignum est, ut alicuius opera indegeret, et quidem mortui, cum dignius ab initio deum aliquem fecisset qui mortui erat operam desideraturus.

[4] Therefore, if there is one who makes gods, I return to examine the causes for making gods out of men, and I find none, unless perhaps that great god desired ministries and auxiliaries for the divine offices. First, it is unworthy that he should be in need of anyone’s service—indeed, of a dead man’s—since, more fittingly, from the beginning he would have made some god who was going to need a dead man’s service.

[5] Sed nec operae locum video. Totum enim hoc mundi corpus, sive innatum et infectum secundum Pythagoram sive natum factumve secundum Platonem, semel utique in ista constructione dispositum et instructum et ordinatum cum omni ~~rationis gubernaculo inventum est. Imperfectum non potuit esse quod perfecit omnia.~~

[5] But neither do I see any place for work. For this whole body of the world, whether unbegotten and unfashioned according to Pythagoras or begotten and made according to Plato, was once for all, in this construction, disposed and furnished and ordered, found with every helm of reason. That which perfected all things could not have been imperfect.

[6] Nihil Saturnum et Saturniam gentem expectabat. Vani erunt homines, nisi certi sint a primordio et pluvias de caelo ruisse et sidera radiasse et lumina floruisse et tonitrua mugisse et ipsum Iovem quae in manu eius imponitis fulmina timuisse, item omnem frugem ante Liberum et Cererem et Minervam, immo ante illum aliquem principem hominem de terra exuberasse, quia nihil continendo et sustinendo homini prospectum post hominem potuit inferri.

[6] Nothing was waiting for Saturn and the Saturnian race. Men will be vain, unless they are certain that from the beginning rains rushed down from heaven and the stars radiated and lights flourished and thunders bellowed, and that Jupiter himself feared the thunderbolts which you place in his hand; likewise that all produce, before Liber and Ceres and Minerva—nay, before that some leading man—abounded from the earth, because by holding back and withholding no provision for man could be brought in after man.

[7] Denique invenisse dicuntur necessaria ista vitae, non instituisse. Quod autem invenitur, fuit, et quod fuit, non eius deputabitur qui invenit, sed eius qui instituit; erat enim antequam inveniretur.

[7] Finally, they are said to have found these necessities of life, not to have instituted them. But what is found existed, and what existed will not be ascribed to him who found it, but to him who instituted it; for it existed before it was found.

[8] Ceterum si propterea Liber deus, quod vitem demonstravit, male cum Lucullo actum est, qui primus cerasia ex Ponto Italiae promulgavit, quod non est propterea consecratus ut frugis novae auctor, qui ostensor.

[8] But then, if for that reason Liber is a god, because he showed the vine, it has gone ill with Lucullus, who first promulgated cherries (cerasia) from Pontus to Italy, since he has not on that account been consecrated as the author of a new fruit, being only a pointer-out.

[9] Quamobrem, si ab initio et instructa et certis exercendorum officiorum suorum rationibus dispensata universitas constitit, vacat ex hac parte causa allegendae humanitatis in divinitatem, quia quas illis stationes et potestates distribuistis, tam fuerunt ab initio quam et fuissent etiamsi deos istos non creassetis.

[9] Wherefore, if from the beginning the universe stood constituted, both arrayed and apportioned by fixed rules for the exercising of its own offices, the case is void on this side for alleging humanity into divinity; because the stations and powers which you have distributed to them were as much there from the beginning as they would have been even if you had not created those gods.

[10] Sed convertimini ad causam aliam respondentes collationem divinitatis meritorum remunerandorum fuisse rationem. Et hinc conceditis, opinor, illum deum deificum iustitia praecellere, qui non temere nec indigne nec prodige tantum praemium dispensarit.

[10] But turn yourselves to another cause, answering that the collation—i.e., the conferral—of divinity was the rationale for remunerating merits. And hence you concede, I suppose, that that deific god excels in justice, who has not dispensed so great a reward rashly, nor unworthily, nor prodigally.

[11] Volo igitur merita recensere, an eiusmodi sint, ut illos in caelum extulerint et non potius in imum Tartarum merserint, quem carcerem poenarum infernarum, cum vultis, affirmatis.

[11] I wish, therefore, to recount the merits, whether they are of such a sort that they have lifted them into heaven and not rather plunged them into the lowest Tartarus, which you, when you wish, affirm to be the prison of infernal punishments.

[12] Illuc enim abstrudi solent impii quique in parentes et incesti in sorores et maritarum adulteri et virginum raptores et puerorum contaminatores, et qui saeviunt, et qui occidunt, et qui furantur, et qui decipiunt, et quicumque similes sunt alicuius dei vestri, quem neminem integrum a crimine aut vitio probare poteritis, nisi hominem negaveritis.

[12] For thither are wont to be thrust the impious, and those who act against their parents, and the incestuous with their sisters, and adulterers of married women, and ravishers of virgins, and contaminators of boys, and those who rage, and those who kill, and those who steal, and those who deceive, and whoever are similar to any one of your gods, none of whom you will be able to prove entire from crime or vice, unless you deny him to be a man.

[13] Atquin, ut illos homines fuisse non potestis negare, etiam istae notae accedunt, quae nec deos postea factos credi permittunt. Si enim vos talibus puniendis praesidetis, si commercium, colloquium, convictum malorum et turpium probi quique respuitis, horum autem pares deus ille maiestatis suae consortio adscivit, quid ergo damnatis, quorum collegas adoratis?

[13] And yet, since you cannot deny that they were men, there accrue also those marks which do not permit them thereafter to be believed to have been made gods. For if you preside over the punishing of such persons; if you, as upright and honorable men, reject commerce, colloquy, and convivial association with the wicked and the base; but that god has admitted peers of these into the consortium of his majesty—why then do you condemn those whose colleagues you adore?

[14] Suggillatio est in caelo vestra iustitia. Deos facite criminosissimos quosque, ut placeatis deis vestis! Illorum est honor consecratio coaequalium.

[14] Your justice is a disgrace in heaven. Make gods of whosoever are most criminal, in order to please your gods! Their honor is the consecration of coequals.

[15] Sed, ut omittam huius indignitatis retractatum, probi et integri et boni fuerint! Quot tamen potiores viros apud inferos reliquistis! Aliquem de sapientia Socratem, de iustitia Aristiden, de militia Themistoclem, de sublimitate Alexandrum, de felicitate Polycraten, de copia Croesum, de eloquentia Demosthenen.

[15] But, to pass over a reconsideration of this indignity, let them have been men of probity and integrity and goodness! How many better men, however, have you left in the underworld! For wisdom, Socrates; for justice, Aristides; for warfare, Themistocles; for sublimity, Alexander; for felicity, Polycrates; for abundance, Croesus; for eloquence, Demosthenes.

[16] Quis ex illis deis vestris gravior et sapientior Catone, iustior et militarior Scipione? quis sublimior Pompeio, felicior Sylla, copiosior Crasso, eloquentior Tullio? Quanto dignius istos deos ille adsumendos expectasset, praescius utique potiorum!

[16] Which among those your gods is graver and wiser than Cato, more just and more martial than Scipio? Who more sublime than Pompey, more fortunate than Sulla, more copious in riches than Crassus, more eloquent than Cicero? How much more worthily would he have expected these to be assumed as gods, being surely prescient of the worthier!

Properavit, opinor, et caelum semel clusit et nunc utique melioribus apud inferos mussitantibus erubescit.

He hastened, I reckon, and once closed heaven, and now surely he blushes, as the better men among the infernal dwellers whisper.

XII.

12.

[1] Cesso iam de isto, ut qui sciam me ex ipsa veritate demonstraturum, quid non sint, cum ostendero, quid sint. Quantum igitur de deis vestris, nomina solummodo video quorundam veterum mortuorum et fabulas audio et sacra de fabulis recognosco:

[1] I cease now from that, as one who knows that I will demonstrate from truth itself what they are not, when I have shown what they are. As to your gods, then, I see only the names of certain ancient dead, and I hear fables, and I recognize sacred rites from fables:

[2] quantum autem de simulacris ipsis, nihil aliud reprehendo quam materias sorores esse vasculorum instrumentorumque communium vel ex isdem vasculis et instrumentis quasi fatum consecratione mutantes, licentia artis transfigurante, et quidem contumeliosissime et in ipso opere sacrilege, ut revera nobis maxime, qui propter ipsos deos plectimur, solatium poenarum esse possit, quod eadem et ipsi patiuntur, ut fiant.

[2] but as to the simulacra themselves, I blame nothing else than that their materials are sisters of common vessels and instruments, or from these same vessels and instruments, as if fate-changing by consecration, the license of art transfiguring them—and indeed most contumeliously and, in the very workmanship, sacrilegiously—so that truly for us especially, who are punished on account of those very gods, there may be a solace of our penalties, that the same things they themselves suffer, in order that they may be made.

[3] Crucibus et stipitibus imponitis Christianos: Quod simulacrum non prius argilla deformat cruci et stipiti superstructa? in patibulo primum corpus dei vestri dedicatur.

[3] You set Christians upon crosses and stakes: what simulacrum is not first shaped by clay superposed upon a cross and a stake? on the gibbet the body of your god is first dedicated.

[4] Ungulis deraditis latera Christianorum: At in deos vestros per omnia membra validius incumbunt asciae et runcinae et scobinae. Cervices ponimus: Ante plumbum et glutinum et gomphos sine capite sunt dei vestri. Ad bestias impellimur: Certe quas Libero et Cybele et Caelesti applicatis.

[4] You scrape down with claws the sides of Christians: but upon your gods, over all their limbs, axes and planes and rasps press more mightily. We set down our necks: before the lead and the glue and the headless pegs, your gods are without a head. We are driven to the beasts: surely to those which you attach to Liber and Cybele and Caelestis.

[5] Ignibus urimur: Hoc et illi a prima quidem massa. In metalla damnamur: Inde censentur dei vestri. In insulis relegamur.

[5] We are burned by fires: this too they, from their very first mass. We are condemned to the mines: thence your gods are assessed. We are relegated to islands.

Solet et in insula aliqui deus vester aut nasci aut mori. Si per haec constat divinitas aliqua, ergo qui puniuntur consecrantur et numina erunt dicenda supplicia.

It is also usual that some god of yours either is born or dies on an island. If by these things some divinity is established, then those who are punished are consecrated, and the punishments must be called numina.

[6] Sed plane non sentiunt has iniurias et contumelias fabricationis suae dei vestri sicut nec obsequia. O impiae voces, o sacrilega convicia! Infrendite, inspumate!

[6] But plainly your gods, of their own fabrication, do not sense these injuries and contumelies, just as they do not sense the services. O impious voices, O sacrilegious revilings! Gnash, froth!

Idem estis, qui Senecam aliquem pluribus et amarioribus de vestra superstitione perorantem <non> ;reprehendistis.

You are the same people who did not censure a certain Seneca, haranguing at greater length and with more bitterness about your superstition.

[7] Igitur si statuas et imagines frigidas mortuorum suorum simillimas non adoramus, quas milvi et mures et araneae intellegunt, nonne laudem magis quam poenam merebatur repudium agniti erroris? Possumus enim videri laedere eos, quos certi sumus omnino non esse? Quod non est, nihil ab ullo patitur, quia non est.

[7] Therefore, if we do not adore statues and cold images, very like their own dead, which kites and mice and spiders understand, would not the repudiation of a recognized error deserve praise rather than punishment? For can we seem to injure those whom we are certain do not exist at all? That which is not suffers nothing from anyone, because it is not.

XIII.

13.

[1] "Sed nobis dei sunt", inquis. Et quomodo vos e contrario impii et sacrilegi et irreligiosi erga deos vestros deprehendimini, qui quos praesumitis esse, neglegitis, quos timetis, destruitis, quos etiam vindicatis, illuditis?

[1] "But you say, 'We have gods.' And how is it that you, on the contrary, are detected as impious and sacrilegious and irreligious toward your own gods—who those whom you presume to exist, you neglect; those whom you fear, you destroy; those whom you even vindicate, you mock?"

[2] Recognoscite, si mentior. Primo qui, cum alii alios colitis, utique quos non colitis, offenditis. Praelatio alterius sine alterius contumelia non potest procedere, quia nec electio sine reprobatione.

[2] Recognize it, if I am lying. First, you who, while you worship some, certainly offend those whom you do not worship. The prelation of one cannot proceed without the contumely of another, since neither can election be without reprobation.

[3] Iam ergo contemnitis quos reprobatis, quos reprobando offendere non timetis. Nam, ut supra praestrinximus, status dei cuiusque in senatus aestimatione pendebat. Deus non erat, quem homo consultus noluisset et nolendo damnasset.

[3] So then you contemn those whom you reprobate, those whom, by reprobating, you do not fear to offend. For, as we have touched upon above, the status of each god hung on the Senate’s estimation. He was no god, one whom a man, when consulted, would have refused, and by refusing would have damned.

[4] Domesticos deos, quos Lares dicitis, domestica potestate tractatis pignerando venditando demutando aliquando in caccabulum de Saturno, aliquando in trullam de Minerva, ut quisque contritus atque contusus est, dum diu colitur, ut quisque dominus sanctiorem expertus est domesticam necessitatem.

[4] The household gods, whom you call Lares, you handle by domestic authority, by pawning, by selling, by swapping—sometimes into a cooking-pot from Saturn, sometimes into a ladle from Minerva—as each is worn down and bruised while being long worshiped, as each master has experienced a more sacred domestic necessity.

[5] Publicos aeque publico iure foedatis, quos in hastario vectigales habetis. Sic Capitolium, sic olitorium forum petitur; sub eadem voce praeconis, sub eadem hasta, sub eadem adnotatione quaestoris divinitas addicta conducitur.

[5] You likewise defile the public [gods] by public law, those whom you have as revenue-paying items in the auction-hall. Thus the Capitol, thus the greengrocers’ forum is bid for; under the same voice of the crier, under the same spear, under the same annotation of the quaestor, divinity, adjudged, is leased out.

[6] Sed enim agri tributo onusti viliores, hominum capita stipendio censa ignobiliora (nam hae sunt notae captivitatis), dei vero, qui magis tributarii, magis sancti; immo qui magis sancti, magis tributarii. Maiestas quaestuaria efficitur: Circuit cauponas religio mendicans; exigitis mercedem pro solo templi, pro aditu sacri. Non licet deos gratis nosse; venales sunt.

[6] But indeed fields laden with tribute are of lesser value, the heads of men, assessed by a stipend-tax, more ignoble (for these are the marks of captivity), but the gods— the more tributary, the more holy; nay rather, the more holy, the more tributary. Majesty is made a matter of gain: religion, as a mendicant, makes the rounds of the taverns; you exact a fee for the very soil of the temple, for access to the sacred. It is not permitted to know the gods gratis; they are for sale.

[7] Quid omnino ad honorandos eos facitis, quod non etiam mortuis vestris conferatis? Aedes proinde, aras proinde. Idem habitus et insignia in statuis; ut aetas, ut ars, ut negotium mortui fuit, ita deus est.

[7] What, altogether, do you do for honoring them that you do not also confer upon your dead? Temples likewise, altars likewise. The same dress and insignia in the statues; as the age, as the art, as the occupation of the dead man was, so is the god.

Quo differt ab epulo Iovis silicernium, a simpulo obba, ab haruspice pollinctor? Nam et haruspex mortuis apparet.

In what way does the silicernium differ from the banquet of Jove, the obba from the simpulum, the pollinctor from the haruspex? For the haruspex too appears in attendance upon the dead.

[8] Sed digne imperatoribus defunctis honorem divinitatis dicatis, quibus et viventibus eum addicitis. Accepto ferent dei vestri, immo gratulabuntur, quod pares eis fiant domini sui.

[8] But fittingly you ascribe the honor of divinity to emperors now defunct, to whom also while living you adjudge it. Your gods will take it as acceptable; nay rather, they will congratulate, because their own lords become equals to them.

[9] Sed cum Larentinam publicum scortum (velim saltim Laidem aut Phrynem), inter Iunones et Cereres et Dianas adoratis; cum Simonem Magum statua et inscriptione Sancti Dei inauguratis; cum de paedagogiis aulicis nescio quem synodi deum facitis, licet non nobiliores dei veteres, tamen contumeliam a vobis deputabunt, hoc et aliis licuisse, quod solis antiquitas contulit.

[9] But when you adore Larentina, a public scortum (I would wish at least a Lais or a Phryne), among the Junos and Cereses and Dianas; when you inaugurate Simon Magus with a statue and the inscription "Sancti Dei"; when from aulic paedagogies you make I-know-not-whom a god of a synod, although the older gods are not more noble, nevertheless they will reckon it as contumely from you, that what antiquity conferred upon them alone has been permitted also to others.

XIV.

14.

[1] Volo et ritus vestros recensere. Non dico quales sitis in sacrificando, cum enecta et tabidosa et scabiosa quaeque mactatis, cum de opimis et integris supervacua quaeque truncatis, capitula et ungulas, quae domi quoque pueris vel canibus destinassetis, cum de decima Herculis nec tertiam partem in aram eius imponitis; laudabo magis sapientiam, quod de perdito aliquid eripitis.

[1] I also wish to review your rites. I do not say what you are like in sacrificing, when you slaughter whatever is worn-out, tabid, and scabby; when from the fat and intact ones you truncate whatever is superfluous, the little heads and the hoofs, which at home you would likewise have assigned to boys or to dogs; when from the tithe of Hercules you place not even a third part upon his altar; I will rather praise your wisdom, in that you snatch something from what is lost.

[2] Sed conversus ad litteras vestras, quibus informamini ad prudentiam et liberalia officia, quanta invenio ludibria! Deos inter se propter Troianos et Achivos ut gladiatorum paria congressos depugnasse; Venerem humana sagitta sauciatam, quod filium suum Aenean paene interfectum ab eodem Diomede rapere vellet;

[2] But turned to your letters, by which you are informed for prudence and liberal offices, how great mockeries I find! that the gods, on account of the Trojans and Achaeans, came together and fought it out among themselves like pairs of gladiators; that Venus was wounded by a human arrow, because she wished to snatch away her son Aeneas, almost killed by that same Diomedes;

[3] Martem tredecim mensibus in vinculis paene consumptum; Iovem, ne eandem vim a ceteris caelitibus experiretur, opera cuiusdam monstri liberatum, et nunc flentem Sarpedonis casum, nunc foede subantem in sororem sub commemoratione non ita dilectarum iampridem amicarum.

[3] Mars almost consumed in chains for thirteen months; Jupiter, lest he experience the same force from the other celestials, liberated by the agency of a certain monster, and now weeping the fall of Sarpedon, now foully mounting his sister upon the recollection of long-ago girlfriends not so dearly loved.

[4] Exinde quis non poeta ex auctoritate principis sui dedecorator invenitur deorum? Hic Apollinem Admeto regi pascendis pecoribus addicit; ille Neptuni structorias operas Laomedonti locat.

[4] Thence, what poet is not found, on the authority of his own prince, a dishonorer of the gods? This one binds Apollo to King Admetus for the pasturing of herds; that one lets out Neptune’s structural services to Laomedon.

[5] Est et ille de lyricis, Pindarum dico, qui Aesculapium canit avaritiae merito, quia medicinam nocenter exercebat, fulmine iudicatum. Malus Iuppiter, si fulmen illius est, impius in nepotem, invidus in artificem!

[5] There is also that one of the lyric poets—I mean Pindar—who sings that Aesculapius, deservedly for avarice, because he was practicing medicine harmfully, was condemned by a thunderbolt. Bad Jupiter, if the thunderbolt is his, impious toward his grandson, envious toward the artificer!

[6] Haec neque vera prodi neque falsa confingi apud religiosissimos oportebat. Nec tragici quidem aut comici parcunt, ut non aerumnas vel errores domus alicuius dei praefentur.

[6] It was not proper that these things be either brought forth as true or contrived as false among the most religious. Nor indeed do the tragic or the comic poets refrain from presenting the afflictions or the errors of the household of some god.

[7] Taceo de philosophis, Socrate contentus, qui in contumeliam deorum quercum et hircum et canem deierabat. "Sed propterea damnatus est Socrates, quia deos destruebat." Plane olim, id est semper, veritas odio est.

[7] I am silent about the philosophers, content with Socrates, who, in contumely of the gods, used to swear by an oak and a he-goat and a dog. "But for that reason Socrates was condemned, because he was destroying the gods." Plainly once upon a time, that is, always, truth is hated.

[8] Tamen cum paenitentia sententiae Athenienses et criminatores Socratis postea afflixerint et imaginem eius auream in templo collocarint, rescissa damnatio testimonium Socrati reddit.

[8] Yet, when in penitence for the sentence the Athenians afterwards afflicted the accusers of Socrates and placed his golden image in the temple, the rescinded condemnation renders testimony to Socrates.

[9] Sed et Diogenes nescio quid in Herculem ludit, et Romanus cynicus Varro trecentos Ioves, sive Iu

piteros dicendos, sine capitibus introducit.

[9] But Diogenes also makes I-know-not-what jest at Hercules, and the Roman Cynic Varro introduces three hundred Joves—or, as they ought to be called, Jupiters—without heads.

XV.

15.

[1] Cetera lasciviae ingenia etiam voluptatibus vestris per deorum dedecus operantur. Dispicite Lentulorum et Hostiliorum venustates, utrum mimos an deos vestros in iocis et strophis rideatis: "moechum Anubin" et "masculum Lunam" et "Dianam flagellatam" et "Iovis mortui testamentum recitatum" et "tres Hercules famelicos irrisos".

[1] The other wits of lasciviousness also work upon your pleasures through the disgrace of the gods. Consider the witticisms of the Lentuli and the Hostilii, whether you are laughing at mimes or at your own gods in jokes and strophes: "Anubis the adulterer" and "Luna made male" and "Diana flogged" and "the testament of dead Jupiter recited" and "three famished Herculeses mocked".

[2] Sed et histrionum litterae omnem foeditatem eorum designant. Luget Sol filium de caelo iactatum laetantibus vobis, et Cybele pastorum suspirat fastidiosum non erubescentibus vobis, et sustinetis Iovis elogia cantari, et Iunonem Venerem Minervam a pastore iudicari.

[2] But even the literature of the actors designates all their foulness. Sol mourns his son hurled from heaven, while you rejoice, and Cybele sighs for the disdainful shepherd, you not blushing, and you endure that the eulogies of Jove be sung, and that Juno, Venus, and Minerva be judged by a shepherd.

[3] Ipsum quod imago dei vestri ignominiosum caput et famosum vestit, quod corpus impurum et ad istam artem effeminatione productum Minervam aliquam vel Herculem repraesentat, nonne violatur maiestas et divinitas constupratur laudantibus vobis?

[3] The very fact that the image of your god clothes a disgraceful and notorious head, that an impure body, brought forth for that art by effemination, represents some Minerva or Hercules— is not majesty violated, and divinity ravished, with you applauding?

[4] Plane religiosiores estis in cavea, ubi super sanguinem humanum, super inquinamenta poenarum proinde saltant dei vestri, argumenta et historias noxiis ministrantes, nisi quod et ipsos deos vestros saepe noxii induunt.

[4] Clearly you are more religious in the cavea, where, over human blood, over the defilements of punishments, your gods likewise dance, ministering plots and stories through the condemned, except that the condemned often even assume your very gods themselves.

[5] Vidimus aliquando castratum Attin, illum deum ex Pessinunta, et qui vivus ardebat, Herculem induerat. Risimus et inter ludicras meridianorum crudelitates Mercurium mortuos cauterio examinantem; vidimus et Iovis fratrem gladiatorum cadavera cum malleo deducentem.

[5] We have at times seen the castrated Attis, that god from Pessinus, and one who was burning alive had donned the role of Hercules. We laughed too, amid the ludicrous cruelties of the noonday shows, at Mercury examining the dead with a cautery; and we have seen Jove’s brother leading down the corpses of gladiators with a mallet.

[6] Singula ista quaeque adhuc investigare quis posset, si honorem inquietant divinitatis, si maiestatis vestigia obsoletant, de contemptu utique censentur tam eorum, qui eiusmodi factitant, quam eorum, quibus factitant.

[6] Who could still investigate each of those particulars, if they disturb the honor of divinity, if they make obsolete the vestiges of majesty? They are surely assessed on the score of contempt, both of those who do such things and of those for whom they do them.

[7] Sed ludicra ista sint! Ceterum si adiciam, quae non minus conscientiae omnium recognoscent, in templis adulteria componi, inter aras lenocinia tractari, in ipsis plerumque aedituorum et sacerdotum tabernaculis, sub isdem vittis et apicibus et purpuris thure flagrante libidinem expungi, nescio, ne plus de vobis dei vestri quam de Christianis querantur. Certe sacrilegi de vestris semper apprehenduntur; Christiani enim templa nec interdiu norunt; spoliarent forsitan ea et ipsi, si et ipsi ea adorarent.

[7] But let these be amusements! Moreover, if I should add things which the conscience of all will recognize no less—that adulteries are arranged in the temples, that among the altars panderings are transacted, for the most part in the very tabernacles of the temple-wardens and priests; that under the same fillets and apexes and purples, with incense blazing, lust is paid off—I do not know whether your gods complain more about you than about the Christians. Surely sacrilegists from your number are always apprehended; for the Christians do not even know the temples by day; perhaps they too would despoil them, if they too worshiped them.

[8] Quid ergo colunt qui talia non colunt? Iam quidem intellegi subiacet veritatis esse cultores qui mendacii non sint, nec errare amplius in eo, in quo errasse se recognoscendo cessaverunt. Hoc prius capite et omnem hinc sacramenti nostri ordinem haurite, repercussis ante tamen opinionibus falsis.

[8] What then do they worship who do not worship such things? Now indeed it lies ready to be understood that they are worshipers of truth who are not of mendacity, and that they no longer err in that wherein, by recognizing that they had erred, they have ceased. Take this as the first head, and from here imbibe the whole order of our sacrament, false opinions having first been repelled.

XVI.

16.

[1] Nam, ut et quidam, somniastis caput asininum esse deum nostrum. Hanc Cornelius Tacitus suspicionem eiusmodi inseruit.

[1] For, as even some people, you have dreamed that an ass’s head is our god. Cornelius Tacitus inserted a suspicion of this sort.

[2] Is enim in quinta Historiarum suarum bellum Iudaicum exorsus ab origine gentis etiam de ipsa tam origine quam de nomine et religione gentis quae voluit argumentatus, Iudaeos refert Aegypto expeditos sive, ut putavit, extorres vastis Arabiae, in locis aquarum egentissimis cum siti macerarentur, onagris, qui forte de pastu potum petituri aestimabantur, indicibus fonti[bu]s usos ob eam gratiam consimilis bestiae superficiem consecrasse.

[2] For he, in the fifth book of his Histories, having commenced the Jewish war from the origin of the nation, and having argued, as he wished, both about that origin itself and about the name and the religion of the nation, reports the Jews as led out from Egypt—or, as he supposed, as exiles—through the wastes of Arabia, in places most needy of waters; while they were being worn by thirst, they used onagers (wild asses), which by chance were thought to be about to seek drink from pasture, as guides to springs, and for that favor they consecrated the effigy of a similar beast.

[3] Atque ita inde praesumptum opinor nos quoque, ut Iudaicae religionis propinquos, eidem simulacro initiari. At enim idem Cornelius Tacitus, sane ille mendaciorum loquacissimus, in eadem Historia refert Gnaeum Pompeium, cum Hierusalem cepisset proptereaque templum adisset speculandis Iudaicae religionis arcanis, nullum illic repperisse simulacrum.

[3] And thus from there it has, I suppose, been presumed of us too, as close to the Jewish religion, that we are initiated to the same simulacrum. But indeed that same Cornelius Tacitus—surely that man most loquacious in mendacities—in the same History reports that Gnaeus Pompeius, when he had taken Jerusalem and for that reason had gone to the temple to scrutinize the arcana of the Jewish religion, found no simulacrum there.

[4] Et utique, si id colebatur, quod aliqua effigie repraesentabatur, nusquam magis quam in sacrario suo exhiberetur, eo magis, quia nec verebatur extraneos arbitros quamquam vana cultura. Solis enim sacerdotibus adire licitum; etiam conspectus ceterorum velo oppanso interdicebatur.

[4] And assuredly, if that were worshiped which was represented by some effigy, nowhere more than in its own sanctuary would it be exhibited—so much the more, because it did not fear outside arbiters, although the worship was vain. For only the priests were permitted to approach; even the sight of the rest was interdicted by a veil spread out.

[5] Vos tamen non negabitis et iumenta omnia et totos cantherios cum sua Epona coli a vobis. Hoc forsitan improbamur, quod inter cultores omnium pecudum bestiarumque asinarii tantum sumus.

[5] You, however, will not deny that both all beasts of burden and whole geldings, together with their Epona, receive cult from you. Perhaps for this we are reproached, that among the cultors of all herd-animals and beasts we are only ass-worshipers.

[6] Sed et qui crucis nos religiosos putat consecraneus erit noster. Cum lignum aliquod propitiatur, viderit habitus, cum materiae qualitas eadem sit; viderit forma, dum id ipsum dei corpus sit. Et tamen quanto distinguitur a crucis stipite Pallas Attica, et Ceres Pharia[m], quae sine effigie rudi palo et informi ligno prostat?

[6] But even he who thinks us religious of the cross will be our fellow-consecrated. When some wood is propitiated, let him regard the appearance, since the quality of the material is the same; let him regard the form, since that very thing is the body of a god. And yet by how much is the Attic Pallas distinguished from the stake of the cross, and the Pharian Ceres, who, without effigy, is exhibited as a rough stake and shapeless wood?

[7] Pars crucis est omne robur, quod erecta statione defigitur. Nos, si forte, integrum et totum deum colimus. Diximus originem deorum vestrorum a plastis de cruce induci.

[7] Every sturdy timber that is fastened in an upright position is a part of a cross. We, perchance, worship a god entire and whole. We have said that the origin of your gods is brought in by modellers from a cross.

Sed et Victorias adoratis in tropaeis, cum cruces intestina sint tropaeorum.

But you also adore Victories upon trophies, since crosses are the intestines of trophies.

[8] Religio Romanorum tota castrensis signa veneratur, signa iurat, signa omnibus deis praeponit. Omnes illi imaginum suggestus in signis monilia crucum sunt; siphara illa vexillorum et cantabrorum stolae crucum sunt. Laudo diligentiam: Noluistis incultas et nudas cruces consecrare.

[8] The religion of the Romans is wholly of the camp: it venerates the standards, it swears by the standards, it sets the standards before all the gods. All those platforms of images on the standards are necklaces of crosses; those siphara of the vexilla and of the cantabra are stoles of crosses. I praise your diligence: you were unwilling to consecrate unadorned and naked crosses.

[9] Alii plane humanius et versimulius solem credunt deum nostrum. Ad Persas, si forte, deputabimur, licet solem non in linteo depictum adoremus habentes ipsum ubique in suo clipeo.

[9] Others plainly, more humanely and more plausibly, believe our god to be the sun. We shall, perhaps, be assigned to the Persians, although we do not adore the sun depicted on linen, having him himself everywhere on his own shield.

[10] Denique inde suspicio, quod innotuerit nos ad orientis regionem precari. Sed et plerique vestrum affectatione aliquando et caelestia adorandi ad solis ortum labia vibratis.

[10] Finally, hence the suspicion, because it has become known that we pray toward the region of the Orient. But a great many of you too, out of affectation at times and in adoring the celestial things, flutter your lips toward the rising of the sun.

[11] Aeque si diem solis laetitiae indulgemus, alia longe ratione quam religione solis, secundo loco ab eis sumus, qui diem Saturni otio et victui decernunt exorbitantes et ipsi a Iudaico more, quem ignorant.

[11] Likewise, if we indulge joy on the day of the sun, on a far different rationale than the religion of the sun, we are second to those who assign the day of Saturn to idleness and victuals, they themselves deviating from the Judaic custom, of which they are ignorant.

[12] Sed nova iam dei nostri in ista proxime civitate editio publicata est, ex quo quidam frustrandis bestiis mercenarius noxius picturam proposuit cum eiusmodi inscriptione: "Deus Christianorumὀνοκοίτης ". Is erat auribus asininis, altero pede ungulatus, librum gestans et togatus. Risimus et nomen et formam.

[12] But a new edition of our god has now been made public in that city close by, whereupon a certain criminal mercenary for cheating the beasts exhibited a painting with an inscription of such a sort: "The God of the Christiansὀνοκοίτης ". He had ass-like ears, was hoofed in one foot, carried a book, and wore a toga. We laughed at both the name and the form.

[13] Sed illi debebant adorare statim biforme numen, qui et canino et leonino capite commixtos et de capro et de ariete cornutos et a lumbis hircos et a cruribus serpentes et planta vel tergo alites deos receperunt.

[13] But they ought straightway to have adored the biform numen, they who have received gods commingled with a canine and a leonine head, and horned from the he-goat and the ram, and he-goats at the loins, and serpents at the legs, and winged at the sole or on the back.

[14] Haec ex abundanti, ne quid rumoris irrepercussum quasi de conscientia praeterissemus. Quae omnia conversi iam ad demonstrationem religionis nostrae repurgabimus.

[14] These things by way of abundant caution, lest we should have passed over any rumor unrefuted, as if from conscience. All which, turning now to the demonstration of our religion, we shall repurge.

XVII.

17.

[1] Quod colimus deus unus est, qui totam molem istam cum omni instrumento elementorum corporum spirituum verbo quo iussit, ratione qua disposuit, virtute qua potuit, de nihilo expressit in ornamentum maiestatis suae, unde et Graeci nomen mundoκόσμον accommodaverunt.

[1] The god whom we worship is one, who expressed out of nothing this whole mass, with all the instrument of elements, bodies, and spirits, by the word with which he commanded, by the reason with which he disposed, by the virtue with which he was able, into an ornament of his majesty, whence also the Greeks to the world the nameκόσμον have applied.

[2] Invisibilis est, etsi videatur; incomprehensibilis, etsi per gratiam repraesentetur; inaestimabilis, etsi humanis sensibus aestimetur; ideo verus et tantus est. Ceterum quod videri communiter, quod comprehendi, quod aestimari potest, minus est et oculis, quibus occupatur, et manibus, quibus contaminatur, et sensibus, quibus invenitur; quod vero inmensum est, soli sibi notum est.

[2] He is invisible, although he may be seen; incomprehensible, although he may be represented through grace; inestimable, although he is estimated by human senses; therefore he is true and so great. Moreover, that which can commonly be seen, which can be comprehended, which can be estimated, is less than the eyes by which it is occupied, than the hands by which it is contaminated, and than the senses by which it is found; but that which is truly immense is known to itself alone.

[3] Hoc est, quod deum aestimari facit, dum aestimari non capit; ita eum vis magnitudinis et notum hominibus obicit et ignotum. Et haec est summa delicti nolentium recognoscere, quem ignorare non possunt.

[3] This is what makes God to be estimated, while it does not allow of being estimated; thus the force of his magnitude both sets him forth to men as known and as unknown. And this is the sum of the delict of those unwilling to recognize him, whom they cannot be ignorant of.

[4] Vultis ex operibus ipsius tot ac talibus, quibus continemur, quibus sustinemur, quibus oblectamur, etiam quibus exterremur, vultis ex animae ipsius testimonio comprobemus?

[4] Do you wish, from his works—so many and such—by which we are contained, by which we are sustained, by which we are delighted, even by which we are stricken with terror; do you wish that we confirm it also from the testimony of the soul itself?

[5] Quae licet carcere corporis pressa, licet institutionibus pravis circumscripta, licet libidinibus et concupiscentiis evigorata, licet falsis deis exancillata, cum tamen resipiscit, ut ex crapula, ut ex somno, ut ex aliqua valetudine, et sanitatem suam patitur, "deum" nominat, hoc solo, quia proprie verus hic unus. "Deus bonus et magnus" et "quod deus dederit" omnium vox est.

[5] Which, although pressed by the prison of the body, although circumscribed by depraved institutions, although enervated by lusts and concupiscences, although made a handmaid to false gods, when however it comes to its senses, as from crapulence, as from sleep, as from some illness, and admits its own health, it names "god," for this alone, because properly this one alone is true. "God good and great" and "what god will have given" is the voice of all.

[6] Iudicem quoque contestatur illum: "Deus videt" et "deo commendo" et "deus mihi reddet". O testimonium animae naturaliter Christianae! Denique pronuntians haec non ad Capitolium, sed ad caelum respicit. Novit enim sedem dei vivi; ab illo, et inde descendit.

[6] It also calls upon that Judge as witness: "God sees" and "I commend to God" and "God will render to me." O testimony of the soul naturally Christian! Indeed, in pronouncing these things it looks not to the Capitol, but to heaven. For it knows the seat of the living God; from Him, and from there it descended.

XVIII.

18.

[1] Sed quo plenius et impressius tam ipsum quam dispositiones eius et voluntates adiremus, adiecit instrumentum litteraturae, si qui velit de deo inquirere et inquisito invenire et invento credere et credito deservire.

[1] But in order that we might approach both him himself and his dispositions and volitions more fully and more impressively, he added the instrument of literature, if anyone should wish to inquire about God and, having inquired, to find, and, having found, to believe, and, the one believed, to render service.

[2] Viros enim iustitiae innocentia dignos deum nosse et ostendere a primordio in saeculum emisit spiritu divino inundatos, quo praedicarent deum unicum esse, qui universa condiderit, qui hominem de humo struxerit — hic enim est verus Prometheus —, qui saeculum certis temporum dispositionibus et exitibus ordinavit,

[2] For from the beginning he sent into the age men worthy by justice and innocence to know God and to show him, inundated with the divine Spirit, in order that they might proclaim that God is one, who founded all things, who constructed man from the soil — for this is the true Prometheus —, who ordered the age by fixed dispositions and outcomes of times,

[3] exinde quae signa maiestatis suae iudicantis ediderit per imbres, per ignes, quas demerendo sibi disciplinas determinaverit, quae ignoratis et deser[i]tis et observatis his praemia destinarit, ut qui prodacto aevo isto iudicaturus sit suos cultores in vitae aeternae retributionem, profanos in ignem aeque perpetem et iugem, suscitatis omnibus ab initio defunctis et reformatis et recensitis ad utriusque meriti dispunctionem.

[3] thereafter, what signs of his judging majesty he has put forth through rains, through fires; what disciplines he has determined for meriting him to oneself; what rewards he has destined for these things when ignored and deserted and observed, to the end that, when this age has been prolonged, he is going to judge his worshipers into the retribution of eternal life, the profane into fire equally perpetual and continual, with all the deceased from the beginning having been raised and reformed and reviewed for the dispunction of the merit of each side.

[4] Haec et nos risimus aliquando. De vestris sumus: Fiunt, non nascuntur Christiani.

[4] These things we too have laughed at once upon a time. We are of your number: Christians are made, not born.

[5] Quos diximus praedicatores prophetae de officio praefandi vocantur. Voces eorum itemque virtutes, quas ad fidem divinitatis edebant, in thesauris litterarum manent, nec istae latent. Ptolemaeorum eruditissimus, quem Philadelphum supernominant, et omnis litteraturae sagacissimus, cum studio bibliothecarum Pisistratum, opinor, aemularetur, inter cetera memoriarum, quibus aut vetustas aut curiositas aliqua ad famam patrocinabatur, ex suggestu Demetri Phalerei, grammaticorum tunc probatissimi, cui praefecturam mandaverat, libros a Iudaeis quoque postulavit, proprias atque vernaculas litteras, quas soli habebant.

[5] Those whom we have called preachers are called prophets from the office of speaking beforehand. Their voices, and likewise the virtues (powers) which they produced in support of faith in divinity, remain in the treasuries of letters, nor do these lie hidden. The most learned of the Ptolemies, whom they surname Philadelphus, and most sagacious in all literature, while in zeal for libraries he emulated Pisistratus, I reckon, among the other memorials whose fame was patronized either by antiquity or by some curiosity, at the suggestion of Demetrius of Phalerum—the most approved of the grammarians at that time—to whom he had entrusted the prefecture, requested books also from the Jews, in their own and vernacular letters, which they alone possessed.

[6] Ex ipsis enim et ad ipsos semper prophetae peroraverant, scilicet ad domesticam dei gentem ex patrum gratia. Hebraei retro, qui nunc Iudaei; igitur et litterae Hebraeae et eloquium.

[6] For from among them and to them the prophets had always perorated, namely to the domestic people of God by the favor of the fathers. Hebrews formerly, who now are Jews; therefore both the Hebrew letters and the speech.

[7] Sed ne notitia vacaret, hoc quoque a Iudaeis Ptolemaeo subscriptum est septuaginta et duobus interpretibus indultis, quos Menedemus quoque philosophus, providentiae vindex, de sententiae communione suspexit. Affirmavit haec vobis etiam Aristaeus.

[7] But lest the information be lacking, this too was attested to Ptolemy by the Jews, with seventy-two interpreters granted, whom Menedemus also, the philosopher, a vindicator of providence, looked up to on account of a communion of opinion. Aristaeus also affirmed these things to you.

[8] Ita in Graecum stilum exaperta monumenta reliquit; hodie apud Serapeum Ptolemaei bibliothecae cum ipsis Hebraicis exhibentur.

[8] Thus he left the monuments laid open into the Greek style; today at the Serapeum the libraries of Ptolemy are exhibited together with the very Hebrew texts.

[9] Sed et Iudaei palam lectitant. Vectigalis libertas; vulgo aditur sabbatis omnibus. Qui audierit, inveniet deum; qui etiam studuerit intellegere, cogetur et credere.

[9] But the Jews also read publicly. A liberty under tribute; it is resorted to by the common crowd on all Sabbaths. Whoever hears will find God; whoever even studies to understand will be compelled also to believe.

XIX.

19.

[1] Primam instrumentis istis auctoritatem summa antiquitas vindicat; apud vos quoque religionis est instar fidem de temporibus adserere.

[1] The highest antiquity claims the primary authority for these instruments; among you as well, it is tantamount to religion to assert credibility from chronology.

(Fragmentum Fuldense)

(Fulda Fragment)

[F1] Auctoritatem litteris praestat antiquitas summa. Primus enim prophetes, Moyses, qui mundi conditionem et generis humani pul<lu>latione<m> et mox ultricem iniquitatis illius aevi vim cataclysmi de praeterito exorsus est per vaticinationem usque ad suam aetatem, et deinceps per res suas futurorum imagines edidit, penes quem et temporum ordo, digestus ab initio, supputationem saeculi praestitit, superior invenitur annis circiter trecentis quam ille antiquissimus penes vos Danaus in Argo<s> transvenisset. [F2] Troiano denique proelio ad mille annos ante est, unde et ipso Saturno.

[F1] The highest antiquity lends authority to the letters. For the first prophet, Moses—who, beginning from the past, set forth through vaticination the constitution of the world, the pullulation of the human race, and soon the avenging force of the cataclysm upon the iniquity of that age, down to his own time, and thereafter through his own deeds published images of things to come—has with him also the order of the times, digested from the beginning, which supplied the supputation of the age; he is found to be earlier by about three hundred years than that most ancient figure among you, when Danaus had crossed over into Argos. [F2] Finally, he is earlier than the Trojan battle by a thousand years, and thus earlier even than Saturn himself.

Secundum enim historiam Thalli, qua relatum est Bel[l]um Assyriorum et Saturnum Titanorum reges cum Iove dimicasse, ostenditur Bel[l]um CCCXX et duobus annis Iliacum exitum antecessisse. Per hunc Moysen etiam illa lex propria Iudaeis a deo missa est. [F3] Deinceps multa et alii prophetae, vetustiores litteris vestris; nam et qui ultimo cecinit, aut aliquantulo praecucurrit aut certe concurrit aetate sapientiae auctoribus, etiam latoribus legis.

According to the history of Thallus, in which it is reported that Be[l]us of the Assyrians and Saturn, kings of the Titans, fought with Jove, it is shown that Be[l]us preceded the Iliac outcome by 322 years. Through this Moses also that law proper to the Jews was sent by God. [F3] Thereafter many things also other prophets (uttered), more ancient than your writings; for even he who sang last either ran somewhat ahead or at least coincided in age with the authors of wisdom, even the lawgivers.

[F4] Cyri enim et Darii regno fuit Zacharias, quo in tempore Thales, physicorum princeps, sciscitanti Croeso nihil certum de divinitate respondit, turbatus scilicet vocibus prophetarum. Solon eidem regi finem longae vitae intuendum praedicavit, non aliter quam prophetae. [F5] Adeo respici potest tam iura vestra quam studia de lege deque divina doctrina concepisse.

[F4] For in the reign of Cyrus and Darius there was Zechariah; at which time Thales, prince of the physicists (natural philosophers), to Croesus when he inquired returned nothing certain about divinity, plainly disturbed by the voices of the prophets. Solon to the same king proclaimed that the end of a long life must be looked to, not otherwise than the prophets. [F5] To such a degree it can be observed that both your laws and your studies have conceived their origin from the Law and from divine doctrine.

Quod prius est, hoc sit semen necesse est. Inde quaedam nobiscum vel prope nos habetis: [F6] De sophia amor eius philosophia vocitatus est; de prophetia adfectatio eius poeticam vaticinationem deputavit. Gloriae homines si quid invenerant, ut proprium facerent, adulteraverunt.

What is prior must be the seed. Thence you have certain things either with us or near us:
[F6] From sophia, love of it was called philosophy; from prophetia, the affectation of it assigned poetic vaticination. Glory-seeking men, whatever they had discovered, adulterated it in order to make it their own.

Etiam fructibus a semine degenerare contigit.

It has even come to pass that fruits degenerate from the seed.

[F7] Multis adhuc de vetustate modis consisterem divinarum litterarum, si non maior auctoritas illis ad fidem de veritatis suae viribus quam de aetatis annalibus suppetisset. Quid enim potentius patrocinabitur testimonio earum, nisi dispunctio cotidiana saeculi totius, cum dispositione<s> regnorum, cum casus urbium, cum exitus gentium, cum status temporum ita omnibus respondent, quemadmodum ante milia annorum praenuntiabantur? [F8] Unde et spes nostra, quam ridetis, animatur, et fiducia, quam praesumptionem vocatis, corroboratur.

[F7] I would still, by many modes, take my stand on the antiquity of the divine letters, if there had not been forthcoming to them a greater authority for faith from the forces of their truth than from the annals of age. For what will more powerfully advocate their testimony, unless the day-by-day demarcation of the whole age—together with the dispositione<s> of kingdoms, with the falls of cities, with the outcomes of nations, with the statuses of the times—thus corresponds in all respects as they were fore-announced thousands of years before? [F8] Whence also our hope, which you laugh at, is animated, and the confidence, which you call presumption, is corroborated.

Idonea est enim recognitio praeteritorum ad disponendam fiduciam futurorum: Eadem voces praedicaverunt utramque partem, eadem litterae notaverunt. [F9] Unum est tempus apud illas, quod apud nos separari videtur. Ita omnia, quae supersunt, i<a>m probata sunt nobis, quia cum illis, quae probata sunt, tunc futuris praedicabantur.

For a recognition of past things is suitable for arranging the confidence of future things: the same voices have proclaimed both parts, the same letters have noted them. [F9] With them there is one time, which with us seems to be separated. Thus all things that remain have already been proved to us, because along with those things that have been proved, they were then being proclaimed as future.

Habetis, quod sciam, et vos Sibyllam, quatinus appellatio ista verae vatis dei veri passim super ceteros, qui vaticinari videbantur, usurpata est, sicut vestrae Sibyllae nomen de veritate mentitae, quemadmodum et dei vestri.

You have, so far as I know, a Sibyl too, inasmuch as that appellation of the true prophetess of the true God has been widely usurped over the rest who seemed to vaticinate—just as the name of your Sibyl has lied about the truth, as likewise have your gods.

[2] Omnes itaque substantias omnesque materias origines ordines venas veterani cuiusque stili vestri, gentes etiam plerasque et urbes insignes historiarum et canas memoriarum, ipsas denique effigies litterarum, indices custodesque rerum, et — puto adhuc minus dicimus — ipsos, inquam, deos vestros, ipsa templa et oracula et sacra unius interim prophetae scrinium saeculis vincit, in quo videtur thesaurus collocatus totius Iudaici sacramenti et inde iam nostri.

[2] All therefore the substances and all the materials, the origins, the orders, the veins of every veteran of your style, even very many peoples and cities renowned for histories and hoary with memories, the very effigies of letters at last, the indices and custodians of things, and — I think we are still saying less — your very gods themselves, the temples themselves and the oracles and the sacred rites, are outstripped by the book‑chest of a single prophet for the present, in which the treasure seems to have been deposited of the whole Jewish sacrament, and from there now of ours.

[3] Si quem audistis interim Moysen, Argivo Inacho pariter aetate est; quadringentis paene annis — nam et septem minus — Danaum, et ipsum apud vos vetustissimum, praevenit; mille circiter cladem Priami antecedit; possem etiam dicere quingentis amplius et Homerum, habens quos sequar.

[3] If you have heard in the meantime of Moses, he is contemporaneous with Argive Inachus; by almost 400 years — indeed by seven fewer — he anticipates Danaus, himself among you the most ancient; he precedes by about 1,000 the disaster of Priam; I could even say by more than 500 as to Homer, having authorities whom I might follow.

[4] Ceteri quoque prophetae etsi Moysi postumant, extremissimi tamen eorum non retrosiores reprehenduntur primoribus vestris sapientibus et legiferis et historicis?

[4] The other prophets also, although they come after Moses, yet are not even the very last of them judged more recent than your primaries—your sages and lawgivers and historians?

[5] Haec quibus ordinibus probari possint, non tam difficile est nobis exponere quam enorme, nec arduum, sed interim longum. Multis instrumentis cum digitorum supputariis gesticulis adsidendum est; reseranda antiquissimarum etiam gentium archiva, Aegyptiorum Chaldaeorum Phoenicum;

[5] By what orders these things can be proved, it is not so difficult for us to set forth as it is enormous, nor arduous, but for the meantime long. One must sit down with many instruments, with the supputatory gesticulations of the fingers; the archives too of the most ancient nations must be unsealed, of the Egyptians, Chaldaeans, Phoenicians;

[6] advocandi municipes eorum, per quos notitia subministrata est, ali[o]qui[n] Manethon Aegyptius et Berosus Chaldaeus, sed et Hieromus Phoenix, Tyri[i] rex; sectatores quoque ipsorum Mendesius Ptolemaeus et Menander Ephesius et Demetrius Phalereus et rex Iuba et Apion et Thallus et, si quis istos aut probat aut revincit, Iudaeus Iosephus, antiquitatum Iudaicarum vernaculus vindex;

[6] their fellow-citizens are to be called in, through whom the information has been supplied—otherwise Manetho the Egyptian and Berossus the Chaldaean, and likewise Hiram the Phoenician, king of Tyre; their followers as well, Ptolemy of Mendes and Menander the Ephesian and Demetrius of Phalerum and King Juba and Apion and Thallus; and, if anyone either approves or refutes these, Josephus the Jew, the native vindicator of Jewish antiquities;

[7] Graecorum etiam censuales conferendi, et quae quando sint gesta, [a]ut concatenationes temporum aperiantur, per quae luceant annalium numeri; peregrinandum est in historias et litteras orbis. Et tamen quasi partem iam probationis intulimus, cum per quae probari possint, adspersimus.

[7] The census-rolls of the Greeks too are to be compared, and what things were done and when, or the concatenations of times are to be laid open, whereby the numbers of the annals may be illuminated; one must peregrinate through the histories and letters of the world. And yet we have, as it were, already brought in a part of the proof, since we have sprinkled in the things by which they can be proved.

[8] Verum differre praestat, vel ne minus persequamur festinando vel diutius evagemur persequendo.

[8] But it is better to defer, either lest we pursue less by hastening, or lest we wander longer by pursuing.

XX.

20.

[1] Plus iam offerimus pro ista dilatione: Maiestatem scripturarum, si non vetustate divinas probamus, si dubitatur antiquitas. Nec hoc tardius aut aliunde discendum; coram sunt quae docebunt: Mundus et saeculum et exitus.

[1] We now offer more for that deferral: the Majesty of the Scriptures, if we do not prove them divine by antiquity, if antiquity is doubted. Nor is this to be learned more slowly or from elsewhere; before us are the things that will teach: the World and the age and the outcome.

[2] Quicquid agitur, praenuntiabatur; quicquid videtur, audiebatur. Quod terrae vorant urbes, quod insulas maria fraudant, quod externa atque interna bella dilaniant, quod regnis regna compulsant, quod fames et lues et locales quaeque clades et frequentiae plerumque mortium vastant, quod humiles sublimitate, sublimes humilitate mutantur,

[2] Whatever is done was pre-announced; whatever is seen was heard beforehand. That lands devour cities, that seas defraud islands, that external and internal wars lacerate, that kingdoms drive kingdoms against one another, that famine and pestilence and local disasters of every kind, and, for the most part, the frequencies of deaths lay waste, that the humble are changed by exaltation, the exalted by humiliation,

[3] quod iustitia rarescit, iniquitas increbrescit, bonarum omnium disciplinarum cura torpescit, quod etiam officia temporum et elementorum munia exorbitant, quod et monstris et portentis naturalium forma turbatur, providenter scripta sunt. Dum patimur, leguntur; dum recognoscimus, probantur. Idoneum, opinor, testimonium divinitatis veritas divinationis.

[3] that justice grows rare, iniquity grows rife, the care of all good disciplines grows torpid, that even the offices of the times and the duties of the elements go out of course, that both by monsters and portents the form of natural things is disturbed, have been written providently. While we suffer, they are read; while we recognize, they are proved. A fitting, I suppose, testimony of divinity is the truth of divination.

[4] Hinc igitur apud nos futurorum quoque fides tuta est, iam scilicet probatorum, quia cum illis, quae cottidie probantur, praedicebantur: Eaedem voces sonant, eaedem litterae notant, idem spiritus pulsat, unum tempus est divinationi futura praefanti;

[4] Hence therefore among us the credence of future things also is secure, now, to wit, as having already been proved, because they were fore-predicted together with those things which are proved every day: The same voices sound, the same letters denote, the same Spirit impels, there is one time for the divination fore-declaring the future;

[5] apud homines, si forte, distinguitur, dum expungitur, dum ex futuro praesens, dehinc ex praesenti praeteritum deputatur. Quid delinquimus, oro vos, futura quoque credentes, qui iam didicimus illi per duos gradus credere?

[5] among men, perhaps, it is distinguished as it is expunged, as from future the present, thereafter from the present the preterite is reckoned. What do we do amiss, I pray you, in believing things future as well, we who have already learned to believe him by two steps?

XXI.

21.

[1] Sed quoniam edidimus antiquissimis Iudaeorum instrumentis sectam istam esse suffultam, quam aliquanto novellam, ut Tiberiani temporis, plerique sciunt profitentibus nobis quoque, fortasse an hoc nomine de statu eius retractetur, quasi sub umbraculo insignissimae religionis, certe licitae, aliquid propriae praesumptionis abscondat,

[1] But since we have declared, by the most ancient instruments of the Jews, that that sect is supported—which, as rather novel, of the time of Tiberius, most people know, as we too profess—perhaps on this ground its status may be reconsidered, as though, under the awning of a most distinguished religion, certainly a lawful one, it were hiding something of its own presumption,

[2] vel quia praeter aetatem neque de victus exceptionibus neque de solemnitatibus dierum neque de ipso signaculo corporis neque de consortio nominis cum Iudaeis agimus, quod utique oporteret, si eidem deo manciparemur.

[2] or because, apart from the date, we deal neither with exceptions in diet nor with the solemnities of days nor with the very seal of the body nor with the fellowship of the name with the Jews, which certainly would be fitting, if we were mancipated to the same god.

[3] Sed et vulgus iam scit Christum ut hominum aliquem, qualem Iudaei indicaverunt: quo facilius quis nos hominis cultores existimaverit. Verum neque de Christo erubescimus, cum sub nomine eius deputari et damnari iuvat, neque de deo aliter praesumimus. Necesse est igitur pauca de Christo ut deo.

[3] But even the common crowd already knows Christ as some human, such as the Jews indicated: whereby someone might the more easily reckon us worshipers of a man. In truth, neither do we blush for Christ, since it pleases us to be enrolled and damned under his name, nor do we presume otherwise concerning God. It is necessary, therefore, to say a few things about Christ as God.

[4] Totum Iudaeis erat apud deum gratia, ubi et insignis iustitia et fides originalium auctorum. Unde illis et generis magnitudo et regni sublimitas floruit et tanta felicitas, ut de dei vocibus, quibus edocebantur, de promerendo deo et non offendendo praemonerentur.

[4] All grace with God belonged to the Jews, where both conspicuous justice and the faith of the original founders were; whence for them both the greatness of the race and the sublimity of the kingdom flourished, and such felicity, that by the voices of God, by which they were being instructed, they were forewarned about winning favor with God and not giving offense.

[5] Sed quanta deliquerint, fiducia patrum inflati ad declinandum, derivantes a disciplina in profanum modum, etsi ipsi non confiterentur, probaret exitus hodiernus ipsorum. Dispersi, palabundi, et soli et caeli sui extorres vagantur per orbem sine homine, sine deo rege, quibus nec advenarum iure terram patriam saltim vestigio salutare conceditur.

[5] But how greatly they have transgressed, puffed up by confidence in the fathers to a decline, drawing off from discipline into a profane mode, even if they themselves did not confess it, their present outcome would prove. Scattered, wandering vagrants, exiles from their own soil and sky, they roam through the world, without a man as king, without God as king, to whom it is not granted even by the right of foreigners to salute their fatherland at least with a footprint.

[6] Cum haec illis sanctae voces praeminarentur, eadem semper omnes ingerebant fore, uti sub extimis curriculis saeculi ex omni iam gente et populo et loco cultores sibi allegeret deus multo fideliores, in quos gratiam transferret, pleniorem quidem ob disciplinae auctioris capacitatem.

[6] While the holy voices were pre-announcing these things to them, they were always impressing upon all the same: that, under the last courses of the age, God would elect for himself worshipers, already from every nation and people and place, far more faithful, into whom he would transfer grace—fuller indeed, by reason of the capacity for a more augmented discipline.

[7] Venit igitur qui ad reformandam et illuminandam eam venturus a deo praenuntiatur, Christus ille filius dei. Huius igitur gratiae disciplinaeque arbiter et magister, illuminator atque deductor generis humani filius dei adnuntiabatur — non quidem ita genitus, ut erubescat in filii nomine aut de patris semine.

[7] Therefore he came who had been foretold by God as about to come to reform and to illuminate it, that Christ, the Son of God. Accordingly, the Son of God was announced as the arbiter and master of this grace and discipline, the illuminator and conductor of the human race — not, indeed, begotten in such a way that there should be shame in the name of Son or about the Father’s seed.

[8] Non de sororis incesto nec de stupro filiae aut coniugis alienae deum patrem passus est squamatum aut cornutum aut plumatum, amatorem in auro conversum Danaidis. Iovis ista sunt numina vestra.

[8] He did not suffer God the Father, on account of a sister’s incest nor of the stupration of a daughter or of another man’s wife, to be scaly or horned or feathered, a lover transformed into gold for Danaë. Those are your numina of Jove.

[9] Ceterum dei filius nullam de impudicitia habet matrem; etiam quam videtur habere, non nupserat. Sed prius substantiam edisseram, et ita nativitatis qualitas intellegetur.

[9] However, the son of god has no mother from unchastity; even she whom he seems to have had not married. But first I will expound the substance, and thus the quality of the nativity will be understood.

[10] Iam ediximus deum universitatem hanc mundi verbo et ratione et virtute molitum. Apud vestros quoque sapientesλόγον , id est sermonem atque rationem, constat artificem videri universitatis. Hunc enim Zeno determinat factitatorem, qui cuncta in dispositione formaverit; eundem et fatum vocari et deum et animum Iovis et necessitatem omnium rerum.

[10] We have already declared that God fashioned this universe of the world by word and by reason and by power. Among your wise men too
λόγον , that is, speech and reason, it is agreed to be seen as the artificer of the universe. For Zeno defines this as the maker, who has formed all things in an ordering; and that the same is called both Fate and God and the mind of Jove and the necessity of all things.

Haec Cleanthes in spiritum congerit, quem permeatorem universitatis affirmat.

Cleanthes heaps these things into the spirit, whom he affirms to be the permeator of the universe.

[11] Et nos autem sermoni atque rationi itemque virtuti, per quae omnia molitum deum ediximus, propriam substantiam spiritum inscribimus, cui et sermo insit pronuntianti et ratio adsit disponenti et virtus praesit perficienti. Hunc ex deo prolatum didicimus et prolatione generatum et idcirco filium dei et deum dictum ex unitate substantiae; nam et deus spiritus.

[11] And we too assign to Speech and Reason and likewise to Virtue, through which we have declared God to have wrought all things, Spirit as their proper substance, in whom both speech is inherent for pronouncing, and reason is present for ordering, and virtue presides for perfecting. We have learned that this one was brought forth out of God and generated by prolation, and therefore called the Son of God and God from the unity of substance; for God also is spirit.

[12] Et cum radius ex sole porrigitur, portio ex summa; sed sol erit in radio, quia solis est radius nec separatur substantia sed extenditur, [ita de spiritu spiritus et de deo deus] ut lumen de lumine accensum. Manet integra et indefecta materia[e] matrix, etsi plures inde traduces qualitatis mutueris.

[12] And when a ray is extended from the sun, it is a portion from the sum; but the sun will be in the ray, because the ray is of the sun, nor is the substance separated but extended, [thus from Spirit, spirit, and from God, God], as light kindled from light. The matrix of matter remains entire and undiminished, even if you borrow many offshoots of the same quality from it.

[13] Ita et quod de deo profectum est, deus et dei filius et unus ambo; ita et de spiritu spiritus et de deo deus modulo alter[num], numerum gradu, non statu fecit, et a matrice non recessit, sed excessit.

[13] Thus also that which has proceeded from God is God and the Son of God, and both are one; thus also from Spirit, Spirit, and from God, God—another in mode—he has made a number by degree, not by state; and he has not receded from the matrix, but has gone forth beyond.

[14] Iste igitur dei radius, ut retro semper praedicabatur, delapsus in virginem quandam et in utero eius caro figuratus nascitur homo deo mixtus. Caro spiritu instructa nutritur adolescit affatur docet operatur et Christus est. Recipite interim hanc fabulam — similis est vestris —, dum ostendimus, quomodo Christus probetur et qui penes vos eiusmodi fabulas aemulas ad destructionem veritatis istius [modi] praeministraverint.

[14] Therefore this ray of God, as was ever proclaimed aforetime, having glided down into a certain virgin and, in her womb, fashioned as flesh, is born a man commixed with God. The flesh, instructed by the Spirit, is nourished, grows up, addresses, teaches, works, and is Christ. Receive meanwhile this fable — similar to yours —, while we show how Christ is proved and who among you have preministered such rival fables to the destruction of this truth [of this kind].

[15] Sciebant et Iudaei venturum esse Christum, scilicet quibus prophetae loquebantur. Nam et nunc adventum eius expectant, nec alia magis inter nos et illos compulsatio est, quam quod iam venisse non credunt. Duobus enim adventibus eius significatis, primo, qui iam expunctus est in humilitate condicionis humanae, secundo, qui concludendo saeculo imminet in sublimitate divinitatis exsertae, primum non intellegendo secundum, quem manifestius praedicatum sperant, unum existimaverunt.

[15] The Jews also knew that Christ was going to come, namely those to whom the prophets were speaking. For even now they await his advent, nor is there any greater contention between us and them than this, that they do not believe he has already come. For with his two advents having been signified—the first, which has already been accomplished in the humility of the human condition; the second, which is imminent for the concluding of the age, in the sublimity of divinity laid bare—by not understanding the first, they have supposed the second, which they hope for as more manifestly proclaimed, to be a single one.

[16] Ne enim intellegerent pristinum, credituri, si intellexissent, et consecuturi salutem, si credidissent, meritum fuit delictorum. Ipsi legunt ita scriptum multatos se sapientia et intellegentia et oculorum et aurium fruge.

[16] For that they might not understand the former—who would have believed if they had understood, and would have obtained salvation if they had believed—was the desert of sins. They themselves read it thus written, that they have been mulcted of sapience and intelligence, and of the fruit of the eyes and ears.

[17] Quem igitur hominem solummodo praesumpserant de humilitate, sequebatur, uti magum aestimarent de potestate, cum ille verbo daemonia de hominibus excuteret, caecos reluminaret, leprosos purgaret, paralyticos restringeret, mortuos denique verbo redderet vitae, elementa ipsa famularet compescens procellas et freta ingrediens, ostendens se esse verbum dei id est LOGON illud primordiale, primogenitum, virtute et ratione comitatum et spiritu fultum, eundem qui verbo omnia et faceret et fecisset.

[17] Therefore the one whom they had presumed to be only a man, on account of his humility, it followed that they should esteem a magus on account of his power, since he by a word would shake out demons from human beings, re-illumine the blind, purge lepers, strengthen paralytics, and at last by a word restore the dead to life, would make even the very elements do service, quelling storms and treading the seas, showing himself to be the word of God, that is, that primordial LOGOS, first-begotten, accompanied by virtue and reason and supported by the Spirit, the same who by a word both would make and had made all things.

[18] Ad doctrinam vero eius, qua revincebantur, magistri primoresque Iudaeorum ita exasperabantur, maxime quod ingens ad eum multitudo deflecteret, ut postremo oblatum Pontio Pilato, Syriam tunc ex parte Romana procuranti, violentia suffragiorum in crucem [Iesum] dedi sibi extorserint. Praedixerat et ipse ita facturos; parum, si non et prophetae retro.

[18] As to his doctrine, by which they were refuted, the teachers and foremost men of the Jews were so exasperated—especially because an immense multitude was turning toward him—that at last, when he was presented to Pontius Pilate, who was then procuring Syria on the Roman side, by the violence of suffrages they extorted for themselves that [Jesus] be given over to the cross. He himself had foretold that they would do thus; to say nothing of the prophets before.

[19] Et tamen suffixus multa mortis illius propria ostendit insignia. Nam spiritum cum verbo sponte dimisit praevento carnificis officio. Eodem momento dies medium orbem signante sole subducta est.

[19] And yet, though affixed, he displayed many insignia proper to that death. For he of his own accord dismissed the spirit with a word, forestalling the executioner’s office. In the same moment, the day was withdrawn from the mid-orb, the sun marking it.

Deliquium utique putaverunt qui id quoque super Christo praedicatum non scierunt. Et tamen eum mundi casum relatum in arcanis vestris habetis.

They certainly supposed it an eclipse, those who did not know that this too had been foretold concerning Christ. And yet you have that fall of the world recorded in your secret archives.

[20] Tunc Iudaei detractum et sepulcro conditum magna etiam militari manu custodiae diligentia circumsederunt, ne, quia praedixerat tertia die resurrecturum se a morte, discipuli furto amoliti cadaver fallerent suspectos.

[20] Then the Jews, once he had been taken down and laid in a sepulcher, surrounded it with diligent custody, even with a great military band, lest, because he had predicted that on the third day he would resurrect from death, the disciples, having removed the cadaver by theft, should deceive those who were suspicious.

[21] Sed ecce tertia die concussa repente terra et mole revoluta, quae obstruxerat sepulcrum, et custodia pavore disiecta, nullis apparentibus discipulis, nihil in sepulcro repertum est praeterquam exuviae sepulti.

[21] But behold, on the third day, the earth suddenly shaken, and the mass rolled away which had obstructed the sepulcher, and the guard scattered in terror, with no disciples appearing, nothing was found in the tomb except the exuviae of the buried one.

[22] Nihilominus tamen primores, quorum intererat et scelus divulgare et populum vectigalem et famularem sibi a fide revocare, subreptum a discipulis iactitaverunt. Nam nec ille se in vulgus eduxit, ne impii errore liberarentur, ut et fides, non mediocri praemio destinata, difficultate constaret.

[22] Nevertheless, however, the leading men, in whose interest it was both to divulge the crime and to recall the people tributary and servile to themselves from the faith, kept alleging that it had been surreptitiously taken by the disciples. For neither did he bring himself out into the public, lest the impious be liberated by error, and so that faith, destined for no mean reward, might be made firm by difficulty.

[23] Cum discipulis autem quibusdam apud Galilaeam, Iudaeae regionem, ad quadraginta dies egit docens eos quae docerent. Dehinc ordinatis eis ad officium praedicandi per orbem circumfusa nube in caelum est receptus multo verius quam apud vos adseverare de Romulo Proculi solent.

[23] But with certain disciples he spent forty days at Galilee, a region of Judaea, teaching them what they should teach. Then, they having been ordained to the office of preaching throughout the world, with a cloud poured around, he was received into heaven, much more truly than among you they are accustomed to asseverate about Romulus to Proculus.

[24] Ea omnia super Christo Pilatus, et ipse iam pro sua conscientia Christianus, Caesari tunc Tiberio nuntiavit — sed et Caesares credidissent super Christo, si aut Caesares non essent necessarii saeculo, aut si et Christiani potuissent esse Caesares.

[24] Pilate—he himself already, in his own conscience, a Christian—reported all those things about Christ to Caesar, then Tiberius — but even the Caesars would have believed about Christ, if either Caesars were not necessary to the age, or if Christians too could have been Caesars.

[25] Discipuli quoque diffusi per orbem ex praecepto magistri dei paruerunt, qui et ipsi a Iudaeis insequentibus multa perpessi utique pro fiducia veritatis libenter Romae postremo per Neronis saevitiam sanguinem Christianum seminaverunt.

[25] The disciples too, diffused through the orb by the precept of their master, obeyed God, who also themselves, with Jews pursuing, having suffered many things—assuredly for confidence in the truth—gladly at Rome at last, through Nero’s savagery, sowed Christian blood.

[26] Sed monstrabimus vobis idoneos testes Christi ipsos illos, quos adoratis. Multum est, si eos adhibeam, ut credatis Christianis, propter quos non creditis Christianis.

[26] But we will show you suitable witnesses of Christ—those very ones themselves whom you adore. It is much, if I should adduce them, that you may believe the Christians, on account of whom you do not believe the Christians.

[27] Interim hic est ordo nostrae institutionis, hunc edidimus et sectae et nominis censum cum suo auctore. Nemo iam infamiam incutiat, nemo aliud existimet, quia nec fas est ulli de sua religione mentiri. Ex eo enim, quod aliud a se coli dicit quam colit, negat quod colit, et culturam et honorem in alterum transfert et transferendo iam non colit, quod negavit.

[27] Meanwhile, this is the order of our institution; we have published this census both of the sect and of the name, with its author. Let no one now inflict infamy, let no one suppose otherwise, since it is not even lawful for anyone to lie about his own religion. For from the fact that he says that something other is worshipped by him than what he worships, he denies what he worships, and he transfers both the cult and the honor onto another, and by transferring he now no longer worships that which he denied.

[28] Dicimus et palam dicimus et vobis torquentibus lacerati et cruenti vociferamur: "Deum colimus per Christum". Illum hominem putate; per eum et in eo se cognosci et coli deus vult.

[28] We say, and we say openly, and, while you are torturing us, torn and blood-stained we cry aloud: "We worship God through Christ." Think him a man; through him and in him God wills himself to be known and to be worshiped.

[29] Ut Iudaeis respondeamus, et ipsi deum per hominem Moysen colere didicerunt; ut Graecis occurram, Orpheus Pieriae, Musaeus Athenis, Melamp[h]us Argis, Trophonius Boeotiae initiationibus homines obligaverunt; ut ad vos quoque dominatores gentium adspiciam, homo fuit Pompilius Numa, qui Romanos operosissimis superstitionibus oneravit.

[29] That we may respond to the Jews, they too learned to worship god through the man Moses; that I may meet the Greeks, Orpheus of Pieria, Musaeus at Athens, Melamp[h]us at Argos, Trophonius in Boeotia obligated men by initiations; that I may also look to you, rulers of the nations, Numa Pompilius was a man, who burdened the Romans with the most laborious superstitions.

[30] Licuerit et Christo commentari divinitatem, rem propriam, non qua rupices et adhuc feros homines multitudini tot numinum demerendorum attonitos efficiendo ad humanitatem temperaret, quod Numa, sed qu[i]a iam expolitos et ipsa urbanitate deceptos in agnitionem veritatis ocularet.

[30] Let it also be allowed to Christ to set forth divinity, his own proper affair, not in the way by which, by making rugged and still feral men aghast at the multitude of so many deities to be won over, he might temper them to humanity—that which Numa did—but because he would open the eyes of those already polished and deceived by urbanity itself into the recognition of truth.

[31] Quaerite igitur, si vera est ista divinitas Christi, si ea est, qua cognita ad bonum quis reformatur, sequitur ut falsae renuntietur, comperta inprimis illa omni ratione, quae delitiscens sub nominibus et imaginibus mortuorum quibusdam signis et miraculis et oraculis fidem divinitatis operatur.

[31] Therefore inquire, if that divinity of Christ is true, if it is that which, once known, one is reformed to the good, it follows that the false be renounced, that one especially, discovered by every argument, which, lurking under the names and images of the dead, by certain signs and miracles and oracles produces a faith in divinity.

XXII.

22.

[1] Atque adeo dicimus esse substantias quasdam spiritales. Nec novum nomen est; sciunt daemones philosophi Socrate ipso ad daemonii arbitrium exspectante. Quidni?

[1] And indeed we say that there are certain spiritual substances. Nor is the name new; the philosophers know daemons, with Socrates himself awaiting at a daemon’s arbitrament. Why not?

Cum et ipsi daemonium a pueritia adhaesisse dicatur, dehortatorium plane a bono.

Since to him himself as well a daemon is said to have adhered from boyhood, plainly a dissuader from the good.

[2] Omnes sciunt poetae; etiam vulgus indoctum in usu maledicti frequentat. Nam et Satanan, principem huius mali generis, proinde de propria conscientia animae eadem exsecramenti voce pronuntiat. Angelos quoque etiam Plato non negavit.

[2] All poets know it; even the unlearned crowd frequents it in the use of malediction. For even “Satan,” the prince of this genus of evil, the soul, from its own conscience, pronounces with the same voice of exsecration. Angels too even Plato did not deny.

Utriusque nominis testes esse vel magi adsunt.

Even magi are present as witnesses of both names.

[3] Sed quomodo de angelis quibusdam sua sponte corruptis corruptior gens daemonum evaserit, damnata a deo cum generis auctoribus et cum eo, quem diximus, principe, apud litteras sanctas ordo cognoscitur.

[3] But how, from certain angels corrupted by their own will, there has emerged a more corrupt race of daemons, condemned by God together with the authors of the kind and with the prince whom we mentioned, the order is recognized in the sacred letters.

[4] Nunc de operatione eorum satis erit exponere.

[4] Now it will suffice to set forth concerning their operation.

Operatio eorum est hominis eversio; sic malitia spiritalis a primordio auspicata est in hominis exitium. Itaque corporibus quidem et valetudines infligunt et aliquos casus acerbos, animae vero repentinos et extraordinarios per vim excessus.

Their operation is the subversion of man; thus spiritual malice from the beginning set out for man’s ruin. And so, upon bodies indeed they inflict illnesses and certain bitter accidents, and upon the soul sudden and extraordinary trances by force.

[5] Suppetit illis ad utramque substantiam hominis adeundam subtilitas et tenuitas sua. Multum spiritalibus viribus licet, ut invisibiles et insensibiles in effectu potius quam in actu suo appareant, si poma, si fruges nescio quod aurae latens vitium in flore praecipitat, in germine exanimat, in pubertate convulnerat, ac si caeca ratione temptatus aer pestilentes haustus suos offundit.

[5] Their own subtlety and tenuity is at hand to them for approaching both substances of the human being. Much is permitted to spiritual forces, so that, invisible and insensible, they appear in their effect rather than in their act—just as, whether fruits or crops, some hidden taint of the air precipitates them in the blossom, kills them in the bud, sorely wounds them in their pubescence; and as when the air, tempted by blind reason, pours out its pestilential draughts.

[6] Eadem igitur obscuritate contagionis adspiratio daemonum et angelorum mentis quoque corruptelas agit furoribus et amentiis foedis aut saevis libidinibus cum erroribus variis, quorum iste potissimus, quo deos istos captis et circumscriptis hominum mentibus commendat, ut et sibi pabula propria nidoris et sanguinis procuret simulacris imaginibus oblata.

[6] Therefore, by the same obscurity of contagion, the aspiration of demons and of angels likewise drives the corruptions of the mind—into furies and insanities, into foul or savage libidinousness—together with various errors, the chief of which is this: whereby it commends those gods to the captured and hemmed-in minds of men, so that it may also procure for itself its proper fodders of reek and blood, offered to simulacra, to images.

[7] Et quae illi accuratior pascua est, quam hominem e cogitatu verae divinitatis avertat praestigiis falsis? Quas et ipsas quomodo [ut] operetur expediam.

[7] And what more exact pasture for him than he turn man away from the thought of the true divinity by false prestidigitations? Which very things also, how [that] he operates them, I will set forth.

[8] Omnis spiritus ales est: hoc angeli et daemones. Igitur momento ubique sunt. Totus orbis illis locus unus est; quid ubi geratur tam facile sciunt quam adnuntiant.

[8] Every spirit is winged: such are angels and demons. Therefore in an instant they are everywhere. The whole world is to them a single place; what is being done where they know as easily as they announce it.

Velocitas divinitas creditur, quia substantia ignoratur. Sic et auctores interdum videri volunt eorum, quae adnuntiant; et sunt plane malorum nonnumquam, bonorum tamen numquam.

Velocity is believed to be divinity, because the substance is unknown. Thus also they sometimes wish to seem authors of the things which they announce; and plainly they are sometimes authors of evils, yet never of goods.

[9] Dispositiones etiam dei et tunc prophetis contionantibus excerpunt et nunc lectionibus resonantibus carpunt. Ita et hinc sumentes quasdam temporum sortes aemulantur divinitatem, dum furantur divinationem.

[9] They even excerpt the dispositions of God, both then, when prophets were addressing the assembly, and now they snatch at them as the readings are resounding. Thus also, taking from here certain lots of the times, they emulate divinity, while they steal divination.

[10] In oraculis autem quo ingenio ambiguitates temperent in eventus, sciunt Croesi, sciunt Pyrrhi. Ceterum testudinem decoqui cum carnibus pecudis Pythius eo modo renuntiavit, quo supra diximus: momento apud Lydiam fuerat. Habentes de incolatu aeris et de vicinia siderum et de commercio nubium caelestes sapere paraturas, ut et pluvias, quas iam sentiunt, repromittant.

[10] In oracles, however, with what ingenuity they temper ambiguities to the outcomes, Croesuses know, Pyrrhuses know. Moreover, that a tortoise was being boiled with the flesh of a sheep the Pythian reported in the manner which we said above: in a moment he had been in Lydia. Having, from their dwelling in the air and from nearness to the stars and from commerce with the clouds, heavenly equipment for knowing, they also promise rains, which they already feel.

[11] Benefici plane et circa curas valetudinum. Laedunt enim primo, dehinc remedia praecipiunt ad miraculum nova sive contraria; post quae desinunt laedere, et curasse creduntur.

[11] Beneficial, to be sure, even in regard to the care of health. For they harm at first; then they prescribe remedies—novel or contrary—to a miraculous effect; after which they cease to harm, and are believed to have cured.

[12] Quid ergo de ceteris ingeniis vel etiam viribus fallaciae spiritalis edisseram, phantasmata Castorum et aquam cribro gestatam et navem cingulo promotam et barbam tactu irrufatam, ut numina lapides crederentur, ut deus verus non quaereretur?

[12] What, then, shall I expound about the other ingenuities, or even the forces, of spiritual fallacy: the phantasms of the Castors, and water carried in a sieve, and a ship propelled by a girdle, and a beard reddened by a touch, so that stones were believed to be divinities, so that the true God was not sought?

XXIII.

23.

[1] Porro si et magi phantasmata edunt et iam defunctorum infamant animas, si pueros in eloquium oraculi elidunt, si multa miracula circulatoriis praestigiis ludunt, si et somnia immittunt, habentes semel invitatorum angelorum et daemonum adsistentem sibi potestatem, per quos et caprae et mensae divinare consuerunt: quanto magis ea potestas de suo arbitrio et pro suo negotio studeat totis viribus operari quod alienae praestat negotiationi!

[1] Furthermore, if the magi also bring forth phantasms and even defame the souls of the departed, if they force boys into the oracular utterance, if they play many miracles by the sleights of mountebanks, if they also send in dreams, having once for themselves the attending power of angels and demons that have been invited, through whom they have been accustomed to have both she‑goats and tables divine: how much more will that power, by its own discretion and for its own business, strive with all its might to operate what it supplies to another’s trafficking!

[2] Aut si eadem et angeli et daemones operantur, quae et dei vestri, ubi est ergo praecellentia divinitatis, quam utique superiorem omni potestate credendum est? Non ergo dignius praesumetur ipsos esse, qui se deos faciant, cum eadem edant, quae faciant deos credi, quam pares angelis et daemonibus deos esse?

[2] Or if both angels and demons operate the same things as your gods, where then is the pre-eminence of divinity, which surely is to be believed superior to every power? Will it not then be more worthily presumed that they themselves are the ones who make themselves gods, since they bring forth the same things which make gods be believed in, rather than that the gods are equal to angels and demons?

[3] Locorum differentia distinguitur, opinor, ut a templis deos existimetis, quos alibi deos non dicitis, ut aliter dementire videatur qui sacras turres pervolat, aliter qui tecta viciniae transilit, et alia vis pronuntietur in eo, qui genitalia vel lacertos, alia , qui sibi gulam prosecat. Compar[a] exitus furoris et una ratio est instigationis.

[3] The difference of places is distinguished, I suppose, so that from the temples you esteem as gods those whom elsewhere you do not call gods, so that he seems to rave in one way who flies over sacred towers, in another who leaps across the roofs of the neighborhood, and one force is pronounced in him who cuts his genitals or his upper arms, another , who slits his own throat. Compare the outcomes of frenzy, and there is one rationale of instigation.

[4] Sed hactenus verba; iam hinc demonstratio rei ipsius, qua[m] ostendemus unam esse utriusque nominis qualitatem. Edatur hic aliqui ibidem sub tribunalibus vestris, quem daemone agi constet; iussus a quolibet Christiano loqui spiritus ille tam se daemonem confitebitur de vero quam alibi deum de falso.

[4] But thus far words; now from here the demonstration of the thing itself, by which we will show that the quality of the two names is one and the same. Let someone be produced here, likewise under your tribunals, whom it is agreed is driven by a demon; the spirit, ordered by any Christian to speak, will confess himself a demon in truth just as elsewhere he a god in falsehood.

[5] Aeque producatur aliquis ex his, qui de deo pati existimantur, qui aris inhalantes numen de nidore concipiunt, qui ructando curantur, qui anhelando praefantur.

[5] Likewise let someone be brought forward from among those who are thought to suffer from a god, who, inhaling at the altars, conceive the numen from the reek, who are cured by belching, who by panting pre-utter.

[6] Ista ipsa Virgo Caelestis, pluviarum pollicitatrix, ipse iste Aesculapius, medicinarum demonstrator, alia die morituris socordio et tanatio et asclepiodoto subministrator, nisi se daemones confessi fuerint, Christiano mentiri non audentes, ibidem illius Christiani procacissimi sanguinem fundite!

[6] That very Virgo Caelestis, a promiser of rains, that very Aesculapius, a demonstrator of medicines, on another day for those about to die, to socordio and tanatio and asclepiodoto, a subministrator of ,—unless they shall have confessed themselves demons, not daring to lie to a Christian—right there pour out the blood of that most impudent Christian!

[7] Quid isto opere manifestius? Quid hac probatione fidelius? Simplicitas veritatis in medio est; virtus illi sua adsistit; nihil suspicari licebit.

[7] What is more manifest than this work? What more faithful than this probation? The simplicity of truth is in the midst; its own virtue stands by it; it will be permitted to suspect nothing.

Magia aut aliqua eiusmodi fallacia fieri [dictis non] dicetis, si oculi vestri et aures permiserint vobis.

You will say it is being done by magic or by some fallacy of this kind [not by words], if your eyes and ears have permitted you.

[8] Quid autem inici potest adversus id, quod ostenditur nuda sinceritate? Si altera parte vere dei sunt, cur sese daemonia mentiuntur? An ut nobis obsequantur?

[8] But what can be advanced against that which is shown in naked sincerity? If, on the other side, they truly are gods, why do the demons lie about themselves? Or is it so that they may be obsequious to us?

Iam ergo subiecta est Christianis divinitas vestra; nec divinitas deputanda est, quae subdita est homini et, si quid ad dedecus facit, aemulis suis.

Now therefore your divinity has been subjected to the Christians; nor is that to be deemed a divinity which is subject to man and, if it does anything to disgrace, to its rivals.

[9] Si altera parte daemones sunt vel angeli, cur se alibi pro deis agere respondent? Nam sicut illi, qui dei habentur, daemones se dicere noluissent, si vere dei essent, scilicet ne se de maiestate deponerent, ita et isti, quos directo daemonas nostis, non auderent alibi pro deis agere, si aliqui omnino dei essent, quorum nominibus utuntur; vererentur enim abuti maiestatem superiorum sine dubio et timendorum.

[9] If, on the other hand, they are demons or angels, why do they elsewhere assert that they act as gods? For just as those who are accounted gods would not have wished to call themselves demons, if they were truly gods—namely, lest they depose themselves from majesty—so also these, whom you plainly know to be demons, would not dare elsewhere to act as gods, if there were any gods at all whose names they use; for they would fear to abuse the majesty of their superiors, without doubt and to be feared.

[10] Adeo nulla est divinitas ista, quam tenetis, quia, si esset, neque a daemoniis affectaretur in confessione neque a deis negaretur. Cum ergo utraque pars concurrit in confessionem deos esse negans, agnoscite unum genus esse, id est daemonas [verum] utrobique.

[10] Thus that divinity which you hold is no divinity at all, because, if it existed, it would neither be affected—claimed—by daemons in their confession nor be denied by gods. Since therefore both parties concur in a confession denying that they are gods, acknowledge that there is one genus, that is, daemons [truly] on both sides.

[11] Iam deos quaerite; quos enim praesumpseratis, daemonas esse cognoscitis. Eadem vero opera nostra ab eisdem deis vestris non tantum hoc detegentibus, quod neque ispi dei sint neque ulli alii, etiam illud in continenti cognoscitis, qui[d] sit vere deus, et an ille et an unicus, quem Christiani profitemur, et an ita credendus colendusque, ut fides, ut disciplina disposita est Christianorum.

[11] Now go seek gods; for those whom you had presumed, you recognize to be demons. Indeed, by the same operation of ours, with these same your gods not only uncovering this—that neither they themselves are gods nor any others—you also at once come to know besides what is truly God, and whether it is he, and whether the Unique One, whom the Christians profess, and whether he is thus to be believed and to be worshiped, as the faith and the discipline of the Christians is ordered.

[12] Dicent ibidem et quis ille "Christus cum sua fabula", si homo communis condicionis, si magus, si post mortem de sepulchro a discipulis subreptus, si nunc denique penes inferos, si non in caelis potius et inde venturus cum totius mundi motu, cum orbis horrore, cum planctu omnium, sed non Christianorum, ut dei virtus et dei spiritus et sermo et sapientia et ratio, et dei filius.

[12] They will in that same place also say who that "Christ with his fable" is, whether a man of common condition, whether a magus, whether after death stolen from the sepulcher by his disciples, whether now at length among the underworld, whether not rather in the heavens and from there about to come with the motion of the whole world, with the horror of the orb, with the lamentation of all, but not of the Christians, as the power of God and the spirit of God and the word and wisdom and reason, and the son of God.

[13] Quodcumque ridetis, rideant et illi vobiscum; negent Christum omnem ab aevo animam restituto corpore iudicaturum, dicant hoc pro tribunali, si forte, Minoen et Rhadamanthum secundum consensum Platonis et poetarum hoc esse sortitos.

[13] Whatever you laugh at, let them laugh at it with you as well; let them deny that Christ will judge every soul from every age, with the body restored; let them say this before the tribunal—if perhaps Minos and Rhadamanthus, according to the consensus of Plato and the poets, have been allotted this task.

[14] Suae saltim ignominiae et damnationis notam refutent: Renu[nti]ant se immundos spiritus esse, quod vel ex pabulis eorum, sanguine et fumo et putidis rogis pecorum, et impuratissimis linguis ipsorum vatum intellegi debuit; renuant ob malitiam praedamnatos se in eundem iudicii diem cum omnibus cultoribus et operationibus suis.

[14] Let them at least refute the mark of their own ignominy and condemnation: let them deny that they are unclean spirits, which ought to have been understood even from their feed—blood and smoke and the putrid pyres of livestock—and from the most impure tongues of their own prophets; let them deny that, on account of malice, they have been pre-condemned to the same day of judgment together with all their cultists and their operations.

[15] Atquin omnis haec nostra in illos dominatio et potestas de nominatione Christi valet et de commemoratione eorum, quae sibi a deo per arbitrum Christum imminentia exspectant. Christum timentes in deo et deum in Christo subiciuntur servis dei et Christi.

[15] And yet all this our domination and power over them is effective by the naming of Christ and by the commemoration of the things which they expect as imminent to themselves from God through Christ the Arbiter. Fearing Christ in God and God in Christ, they are subjected to the servants of God and of Christ.

[16] Ita de contactu deque afflatu nostro, contemplatione et repraesentatione ignis illius correpti etiam de corporibus nostro imperio excedunt inviti et dolentes et vobis praesentibus erubescentes.

[16] Thus from our touch and from our breath, seized by the contemplation and representation of that fire, they even withdraw from bodies at our command, unwilling and grieving, and, with you present, blushing with shame.

[17] Credite illis, cum verum de se loquuntur, qui mentientibus creditis! Nemo ad suum dedecus mentitur, quin potius ad honorem. Magis fides proxima est adversus semetipsos confitentes quam pro semetipsis negantes.

[17] Believe them, when they speak the truth about themselves, you who believe the mendacious! No one lies to his own disgrace; rather to honor. Credence is more closely due to those confessing against themselves than to those denying on their own behalf.

[18] Haec denique testimonia deorum vestrorum Christianos facere consuerunt; quam plurimum illis credendo in Christo deum credimus. Ipsi litterarum nostrarum fidem accendunt, ipsi spei nostrae fidentiam aedificant.

[18] These, finally, testimonies of your gods have been accustomed to make Christians; by believing them to the utmost, we believe in God in Christ. They themselves kindle the credibility of our writings, they themselves edify the confidence of our hope.

[19] Colitis illos, quod sciam, etiam de sanguine Christianorum. Nollent itaque vos tam fructuosos, tam officiosos sibi amittere, vel ne a vobis quandoque [a] Christianis, fugentur, si illis sub Christiano volente vobis veritatem probare, mentiri liceret.

[19] You worship them, so far as I know, even with the blood of Christians. They would not, therefore, wish to lose you—so fruitful, so officious for themselves—or to be put to flight by you Christians at some time, if it were permitted them, under a Christian willing to prove the truth to you, to lie.

XXIV.

24.

[1] Omnis ista confessio illorum, qua se deos negant esse quaque non alium deum respondent praeter unum, cui nos mancipamur, satis idonea est ad depellendum crimen laesae maxime Romanae religionis. Si enim non sunt dei pro certo, nec religio pro certo est; si religio non est, quia nec dei, pro certo, nec nos pro certo rei sumus laesae religionis.

[1] All that confession of theirs, whereby they deny themselves to be gods and whereby they answer that there is no other god except the One to whom we are mancipated, is quite adequate to drive away the charge of injured, especially Roman, religion. For if they are not gods, for certain, neither is the religion, for certain; if there is no religion, because there are not gods, for certain, neither are we, for certain, guilty of injured religion.

[2] At e contrario in vos exprobratio resultabit, qui mendacium colentes veram religionem veri dei non modo neglegendo, quin insuper expugnando, in verum committitis crimen verae irreligiositatis.

[2] But conversely the reproach will recoil upon you, who, cultivating falsehood, not only by neglecting but even moreover by assailing the true religion of the true God, commit the true crime of true irreligiosity.

[3] Nunc ut constaret illos deos esse, nonne conceditis de aestimatione communi aliquem esse sublimiorem et potentiorem, velut principem mundi perfectae [peritiae] maiestatis? Nam et sic plerique disponunt divinitatem, ut imperium summae dominationis esse penes unum, officia eius penes multos velint, ut Plato Iovem magnum in caelo comitatum exercitu describit deorum pariter et daemonum; itaque oportere et procurantes et praefectos et praesides pariter suspici.

[3] Now, in order that it be established that those are gods, do you not concede from common estimation that there is someone more sublime and more potent, as the prince of the world, of perfect [expertise] majesty? For many likewise dispose divinity thus, that the imperium of supreme dominion rests with one, while they would have its offices rest with many, as Plato describes great Jove in heaven attended by an army alike of gods and of daemons; and thus that both the procurators and the prefects and the presidents alike ought to be looked up to.

[4] Et tamen quod facinus admittit, qui magis ad Caesarem promerendum et opera et spem suam transfert nec appellationem dei, ita ut imperatoris, in ali quam principe confitetur, cum capitale esse iudicetur alium praeter Caesarem et dicere et audire?

[4] And yet what crime does he commit, who rather transfers both his service and his hope to the earning of Caesar’s favor, and does not confess the appellation of “god,” just as that of “emperor,” in anyone other than the princeps, since it is judged a capital offense both to speak and to hear of another besides Caesar?

[5] Colat alius deum, alius Iovem; alius ad caelum manus supplices tendat, alius ad aram Fidei manus; alius (si hoc putatis) nubes numeret orans, alius lacunaria; alius suam animam deo suo voveat, alius hirci.

[5] Let one worship a god, another Jove; let one stretch suppliant hands to heaven, another his hands to the altar of Faith; let one (if you think this) number the clouds in prayer, another the coffered ceilings; let one vow his own soul to his god, another a he-goat.

[6] Videte enim, ne et hoc ad irreligiositatis elogium concurrat, adimere libertatem religionis et interdicere optionem divinitatis, ut non liceat mihi colere quem velim, sed cogar colere quem nolim. Nemo se ab invito coli volet, ne homo quidem.

[6] See to it, indeed, lest this also run to the indictment of irreligion: to take away the liberty of religion and to interdict the option of divinity, so that it is not permitted to me to worship whom I will, but I am compelled to worship whom I will not. No one will wish to be worshiped by the unwilling, not even a man.

[7] Atque adeo et Aegyptiis permissa est tam vanae superstitionis potestas avibus et bestiis consecrandis et capite damnandi qui aliquem huiusmodi deum occiderit.

[7] And indeed even to the Egyptians there has been permitted the power of so vain a superstition: of consecrating birds and beasts, and of condemning to capital punishment those who might have killed some god of this sort.

[8] Unicuique etiam provinciae et civitati suus deus est, ut Syriae Atargatis, ut Arabiae Dusares, ut Norici Belenus, ut Africae Caelestis, ut Mauritaniae reguli sui. Romanas, ut opinor, provincias edidi, nec tamen Romanos deos earum, quia Romae non magis coluntur quam qui per ipsam quoque Italiam municipali consecratione censentur: Casi[a]niensium Deluentinus, Narnensium Visidianus, A[e]sculanorum Ancharia, Volsiniensium Nortia, Ocriculanorum Valentia, Sutrinorum Hostia; Faliscorum in honorem patris Curris et accepit cognomen Iuno.

[8] To each province and city too there is its own god: as to Syria, Atargatis; as to Arabia, Dusares; as to Noricum, Belenus; as to Africa, Caelestis; as to Mauretania, its own petty kings. I have, as I suppose, produced Roman provinces, and yet not their Roman gods, because at Rome they are not more worshiped than those who throughout Italy itself are assessed by municipal consecration: of the Casi[a]nienses, Deluentinus; of the Narnenses, Visidianus; of the A[e]sculani, Ancharia; of the Volsinienses, Nortia; of the Ocriculani, Valentia; of the Sutrini, Hostia; of the Faliscans, in honor of her father, Juno even received the cognomen Curris.

[9] Sed nos soli arcemur a religionis proprietate. Laedimus Romanos nec Romani habemur, qui non Romanorum deum colimus.

[9] But we alone are warded off from the proprietary right of religion. We injure the Romans and are not held Romans, since we do not worship the god of the Romans.

[10] Bene quod omnium deus est, cuius, velimus ac nolimus, omnes sumus. Sed apud vos quodvis colere ius est praeter deum verum, quasi non hic magis omnium sit deus, cuius omnes sumus.

[10] Good, that he is the god of all, whose—whether we will or will not—we all are. But among you it is a right to worship anything whatsoever except the true God, as though this one were not more the god of all, whose we all are.

XXV.

25.

[1] Satis quidem mihi videor probasse de falsa et vera divinitate, cum demonstravi, quemadmodum probatio consistat, non modo disputationibus, nec argumentationibus, sed ipsorum etiam testimoniis, quos deos creditis, ut nihil iam ad hanc causam sit retractandum.

[1] I indeed seem to myself to have proved sufficiently concerning false and true divinity, since I have shown how proof is constituted, not only by disputations nor by argumentations, but even by the very testimonies of those whom you believe to be gods, so that nothing now in this cause is to be reconsidered.

[2] Quoniam tamen Romani nominis proprie menti occurrit, non omittam congressionem, quam provocat illa praesumptio dicentium Romanos pro merito religiositatis diligentissimae in tantum sublimitatis elatos, ut orbem occuparint, et adeo deos esse, ut praeter ceteros floreant qui illis officium praeter ceteros faciant.

[2] Since, however, specific mention of the Roman name occurs, I will not omit the confrontation which that presumption provokes, of those who say that the Romans, by the merit of most diligent religiosity, have been lifted to such a height of sublimity that they have occupied the world, and that there are gods to such a degree that those flourish beyond the rest who render them service beyond the rest.

[3] Scilicet ista merces Romano nomini a Romanis deis pro gratia expensa est: Sterculus et Mutunus et Larentina provexit imperium. Peregrinos enim deos non putem extraneae genti magis fa

[3] Surely that recompense to the Roman name has been disbursed by the Roman gods in return for favor: Sterculus and Mutunus and Larentina have advanced the empire. For I would not think that peregrine gods wished to have done more for a foreign nation than for their own, and to have given their fatherland’s soil, in which they were born, reared, ennobled, and buried, to transmarine peoples.

[4] Viderit Cybele, si urbem Romanam ut memoriam Troiani generis adamavit, vernaculi sui scilicet, adversus Achivorum arma protecti, si ad ultores transire prospexit, quo ~~sciebat Graeciam Phrygiae debellatorem subacturos.~~

[4] Let Cybele see to it, if she loved the Roman city as a memorial of the Trojan race—namely, of her own homeborn, protected against the arms of the Achaeans—if she foresaw to pass over to the avengers, whom she knew would subdue Greece, the conqueror of Phrygia.

[5] Itaque maiestatis suae in urbem collatae grande documentum nostra etiam aetate proposuit, cum M. Aurelio apud Sirmium rei publicae exempto die sexto decimo Kalendarum Aprilium archigallus ille sanctissimus die nono Kalendarum earundem, quo sanguinem impurum lacertos quoque castrando libabat, pro salute imperatoris Marci iam intercepti solita aeque imperia mandavit.

[5] And so, even in our own age, she displayed a great proof of her majesty conferred upon the city, when, Marcus Aurelius having been taken from the commonwealth at Sirmium on the 16th day before the Kalends of April, that most holy archigallus on the 9th day before the Kalends of the same, on which he would offer a libation of impure blood, even by mutilating his upper arms by castrating himself, issued the customary commands for the health of the emperor Marcus—already snatched away.

[6] O nuntios tardos, o somniculosa diplomata, quorum vitio excessum imperatoris non ante Cybele cognovit, ne deam talem riderent Christiani!

[6] O slow messengers, O drowsy dispatches, through whose fault Cybele did not learn earlier of the emperor’s departure, lest the Christians laugh at such a goddess!

[7] Sed non statim et Iuppiter Cretam suam Romanis fascibus concuti sineret, oblitus antrum illud Idaeum et aera Corybantia et iocundissimum illic nutricis suae odorem. Nonne omni Capitolio tumulum illum suum praeposuisset, ut ea potius orbi terra[e] praecelleret, quae cineres Iovis texit?

[7] But not at once would Jupiter have allowed his own Crete to be shaken by the Roman fasces, forgetting that Idaean cave and the Corybantian bronzes and the most delightful odor there of his nurse. Would he not have preferred that tomb of his to the whole Capitol, so that that place rather might excel the orb of the earth, which covered the ashes of Jove?

[8] Vellet Iuno Punicam urbem "posthabita Samo" dilectam ab Aeneadarum utique gente deleri? Quod sciam:

[8] Would Juno also wish the Punic city, "Samos being set after," beloved by the race of the Aeneadae at any rate, to be destroyed? As far as I know:

                    hic illius arma,
   hic currus fuit; hoc regnum dea gentibus esse,
   si qua fata sinant, iam tum tenditque fovetque.

                    here were her arms,
   here was her chariot; this the goddess to be a kingdom for the nations,
   if in any way the fates allow, even then both aims and cherishes.

Misera illa "coniu<n>x Iovis et soror" adversus fata non valuit! Plane "fato stat Iuppiter ipse".

That wretched “wife of Jove and sister” did not prevail against the fates! Clearly, “Jupiter himself stands by fate.”

[9] Nec tantum tamen honoris fatis Romani dicaverunt dedentibus sibi Carthaginem adversus destinatum votumque Iunonis, quantum prostitutissimae lupae La[u]rentinae.

[9] Not, however, so much honor did the Romans dedicate to the Fates, delivering up Carthage to them adverse to Juno’s destined decree and vow, as to the most prostituted she-wolf La[u]rentina.

[10] Plures deos vestros regnasse certum est. Igitur si conferendi imperii tenent potestatem — cum ipsi regnarent, a quibus acceperant eam gratiam? Quem coluerat Saturnus et Iuppiter?

[10] It is certain that several of your gods have reigned. Therefore, if they hold the power of conferring imperium
— when they themselves were reigning, from whom had they received that favor? Whom had Saturn and Jupiter worshipped?

Aliquem, opinor, Sterculum. Sed postea Romani cum indigitamentis suis.

Someone, I suppose, Sterculus. But afterwards the Romans did so with their indigitamenta.

[11] Etiam si qui non regnaverunt, tamen regnabantur ab aliis nondum cultoribus suis, ut qui nondum dei habebantur. Ergo aliorum est regnum dare, quia regnabatur multo ante quam isti dei inciderentur.

[11] Even if some did not reign, nevertheless they were reigned over by others not yet their worshipers, inasmuch as they were not yet held as gods. Therefore it belongs to others to grant the kingdom, because there was reigning long before these gods were incised.

[12] Sed quam vanum est fastigium Romani nominis religiositatis meritis deputare, cum post imperium sive adhuc regnum religio profecerit, age iam, rebus religio profecerit. Nam, etsi a Numa concepta est curiositas superstitiosa, nondum tamen aut simulacris aut templis res divina apud Romanos constabat.

[12] But how vain it is to assign the pinnacle of the Roman name to the merits of religiosity, since religion made progress after the imperial rule, or even while it was still the kingdom—come now—religion made progress in its affairs. For, although superstitious curiosity was conceived by Numa, nevertheless among the Romans the divine service did not yet consist either in images or in temples.

[13] Frugi religio et pauperes ritus et nulla Capitolia certantia ad caelum, sed temeraria de caespite altaria, et vasa adhuc Samia, et nidor exil[l]is et deus ipse nusquam. Nondum enim tunc ingenia Graecorum atque Tuscorum fingendis simulacris urbem inundaverant. Ergo non ante religiosi Romani quam magni, ideoque non ob hoc magni, quia religiosi.

[13] A frugal religion and poor rites, and no Capitolia contending toward the sky, but makeshift altars of sod, and vessels still Samian, and a meager reek, and the god himself nowhere. For as yet the talents of Greeks and Tuscans for fashioning simulacra had not flooded the city. Therefore the Romans were not religious before they were great, and hence they were not great on this account, because they were religious.

[14] Atquin quomodo ob religionem magni, quibus magnitudo de irreligiositate provenit? Ni fallor enim, omne regnum vel imperium bellis quaeritur et victoriis propagatur. Porro bella et victoriae captis et eversis plurimum urbibus constant.

[14] And yet how are they great on account of religion, whose greatness has proceeded from irreligiosity? Unless I am mistaken, every kingdom or empire is sought by wars and is propagated by victories. Moreover, wars and victories consist for the most part in cities captured and overthrown.

Id negotium sine deorum iniuria non est; eaedem strages moenium et templorum, pares caedes civium et sacerdotum nec dissimiles rapinae sacrarum divitiarum et profanarum.

That undertaking is not without injury to the gods; the same devastations of walls and of temples, equal slaughters of citizens and of priests, and not dissimilar rapines of sacred and profane wealth.

[15] Tot igitur sacrilegia Romanorum quot tropaea, tot deis quot de gentibus triumphi, tot manubiae quot manent adhuc simulacra captivorum deorum.

[15] Thus the sacrileges of the Romans are as many as the trophies, as many triumphs over the gods as over the nations, as many spoils as there still remain simulacra of captive gods.

[16] Et ab hostibus ergo suis sustinent adorari et illis "imperium sine fine" decernunt, quorum magis iniurias quam adulationes remunerasse debuerant. Sed qui nihil sentiunt, tam impune laeduntur quam frustra coluntur.

[16] And therefore they endure to be adored by their own enemies and decree to them "rule without end," whom they ought rather to have remunerated for injuries than for adulations. But those who perceive nothing are harmed with impunity as they are worshiped in vain.

[17] Certe non potest fidei convenire, ut religionis meritis excrevisse videantur qui, ut suggessimus, religionem aut laedendo creverunt aut crescendo laeserunt. Etiam illi, quorum regna conflata sunt in imperii Romanii summam, cum ea amitterent, sine religionibus non fuerunt.

[17] Surely it cannot befit faith, that they should seem to have increased by the merits of religion who, as we have suggested, either by injuring religion increased, or by increasing injured it. Even those whose kingdoms were fused into the sum of the Roman imperium, when they lost them, were not without religions.

XXVI.

26.

[1] Videte igitur, ne ille regna dispenset cuius est et orbis qui regnatur et homo ipse qui regnat; ne ille vices dominationum ipsis temporibus in saeculo ordinarit, qui ante omne tempus fuit et saeculum corpus temporum fecit; ne ille civitates extollat aut deprimat, sub quo fuit sine civitatibus aliquando gens hominum!

[1] See then whether it is not he who dispenses kingdoms, he to whom belong both the orb that is ruled and the very man who rules; whether it is not he who has ordered the turns of dominations with the times themselves in the saeculum, who was before all time and made the saeculum the corpus of times; whether it is not he who raises up or casts down cities, under whom at one time the race of men existed without cities!

[2] Quid erratis? Prior est quibusdam deis suis silvestris Roma; ante regnavit quam tantum ambitum Capitolii extrueret[ur]. Regnaverant et Babylonii ante pontifices et Medi ante quindecimviros et Aegyptii ante Salios et Assyrii ante Lupercos et Amazones ante virgines Vestales.

[2] Why do you err? Rome is prior to certain of her own woodland gods; she reigned before so great a circuit of the Capitol was erected. The Babylonians too had reigned before the pontiffs, and the Medes before the quindecimvirs, and the Egyptians before the Salii, and the Assyrians before the Luperci, and the Amazons before the Vestal virgins.

[3] Postremo si Romanae religiones regna praestant, numquam retro Iudaea regnasset despectrix communium istarum divinitatum, cuius et deum victimis et templum donis et gentem foederibus aliquamdiu, Romani, honorastis, numquam dominaturi eius, si non deliquisset ultimo in Christum.

[3] Finally, if Roman religions bestow kingdoms, Judea, the despiser of those common divinities, would never formerly have reigned, whose God with victims and whose temple with gifts and whose nation with treaties for some time, Romans, you honored, nor would you ever be destined to be lords of it, if it had not at the last offended against Christ.

XXVII.

27.

[1] Satis haec adversus intentationem laesae divinitatis, quo non videamur laedere eam, quam ostendimus non esse. Igitur provocati ad sacrificandum obstruimus gradum pro fide conscientiae nostrae, qua certi sumus, ad quos ista perveniant officia sub imaginum prostitutione et humanorum nominum consecratione.

[1] Enough of these things against the attempted accusation of injured divinity, lest we seem to wound that which we have shown not to exist. Therefore, when provoked to sacrifice, we obstruct our step for the faith of our conscience, by which we are certain to whom those offices arrive under the prostitution of images and the consecration of human names.

[2] Sed quidam dementiam existimant, quod, cum possimus et sacrificare in praesenti et illaesi abire manente apud animum proposito, obstinationem saluti praeferamus.

[2] But certain persons consider it dementia, that, although we can both sacrifice on the spot and depart unscathed, our purpose remaining with the mind, we prefer obstinacy to safety.

[3] Datis scilicet consilium, quo vobis abutamur; sed agnoscimus, unde talia suggerantur, quis totum hoc agitet, et quomodo nunc astutia suadendi, nunc duritia saeviendi ad constantiam nostram deiciendam operetur:

[3] You are, to be sure, giving counsel for us to abuse to your advantage; but we recognize whence such things are suggested, who agitates all this, and how, now by the astuteness of persuading, now by the hardness of raging, he operates for the casting down of our constancy:

[4] Ille scilicet spiritus daemonicae et angelicae paraturae, qui noster ob divortium aemulus et ob dei gratiam invidus, de mentibus vestris adversus nos proeliatur occulta inspiratione modulatis et subornatis ad omnem, quam in primordio exorsi sumus, et iudicandi perversitatem et saeviendi iniquitatem.

[4] That spirit, to be sure, of daemonic and angelic apparatus, who is our rival on account of the divorce and envious on account of the grace of God, wages war against us from your minds by hidden inspiration, minds tuned and suborned to every point—as we set forth at the beginning—both the perversity of judging and the iniquity of raging.

[5] Nam licet subiecta sit nobis tota vis daemonum et eiusmodi spirituum, ut nequam tamen [et] servi metu nonnumquam contumaciam miscent et laedere gestiunt quos alias verentur; odium enim etiam timor spirat,

[5] For although the whole force of the demons and of spirits of such a kind is subject to us, yet, being wicked [and] slavish, out of fear they sometimes mingle contumacy and are eager to injure those whom otherwise they fear; for even fear breathes hatred,

[6] praeterquam et desperata condicio eorum ex praedamnatione solatium reputat fruendae interim malignitatis de poenae mora. Et tamen apprehensi subiguntur et condicioni suae succidunt, et quos de longinquo oppugnant, de proximo obsecrant.

[6] except that their desperate condition, from pre-condemnation, also reckons as a solace, from the delay of punishment, the meantime enjoyment of malignity. And yet, when apprehended, they are subdued and succumb to their own condition, and those whom they assail from afar, they beseech at close quarters.

[7] Itaque, cum vice rebellantium ergastulorum sive carcerum vel metallorum vel hoc genus poenalis servitutis erumpunt adversus nos, in quorum potestate sunt, certi et impares se esse et hoc magis perditos, ingratis resistimus ut aequales et repugnamus perseverantes in eo, quod oppugnant et illos numquam magis detriumphamus quam cum pro fideli obstinatione damnamur.

[7] And so, when, in the guise of rebellious workhouses or prisons or mines or this kind of penal servitude, they erupt against us, in whose power they are, being certain that they are unequal and for that very reason the more ruined, we, much against their will, resist as equals and repugn, persevering in that which they oppugn, and we never triumph over them more than when we are condemned for faithful obstinacy.

XXVIII.

28.

[1] Quoniam autem facile iniquum videretur liberos homines invitos urgeri ad sacrificandum — nam et alias divinae rei faciundae libens animus indicitur —, certe ineptum existimaretur, si quis ab alio cogeretur ad honorem deorum, quos ultro sui causa placare deberet, ne prae manu esset iure libertatis dicere: "Nolo mihi Iovem propitium; tu quis es? Me conveniat Ianus iratus ex qua velit fronte; quid tibi mecum est?"

[1] Since moreover it would easily seem iniquitous that free men be pressed, unwilling, to sacrifice — for even otherwise, for doing the divine rite a willing spirit is prescribed —, surely it would be thought inept if someone were compelled by another to the honor of the gods, whom he ought of his own accord, for his own sake, to placate, since by the right of liberty he would have at the ready to say: "I do not want Jove propitious to me; who are you? Let angry Janus meet me from whatever face he wishes; what have you to do with me?"

[2] Formati estis ab isdem utique spiritibus, uti nos pro salute imperatoris sacrificare cogatis, et imposita est tam vobis necessitas cogendi quam nobis obligatio periclitandi.

[2] You have been formed by the same spirits, assuredly, to constrain us to sacrifice for the safety of the emperor, and a necessity of constraining has been imposed upon you as much as an obligation of incurring peril has been imposed upon us.

[3] Ventum est igitur ad secundum titulum laesae augustioris maiestatis, siquidem maiore formidine et callidiore timiditate Caesarem observatis quam ipsum de Olympo Iovem. Et merito, si sciatis. Quis enim ex viventibus quilibet non mortuo potior?

[3] We have come, therefore, to the second count of lèse-majesté against the more august majesty, since indeed with greater dread and a more crafty timidity you observe Caesar than Jove himself from Olympus. And with good reason, if you knew it. For who of the living—any one whatsoever—is not preferable to a dead man?

[4] Sed nec hoc vos ratione facitis potius quam respectu praesentaneae potestatis; adeo et in isto irreligiosi erga deos vestros deprehendemini, cum plus timoris humano dominio dicatis. Citius denique apud vos per omnes deos quam per unum genium Caesaris peieratur.

[4] But not even this do you do by reason rather than by regard for present power; thus even in this you are caught as irreligious toward your gods, since you ascribe more fear to human dominion. Sooner, in fine, among you one is forsworn by all the gods than by the one Genius of Caesar.

XXIX.

29.

[1] Constet igitur prius, si isti, quibus sacrificatur, salutem imperatoribus vel cuilibet homini impertire possunt, et ita nos crimini maiestatis addicite, si angeli aut daemones substantia pessimi spiritus beneficium aliquod operantur, si perditi conservant, si damnati liberant, si denique, quod in conscientia vestra est, mortui vivos tuentur.

[1] Let it stand established therefore first, whether those to whom sacrifice is offered are able to impart safety to the emperors or to any man; and so adjudge us to the crime of majesty, if angels or demons, in the substance of a most-wicked spirit, work any benefaction, if the ruined preserve, if the condemned liberate, if finally—what is in your conscience—the dead protect the living.

[2] Nam utique suas primo statuas et imagines et aedes tuerentur, quae, ut opinor, Caesarum milites excubiis salva praestant. Puto autem, eae ipsae materiae de metallis Caesarum veniunt, et tota templa de nutu Caesaris constant.

[2] For surely they would first guard their own statues and images and shrines, which, as I suppose, the soldiers of the Caesars by their sentry-watches provide to be safe. I think, moreover, those very materials come from the Caesars’ mines, and the entire temples subsist at the nod of Caesar.

[3] Multi denique dei habuerunt Caesarem iratum; facit ad causam, si et propitium, cum illis aliquid liberalitatis aut privilegii confert. Ita qui sunt in Caesaris potestate, cuius et toti sunt, quomodo habebunt salutem Caesaris in potestate, ut eam praestare posse videantur, quam facilius ipsi a Caesare consequantur?

[3] Many, in fine, gods have had Caesar angry; it pertains to the cause, if also propitious, when he confers upon them some liberality or privilege. Thus those who are in Caesar’s power, and wholly his, how will they have Caesar’s safety in their power, so that they may seem able to furnish it—something which they themselves more easily obtain from Caesar?

[4] Ideo ergo committimus in maiestatem imperatorum, quia illos non subicimus rebus suis, quia non ludimus de officio salutis ipsorum, qui eam non putamus in manibus esse plumbatis!

[4] Therefore we commit against the Majesty of the emperors, because we do not subordinate them to their own things, because we do not play games with the office of their safety—we who do not think that it is in leaden hands!

[5] Sed vos irreligiosi, qui eam quaeritis ubi non est, petitis a quibus dari non potest, praeterito eo, in cuius est potestate, insuper eos debellatis, qui eam sciunt petere, qui etiam possunt impetrare, dum sciunt petere!

[5] But you irreligious ones, who seek it where it is not, ask from those by whom it cannot be given, having passed by him in whose power it is; moreover, you debellate those who know how to ask for it, who also can impetrate it, since they know how to ask!

XXX.

30.

[1] Nos enim pro salute imperatorum deum invocamus aeternum, deum verum, deum vivum, quem et ipsi imperatores propitium sibi praeter ceteros malunt. Sciunt, quis illis dederit imperium; sciunt, qua homines, quis et animam; sentiunt eum esse deum solum, in cuius solius potestate sint, a quo sint secundi, post quem primi, ante omnes et super omnes deos. Quidni?

[1] For we, on behalf of the safety of the emperors, invoke God eternal, God true, God living, whom the emperors themselves prefer to have propitious to them beyond the rest. They know who gave them their imperium; they know, as men, who also gave them their soul; they perceive that he is the only God, in whose sole power they are, by whom they are second, after whom they are first, before all and above all gods. Why not?

Cum super omnes homines, qui utique vivunt et mortuis antistant.

Since they are above all men, who assuredly live and stand before the dead.

[2] Recogitant quousque vires imperii sui valeant, et ita deum intellegunt; adversus quem valere non possunt, per eum valere se cognoscunt. Caelum denique debellet imperator, caelum captivum triumpho suo invehat, caelo mittat excubias, caelo vectigalia imponat! Non potest.

[2] They reconsider how far the forces of their empire prevail, and thus they understand God; against whom they cannot prevail, they recognize that through him they prevail. Let the emperor, then, wage war to the finish upon heaven, let him carry heaven captive in his triumph, let him send sentries to heaven, let him impose tribute on heaven! He cannot.

[3] Ideo magnus est, quia caelo minor est; illius enim est ipse, cuius et caelum est et omnis creatura. Inde est imperator, unde et homo antequam imperator; inde potestas illi, unde et spiritus.

[3] Therefore he is great, because he is lesser than heaven; for he himself belongs to him whose are both heaven and every creature. Thence he is emperor, whence also a man before he is emperor; thence his power, whence also his spirit.

[4] Illuc suspicientes Christiani manibus expansis, quia innocuis, capite nudo, quia non erubescimus, denique sine monitore, quia de pectore oramus, precantes sumus semper pro omnibus imperatoribus vitam illis prolixam, imperium securum, domum tutam, exercitus fortes, senatum fidelem, populum probum, orbem quietum, quaecumque hominis et Caesaris vota sunt.

[4] Thither looking up, Christians with hands outstretched, because innocuous, with head bare, because we do not blush, and finally without a monitor, because we pray from the heart, we are always petitioners for all emperors: for a prolonged life to them, a secure imperium, a safe house, strong armies, a faithful senate, an upright people, a quiet orb, whatever are the vows of a man and of Caesar.

[5] Haec ab alio orare non possum quam a quo me scio consecuturum, quoniam et ipse est, qui solus praestat, et ego sum, cui impetrare debetur, famulus eius, qui eum solus observo, qui propter disciplinam eius occidor, qui ei offero opimam et maiorem hostiam, quam ipse mandavit, orationem de carne pudica, de anima innocenti, de spiritu sancto profectam,

[5] These things I cannot pray for from any other than from him from whom I know I shall obtain them, since he himself is the one who alone bestows, and I am the one to whom the obtaining is owed, his servant, who alone observe him, who am slain on account of his discipline, who offer to him an opulent and greater sacrifice, which he himself commanded, a prayer proceeding from chaste flesh, from an innocent soul, from the Holy Spirit,

[6] non grana turis unius assis, Arabicae arboris lacrimas, nec duas meri guttas, nec sanguinem reprobi bovis mori optantis, et post omnia inquinamenta etiam conscientiam spurcam: ut mirer, cum hostiae probantur penes vos a vitiosissimis sacerdotibus, cur [quibus] praecordia potius victimarum quam ipsorum sacrificantium examinentur.

[6] not the grains of incense worth a single as, the tears of the Arabian tree, nor two drops of pure wine, nor the blood of a reprobate ox wishing to die, and, after all the defilements, even a filthy conscience: so that I marvel, since the victims are approved in your keeping by the most vicious priests, why [for whom] the vitals of the victims rather than those of the sacrificers themselves are examined.

[7] Sic itaque nos ad deum expansos ungulae fodiant, cruces suspendant, ignes lambant, gladii guttura detruncent, bestiae insiliant: paratus est ad omne supplicium ipse habitus orantis Christiani. Hoc agite, boni praesides, extorquete animam deo supplicantem pro imperatore! Hic erit crimen, ubi veritas et dei devotio est!

[7] Thus therefore let claws dig into us as we are stretched out to God, let crosses suspend us, let fires lick, let swords lop off throats, let beasts leap upon us: the very bearing of the praying Christian is prepared for every punishment. Do this, good governors, wrench out the soul that is supplicating God on behalf of the emperor! Here will be the crime, where truth and devotion to God are!

XXXI.

31.

[1] Adolati nunc sumus imperatori et mentiti vota, quae diximus, ad evadendam scilicet vim? Plane proficit ista fallacia; admittitis nos enim probare quodcumque defendimus. Qui ergo putaveris nihil nos de salute Caesarum curare, inspice dei voces, litteras nostras, quas neque ipsi supprimimus et plerique casus ad extraneos transferunt.

[1] Are we now adulators of the emperor and have we lied about the vows we have spoken, namely to evade force? Clearly that fallacy profits; for you admit us to prove whatever we defend. Therefore, whoever would think that we care nothing for the safety of the Caesars, inspect the voices of God, our letters, which neither do we ourselves suppress, and many an occasion transfers to outsiders.

[2] Scitote ex illis praeceptum esse nobis ad redundantiam benignitatis etiam pro inimicis deum orare et persecutoribus nostris bona precari. Qui magis inimici et persecutores Christianorum quam de quorum maiestate convenimur in crimen?

[2] Know that from those it has been prescribed to us, unto an overflow of benignity, to pray to God even for enemies and to ask good things for our persecutors. Who are more enemies and persecutors of Christians than those on account of whose majesty we are arraigned on a charge?

[3] Sed etiam nominatim atque manifeste: "Orate", inquit, "pro regibus et pro principibus et potestatibus, ut omnia tranquilla sint vobis!" Cum enim concutitur imperium, concussis etiam ceteris membris eius, utique et nos, licet extranei a turbis aestimemur, in aliquo loco casus invenimur.

[3] But also by name and manifestly: "Pray," he says, "for kings and for princes and powers, that all things may be tranquil for you!" For when the imperium is shaken, the other members of it also being shaken, surely we too, although we are deemed extraneous to the tumults, are found somewhere in the mishap.

XXXII.

32.

[1] Est et alia maior necessitas nobis orandi pro imperatoribus, etiam pro omni statu imperii rebusque Romanis, qui vim maximam universo orbi imminentem ipsamque clausulam saeculi acerbitates horrendas comminantem Romani imperii commeatu scimus retardari. Itaque nolumus experiri et, dum precamur differri, Romanae diuturnitati favemus.

[1] There is also another greater necessity for us to pray for the emperors, and even for the whole status of the empire and Roman affairs, because we know that the greatest force threatening the entire orb, and the very closure of the age, menacing horrendous severities, is delayed by the stay of the Roman empire. Therefore we do not wish to experience it, and, while we pray that it be deferred, we favor the long duration of Rome.

[2] Sed et iuramus sicut non per genios Caesarum, ita per salutem eorum, quae est augustior omnibus geniis. Nescitis genios daemonas dici et inde diminutiva voce daemonia? Nos iudicium dei suspicimus in imperatoribus, qui gentibus illos praefecit.

[2] But we also swear—not by the genii of the Caesars, but by their safety, which is more august than all genii. Do you not know that genii are called daemons, and from that, by a diminutive word, “daemonia”? We look up to the judgment of God in the emperors, who has set them over the nations.

[3] Id in eis scimus esse, quod deus voluit, ideoque et salvum volumus esse quod deus voluit, et pro magno id iuramento habemus. Certerum daemonas, id est genios, adiurare consuevimus, ut illos de hominibus exigamus, non deierare, ut eis honorem divinitatis conferamus.

[3] We know that in them there is what God has willed; and therefore we also want what God has willed to be safe, and we hold that as a great oath. However, we are accustomed to adjure the demons, that is, the genii, so that we may drive them out of men, not to swear by them, so as to confer upon them the honor of divinity.

XXXIII.

33.

[1] Sed quid ego amplius de religione atque pietate Christiana in imperatore? quem necesse est suspiciamus ut eum, quem dominus noster elegit, ut merito dixerim: "Noster est magis Caesar, a nostro deo constitutus."

[1] But why should I say more about Christian religion and piety in the emperor? whom we must look up to as him whom our Lord has chosen, so that I may deservedly say: "Our Caesar is more truly ours, constituted by our God."

[2] Itaque ut meo plus ego illi operor in salutem, si quidem non solum ab eo postulo eam, qui potest praestare, aut quod talis postulo, qui merear impetrare, sed etiam quod temperans maiestatem Caesaris infra deum magis illum commendo deo, cui soli subicio; subicio autem, cui non adaequo.

[2] Therefore, in my way, I work more for his salvation, since indeed I not only request it from him who can furnish it, or because, being such a one, I request it so that I may merit to impetrate it, but also because, tempering the majesty of Caesar beneath God, I commend him rather to God, to whom alone I subject him; I subject him, however, to one to whom I do not equate him.

[3] Non enim deum imperatorem dicam, vel quia mentiri nescio, vel quia illum deridere non audeo, vel quia nec ipse se deum volet dici. Si homo sit, interest homini deo cedere; satis habeat appellari imperator; grande et hoc nomen est, quod a deo traditur. Negat illum imperatorem qui deum dicit; nisi homo sit, non est imperator.

[3] For I will not call the emperor a god, either because I do not know how to lie, or because I do not dare to deride him, or because neither will he himself wish to be called a god. If he be a man, it behooves a man to cede to God; let it suffice for him to be called emperor; and this is a great name, which is bestowed by God. He denies him to be emperor who calls him a god; unless he be a man, he is not an emperor.

[4] Hominem se esse etiam triumphans in illo sublimissimo curru admonetur; suggeritur enim ei a tergo: "Respice post te! Hominem te memento!" Et utique hoc magis gaudet tanta se gloria coruscare, ut illi admonitio condicionis suae sit necessaria. Minor erat, si tunc deus diceretur, quia non vere diceretur. Maior est qui revocatur, ne se deum existimet.

[4] Even while triumphing in that most sublime chariot, he is admonished that he is a man; for it is suggested to him from behind: "Look behind you! Remember you are a man!" And surely he rejoices the more that he flashes with such great glory, such that a reminder of his condition is necessary for him. He would be lesser, if then he were called a god, because it would not be said truly. Greater is he who is called back, lest he esteem himself a god.

XXXIV.

34.

[1] Augustus, imperii formator, ne dominum quidem dici se volebat. Et hoc enim dei est cognomen. Dicam plane imperatorem dominum, sed more communi, sed quando non cogor, ut dominum dei vice dicam.

[1] Augustus, the framer of the empire, did not even wish himself to be called “lord.” For even this is a cognomen of a god. I will plainly call the emperor “lord,” but in the common manner, yet when I am not compelled to say “lord” in a god’s stead.

Ceterum liber sum illi; dominus enim meus unus est, deus omnipotens, aeternus, idem qui et ipsius.

However, I am free with respect to him; for my lord is one, God omnipotent, eternal, the same who is his as well.

[2] Qui pater patriae est, quomodo dominus est? Sed et gratius est nomen pietatis quam potestatis; etiam familiae magis patres quam domini vocantur.

[2] He who is Father of the Fatherland, how is he a master? But the name of piety is more pleasing than that of power; even in families they are called “fathers” rather than “masters.”

[3] Tanto abest, ut imperator deus debeat dici, quod non potest credi — non modo turpissima, sed et perniciosa adulatione. Tamquam si habens imperatorem alterum appelles, nonne maximam et inexorabilem offensam contrahes eius, quem habuisti, etiam ipsi timendam, quem appellasti? Esto religiosus in deum, qui vis illum propitium imperatori!

[3] So far is it from being the case that the emperor ought to be called a god, that he cannot be believed to be one — not only by most disgraceful, but even by pernicious adulation. As if, while having an emperor, you should call another one emperor, would you not incur the greatest and inexorable offense of him whom you already had, an offense to be feared even by the very one whom you addressed? Be religious toward God, if you want Him propitious to the emperor!

Desine alium deum credere atque ita et hunc deum dicere, cui deo opus est!

Cease to believe another god, and so to call this one a god as well—he who has need of a god!

[4] Si non de mendacio erubescit adulatio eiusmodi hominem deum appellans, timeat saltim de infausto: Maledictum est ante apotheosin deum Caesarem nuncupari.

[4] If adulation does not blush for the lie, calling a man of this sort a god, let it at least fear the inauspicious: it is ill‑omened, before the apotheosis, for Caesar to be called a god.

XXXV.

35.

[1] Propterea igitur publici hostes Christiani, quia imperatoribus neque vanos neque mentientes neque temerarios honores dicant, quia verae religionis homines etiam solemnia eorum conscientia potius quam lascivia celebrant.

[1] Therefore, Christians are public enemies, because they do not proclaim to the emperors honors that are vain, or lying, or rash, because men of the true religion celebrate even their solemnities by conscience rather than by wantonness.

[2] Grande videlicet officium focos et toros in publicum educere, vicatim epulari, civitatem tabernae habitu abolefacere, vino lutum cogere, catervatim cursitare ad iniurias, ad impudentias, ad libidinis illecebras! Sicine exprimitur publicum gaudium per dedecus publicum? Haecine solemnes dies principum decent, quae alios dies non decent?

[2] A grand duty, forsooth: to lead hearths and couches out into public, to banquet street by street, to abolish the city under the habit of a tavern, to coagulate mire with wine, to run about in crowds to outrages, to impudences, to the allurements of lust! Is public joy thus expressed through public disgrace? Do these things befit the princes’ solemn days, which do not befit other days?

[3] Qui observant disciplinam de Caesaris respectu, hi eam propter Caesarem deserunt, et malorum morum licentia pietas erit, occasio luxuriae religio deputabitur!

[3] Those who observe discipline out of regard for Caesar, these on account of Caesar abandon it, and the license of evil morals will be piety, the occasion of luxury will be reckoned religion!

[4] O nos merito damnandos! Cur enim vota et gaudia Caesarum casti et sobrii et probi expungimus? cur die laeto non laureis postes obumbramus nec lucernis diem infringimus?

[4] O we deserving to be condemned! For why, as chaste and sober and upright, do we expunge the vows and joys of the Caesars? why on a glad day do we not overshadow the doorposts with laurels nor dim the day with lamps?

Honesta res est solemnitate publica exigente induere domui tuae habitum alicuius novi lupanaris!

It is an honorable thing, the public solemnity exacting it, to clothe your house in the habit of some new brothel!

[5] Velim tamen in hac quoque religione secundae maiestatis, de qua in secundum sacrilegium convenimur Christiani non celebrando vobiscum solemnia Caesarum, quo more celebrari nec modestia nec verecundia nec pudicitia permittunt, sed occasio voluptatis magis quam digna ratio persuasit, fidem et veritatem vestram demonstrare, ne forte et istic deteriores Christianis deprehendantur qui nos nolunt Romanos haberi, sed ut hostes principum Romanorum.

[5] I would wish, however, in this religion too of the second majesty, on account of which we Christians are convened on a charge of a second sacrilege for not celebrating with you the solemnities of the Caesars—solemnities to be celebrated in a manner which neither modesty nor verecundity nor chastity permit, but which the occasion of voluptuous pleasure rather than a worthy rationale has persuaded—that you demonstrate your faith and truth, lest perchance even here there be detected those worse than the Christians, who are unwilling that we be held as Romans, but as enemies of the Roman princes.

[6] Ipsos Quirites, ipsam vernaculam septem collium plebem convenio, an alicui Caesari suo parcat illa lingua Romana: Testis est Tiberis, et scholae bestiarum.

[6] I address the Quirites themselves, the native plebs of the seven hills themselves, whether that Roman tongue would spare any one of its own Caesars: witness is the Tiber, and the schools of beasts.

[7] Iam si pectoribus ad translucendum quandam specularem materiam natura obduxisset, cuius non praecordia insculpta apparent novi ac novi Caesaris scaenam congiario dividundo praesidentis, etiam illa hora, qua acclamant: "de nostris annis augeat tibi Iuppiter annos!" Haec Christianus tam enuntiare non novit quam de novo Caesare optare.

[7] Now if nature had overlaid upon breasts some specular material for translucence, without which their precordia, engraved, would not appear presenting the scene of a new and ever-new Caesar presiding over the congiary in its distribution, even at that very hour when they acclaim: "de nostris annis augeat tibi Jupiter years!" A Christian knows as little how to enunciate such things as to wish for a new Caesar.

[8] "Sed vulgus", inquis. Ut vulgus, tamen Romani, nec ulli magis depostulatores Christianorum quam vulgus. Plane ceteri ordines pro auctoritate religiosi ex fide; nihil hosticum de ipso senatu, de equite, de castris, de palatiis ipsis spira[n]t!

[8] "But 'the mob,'" you say. Though a mob, yet they are Romans; nor are there any more zealous prosecutors of Christians than the mob. Clearly the other orders, in accord with authority, are religious out of faith; nothing hostile breathes from the senate itself, from the equestrian order, from the camps, from the palaces themselves!

[9] Unde Cassii et Nigri et Albini? Unde qui inter duas laurus obsident Caesarem? Unde qui faucibus eius exprimendis palaestricam exercent?

[9] Whence the Cassii and the Nigri and the Albini? Whence those who, between the two laurels, besiege Caesar? Whence those who exercise the palaestric art for the squeezing of his throat?

Unde qui armati palatium irrumpunt, omnibus tot Sigeriis atque Partheniis audaciores? De Romanis, nisi fallor, id est de non Christianis.

Whence are those who, armed, burst into the palace, more audacious than all those so many Sigerii and Parthenii? From Romans, unless I am mistaken, that is, from non-Christians.

[10] Atque adeo omnes illi sub ipsa usque impietatis eruptione et sacra faciebant pro salute imperatoris et genium eius deierabant, alii foris, alii intus, et utique publicorum hostium nomen Christianis dabant.

[10] And indeed all those men, right up to the very eruption of impiety itself, both were performing sacred rites for the safety of the emperor and were swearing by his genius, some outside, others inside; and in any case they were assigning the name of public enemies to the Christians.

[11] Sed et qui nunc scelestarum partium socii aut plausores cottidie revelantur, post vindemiam parricidarum racematio superstes, quam recentissimis et ramosissimis laureis postes praestruebant, quam elatissimis et clarissimis lucernis vestibula nebulabant, quam cultissimis et superbissimis toris forum sibi dividebant, non ut gaudia publica celebrarent, sed ut vota propria iam ediscerent in aliena sollemnitate et exemplum atque imaginem spei suae inaugurarent nomen principis in corde mutantes.

[11] But also those who are now every day being unveiled as allies or applauders of the wicked parties, a surviving raceme after the vintage of parricides, who were piling up the doorposts with the freshest and most ramose laurels, who were making the vestibules smoky with the loftiest and brightest lamps, who with the most elegant and most superb couches were dividing up the forum for themselves, not in order to celebrate public joys, but in order already to learn by heart their own vows in another’s solemnity and to inaugurate the exemplar and image of their hope, changing the name of the princeps in their heart.

[12] Eadem officia dependunt et qui astrologos et haruspices et augures et magos de Caesarum capite consultant, quas artes ut ab angelis desertoribus proditas et a deo interdictas ne suis quidem causis adhibent Christiani.

[12] The same offices are rendered also by those who consult astrologers and haruspices and augurs and magi about the person (the “head”) of the Caesars—arts which, as handed down by deserter angels and interdicted by God, Christians do not even adhibit for their own causes.

[13] Cui autem opus est perscrutari super Caesaris salute, nisi a quo aliquid adversus illam cogitatur vel optatur, aut post illam speratur et sustinetur? Non enim ea mente de caris consulitur qua de dominis. Aliter curiosa est sollicitudo sanguinis, aliter servitutis.

[13] But who has need to scrutinize about Caesar’s safety, except one by whom something against it is being conceived or desired, or who hopes for and waits for what comes after it? For one does not consult about the dear ones with the same mind as about lords. The curious solicitude of blood is one thing, that of servitude another.

XXXVI.

36.

[1] Si haec ita sunt, ut hostes deprehendantur qui Romani vocabantur, cur nos, qui hostes existimamur, Romani negamur? Non possumus et Romani non esse et hostes esse, cum hostes reperiantur qui Romani habebantur.

[1] If these things are so, that enemies are apprehended who were called Romans, why are we, who are thought to be enemies, denied to be Romans? We cannot both not be Romans and be enemies, since enemies are found who were held to be Romans.

[2] Adeo pietas et religio et fides imperatoribus debita non in huiusmodi officiis consistit, quibus et hostilitas magis ad velamentum sui potest fungi, sed in his moribus, quibus divinitas imperat tam vere, quam circa omnes necesse habet, exhiberi.

[2] Thus piety and religion and the faith owed to emperors do not consist in duties of this sort, by which even hostility can rather serve as a veil for itself, but in those mores which the divinity commands to be exhibited as truly as it must needs be shown toward all.

[3] Neque enim haec opera bonae mentis solis imperatoribus debentur a nobis. Nullum bonum sub exceptione personarum administramus, quia nobis praestamus, qui non ab homine aut laudis aut praemii expensum captamus, sed a deo exactore et remuneratore indifferentis benignitatis.

[3] For neither are these works of a good mind owed by us to emperors alone. We administer no good with an exception of persons, since we render it on our own account—we who do not seek from man the reckoning either of praise or of reward, but from God, the exactor and remunerator of impartial benignity.

[4] Iidem sumus imperatoribus, qui et vicinis nostris. Male enim velle, male facere, male dicere, male cogitare de quoquam ex aequo vetamur. Quodcumque non licet in imperatorem, id nec in quemquam; quod in neminem, eo forsitan magis nec in ipsum, qui per deum tantus est.

[4] We are the same toward emperors as toward our neighbors. For we are equally forbidden to will ill, to do ill, to speak ill, to think ill of anyone. Whatever is not permitted against the emperor, that neither against anyone; what is against no one, by so much perhaps the more not against him himself, who is so great through God.

XXXVII.

37.

[1] Si inimicos, ut supra diximus, iubemur diligere, quem habemus odisse? Item, si laesi vicem referre prohibemur, ne de facto pares simus, quem possumus laedere?

[1] If we are bidden to love enemies, as we said above, whom have we to hate? Likewise, if, when wronged, we are prohibited to return in kind, lest we be equal in the deed, whom can we harm?

[2] Nam de isto ipsi recognoscite! Quotiens enim in Christianos desaevitis, partim animis propriis, partim legibus obsequentes! Quotiens etiam praeteritis vobis suo iure nos inimicum vulgus invadit lapidibus et incendiis!

[2] For on this point, recognize it yourselves! How often, indeed, do you rage savagely against Christians, partly by your own passions, partly being obsequious to the laws! How often also, with you passing it over, does the hostile crowd assail us with stones and with arsons, as by its own right!

Ipsis Bacchanalium furiis nec mortuis parcunt Christianis, quin illos de requie sepulturae, de asylo quodam mortis, iam alios, iam nec totos avellant, dissecent, distrahant.

With the very furies of the Bacchanalia they do not spare even dead Christians, but rather tear them from the repose of burial, from a certain asylum of death, now some, now not whole, they pluck away, cut to pieces, and drag asunder.

[3] Quid tamen de tam conspiratis umquam denotatis, de tam animatis ad mortem usque pro iniuria repensatis, quando vel una nox pauculis faculis largiter ultionis posset operari, si malum malo dispungi penes nos liceret? Sed absit, ut aut igni humano vindicetur divina secta aut doleat pati, in quo probatur!

[3] What, however, of those so conspired, ever denounced, of those so animated even unto death, requited for an injury, when even a single night with a few torches could amply work vengeance, if it were permitted with us that evil be counterbalanced by evil? But far be it, that the divine sect be avenged by human fire, or that it should grieve to suffer, wherein it is proved!

[4] Si enim et hostes exsertos, non tantum vindices occultos agere vellemus, deesset nobis vis numerorum et copiarum? Plures nimirum Mauri et Marcomanni ipsique Parthi, vel quantaecumque unius tamen loci et suorum finium gentes quam totius orbis. Hesterni sumus, et vestra omnia implevimus, urbes insulas castella municipia conciliabula castra ipsa tribus decurias palatium senatum forum; sola vobis reliquimus templa.

[4] For if we were willing to conduct ourselves as open enemies as well, not only as occult avengers, would the force of numbers and of resources be lacking to us? The Moors and the Marcomanni and the Parthians themselves, or whatever peoples they are, however many, are nevertheless of one place and within their own borders, not of the whole orb. We are but of yesterday, and we have filled all your things, cities islands forts municipalities meeting-places the camps themselves tribes decuries the palace the senate the forum; to you alone we have left the temples.

[5] Cui bello non idonei, non prompti fuissemus etiam impares copiis, qui tam libenter trucidamur, si non apud istam disciplinam magis occidi liceret quam occidere?

[5] For what war would we not have been fit, not prompt, even though unequal in forces, we who are so gladly butchered, if under that discipline it were not more permitted to be slain than to slay?

[6] Potuimus et inermes nec rebelles, sed tantummodo discordes, solius divortii invidia adversus vos dimicasse. Si enim tanta vis hominum in aliquem orbis remoti sinum abrupissemus a vobis, suffudisset utique dominationem vestram tot qualicumque civium amissio, immo etiam et ipsa destitutione punisset.

[6] We could, even unarmed and no rebels, but only discordant, have contended against you by the mere odium of a divorce. For if so great a force of men had torn ourselves away from you into some recess of the remote world, the loss of so many citizens, of whatever kind, would surely have put your dominion to the blush, nay, would even have punished it by destitution itself.

[7] Procul dubio expavissetis ad solitudinem vestram, ad silentium rerum et stuporem quendam quasi mortui orbis; quaesissetis quibus imperaretis; plures hostes quam cives vobis remansissent.

[7] Beyond doubt you would have been terrified at your own solitude, at the silence of affairs and a certain stupefaction as of a dead world; you would have inquired whom you were to rule; more enemies than citizens would have remained to you.

[8] Nunc enim pauciores hostes habetis prae multitudine Christianorum, paene omnium civium paene omnes cives Christianos habendo. Sed hostes maluistis vocare generis humani potius quam erroris humani.

[8] For now you have fewer enemies, in comparison with the multitude of Christians, since you have as Christians almost all the citizens of almost all the cities. But you have preferred to call them enemies of the human race rather than of human error.

[9] Quis autem vos ab illis occultis et usquequaque vastantibus mentes et valetudines vestras hostibus raperet, a daemoniorum incursibus dico, quae de vobis sine praemio, sine mercede depellimus? Suffecisset hoc solum nostrae ultioni, quod vacua exinde possessio immundis spiritibus pateret.

[9] But who would rescue you from those enemies hidden and everywhere ravaging your minds and your health, I mean from the incursions of demons, which we drive away from you without reward, without wage? This alone would have sufficed for our vengeance: that thereafter, as a vacant possession, you would lie open to unclean spirits.

[10] Porro nec tanti praesidii compensationem cogitantes non modo non molestum vobis genus, verum etiam necessarium hostes iudicare maluistis, qui[a] sumus plane, non generis humani tamen, sed potius erroris.

[10] Moreover, not considering the compensation for so great a safeguard, you have preferred to judge as enemies a kind not only not troublesome to you, but even necessary—because we are plainly so, not of the human race, however, but rather of error.

XXXVIII.

38.

[1] Proinde nec paulo lenius inter licitas factiones sectam istam deputari oportebat, a qua nihil tale committitur, quale de illicitis factionibus timeri solet.

[1] Accordingly this sect ought not to be assigned even a whit more leniently among illicit factions, since from it nothing of the kind is committed that is wont to be feared with respect to illicit factions.

[2] Nisi fallor enim, prohibendarum factionum causa de providentia constat modestiae publicae, ne civitas in partes scinderetur, quae res facile comitia concilia curias contiones, spectacula etiam aemulis studiorum compulsationibus inquietaret, cum iam et in quaestu habere coepissent venalem et mercenariam homines violentiae suae operam.

[2] Unless I am mistaken, the purpose of prohibiting factions rests on the providence of public modesty, lest the commonwealth be split into parties—a thing which would easily unsettle the comitia, councils, curiae, assemblies, and even spectacles, by the clashings of rival zeal—since by now men had also begun to turn to profit the service of their own violence, putting it up for sale and hire.

[3] At enim nobis ab omni gloriae et dignitatis ardore frigentibus nulla est necessitas coetus nec ulla magis res aliena quam publica. Unam omnium rem publicam agnoscimus, mundum.

[3] But indeed, we, chilled from every ardor of glory and dignity, have no necessity of a gathering, nor anything more alien than the public sphere. We acknowledge one commonwealth of all, the world.

[4] Aeque spectaculis vestris in tantum renuntiamus, in quantum originibus eorum, quas scimus de superstitione conceptas, cum et ipsis rebus, de quibus transiguntur, praetersumus. Nihil est nobis dictu visu auditu cum insania circi, cum impudicitia theatri, cum atrocitate arenae, cum xysti vanitate.

[4] Likewise we renounce your spectacles in so far as we renounce their origins, which we know to have been conceived from superstition, since we also pass over the very matters about which they are transacted. We have nothing, in word, in sight, in hearing, to do with the insanity of the circus, with the impudicity of the theatre, with the atrocity of the arena, with the vanity of the xystus.

[5] Licuit Epicureis aliam decernere voluptatis veritatem, id est animi aequitatem: In quo vos offendimus, si alias praesumimus voluptates? Si oblectari novisse nolumus, nostra iniuria est, si forte, non vestra. Sed reprobamus, quae placent vobis.

[5] It was permitted to the Epicureans to determine another verity of pleasure, that is, the equanimity of mind: In what do we offend you, if we presume other pleasures? If we are unwilling to be delighted in the newest way, it is our injury, if perchance, not yours. But we disapprove of the things which please you.

Nec vos nostra delectant.

Nor do our things delight you.

XXXIX.

39.

[1] Edam iam nunc ego ipse negotia Christianae factionis, ut, qui mala refutaverim, bona ostendam. Corpus sumus de conscientia religionis et disciplinae unitate et spei foedere.

[1] I will now myself set forth the business of the Christian faction, so that, having refuted the evils, I may show the goods. We are a body from the conscience of religion and the unity of discipline and the covenant of hope.

[2] Coimus in coetum et congregationem, ut ad deum quasi manu facta precationibus ambiamus orantes. Haec vis deo grata est. Oramus etiam pro imperatoribus, pro ministris eorum et potestatibus, pro statu saeculi, pro rerum quiete, pro mora finis.

[2] We come together into a meeting and congregation, in order that, praying, we may with prayers beset God as if with a formed band. This force is pleasing to God. We also pray for the emperors, for their ministers and powers, for the status of the age, for the quiet of affairs, for a delay of the end.

[3] Coimus ad litterarum divinarum commemorationem, si quid praesentium temporum qualitas aut praemonere cogit aut recognoscere. Certe fidem sanctis vocibus pascimus, spem erigimus, fiduciam figimus, disciplinam praeceptorum nihilominus inculcationibus densamus.

[3] We come together for the commemoration of the divine letters, if the quality of present times compels us either to fore-warn or to re-cognize anything. Surely we feed faith with holy voices, we raise up hope, we fix confidence, we nonetheless densify the discipline of the precepts by inculcations.

[4] Ibidem etiam exhortationes, castigationes et censura divina. Nam et iudicatur magno cum pondere, ut apud certos de dei conspectu, summumque futuri iudicii praeiudicium est, si quis ita deliquerit, ut a communicatione orationis et conventus et omnis sancti commercii relegetur.

[4] In the same place, too, there are exhortations, chastisements, and divine censure. For judgment also is rendered with great weight, as by persons assured of the sight of God; and it is the highest prejudgment of the future judgment, if anyone has so transgressed as to be relegated from the communication of prayer and of the assembly and of all holy commerce.

[5] Praesident probati quique seniores, honorem istum non pretio, sed testimonio adepti, neque enim pretio ulla res dei constat. Etiam, si quod arcae genus est, non de honoraria summa quasi redemptae religionis congregatur. Modicam unusquisque stipem menstrua die, vel cum velit et si modo velit et si modo possit, apponit.

[5] Approved elders preside, having obtained that honor not by price but by testimony—for no matter of God is set at a price. Also, if there is any kind of coffer, it is not gathered from an honorarium sum, as though religion had been redeemed. Each person adds a modest contribution on the monthly day, or whenever he wishes, and only if he wishes and only if he can, he puts it in.

Nam nemo compellitur, sed sponte confert.

For no one is compelled, but contributes spontaneously.

[6] Haec quasi deposita pietatis sunt. Nam inde non epulis nec potaculis nec ingratis voratrinis dispensatur, sed egenis alendis humandisque et pueris ac puellis re ac parentibus destitutis iamque domesticis senibus, item naufragis et si qui in metallis et si qui in insulis vel in custodiis, dumtaxat ex causa dei sectae, alumni confessionis suae fiunt.

[6] These are, as it were, deposits of piety. For from that fund there is no disbursement for banquets nor drinking-bouts nor thankless gluttonies, but for feeding and burying the needy, and for boys and girls destitute of means and of parents, and now also for household old men, likewise for the shipwrecked, and if any are in the mines, and if any are on islands or in custodias, provided only that it be for the cause of God’s sect: they become the wards of their own confession.

[7] Sed eiusmodi vel maxime dilectionis operatio notam nobis inurit penes quosdam. "Vide", inquiunt, "ut invicem se diligant" — ipsi enim invicem oderunt — "et ut pro alterutro mori sint parati"; ipsi enim ad occidendum alterutrum paratiores erunt.

[7] But an operation of love of this kind, most of all, brands us with a mark among certain people. "See," they say, "how they love one another" — for they themselves hate one another — "and how they are ready to die for one another"; for they themselves will be readier to kill one another.

[8] Sed et quod fratres nos vocamus, non alias, opinor, insaniunt, quam quod apud ipsos omne sanguinis nomen de affectione simulatum est. Fratres autem etiam vestri sumus iure naturae matris unius, etsi vos parum homines, quia mali fratres.

[8] But even at the fact that we call ourselves brothers, they, I suppose, go mad for no other reason than that among themselves every name of blood is simulated out of affection. But we too are your brothers by the right of nature, of one mother, even if you are scarcely human, because you are bad brothers.

[9] At quanto dignius fratres et dicuntur et habentur, qui unum patrem deum agnoverint, qui unum spiritum biberint sanctitatis, qui de uno utero ignorantiae eiusdem ad unam lucem expaverint veritatis!

[9] But how much more worthily are they both called and held as brothers, who have acknowledged one Father God, who have drunk one Spirit of sanctity, who from one womb of the same ignorance have been startled forth into the one light of truth!

[10] Sed eo fortasse minus legitimi existimamur, quia nulla de nostra fraternitate tragoedia exclamat, vel quia ex substantia familiari fratres sumus, quae penes vos fere dirimit fraternitatem.

[10] But perhaps on that account we are considered the less legitimate, because no tragedy cries out about our fraternity, or because we are brothers from family substance, which among you for the most part dissolves fraternity.

[11] Itaque qui animo animaque miscemur, nihil de rei communicatione dubitamus. Omnia indiscreta sunt apud nos praeter uxores.

[11] And so we who are mingled in mind and in soul, do not at all hesitate about the communication of property. All things are indiscrete among us, except wives.

[12] In isto loco consortium solvimus, in quo solo ceteri homines consortium exercent, qui non amicorum solummodo matrimonia usurpant, sed et sua amicis patientissime subministrant — ex illa, credo, maiorum et sapientissimorum disciplina, Graeci Socratis et Romani Catonis, qui uxores suas amicis communicaverunt, quas in matrimonium duxerant liberorum causa et alibi creandorum, nescio quidem an invitas;

[12] In this place we dissolve consortium, in which alone the rest of men exercise consortium, who not only usurp the marriages of friends, but also most patiently supply their own to friends — from that, I suppose, discipline of the ancestors and most wise, the Greek Socrates and the Roman Cato, who shared their wives with friends, whom they had taken in matrimony for the sake of children and of having them begotten elsewhere, I do not indeed know whether unwilling.

[13] quid enim de castitate curarent, quam mariti tam facile donaverant? O sapientiae Atticae, o Romanae gravitatis exemplum: leno[n] est philosophus et censor!

[13] For what, indeed, would they care about chastity, which the husbands had so easily donated? O example of Attic wisdom, O of Roman gravity: the pimp[n] is a philosopher and a censor!

[14] Quid ergo mirum, si tanta caritas convivatur? Nam et cenulas nostras, praeterquam sceleris infames, ut prodigas quoque suggillatis. De nobis scilicet Diogenis dictum est: "Megarenses obsonant quasi crastina die morituri, aedificant vero quasi numquam morituri."

[14] What then is wondrous, if such charity banquets together? For you also, besides making our little dinners infamous for crime, you taunt them as prodigal as well. Of us, forsooth, is the saying of Diogenes: "The Megarians shop for delicacies as though they were to die tomorrow, but they build as though they were never to die."

[15] Sed stipulam quis in alieno oculo facilius perspicit quam in suo trabem. Tot tribubus et curiis et decuriis ructantibus acescit aer; Saliis cenaturis creditor erit necessarius; Herculanarum decimanarum et polluctorum sumptus tabularii supputabunt; Apaturiis, Dionysiis, mysteriis Atticis cocorum dilectus indicitur; ad fumum cenae Serapiacae sparteoli excitabuntur — de solo triclinio Christianorum retractatur.

[15] But who perceives a straw in another’s eye more easily than a beam in his own? The air turns sour with so many tribes and curiae and decuries belching; when the Salii are to dine, a creditor will be necessary; the clerks will reckon the expenses of the Herculean tithes and of the polluctores; at the Apaturia, the Dionysia, the Attic mysteries, a levy of cooks is proclaimed; at the smoke of the Serapian dinner little sparte-wicks will be stirred up
— only the Christians’ triclinium is taken up for reconsideration.

[16] Cena nostra de nomine rationem sui ostendit: Id vocatur quod dilectio penes Graecos. Quantiscumque sumptibus constet, lucrum est pietatis nomine facere sumptum, siquidem inopes quosque refrigerio isto iuvamus, non qua penes vos parasiti affectant ad gloriam famulandae libertatis sub auctoramento ventris inter contumelias saginandi, sed qua penes deum maior est contemplatio mediocrium.

[16] Our supper shows from its name the rationale of itself: it is called that which is “love” among the Greeks. Whatever expenses it may entail, it is a profit to make an expenditure in the name of piety, since we help the indigent by that refreshment—not as, among you, parasites aspire to the glory of a servile “freedom,” under the enlistment-bounty of the belly, to be fattened amid contumelies, but in that, with God, there is a greater consideration for those of moderate means.

[17] Si honesta causa est convivii, reliquum ordinem disciplinae de causa aestimate! Quod sit de religionis officio, nihil vilitatis, nihil immodestiae admittit. Non prius discumbitur quam oratio ad deum praegustetur; editur quantum esurientes capiunt; bibitur quantum pudicis utile est.

[17] If the cause of the banquet is honorable, judge the remaining order of the discipline by the cause! Since it is of the office of religion, it admits nothing of vileness, nothing of immodesty. We do not recline before a prayer to God is tasted beforehand; as much is eaten as the hungry can take; as much is drunk as is useful for the modest.

[18] Ita saturantur, ut qui meminerint, etiam per noctem adorandum deum sibi esse; ita fabulantur, ut qui sciant dominum audire. Post aquam manualem et lumina, ut quisque de scripturis sanctis vel de proprio ingenio potest, provocatur in medium deo canere; hinc probatur quomodo biberit. Aeque oratio convivium dirimit.

[18] Thus they are sated, as those who remember that even through the night God is to be adored by them; thus they converse, as those who know that the Lord hears. After the manual ablution and the lights, as each is able from the Holy Scriptures or from his own native ingenium, he is called forth into the midst to sing to God; hence it is proved how he has drunk. Prayer likewise breaks up the banquet.

[19] Inde disceditur non in catervas caesionum nec in classes discursationum nec in eruptiones lasciviarum, sed ad eandem curam modestiae et pudicitiae, ut qui non tam cenam cenaverint quam disciplinam.

[19] Thence we depart not into bands of beatings, nor into ranks of ramblings, nor into outbreaks of wantonness, but to the same care of modesty and chastity, as those who have eaten not so much a dinner as a discipline.

[20] Haec coitio Christianorum merito sane illicita, si illicitis par, merito damnanda, si quis de ea queritur eo titulo, quo de factionibus querela est.

[20] This convention of Christians is indeed deservedly illicit, if on a par with illicit ones, deservedly to be condemned, if anyone makes complaint about it under that title under which the complaint is about factions.

[21] In cuius perniciem aliquando convenimus? Hoc sumus congregati, quod et dispersi, hoc universi, quod et singuli: Neminem laedentes, neminem contristantes. Cum probi, cum boni coeunt, cum pii, cum casti congregantur, non est factio dicenda, sed curia.

[21] For whose ruin have we ever assembled? We are this when congregated which we are also when dispersed, this as a whole which we are also as individuals: harming no one, saddening no one. When the upright, when the good meet, when the pious, when the chaste are congregated, it is not to be called a faction, but a curia.

XL.

40.

[1] At e contrario illis nomen factionis accommodandum est, qui in odium bonorum et proborum conspirant, qui adversum sanguinem innocentium conclamant, praetexentes sane ad odii defensionem illam quoque vanitatem, quod existiment omnis publicae cladis, omnis popularis incommodi Christianos esse in causa[m].

[1] But on the contrary, to those the name of faction is to be applied, who conspire in hatred against the good and the upright, who clamor for the blood of the innocent, indeed pretexting for the defense of their hatred that vanity as well, namely that they suppose Christians to be the cause of every public calamity, of every popular inconvenience.

[2] Si Tiberis ascendit in moenia, si Nilus non ascendit in arva, si caelum stetit, si terra movit, si fames, si lues, statim: "Christianos ad leonem!" acclamatur. Tantos ad unum?

[2] If the Tiber rises to the walls, if the Nile does not rise to the fields, if the sky stands still, if the earth moves, if famine, if pestilence, at once: "Christians to the lion!" is shouted. So many to one?

[3] Oro vos, ante Tiberium, id est ante Christi adventum, quantae clades orbem et urbes ceciderunt! Legimus Hieran, Anaphen et Delon et Rhodon et Co insulas multis cum milibus hominum pessum abisse.

[3] I beseech you, before Tiberius—that is, before the advent of Christ—how many disasters fell upon the world and its cities! We read that the islands Hiera, Anaphe, Delos, Rhodes, and Cos went to ruin, together with many thousands of people.

[4] Memorat et Plato maiorem Asiae vel Africae terram Atlantico mari ereptam. Sed et mare Corinthium terrae motus ebibit, et vis undarum Lucaniam abscisam in Siciliae nomen relegavit. Haec utique non sine iniuria incolentium accidere potuerunt.

[4] Plato also recounts that a land greater than Asia or Africa was snatched away by the Atlantic sea. But also an earthquake drank up the Corinthian sea, and the force of the waves relegated cut-off Lucania under the name of Sicily. These things, assuredly, could not have happened without injury to the inhabitants.

[5] Ubi vero tunc, non dicam deorum vestrorum contemptores Christiani, sed ipsi dei vestri, cum totum orbem cataclysmus abolevit vel, ut Plato putavit, campestre solummodo?

[5] Where then were, I will not say the Christians, despisers of your gods, but your gods themselves, when a cataclysm abolished the whole world or, as Plato supposed, only the plain?

[6] Posteriores enim illos clade diluvii contestantur ipsae urbes, in quibus nati mortuique sunt, etiam quas condiderunt; neque enim alias hodiernum manerent nisi et ipsae postumae cladis illius.

[6] For that they are later than the disaster of the deluge, the cities themselves attest, in which they were born and died, even those which they founded; for otherwise they would not remain today, unless they themselves also were subsequent to that calamity.

[7] Nondum Iudaeum ab Aegypto examen Palaestina susceperat, nec iam illic Christianae sectae origo consederat, cum regiones adfines eius, Sodoma et Gomorra, igneus imber exussit. Olet adhuc incendio terra, et si qua illic arborum poma, conantur oculis tenus, ceterum contacta cinerescunt.

[7] Not yet had Palestine received the Jewish swarm from Egypt, nor had the origin of the Christian sect already settled there, when the regions adjoining it, Sodom and Gomorrah, a fiery rain burned up. The land still reeks with the conflagration, and if there are any fruits of the trees there, they suffice for the eyes only; but, once touched, they turn to ash.

[8] Sed nec Tuscia iam tunc atque Campania de Christianis querebantur, cum Vulsinios de caelo, Pompeios de suo monte perfudit ignis. Nemo adhuc Romae deum verum adorabat, cum Hannibal apud Cannas per Romanos anulos caedes suas modio metiebatur. Omnes dei vestri ab omnibus colebantur, cum ipsum Capitolium Senones occupaverant.

[8] But neither Tuscany nor Campania were as yet complaining about Christians, when fire poured over Volsinii from the sky, and over Pompeii from its own mountain. No one yet in Rome was adoring the true God, when Hannibal at Cannae was measuring his slaughters by the modius by means of Roman rings. All your gods were being worshiped by all, when the Senones had occupied the Capitol itself.

[9] Et bene quod, si quid adversi urbibus accidit, eaedem clades templorum quae et moenium fuerunt, ut iam hoc revincam non ab eis evenire, quia et ipsis evenit.

[9] And it is well that, if anything adverse happens to cities, the same calamities were of the temples as of the walls, so that I may now refute this: that they do not occur from them, since they befall them as well.

[10] Semper humana gens male de deo meruit, primo quidem ut inofficiosa eius, quem cum intellegeret ex parte, non requisivit, sed et alios insuper sibi commentata, quos coleret; dehinc quod non inquirendo innocentiae magistrum et nocentiae iudicem et exactorem omnibus vitiis et criminibus inolevit.

[10] The human race has always merited ill from God, first indeed as undutiful toward him, whom, although it understood in part, it did not seek out, but even devised others in addition for itself to worship; then because, by not inquiring after the master of innocence and the judge of guilt and the exactor, it grew rank in all vices and crimes.

[11] Ceterum si requisisset, sequebatur, ut cognosceret requisitum et recognitum observaret et observatum propitium magis experiretur quam iratum.

[11] Moreover, if it had sought, it would follow that it would know the One sought, and, once recognized, would observe him, and, being observed, would experience him as more propitious than irate.

[12] Eundem igitur nunc quoque scire debet iratum, quem et retro semper, priusquam Christiani nominarentur. Cuius bonis utebatur ante editis quam sibi deos fingeret, cur non ab eo etiam mala intellegat evenire, cuius bona esse non sensit? Illius rea est, cuius et ingrata.

[12] Therefore it ought now also to know the same one as angry, as indeed formerly always, before they were named Christians. Since it was using his goods, brought forth before it fashioned gods for itself, why does it not understand that evils also come from him, whose goods it did not perceive to be his? It stands a defendant to him, to whom it is also ungrateful.

[13] Et tamen pristinas clades comparemus, leviora nunc accidunt, ex quo Christianos a deo orbis accepit. Ex eo enim et innocentia saeculi iniquitates temperavit et deprecatores dei esse coeperunt.

[13] And yet let us compare the pristine disasters: lighter things now befall, ever since the world received Christians from God. From that time indeed both the innocence of the age tempered iniquities, and they began to be deprecators with God.

[14] Denique cum ab imbribus aestiva hiberna suspendunt et annus in cura est, vos quidem cottidie pasti statimque pransuri balneis et cauponis et lupanaribus operantibus aquilicia Iovi immolatis, nudipedalia populo denuntiatis, caelum apud Capitolium quaeritis, nubila de laquearibus exspectatis, aversi ab ipso et deo et caelo.

[14] Finally, when from the rains they suspend summer- and winter-quarters and the year is in concern, you, indeed, daily fed and straightway about to dine, with baths and taverns and brothels in operation, immolate aquilicia to Jove, you proclaim barefoot-processions to the people, you seek the sky at the Capitol, you expect clouds from the coffered ceilings, turned away from him, both from God and from heaven.

[15] Nos vero ieiuniis aridi et omni continentia expressi, ab omni vitae fruge dilati, in sacco et cinere volutantes invidia caelum tundimus, deum tangimus et, cum misericordiam extorserimus — Iuppiter honoratur.

[15] But we, indeed, parched by fasts and pressed out by every continence, removed from every fruit of life, rolling in sackcloth and ashes, we pound heaven in envy, we touch God, and, when we have extorted mercy — Jupiter is honored.

XLI.

41.

[1] Vos igitur importuni rebus humanis, vos rei, publicorum incommodorum illices semper, apud quos deus spernitur, statuae adorantur. Etenim credibilius haberi debet eum irasci, qui neglegatur quam qui coluntur;

[1] You therefore, inopportune to human affairs, you are the guilty ones, perpetual enticers of public inconveniences, among whom God is spurned, statues are adored. For indeed it ought to be held more credible that He is angered who is neglected, rather than that those who are worshiped are.

[2] aut ne illi iniquissimi, si propter Christianos etiam cultores suos laedunt, quos separare deberent a meritis Christianorum! "Hoc", inquitis, "et in deum vestrum repercutere est, si quod et ipse pati[a]tur, propter profanos etiam suos cultores laedi." Admittite prius dispositiones eius, et non retorquebitis.

[2] or else let them be most iniquitous, if, on account of Christians, they also injure their own cultors (worshipers), whom they ought to separate from the deserts of Christians! "This," you say, "is to repercuss upon your god as well, if he too suffers that, on account of the profane—even his own cultors—his people be harmed." First admit his dispositions, and you will not retort it.

[3] Qui enim semel aeternum iudicium destinavit post saeculi finem, non praecipitat discretionem, quae est condicio iudicii, ante saeculi finem. Aequalis est interim super omne hominum genus, et indulgens et increpans; communia voluit esse et commoda profanis et incommoda suis, ut pari consortio omnes et lenitatem eius et severitatem experiremur.

[3] For he who once has destined an eternal judgment after the end of the age does not precipitate the discrimination—which is the condition of judgment—before the end of the age. In the meantime he is equal over the whole human race, both indulging and rebuking; he has willed that both the benefits to the profane and the disadvantages to his own be common, so that by an equal consortium we all might experience both his lenity and his severity.

[4] Quia haec ita didicimus apud ipsum, diligimus lenitatem, metuimus severitatem; vos contra utramque despicitis; et sequitur, ut omnes saeculi plagae nobis, si forte, in admonitionem, vobis in castigationem a deo obveniant.

[4] Because we have thus learned these things from him himself, we cherish lenity and we fear severity; you, on the contrary, despise both; and it follows that all the plagues of the age befall us, perchance, for admonition, and you for castigation, from God.

[5] Atquin nos nullo modo laedimur; inprimis quia nihil nostra refert in hoc aevo nisi de eo quam celeriter excedere; dehinc quia, si quid adversi infligitur, vestris meritis deputatur. Sed et si aliqua nos quoque praestringunt ut vobis cohaerentes, laetamur magis recognitione divinarum praedicationum, confirmantium scilicet fiduciam et fidem spei nostrae. Sin vero ab eis, quos colitis, omnia vobis mala eveniunt nostri causa, quid colere perseveratis tam ingratos, tam iniustos, qui magis vos in dolore Christianorum iuvare et adserere debuerant [quos separare deberent a meritis Christianorum]?

[5] And yet we are in no way harmed; in the first place because nothing concerns us in this age except this, how quickly to depart from it; then because, if anything adverse is inflicted, it is assigned to your merits. But even if certain things also graze us, as being attached to you, we rejoice the more at the recognition of the divine predictions, namely those confirming the confidence and the faith of our hope. But if indeed, from those whom you worship, all evils befall you on our account, why do you persist in worshiping those so ungrateful, so unjust, who rather ought to have aided and upheld you in the suffering of Christians [who ought to separate you from the merits of Christians]?

XLII.

42.

[1] Sed alio quoque iniuriarum titulo postulamur: et infructuosi [in] negotiis dicimur. Quo pacto homines vobiscum degentes, eiusdem victus habitus instructus, eiusdem ad vitam necessitatis? Neque enim Brachmanae aut Indorum gymnosophistae sumus, silvicolae et exules vitae.

[1] But we are also accused under another title of injuries: and we are called unfruitful [in] business. How can that be, when we are men living with you, of the same sustenance, attire, equipment, and the same necessities for life? For we are not Brahmans or the Gymnosophists of the Indians, forest-dwellers and exiles from life.

[2] Meminimus gratiam debere nos deo domino creatori; nullum fructum operum eius repudiamus, plane temperamus, ne[c] ultra modum aut perperam utamur. Itaque non sine foro, non sine macello, non sine balneis tabernis officinis stabulis nundinis vestris ceterisque commerciis cohabitamus in hoc saeculo.

[2] We remember that we owe gratitude to God the Lord the Creator; we repudiate no fruit of his works, plainly we temper, nor use beyond measure or amiss. And so not without the forum, not without the macellum, not without baths taverns workshops stables your market-days and the other commerces we cohabit in this age.

[3] Navigamus et nos vobiscum et militamus et rusticamur et mercatus proinde miscemus, artes, opera nostra publicamus usui vestro. Quomodo infructuosi videmur negotiis vestris, cum quibus et de quibus vivimus, non scio.

[3] We sail also with you, and we serve as soldiers, and we farm, and we likewise mingle in markets; we publish our arts and works for your use. How we seem unfruitful to your businesses, with which and by which we live, I do not know.

[4] Sed si caerimonias tuas non frequento, attamen et illa die homo sum. Non lavor diluculo Saturnalibus, ne et noctem et diem perdam; attamen lavor honesta hora et salubri, quae mihi et calorem et sanguinem servet; rigere et pallere post lavacrum mortuus possum.

[4] But if I do not frequent your ceremonies, nevertheless even on that day I am a man. I do not bathe at daybreak on the Saturnalia, lest I lose both night and day; nevertheless I bathe at a respectable and salubrious hour, which preserves for me both warmth and blood; I can be rigid and pale after the bath, like a dead man.

[5] Non in publico Liberalibus discumbo, quod bestiariis supremam cenantibus mos est; attamen ubi, de copiis tuis ceno.

[5] I do not recline in public on the Liberalia, which is the custom with bestiarii as they dine their last meal; yet wherever I do, I dine from your supplies.

[6] Non emo capiti coronam; quid tua interest, emptis nihilominus floribus quomodo utar? Puto gratius esse liberis et solutis et undique vagis; sed et si in coronam coactis, nos coronam naribus novimus; viderint qui per capillum odorantur!

[6] I do not buy a crown for the head; what is it to you, with the flowers nevertheless bought, how I shall use them? I think them more pleasing free and loosened and straying on every side; but even if compressed into a crown, we know a crown for the nostrils; let those see to it who take in fragrance through their hair!

[7] Spectaculis non convenimus; quae tamen apud illos coetus venditantur si desideravero, liberius de propriis locis sumam. Tur plane non emimus; si Arabiae queruntur, sciant Sabaei plures et cariores suas merces Christianis sepeliendis profligari quam deis fumigandis.

[7] We do not resort to the spectacles; yet the things that are vended at those assemblies—if I should desire them, I will more freely take them from their proper places. We plainly do not buy frankincense; if the Arabias complain, let the Sabaeans know that more and costlier of their wares are expended on burying Christians than on fumigating the gods.

[8] "Certe", inquitis, "templorum vectigalia cottidie decoquunt; stipes quotusquisque iam iactat?" Non enim sufficimus et hominibus et deis vestris mendicantibus opem ferre, nec putamus aliis quam petentibus impertiendum. Denique porrigat manum Iuppiter et accipiat, cum interim plus nostra misericordia insumit vicatim quam vestra religio templatim.

[8] "Surely," you say, "the revenues of the temples are daily boiled down; how many now cast in alms?" For we are not sufficient to bring help both to men and to your gods who beg, nor do we think it should be imparted to any except those who ask. Finally, let Jupiter stretch out his hand and receive it, while meanwhile our compassion expends more neighborhood by neighborhood than your religion temple by temple.

[9] Sed cetera vectigalia gratias Christianis agent ex fide dependetibus debitum, qua alieno fraudando abstinemus, ut, si ineatur, quantum vectigalibus pereat fraude et mendacio vestrarum professionum, facile ratio haberi possit, unius speciei querela compensata pro commodo ceterarum rationum.

[9] But the other revenues will give thanks to the Christians, who in good faith pay what is owed, whereby we refrain from defrauding what belongs to another, so that, if an accounting be entered into, how much is lost to the revenues by the fraud and mendacity of your declarations may easily be reckoned, the complaint about one kind being compensated by the advantage of the rest of the accounts.

XLIII.

43.

[1] Plane confitebor, quinam, si forte, vere de sterilitate Christianorum conqueri possint. Primi erunt lenones perductores aquarioli, tum sicarii venenarii magi, item haruspices harioli mathematici.

[1] I will plainly confess who, if perhaps, might truly be able to complain about the sterility of the Christians. First will be the pimps, the procurers, the water-sellers; then assassins, poisoners, magi; likewise haruspices, soothsayers, mathematici (astrologers).

[2] His infructuosos esse magnus est fructus.

[2] For these, it is a great fruit that they be infructuous.

Et tamen, quodcumque dispendium est rei vestrae per hanc sectam, cum aliquo praesidio compensari potest. Quanti habetis, non dico iam qui de vobis daemonia excutiant, non dico iam qui pro vobis quoque vero deo preces sternant, quia forte non creditis, sed a quibus nihil timere possitis?

And yet, whatever dispendium there is to your interest through this sect can be compensated with some safeguard. How highly do you value—not to say those who shake out demons from among you, not to say those who also strew prayers to the true God on your behalf, since perhaps you do not believe—but those from whom you can fear nothing?

XLIV.

44.

[1] At enim illud detrimentum rei publicae tam grande quam verum nemo circumspicit, illam iniuriam civitatis nullus expendit, cum tot iusti impendimur, cum tot innocentes erogamur.

[1] But indeed that detriment to the republic, as great as it is real, no one considers; that injury to the civic community no one weighs, when so many just are expended, when so many innocents are disbursed.

[2] Vestros enim iam contestamur actus, qui cottidie iudicandis custodiis praesidetis, qui sententiis elogia dispungitis. Tot a vobis nocentes variis criminum elogiis recensentur: quis illic sicarius, quis manticularius, quis sacrilegus aut corruptor aut lavantium praedo, quis ex illis etiam Christianus adscribitur? aut cum Christiani suo titulo offeruntur, quis ex illis etiam talis quales tot nocentes?

[2] For we now call your acts to witness, you who daily preside over the judging of those in custody, you who with your sentences strike off the docket-entries. So many guilty persons are by you enumerated under various crime headings: who there is an assassin, who a cutpurse, who a sacrilegist or a corrupter or a plunderer of bathers—who among them is also entered as a Christian? Or when Christians are presented under their own title, which of them is also such as so many guilty men?

[3] De vestris semper aestuat carcer, de vestris semper metalla suspirant, de vestris semper bestiae saginantur, de vestris semper munerarii noxiorum greges pascunt. Nemo illic Christianus, nisi plane tantum Christianus; aut, si et aliud, iam non Christianus.

[3] From among yours the prison always seethes, from among yours the mines always sigh, from among yours the beasts are always fattened, from among yours the show-sponsors pasture their herds of the guilty. No one there is a Christian, unless plainly only a Christian; or, if he is something else as well, by now he is not a Christian.

XLV.

45.

[1] Nos ergo soli innocentes! Quid mirum, si necesse est? Enimvero necesse est.

[1] We then the only innocent! What marvel, if it is necessary? Indeed, it is necessary.

Innocentiam a deo edocti et perfecte eam novimus, ut a perfecto magistro revelatam, et fideliter custodimus, ut ab incontemptibili dispectore mandatam.

Innocence, instructed by God, we also know perfectly, as revealed by a perfect Master, and we faithfully guard it, as having been mandated by an incontemptible Inspector.

[2] Vobis autem humana aestimatio innocentiam tradidit, humana item dominatio imperavit; inde nec plenae nec adeo timendae estis disciplinae ad innocentiae veritatem. Tanta est prudentia hominis ad demonstrandum bonum quanta auctoritas ad exigendum; tam illa falli facilis quam ista contemni.

[2] But to you human estimation handed down innocence, and likewise human domination commanded it; hence you are of a discipline, toward the truth of innocence, neither full nor so much to be feared. So great is man’s prudence for demonstrating the good as his authority for exacting it; the former is as easy to be deceived as the latter to be contemned.

[3] Atque adeo quid plenius, dicere: "Non occides" an docere: "Ne irascaris quidem"? Quid perfectius, prohibere adulterium an etiam ab oculorum solitaria concupiscentia arcere? Quid eruditius, de maleficio an et de maliloquio interdicere? Quid instructius, iniuriam non permittere an nec vicem iniuriae sinere?

[3] And indeed, what is fuller: to say, "You shall not kill," or to teach, "Do not even be angry"? What more perfect: to prohibit adultery, or even to ward off the solitary concupiscence of the eyes? What more erudite: to interdict malefice, or also maliloquy? What more instructive: not to permit injury, or not even to allow a return in kind for injury?

[4] Dum tamen sciatis ipsas leges quoque vestras, quae videntur ad innocentiam pergere, de divina lege ut antiquiore forma mutuatas. Diximus iam de Moysi aetate.

[4] Only, however, know that your very laws too, which seem to proceed toward innocence, have been borrowed from the divine law as from the more ancient form. We have already spoken about the age of Moses.

[5] Sed quanta auctoritas legum humanarum, cum illas et evadere homini contingat [et] plerumque in admissis delitiscenti, et aliquando contemnere ex voluntate vel necessitate deliquenti?

[5] But what authority have human laws, since it befalls a man both to evade them—and for the most part, in admitted offenses, by lying concealed—and at times to contemn them, delinquent from will or from necessity?

[6] Recogitate ea etiam pro brevitate supplicii cuiuslibet non tamen ultra mortem remansuri. Sic et Epicurus omnem cruciatum doloremque depretiat, modicum quidem contemptibilem pronuntiando, magnum vero non diuturnum.

[6] Re-cogitate these things as well, in view of the brevity of any punishment, you not, however, going to remain beyond death. Thus too Epicurus depreciates every torment and pain, pronouncing the slight indeed contemptible, but the great not long-lasting.

[7] Enimvero nos, qui sub deo omnium speculatore dispungimur quique aeternam ab eo poenam providemus, merito soli innocentiae occurrimus et pro scientiae plenitudine et pro latebrarum difficultate et pro magnitudine cruciatus, non diuturni, verum sempiterni, eum timentes, quem timere debebit et ipse, qui timentes iudicat, deum, non proconsulem timentes.

[7] Indeed, we, who are audited under God, the overseer of all, and who foresee from him eternal penalty, with good reason make for innocence alone—both because of the plenitude of knowledge and because of the difficulty of hiding-places and because of the magnitude of the cruciation, not long-lasting, but sempiternal—fearing him whom even he who judges those who fear will himself have to fear: God, fearing not the proconsul.

XLVI.

46.

[1] Constitimus, ut opinor, adversus omnium criminum intentationem, quae Christianorum sanguinem flagitat; ostendimus totum statum nostrum, et quibus modis probare possimus ita esse sicut ostendimus, ex fide scilicet et antiquitate divinarum litterarum, item ex confessione spiritualium potestatum. Qui nos revincere audebit, non arte verborum, sed eadem forma, qua probationem constituimus, de veritate?

[1] We have, as I suppose, taken our stand against the instigation of all charges which clamors for the blood of Christians; we have shown our whole state, and by what modes we can prove it to be as we have shown—namely from the faith and antiquity of the divine letters, likewise from the confession of the spiritual powers. Who will dare to refute us, not by the art of words, but by the same form in which we have constituted the proof, on the question of the truth?

[2] Sed dum unicuique manifestatur veritas nostra, interim incredulitas, dum de bono sectae huius obducitur, quod usu[i] iam et de commercio innotuit, non utique divinum negotium existimat, sed magis philosophiae genus. "Eadem", inquit, "et philosophi monent atque profitentur, innocentiam iustitiam patientiam sobrietatem pudicitiam."

[2] But while our truth is made manifest to each person, meanwhile incredulity, while a covering is drawn over the good of this sect, which has now become known by use[i] and by commerce, does not, to be sure, consider it a divine business, but rather a genus of philosophy. "The same things," he says, "the philosophers also exhort and profess—innocence, justice, patience, sobriety, chastity."

[3] Cur ergo quibus comparamur de disciplina, non proinde illis adaequamur ad licentiam impunitatemque disciplinae? vel cur et illi, ut pares nostri, non urgentur ad officia, quae nos non obeuntes periclitamur?

[3] Why, then, in regard to discipline, when we are compared with them, are we not correspondingly equated with them in the license and impunity of the discipline? Or why are they also, as our peers, not urged to the duties, which, if we do not discharge them, we are imperiled?

[4] Quis enim philosophum sacrificare aut deierare aut lucernas meridie vanas proferre compellit? Quin immo et deos vestros palam destruunt et superstitiones vestras commentariis quoque accusant laudantibus vobis. Plerique etiam in principes latrant sustinentibus vobis, et facilius statuis et salariis remunerantur quam ad bestias pronuntiantur.

[4] For who compels a philosopher to sacrifice or to swear an oath or to bring forth vain lamps at midday? Nay rather, they even openly demolish your gods and in their commentaries also accuse your superstitions, you applauding. Many even bark against the princes, you putting up with it, and they are more readily rewarded with statues and salaries than sentenced to the beasts.

[5] Sed merito; philosophi enim, non Christiani cognominantur. Nomen hoc philosophorum daemonia non fugat. Quidni?

[5] But with good reason; for they are surnamed philosophers, not Christians. This name of “philosophers” does not put daemons to flight. Why should it?

Cum secundum deos philosophi daemonas deputent. Socratis vox est: "Si daemonium permittat." Idem et cum aliquid de veritate sapiebat deos negans, Aesculapio tamen gallinaceum prosecari iam in fine iubebat, credo, ob honorem patris eius, quia Socratem Apollo sapientissimum omnium cecinit. O Apollinem inconsideratum!

Since philosophers reckon the daemons next after the gods. It is the voice of Socrates: "If the daemonion permit." And the same man, even when he savored something of truth, denying the gods, nevertheless at the very end was bidding a cock to be sacrificed to Aesculapius— I believe, in honor of his father, since Apollo sang that Socrates was the wisest of all. O inconsiderate Apollo!

Sapientiae testimonium reddidit ei viro, qui negabat deos esse.

He rendered a testimony of wisdom to that man who denied that the gods exist.

[6] In quantum odium flagrat veritas, in tantum qui eam ex fide praestat offendit; qui autem adulterat et affectat, hoc maxime nomine gratiam pangit apud insectatores veritatis.

[6] In proportion as truth blazes into hatred, to that extent he who presents it out of faith gives offense; but he who adulterates it and affects it, under this very title most of all strikes a pact for favor with the persecutors of truth.

[7] Quam illusores et corruptores inimice philosophi affectant veritatem et affectando corrumpunt, ut qui gloriam captant, Christiani et necessario appetunt et integre praestant, ut qui saluti suae curant.

[7] Which truth the scoffers and corrupters—the philosophers, inimically—affect, and by affecting they corrupt, as those who snatch at glory; whereas Christians both necessarily seek it and present it integrally, as those who care for their own salvation.

[8] Adeo neque de scientia neque de disciplina, ut putatis, aequamur. Quid enim Thales, ille princeps physicorum, sciscitanti Croeso de divinitate certum renuntiavit, commeatus deliberandi saepe frustratus?

[8] So neither in knowledge nor in discipline, as you suppose, are we equated. For what certain thing did Thales, that prince of the physicists, report back to Croesus, when he was inquiring about divinity, his leaves for deliberation often frustrated?

[9] Deum quilibet opifex Christianus et invenit et ostendit et exinde totum, quod in deum quaeritur, re quoque adsignat, licet Plato affirmet factitatorem universitatis neque inveniri facilem et inventum enarrari in omnes difficilem.

[9] Any Christian artisan both finds God and shows him, and from there also assigns in reality the whole that is sought concerning God, although Plato affirms that the fabricator of the universe is not easy to find and, once found, is difficult to enarrate to all.

[10] Ceterum si de pudicitia provocemur, lego partem sententiae Atticae, in Socratem corruptorem adolescentium pronuntiatum. Sexum nec femineum mutat Christianus. Novi et Phrynen meretricem Diogenis supra recumbentis ardore[m] subantem; audio et quendam Speusippum de Platonis schola in adulterio perisse.

[10] Moreover, if we are provoked about pudicity, I read a part of the Attic sentence: that Socrates was pronounced a corrupter of adolescents. A Christian does not change the sex, not even the feminine. I also know Phryne the courtesan quenching the ardor of Diogenes as he reclined above; I also hear that a certain Speusippus, from Plato’s school, perished in adultery.

Christianus uxori suae soli masculus nascitur.

A Christian is born a male for his own wife alone.

[11] Democritus excaecando semetipsum, quod mulieres sine concupiscentia adspicere non posset et doleret, si non esset potitus, incontinentiam emendatione profitetur. At Christianus salvis oculis feminas non videt; animo adversus libidinem caecus est.

[11] Democritus, by blinding himself—because he could not look upon women without concupiscence and would be pained if he had not been able to obtain them—professes incontinence by a corrective emendation. But the Christian, with his eyes sound, does not see women; in mind he is blind against libido.

[12] Si de probitate defendam, ecce lutulentis pedibus Diogenes superbos Platonis toros alia superbia deculcat; Christianus nec in pauperem superbit.

[12] If I defend on the score of probity, behold, with muddy feet Diogenes tramples down the proud couches of Plato by another pride; the Christian is not proud even against a poor man.

[13] Si de modestia certem, ecce Pythagoras apud Thurios, Zenon apud Prienenses tyrannidem affectant; Christianus vero nec aedilitatem.

[13] If I should contend about modesty, behold Pythagoras at Thurii, Zeno among the Prienians aspire to tyranny; the Christian, however, not even to the aedileship.

[14] Si de aequanimitate congrediar, Lycurgus apocarteresin optavit, quod leges eius Lacones emendassent; Christianus etiam damnatus gratias agit. Si de fide comparem, Anaxagoras depositum hostibus denegavit; Christianus et extra fidelis vocatur.

[14] If I should join issue on equanimity, Lycurgus opted for apocarteresis, because the Laconians had amended his laws; the Christian, even when condemned, gives thanks. If I compare on faith, Anaxagoras denied a deposit to his hosts; the Christian is called faithful even by those outside.

[15] Si de simplicitate consistam, Aristoteles familiarem suum Hermian turpiter loco excedere fecit; Christianus nec inimicum suum laedit. Idem Aristoteles tam turpiter Alexandro, regendo potius, adulatur, quam Plato a Dionysio ventris gratia venditatur.

[15] If I take my stand on simplicity, Aristotle made his familiar Hermias shamefully withdraw from his place; the Christian does not even injure his enemy. The same Aristotle so shamefully adulates Alexander, rather by governing him, as Plato is sold by Dionysius for the belly’s sake.

[16] Aristippus in purpura sub magna gravitatis superficie nepotatur, Icthy[di]as, dum civitati insidias disponit, occiditur. Hoc pro suis omni atrocitate dissipatis nemo umquam temptavit Christianus.

[16] Aristippus, in purple, carouses beneath a great surface of gravitas; Ichthy[di]as, while laying insidious plots against his city, is slain. This, with his own people scattered by every atrocity, no Christian has ever attempted.

[17] Sed dicet aliquis etiam de nostris excidere quosdam a regula disciplinae. Desinunt tamen Christiani haberi penes nos; philosophi vero illi cum talibus factis in nomine et honore sapientiae perseverant.

[17] But someone will say that even some of our own fall away from the rule of discipline. They cease, however, to be held as Christians among us; but those philosophers, with such deeds, persevere in the name and honor of wisdom.

[18] Adeo quid simile philosophus et Christianus, Graeciae discipulus et caeli, famae negotiator et vitae, verborum et factorum operator, et rerum aedificator et destructor, amicus et inimicus erroris, veritatis interpolator et integrator et expressor, et furator eius et custos?

[18] So then, what resemblance has the philosopher and the Christian, the disciple of Greece and of heaven, the broker of fame and of life, the operator of words and of deeds, and the builder and destroyer of things, the friend and enemy of error, the interpolator and integrator and expresser of truth, and its thief and its guardian?

XLVII.

47.

[1] Antiquior omnibus veritas, nisi fallor: et hoc mihi proficit antiquitas praestructa divinae litteraturae, quo facile credatur thesaurum eam fuisse posteriori cuique sapientiae. Et si non onus iam voluminis temperarem, excurrerem in hanc quoque probationem.

[1] Truth is more ancient than all things, unless I am mistaken: and this profits me—the pre-established antiquity of the divine literature—whereby it is easily believed that it was a treasure to each subsequent sapience. And if I were not now tempering the burden of the volume, I would also digress into this demonstration.

[2] Quis poetarum, quis sophistarum, qui non omnino de prophetarum fonte potaverit? Inde igitur philosophi sitim ingenii sui rigaverunt, ut quae de nostris habent, ea nos comparent illis. Inde, opinor, et a quibusdam philosophia quoque eiecta est, a Thebaeis dico et a Spartiatis et Argivis.

[2] Who of the poets, who of the sophists, has not altogether drunk from the fount of the prophets? From there, therefore, the philosophers slaked the thirst of their own ingenium, so that, in the things they have from our people, they make us comparable to them. From there, I suppose, philosophy too was even ejected by certain men—I mean by the Thebans and by the Spartans and the Argives.

[3] Dum ad nostra conantur et homines gloriae, ut diximus, et eloquentiae solius libidinosi, si quid in sanctis [scripturis] offenderunt digestis [ex] pro instituto curiositatis, ad propria opera verterunt, neque satis credentes divina esse, quo minus interpolarent, neque satis intellegentes, ut adhuc tunc subnubila, etiam ipsis Iudaeis obumbrata, quorum propria videbantur.

[3] While they strive toward our matters, both men of glory, as we have said, and those lustful for mere eloquence, if they encountered anything in the holy [scriptures], set out [ex] according to the program of curiosity, they turned it to their own works, neither believing sufficiently that they were divine, so as to refrain from interpolating, nor understanding sufficiently, inasmuch as they were as yet then somewhat-cloudy, overshadowed even to the Jews themselves, whose own they seemed.

[4] Nam et si qua simplicitas erat veritatis, eo magis scrupulositas humana fidem aspernata nutabat, per quod incertum miscuerunt etiam quod invenerant certum.

[4] For even if there was any simplicity of truth, so much the more did human scrupulosity, having spurned faith, waver, whereby they mixed the uncertain even what they had found certain.

[5] Inventum enim solummodo deum non ut invenerant disputaverunt, ut et de qualitate et de natura eius et de sede disceptent.

[5] For, having only found God, they did not discuss him as they had found him, so that they might debate both about his quality and about his nature and about his seat.

[6] Alii incorporalem adseverant, alii corporalem, ut tam Platonici quam Stoici; alii ex atomis, alii ex numeris, qua Epicurus et Pythagoras; alius ex igni, qua Heraclito visum est; et Platonici quidem curantem rerum, contra Epicurei otiosum et inexercitum et, ut ita dixerim, neminem humanis rebus;

[6] Some assert him incorporeal, others corporeal, as both the Platonists and the Stoics; some from atoms, others from numbers, as Epicurus and Pythagoras; another from fire, as it seemed to Heraclitus; and the Platonists indeed [make him] caring for affairs, whereas the Epicureans [make him] idle and unexercised and, so to say, no one with respect to human affairs;

[7] positum vero extra mundum Stoici, qui figuli modo extrinsecus torqueat molem hanc; intra mundum Platonici, qui gubernatoris exemplo intra id maneat, quod regat.

[7] placed indeed outside the world by the Stoics, who, after the fashion of a potter, from without twists this mass; within the world by the Platonists, who, after the example of a helmsman, remains within that which he rules.

[8] Sic et de ipso mundo, natus innatusve sit, decessurus mansurusve sit, variant; sic et de animae statu, quam alii divinam et aeternam, alii dissolubilem contendunt; ut quis sensit, ita et intulit aut reformavit.

[8] Thus too about the world itself, whether it is born or unbegotten, whether it will pass away or will remain, they vary; so also about the state of the soul, which some contend to be divine and eternal, others dissoluble; as each sensed, so also he introduced or reformed (it).

[9] Nec mirum, si vetus instrumentum ingenia philosophorum interverterunt. Ex horum semine etiam nostram hanc noviciolam paraturam viri quidam suis opinionibus ad philosophicas sententias adulteraverunt et de una via obliquos multos et inexplicabiles tramites sciderunt. Quod ideo suggesserim, ne cui nota varietas sectae huius in hoc quoque nos philosophis adaequare videatur et ex varietate defensionum iudicet veritatem.

[9] Nor is it a wonder, if the minds of the philosophers have overturned the Old Instrument. From their seed certain men have even adulterated this our somewhat new apparatus, with their own opinions toward philosophical tenets, and from the one way they have torn many oblique and inextricable by‑paths. Which I have suggested for this reason, lest to anyone the well-known variety of this sect should seem in this point also to make us equal to the philosophers, and he judge the truth from the variety of defenses.

[10] Expedite autem praescribimus adulteris nostris illam esse regulam veritatis, quae veniat a Christo transmissa per comites ipsius, quibus aliquanto posteriores diversi isti commentatores probabuntur.

[10] Expeditiously, however, we prescribe to our adulterators that that is the rule of truth which comes from Christ, transmitted through his companions, to whom these diverse commentators will be proved considerably posterior.

[11] Omnia adversus veritatem de ipsa veritate constructa sunt, operantibus aemulationem istam spiritibus erroris. Ab his adulteria huiusmodi salutaris disciplinae subornata, ab his quaedam etiam fabulae immissae, quae de similitudine fidem infirmarent veritatis vel eam sibi potius evincerent, ut quis ideo non putet Christianis credendum, quia nec poetis nec philosophis, vel ideo magis poetis et philosophis existimet credendum, quia non Christianis.

[11] All things against the truth are constructed from the truth itself, with spirits of error operating this emulation. By these, adulterations of the salutary discipline have been suborned; by these, too, certain fables have been introduced, which by their similitude would enfeeble the faith of the truth, or rather win it over to themselves, so that one would therefore think Christians not to be believed, because neither poets nor philosophers are, or would therefore judge poets and philosophers rather to be believed, because not Christians.

[12] Itaque ridemur praedicantes deum iudicaturum. Sic enim et poetae et philosophi tribunal apud inferos ponunt. Et gehennam si comminemur, quae est ignis arcani subterraneam ad poenam thesaurus, proinde decachinnamur.

[12] Therefore we are mocked as we proclaim that God will judge. For in the same way both poets and philosophers place a tribunal in the underworld. And if we threaten Gehenna, which is a subterranean treasury of hidden fire for punishment, we are accordingly laughed to a tenfold laugh.

Sic enim et Pyriphlegethon apud mortuos amnis est.

For thus too the Pyriphlegethon is a river among the dead.

[13] Et si paradisum nominemus, locum divinae amoenitatis recipiendis sanctorum spiritibus destinatum, maceria quadam igneae illius zonae a notitia orbis communis segregatum, Elysii campi fidem occupaverunt.

[13] And if we should name paradise, a place of divine amenity destined for receiving the spirits of the saints, fenced off by a certain wall from that fiery zone, separated from the notice of the common world, the Elysian Fields have preempted belief.

[14] Unde haec, oro vos, philosophis aut poetis tam consimilia? Non nisi de nostris sacramentis. Si de nostris sacramentis, ut de prioribus, ergo fideliora sunt nostra magisque credenda, quorum imagines quoque fidem inveniunt.

[14] Whence are these things, I pray you, so similar to the philosophers or the poets? From none but our sacraments. If from our sacraments, as from earlier ones, therefore ours are more faithful and more to be believed, whose very images also find credence.

Si de suis sensibus, iam ergo sacramenta nostra imagines posteriorum habebuntur, quod rerum forma non sustinet; numquam enim corpus umbra aut veritatem imago praecedit.

If from their own senses, now then our sacraments will be held to be images of later things, which the form of things does not sustain; for never does the body precede the shadow, nor does the image precede the truth.

XLVIII.

48.

[1] Age iam, si qui philosophus adfirmet, ut ait Laberius de sententia Pythagorae, hominem fieri ex mulo, colubram ex muliere, et in eam opinionem omnia argumenta eloquii virtute distorserit, nonne consensum movebit et fidem infiget? Etiam ab animalibus abstinendi propterea persuasum quis habeat, ne forte bubulam de aliquo proavo suo obsonet? At enim Christianus si de homine hominem ipsumque de Gaio Gaium reducem repromittat, lapidibus magis nec saltem coetibus a populo exigetur.

[1] Come now, if some philosopher should affirm, as Laberius says from the sententia of Pythagoras, that a man is made from a mule, a snake from a woman, and should, by the virtue of eloquence, twist all arguments into that opinion, will he not move consensus and implant faith? Even that one must abstain from animals for this reason someone may have been persuaded, lest perchance he serve beef from some great‑grandfather of his as a dish. But indeed if a Christian should promise back a man from a man, and Gaius himself Gaius returned, he will be driven out by the people rather with stones, and not even merely from assemblies.

[2] Si quaecumque ratio praeest animarum humanarum reciprocandarum in corpora, cur non in eandem substantiam redeant, cum hoc sit restitui: Id esse, quod fuerat? Iam non ipsae sunt, quae fuerant, quia non potuerunt esse quod non erant, nisi desinant esse quod fuerant.

[2] If whatever ratio presides over the reciprocating of human souls into bodies, why do they not return into the same substance, since this is to be restored: to be that which it had been? Already they are not themselves, who they had been, because they could not be what they were not, unless they cease to be what they had been.

[3] Multis etiam locis ex otio opus erit, si velimus ad hanc partem lascivire, quis in quam bestiam reformari videretur. Sed de nostra magis defensione, qui proponimus multo utique dignius credi hominem ex homine rediturum, quemlibet pro quolibet, dum hominem, ut eadem qualitas animae in eandem restau[ra]retur condicionem, etsi non effigiem.

[3] It would also require leisure in many places, if we should wish to wanton on this side, as to who would seem to be re-formed into what beast. But rather for our own defense, we who propose that it is much, assuredly, more worthy to be believed that a man will return from a man—anyone for anyone, so long as a man—so that the same quality of the soul might be restored into the same condition, even if not the effigy.

[4] Certe quia ratio restitutionis destinatio iudicii est, necessario idem ipse, qui fuerat, exhibebitur, ut boni seu contrarii meriti iudicium a deo referat. Ideoque repraesentabuntur et corpora, quia neque pati quicquam potest anima sola sine materia stabili, id est carne, et, quod omnino de iudicio dei pati debent animae, non sine carne meruerunt, intra quam omnia egerunt.

[4] Surely, since the rationale of restitution is the destination of judgment, necessarily the very same person who had been will be exhibited, so that he may receive from God the judgment of good or of contrary merit. And therefore the bodies too will be re-presented, because the soul alone can suffer nothing without stable matter, that is, flesh; and what the souls ought altogether to suffer from the judgment of God, they did not merit without flesh, within which they did all things.

[5] "Sed quomodo", inquis, "dissoluta materia exhiberi potest?" Considera temetipsum, o homo, et fidem rei invenies. Recogita, quid fueris antequam esses. Utique nihil; meminisses enim, si quid fuisses.

[5] "But how," you say, "can dissolved matter be exhibited?" Consider yourself, O man, and you will find the proof of the matter. Think again what you were before you existed. Surely nothing; for you would have remembered, if you had been anything.

Qui ergo nihil fueras priusquam esses, idem nihil factus cum esse desieris, cur non possis rursus esse de nihilo eiusdem ipsius auctoris voluntate, qui te voluit esse de nihilo? Quid novi tibi eveniet?

Therefore you, who were nothing before you existed, having been made the same nothing when you have ceased to be, why can you not again be from nothing by the will of that very author who willed you to be from nothing? What new thing will befall you?

[6] Qui non eras, factus es; cum iterum non eris, fies. Redde, si potes, rationem qua factus es, et tunc require, qua fies! Et tamen facilius utique fies quod fuisti aliquando, quia aeque non difficile factus es, quod numquam fuisti aliquando.

[6] You, who were not, have been made; when again you will not be, you will be made. Render, if you can, the rationale by which you were made, and then inquire by what you will be made! And yet, assuredly, you will more easily be made what you once were, since it was equally no difficult thing that you were made what you had never at any time been.

[7] Dubitabitur, credo, de dei viribus, qui tantum corpus hoc mundi de eo, quod non fuerat, non minus quam de morte vacationis et inanitatis imposuit, animatum spiritu omnium animarum animatore, signatum et ipsum humanae resurrectionis exemplum in testimonium vobis.

[7] Will one, I suppose, be in doubt about the powers of God, who set this so-great body of the world from that which had not been, no less than from the death of privation and inanity, animated by the Spirit, the animator of all souls, and marked it itself as an example of human resurrection as a testimony to you?

[8] Lux cottidie interfecta resplendet et tenebrae pari vice decedendo succedunt, sidera defuncta vivescunt, tempora ubi finiuntur incipiunt; fructus consummantur et redeunt, certe semina non nisi corrupta et dissoluta fecundius surgunt; omnia pereundo servantur, omnia de interitu reformantur.

[8] Light, daily slain, shines forth again, and darkness, in equal turn, succeeds upon the withdrawal; the stars, having passed away, come to life; seasons, where they are finished, begin; fruits are consummated and return, surely seeds rise more fecund only when corrupted and dissolved; all things, by perishing, are preserved, all things are re-formed from destruction.

[9] Tu homo, tantum nomen, si intellegas te, vel de titulo Pythiae discens, dominus omnium morientium et resurgentium, ad hoc morieris, ut pereas? Ubicumque resolutus fueris, quaecumque te materia destruxerit, hauserit, aboleverit, in nihilum prodegerit, reddet te. Eius est nihilum ipsum, cuius et totum.

[9] You, man—so great a name—if you understand yourself, or learning even from the Pythia’s inscription, lord of all who are dying and who rise again, do you die for this end, that you may perish? Wherever you may have been dissolved, whatever matter shall have destroyed you, swallowed you up, abolished you, reduced you to nothing, will give you back. Nothingness itself is his, whose is also the whole.

[10] "Ergo", inquitis, "semper moriendum erit et semper resurgendum?" Si ita rerum dominus destinasset, ingratis experireris conditionis tuae legem. At nunc non aliter destinavit quam praedicavit.

[10] "Therefore," you say, "must there always be dying and always rising again?" If the lord of things had destined it thus, against your will you would experience the law of your condition. But as it is, he has not destined otherwise than he has proclaimed.

[11] Quae ratio universitatem ex diversitate composuit, ut omnia aemulis substantiis sub unitate constarent, ex vacuo et solido, ex animali et inanimali, ex comprehensibili et incomprehensibili, ex luce et tenebris, ex ipsa vita et morte, eadem aevum quoque ita destinata distincta conditione conseruit, ut prima haec pars, ab exordio rerum quam incolimus, temporali aetate ad finem defluat, sequens vero, quam expectamus, in infinitam aeternitatem propagetur.

[11] The same reason which composed the universe out of diversity, so that all things might stand together under unity with rival substances—out of the void and the solid, the animate and the inanimate, the comprehensible and the incomprehensible, light and darkness, life itself and death—has likewise preserved the aeon by a condition destined and distinguished, such that this first part, from the beginning of things which we inhabit, flows down to an end in temporal age, while the following, which we await, is propagated into infinite eternity.

[12] Cum ergo finis et limes, medius qui interhiat, adfuerit, ut etiam ipsius mundi species transferatur aeque temporalis, quae illi dispositioni aeternitatis aulaei vice oppansa est, tunc restituetur omne humanum genus ad expungendum, quod in isto aevo boni seu mali meruit, et exinde pendendum in immensam aeternitatis perpetuitatem.

[12] When, therefore, the end and the boundary—the middle interval that yawns between—shall have arrived, so that even the appearance of the world itself, likewise temporal, which has been hung in front of that disposition of eternity in the stead of a stage-curtain, be transferred, then the whole human race will be restored for the expunging of what in this age it has merited of good or of ill, and thereafter to be suspended into the immense perpetuity of eternity.

[13] Ideoque nec mors iam, nec rursus ac rursus resurrectio, sed erimus idem qui nunc, nec alii post, dei quidem cultores apud deum semper, superinduti substantia propria aeternitatis; profani vero et qui non integre ad deum, in poena aeque iugis ignis, habentes ex ipsa natura eius divina[m] scilicet, subministrationem incorruptibilitatis.

[13] And so neither death now, nor again and again a resurrection, but we shall be the same as we are now, and not others thereafter—worshipers of God indeed with God always, over-clothed with the proper substance of eternity; but the profane, and those who have not integrally unto God, will be in the penalty of likewise perpetual fire, receiving from its very nature—namely, divine—the subministration of incorruptibility.

[14] Noverunt et philosophi diversitatem arcani et publici ignis. Ita longe alius est, qui usui humano, alius qui iudicio dei apparet, sive de caelo fulmina stringens, sive de terra per vertices montium eructans; non enim absumit quod exurit, sed dum erogat, reparat.

[14] Philosophers also know the diversity of arcane and public fire. Thus far different is the one which is for human use, the other which appears for the judgment of God, whether drawing down lightning from heaven, or belching forth from the earth through the summits of mountains; for it does not consume what it burns, but while it disburses, it restores.

[15] Adeo manent montes semper ardentes, et qui de caelo tangitur, salvus est, ut nullo iam igni decinerescat. Et hoc erit testimonium ignis aeterni, hoc exemplum iugis iudicii poenam nutrientis: Montes uruntur et durant. Quid nocentes et dei hostes?

[15] To such a degree the mountains remain ever burning, and that which is touched from heaven is safe, so that by no fire does it turn to ashes. And this will be testimony of the eternal fire, this an example of a perpetual judgment nourishing the punishment: Mountains are burned and endure. What of the guilty and the enemies of God?

XLIX.

49.

[1] Hae sunt, quae in nobis solis praesumptiones vocantur, in philosophis et poetis summae scientiae et insignia ingenia. Illi prudentes, nos inepti; illi honorandi, nos irridendi, immo eo amplius et puniendi.

[1] These are the things which in us alone are called presumptions; in philosophers and poets, the highest science and distinguished geniuses. They are prudent, we inept; they are to be honored, we to be mocked—nay, so much the more, even to be punished.

[2] Falsa nunc sint quae tuentur et merito praesumptio, attamen necessaria; inepta, attamen utilia, siquidem meliores fieri coguntur qui eis credunt, metu aeterni supplicii et spe aeterni refrigerii. Itaque non expedit falsa dici nec inepta haberi quae expedit vera praesumi. Nullo titulo damnari licet omnino quae prosunt.

[2] Granted that the things which they uphold are now false and, with good reason, a presumption, nevertheless necessary; inept, yet useful, since those who believe them are compelled to become better by fear of eternal punishment and hope of eternal refreshment. Therefore it is not expedient that they be called false nor held inept which it is expedient to be presumed true. On no pretext is it at all permitted that things which are beneficial be condemned.

In vobis itaque praesumptio est haec ipsa, quae damnat utilia. Proinde nec inepta esse possunt.

In you, therefore, the presumption is this very thing, which condemns the useful; accordingly, they cannot be inept.

[3] Certe, etsi falsa et inepta, nulli tamen noxia. Nam et multis aliis similia, quibus nullas poenas inrogatis, vanis et fabulosis, inaccusatis et impunitis, ut innoxiis. Sed in eiusmodi enim, si utique, inrisui iudicandum est, non gladiis et ignibus et crucibus et bestiis.

[3] Certainly, even if false and inept, yet noxious to no one. For there are, besides, many similar things, upon which you inflict no penalties—vain and fabulous, unaccused and unpunished, as being innoxious. But in matters of this sort, if at all, they should be adjudged to derision, not to swords and fires and crosses and beasts.

[4] De qua iniquitate saevitiae non modo caecum hoc vulgus exsultat et insultat, sed et quidam vestrum, quibus favor vulgi de iniquitate captatur, gloriantur; quasi non totum, quod in nos potestis, nostrum sit arbitrium.

[4] Over this iniquity of savagery not only does this blind mob exult and insult, but even certain among you, by whom the favor of the crowd is captured through iniquity, glory;
as though not the whole of what you are able against us were at our discretion.

[5] Certe, si velim, Christianus sum. Tunc ergo me damnabis, si damnari velim. Cum vero quod in me potes, nisi velim, non potes, iam meae voluntatis est quod potes, non tuae potestatis.

[5] Certainly, if I should wish, I am a Christian. Then therefore you will condemn me, if I should wish to be condemned. But since what you can do to me you cannot do unless I am willing, then what you can do is of my will, not of your power.

Proinde et vulgus vane de nostra vexatione gaudet.

Accordingly even the vulgar crowd vainly rejoices over our vexation.

[6] Proinde enim nostrum est gaudium, quod sibi vindicat, qui malumus damnari quam a deo excidere. Contra illi, qui nos oderunt, dolere, non gaudere debebant, consecutis nobis quod elegimus.

[6] Accordingly the joy is ours—which he claims for himself—we who would rather be condemned than fall away from God. Conversely, those who hate us ought to sorrow, not to rejoice, since we have attained what we chose.

50.

[1] "Ergo", inquitis, "cur querimini, quod vos insequamur, si pati vultis, cum diligere debeatis per quos patimini quod vultis?" Plane volumus pati, verum eo more, quo et bellum miles. Nemo quidem libens patitur, cum et trepidare et periclitari sit necesse;

[1] "Therefore," you say, "why do you complain that we pursue you, if you wish to suffer, since you ought to love those by whom you suffer what you wish?" Clearly we wish to suffer, but in that manner in which the soldier does war as well. No one indeed suffers gladly, since it is necessary both to tremble and to be in peril;

[2] tamen et proeliatur omnibus viribus et vincens in proelio gaudet qui de proelio querebatur, quia et gloriam consequitur et praedam. Proelium est nobis, quod provocamur ad tribunalia, ut illic sub discrimine capitis pro veritate certemus. Victoria est autem, pro quo certaveris, obtinere.

[2] yet he also fights with all his forces, and, conquering in the battle, he who was complaining of the battle rejoices, because he attains both glory and booty. The battle for us is that we are summoned to the tribunals, so that there under capital jeopardy we may contend for the truth. Victory, however, is to obtain that for which you have contended.

Ea victoria habet et gloriam placendi deo et praedam vivendi in aeternum.

That victory has both the glory of pleasing God and the booty of living for ever.

[3] Sed obducimur. Certe, cum obtinuimus. Ergo vicimus, cum occidimur, denique evadimus, cum obducimur.

[3] But we are led off. Granted, when we have prevailed. Therefore we have conquered when we are killed; finally, we escape when we are led off.

Licet nunc sarmenticios et semaxios appelletis, quia ad stipitem dimidii axis revincti sarmentorum ambitu exurimur, hic est habitus victoriae nostrae, haec palmata vestis, tali curru triumphamus.

Though now you may call us “brushwood-men” and “half-axle ones,” because, bound to a stake of a half-axle, we are burned by the encircling of brushwood, this is the garb of our victory, this the palm-bearing vestment; in such a chariot we triumph.

[4] Merito itaque victis non placemus; propterea enim desperati et perditi existimamur. Sed haec desperatio atque perditio penes vos in causa gloriae et famae vexillum virtutis extollunt.

[4] Therefore, with good reason we do not please the vanquished; for on that account we are reckoned desperate and lost. But this desperation and perdition, among you, in the cause of glory and fame, raise aloft the banner of virtue.

[5] Mucius dexteram suam libens in ara reliquit: O sublimitas animi! Empedocles totum sese [Atheniensium] Aetnaeis incendiis donavit: O vigor mentis! Aliqua Carthaginis conditrix rogo [se] secundum matrimonium dedit: O praeconium castitatis!

[5] Mucius willingly left his right hand on the altar: O sublimity of spirit! Empedocles gave his whole self to the Aetnaean conflagrations [of the Athenians]: O vigor of mind! A certain foundress of Carthage gave [herself] to the pyre on account of a second marriage: O proclamation of chastity!

[6] Regulus, ne unus pro multis hostibus viveret, toto corpore cruces patitur: O virum fortem et in captivitate victorem! Anaxarchus cum in exitum ptisanae pilo contunderetur: "Tunde, tunde", aiebat, "Anaxarchi follem; Anaxarchum enim non tundis!" O philosophi magnanimitatem, qui de tali exitu suo etiam iocabatur!

[6] Regulus, lest one man should live in place of many enemies, suffers torments with his whole body: O brave man and, in captivity, a victor! Anaxarchus, when he was being pounded with a pestle into ptisane to his death, said: "Pound, pound the bag of Anaxarchus; for you are not pounding Anaxarchus!" O the magnanimity of the philosopher, who even joked about such an end of his own!

[7] Omitto eos, qui cum gladio proprio vel alio genere mortis mitiore de laude pepigerunt. Ecce enim et tormentorum certamina coronantur a vobis.

[7] I pass over those who, with their own sword or with another, milder kind of death, have struck a bargain for praise. Behold, for even the contests of torments are crowned by you.

[8] Attica meretrix carnifice iam fatigato postremo linguam suam comesam in faciem tyranni saevientis exspellit, ut exspueret et vocem, ne coniuratos confiteri posset, si etiam victa voluisset.

[8] An Attic courtesan, with the executioner already wearied, at last, having chewed her own tongue, expelled it into the face of the raging tyrant, so that she might spit out even her voice, lest she be able to confess the conspirators, even if, overcome, she had wished to.

[9] Zeno Eleates consultus a Dionysio, quidnam philosophia praestaret, cum respondisset: "Contemptum mortis", impassibilis flagellis tyranni obiectus sententiam suam ad mortem usque signabat. Certe Laconum flagella sub oculis etiam hortantium propinquorum acerbata tantum honorem tolerantiae domui conferunt, quantum sanguinis fuderint.

[9] Zeno the Eleatic, when consulted by Dionysius as to what, pray, philosophy might provide, when he had answered: "Contempt of death," remained impassible, when exposed to the tyrant’s scourges, sealing his opinion even unto death. Surely the Laconian scourges, made the harsher under the eyes even of kinsmen encouraging them, confer upon the house as much honor of endurance as the amount of blood they have poured out.

[10] O gloriam licitam, quia humanam, cui nec praesumptio perdita nec persuasio desperata reputatur in contemptu mortis et atrocitatis omnimodae, cui tantum pro patria, pro imperio, pro amicitia pati permissum est, quantum pro deo non licet!

[10] O licit glory, because human, for which neither ruined presumption nor desperate persuasion is reckoned in the contempt of death and atrocity of every kind, for which it has been permitted to suffer so much for fatherland, for empire, for friendship, as much as for God it is not licit!

[11] Et tamen illis omnibus et statuas defunditis et imagines inscribitis et titulos inciditis in aeternitatem. Quantum de monumentis potestis scilicet, praestatis et ipsi quodammodo mortuis resurrectionem. Hanc qui veram a deo sperat, si pro deo patiatur, insanus est!

[11] And yet to all those you both cast statues and inscribe images and incise titles into eternity. As much as you can by means of monuments, of course, you furnish even to the dead themselves, in a certain manner, a resurrection. He who hopes for this true one from God, if he suffers for God, is insane!

[12] Sed hoc agite, boni praesides, meliores multo apud populum, si illis Christianos immolaveritis, cruciate, torquete, damnate, atterite nos: probatio est enim innocentiae nostrae iniquitas vestra. Ideo nos haec pati deus patitur. Nam et proxime ad lenonem damnando Christianam potius quam ad leonem, confessi estis labem pudicitiae apud nos atrociorem omni poena et omni morte reputari.

[12] But do this, good magistrates, much the better in the eyes of the people, if you immolate Christians to them; torture, rack, condemn, crush us: for your iniquity is a proof of our innocence. For this cause God allows us to suffer these things. For even most recently, by condemning a Christian woman to the pimp rather than to the lion, you have confessed that the stain upon pudicity is reputed among us more atrocious than every punishment and every death.

[13] Nec quicquam tamen proficit exquisitior quaeque crudelitas vestra; illecebra est magis sectae. Plures efficimur, quotiens metimur a vobis: semen est sanguis Christianorum.

[13] Nor yet does your every more exquisite cruelty accomplish anything; it is rather an allurement of the sect. We become more numerous whenever we are mown down by you: the blood of Christians is seed.

[14] Multi apud vos ad tolerantiam doloris et mortis hortantur, ut Cicero in Tusculanis, ut Seneca in Fortuitis, ut Diogenes, ut Pyrrhon, ut Callinicus; nec tamen tantos inveniunt verba discipulos, quantos Christiani factis docendo.

[14] Many among you exhort to the tolerance of pain and death—like Cicero in the Tusculans, like Seneca in the Fortuitous, like Diogenes, like Pyrrhon, like Callinicus; and yet words do not find as many disciples as Christians do by teaching through deeds.

[15] Illa ipsa obstinatio, quam exprobratis, magistra est. Quis enim non contemplatione eius concutitur ad requirendum, quid intus in re sit? Quis non, ubi requisivit, accedit, ubi accessit, pati exoptat, ut totam dei gratiam redimat, ut omnem veniam ab eo compensatione sanguinis sui expediat?

[15] That very obstinacy, which you reproach, is a teacher. For who is not by its contemplation shaken to inquire what is within the matter? Who is there who, once he has inquired, does not accede; and once he has acceded, does not long to suffer, so that he may redeem the whole grace of God, so that he may obtain all pardon from him by the compensation of his own blood?

[16] Omnia enim huic operi delicta donantur. Inde est, quod ibidem sententiis vestris gratias agimus. Ut est aemulatio divinae rei et humanae, cum damnamur a vobis, a deo absolvimur.

[16] For to this work all delicts are remitted. Hence it is that there, in the same place, we give thanks for your sentences. Such is the emulation of the divine thing and the human: when we are condemned by you, we are absolved by God.