On the Government of God

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.37-65.

Preface and Book 1

Preface, to Salonius : That the salutary purpose of the present work

should atone for its lack of the vain adornments of rhetoric

Book I : The government of God proved by the general conviction of

mankind, and by his judgment recounted in the books of Moses

1. On the general belief in God's government.

2. That good Christians cannot be wretched.

3. Of the infirmities of the saints.

4. God's guidance and judgments of the world.

5. On the meaning of prayer.

6. The earliest instances of God's judgment.

7. God's judgment shown in the Flood.

8. The examples of Abraham, of Sodom and Gomorrah.

9. The Exodus.

10. Man's ingratitude for his present blessings.

11. Examples of God's mercy and of his severity.

12. God's judgments of the Hebrews.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

T

O THE HOLY BISHOP SALONIUS,

S

ALVIAN SENDS GREETINGS IN THE

L

ORD

Practically all men who have chosen some form of literary composition as a

fitting expression of their native genius have taken especial pains, whether

they were writing of useful and worthy matters, or of useless and unworthy, to

lighten the order of their discourse by the brilliance of their language and to

illumine by their style the questions under discussion. It is to style therefore

that the majority of writers on secular topics, whether in prose or verse, have

paid most attention, not considering sufficiently the necessity of choosing

subjects worthy of approbation, provided that whatever they said was either

chanted in smooth and elegant verse, or narrated in distinguished prose.

These authors have sought their own ends, and looking toward their individual

praise rather than the benefit of others have not tried to be considered

salutary and helpful, but rhetorical and eloquent. Therefore their writings are

swollen with vanity, infamous for their falsehood, smeared with filth, or

vicious because of their obscene subjects. Trafficking in such unworthy fashion

to purchase praise for ingenuity seems to me less a glorification than a

condemnation of one's genius. Since we, on the other hand, are lovers of deeds

rather than words,

we seek utility rather than

applause.

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It is not, then, for vain and worldly adornments that we solicit praise, but

for salutary prescriptions. Our writings, trifling though they are, shall

present no vain lures but actual remedies, calculated not to please idle ears

but to benefit the minds of the sick. So do we hope to gain our full reward from

heaven.

Now if this healing grace of ours cures the unfavorable opinion of our God

held by certain men, it will be no small reward that I have thus aided many. But

if no such benefit accrues, the very fact that I have tried to be of service may

not be unfruitful. For a mind devoted to a good work and a charitable aim,

though it has not achieved full success in its undertaking, is still rewarded

for its good intent. At this point then I shall begin.

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THE FIRST BOOK

By certain men God is

said to be careless and neglectful of human actions, on the ground that he

neither protects good men nor restrains the wicked; and they claim that this is

why at the present time the good are generally wretched and the wicked happy.

Since we are dealing with Christians the Holy Scriptures alone should be

sufficient to refute this charge. The many who are still somewhat infected by

pagan unbelief may perhaps be convinced by the testimony of the greatest pagan

philosophers. Let us, then, prove that not even these men had any conception of

a God careless and neglectful of the world, though they had no means of really

knowing God, since they were outside the true faith and were ignorant of the law

through which he is apprehended.

Pythagoras the philosopher, whom Philosophy herself regarded as her master,

said in his discourse on the nature and beneficent works of God: "The Soul

moves to and fro and is diffused through all parts of the world, and from it all

living creatures receive their life..."

How then can God be said to neglect the world for which he so far shows his

love that he extends his own being through its whole mass? Plato and all the

Platonic school confess that God is the controller of all things. The Stoics

testify that he remains always as steersman within that which he guides. What

truer or more religious conception could they have had of the loving care of God

than this comparison with a helmsman? For they clearly understood that as the

helmsman never takes his hand from the tiller, so God

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never in the slightest degree withdraws his care from the world; and as the

pilot catching the breezes, avoiding rocks, watching the stars, is completely

absorbed, body and soul, in his task, so our God never turns his most gracious

eyes from the whole extent of the world, nor takes away the guiding power of his

providence, nor removes the indulgence of his most kindly love. Whence comes

also that ancient mystic saying by which Maro wished to prove himself no less

philosopher than poet: "For God makes his way through all lands and the

paths of the sea and the high heavens."

Tully

also says: "Nor indeed can God himself, who is known by us, be known in any

other way than as a mind loosed and free and separated from all mortal matter,

understanding all things and moving them."

Elsewhere he states that nothing is more immediately present than God;

by him the world is necessarily ruled. God, therefore, is neither subject nor

obedient to any natural force; he himself rules all nature. Unless forsooth we

are led by our great wisdom to believe that he, by whom we say all things are

ruled, at the same time both rules and neglects them! Since even men outside our

faith have been compelled by sheer necessity to say that all things are known by

God and are moved and ruled by him, how is it that some now think him careless

and neglectful of the world? Is it not he who comprehends all creation by the

fineness of his perception, moves it by his strength, rules it by his power, and

protects it by his kindness?

I have told you what men preeminent alike in philosophy and eloquence have

thought of the majesty and government of the most high God. Moreover, I have

cited the noblest masters of both these supreme arts expressly to facilitate my

proof that all others have either agreed, or, if they have disagreed, have done

so without any authority. And, in fact, I can find none who have differed from

this

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judgment, except for the

delirious ravings of the Epicureans and certain of their imitators.

These last have associated God with carelessness and sloth, just as they have

linked pleasure with virtue ---- so it appears that those who entertain this

idea are likely to follow the vices of the Epicureans along with their opinion

and doctrine.

I do not think that

we need also use the divine word to prove so obvious a case, especially since

the sacred writings furnish such abundant and open refutation of all the claims

of ungodly men that, in meeting those of their vile charges which follow, we

shall be able to refute more fully those already mentioned. They say that God

neglects us entirely, since he neither restrains the wicked nor protects the

good, and therefore in this world the condition of the better men is

substantially the worse. They contrast the poverty of good men with the wealth

of the wicked, their weakness with the strength of the wicked, their constant

grief with the others' perpetual joy, their misery and mean estate with the

honors and prosperity of sinners.

I wish at the outset to ask those who mourn this state of affairs, or base

their accusations on it, this one question: is their grief for the saints, that

is, the true and faithful Christians, or for the false impostors? If for the

false, it is a needless grief that mourns for the unhappiness of the wicked,

since, to be sure, all evil men are made worse by success in their undertakings,

and rejoice at the lucky turn of their folly. Yet they ought to be most wretched

in order that they may cease to be wicked, that they may cease to apply the name

of religion to their most evil gains and to bestow the title of sanctity on

their sordid traffickings; in such a case, indeed, a comparison of the

misfortunes of sinners with their misdeeds

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shows that they are less unfortunate than they deserve, for the utmost

misfortunes they can suffer leave them still less wretched than they are wicked.

It is foolish to grieve for their lack of wealth and happiness. Far less should

we lament in the case of the saints, for however unhappy they may seem to men

who do not understand their condition, it is impossible for them to be otherwise

than happy. Moreover, it is superfluous to think them wretched because of

sickness or poverty or any like misfortune, in the midst of which they count

themselves happy; for no man is wretched because of other men's judgment, but

only in his own.

So those who are truly happy in their own estimation cannot be unhappy

through the false conception of any man; for none, I think, are more fortunate

than those who live and act according to their own determination and vows.

Religious men are lowly ----they wish to be so; poor ---- they delight in

poverty; without ambition---- they spurn it; unesteemed ---- they flee from

honors; they mourn ---- but they seek out occasion for mourning; they are weak

----nay, they rejoice in weakness. For the apostle said, "When I am weak,

then am I strong."

Nor was this opinion held

undeservedly by the man to whom God himself spoke thus: "My grace is

sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness."

It is useless for us to bemoan this affliction of bodily illness, which we

know is the mother of strength. Therefore, whatever their sorrows may have been,

any who are truly religious should be called happy, since amid any hardships or

difficulties whatsoever none are happier than those who are what they wish to

be. Although we all know individuals whose aims are vile and shameful, who think

themselves happy in gaining their desires, yet in actual fact such men are not

happy, because they ought not to desire what

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they do. Moreover, the religious are happier than all others in this, that they

have what they wish and at the same time cannot possibly wish for anything

better than they have.

So toil, fasting, poverty,

humility and weakness are not burdensome to all who suffer them but only to

those who are unwilling to bear them. For the mind of the sufferer determines

whether his troubles are heavy or light to endure. Just as no task is so light

that it is not heavy to the man who performs it unwillingly, none is so heavy

that it does not seem light to him who performs it gladly.

Or are we perhaps to think that it was a burden to those ancient patterns of

virtue, the Fabii, Fabricii and Cincinnati, that they, who did not wish riches,

were poor?

Remember that they directed all their

efforts, all their labor, to the common good, and by their individual poverty

contributed to the growing wealth of the state. Surely you do not think that it

was with groans and sadness that they endured their famous life of rustic

economy, when they ate their cheap country fare before the very fire over which

they had cooked it, and delayed even this poor meal until evening? Did they take

it ill that they were not piling up talents of gold in the pursuit of miserly

wealth, when they were passing laws to restrict the circulation even of silver?

Could men who judged a patrician unworthy of the senate because he had wished to

increase his wealth

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to the sum of

ten pounds of silver possibly think it a penalty for their illicit greed that

they had not their purses stuffed with gold?

In those days, I think, men did not despise humble ways of life, when they

wore only one short and shaggy garment, when they were summoned from the plow to

the dictator's

fasces,

and, on the point of winning fame in the consular

robes, very likely wiped off their dusty sweat on those same imperial togas that

they were about to don. In their time the magistrates were poor, but the state

wealthy, whereas now the wealth of officials makes the state poor. What madness,

I ask you, or what blindness, leads men to think that private fortunes can

survive in the midst of the need and beggary of the state? Such were the ancient

Romans; so they in their day scorned riches, though they knew not God, just as

in ours men who follow the Lord still scorn them.

But why do I speak of those men who in their desire to extend the Roman power

turned their scorn of private means to the public enrichment, and while

individually poor still had abundance in the common wealth of the state? Even

Greek philosophers without any interest in public gain, through sheer greed of

glory have been known to strip themselves of almost all articles of common use,

and, not content with this, have exalted their creed to the lofty pinnacle of

contempt of suffering and death, saying that even in chains and punishment a

wise man still is happy.

They would have it that

the power of virtue is so great that a good man can never fail to be content.

If, then, certain wise men now think that those men were not unhappy, though

they received no reward for their efforts but transient praise, how much more

must religious and saintly men cease to be thought wretched, who both enjoy at

this present time

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the delights of

their faith, and are to attain as well the reward of eternal blessedness?

One of those of whom

we complain said to a certain holy man who followed the true doctrine, that is,

that God rules all things and tempers his governance and guidance according to

his knowledge of human necessities: "Why then, I ask, are you yourself

infirm?" His line of reasoning, I suppose, was as follows: "if God, as

you think, rules everything in this present life, if he dispenses all fortunes,

then how is it that a man whom I know to be a sinner is strong and healthy,

whereas you, whose sanctity I do not question, are infirm?"

Who does not marvel at the depth of feeling of one who considers the merits

and virtues of a godly man worthy of such great recompense that he thinks they

should be rewarded in this present life by the fleshly strength of the body? I

answer, therefore, not in the name of any one saint but of them all: "Do

you ask, then, whoever you are, how it is that holy men come to be weak? My

answer is brief: they make themselves infirm for the express reason that if they

are strong, they can hardly be holy."

I

think that men gain strength entirely through their food and drink, and are weak

through abstinence, thirst and fasting. Therefore it is not strange that those

are weak who scorn the use of the means by which others are made strong. And

there is good reason for such scorn, according to the words of the apostle Paul,

when he said: "I keep under my body and bring it into subjection; lest that

by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a

castaway."

If the apostle himself

considered the weakness of the body an end to be sought, who acts wisely in

avoiding it? If the apostle feared the strength of the flesh, who rightly

presumes to

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be strong? This, then,

is the reason why men who have given themselves over to Christ both are and wish

to be weak. Far be it from us to think that holy men are neglected by God for

the very reason for which, we trust, they are the more loved by him. We read

that the apostle Timothy was most weak in the flesh.

Was this a sign of God's neglect, or did Timothy through his weakness fail to

please Christ, willing as he was to be weak in order to please him? Even so the

apostle Paul, though Timothy was suffering from serious infirmities, yet

permitted him to take and sip only a very little wine; that is, he wished him to

have regard for his weakness but not so far as to attain full vigor.

And why was this? What other reason could there be but that which he himself has

given? "For the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against

the flesh; and these are contrary," he says, "the one to the other, so

that ye cannot do the things that ye would."

It was not without insight that a certain author

said in this connection that if the strength of the body prevents us from

doing what we wish, the flesh must be weakened in order that we may achieve our

desires. For he says: "The weakness of our flesh sharpens the vigor of the

mind, and when our limbs are weakened bodily strength is transformed into

spiritual virtue. Then our inmost parts no longer seethe with disgraceful

passions, and secret desires no longer kindle a diseased mind; our senses do not

roam wantonly over various enticements, but the soul alone exults, rejoicing in

the weakness of the body as over a defeated adversary."

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This, as I said, is the cause to which religious men ascribe their

infirmities, and you, I think, can no longer deny its validity.

But perhaps they

have, you say, other and greater sufferings, that is, they endure many hard and

bitter trials in this life; they arc captured, tortured and butchered. That is

true, but what are we to make of the fact that the prophets were led away into

captivity and that the apostles also suffered torments? Surely we cannot doubt

that God had the greatest concern for them, since it was for God that they bore

these afflictions. But perhaps you claim this as an additional proof that God

neglects everything that happens in this life and reserves his whole care for

the judgment to come, since the good have always suffered, as the wicked have

performed, all things evil. This idea does not seem to be that of an unbeliever,

especially as it admits the future judgment of God. But we say that the human

race is to be judged by Christ, while yet maintaining that now also God rules

and ordains all things in accordance with his reason. While we declare that he

will judge in the future, we also teach that he always has judged us in this

life. As God always governs, so too he always judges, for his government is

itself judgment.

In how many ways do you wish this proved, by reason, or by examples, or by

authorities? If you wish it proved by reason, who is so lacking in ordinary

human intelligence and so utterly averse to the truth of which we speak, that he

does not recognize and see that the surpassing beauty of the created world, the

inestimable grandeur of the heavens above and of the regions below are ruled by

the same power that created them? He who devised their elements will himself be

their governor. He will guide all things by a providence and reason consistent

with the majestic power by which he founded them. And certainly, since even in

those matters that are conducted by human activity, absolutely nothing exists

without reason, and all things derive their security from providence, even as

the body derives its life from the soul; so in this world not only

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empires and provinces, civil and military affairs, but also the lesser offices

and private homes, the very sheep and the smaller sorts of domestic animals are

controlled by no other means than human ordinance and wisdom, as by a guiding

hand on the tiller. All this beyond a doubt is in accordance with the will and

judgment of the most high God, that the whole human race should govern the

lesser parts, or limbs of the world, following the example of God's government

of the whole body of the universe.

But, you suggest, in the beginning the governance of his creatures was so

determined and arranged by God; yet after he had formed and perfected the whole

scheme of things, he abdicated, and renounced the administration of earthly

matters. I suppose you mean to imply that he fled from the idea of toil and

repudiated it, that he sought to avoid the annoyance of constant effort. Or was

it that, occupied with other business, he abandoned a part of his affairs, since

he could not attend to the whole?

God then puts far

from himself, you say, all thought of mortal men. In that case what rational

ground is there for our belief in his divinity? What reason is there for

worshipping Christ, or what hope of winning his favor? For if God in this life

neglects the human race, why do we daily stretch out our hands toward heaven?

Why do we pray so often for the mercy of God? Why do we hasten to the churches?

Why kneel in prayer before the altars? There is no reason for praying if the

hope of an answer to prayer is taken from us. You see what vain folly lies in

the urging of this idea; truly, if it is accepted, nothing at all remains of our

religion. But perhaps you take refuge in the argument that we honor God in the

fear of a future judgment, and perform all the ritual of our daily worship to

gain absolution on the judgment day hereafter. In that case, what was the

meaning of the daily preaching of Paul the apostle in the church, and his

command that we offer constantly to God our prayers, our entreaties, our

requests and our thanksgivings?

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What is the purpose of all this? What else than, as he himself says,

"that we may live a quiet and peaceable life in all chastity?"

For our present needs, as we see, he orders us to pray and beseech the Lord.

Surely he would not command this if he were not sure that God hearkens to

prayer. How can any one suppose that the ears of God are open for the granting

of boons at some future time, but deaf and blocked against immediate petitions?

Or what leads us when praying in the church to ask God for present safety, if we

think that he does not listen at all to our prayers? In that case we should make

no vows for our safety and prosperity.

Perhaps, to the end that the modesty of the request may win favor for the

voice of the petitioner, we should rather pray thus: "Lord, we do not seek

prosperity in this life, nor beseech you for immediate favors, for we know that

your ears are closed to such petitions and that you do not listen to such

prayers, but we ask only for those favors that shall be granted us after our

death."

Granted that such a petition is not without value, on what rational basis

does it rest? For if God is without interest in this life, and closes his ears

to the prayers of his suppliants, then doubtless he who does not hear our

present pleas is deaf also to our prayers for the future. Are we to believe that

Christ listens or denies his attention according to the diverse nature of our

prayers, that lie closes his ears when we ask for present boons, and opens them

when we ask for blessings to come? But enough of this. The arguments are so

stupid and frivolous that one needs to beware lest what is said for the honor of

God seem injurious to him. For so great and terrible is the reverence due to his

sacred majesty that we should not only shudder at the arguments of our

opponents, but should also make our defence of religion with due fear and

circumspection.

If, therefore, it is stupid and impious to believe that the divine love

despises the care of human affairs, then God does not despise

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it; moreover, if he does not scorn it, he governs; if he governs, he judges by

the very exercise of his government, since there can be no rule without the

constant exercise of judgment on the part of the ruler.

Perhaps some one may

think a proof too insecure that rests on reason alone without the support of

authority. Let us see how God has ruled the world from the beginning; for by

demonstrating that he has always ruled the universe, we shall prove that he has

at the same time exercised judgment.

What is the testimony of the Scriptures? "Therefore God formed man of

clay and breathed into him the breath of life." And what followed? "

He placed him in a paradise of pleasure."

What next? What else than that he gave him law, filled him with his commands,

formed him by his instruction? But what happened then? Man transgressed the

sacred ordinance, underwent judgment, lost paradise and suffered the penalty of

damnation. Who can fail to see God as both governor and judge in this whole

account? For he placed Adam in paradise in innocence; he expelled him in guilt.

In Adam's establishment we see the divine ordinance; in his expulsion, the

divine judgment. For when God set man in a place of delight, he ordained his way

of life; but when he expelled him in guilt from that realm, he exercised

judgment. This then is the story of the first man, that is, of the father.

What of the second, the son? "In process of time it came to pass,"

say the Holy Scriptures, "that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an

offering unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock

and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering:

but unto Cain and his offering he had not respect."

Before I speak of the more obvious judgment of God, I think that even in the

account just given there is a certain indication of

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judgment; for in the act of receiving one brother's sacrifice and rejecting the

other God gave a most open verdict as to the justice of the one and the

injustice of the other. But this was not enough. Thereafter Cain paved the way

for his later crimes by leading his brother into the wilderness; in the friendly

protection of the desert he committed his murder. He proved himself at once the

most wicked and most stupid of men, since he thought he had sufficient secrecy

for the most evil and abhorrent act if he avoided the sight of men when about to

commit fratricide with God as his witness.

Whence I think he had this same idea that is now so prevalent, that God does

not behold things done on earth and does not see any of the acts of wicked men.

Nor is there any doubt of this, since, when he was admitted to speech with God

after the commission of his crime, he answered that he knew nothing of his

brother's death. He was so sure of God's ignorance of his deed, that he thought

the most deadly wrong could be hidden by a mere lie.

But the event proved other than he anticipated. For though he thought his

fratricide unseen by God, his condemnation taught him that God had seen. I now

have one question to ask of those who deny that human affairs are regarded by

God or ruled or judged by him: are all the circumstances different in these

accounts that we have given? For I think that he is present who is concerned in

the sacrifice; he rules who rebukes Cain after his sacrifice; he is anxious who

requires the victim of the murderer; he judges who condemns the wicked slayer by

a just verdict.

In this incident, indeed, there is yet another point convenient to our

argument. Surely we are not to wonder that holy men are now suffering certain

hardships, since we see that God even at that time permitted the first of his

saints to be most wickedly slain. As to the reason why he permits such actions,

it is not within the power of human weakness to discover fully, nor is this a

fit occasion for such discussion. For the present it is enough to prove that

deeds

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of this sort do not occur

because of the negligence or inattention of God, but are permitted by the

dispensation of his wisdom. Moreover, we can by no means call him unjust, for

the will of God is the highest justice; nor does a divine action cease to be

righteous because man is incapable of grasping the workings of the divine

justice. But let us return to the main argument.

We have seen in the

accounts already given that nothing is done without the care of God, but that

some of these actions were so arranged by his divine wisdom, some endured by his

forbearance, some punished by his sentence. Certain people, perhaps, think that

these few cases do not sufficiently establish our contention; let us see if we

can make it completely clear through the experience of all men.

When, therefore, the human race had increased and multiplied alike in numbers

and in wickedness, as the Holy Scripture says: "God seeing that the

wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the

thoughts of his heart was only evil continually, repented that he had made man

on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart, and he said: 'I will destroy man

whom. I have created, from the face of the earth.' "

Let us consider how both the care of God and his severity are equally shown

in the whole account. For first we read, "moreover God seeing";

secondly, "it grieved him at his heart"; and thirdly, "he said,

'I will destroy man whom I have created.'" In the first statement, that God

sees all things, his care is shown; in the statement that he grieves is shown

the terror of his wrath; that he punishes, his severity as a judge. "God

therefore repented," says the Holy Scripture, "that he had made man on

the earth"; this does not indicate that God is subject to repentance or any

other emotion, but rather that the divine word, to further our understanding of

the true meaning of the Scriptures, speaks to us in terms of human feeling and

shows the force of God's anger under

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the name of repentance; moreover, the divine wrath is the punishment of the

sinner.

What followed then? When God saw that the earth was corrupt he said to Noah:

"The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with

violence through them: and behold, I will destroy them with the earth."

What happened next? "All the fountains of the great deep were broken up,

and the flood-gates of heaven were opened and the rain was upon the earth forty

days and forty nights."

And a little later:

"All flesh died that moved upon the earth." And again: "And Noah

only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark."

Now I wish to ask those who say that God neglects human fortunes whether they

believe that at this time he cared for earthly matters and judged them? I think

he not merely judged but gave a twofold judgment; for in preserving the good he

proved himself a generous giver of rewards, and in destroying the wicked, a

severe judge.

Perhaps these instances may seem to stupid wits to lack authority, since they

happened before the Flood ---- in another age, as it were. As if we could assume

that God was different at that time, and afterwards ceased to desire to exercise

the same care for the world! Indeed, by the divine grace I could prove my

statements by examples from all generations since the Flood, but their great

number forbids. However, certain of the more important instances will suffice,

for since God is undoubtedly the same in the greater and the lesser cases, the

lesser may be inferred from the greater.

After the Flood God

blessed the generation of men, and when this blessing had brought forth an

immeasurable host of men, God spoke to Abraham from heaven, ordering him to

leave his own land and go to a strange country. He was called, he followed; he

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was guided and established; from a poor man he became rich; from an obscure man,

powerful. Though reduced by his journeyings to the lowest estate, he came to be

most high in honor. Yet in order that the previous gifts of God to him should

not seem undeserved generosity, he who rejoiced in prosperity was tested in

adversity. Then came toil, danger and fear; he was vexed by travelling, worn out

by exile, visited with shame, and deprived of his wife. God ordered him to

sacrifice his son; the father offered his child, and so far as the resolution of

his heart was concerned, performed the sacrifice. Again came periods of exile,

again fear, the hatred of the Philistines, the rapine of Abimelech ---- many

evils, yet compensated by equal consolations, for though he was afflicted in

many things, yet was he rewarded for them all.

What conclusion are we to draw? In all the events which we have recounted, is

not God seen examining Abraham, inviting and leading him, anxious for him, his

sponsor, protector, benefactor, testing and exalting him, at once his avenger

and his judge?

Surely he examined him, for he chose him as the one best

man of them all; he invited him, for he called him; he was his guide, leading

him through in safety to unknown lands; anxious for him, for he visited him by

the oak tree; his sponsor, in promises of things to come; his protector,

guarding him among barbarous races; his benefactor, in that he enriched him; his

examiner, in that he wished to test him by harsh trials; his exalter, for he

made him powerful beyond all men; his avenger, for he avenged him on his

adversaries; his judge, for in avenging him he exercised judgment.

Moreover, God at once added another item to this history when he said:

"The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is grown great, and their sin is increased

overmuch."

The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah,

he said, is grown great. He said well that sins cry out, for without doubt the

cry of sinners is great, as it ascends from earth to heaven. Why does he speak

of men's sins as crying out?

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Certainly because he means that his ears are smitten by the cries of our sins,

that the punishment of sinners may not be delayed. Truly, it is a cry, and a

great cry, when the fatherly love of God is overcome by the cries of sin, so

that he is compelled to punish the sinners.

God showed how unwillingly he punishes even the worst of sinners, when he

said that the cry of Sodom ascended to him. That is to say: "My mercy

indeed persuades me to spare them; nevertheless the cry of their sins compels me

to punish." When he had said this, what resulted? Angels were sent to

Sodom; they set out, and entered the city; they were treated hospitably by the

good and injuriously by the wicked; the wicked were blinded and the good saved.

Lot, with his dear ones who honored God, was led out of the city; Sodom itself

was burned with its wicked inhabitants.

I ask at this point whether it was in accordance with justice or contrary to

it that God burned these wicked men? He who says that the Sodomites were

unjustly punished by God accuses him of injustice; if, on the other hand, God

justly destroyed those evil men, he judged them.

Surely he judged them, and indeed his judgment clearly foreshadowed that

which is to come. For it is well known that in time to come Gehenna will be in

flames for the punishment of the wicked, just as flames from heaven then

consumed the city of Sodom and its neighbors. Moreover, God wished his immediate

action to prefigure that coming judgment, when he sent Gehenna down out of

heaven upon an impious people. So the apostle also says that God condemned the

cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by their overthrow, making them an example to those

that hereafter should live ungodly lives,

although his action on that occasion had in it more

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of mercy than of severity. For that he so long delayed their punishment was due

to his mercy; that he finally punished them, to his justice. So when God sent

his angels to Sodom, he wished to prove to us that he is loath to punish even

wicked men; to the end that when we should read what insults the angels endured

from the people of Sodom, and see plainly the enormity of their crimes, the

disgraceful character of their vices and the obscenity of their lusts, he might

prove to us that he did not wish to destroy them, but they themselves forced

their destruction on him.

I might mention

countless further examples, but I am afraid that in my effort to give adequate

proof I may seem to have composed a whole history. Moses pasturing his sheep in

the desert saw a bush burning, heard God from the midst of the bush and received

his commands. He was exalted in power and was sent to Pharaoh; he spoke with

him, was scorned, but conquered. The Egyptian was struck down, Pharaoh's

disobedience was smitten, and not in one way alone, but many, to the end that he

should be tortured by a diversity of punishments in consideration of the

greatness of his sacrilege. What was the outcome? Ten times he rebelled; ten

times he was smitten. What is our conclusion? I think you must recognize that in

all these cases God shows equally his care for human affairs and his judgment of

them.

In Egypt, indeed, the judgment of God at that time was evidently not single

but manifold. For as often as he smote the rebellious Egyptians, so often he

judged them. But after the events already told, what happened? Israel was

dismissed; after celebrating the Passover they despoiled the Egyptians and

departed in wealth. Pharaoh repented, gathered his army, overtook the fugitives,

encamped beside them, was separated from them by the darkness; the sea was dried

up, Israel crossed over and by the friendly withdrawal of the waves was set

free. Pharaoh followed, the sea rolled over him, and he was drowned by the

engulfing waves.

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I think that the judgment of God has been made clear in these events, and

indeed not merely his judgment but also his moderation and patience. For it was

due to his patience that the Egyptians in their rebellion were often smitten, to

his judgment that for their persistent stubbornness they were condemned to

death. Therefore, after this series of adventures the race of the Hebrews,

victorious without warfare, entered the desert. They followed an uncharted

course, pathless wanderers, with God to lead the way, honored by his divine

comradeship, powerful through their heavenly leader, following a moving column

of cloud by day, of fire by night, which took on shifting changes of color to

suit the changing skies, that its dull obscurity might stand out in contrast to

the strong light of day and its flaming splendor illumine by its clear glow the

mists of night.

Add to this the springs that suddenly gushed forth, add the bitter waters

given and changed, keeping their old appearance but changing their character.

Add mountain peaks cleft open by streams gushing forth, dusty fields foaming

with new torrents. Add flocks of birds sent into the camp of the wanderers,

since God in his most indulgent love catered not only to the needs but also to

the palates of his people; the food granted throughout forty years by the daily

ministry of the stars, the dew of sweet morsels shed from the poles, offering

abundance not merely for nourishment but for delight. Add that the men

experienced in no part of their bodies the growth or losses natural to human

beings, their nails did not grow, nor their teeth decay, their hair stayed

always of one length, their feet were not worn by the march, their clothing was

not tattered, their shoes not broken, and thus the honor granted to the men

themselves was even sufficient to dignify their mean garments.

Add to all this God descending to earth to instruct his

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people, lending himself, God the Son,

to earthly

sight, the countless throngs of people admitted to familiar intercourse with

him, waxing strong in the power of his sacred intimacy.

Add to this the thunders, the lightnings, the terrifying blasts of celestial

trumpets, the fearful crashing over the whole sky, the poles rumbling with a

holy sound, the fires, mists and clouds filled with the very presence of God,

God speaking to man face to face, the law resounding from his holy lips, the

letters inscribed in minutest accuracy on the stone page by the finger of God,

the stone become a written scroll, the people learning and God teaching in a

school of heaven and earth commingled, almost a union of men and angels.

For it is written that when Moses had taken the words of the people to the

Lord, the Lord said to him: "Lo, now I come to thee in a thick cloud, that

the people may hear when I speak with thee."

And a little later: "Lo, there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick

cloud upon the mount."

Again: "And the

Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the mount."

Again: "And the Lord talked with Moses. And all the people saw the

cloudy pillar stand at the tabernacle door: and all the people rose up and

worshipped, every man at his tent door. And the Lord spake unto Moses, face to

face, as a man speaketh unto his friend."

In view of all this, does God seem to take any thought for men, giving them

such great gifts, helping them so much, sharing his speech with a vile mortal,

as if admitting him to converse in his

|59

sacred fellowship, opening before him his hands filled with immortal riches,

nourishing him with a cup of nectar, feeding him with celestial food? What

greater care, I ask, could his guidance afford, what greater love could he show,

than possession in the course of this present life of such a mirror of future

blessedness?

10.

Perhaps at this

juncture you may answer that God did once exercise such care for men, but now

does not at all. Why should we believe this? Because we do not now eat manna

daily as the Israelites did? But we reap fields full of grain at the harvest.

Because we do not catch quails that fly into our hands? But we devour all kinds

of birds, cattle and beasts. Because we are not granted waters gushing from

clefts opened in the rocks? But we pour the fruits of our vines into our wine

cellars. I have more to add: we ourselves, who say that the children of Israel

at that time were cared for by God but that we are neglected by him, would

absolutely reject the choice of their condition if we could receive their past

favors in exchange for our present benefits. For we should not be willing to

lose what we now have in order to gain what they then enjoyed, not that we are

better off than the Israelites were, but that they too, who were then daily fed

by the ministry of the stars and of God, preferred the old accustomed fodder for

their bellies to the favors they enjoyed. They were actually sad at their vile

recollections of carnal foods, pining away with a vulgar yearning for onions and

garlic, not because their former diet was more wholesome, but because they acted

just as we do now. They loathed what they had and longed for what they lacked.

We would rather praise bygone days than the present, not that we should prefer

to revive the past if the choice were given us, but because it is a well-known

failing of the human mind always to desire what it lacks, and, as the proverb

says, "Another's goods please us, and ours please others more."

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To this may be added a trait shared by almost all, of being forever

ungrateful to God, and all in turn are bound by the deep-rooted and inborn vice

of belittling the blessings God gives, in order that they may not feel obliged

to look on themselves as his debtors.

But enough of this: let us at last return to our original proposition. I

think we have made no slight progress toward proving the point; still let me add

one instance more, if you please, since it is better to prove a matter more

fully than is necessary than to risk falling short of conviction.

11.

Freed from

Pharaoh's yoke the people of the Hebrews transgressed near Mount Sinai, and were

at once smitten by the Lord for their transgression. For it is written:

"And the Lord plagued the people for their delusion concerning the calf

which Aaron made."

What greater and clearer

judgment could God give concerning sinners than that punishment should overtake

them forthwith in the midst of their sin? Yet since all the people were guilty,

why was not destruction visited on all alike? Surely because the Lord, loving

them, smote some with the sword of his sentence, in order to correct the others

by their example, and to prove to all at one time his censure in chastising

their sin and his affection in pardoning them. For his censure was shown in the

punishment, his mercy in the pardon, though disproportionately, for on that

occasion he yielded more to mercy than to severity.

Surely then, since our most indulgent Lord shows himself always more prone to

mercy than to punishment, even though in punishing a part of the Jewish host by

his divine censure he gave some scope to judgment and severity, yet his love

claimed the greater portion of the people ---- a special and peculiar act of

mercy to countless

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men that the

punishment might not destroy all who were implicated in the guilt. But toward

certain individuals and families, as we read, the censure of God was inexorable.

Such an instance is that of the man who, when the people rested on the Sabbath

day, presumed to gather wood and was killed. For although his action seemed

harmless in itself, yet the observance of the day made it sinful. Or the time

when two men were contesting with each other, and one, since he had blasphemed,

was punished by death. For it is written: "Lo the son of an Israelitish

woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the children of Israel; and

this son of an Israelitish woman and a man of Israel strove together in the

camp; and the Israelitish woman's son blasphemed the name of the Lord, and

cursed. And they brought him to Moses." And a little later: "And they

put him in ward, that the mind of the Lord might be showed them. And the Lord

spake unto Moses, saying, 'Bring forth him that hath cursed without the camp ;

and let all that heard him lay their hands upon his head, and let all the

congregation stone him.' "

Was not God's judgment immediate and manifest and his sentence pronounced

as if the heavenly decision followed the forms of our legal procedure? First the

man who had sinned was arrested, then he was led, so to speak, before the

judge's seat, thirdly accused and then put into prison, lastly punished by the

authority of the divine judgment; furthermore he was not only punished but

punished in accordance with evidence given, so that God's justice and not merely

his power was seen to condemn his guilt. This truly was meant as an example

working toward the correction of all men, so that none should commit thereafter

the deed which all the people had punished in one person. For this reason and by

this judgment the Lord does all things now and has always done them, that

whatever penalties individuals have to bear should work toward the correction of

all.

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So it was also when Abihu and Nadab, men of priestly blood, were consumed by

fire from heaven, in whose case, to be sure, the Lord wished to show not merely

judgment but judgment immediately impending. For it is written that when the

fire sent by the Lord had consumed the burnt offering: "Nadab and Abihu,

the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein and put

incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded

them not. And there went out fire from the Lord and devoured them and they died

before the Lord."

What else did he wish

than to show his right hand stretched over us, and his sword ever threatening?

For he punished the errors of the aforesaid men at once, in their very act, and

the crime of the sinners was scarcely committed before punishment was exacted

for their misdeeds.

Yet not only this was accomplished in their case, but much else besides, For,

as in these men not a wicked intention but only a misguided impulse was

punished, the Lord surely made clear what punishment any one would deserve who

committed a sin through contempt of the divine power, since even those who had

sinned only through thoughtlessness were struck down by God ---- or how guilty

they would be who acted contrary to his command, when those who merely acted

without his command were thus stricken. God also wished to further our

correction by a salutary example, that all laymen should understand how much

they ought to fear the wrath of God, since neither did the high priest's merits

rescue his sons from instant punishment, nor did the privilege of the sacred

ministry redeem them.

But why do I speak of men whose ill-advised action really did in some measure

affect God and work injury to his divinity? Mary spoke against Moses and was

punished; she was not only punished, but punished in due course of trial. For

first she was called to justice, then accused, and thirdly chastised. In the

accusation she

|63

learned the full

force of her sentence, and in her leprosy she paid full atonement for her crime

---- yet this punishment humbled not Mary alone, but Aaron as well. For, though

it was unsuitable for the high priest to be deformed by leprosy, yet the

correction of the Lord plagued him also. Nor was this all. In the punishment

that Mary suffered, Aaron too was involved, as sharer in her guilt; Mary indeed

was punished that Aaron might be put to confusion.

Furthermore, that we might recognize in the individual cases that the form of

the divine judgment is inexorable, God did not even yield to the intercession of

the injured party. For we read that the Lord spoke thus to Aaron and Mary:

"Wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against my servant

Moses?" And the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, and he

departed. And behold, Mary became leprous, and white as snow: and Moses cried

unto the Lord, saying: "Heal her now, O God, I beseech thee." And

the Lord said unto Moses: "If her father had but spit in her face, should

she not be ashamed seven days? Let her be shut out from the camp seven days,

and after that let her be received in again."

These things that we have told should be sufficient for this division of the

argument and for this part of our work; for it is an endless task to discuss all

the cases; indeed, it would be overlong merely to enumerate them without any

discussion. But let me add one more instance.

12.

The people of the

Hebrews repented having gone out of Egypt; they were struck down: then they

grieved at the weariness and toil of the journey, and were afflicted: they

desired flesh-meat, and were smitten. And because, eating manna daily, they

desired to satiate the cravings of their bellies with illicit foods, they were

sated indeed in their passionate greed, but tortured in that very satiety.

"For while their food was still in their mouths," says the Scripture,

"the wrath of God came upon them, and slew very many of them and smote down

the chosen men of Israel."

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Og rebelled against Moses: he was blotted out. Korah taunted him: he was

overwhelmed. Dathan and Abiram murmured against him: they were swallowed up.

"For the earth opened and swallowed Dathan, and covered the company of

Abiram."

Two hundred and fifty leaders of

the people also, as the sacred narrative testifies, who were called upon by name

to speak at the time of the council, rose against Moses. "And they gathered

themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said to them: 'Ye take

too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and

the Lord is among them; wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the

congregation of the Lord?' " And what happened after this? "There came

out a fire from the Lord, and consumed the two hundred and fifty men that

offered incense."

When such deeds were committed, heavenly mercy was of no avail. Correction

was administered again and again, yet improvement did not follow. For just as we

are chastised again and again, and do not improve, so they too, though

constantly struck down, did not mend their ways. For what is written? "But

on the morrow all the congregation of the children of Israel murmured against

Moses and Aaron, saying, 'Ye have killed the people of the Lord.' "

What happened then? Fourteen thousand seven hundred men were struck down at

once and consumed by divine fire. Since all the multitude of the people sinned,

why did not the punishment fall on all alike? Especially since, as I said

before, no one escaped from Koran's sedition. Why did God on the former occasion

wish all the assemblage of sinners to be killed, but at this time a portion

only? Surely because the Lord is full of justice and mercy and therefore his

indulgence causes many concessions to his love, and his discipline to his

severity. And so on the one occasion he gave first place

|65

to discipline that the punishment of all the guilty might redound to the general

betterment; on the other he yielded precedence to mercy, that the whole people

might not perish. Although he acted with such mercy, yet because the punishment

so often repeated for a part of the people did not profit them, finally he

condemned them all to death. This example should contribute to our fear and our

correction alike, that we, failing to be improved by their example, may not come

to be punished by a destruction like theirs.

There is no doubt what their end was. Although the whole race of the Hebrews

went out of Egypt to enter the promised land, yet not one of them entered it

save two holy men alone. For it is written: "The Lord spake unto Moses and

unto Aaron, saying: 'How long shall I bear with this evil congregation, which

murmur against me? As truly as I live, saith the Lord, as ye have spoken in mine

ears this day, so will I do to you: your carcasses shall fall in this

wilderness!'" What followed? "Your little ones," he said,

"which you said would be a prey, them will I bring in, and they shall know

the land which ye have despised. But as for you, your carcasses, they shall fall

in this wilderness." And what then? " All died and were struck down in

the sight of the Lord."

What detail is lacking in this whole account? Would you see a ruler? Behold

him, correcting present sins and disposing the future. Would you see a severe

judge? Behold, he punishes the guilty. Would you see a just and loving judge?

Behold, he spares the innocent. Would you see the judge of the whole world?

Behold, his judgment is in all places. For as judge he accuses and as judge he

rules; as judge he pronounces sentence; as judge he destroys the guilty, and as

judge he rewards the innocent.

[Footnotes moved to the end and renumbered]

As is usually the case with writers

trained in the later Roman rhetorical schools, Salvian's disclaimer of any

interest in rhetorical style leads him to use an elaborate phraseology in his

preface, somewhat at variance with his usual simpler and more colloquial style.

See Seneca

De tranquillitate

vitae

I. 1, and IV. 1,

infra.

In these notes, references without

title are to Salvian,

De gubernatione Dei

(

On the Government of God

Ad ecclesiam

refers to the treatise

To the Church against Avarice; Ep.

the

Letters.

See Cicero

De natura deorum

I.

11. 27. Salvian, however, cited the passage from Lactantius

Institutiones

divinae

I. 5. 17. The best discussion of Salvian's borrowings from

Lactantius will be found in Zschimmer,

Salvianus und seine Schriften,

62.

Quoted by Lactantius

op. cit.

I.

5. 12 from Vergil

Georgics

IV. 221-222.

Ibid.

I. 5. 25, quoted from.

Cicero

Disputationes Tusculanae

I. 27. 66.

Cited by Lactantius

op. cit.

I.

5. 24 as from Cicero

Do natura deorum,

but the passage is not found

there.

The early Christian attitude toward the

Epicureans was regularly hostile, in striking contrast to their ready

recognition of the kinship between the Stoic philosophy and Christianity. The

Epicurean denial of any divine government of the world was in itself sufficient

to lead Salvian to condemn their doctrines.

See Seneca

De remediis fortuitorum

XVI,

end: "The happy man is not he who seems such to others, but to

himself."

II Corinthians 12. 10.

10.

Ibid.

12. 9.

11.

A conception of the religious life

common throughout the Middle Ages, and mirroring for the saints in this life the

future joys of paradise. Compare the familiar line from the hymn of Peter

Damiani:

"Avidi et semper pleni, quod habent desiderant."

12.

See Salvian

Ad ecclesiam

IV.

9. 49: "Every command is hard that is given to unwilling men."

13.

These were among the best-known

examples of early Roman virtue; cf. H. W. Litchfield, "National

Exempla

Virtutis

in Eoman Literature,"

Harvard Studies in Classical

Philology,

XXV (1914), 1-71. All these are cited in Valerius Maximus IV.

3-4, as examples of abstinence, continence and poverty, and were used by

Christian writers from Augustine and Orosius to modern times to illustrate the

same virtues. The contrast between Roman and Greek ambition which follows was

also a commonplace before Salvian's time, and has been since.

14.

See the story of Cornelius

Rufinus in Valerius Maximus II. 9. 4; Tertullian

Apologeticum

15.

A stock characteristic of the

Stoic and the Epicurean sage: cf. Seneca

Epistulae morales

lxvi. 18;

Cicero

Disputationes Tusculanae

II. 7. 17,

De finibus

11. 27.

16.

See Salvian

Ep.

V. 3:

"Although I do not think that even this infirmity of your earthly vessel

has been harmful to you, for its strength, as you know, is always hostile to the

mind; so that I am right in thinking you as much stronger now in spirit, as you

have begun to be weaker in the flesh."

17.

I Corinthians 9. 27.

18.

In common with others of his time,

Salvian used the term "apostle" more loosely than we do now.

19.

See I Timothy 5.23. An excellent

example of Salvian's occasional readiness to distort Scripture for his purpose,

perhaps justifiable in this case because of the frequent misuse of the same text

by other authors, to support both sides of the same argument.

20.

(Galatians 5.17).

21.

Salvian, in

Ep.

V. 4, his

letter to "sister Cattura," in which he congratulates her not only on

recovery from an illness but also on the illness itself, which had strengthened

her soul at the expense of her body. See also note 14.

22.

I Timothy 2. 2.

23.

(Genesis 2. 7-8).

24.

Ibid.

4. 3-5.

25.

Ibid.

6.5-7.

26.

Ibid.

6.13.

27.

Ibid.

7. 11-12.

28.

Ibid.

7. 21, 23.

29.

Ibid.

18.20.

30.

Rittershausen,

Salviani opera

(Altdorf

1611),

ad loc,

cites a verse listing the five sins that were proverbially

said to cry for justice to heaven:

"Clamitat in caelum vox sanguinis, et Sodomorum,

vox oppressorum, viduae, pretium famulorum."

31.

II Peter 2. 6.

32.

Another instance of details added

without scriptural authority: in fact the instances of leprosy and death among

the Israelites during the march seem directly contradictory to Salvian's

statements.

33.

Again an addition not justified by

the words of the Old Testament. Salvian, in common with other early Christian

writers, not infrequently names Christ when we should expect the name of God

instead. And the "throngs of people" were expressly excluded from

familiar intercourse with God; cf. (Exodus 19. 21-24); 24. 1-2.

34.

(Exodus 19. 9).

35.

Ibid.

19. 16.

36.

Ibid.

19.20.

37.

Ibid.

33. 9-11.

38.

Publilius Syrus, verse 28. Salvian's

text here is influenced by Seneca

De ira

3. 31. 1.

39.

Rittershausen,

ad loc,

cites

the proverb:

Superflua non nocent.

The phrasing suggests a legal

connotation, in connection with which he cites Paulus and Ulpian on the value of

more than the required number of witnesses to a will, or more written evidence

than is actually needed to prove a case.

40.

(Exodus 32. 35).

41.

(Leviticus 24.10-14).

42.

Ibid.

10.1-2.

43.

(Numbers 12. 8-15), condensed.

Note that Salvian uses the name Mary for the Biblical Miriam.

44.

(Psalms 78. 30-31).

45.

Ibid.

106.17.

46.

(Numbers 16. 3), 35.

47.

Ibid.

16.41.

48.

Ibid.

14. 26-29, 31-32, 37.

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.66-76.

Book 2

Book II. : The immediate judgment of God as seen in the history of King David

1. Of the presence of God.

2. God's watchful care.

3. His vengeance.

4. The punishment of David.

5. David's exile.

6. The immediacy of God's judgment.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE SECOND BOOK

The examples given

above are sufficient proof, therefore, that our God acts constantly as a most

anxious watcher, a most tender ruler, and a most just judge. But perhaps one of

my less enlightened readers is thinking: "If all things are now conducted

by God as they were in those days, why is it that the evil prevail while the

good are afflicted; and whereas in the past the evil felt God's wrath, and the

good his mercy, now by some strange reversal the good appear to experience his

wrath and the evil his favor?" These questions I shall answer presently,

but now since I have promised to prove three points, namely, God's presence, his

government and his judgment, by three methods, that is, by reason, by examples

and by authority and since I have already given sufficient proof of them by

reason and examples, it remains for me to verify them by authority. Yet the

examples I have given should rank as authority, since that term is rightly

applied to the means by which the truth of matters under discussion is

established.

Which then of the above-mentioned points should first be proved by sacred

authority ---- his presence, his government, or his judgment? His presence, I

think, because he who is to rule or judge must surely be present, in order to be

able to rule or judge anything whatever.

Speaking through the Sacred Books, the Divine Word says.: "The eyes of

the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good."

Here you find God present, looking upon us, his eyes watching us wherever we

may be. If the Divine Word assures us that God observes the good and the wicked,

it is expressly to prove that nothing escapes his watchful scrutiny. For your

fuller comprehension, hear the testimony of the Holy Spirit in another part

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of the Scriptures, when it says: "Behold, the eye of the Lord is upon them

that fear him, to deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in

famine."

This is why God is said to watch

over the just, that he may preserve and protect them. For the propitious

oversight of his divinity is the safeguard, of our mortal life.

Elsewhere the Holy Spirit speaks in the same fashion: "The eyes of the Lord

are upon the righteous, and his ears, are open unto their cry."

See with what gentle kindness the Scripture says the Lord treats his people.

For when it says the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, his watchful love is

shown; when it says that his ears are always open to their prayers, his

readiness to hear is indicated. That his ears are always open to the prayers of

the righteous proves not merely God's attention, but one might almost say his

obedience. For how are the ears of the Lord open to the prayers of the

righteous? How, save that he always hears, always hears clearly, always grants

readily the pleas he has heard, bestows on men at once what he has clearly heard

them ask? So the ears of our Lord are always ready to listen to the prayers of

his saints, always attentive. How happy should we all be if we ourselves were as

ready to hearken to God as he is to hear us!

But perhaps you say that the proof of God's guardianship of the just is

useless to our argument, since this is not a general watchfulness of the divine

power but merely a special favor granted to the righteous. Note, however, that

the Sacred Word testified above that the eyes of the Lord watch over both good

and evil. If you still wish to argue the point, consider this, for it follows in

the text: "Moreover the face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to

cut off the remembrance of them from the earth."

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You see that you have no ground for complaint that God does not look upon the

unjust also, since you know that he watches all men, but with different effect

because of the inequality of their merits. The good indeed are watched by him

that they may be preserved, the evil that they may be destroyed. You yourself,

who deny that God watches men, have your place with these last; know then that

you are not only clearly seen by God, but are without doubt in imminent peril.

For since the face of the Lord is upon them that do evil, to cut off remembrance

of them from the earth, you, who wickedly say that the eyes of the Lord do not

see you, must learn by your destruction the wrath of an all-seeing God. These

arguments, then, are sufficient to prove the presence and watchfulness of God.

Let us now see

whether he who watches us also rules us, although, forsooth, his watchfulness in

itself implies governance as its motive, unless he looks upon us in order to

neglect us thereafter. Surely the fact that he deigns to look upon us is itself

an indication of his care for us, especially since the Sacred Word has borne

witness, as I have shown above, that the wicked are observed by God to their

destruction, the good to their salvation. Certainly this very fact shows the

divine guidance, for this is actually ruling by just government and dealing with

men individually according to their several merits.

Listen, however, to fuller testimony on this point. The Holy Spirit spoke

thus to God the Father in a psalm: "Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel."

Israel means "Seeing God," since indeed Christians who believe

faithfully see him with faith in their hearts:. Though God is the governor of

all things, still his governance is spoken of as being chiefly assigned to those

who especially deserve divine guidance. Therefore you also, whoever you are, if

you are a Christian, must of necessity believe in God's government. If, however,

you refuse utterly to believe that you, together with other

|69

Christians, are ruled by God, you must recognize that you belong outside the

whole body of Christians.

But if, as we suggested earlier, you are more interested in the case of men

in general, than of Christians alone, see how clearly the Holy Book says that

all things are daily ruled by the divine will and the whole world incessantly

guided by God, for it says: "He himself loves counsel and discipline."

"For neither is there any other God beside

thee that careth for all, bat being righteous thou rulest all things righteously

and with great reverence dost dispose us."

Here you have God constantly arranging, constantly governing; yet in the

passage cited not only his divine governance but also the high honor of man is

declared. For the words, "thou dost dispose us," show the power of his

divine government, but the words, "with great reverence," show the

culmination of human honor. Elsewhere also we read in the words of the prophet:

"Do I not fill heaven and earth!"

And he

himself tells us why he fills all things: "Because I am with you to save

you."

Obviously then God shows us not

merely his rule and the fulness of his power but also the might and benefits

that result from its plenitude. For the fulness of divinity bears within it this

fruit, that it saves all things that it fills. Thus in the Acts of the Apostles

the most blessed Paul said: "In him we live and move and have our

being."

Doubtless he is more

than the controller of our lives, in whom is the very source of life. For Paul

did not say that we are moved by God but in him, teaching us, to be sure, that

our real substance is rooted within his sacred attributes, since we truly live

in him from whom we receive our being.

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The Savior himself said also in the Gospel: "Lo, I am with you alway,

even unto the end of the world."

He not

only said that he is with us, but that he is with us all our days. Do you then,

most thankless of men, say that he who is constantly with us has no care or

thought for us? What then does he do in our company? Can you possibly think that

he is with us in order to neglect and overlook us? And how can he consistently

grant his presence to our virtue and neglect our vice? "For lo," he

says, "I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." Truly we

have a marvelous comprehension of God's love if we say falsely that he is

constantly neglectful of us while he says that he is constantly with us. Through

this he wishes to show that his love and protection are constantly with us,

since his very presence does not leave us. But we turn the divine charity into

contempt; we change the indications of his love into proofs of hatred. For we

try to see evidence of hatred rather than of love in his saying that he is with

us. If the Lord had said that he would remain apart from us, we might perhaps

have less occasion to gossip about his lack of care, in his absence. Constant

neglect is a proof of greater contempt and scorn from one who never leaves us.

There is the more odium in staying with us always if, while never depriving us

of his presence, he continually shuts us out from his loving care.

But far be it from us to believe that our most loving and merciful God would

have wished to be always near us for the sake of increasing by his presence the

apparent contempt of his neglect: far be it from us even to say such a, wicked

thing. For I think there is no one in the whole human race who is so evil that

he wishes to be with any man on account of his dislike of him, or wishes to

employ his presence solely to achieve greater satisfaction of his hatred by

scorning him face to face. Let human nature itself teach and convince us that we

wish to be with one man or another because we love the one whose company we

desire. And just because we

|71

love a

man, we wish our presence to be of benefit to him whom we love. So what we

cannot deny even to a criminal, we deny to God, and make him seem worse than the

worst of men, if we think that he promised to be with us in order to show

greater contempt for us by his subsequent neglect. But enough of this.

We have already

proved by sacred testimony that all things are both watched and ruled by God; it

remains now to show that the greater part are also judged by his divine power in

this world.

When the blessed David had suffered the insulting scorn of Nabal the

Carmelite, since he himself postponed vengeance, he received his revenge at once

at the hand of God. So when, shortly after, his enemy had been overwhelmed and

killed by the hand of the Lord, he spoke thus: "Blessed be the Lord, that

hath pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal."

Likewise when his rebellious son had driven him from his kingdom the Lord as his

judge in a brief space requited him, and more abundantly than he himself

desired.

God wished to show that the affliction of those who suffered injustice was

greater in his eyes than in their own. For when a man takes vengeance beyond the

wish of the injured person, what else can he mean than that he is acting on his

own behalf also? So when, for his attempted parricide, David's son was being

hung on a cross not made with hands, the Divine Word tells us that the

punishment divinely brought upon him was thus reported: "I bring thee good

tidings, my lord king; for the Lord hath avenged thee this day of all them that

rose up against thee."

You see how the

sacred books prove through divine witnesses that God judges not only by deeds,

as we said above, and by examples, but by the very name and terms of judgment,

even in our present age. Perhaps you think that it was as a special favor

granted by God to a holy man, that he wrought judgment forthwith on David's

enemies. The day will not suffice if I would tell of

|72

his immediate sentences and judgments in this world. Yet, that you may clearly

understand that it is not so much in consideration of the persons concerned as

of their actions that he exercises his sacred censure, hear how God our judge,

who constantly gave his unmistakable verdict on behalf of his servant David,

many times passed judgment on David himself. And indeed this occurred not in a

matter affecting many men, nor ---- which would perhaps naturally have aroused

God the more ---- affecting holy men, but in the case of a single individual, a

barbarian,

a case in which it was not the person

concerned that demanded vengeance, but the action. For when David had killed

Uriah the Hittite, a man belonging to an impious people and a hostile nation, he

was at once charged thus by the divine voice: "Thou hast killed Uriah the

Hittite with the sword and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain

him with the sword of the children of Ammon. Now therefore the sword shall never

depart from thine house. Therefore thus saith the Lord, 'Behold, I will raise up

evil against thee out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine

eyes and give them unto thy neighbor. For thou didst it secretly; but I will do

this thing before all Israel and before the sun.' "

What answer have you to this, you who believe that God not only fails to

judge our every action but does not regard us at all? Do you see that the eyes

of the Lord were in no wise withdrawn from the single secret sin which David

once committed? Wherefore do you also, who ---- as a consolation I suppose for

your sins ---- think that our acts are not observed by God, learn from this same

instance that you are always seen by Christ, and know that you must receive

punishment, perhaps very shortly. For you see that even the blessed David was

unable to hide his own misdeed in the secret places of his innermost chambers,

and to claim exemption from instant punishment by the undoubted merit of his

great deeds. For what did the Lord say to him? "I will take thy wives

before

|73

thine eyes, and the sword

shall never depart from thine house." You see what immediate judgment so

great a man suffered at once for one sin. Condemnation followed close on the

heels of the fault, a condemnation punishing immediately without reservations

and arresting the wrongdoer on the spot, not putting off the charge to a later

time.

Therefore he did not say: "Because you have done this, know that the

judgment of the Lord shall come and you shall be tortured hereafter by the

flames of Gehenna." No; he said: "You shall suffer torture at once,

and shall feel the sword of divine justice already at your throat."

And what followed? The guilty man acknowledged his fault, was humbled, stung

by remorse, confessed and mourned his sin. He repented and implored pardon, gave

up his royal jewels, laid aside his gold-wrought robes, put off the purple,

resigned the glory of his crown, changed his whole bodily habit, cast off every

aspect of kingship with its trappings, and put on the guise of a penitent

fugitive, eagerly assuming a squalor that should plead in his defence; he was

wasted by fasting, withered by thirst, exhausted by weeping, self-imprisoned in

loneliness. And yet this king of so great repute, greater in holiness than in

mere temporal power, surpassing all men in the favors earned by his former

merits, although he sought pardon so earnestly, did not escape punishment. The

fruit of such great penitence was indeed sufficient to win remission from

eternal expiation, but not to earn pardon at the moment. Finally, what did the

prophet say to the penitent? "Because thou hast made the enemies of the

Lord blaspheme, the son that is born to thee shall die."

In addition to the bitter loss of his son, God wished the loving father to

suffer also the knowledge of the full extent of his punishment, that he himself

had caused the death of the clearly loved son for whom he mourned, when the boy

born of his father's crime was slain for the very crime that had begotten him.

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This is the first

instance of the divine punishment; the first, to be sure, but not the only one,

for a long series of great griefs followed and an almost unending succession of

misfortunes haunted his household. Thamar was seduced by the mad act of Amnon,

and Amnon slain by Absalom. A great crime indeed was committed by the first

brother, but its retribution by the other was worse. In these actions David the

father was punished alike by both sons' crimes. Two children sinned, but three

were ruined by the sin of two; for Thamar suffered the loss of her virginity,

while in Amnon also the destruction of Absalom was mourned. And verily you

cannot tell for which of the two sons so loving a father mourned the more

grievously, the one slain in this world by his brother's hand, or the other who

by his own hand was doomed forever.

From this

time indeed ills were piled up beyond reckoning, according to the word of God.

The father long endured the treachery of his son, was driven from his kingdom,

and sought in exile an escape from murder. Which was worse, the vice or the

bloodthirstiness of his son? By incest he disgraced his father when his

attempted parricide failed, and by his diligent heaping up of crime achieved an

incest passing the bounds of incest, committing in public, to his father's

greater shame, a crime abominable even in secret. It was a mortal sin that he

performed against his exiled father, but worse still was the injury wrought by

his public incest before the eyes of the whole world.

Must we add to this the spectacle of David's actual flight? Picture this

mighty king, so greatly renowned, higher in honor than all others, greater than

the world itself, fleeing his whole people with a tiny band of slaves. In

comparison with his former state he was needy indeed; in comparison with his

wonted train

he went

|75

alone. He fled in fear, disgrace and sorrow ---- "walking," the

Scripture says, "with covered head, and barefoot."

He had outlived his former state, exiled from himself, almost, one might

say, surviving his own death. He sank so low as to merit the scorn of his own

servants, or ---- which is harder yet to bear ---- their pity. So Ziba was fain

to feed him, and Shimei did not fear to curse him publicly. God's judgment so

changed him from his former self that he endured the open insults of a single

enemy ---- he who had made the world to tremble!

Who now denies that

God watches over human actions? Behold how often the Scriptures have shown in

the case of one man that God not only observed, but also judged his acts! And

why? Why indeed, except that we should understand that the Lord's verdict and

coercion are always to be exercised in this world as they were then? So we read

that even holy men were punished aforetime by God's judgment, to teach us that

we too must always be judged in our present life by God. For as God always is,

so is his justice eternal. As God's omnipotence is never-failing, so is his

verdict unchangeable. As long as his law endures, so long also shall his justice

remain. Therefore all his saints in their sacred books, amid the imminent fear

of martyrdom and the swords of the persecutors, demand that the immediate

judgment of God be established. For thus said the just man in a psalm:

"Judge me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation." And

that this might not be construed as a reference to some future judgment of God,

he added at once: "Deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man."

Certainly it is the immediate judgment of God that he demands who begs to

be freed from the hands of the persecutor. In his consciousness of a just cause

the psalmist did well to pray for God's justice rather than for his favor, for

the best verdict is always given to the righteous cause if the case is conducted

with justice.

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Elsewhere also the psalmist spoke most clearly, saying: "Judge, O Lord,

them that injure me; fight against them that fight against me; seize arms and

shield and stand up for mine help."

You see

in this case that he does not demand the severity of a future trial, but the

verdict of immediate justice.

For what are his words? "Take up the shield and seize the sword"

---- the shield, of course, for protection and the sword for vengeance ---- not

that God's judgment needs such weapons, but because in this world the names of

dreaded arms are the instruments of dread judgments. Speaking to human

intelligence in figures drawn from human life, since he was praying for judgment

and for vengeance on his adversaries, he expressed the power of God's punishment

in terms of the instruments of earthly vengeance.

Lastly, the same prophet showed elsewhere the great difference between the

present and the future judgments of God. For what did he say to the Lord about

his verdict in the present trial? "Thou sittest on the throne and

judgest." And what about the future and everlasting judgment of God?

"He shall judge the world in righteousness;" and again: "He shall

minister judgment to the people in uprightness."

By these words surely he made a clear distinction in time between the present

and the future judgments of God. For to indicate the present he wrote,

"thou judgest," and to distinguish the future from the present he

added, "he shall judge."

Sufficient proof of God's care for us and of his government and judgment has

now been given by reason, by examples and by authority,

especially since the books to follow are all to be concerned with the same

proof. Now if we receive from God, whose work we are performing, strength to

complete our task, we shall attempt to bring to light and to refute the

customary arguments opposed by our adversaries to these essential doctrines.

[Footnotes moved to the end]

(Proverbs 15. 3).

(Psalms 33. 18-19).

Note the converse of this statement

already given in 1.7

supra:

"The divine wrath is the punishment of

the sinner."

Ibid.

34. 15.

Ibid.

34. 16.

Ibid.

80. 1.

(Ecclesiasticus 39.10); Salvian has

diligit

for the

diriget

of the Vulgate, though the latter reading would

express his idea better than the verb he uses.

(Wisdom 12. 13), 15, 18.

(Jeremiah 23. 24).

10.

Ibid.

42. 11.

11.

(Acts 17. 28).

12.

(Matthew 28. 20).

13.

I Samuel 25. 39.

14.

II Samuel 18.31.

15.

That is, not a Hebrew.

16.

II Samuel 12. 9-12.

17.

Ibid.

12. 14.

18.

Here Salvian seems to overlook II

Samuel 13.39: "And the soul of King David longed to go forth unto Absalom:

for he was comforted concerning Amnon, seeing he was dead."

19.

I have followed here Pauly's

conjecture:

in comparatione comitatus sui soliti solus.

20.

II Samuel 15. 30.

21.

(Psalms 43.1).

22.

Ibid.

35.1-2.

23.

Ibid.

9. 4, 8.

24. 24 See II. 1

supra.

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.77-97.

Book 3

Book III. : On the obligations of the Christian life

1. Divine authority and human reason.

2. Christian belief.

3. The obligations of the Christian life.

4. The apostle's imitation of Christ.

5. The services due to God.

6. How men follow Christ's precepts.

7. The necessity of impartial obedience.

8. The lesser commands of God.

9. The vices of Christians.

10. The guilt of rich men and nobles.

11. Their vain hope of salvation.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE THIRD BOOK

It is well: the

foundations have been laid

for a work undertaken

from pious motives and from love of a sacred duty; they have not been laid in

marshy ground or built of perishable stone, but are strengthened by the sacred

treasures used in their building and by the skill of their divine architect.

These foundations, as God himself says in his Gospel, cannot be shaken by raging

winds, undermined by river floods, or washed away by the rains.

Since the divine writings in some fashion lent their aid to the erection of this

structure, and the Holy Scriptures performed the joiner's task, the work itself

must, through the help of the Lord Jesus Christ, be as strong as its makers. So

this edifice receives its character from its parent stock and cannot be shaken

while the builders remain sound.

As no one can tear down the walls of earthly houses without tearing apart

their stones and mortar, so none can destroy this structure of ours unless he

first destroys the materials of which it is composed. Since these certainly can

in no way be weakened, we may safely assume the permanence of a building whose

strength is insured by immortal aid.

The question is raised why, if everything in this world is controlled by the

care and governance and judgment of God, the condition of the barbarians is so

much better than ours, why among us the fortune of good men is harder than that

of the wicked. Why should upright men fall ill and reprobates recover? Why does

the whole world fall prey to powers for the most part unjust? Perhaps a rational

and fairly consistent answer would be: "I do not know." For I do not

know the secrets of God. The oracle of

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his heavenly word is sufficient proof for me in this case. God says, as I have

already proved in my earlier books, that all things are subject to his

oversight, his rule and his judgment. If you wish to know what doctrines you

must accept, you have the sacred writings: the perfect course is to hold fast

what you have read in them.

Moreover, I would not have you ask me to account for God's actions in the

cases of which I speak. I am a man; I do not understand the secrets of God,

I do not dare search them out, I am afraid to pry into them, for to seek to know

more than is permitted is in itself a kind of rash sacrilege.

God says that he moves and ordains all things: let that suffice. Do you ask me

why one man is greater and another less, one wretched and another happy, one

strong and another weak? Why indeed God does such things. I do not know, but the

proof that he is the source of all actions should convince you fully. As God is

greater than the sum total of human reason, our knowledge that everything is

done by him ought to have more weight with us than reason alone. You do not

need, therefore, to hear any new argument on this point; let God's authority be

set over against all reason from any source whatever.

We are not at liberty to say that of the actions of the divine will one is

just and another unjust, because whatever you see is done by God, whatever you

are sure is done by him, you must confess is more than just. So much can be said

of God's government and justice without further discussion and without

uncertainty. I need not prove by arguments what is proved by his very words.

When we read that God says he constantly sees all the earth, we have proof that

he sees it, since he says so. When we read that he

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rules all creation, we have proof that he rules it, because he so affirms. When

we read that he orders all things by his immediate judgment, his judgment is

clearly proved by his own testimony. All other statements, made in human terms,

need proofs and witnesses, whereas God's speech is its own witness, since the

words of perfect truth must be perfect testimony to the truth. Yet since our God

willed that we should through the Sacred Scriptures know certain things, as if

from the archives of his spirit and mind ----since the pronouncements of the

Holy Scriptures are themselves in a way the mind of God ---- I shall not conceal

anything that God has wished his people to know and preach.

One thing, however, I should like to know before 1 begin ----whether I am to

address my words to Christians or to pagans. If to Christians, I do not doubt

that I shall prove my case. But if I speak to pagans, I should scorn the

attempt, not for any lack of proofs, but because I despair of profit from my

discourse. Surely it is fruitless and lost labor when a perverse listener is not

open to conviction. Yet because I think there is no one belonging to the

Christian name who does not at least wish to seem a Christian, I shall address

my words to Christians, However many pagans still adhere to their impious

unbelief, it is enough for me to prove my contentions to a Christian audience.

So you keep airing

the question why we Christians who believe in God are more wretched than all

other men. The words of the apostle to the churches might have furnished me with

a sufficient answer to this: "That no man should be moved by these

afflictions; for you yourself know that we are appointed thereunto."

Since the apostle says we are meant to endure hardships, miseries and sorrows,

why is it strange that we suffer every evil, who are fighting for the sake of

enduring all adversities? Since, however, many do not appreciate this, but think

that Christians should receive from God, as the wages due to their faith,

greater

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strength than all other

races, because they are more religious than all others, let us agree to their

opinion and argument.

Let us see what it means to believe firmly in God. We who wish our reward for

belief and faith in this life to be so great must consider what sort of belief

and faith we should have. What is belief and what is faith? I think it is that a

man believe in Christ faithfully, that he be faithful to God, that is, that he

faithfully keep God's commandments.

For as the

slaves of rich men or of government officials, to whom expensive furnishings and

valuable stores are entrusted, cannot be called faithful if they have swallowed

up the goods entrusted to them; so Christians also are proved unfaithful if they

have corrupted the good things granted them by God.

Perhaps you ask what the good is that God grants to Christian men? What else

but all the substance of our faith, all those things through which we are

Christians? First the law, then the prophets, thirdly the Gospels, fourthly the

reading of the apostles, finally the gift of fresh regeneration, the grace of

holy baptism, the unction of the divine chrism. You remember that of old among

the Hebrews, the people especially chosen of God, when the office of the judges

had passed over into the power of kings, God called the most approved and

excellent men to reign through the royal unction. So every Christian, having

performed all God's commands after receiving the chrism of the church, shall be

called to heaven to receive the reward of his labors. Since these are the

elements of our faith, let us see who keeps these great sacraments in such a way

as to be judged faithful, for, as I said, the unfaithful must be those who do

not keep their trust. And indeed I do not ask that a man perform all the

commands of the Old and New Testaments: I exempt him from the censorial power of

the old law, the threats of the prophets, even from the strictest interpretation

of the apostolic books or the full doctrine of the Gospels in their complete

perfection, though these last admit no exception. I only ask who lives in

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accordance with the least number of God's commands. I do not mean those which so

many avoid that they are almost accursed. God's honor and reverence have

advanced so far among us that those things which our lack of devotion leads us

to neglect, we consider worthy even of hatred.

For instance, who would deign even to listen to our Savior's bidding not to

take thought for the morrow? Who obeys his order to be content with a single

tunic? Who thinks the command to walk unshod possible or even tolerable to

follow? These precepts then I pass over. For here our faith, in which we trust,

falls short, so that we judge superfluous the precepts the Lord intended for our

benefit. "Love your enemies," said the Savior, "do good to them

that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute

you."

Who could keep all these commandments'?

Who would deign to follow God's commands in respect to his enemies, I do not say

in wishes, but even in words? Even if a man compels himself to do so, still it

is his lips alone that act, and not his mind; he lends the service of his voice

to the action without changing the feeling of his heart. Therefore, even if he

forces himself to say a prayer for his adversary, his lips move, but he does not

really pray.

To discuss all such cases would take too long; but one point I add, that we

may know that not only do we fail to accede to all God's commands, but we

actually obey almost none of them. This is why the apostle cried: "For if a

man think himself to be something when he is nothing, he deceiveth

himself."

We add this to our sins, that

although we are guilty in every respect, we still believe ourselves to be pure

and holy. Thus the offences of our iniquity are piled high by a false assumption

of righteousness. "Whosoever hateth his brother," says the apostle,

"is a murderer."

We may know from this

that there are many murderers who

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think themselves innocent, because, as we see, murder is committed not only by

the hand of him that kills, but also by the heart of him that hates. For this

reason the Savior added to this precept a still harsher decree, saying:

"Whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of

the judgment."

Anger is the mother of

hatred. Hence the Savior wished to shut out wrath, that hatred might not spring

from it. If then not only hatred but even wrath makes us guilty in God's

judgment, we clearly see that as no one in the world is free from anger, so no

one can be free from conviction of sin. Moreover, God seems to trace every fiber

of that precept to its end, and cut off all its fruits and branches, when he

says: "But whosoever shall say, 'Thou fool,' shall be in danger of hell

fire; whosoever shall say to his brother, '

Racha

,' shall be in danger of

the council." Many do not know what kind of danger is involved in

racha,

but they know very well with what slanderous intent men are charged with

folly.

So, using their knowledge rather than

their ignorance, they prefer to expiate in the divine fires the guilt incurred

by a form of abuse they understand, rather than to atone before human councils

for one that they do not know.

Since this is true,

and since these commands of the Lord not only fail of being carried out by us,

but are practically all reversed, when shall we come to obey his greater

precepts'? The Savior said: "Whosoever forsaketh not all that he hath, he

cannot be my disciple. . . . And he that taketh not his cross and followeth

after me, is not worthy of me."

He who

calls himself a Christian ought to walk as Christ walked. Certainly not only

those who follow the delights and pomps of the world, but even those who abandon

worldly interests fail to meet these requirements. Those who

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make a show of renouncing their wealth do not appear to make their renunciation

complete, and those who are thought to be carrying their cross so carry it that

they gain more honor in the name of the cross than suffering in its passion.

Even though all those men should in good faith accomplish these precepts in some

measure, still it is certain that none of them could succeed in walking along

the paths of this life as the Savior walked. For the apostle says: "He that

saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked."

Perhaps certain men

think the commands of the apostle are hard. Clearly they must be considered

difficult, if the apostles exacted from others the performance of duties they

did not lay upon themselves. But if, on the other hand, they enjoined upon

others much lighter duties than on themselves, instead of being considered harsh

teachers, they must be thought most indulgent parents, who, through their

religious zeal, themselves in loving indulgence take the burdens their sons

should bear.

What was it that one of them said to the people of the church? "My

little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in

you." And again: "Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of

Christ."

This is his command, that we

imitate him who gave himself over to the imitation of Christ. Indeed, none can

doubt that he himself imitated Christ. As Christ for our sake subjected himself

to the world, so did Paul for Christ's sake. As Christ for us endured the

heaviest pains and labors, so did Paul for Christ. As Christ for us suffered

scorn and mockery, so did Paul for Christ. As Christ for us endured his passion

and death, so did Paul for Christ. Therefore not without cause, conscious of his

own merits, he said: "I have fought a good fight, I have kept the faith;

henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness."

|84

Since he so followed Christ, let us consider which of us seems to be a true

follower of the apostle. He writes of himself first of all that he never gave

offence to any, but in all things showed himself the minister of God, in much

patience, in affliction, in necessities, in blows, in imprisonments, in stripes.

Elsewhere, comparing himself with others, he says: "Howbeit, whereinsoever

any is bold (I speak foolishly) I am bold also: I speak as a fool, I am more; in

labors more abundant, in prisons more frequent, in stripes above measure, in

deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was

I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck."

Surely, even if we leave out of account the other apostolic virtues that he

lists, when the apostle says that he has suffered shipwreck three times, in this

at least we can outdo him. We have not merely been wrecked three times, but our

whole life is one continuous shipwreck; indeed all men are living such vicious

lives that there seems to be no Christian who is not wrecked constantly.

Some one may object

that it does not befit our present time to endure for Christ such sufferings as

did the apostles of old. It is true that there are no longer heathen princes,

nor tyrannous persecutors; the blood of the saints is not shed now nor their

faith tried by tortures. Our God is content with the service of our peace, that

we please him simply by the purity of our spotless acts and the holiness of an

unstained life. Our faith and devotion are the more due him because he demands

lesser services from us and has foregone the greater exactions. Since even our

princes are Christians, there is no persecution and religion is not disturbed,

we who are not forced to test our faith by harsher trials ought certainly to

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seek the more to please God in small ways. For he by whom trifles are duly

performed proves that if occasion arises he will be capable of greater things.

Let us then pass over

the trials of the most blessed Paul, let us even omit the accounts we read in

the books later written about our faith, of the sufferings endured by almost all

Christians, who, mounting to the doors of the heavenly palaces by their

tortures, contrived steps for their ascent from the very racks and scaffolds.

Let us see whether in those lesser and ordinary observances of religious

devotion which we all as Christians can perform in utter peace at all times, we

are really trying to accede to the Lord's commands.

Christ orders us not to quarrel. Who obeys this order? He not only gives the

command, but insists on it so far that he bids us renounce those things about

which a dispute has arisen, provided we may thus end the suit. "For,"

he says, "if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let

him have thy cloak also."

I ask who there

are who yield to the attempts of their adversaries to despoil them; further, who

there are who do not try to rob their opponents in turn? For we are so far from

leaving them other property in addition to our coats, that if we can find any

way to do it we take away coats and cloaks as well from our enemies. Indeed, so

eagerly do we obey the Lord's commands that it does not satisfy us to refuse our

adversaries even the least part of our garments, unless we rob them of

everything we possibly can, as far as the circumstances permit.

Moreover, there is a second similar commandment joined with this one, in

which the Lord says: "Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn

to him the other also."

How many men do we

think there are who would listen politely to such words, or agree to them in

their hearts, even if they pretended to listen? How

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often do you find a man who does not return many blows for the one that he has

received? He is so far from turning his other cheek to the man who strikes him

that he thinks that he is winning when he has outdone his adversary, not in

being struck, but in striking. The Savior said: "What you wish that men

should do unto you, do ye even so to them."

A part of this saying we know so well that we never overlook it ---- a part we

omit so constantly that we do not know it at all. For we know very well what we

wish others to do for us, but we do not know what we ourselves ought to do for

them. Would that we really did not know! For our guilt would be less if due to

ignorance, according to the saying: "He who does not know his lord's will

shall be beaten with few stripes; but he who knows and does not do according to

his lord's will, shall be beaten with many stripes."

But now our offence is the greater because we cherish a part of this sacred

command on account of its usefulness to our convenience, and pass over a part of

it in injury to God. Paul the apostle also adds to this word of the Lord in his

preaching, saying: "Let no man seek his own, but every man another's

wealth." And again: "Look not every man on his own things, but every

man also on the things of others."

You see then how faithfully he performed the precepts of Christ when, as the

Savior bade us take thought for others just as we do for ourselves, he ordered

us to consult the welfare of others more than our own, proving himself, to be

sure, a good servant of a good master, and a glorious disciple of an exemplary

teacher. He so followed in the steps of the Lord, that his own footprints

somehow made those of his Master more evident and more clearly formed.

Which of these do we Christians obey, the command of Christ or that of his

apostle? I think we obey neither one. For we are so far from doing anything that

inconveniences ourselves, that we choose

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instead to provide first of all for our own convenience, whatever discomfort

this involves for others.

Perhaps you may think

we are choosing only the greater commandments, which no one follows, and which,

as Christians themselves think, cannot be followed in any case, and are passing

over others which can be and indeed are followed by all. But this point must be

considered first, that no slave is allowed to choose according to his own wishes

which of his master's commands he will carry out and which he will not, nor by a

most insolent abuse to assume the task that pleases him and reject the rest.

Certainly human masters think it impossible to tolerate calmly slaves who hear

part of their orders and despise the rest, who, according to their own desires,

carry out the commands they think should be performed and trample under foot

those they think deserve such treatment. If slaves obey their masters according

to their own free will alone, they are not rendering true obedience even when

they seem to obey. When a slave obeys only such of his master's orders as he

pleases, he is no longer doing his master's will but his own. If then we, who

are but weak little men, are still utterly unwilling that our slaves, who are

equal to us in their common humanity, though our inferiors in their condition of

servitude, should despise us, how unjustly, forsooth, do we scorn our heavenly

Master, since we, being ourselves men, yet think we ought not to be despised by

men of our own condition!

Unless perhaps we have

such great wisdom and deep intelligence that we who are unwilling to hear any

insults from our slaves wish God to be subject to insults from us,

|88

and believe that he deserves to endure from us such treatment as we consider

unfit for human endurance.

For this reason, to return to our former topic, any who think that I am

talking of the greater commands of God and omitting the lesser, must recognize

the unreasonableness of their complaint. There is no just reason for preferring

some commands, when all must be performed. As I have already said, just as the

servants of carnal masters are by no means permitted to choose which of their

master's precepts they are to perform and which they are not, so we, who are the

servants of our Lord, ought not to think it in any way permissible to humor

ourselves by choosing those commands that please us, or by an abusive indulgence

of our pride to trample under foot those that displease us.

Let us, however, come

to an agreement with those who do not wish us to tell of the greater commands of

the Lord, for the reason perhaps that they think they are fulfilling his lesser

precepts, though it is not sufficient for salvation to perform the lesser

commandments while scorning the greater. It is written: "For whosoever

shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of

all."

Although for this reason it is not

sufficient for us to obey all God's small and least commands, yet I agree to

speak only of these, in order to show that most Christians have not performed

even the least and slightest of their duties.

Our Savior ordered that Christian men should not swear. The men who perjure

themselves daily are more numerous than those who do not swear at all. He

commanded that no one should curse. Whose speech is not cursing? For curses are

always the first instrument of wrath; whatever in our weakness we cannot perform

we ardently desire in our anger, and thus in every impulse of our wrathful

hearts we use evil wishes as our weapons.

Hence

every

|89

man shows plainly that

whatever he wishes may happen to his adversaries he would do to them if he

could. Since we ail put our tongues to this wicked use on the slightest

provocation, our disregard of the Lord's will shows that we think it will be

held of small account by God, who gave these commands. But the Holy Scripture

says: "Revilers shall not inherit the kingdom of God."

From this we may judge how serious and deadly a crime evil-speaking is,

which by itself shuts a man out of heaven, even though the rest of his life may

have been good.

Christ ordered that envy be far from us, but we, contrary to his teaching,

envy not merely outsiders but even our friends. This is the ruling vice in the

hearts of almost all: our greed for eating has its limits, but our greed for

slandering others has no end; our appetite for food becomes sated, but our

appetite for spite does not. Perchance the punishment for this fault is a slight

one? "The slanderous man," says the Holy Scripture, "shall be

rooted out."

Surely that is a

serious and fearful punishment, yet it does not serve to reform us. Every one of

us thinks it worth while to endanger himself as long as he may continue to

injure others. The retribution for this vice is clearly a suitable one, as it

attacks, the doer only; it does no injury at all to the person slandered, but

only punishes the man from whose lips the libel comes.

I suppose I seem to be out of my mind in repeating these words, and I can

easily bear the appearance of madness in such a case. For the Lord was not

speaking senselessly when he enjoined us through his apostle: "Let all

clamor be put away from you, with all malice."

Both of these evils indeed are ever present with us, but malice more than

clamor. Clamor indeed is not always on our lips, but malice is always in our

hearts. So I think that if clamor should cease among us, yet malice would remain

to the end.

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Our God orders us also to live without murmuring and without complaints.

When in the history of the human race have these been unknown? In hot weather we

complain of drought, in rainy weather of floods; if it is a bad season for the

crops we complain of scarcity, in a good season, of low prices. We long for

plenty, and when we get it we object to it. What could be more wicked or more

disgraceful than this? We complain of God's mercy even in this, that he gives us

what we ask.

God bade his servants keep all scandal from their sight altogether, and so he

said: "Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed

adultery with her already in his heart,"

From this we can fully understand how chaste our Savior wished us to be,

who even shut out licentiousness from our eyes. Knowing that our eyes are in a

way the windows of our souls,

and that all evil

desires make their way into the heart through the eyes as their natural

passageways, he wished us to destroy such desires utterly while they were still

outside that they might not spring up within us and put forth their deadly

shoots within the soul, if they once germinated in our eyesight.

Therefore the Lord said that the wanton glances of lustful men are adulterous,

meaning that a man who truly wishes to shun adultery must keep a watch on his

eyes. The Savior, indeed, wishing to cultivate a most genuine and perfect

sanctity in his worshippers, ordered them to avoid scrupulously even the least

offences, on the ground that according to the cleanness of his eyesight, so also

is the purity of a Christian's life. Just as a man's eye could not receive a

mote of dust without impairing his sight, so our life should not permit any

stain of dishonor

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to find a place in

it. Whence come the following words of the Lord: "If thine eye offend thee,

pluck it out, and if thy hand offend thee, cut it off

;

it is better for

thee, that one of thy members perish, than that thy whole body be cast into

hell."

If, therefore, according to the word

of God, we are dragged down into hell by scandalous actions, surely it is right

to sacrifice our eyes and hands in order to escape this punishment. No man

should deprive himself of his members, but in the ease of certain domestic

relationships so necessary to us that we have come to consider them as eyes or

hands, it is right to deprive ourselves of their present service in order to

escape the torture of eternal fire. When the choice lies between comfort and

life, it is certainly better for the Christian to forfeit his convenience and

gain life.

In all the points of

which we have spoken our Lord has ordered us to obey him, but where are those

who obey all his ordinances or even a very few of them? Where are those who love

their enemies or do good to those that persecute them, or overcome evil by doing

good, who turn their cheeks to those that strike them, who yield their property

without a lawsuit to those that rob them? Who is there that permits himself no

slander whatever, that injures no man by evil speaking, that keeps his lips

silent that they may not break out in bitter curses? Who is there that keeps

these least commandments, not to speak of those greater ones which I mentioned a

short time ago?

Since this is the case and since we keep none of the Lord's commands, why do

we complain of God, who has far more right to complain of us? Why should we

grieve that he does not hear us, when we ourselves do not hear him? What right

have we to whisper that God does not look upon the earth, when we ourselves do

not look up to the heavens? What reason have we to be vexed that our prayers are

despised by the Lord, whose commands we despise?

|92

Suppose that we were equal to our Lord; what chance is there for just

complaint when each side receives the same treatment it gives? And this entirely

overlooks a point easily proved, that we are very far from receiving what we

give, since God really treats us much more kindly than we do him. For the

moment, however, let us act on the assumption that I proposed. The Lord himself

spoke thus: "I cried unto you and ye did not hear me: you too shall cry

unto me and I shall not hear you."

What is

more fair and just than this? We have not hearkened, therefore he does not hear

us. We have not been mindful of him, therefore he does not consider us. What

mortal master, I ask, is content to treat his underlings according to this rule,

that he will scorn them only in proportion to their contempt of him? And yet we

do not stop with such injurious scorn of God as mortal masters receive from

their slaves, since the greatest contempt a slave can show is in not doing what

he has been ordered. We, however, bend all our efforts and energy not only to

neglecting our orders, but even to acting directly contrary to them. For God

commands us all to love one another, but we rend each other in mutual hatred.

God enjoins us all to give our goods to the poor, but we plunder other men's

goods instead. God orders every Christian to keep his eyes pure; how many men

are there who do not wallow in the filth of fornication?

What more can I say? It is a heavy and sorrowful charge that I must bring:

the church itself, which should strive to appease God in all things ---- what

else does it do but arouse him to anger? Except a very few individuals who shun

evil, what else is the whole congregation of Christians but the very dregs of

vice? How often will you find a man in the church who is not a drunkard or

glutton or adulterer or fornicator or robber or wastrel or brigand or homicide?

And what is worst of all, they commit these crimes endlessly. I appeal to the

conscience of all Christians; of these crimes and

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misdeeds that I have just named, who is not guilty of some part, who is not

guilty of the whole? You would more easily find a man guilty of them all than of

none. And because what I have said; may perhaps seem too severe an accusation I

shall go much farther and say that you could more easily find men guilty of ail

evils than of a few, more easily find men guilty of the greater faults than of

the less. That is, it is easier to find men who have committed the greater sins

along with the less than the less without the greater. For almost the whole body

of the church has been reduced to such moral depravity that among all Christian

people the standard of holiness is merely to be less sinful than others. Some

hold the churches, which are the temples and altars of God, in less reverence

than the houses of the least important municipal magistrates. The common run of

men indeed do not presume to enter the doors, I shall not say of illustrious

potentates, but even of governors or presiding officials, unless the official

has called them or contracted business with them, or unless the honor due their

individual position permits their entrance. If anyone enters without due

occasion he is flogged or roughly put out or punished by some humiliation or

personal indignity.

But to the temples, or rather

the altars and sacred shrines of God, all mean and evil men resort violently,

entirely without reverence for his sacred honor. I do not mean to deny that all

should hasten thither to pray to God, but he who enters to win God's favor

should not go out to arouse his anger. The same action should not demand his

indulgence and provoke his wrath. It is a monstrous thing for men to keep

committing the same sins which they lament having committed, and for those who

enter the church to weep for their old misdeeds to go out [to commit new ones].

|94

Go out, did I say? They are usually planning fresh crimes in the very midst

of their prayers and supplications. While men's voices do one thing, their

hearts do another; while their words lament their past misdeeds their minds plan

further wrongs, and thus their prayers increase their guilt instead of winning

pardon for it. So the scriptural curse is truly fulfilled upon them, that from

their very prayers they go out condemned and their petition is turned into sin.

Finally, if any one wishes to know what men of this sort are thinking in

church, let him consider this. When their religious duties are accomplished they

all hurry off at once to their accustomed pursuits ---- some, for instance, to

steal, others to get drunk, others to commit fornication, others to commit

highway robbery ----so that it is perfectly clear that they have spent their

time inside the temple in planning what they will do after leaving it.

10.

Undoubtedly some

men think that all these evils and all the infamous vice of which I have spoken

above may be properly ascribed to slaves or to the lowest of men, whereas the

freeman's reputation is not spotted by the stain of such disgraceful deeds. Yet

what else is the life of all business men but fraud and perjury, of the curials

but injustice,

of petty officials but slander, of

all soldiers but rapine?

Perhaps you think that one need not object to such a charge against

characters of this sort. For, you say, their actions fit their professions, so

it is no wonder that they act according to their

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business in life; as if, indeed, God wishes any man to do or profess evil. Or is

it no offence whatever to His Divine Majesty that the lower classes are known to

commit the greatest crimes, especially when by far the greater part of the human

race belongs to this group? Without doubt, the insult that his divinity suffers

is proportionate to the number of sinners.

Do you say that the nobles are free from these crimes? At best that is but a

small gain, for all the nobles in the world would seem no more than one man in a

great crowd of people. Is even this small group free from guilt? First let us

consider what the Divine Word says of men of this sort. You remember that the

apostle, addressing the people of God, spoke thus: "Hearken, my beloved

brethren. Hath God not chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of

the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him? But ye have despised

the poor. Do not rich men oppress you by their power? Do they not blaspheme that

worthy name by the which ye are called?"

The testimony of the apostle is potent, unless perhaps the nobles think that

they are exempt from his accusation because he named only the rich. The nobles,

however, are either identical with the rich, or, if there are rich men who are

not counted in their number, they are practically in the same category, for so

great is the misery of our times that no one is considered of higher rank than

he who has the greatest riches. It makes little difference which of these the

apostle meant, or if he was talking of both; since his words certainly apply to

both the rich and the noble, it does not signify which of the two he had in

mind. What noble or what rich man ever had any horror of crime? Yet my query was

mistaken ---- many indeed do fear it, but few avoid it. They fear in others the

crimes they themselves constantly commit, being in a strange manner both the

accusers and doers of the same evils. They denounce in public what

|96

they do in secret, and for that reason, when they think they are passing

judgment on others they condemn themselves even more by their censure.

Let us overlook those men who have the greater guilt, and ask what single

rich man or noble there is who preserves his innocence and keeps his hands clean

of every sort of crime? It was foolish for me to say of every sort ---- would

God they were clean of the greatest! Great men seem to consider it their

personal prerogative to commit the lesser crimes as a matter of course. So I

shall say nothing of their more ordinary misdoings. Let us see if any one of

them is free from the two which we consider capital offences, that is, homicide

and sexual vice. Which of them is not either reeking with human blood or smeared

with the filth of an impure life? Either one of these is enough to render him

liable to eternal punishment, but there is hardly a wealthy man who has not

committed both.

11.

Perhaps one of this

number is thinking to himself: "I am not doing such things now." I

commend you if you are not, yet probably you did in the past, and to have

stopped is not equivalent to never having done them at all. But if it were, what

value would there be in one man's desisting from wickedness when so many persist

in their crime? The conversion of one man does not atone for the sins of the

many, nor is it enough to appease God that one man should leave off sinning,

while the whole human race offends him. Consider too that he who is converted

for the sake of escaping eternal death certainly gains a great reward for his

conversion in this escape. By no means could he succeed in turning away the

punishment of damnation from others. It is a mark of intolerable presumption,

and an enormous wickedness, for a man to think himself so holy that he even

supposes wicked men can find salvation through him. God spoke thus of a certain

land and a sinful people: "Though these three men, Noah, Daniel and Job,

were in

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it, they shall deliver

neither sons nor daughters, they only shall be delivered."

No one, I think, will be so shameless as to dare compare himself with such

men as these. However much a man may now try to please God, yet to assert one's

own morality is an example of the greatest unrighteousness. Thus is destroyed

our confidence in the false notion that an innumerable host of sinners can be

saved from the evils that threaten them by the intercession of a few good men.

For since no one is equal to the three men named above, what hope can any have

that countless wicked, men unrelated to them can be saved by a very few good

men, when those saints, who were close to God, did not deserve of the Lord that

their very members, in the persons of their children," should be saved? It

is right that this should be so. Though all sons seem to be members of their

parents, yet they must not be considered members of those whose love they have

begun to cast aside, inasmuch as the wickedness of their degenerate lives has

degraded their natural endowments. So it happens that even we who are said to be

Christians lose the virtue of so great a name by our evil vices. It is of no

possible benefit to have a holy name without morality, for a life that denies

our Christian profession cancels the honor of a glorious rank by the baseness of

unworthy actions.

Since then we see practically no group among all the Christians, no corner in

all the churches, that is not full of all manner of offence and stained with

every deadly sin, why should we beguile ourselves with the name of Christian?

Assuredly our guilt is made the greater by this most sacred name, if we belie it

by our conduct. The name of Christian aggravates our offences against God, since

we continue our sins in the very bosom of the church.

[Footnotes moved to end]

See Lactantius

op. cit.

VII.

1.1:

Bene habet, iacta sunt fundamenta, ut ait eximius orator .

. .;

where

Lactantius is quoting Cicero

Pro Murena

6. 14.

(Matthew 7. 25).

The much quoted words of Terence (

Heauton.

Timoroumenos

77) here take on a new significance, from the Christian

connotation. "I am a man, nothing human is alien to me"----Salvian's

wide sympathies echo the spirit of these words many times, but the secrets of

God, he says, pass man's understanding. Salvian's acquaintance with Terence is

indicated by his use of a line from the

Andria

Ad ecclesiam

III.

12.

See Lactantius

op. cit.

II. 5.

2-3; 8. 69, 71.

I Thessalonians 3. 3.

The definition is repeated in IV. 1

infra.

(Matthew 5. 44).

(Galatians 6. 3).

I (John 3. 15).

10.

(Matthew 5. 22).

11.

Ibid. 5.

22. See also

Gregory

Moralia

21. 5: "

Racha

indeed in the Hebrew tongue is

the exclamation of the angry man, which shows his intention without fully

expressing his wrath in words." For other contemporary discussions cf.

Baluze

ad loc.

12.

(Luke 14. 33) (Matthew 10. 38).

13.

I (John 2. 6).

14.

(Galatians 4.19); I Corinthians 11.1.

15.

II Timothy 4. 7-8.

16.

II Corinthians 6. 4-5.

17.

Ibid

11. 21, 23-25.

18.

Here Salvian makes use of his

fundamental thesis, that the disasters of the Romans are due to their sins. The

first part of this sentence would suggest to his readers the losses due to the

barbarian invasions; in the conclusion he reminds them of the real danger they

face.

19.

(Matthew 5. 40).

20.

Ibid.

5.39.

21.

Ibid. 7.

12.

22.

See (Luke 2. 47-48).

23.

I Corinthians 10.24; Philippians

2.4.

24.

See Cyprian

Ad Demetrianum

"You yourself exact servitude from your slave and, yourself a man, compel a

man to obey you, though you share in the same lot of birth, the same condition

of death, like bodily substance, the same mental frame, and by equal right and

the same rule come into this world and later leave it. Yet unless he serves you

according to your will, unless he is subservient to your whim, you act the

imperious and over-exacting master, afflicting and torturing him often with

stripes, lashes, hunger, thirst, nakedness and the sword, with chains and

imprisonment. And do you not recognize your God and master, who yourself

exercise mastery in this fashion?"

25.

(James 2.10).

26.

Rittershausen, commenting on the

"elegant phrasing" of this sentence, cites Petronius

Carmen de

bello civili

228:

Absentem votis interficit hostem.

27.

I Corinthians 6.10.

28.

See (Romans 1. 30-32); Psalms

140.11; (Proverbs 21. 28).

29.

(Ephesians 4. 31).

30.

(Philippians 2.14-15).

31.

(Matthew 5. 28).

32.

See Lactantius

De opificio Dei

8.11:

"The mind is that which sees through the eyes, placed in front of it, as if

through windows covered with translucent glass or mica."

33.

Among the parallels quoted by

Rittershausen

ad loc,

note especially Seneca

De remediis fortuitorum

12.

34.

See (Mark 9.43-47) (Matthew 18.8-9).

35.

See (Proverbs 1. 24) (Micah 3. 4);

(Psalms 18. 41) (Jeremiah 11. 11) (Zechariah 7.13).

36.

Rittershausen cites this as a

passage used by Cujas and other jurists in their commentaries on the

Corpus

Juris.

Cf. Cod. Just. XII. 19 on those who have the right of access to the

officials of the highest grade.

37.

The slight lacuna in the MSS is

here supplied according to Pauly 's conjecture.

38.

See (Psalms 109. 7).

39.

On the curials cf. V. 4

infra.

The

curials, once honored as the local aristocracy, making up the chief governing

body of the municipalities of the Empire, the

curia,

had now, through the

financial stringencies of the administration, become a class as much oppressed

by the imperial financial agents as they were hated by those from whom they

themselves exacted payments. The requirement that the curials of a district must

make up from their own fortunes any deficit in the payments due had made it

increasingly difficult to keep up the required number, and the injustice of

which Salvian spoke worked in more than one direction. The burdens and

difficulties of the office are best illustrated by the 192 sections of Cod.

Theod. XII. 1.

40.

(James 2.5-7).

41.

(Ezekiel 14.14), 16.

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.98-132.

Book 4

Book IV. : On the oppressions wrought by the Roman nobles, and the guilt of Christians as compared with pagans

1. The necessity of faith and good works.

2. Faith without works.

3. The sins of slaves compared with those of their masters.

4. The oppression of the nobles.

5. The enormity of their crimes.

6. The rich compared with their slaves; the burdens of taxation.

7. The penalties of conversion.

8. That men's crimes are the cause of their misfortunes.

9. The Father's love for his creatures.

10. The fulness of God's love.

11. The ingratitude of man.

12. The guilt of Christians.

13. Comparison of Christians with barbarians.

14. The peculiar guilt of Christians.

15. Their oaths.

16. Their transgressions of the divine law.

17. Pagan ideas of the Christians.

18. Blasphemy.

19. The guilt of Christians compared with that of heathen.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE FOURTH BOOK

Let us then give up

that prerogative of the Christian name, of which I spoke above, by which we

consider that because we are more religious than other people, we ought also to

be stronger. For since, as I have said, the faith of a Christian is to believe

faithfully in Christ,

to keep Christ's

commandments, it surely follows that the man who is unfaithful has no faith,

that he who crushes under foot Christ's commandments does not believe in Christ.

The whole question centers on this point, that he who does not perform the work

of a Christian does not appear to be one, for the name without its proper acts

and function is nothing. A certain man

says in his

writings: "What else is high office without lofty merits but an honorable

title without the man honored, or what is lofty rank without worth but an

ornament in the midst of filth,?"

So, to use the same phrase ourselves, what else is a sacred name without

merit but an ornament in the midst of filth? The sacred word bore witness to

this in the divine writings, saying: "As a jewel of gold in a swine's

snout, so is a fair woman which is without discretion."

Thus among us also the name of Christian is like a golden ornament; if we use it

unworthily, we make ourselves seem like swine wearing jewels.

Finally, whoever wishes fuller proof that mere words are nothing without

actions should consider how countless peoples, by failing in

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good works, have lost the names given them. The twelve tribes of the Hebrews,

when they were of old chosen by God, received two holy names, for they were

called the people of God, and Israel. We read: "Hear, O my people, and I

will speak; O Israel, and I will testify against thee."

Once the Jews bore both these titles, now they have neither. They who long

since left off the worship of God cannot be called God's people, nor can they

who denied his Son be given a name that means "Seeing God." So it is

written: "But Israel does not know, my people doth not consider."

For this reason on another occasion our God spoke of the people of the

Hebrews to the prophet, saying: "Call his name, Not Beloved." And

speaking to the Jews themselves: "You are not my people and I am not your

God."

Moreover, he himself showed clearly why

he spoke thus about them, for he said: "They have forsaken the Lord, the

fountain of living waters."

And again:

"They have rejected the word of the Lord and there is no wisdom in

them."

But indeed I am afraid that this is true of us now no less than it was of

them, since we do not obey the words of the Lord, and our disobedience certainly

shows that there is no wisdom in us. Unless perhaps we believe that we act

wisely in scorning God, and consider it as a sign of the greatest prudence that

we despise Christ's commandments. There is some reason why we should be thought

to hold this opinion, for we all sin with as much accord as if we were doing it

in pursuit of an elaborately planned policy.

Since this is the case, what logical reason have we for deluding ourselves by

a false notion into the belief that the good name of Christian can be of any

possible help to us in the evils we commit? The Holy Spirit says that not even

faith, without good works, can

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benefit Christian men. Yet surely to have faith requires much more than the name

alone, for the name is the mere instrument by which a man is addressed, whereas

faith is the fruit of the spirit. That this same fruit of faith is profitless

without good works, the apostle testifies when he says: "Faith without good

works is dead." And again he says: "For as the body without the spirit

is dead, so faith without works is dead also."

He adds also certain harder sayings for the confusion of those who delude

themselves by their false claims to the Christian faith.

"Yea, a man may

say: 'Thou hast faith and I have works; show me thy faith without thy works, and

I will show thee my faith by my works.' "

By this, indeed, he shows that good acts serve also as witnesses of the

Christian faith, because unless a Christian has performed good works, he cannot

prove his faith at all, and since he cannot prove that it exists, it must be

considered as altogether non-existent.

For he

shows at once that it must be considered as nothing, in his additional words to

the Christian: "Thou belie vest that there is one God; thou doest well: the

devils also believe, and tremble."

Consider

what the apostle meant by this. Let us not be angry at the divine testimony but

assent to it; let us not speak against it but profit by it. "Thou

believest," says the Divine Word to the Christian, "that there is one

God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble." Was not the

apostle in error when he compared the faith of a Christian to that of a devil?

Surely not, but wishing to demonstrate what was said above, that without good

works a man should claim no merit through pride in his faith, for this reason he

says that the devils also believe in God. The intent is, of course, that as the

devils, though they believe in

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God, still persist in their wickedness, the sort of faith that they hold is like

that of certain men who, while they assert their belief in God, still do not

cease to do evil. Moreover, the apostle adds, for the confusion and condemnation

of sinful men, that the devils not only believe in the name of God, but fear and

tremble before it. Which is as much as to say: " Why do you flatter

yourself, O man, whoever you are, for your belief, which without fear and

obedience to God is as nothing? The devils have some advantage over you in this.

For you have but one thing alone, and they have two: you have your belief, but

not fear; they have belief and fear alike." Why do you wonder that we are

chastised, that we are given over into the hands of the enemy, that we are

weaker than all other men? Our miseries, our infirmities, our overthrow, our

captivities and the punishments of our evil slavery are the proof that we are

bad servants of a good master. How are we bad servants? Because, to be sure, our

sufferings are only in proportion to our deserts. How are we the servants of a

good master? Because he shows what we deserve, even though he does not inflict

on us the punishment due, for he would rather correct us by the most kind and

merciful chastisement than permit us to perish. As far as our misdoings are

concerned, we deserve the penalty of death, but he, attaching more importance to

mercy than to severity, prefers to better us by mercifully tempering his

censure, than to slay us by the infliction of a just chastisement.

I know only too well that we are ungrateful for the blows we receive. But why

do we wonder that God strikes us for our sins, when we ourselves strike our

slaves for theirs? Like unjust judges we petty men are unwilling to be scourged

by God, though we scourge men of our own condition. I am not surprised that we

are so unjust in this case, for our very nature and wickedness are of a servile

sort. We wish to do wrong and not be beaten for it. In this we have the same

characteristics as our poor slaves. We all wish to sin without punishment. I

call all men to witness whether I lie: I

|102

declare that there is no one, however great his guilt, who admits that he

deserves torture. From this we may observe how unjust and how exceedingly wicked

a thing it is that we are most severe to others, but most indulgent to

ourselves; harsh to others, but lax with ourselves. For the same crimes we

punish others and let ourselves go free; truly a mark of intolerable indulgence

and presumption. We do not wish to recognize any guilt in ourselves, but we dare

to claim the right to judge others. What can be more unjust or more perverse

than we show ourselves in this? We think that very crime justifiable in our own

case that we condemn most severely in others. So it is not without cause that

the apostle cries out to us: "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man,

whoever thou art, that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou

condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things."

But some rich man may

say: "We do not do the same things, not at all the same things, that slaves

do; for slaves turn into thieves and runaways; slaves live only for their greedy

appetites." It is true that these are vices characteristic of slaves, but

their masters, though not all of them, have more and greater faults. Certain of

them must indeed be excepted, though very few, whom I do not name for fear that

in so doing I may appear less to praise them than to libel those whom I do not

name.

First then, slaves, if they are thieves, are usually forced into robbery by

need, since even though the customary allowances are furnished them, these

conform better to custom than to sufficiency and so fulfill the canon

without satisfying the needs of those who receive them. Their necessity makes

the fault itself less blameworthy, since a convicted thief who seems compelled

to robbery

|103

against his will

deserves pardon. The Scripture itself seems to palliate the wrongdoing of needy

men when it says: "Men do not despise a thief, if he steal to satisfy his

soul when he is hungry."

steals to satisfy his soul; it is for this reason that we think we cannot accuse

strongly enough those who are pardoned by the Divine Word. Regarding the running

away of slaves we speak in the same way as about their thefts; but with even

more justification, forsooth, in this case, since not only their wretched

condition but also their punishments drive them to try to escape. They fear

their overseers, they fear those set to keep silence among them, they fear their

masters' agents. Among all these there are scarcely any to whom they seem to

belong less than to their owners; they are beaten and broken down by them all.

What more can be said? Many slaves take refuge with their masters from fear of

their fellow-slaves. We ought not to hold responsible the slaves who try to

escape, but those who force them to make the attempt. Our slaves labor under a

most unhappy compulsion; longing to serve, they have no choice but to flee. They

have no desire whatever to leave their masters' service, but the cruelty of

their fellows does not allow them to continue in it.

They are called liars also. None the less, they are driven to falsehood by

the brutality of the impending punishment ---- they lie in the hope of escaping

torture. Why is it strange that a terrified slave would rather lie than be

flogged? They are charged with having greedy mouths and stomachs, but this is

nothing new; the man who has often endured hunger has the greater desire for

satiety. Even supposing that he does not lack dry bread, he still hungers for

delicacies, and so must be pardoned if he seeks more greedily that which is

constantly lacking.

But you who are noble, you who are rich, who have an abundance of all good

things, who ought to honor God the more because you enjoy his benefits

endlessly, let us see whether your actions are, I

|104

shall not say holy, but even harmless. What rich man, to repeat my former

question, save only a few, is not stained by every sort of evil deed? And when I

except a few, would that I might include many more in the exception! for then

the innocence of the majority might be the salvation of all. I am speaking about

none now save the man who recognizes that my words apply to him. If what I say

lies outside his conscience my charge will do him no discredit. If, on the other

hand, his heart admits the truth of my words, he should realize that it is not

my tongue that is accusing him but his own conscience.

To recount first the vices characteristic of slaves: if a slave is a runaway,

so are you also, rich and noble though you are; for all men who abandon the law

of the Lord are running away from their master. What fault can you rightly find

in the slave? You are doing as he does. He flees from his master, and you from

yours; but in this you incur more blame than he, for in all likelihood he is

running away from a bad master, while you flee from a good one. In the slave you

criticize incontinent greed. This is a rare fault in him, for want of means to

satisfy it, but a daily one in you because of your abundance. Hence you see that

the words of the apostle censure you more than him; nay, they censure you alone,

for "wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that

judgest doest the same things";

nay, not

the same, but far greater and more wicked. In the slave you punish an infrequent

overindulgence of the appetite, while you constantly distend your own belly with

undigested food. You think theft a servile fault, but you too, O rich man,

commit robbery when you encroach on things forbidden by God. Indeed every man

who performs illicit actions is guilty of theft.

Why do I dwell on

these petty details and speak in a sort of allegorical fashion, when absolutely

unconcealed crimes make it clear that the wealthy commit not mere thefts but

highway robbery

|105

on a grand scale?

How often do you find a rich man's neighbor who is not himself poor, who is

really secure in his acts and position? Indeed by the encroachments of

overpowerful men,

weaklings lose their property

or even their freedom along with their goods, so that it was not without reason

that the Sacred Word alluded to them both, saying: "Wild asses are the prey

of lions in the wilderness; so poor men are a pasture for the rich."

And yet not only the poor but almost the whole human race is suffering this

tyranny. "What else is the official career of eminent men but the

confiscation of all the property of their states? What else is the prefecture of

certain men, whose names I suppress, but plundering?

Nothing causes greater devastation in the poorer states than the high officials.

Honor is bought by a few to be paid for by the oppression of the many; what

could be more disgraceful or more unjust than this? Wretched men pay the

purchase price for honors which they do not buy for themselves,; they have

nothing to do with

|106

the bargain,

but know only too well the payments made;

the

world is turned upside down that a few men may be glorified; the honor of one

man is the ruin of the human race.

To conclude, the Spanish provinces know whereof I speak, for they have

nothing left them but their name;

the provinces

of Africa know it, whose very existence is at an end;

the lands of Gaul know it, for they are devastated, yet not by all their

officials, and so they still draw the scanty breath of life in a few far

corners, since the integrity of a few has supported for a time those whom the

rapine of the many has impoverished.

But my sorrow has led

me to wander too far afield. To return to my former topic: is there any respect

in which even the nobles are not contaminated by servile vices, or have they,

forsooth, a right to commit sins they punish in their slaves? A slave may not

even dream of such ravages as these nobles perform. This, however, is not quite

true, for certain of the slaves, gaining noble rank, commit like sins, or even

worse. Still the remaining slaves can hardly be held responsible for the fact

that some few have so blessedly lost the condition of servitude.

Homicide is rare among slaves because of their dread and fear of

|107

capital punishment, whereas among the rich it is constantly committed because of

their confident hope of immunity. Perhaps I am doing an injustice in reckoning

the actions of the rich as sins, for when they kill their poor slaves they

consider it an act of justice, not a crime.

Nor

is this all; they also abuse their privilege in their vile breaches of chastity.

What rich man keeps his marriage vows, who among them does not plunge headlong

into passionate lust, who does not use his household slaves as harlots and

pursue his madness against any one on whom the heat of his evil desires may

light? They illustrate well the words of the Holy Scriptures about such men as

they: "They are become as horses rushing madly on the mares."

Is it not a proof of what I just said, that the average man washes to make his

own by physical union whatever his eyes have beheld with desire? To use the term

concubine may perhaps seem unfair, since in comparison with the vices mentioned

above it seems almost a form of chastity to be content with a few mates and

restrain one's lusts to a fixed number of wives.

I say "wives" advisedly because we have come to such a pass that many

consider their maidservants as actual wives. Would that they were content to

have only those whom they do so consider! But the truth is more foul and

loathsome by far ---- for certain men who have contracted honorable marriages

take additional wives of servile rank, deforming the sanctity of holy matrimony

by low and mean

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unions, not

blushing to become the consorts of their slave women, toppling over the lofty

structure of marriage for the vile beds of slaves, proving themselves fully

worthy of the rank of those whom they judge worthy of their embrace.

Doubtless many of

those who either are or wish to be nobles listened with lofty scorn to my

statement that some slaves are less reprehensible than their masters. But since

I made this remark not about all of them but only those whom it fits, no one has

any cause for anger if he thinks himself a very different sort of man, for his

anger would be enough to betray his membership in the group of which I spoke.

On the other hand, any nobles who abominate this wickedness should be angry at

such men as these, who defame the very name of nobility by the extreme baseness

of their misdeeds. For although, men of that stripe are a heavy burden to all

Christian people, still by their vileness they pollute especially the members of

their own class. Therefore I have said that certain nobles are worse than

slaves, and I have thus opened the way for contradiction, unless I can adduce

proof for my words.

Take for example this crime, a very great one indeed, of which almost the

whole mass of slaves is guiltless. Has any slave throngs of concubines, is any

one of them denied by the stain of polygamy or do they think they can live like

dogs or swine with as many wives as they have been able to subject to their

lust? The answer, I suppose, is obvious, that slaves have no such opportunities,

for they surely would take them if they had. I believe this, but I cannot

consider actions I do not see performed as having taken place. However

dishonorable his intentions are, however evil his desires may be, no one is

punishable for the crimes that he does not commit. It is generally agreed that

slaves are wicked and worthy of our

|109

contempt. But, be that as it may, free-born men of noble rank are the more to be

reproached if in their more honorable condition they are worse than slaves.

Hence the inevitable conclusion is not that bondmen ought to be absolved from

responsibility for their wrongdoings:, but that the majority of the rich are

more to be condemned in comparison with slaves.

Who can find words to describe the enormity of our present situation? Now

when the Roman commonwealth, already extinct or at least drawing its last breath

in that one corner where it still seems to retain some life, is dying,

strangled by the cords of taxation as if by the hands of brigands, still a great

number of wealthy men are found the burden of whose taxes is borne by the poor;

that is, very many rich men are found whose taxes are murdering the poor.

Very many, I said: I am afraid I might more truly say all; for so few, if any,

are free from this evil, that we may find practically all the rich in the

category to which I have just assigned many of them.

Think a minute: the remedies recently given to some cities. ----what have

they done but make all the rich immune and heap up

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the taxes of the wretched?

To free the rich from

their old dues they have added new burdens to those of the poor; they have

enriched the wealthy by taking away their slightest obligations and afflicted

the poor by multiplying their very heavy payments. The rich have thus become

wealthier by the decrease of the burdens that they bore easily, while the poor

are dying of the increase in taxes that they already found too great for

endurance. So the vaunted remedy most unjustly exalted the one group and most

unjustly killed the other; to one class it was a most accursed reward and to the

other a most accursed poison. Hence I say that nothing can be more wicked than

the rich who are murdering the poor by their so-called remedies, and nothing

more unlucky than the poor, to whom even the general panacea brings death.

Then what a state of

things it is, what a holy condition of affairs, that, if a noble begins to be

converted to God, he at once loses his noble rank! What honor is paid to Christ

among a Christian people in whose eyes religion makes a man ignoble? For as soon

as a man has made an attempt to improve himself, he meets the abusive scorn of

worse men, and thus all are compelled to some degree of evil living that they

may not be considered contemptible. Not without cause did the apostle cry out:

"The whole world lieth in wickedness."

He spoke truly, for it is right to say that the whole world is lying in

wickedness when the good cannot hold their place in it. Indeed, everything is so

full of iniquity that either all who live are evil, or the few who are good are

tortured by the persecution of the many. Therefore, as I said, if any man of

honorable rank devotes himself to religion, he at once ceases to be honored. For

when a man has changed his garments,

forthwith

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he changes his rank; if he has been of high degree, he becomes contemptible; if

he has been most glorious, he becomes the vilest of the vile; if he has been

altogether full of honor, he becomes altogether wretched in aspect.

Yet certain worldly men and unbelievers wonder why they endure the wrath of

God and his hatred, when they persecute him in the persons of all his saints;

for all things are perverse and at variance with the ways of the past. If there

is any good man, he is scorned as though he were evil: if a man is evil, he is

honored as though he were good. Is it then strange that we who daily grow worse,

endure worse tortures daily?

For men daily

invent new evils and do not forsake the old; fresh crimes spring up, but the old

are not abandoned.

Is there any room for

further discussion? However hard and bitter our lot, we still suffer less than

we deserve. Why should we complain that God deals harshly with us? We treat him

much more rudely. We anger him by our impure acts and force him, unwilling

though he is, to punish us. And although the spirit and majesty of God are such

that he is not moved by any passion or anger, yet such is the aggravation of our

sins that they drive him to wrath.

|112

If I may say so, we subject his loving kindness to force, and seem to lay

violent hands on his mercy. For although he is so gentle that ho would like to

spare us constantly, our perversity compels him to punish our sins. As those who

blockade well-fortified cities or attempt to capture and undermine their mighty

strongholds, customarily lay siege to them with all sorts of machines and

weapons, so we attack the mercy of God with every kind of frightful sin as if

we, too, were using siege engines. Then we think God injures us, though we are

acting most injuriously toward him. Indeed every fault of all Christians is an

insult to his divinity. "When we perform those acts that are forbidden by

God we trample underfoot the orders of him who forbade us. It is impious to

blame God's severity for our misfortunes: we should instead accuse ourselves.

For when we commit the sins that cause our torture, we are ourselves the authors

of our torments. Why then do we complain of the bitterness of our punishments?

Each one of us punishes himself.

This is why the prophet said to us: "Behold, all ye that kindle a fire,

that have added fuel to the flame; walk in the light of your fire and in the

sparks that ye have kindled."

For the whole

human race is rushing headlong into eternal punishment by the very course that

the Scriptures describe. First we kindle the fire, then add fuel to the flames,

and lastly enter the flames that we have prepared. When does man first kindle

eternal fire for himself? Surely when he first begins to sin. But when does he

add fuel to the flames? When he heaps up sins upon sins. When shall he enter the

everlasting fire? When he has already completed the irrevocable account of

wickedness by the increase of his sins, as our Savior said to the leaders of the

Jews: "Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers, ye serpents, ye

generation of vipers,"

The men whom the

Lord himself told to fill up the measure were not far from completing the full

number of their sins. Because they were

|113

no longer worthy of salvation, they filled up the number of iniquities by which

they were to perish. Whence also, when the ancient Law recalled that the sins of

the Amorreans

were fulfilled, it is said

that the angels spoke to the blessed Lot, saying: "Whomsoever thou hast in

the city, bring them out of this place, because the cry of them is waxen great

before the face of the Lord, and the Lord hath sent us to destroy them."

For a long time, truly, that most sinful people had been kindling the fires by

which they perished, and so when the tale of their iniquities was completed they

burned in the flames of their own crimes. For they deserved so ill of God that

they suffered in this world the Gehenna that is to come in the later judgment.

But, you say, none

now deserve the end of those men, for none are to be compared with them, in evil

doing. Perhaps that is true, still what do we make of the fact that the Savior

himself said that all who have spurned his Gospel are worse than they? And at

Capernaum he said: "If the mighty works which have been done in thee had

been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you,

that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment

than for thee."

If he said the people of

Sodom are less to be condemned than all who neglect the Gospels, then we who in

most of our actions show our neglect of the Gospel teachings are in graver

danger, especially since we are not willing to be content with crimes long

familiar, that seem a part of our daily life. Many are not satisfied with the

customary vices, with litigation, slander and rapine, with drunkenness and

gorging at feasts, with forgeries and perjury, with adultery and homicide.

Finally, however inhuman the atrocities involved, all the crimes involving

injury to their fellow men are not enough for them, but they must needs turn the

blasphemous violence of their

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mad

minds against the Lord also. For it is written of the wicked: "They set

their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walketh through the earth. . .

. And they say, 'How doth God know, and is there knowledge in the Most High?'

" And again: "The Lord shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob

regard it."

To such men this prophetic saying may well be applied: "The fool hath

said in his heart, 'There is no God.' "

For

they who declare that nothing is seen by God are very near to denying his actual

substance, as they deny his sight, and when they say that he sees nothing they

deny his very existence.

Although no evil deed has any rational foundation,

since there is no bond between reason and wickedness, yet no blasphemy, in my

opinion at least, is more irrational than this or more insane. What is so mad as

for a man, who does not deny that God created the whole world, to deny that he

governs it? How can one admit that God is its maker, and deny that he takes any

care of what be made? As if his intention in creating the universe was to

neglect it when completed! I say that he cares so much for his creatures that I

can prove that he cared for them even before their creation; indeed, the very

act of creation makes this clear. He would not have created the world, if his

care had not preceded the act, especially since we know that in our human kind

there is scarcely a man so stupid that he would carry an undertaking through to

completion without the intention of taking care of it when finished. For a man

who tills a field does so in order to keep it for his own use after it is

cultivated; he who plants a vineyard means to take care of it when he has

planted it; he who gathers the nucleus of a herd means to exercise his skill in

increasing it. He who builds a house or lays its foundations, even though he has

as yet no finished

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dwelling-place,

still embodies in the building he is trying to erect the hopes of a future home.

Yet why should I speak of man alone, when even the smallest sorts of animals

do all things with a view to future use?

Ants,

hiding various sorts of grain from [the fields]

in underground storerooms, drag away and store their hoards because they cherish

them in their desire to live. Why do the bees, when they lay foundations for the

honeycomb or pluck their young from flowers,

search out thyme except from their eager desire for honey, or certain other

flowerets but from love of the young they are to find there?

Has God then instilled this love of their own functions into even the least

of living things, and deprived himself alone of the love of his works? Have you

considered that all our love of good things has come down to us from his good

love? He himself is the fount and source of all our benefits, and since, as it

is written: "In him we live and move and have our being,"

from him surely we have received all the affection we give our offspring; for

the whole world and the whole human race are the offspring of their creator.

Therefore by that very love he has caused us to feel for our sons he wished

us to know how greatly he loved his own. For we read, just as "the

invisible things of him are clearly seen, being understood by the things that

are made,"

even so he wished his love for

us to be known by the love that he gave us toward our own kindred. As it is

written that he wished all fatherhood in heaven and in earth to be named after

him,

so he wished us to recognize

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his fatherly love. Yet why do I say fatherly? for his love is far more than a

father's. This is proved by the words of the Savior in the Gospel, when he said:

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son for the

life of the world."

But the apostle also

says: "God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all. How

hath he not with him also freely given us all things?"

10.

This confirms my

former statement, that God loves us more than a father loves his son. It is

clear that his love surpasses a man's love for his sons, since for our sake he

did not spare his own child. Nay, I add more, he did not spare his righteous

Son, his only begotten Son, his Son who is himself God. What more can be said?

And this was done for us, that is for wicked, unjust and most irreverent men.

Who can justify this love of God toward us, save that his justice is so great

that no shadow of injustice can fall on him? As far as human reason is

concerned, any man would have acted most unjustly if he had had his good son put

to death for his worst slaves. But for this very reason the love of God is the

more surpassing and his goodness the more marvellous, that, as far as human

weakness is concerned, the greatness of his justice almost bears the appearance

of injustice. Therefore the apostle, to indicate as far as he might the

boundless mercy of God, said: " For when we were yet without strength, in

due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one

die."

Certainly in this one sentence he

showed us the love of God. For if scarcely any one undertakes to die for the

greatest righteousness, Christ dying for our iniquity proved what love he bore

us. Why God should have done this, the apostle tells us at once in the words

that follow, saying: "God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we

were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now

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justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him."

He commends his love to us, in that he died for sinners; for a benefit is

of greater worth that is given to men unworthy of it.

So he says: "God commends his love toward us." How does he commend

it? Surely in that he bestows it on the undeserving. If he had given it to holy

men who deserved well of him, he would not seem to have given what was not due,

but what he owed them.

What then have we given in return for this great boon, or what return ought

we to make for it? First of all, what the most blessed prophet testifies that he

owes and will give, saying: "What shall I render unto the Lord for all his

benefits toward me? I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of

the Lord."

This is the first repayment,

that we return death for death, and all die for him who died for us, even though

our death is of much less account than his. Whence it comes that even if we take

death upon us, we cannot by this means repay our debt. But since we cannot

requite him more fully, we seem to be paying the whole, if we return him all

that we can. This, therefore, as I said, is our first payment.

The second is, if we do not pay our debt by death, to pay it by love. The

Savior himself, as the apostle says, by his death wished to commend his love to

us all, to lead us by the example of his loving care to make a fitting return

for such great affection. And just as certain marvellous natural gems, when one

brings them into contact with iron, though it be of the hardest kind, hold it in

suspense by an attraction that seems actually possessed of life, so also he, the

greatest and most glorious gem of the heavenly kingdom, wished to come down from

heaven to approach more closely to us, to draw us, in spite of our hardness, to

his care as if by the hands of his love, that recognizing his gifts and benefits

we might come to know what it befitted us to do for so good a master when he had

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done so much for his wicked

servants. Then should be fulfilled the words of the apostle, that we should be

killed all the day long for his love, and neither tribulation nor distress nor

persecution nor famine nor nakedness nor the sword should be able to separate us

from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus the Lord.

11.

Since our

indebtedness to God is clearly established, let us see what return we make him

for all that we owe. What return, indeed, but all the actions of which I have

spoken before, namely, whatever is indecent, whatever is unworthy, whatever

leads to injury of God, wicked deeds, disgraceful habits, drunken feasts,

bloodstained hands, vile lusts, mad passions and whatever else can better be

reckoned up by the conscience than in words! "For," said the apostle,

"it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in

secret."

Nor is this all, for it is an old

charge, and belongs no more to the present time than to the past. More serious

and lamentable is the fact that we are adding new sins to the old, sins not only

new but of a monstrous and heathen sort, such as have not before been seen in

the churches of God. We blasphemously revile the Lord, saying that he is a God

who does not care for us, a God who pays us no attention, a God who neglects us,

who does not govern us, and hence he is pitiless and obdurate, inhuman, harsh

and cruel. For, since he is described as not regarding us, as careless and

neglectful, what remains but to call him harsh and cruel and inhuman? What blind

impudence! what sacrilegious boldness! It is not enough for us, that, bound in

our countless sins, we are in all things guilty before God, unless we are also

his accusers. Yet what hope, I ask, shall a man have, who, while facing judgment

himself, brings accusation against his judge?

12.

If God does regard

human affairs, some one may say, if he cares for us, loves and guides us, why

does he allow us to be weaker and more miserable than all nations? Why does he

suffer us to be

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conquered by the

barbarians? Why does he permit us to be subject to the rule of our enemies?

To answer very briefly, as I have already said, he suffers us to endure these

trials because we deserve to endure them. Let us consider the disgraceful

habits, the vices and crimes of the Roman people, as we have described them

above, and we shall then understand whether we can have any claim on his

protection when we live in such impurity. If we examine in this light our

customary argument that our misery and weakness show God's neglect of human

affairs, what do we really deserve? If he permitted us, living in such vice and

wickedness, to be exceedingly strong, prosperous and completely happy, then

perhaps there might be some ground for suspicion that God did not see the

evil-doing of the Romans, if he allowed such wicked and abandoned men to be

happy. Since instead he bids such vicious and evil men to be most abject and

wretched, it is perfectly evident that we are seen and judged by God, for our

sufferings are fully deserved.

We, of course, do not think we deserve them, and consequently are the more

guilty and blameworthy for failing to recognize our deserts. The chief

accusation of wrongdoers is their proud assertion of innocence. Among a number

of men charged with the selfsame crime none is more guilty than he who does not

acknowledge his guilt even in his own thoughts. We have, therefore, this single

addition to make to our wrongdoings, that we consider ourselves guiltless.

But, you may object, grant that we are sinners and wicked men, certainly you

cannot deny that we are better than the barbarians, and this alone makes it

clear that God does not watch over human affairs, because we, who are better,

are subject to men worse than ourselves. Whether we are better than the

barbarians, we shall now consider; certainly there can be no doubt that we ought

to be better. And for this very reason, we are worse than they, unless we

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are actually better, for the more honorable position makes any fault doubly

blameworthy. The greater the personal dignity of the sinner, the greater is the

odium of his sin.

Theft for example is a serious

crime in any man, but a thieving senator is doubtless far more to be condemned

than one of the lower classes. Fornication is. forbidden to all, but it is a

much more serious vice in one of the clergy than in one of the people. So also

we, who are said to be Christians and catholic, if we are guilty of vices like

those of the barbarians, sin more seriously than they, for sins committed by men

who claim a holy name are the more abominable. The more lofty our claim to

honor, the greater is our fault; the very religion we profess accuses our

faults, A pledge of chastity increases the sin of lewdness; drunkenness is more

loathsome in one who makes an outward show of sobriety. Nothing is more vile

than a philosopher who pursues a vicious and obscene life, since in addition to

the natural baseness of his vices, he is further branded by his reputation for

wisdom. We therefore, who out of the whole human race have professed the

Christian philosophy, for this reason, must be believed and considered worse

than all other nations, since, living under so great a profession of faith, in

the very bosom of religion, we still sin.

13.

I know it seems to

most men intolerable that we should be called worse than barbarians. What

possible good does it do us to have this seem intolerable? Our condition is made

so much the more serious if we are worse than they and yet insist on believing

ourselves better. "For if a man think himself to be something," the

apostle said, "when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself. But let every man

prove his own work."

We ought to put our

trust in our works, not in our opinion; in reason, not lust; in truth, not in

our will alone.

Since, then, some men think it unsupportable that we should

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be adjudged to be worse, or even not much better than the barbarians, let us

consider in what way we are better, and in relation to which of the barbarians.

For there are two kinds of barbarians in the world, that is, heretics and

pagans.

To all of these, as far as the divine

law is concerned, I declare that we are incomparably superior; as far as our

life and actions are concerned, I say with grief and lamentation that we are

worse. However, as I said before, let us not make this statement of the whole

body of Romans without exception. For I except first of all those men who have

devoted themselves to a religious life, and then some laymen who are equal to

them; or, if that is too much to say, at least very like them in their upright

and honorable actions. As for the rest, all or practically all are more guilty

than the barbarians. And to be more guilty is to be worse.

Therefore, since some men think it irrational and absurd that we should be

judged as worse, or even not much better than the barbarians, let us see, as I

said, how we are worse, and in relation to which barbarians. Now I say that

except for those Romans alone, whom I mentioned just now, the others are all or

almost all more guilty than the barbarians, and more criminal in their lives.

You who read these words are perhaps vexed and condemn what you read. I do not

shrink from your censure; condemn me if I do not succeed in proving my words;

condemn me if I do not show that the Sacred Scriptures also have said what 1 now

claim. I myself who say that we Romans, who judge ourselves far superior to all

other nations on earth, are worse in many respects, do not deny that in certain

ways we are superior. For while we are, as I have said, worse in our way of life

and in our sins, yet in living under the catholic law we are incomparably

superior. But we must consider this, that while it is not our merit that the law

is good, it is our fault that we live badly. Surely it profits us nothing that

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our law is good, if our life and conversation are not; for the good law is the

gift of Christ, whereas the faulty life is our own responsibility. On the

contrary, we are more blameworthy if the law we worship is good and we who

worship it are evil. Nay, we do not worship it, if we are evil, for an evil

worshipper cannot be properly said to worship at all. He who does not worship

sacredly that which is holy does not worship at all, and hereby the very law we

hold accuses us.

14.

Disregarding,

therefore, the privilege of the law, which either does not help us or even

brings just condemnation upon us, let us compare the lives, the aims, the

customs and the vices of the barbarians with our own. The barbarians are unjust

and we are also; they are avaricious and so are we; they are faithless and so

are we; to sum up, the barbarians and ourselves are alike guilty of all evils

and impurities.

Perhaps the answer may be made: if we are equal to them in viciousness, why

are we not also equal to them in strength? Inasmuch as their wickedness is like

ours and their guilt identical, either we should be as strong as they, or they

as weak as we. That is true, and the natural conclusion is that we who are

weaker are the more guilty. What proof have we? The proof is, of course,

inherent in my demonstration that God does everything in accordance with

judgment. For if, as it is written: "The eyes of the Lord are in every

place, beholding the evil and the good:"

and in the words of the apostle: "The judgment of God is according to truth

against all wicked men,"

we, who do not

cease to do evil, see that it is by the judgment of a just God that we endure

the penalties for our evil-doing. But, you object, the barbarians commit the

same sins, and yet are not as wretched as we. There is this difference between

us, that even if the barbarians do the same things that we do, our sins are

still more grievous than theirs. For our vices and

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theirs can be equal without their guilt being as great as ours. All of them, as

I said before, are either pagans or heretics. I shall discuss the pagans first,

since theirs is the older delusion: among these, the nation of the Saxons is

savage, the Franks treacherous, the Gepids ruthless, the Huns lewd ---- so we

see that the life of all the barbarians is full of vice. Can you say that their

vices imply the same guilt as ours, that the lewdness of the Huns is as sinful

as ours, the treachery of the Franks as worthy of accusation, the drunkenness of

the Alemanni as reprehensible as that of Christians, the greed of an Alan as

much to be condemned as that of a believer?

If a Hun or Gepid is deceitful what wonder is it in one who is utterly

ignorant of the guilt involved in falsehood? If a Frank swears falsely, what is

strange in his action, since he thinks perjury a figure of speech, and not a

crime? And why is it strange that the barbarians have this degree of vice, since

they know not the law and God, when a majority of the Romans, who know that they

are sinning, take the same attitude?

Not to speak of any other type of man, let us consider only the throngs of

Syrian merchants who have seized the greater part of all our towns---- is their

life anything else than plotting, trickery and wearing falsehood threadbare?

They think words practically wasted that do not bring some profit to their

speaker. Among these men God's prohibition of an oath is held in such high

esteem that they consider every sort of perjury actually profitable to them.

What wonder is it, then, that the barbarians, who do not know that falsehood is

a sin, practice deception? None of their actions are due to contempt of the

divine ordinances, for they do not know the precepts of God. A man ignorant of

the law cannot act in defiance of it. This is our peculiar guilt, who read the

divine law and constantly violate its terms, who say that we know God and yet

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walk roughshod over his commands and precepts; and therefore, since we despise

him whom we believe and boast that we worship, the very appearance of worship is

an injury to him.

15.

Lastly, to say

nothing of our other sins, who is there among laymen, except a very few, that

does not constantly have the name of Christ on his lips to swear by it? Hence

this is the oath most commonly used by nobles and baseborn men alike: "By

Christ I do this ... ; by Christ I act thus ... ; by Christ I am not going to

say anything else ... ; by Christ I am not going to do anything else." And

what results? The abuse has been carried so far that, as we said before about

heathen barbarians, Christ's name seems now to be not a binding oath but a mere

expletive. For among the great majority this name is held to be so trivial that

men never have less intention of doing a thing than when they swear by Christ to

do it. Although it is written: "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord

thy God in vain,"

reverence for Christ has

fallen so low that among all the vain words of this age scarcely any seems more

vainly used than the name of Christ.

Then many swear by the name of Christ to do things not merely trivial and

foolish but even criminal. For this is their usual manner of speaking: "By

Christ I'll steal that ... ; by Christ I'll wound that man ... ; by Christ I'll

murder him." It has come to such a pass that they feel themselves bound by

religion to commit the crimes they have sworn in Christ's name.

Finally, let me tell an experience of my own. A short time ago, won over by

the pleas of a certain poor man, I besought a man of considerable influence not

to take from the poor wretch his property and substance, not to remove the sole

prop and help that supported his poverty. Then he, who had swallowed the poor

man's goods in ravenous haste, and had already devoured his prey with most

ardent ambition and greed, glared at me with eyes blazing as if he thought I

might take from him something he had not succeeded in

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filching from the other, and said he could not possibly do as I asked, since he

was acting in accordance with a sacred command or decree that he absolutely

could not overlook. When I asked the reason, he said most emphatically, brooking

no contradiction: "I have made a vow to seize that man's property. Consider

then whether I could or should fail to accomplish what I have sworn by the name

of Christ." Then I left him, having heard the reason for his most pious

crime, for what else was I to do, when his action was shown to be so just and

sacred!

16.

At this point I ask

all who are of sound mind: who would ever believe that human covetousness would

reach such a pitch of audacity, would ever scorn God so openly that men should

say it is for Christ's sake they intend to do a deed the very performance of

which is an insult to Christ? "What an unthinkable and monstrous crime! Of

what daring are the wicked minds of men not capable? They arm themselves for

robbery in God's name; they make him somehow responsible for their crimes, and

although Christ forbids and punishes all sin they claim that they perform their

wicked deeds for his sake.

Yet we, complaining of the injustice of the enemy, say that the heathen

barbarians are guilty of perjury. How much less guilty are they who swear

falsely by demons, than we who swear by Christ! How much less serious a crime it

is to take the name of Jove in vain than that of Christ! In the one case it is a

dead man by whom they swear,

in the other the

living God by whose name they swear falsely. In the former instance there is no

longer even a man; in the latter, the most high God; here, since the oath was

taken in the most binding name, the greatest guilt and perjury must be involved;

there, since that by which they swear scarcely exists, clearly there is no

perjury, for since the God by whom they swear does not exist, there is no

perjury when the oath is broken. Finally, let him who wishes to know the truth

of this matter

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listen to the

blessed apostle Paul uttering the very arguments I am giving. These are his

words: "Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them

who are under the law." And again: "Where no law is, there is no

transgression."

In these two statements,

did he not make clear that there are two divisions of the human race, those

placed without the law, and those living under it? What men are there who now

live under the law? Who indeed but the Christians? Such was the apostle himself,

who said of himself: " I am not without law to God, but under the law to

Christ."

Who then are outside the law of Christ? Who but pagans ignorant of the Lord's

law? Therefore it is of these that he says: "Where no law is, there is no

transgression." By this one word he shows that only Christians transgress

the law when they sin, but the pagans who do not know the law sin without

transgression, since no one can transgress in a matter of which he is ignorant.

We alone therefore are transgressors of the divine law, we who, as it is

written, read the law and do not follow it. Hence our knowledge brings us

nothing but guilt, since its result is only that we give the more offence by our

sins, for what we know from our reading and in our hearts, we spurn in our

wantonness and scorn.

So the words of the apostle to every Christian man were most justly spoken:

"Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law

dishonorest thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles

through you."

Of what crimes the Christians are guilty may be learned from this one fact,

that they defame the name of God. And although we have been charged to "do

all things for the glory of God"

we, on the

contrary, do all things for his injury. Although the Savior daily calls to us:

"Let your light so shine before men, that the

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sons of men may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in

heaven,"

we, on the other hand, so live

that the sons of men may see our evil deeds and blaspheme our Father which is in

heaven.

17.

This being the

case, we may indeed beguile ourselves with the great prerogatives of the name of

Christian, we who so act and live that by the very fact that we are said to be a

Christian people we seem to be a reproach to Christ. On the other hand, what do

we find of this sort among the pagans? Can it be said of the Huns: "See

what sort of men these are who are called Christians?" Can it be said of

the Saxons or the Franks: "See what these men do who claim to worship

Christ?" Can the sacred law be blamed for the savage customs of the Moors?

Do the most inhuman rites of Scythians or Gepids bring curses and blasphemy on

the name of the Lord our Savior? Can it be said of any of these: "Where is

the catholic law that they believe? Where are the commandments of piety and

chastity that they learn? They read the Gospel, and are unchaste; they listen to

the apostles, and get drunk; they follow Christ, and plunder; they lead

dishonorable lives, and say that they follow an honorable law." Can such

things be said of any of these nations? Certainly not, but they are all truly

said of us: in us Christ suffers reproach; in us the Christian law is accursed.

Of us are said the words quoted above: "See what sort of men these are who

worship Christ. They are plainly lying when they say that they learn good

things, and boast that they keep the commandments of the sacred law. For if they

learned good things they would be good. Their religion must be like its

followers: doubtless they are what they are taught to be. Thus it appears that

the prophets they have teach impurity; and the apostles they read have

sanctioned wickedness; and the Gospel which they have learned preaches the

actions that they perform; in fine, the lives of the Christians would be holy,

if Christ had taught holiness. So the object of their

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worship must be judged from his worshippers. How can the teacher be good whose

pupils we see are so evil? In him they are Christians ---- they hear Christ

himself and read his words. It is easy for us all to learn the teachings of

Christ. See what the Christians do, and you will clearly discern the teachings

of Christ."

Finally, what distorted and wicked notions the pagans have always had about

the sacraments of the Lord is shown by the bloody inquisitions of brutal

persecutors, who believed that at Christian services only vile and abominable

rites were performed. Even the origins of our religion were thought to spring

from two great crimes, the first being murder and the second incest, which is

worse than murder. Nor were these mere murder and incest, but a more wicked

thing than the bare commission of either of these crimes, the incest of holy

mothers, and the murder of innocent infants, whom, they thought, the Christians

not only murdered, but ---- which is more abominable ---- devoured.

All this was supposed to be done to appease God, as if any evil would cause

him greater offence! as an offering to atone for sin, as if any sin could be

greater! to make him look with favor on sacrifices, as if any act could better

arouse his aversion and horror! to win the right to eternal life, as if indeed,

even supposing it could be won by such actions, it were worth while to attain it

by such atrocious crimes!

18.

We may understand

from this what the pagans have come to believe about the character of

Christians, who worship God in such sacrifices, and what sort of God they think

could have taught such things as sacred rites. Yet how did this belief arise?

How else but through those who are called Christians, but are not; who by their

shameful and disgraceful lives sully the name of their religion; who, as it is

written, "profess that they know God, but in works deny him, being

abominable and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate";

by whom, as we read, "the way of

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truth is evil spoken of"

and the sacred

name of God violated by the profanity of sacrilegious men.

How very difficult it is to atone for subjecting the name of divinity to the

evil-speaking of the heathen, we are taught by the example of the most blessed

David. By the suffrage of his former acts of justice he deserved to win release

by a single act of confession, from eternal punishment for his offences. Yet

even the penitence that pleaded for him did not avail to win pardon for, this

grievous sin. For when Nathan the prophet had heard him confess his fault, and

said to him: "The Lord hath put away thy sin, thou shalt not die," he

added at once: "Howbeit, because by this deed thou hast given great

occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born of

thee shall surely die."

What followed? He laid aside his diadem, cast off his jewels, doffed the

purple, gave up all the splendor of his royal state, and instead shut himself up

alone in mourning, foully clad in sackcloth, drenched with his tears and

besmirched with ashes. Yet though he sought the life of his little child with

such lamentations and entreaties, and strove to move the tender heart of God

with such fervent prayers, all his pleas and protests could not obtain his

pardon, even though he had firmly believed that he should gain what he sought

from God ---- which is the greatest aid to those who pray. From this we learn

that there is absolutely no sin for which it is harder to atone than that of

giving the heathen occasion to blaspheme. For whoever has gravely sinned without

causing others to blaspheme brings condemnation only on himself, but he who has

made others blaspheme drags many men down to death with him, and must be held

answerable for all whom he has implicated in his guilt. Nor is this all;

whenever a man sins; in such a way that his action does not give others occasion

for blasphemy, his sin injures only him who has committed it, but does not

insult the holy name of

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God by the

sacrilegious curses of blasphemy. But if his wrongdoing has caused others to

blaspheme, his sin must be immeasurably great, beyond the bounds of human guilt,

for by the revilings of many he has caused incalculable insult to God.

19.

Moreover, as I have

said, this evil is peculiar to us Christians, because God is blasphemed only

through the agency of those who know the good and do evil; who, as it is

written: " Profess that they know God, but in works deny him";

who, as the same apostle says: "Rest in the law and know his will, and

approve the things that are more excellent; who have the form of knowledge and

of truth in the law; who preach a man should not steal, and themselves steal;

who say a man should not commit adultery and themselves commit it; who make

their boast in the law and through breaking the law dishonor God."

The Christians are worse than other men for the very reason that they ought

to be better. They do not justify their profession of faith, but light against

it by their evil lives. For evil doing is the more damnable in contrast with an

honorable title; and a holy name becomes a crime in an impious man. Therefore

our Savior also says in the Apocalypse to a lukewarm Christian: "I would

thou wert hot or cold; so then because thou art lukewarm, I will spue thee out

of my mouth."

The Lord commanded every Christian to be fervent in faith and spirit. For it

is written: "That we may be fervent in spirit, serving the Lord."

In this fervor of spirit the ardor of religious faith is made known; he who has

the largest share of such ardor is recognized as fervent and faithful, while he

who has none at all is known to be cold and an unbeliever. But he who is betwixt

and between is a lukewarm Christian and hateful to the Lord, who therefore says

to him: " Would that thou wert hot or cold, now therefore

|131

since thou art lukewarm I will spue thee out of my mouth." That is to say:

"Would that you had either the heat and faith of good Christians or the

ignorance of pagans. For then either your warm faith would make you pleasing to

God, or at least for the time being your ignorance of the law would give you

some measure of excuse. But as it is, since you know Christ, and neglect him

whom you know, you who have, so to speak, been received into the very presence

of God by the recognition of the faith, are cast out because of

lukewarmness."

The blessed apostle Peter also made this plain when he said of the lukewarm

and vicious Christians, that is, those who live wicked lives: "For it had

been better for them not to have known the truth, than after they had known it,

to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it is happened unto

them according to the true proverb, 'The dog is turned to his own vomit again,

and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.' "

To make clear that this was said of those who live under the name of

Christian in the vileness and filth of the world, hear what he says of such men

in the same passage: "For if, after they had escaped the pollutions of the

world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again

entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the

beginning."

This, indeed, the blessed Paul

repeats in like manner: "For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou keep

the law; but if thou be a breaker of the law, thy circumcision is made

uncircumcision."

He himself shows very

clearly that by circumcision Christianity is to be understood when he says:

"For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit and have no

confidence in the flesh."

By this we see

that he is comparing the

|132

wicked

Christians with pagans, and not merely comparing them but almost ranking them as

of less account, when he says: "However, if the uncircumcision keep the

righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for

circumcision? And shall not uncircumcision, which is by nature, if it fulfil the

law, judge thee, who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the

law?"

From this we learn, as I said before, that we are much more blameworthy, who

have the law and reject it, than those who neither have it at all nor know it,

for no one despises what he does not know. "I had not known lust," the

apostle says, "except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet,"

Nor do men transgress the law which they do not know, for, as it is written:

"Where no law is, there is no transgression."

If men do not transgress the law which they have not, neither do they despise

the terms of the law which they have not, for no one, as I said, can despise

what he does not know.

We, therefore, are alike scorners and transgressors of the law, and thus we

are worse than the pagans, because they do not know the ordinances of God, but

we know them; they do not possess them, but we do; they do not perform precepts

they have not heard, but we read and trample them under our feet. Hence what

with them is ignorance is in us transgression, since there is less guilt in

ignorance of the law than in contempt of it.

[Footnotes moved to the end]

See III. 2,

supra.

Salvian

Ad ecclesiam

II.

37; a work issued anonymously as the address of Timothy to the church on

avarice, but accepted by Salvian as his in

Ep.

IX, to Salonius. The

anonymous publication explains the manner of his reference in this case. On this

passage cf. also

Ep.

IX. 9: "The names of things are of no avail

without the substance, and the words for virtues are nothing without their

active strength."

(Proverbs 11. 22).

(Psalms 50. 7) (Psalms 81. 8).

(Isaiah 1. 3).

(Hosea 1.9) (Romans 9.25).

(Jeremiah 17.13).

Ibid.

8. 9.

(James 2.20), 26.

10.

Ibid.

2.18.

11.

Rittershausen suggests that Salvian

here alluded to the saying of the jurisconsults: "Not to be, and not to

appear, or not to be susceptible of proof, are one and the same thing."

12.

(James 2.19).

13.

The MS reading

incontumaciae,

the

single occurrence of this word, was formerly questioned, but Pauly now accepts

it, following Hartel, as equivalent to

obsequium.

14.

(Romans 2.1).

15.

That is, the usual slave allowance.

The language seems to be borrowed from Cod. Just. XII. 23:

De canone

frumentario urbis Romae.

Cf. Gregoire et Collombet

ad. loc.

16.

(Proverbs 6. 30).

17.

(Romans 2.1).

18.

Even the imperial estates suffered

from such encroachments; cf. the decree of Arcadius and Honorius, a.d. 399,

providing for restitution of property unjustly seized on the imperial estates,

and for a double penalty if restitution was delayed beyond a period of three

months, applying also to those who had fled, unless they returned to restore the

property stolen. The penalty applied to judges also if they did not give

evidence against the

exactores

and

conpulsores

who were guilty. It

is noteworthy that the decree claimed that but for the imperial clemency a

fourfold penalty should have been exacted; one suspects impotence rather than

clemency as the reason for the lighter fine (Cod. Theod. X. 1.10). On the

general situation, cf. V. 8.

infra.

19.

(Ecclesiasticus 13.19).

20.

Compare the description of Arvandus,

praetorian prefect of Gaul, given by Sidonius Apollinaris

Ep.

I. 7.3,

"He governed his first prefecture with great distinction, and his second

with great destruction." Again, in

Ep.

V. 13 Sidonius described the

"monster" Seronatus, "exhausting the individuals scattered

outside the towns by unheard of forms of inflictions, and ensnaring them by the

sinuous deceits of his calumnies." The same Seronatus (

Ep.

II. 1)

"levies taxes as a master, exacts payments like a judge, slanders like a

barbarian . . , fills the woods daily with fugitives, the villas with enemies,

the altars with accused men, the prisons with clergy." We learn, however,

from

Ep.

VII. 7. 2 that he was at last brought to justice and put to

death, though the government hesitated to act against him.

21.

So Sidonius,

Ep.

V. 13,

said of Seronatus: "Some are freed by his venality, others by his vanity,

none by his mercy."

22.

On this whole passage cf.

Haemmerle,

Studia Salviana,

I. 4, pp. 29-33.

23.

Since Gaul was overrun by the

barbarians earlier than Spain, the latter province suffered heavier taxation at

the hands of the imperial prefects, who tried to make up the Gallic deficit in

the imperial taxation from this source. Cf. Orosius VII. 41. 7: "There are

certain Romans among them who prefer to sustain poverty in freedom among the

barbarians than the constant oppression of taxation among the Romans."

24.

Africa, being under the praetorian

prefect of Italy, as Spain was under that of Gaul, also suffered from the

increase of taxation to make up for losses in Italy.

25.

See Sidonius

Ep.

III. 6. 3:

"Certainly the provinces are much discussed; a good year depends less on

the crops than the officials." Again, in

Ep.

IV.

24.5,

Sidonius illustrated the "integrity of a few" by persuading an

official friend to grant a year's immunity from taxes, and cancellation of the

interest due, to a more straitened taxpayer, to free him "from the

barbarous demands of the collectors yapping around him."

26.

This attitude, however, was in

defiance of a decree of Constantine of A.D. 319 (Cod. Just. IX. 14.1), which

made a master who intentionally killed a slave guilty of homicide, whatever was

the method used.

27.

(Jeremiah 5. 8).

28.

The increase of concubinage in

the fourth century led to progressive legalization of the institution.

Constantino in A.D. 326 forbade it unconditionally (Cod. Just. V. 26) ; Arcadius

and Honorius in 405 strictly limited the inheritance of concubines and their

children

(Ibid.

27. 2) ; Theodosius and Valentinian in 443

(Ibid.

27.

3) provided that natural sons might have full inheritance rights if they entered

the curial class, and natural daughters if they married curials. The last decree

illustrates also how fiscal necessities led to increasing leniency on the part

of the government toward the frailties of the propertied class, especially when

direct benefit to the treasury would result.

29.

See Jerome

Adv. Rufinum

I. 11:

"When vice is attacked anonymously, the man who is angry at the attack

accuses himself. It were the part of a prudent man, therefore, though annoyed,

to hide his guilt and cover his clouded heart by a bright front."

30.

This mention of the notion, prevalent

in the fifth century, of the old age of the Roman power, is somewhat at variance

with Salviun's usual point of view. Sidonius used "the old age of the

world" as a commonplace (cf.

Ep.

VIII. 6.3); Cyprian

(Ad

Demetrianum

4) made it the chief answer to the usual charges against the

Christians: "You blame the Christians because as the world grows old its

parts are weakened." Salvian, on the other hand, saw the old regime as

continuing with new vigor, gained from the barbarians, to take the place of the

old vices.

31.

The efforts of the central government

to do away with such inequalities are illustrated by the decree of Gratian,

Theodosius and Valentinian, a.d. 383 (Cod. Theod. XI. 13. 1) : "Let all the

privileges granted to a few individuals to the destruction of the many be

annulled, and all who have received immunities of this sort by any means be

reduced to an equal lot with the other provincials . . . "; by the decree

of the same emperors in 385 (

Ibid.

I. 20) providing that all be bound

"by the same equal form of levy"; and by that of Arcadius and Honorius

in 399 (

Ibid.

1. 26) removing all privilege, making all men equally

subject to taxation, especially in "those provinces from which the

complaint arises." The repetition of such provisions illustrates clearly

enough the futility of enacting them, which increased in the fifth century.

32.

See V. 8

infra.

We are

reminded, however, how much the rich also had to complain of the burdens of

taxation, by the description (Sidonius

Ep.

V. 17. 5) of a church festival

of which the crowning pleasure was the conversation of Sidonius and his wealthy

friends with "no mention of the imperial officers or of the taxes, not a

word to be betrayed, and no one to betray it."

33.

I (John 5.19).

34.

See V. 10,

infra:

"Thinking

the service of God depends more on costume than on actions, they have changed

their garments but not their hearts." Caesarius of Arles, who is said by

Cyprian (

Vita

1.1. 11) never to have given up in the slightest degree the

customs of the brothers at Lerins, said in the first chapter of his

Regula ad

monachos

(Migne, PL, LXVII, col. 1099) : "In the first place if any man

come to conversion ... let his lay garments not be changed, unless he have first

made bills of sale for his possessions." Elsewhere he said (

Epistola ad

germanos, ibid

. col. 1155): "To lay aside secular garments and put on

religious ones is the work of a moment. . . . Let him not be wont to wear a

style of clothing either too mean, or displaying pride by frequent change, or of

a ruinous elegance." Evidently, then, his idea of a religious habit was not

a set uniform, but one distinguished from secular clothing chiefly by its

simplicity. The emphasis laid by this prominent alumnus of the monastery at

Lerins on the change in clothing as an indication of the adoption of a religious

life seems adequate to settle the question much mooted among editors of Salvian,

whether the change of garments in the present passage is to be taken literally

or figuratively.

35.

See Cyprian

Ad Demetrianum

10:

"And do you wonder that the wrath of God increasingly punishes the human

race, when the sins to be punished increase daily?"

36.

(Isaiah 50. 11).

37.

(Matthew 23. 32-33).

38.

That is, the people of Sodom and

Gomorrah; cf. I.8,

supra.

39.

(Genesis 19. 12-13).

40.

(Matthew 11.23-24) (Luke 10.12-15).

41.

(Psalms 73.9), 11; 94.7.

42.

Ibid.

53.1.

43.

In the classical period this was

already a popular proverb:

Scelera non habent consilium;

cf. Quintilian

Institutio

oratoria

VII. 2. 44.

44.

Cf. Lactantius

De ira Dei

10.44:

"Nor is it probable that the smaller and humbler creatures should have a

rule of life, while the larger and chief ones lack it."

45.

There appears to be a slight

lacuna in the text, unless, as Hartel conjectures (cf. Pauly's note

ad loc),

the

preposition

ex,

for which an object is here supplied, has crept into the

MS text from a marginal notation,

standing for

exempla.

46.

See Vergil

Georgics

IV. 200.

47.

(Acts 17. 28).

48.

(Romans 1. 20).

49.

(Ephesians 3.15).

50.

(John 3. 16).

51.

(Romans 8.32). Note that the Vulgate

reading is the future,

donabit,

while Salvian had

donavit.

52.

(Romans 5. 6-7).

53.

Ibid.

5. 8-9.

54.

(Psalms 116.12-13).

55.

(Romans 8. 35-36), 39.

56.

(Ephesians 5. 12).

57.

This question is answered in a

similar way in Augustine's homily,

De tempore barbarico.

58.

See Juvenal

Sat.

141-142.

59.

(Galatians 6. 3-4).

60.

The Goths and Vandals had been

converted to Arianism; cf. Book IV. 14, 17

infra,

for Salvian's account

of the pagans among the barbarians.

61.

(Proverbs 15. 3).

62.

(Romans 2. 2).

63.

Salvian's estimate of their numbers

seems justified by the numerous inscriptions of Syrian and other orientals,

found in Gaul; cf.

Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum

XII, XIII.

64.

(Exodus 20. 7).

65.

A characteristic example of Christian

euhemerism.

66.

(Romans 3. 19); 4. 15.

67.

I Corinthians 9. 21.

68.

(Romans 2. 23-24).

69.

I Corinthians 10. 31.

70.

(Matthew 5.16).

71.

(Titus 1. 16).

72.

II Peter 2. 2.

73.

II Samuel 12.13-14.

74.

(Titus 1.16).

75.

(Romans 2.17-23),

selections.

76.

Revelations 3. 15-16.

77.

(Romans 12. 11).

78.

II Peter 2. 21-22.

79.

Ibid.

2. 20.

80.

(Romans 2. 25).

81.

(Philippians 3. 3).

82.

(Romans 2. 26-27).

83.

Ibid.

7. 7.

84.

Ibid.

4. 15.

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.133-156.

Book 5

Book V. : On heresy, and on the oppression of the poor by the powerful throughout the Roman Empire

1. Men's opposition to the law.

2. Heresy among the barbarians.

3. Heresy among the Romans.

4. The oppression of the many by the few.

5. The flight of Romans to the barbarians.

6. The revolt of the Bagaudae.

7. The oppression of the poor by the rich.

8. Means of relief.

9. The seeming injustice of God's mercy.

10. The character of true repentance.

11. The true meaning of power.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE FIFTH BOOK

I know that there are

men, utterly lacking in faith and void of the divine truth, who think they have

an easy answer to my arguments. They say that if the guilt of unfaithful

Christians is so great that they sin more in disregarding the commands of the

Lord which they know, than do the heathen tribes in their ignorance, then

ignorance has proved of more benefit to the pagans than knowledge, and knowledge

of the truth is only an obstacle to the Christians.

My answer must be this: it is not the truth that stands in our way, but our

own vices; not the law that does us injury, but our evil ways. In brief, give us

good ways of living and the decrees of the law are in our favor; take away our

vices and the law helps us. "For we know," the apostle said,

"that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully; knowing this, that the law

is not made for a righteous man." Therefore, begin to be just, and you

shall be free from the law, because the law cannot act against the holy life, in

which it consists. "For we know," he said, "that the law is good,

if a man use it lawfully; knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous

man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the unholy, for the ungodly and

for sinners, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound

doctrine."

So the law is not so much fighting

against you, my friend, as you against the law, nor does it by its good precepts

take action against you, but you against it by your evil life. In fact, it is on

your side, but you are against it. It gives you good counsel with holy words,

while you fight against it with evil deeds, and yet not so much against it as

against yourself. To oppose it is to oppose yourself, since in it lie your life

and

|134

safety. When you desert the

divine law, you abandon your own salvation. Thus our complaints of the Lord's

law are like those of an impatient invalid against an excellent doctor. When his

own fault has increased his illness, he accuses his physician of incompetence.

As if, indeed, prescriptions could cure any illness if the patient did not obey

them, or the regimen ordered by the physician work a cure if the patient did not

follow it. What good can bitter draughts do the stomach if sweet ones are taken

immediately after? What good can the silence of those about him do the delirious

patient whose own ravings are killing him? Of what avail will the antidote be if

the poison is poured over it?

Now in our case the law is the antidote, the poison our wickedness. The

antidote of the law cannot cure us who are being killed by the poison of our own

vice. But of these matters I have said enough before, and if occasion arises

shall speak again later with God's help.

Meanwhile, since I

mentioned above that there are two classes or sects of barbarians, namely,

pagans and heretics, and I have already, I think, said enough of the pagans, let

me now add what is necessary about the heretics. For my opponent may say:

"Even if the divine law does not exact of the pagans that they keep

commandments they do not know, it certainly does exact this of the heretics who

know them; for they read the same books we do; they have the same prophets, the

same apostles, the same evangelists, and therefore they are no less guilty than

we are of neglect of the law. Eeally their neglect is much worse than ours, for

although their Scriptures are the same, their actions are much worse.''

Let us consider both points. You say that they read the same books we do. How

can their books be the same, being badly interpolated and falsified by

unscrupulous men? They are not the same at all, for they cannot be said to keep

their identity unchanged if they are corrupted in any part. Having lost their

full

|135

completeness they are not

unharmed, and being robbed of the power of the sacraments they do not keep their

true value. We alone, therefore, have the Sacred Scriptures in full, unviolated

and complete, who either drink them at their fount, or at least drawn from the

purest source by the agency of an incorrupt translation; we alone read them

well. I wish we might fulfil them as well as we read them! But I fear that we

who fail to keep them do not read them correctly either. For there is less guilt

in not reading the holy words than in reading and violating them. The other

nations either do not possess the law of God or have it in a changed and

weakened form, and, as I said, to have it in such a condition is the same thing

as not to have it at all.

If there are any among the barbarians who seem in their books to possess the

Sacred Scriptures less interpolated and torn to pieces than the rest, still the

corruptions in their texts are due to the tradition of their first teachers,

whose disciples hold rather to their tradition than to the Scripture itself. For

they do not abide by the instructions of the true law, but by the interpolations

of an evil and distorted interpretation.

The barbarians, indeed, lacking the Roman training or any other sort of

civilized education, knowing nothing whatever unless they have heard it from

their teachers, follow blindly what they hear. Such men, completely ignorant of

literature and wisdom, are sure to learn the mysteries of the divine law through

instruction rather than reading, and to retain their masters' doctrines rather

than the law itself. Thus the interpretation and doctrine of their teachers have

usurped the authority of the law among them, since they know only what they are

taught. So they are heretics, but unwittingly.

Indeed it is only among us that they are heretics,

|136

and not among themselves, for they are so sure of their own orthodoxy that they

libel us in turn by the accusation of heresy. As they are to us, so are we to

them. We are convinced that they injure the holy incarnation in calling the Son

inferior to the Father: they think that we do injury to the Father in believing

the two equal. The truth is on our side, but they claim it for theirs. We truly

honor God but they think their belief honors his divinity the more. They fall

short in their Christian duty, but through what they think its fullest

performance; their lack of reverence seems to them true piety. So they err, but

with the best intentions, not through hatred, but through love of God, believing

that they honor and love him. Although they have not the true faith, yet they

think they possess the perfect love of God. How they shall be punished for the

error of their false opinion on the day of judgment, none can know but the

Judge. In the meantime, God bears with them patiently, I think, for he sees that

though they have not the true faith, yet their error is due to the love of what

appears to be the truth, especially since he knows that their wrongdoing is due

to ignorance, while among us men neglect what they believe. So their sin is the

fault of their teachers, while ours is our own; theirs is committed in

ignorance, ours in full knowledge; they do what they think right, but we what we

know to be perverse. Therefore with just judgment the patience of God bears with

them but punishes us, because ignorance may be pardoned for a time, but contempt

deserves no lenience. For it is written: ''The servant who knows not his lord's

will and does it not, shall be beaten with few stripes, but he who knows it and

does it not, shall be beaten with many.''

Let us not wonder

that we are beaten with many stripes, since we err not through ignorance but

through rebellion. For knowing

|137

the

good we do not perform it, and knowing the distinction between right and wrong

we pursue the wrong. We read the law and trample underfoot what is lawful; we

learn the decrees of the sacred ordinances only to increase the gravity of our

sins after their prohibition; we say that we worship God, but give our service

to the devil. After all this, we wish to receive good gifts from God, while we

heap wrong upon wrong continually; we wish to have God do our will, though we

are unwilling to do his. We treat with him as his superiors; we wish him to

accede to our wishes constantly, though we constantly fight against his.

But he is just, however unjust we may be; for he punishes those he thinks

deserve punishment, and bears with those he thinks deserve his patience. In each

case his end is the same, that his chastisement of the orthodox may restrain

their lust for sinning, and his forbearance at length bring the heretics to

recognize the full truth of the faith, especially since he knows that those men

are not apt to be unworthy of the catholic faith whom he sees superior to the

orthodox in their way of living. All those of whom I speak are either Vandals or

Goths,

for I say nothing of the multitude of Roman

heretics, and shall not compare them with either Romans or barbarians, since

their lack of faith makes them worse than the Romans, and their disgraceful

lives than the barbarians. That the men of whom I speak are Romans, far from

helping us,

|138

makes our case even

worse. It is easy to estimate what the whole Roman state deserves, when part of

the Romans offend God by their way of life, part by their lack of faith and

their way of living also. Add that the very heresies of the barbarians spring

originally from the false teaching they received from the Romans, and the

inception of heresy among them becomes another heavy charge against us.

But as for the way of

life among the Goths and Vandals, in what single respect can we consider

ourselves superior to them, or even worthy of comparison? Let me speak first of

their affection and charity, which the Lord teaches us are the chief of virtues,

and which he commends not only through the Sacred Scriptures but also in his own

words, when he says: "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples,

if ye love one another."

Now almost all

barbarians, at least those who belong to one tribe, under one king's rule, love

one another, whereas almost all the Romans are at strife with one another. What

citizen is there who does not envy his fellows? Who shows complete charity to

his neighbors? All are indeed far from their neighbors in affection, however

near in place; though living side by side, they are far apart in spirit. While

this is a most grievous wrong, I wish it were true only of citizens and

neighbors. But the situation is still more serious, for not even relations

preserve the bonds of kinship. Who renders a brotherly service for his next of

kin? Who pays to family affection the debt he knows is due to the name he bears?

Who is as closely related by his affections as by blood? Who is not fired with a

dark passion of ill will? Whose emotions are not the prey of envy? Who does not

look on another's good fortune as his own punishment? Who does not reckon

another's good as his own evil? Who finds his own good

|139

fortune so ample that he is willing that another should be fortunate also? Most

men are now suffering a strange and incalculable evil, in that it is not enough

for any man to be happy himself unless another is thereby made wretched. What a

situation is this, how savage, how rooted in the same impiety we deplore, how

alien to barbarians and familiar to Romans, that they proscribe one another by

mutual exactions. My last words, perhaps, give a wrong impression, for it would

be much more tolerable if each man endured what he himself had inflicted on

others. The present situation is harder to bear, for the many are proscribed by

the few, who use the public levies for their individual gain, and convert the

bills of indebtedness to the public treasury to their private profit.

Nor is it only the highest officials who do this, but the least too in almost

equal measure; not only the judges, but their obedient underlings as well.

For what cities are there, or even what municipalities and villages, in which

there are not as many tyrants as curials?

Still

perhaps they preen themselves on their title, since it seems to be one of power

and honor. Brigands usually rejoice and exult at being considered somewhat more

ruthless than they really are. What place is there, as I said before, where the

very lifeblood of widows and orphans is not drained by the leading men of their

states, and with them that of all godly men? For these last are classed with

widows and orphans, since they are either unwilling to

|140

protect themselves, out of devotion to their vows, or unable because of their

simplicity and humility. Therefore not one of them is safe, indeed scarcely any

are safe, except the very greatest, from the plunder and ruin of this universal

brigandage, other than those who are a match for the brigands themselves.

Matters have come to such an evil pass, to such a criminal condition, that only

the wicked man may count himself secure.

But certainly, you

object, even though there are so many who persecute good men, there must be some

who come to the rescue of those in distress, and, as it is written,

"deliver the poor and needy out of the hand of the wicked."

"There is none that doeth good, no, not one:"

as the prophet showed by these words, good men are so rare that scarcely one

seems to remain among us. Who offers help to those who are distressed and

suffering, when even the priests of the Lord make no resistance to the violence

of the unscrupulous? The majority of the clergy either say nothing, or, if they

do speak, their words are no more effective than silence. "With

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many of them it is not lack of resolution, but what they consider a prudent

discretion that commends this course.

They are

not willing to declare the truth openly, for this the sensitive ears of the

wicked cannot bear. Not content with shunning the truth, our oppressors hate and

curse it, they fail to evince any reverence or respect when they do hear the

truth, and show utter scorn for it, in their stubborn and rebellious conceit.

Therefore, even those who have occasion to speak remain silent and refrain from

immediate attacks on those whom they know to be guilty. They dare not publish

the whole truth openly for fear of increasing oppression by a too emphatic

insistence.

Meanwhile the poor are being robbed, widows groan, orphans are trodden down,

so that many, even persons of good birth, who have enjoyed a liberal education,

seek refuge with the enemy

to escape

death under the trials of the general persecution. They seek among the

barbarians the Roman mercy, since they cannot endure the barbarous mercilessness

they find among the Romans.

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Although these men differ in customs and language from those with whom they

have taken refuge, and are unaccustomed too, if I may say so, to the nauseous

odor of the bodies and clothing of the barbarians,

yet they prefer the strange life they find there to the injustice rife among the

Romans. So you find men passing over everywhere, now to the Goths, now to the

Bagaudae, or whatever other barbarians have established their power anywhere,

and they do not repent of their expatriation, for they would rather live as free

men, though in seeming captivity, than as captives in seeming liberty. Hence the

name of Roman citizen, once not only much valued but dearly bought,

is now voluntarily repudiated and shunned, and is thought not merely valueless,

but even almost abhorrent. What can be a greater proof of Roman injustice than

that many worthy noblemen to whom their Roman status should have been the

greatest source of fame and honor, have nevertheless been driven so far by the

cruelty of Roman injustice that they no longer wish to be Romans?

The result is that even those who do not take refuge with the barbarians are

yet compelled to be barbarians themselves; for this is the case with the greater

part of the Spaniards, no small proportion of the Gauls, and, in fine, all those

throughout the Roman world whose Roman citizenship has been brought to nothing

by Roman extortion.

I must now speak of

the Bagaudae,

who, despoiled, afflicted,

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and murdered by wicked and bloodthirsty magistrates, after they had lost the

rights of Roman, citizens, forfeited also the honor of the Roman name. We

transform their misfortunes into crime, we brand them with a name that recalls

their losses, with a name that we ourselves have contrived for their shame! We

call those men rebels and utterly abandoned, whom we ourselves have forced into

crime.

For by what other causes were they made

Bagaudae

save by our unjust acts, the

wicked decisions of the magistrates, the proscription and extortion of those who

have turned the public exactions to the increase of their private fortunes and

made the tax indictions their opportunity for plunder?

Like wild beasts, instead of governing those put under their power, the

officials have devoured them, feeding not only on their

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belongings as ordinary brigands would do, but even on their torn flesh and their

blood. Thus it has come to pass that men who were strangled and half killed by

brutal exactions began to be really barbarians, since they were not permitted to

be Romans. They were satisfied to become what they were not, since they were no

longer allowed to be what they had been; and they were compelled to defend their

lives as best they could, since they saw that they had already completely lost

their liberty.

How does our present situation differ from theirs? Those who have not before

joined the Bagaudae are now being compelled to join them. The overwhelming

injuries poor men suffer compel them to wish to become Bagaudae, but their

weakness prevents them. So they are like captives oppressed by the yoke of an

enemy, enduring their torture of necessity, not of their own choice; in their

hearts they long for freedom, while they suffer the extremes of slavery.

Such is the case

among almost all the lower classes, for the same circumstances force them to two

very different alternatives. They are most strongly compelled to wish for

freedom, but the compulsion they suffer deprives them of power to carry out

their wish. Perhaps it may be asserted that the very men who have these desires

would wish for nothing better than to be free of any occasion to feel them, for

what they wish is the greatest misfortune. They would be much better off if they

had no need for such ambitions. But what other wish can these poor wretches

have? They must endure the frequent, even continuous, ruin of state

requisitions, always menaced by severe and unremitting proscription; they desert

their homes to avoid being tortured in them, and go into voluntary exile to

escape heavy punishment. To such men the enemy are kinder than the tax

collectors. This is proved by their actions, for they flee to the enemy to avoid

the oppression of the levies.

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Such taxation in itself, however harsh and brutal, would still be less severe

and painful if all shared equally in the common lot. But the situation is made

more shameful and disastrous by the fact that all do not bear the burden

together; the tributes due from the rich are extorted from the poor, and the

weaker bear the burdens of the stronger. The only reason why they do not bear

the whole burden is that the exactions are greater than their resources. They

are suffering the most diverse and dissimilar misfortunes, envy and need. For

envy is involved in the payment, and need in the means by which it is made. If

you consider the amount they pay, you will think them wealthy; but if you

consider what they have, you will find them in dire need. Who can square the

accounts of such injustice? They make the payments due from the rich while they

suffer the poverty of beggars.

My next point is still more serious. The rich themselves from time to time

make additions to the amount of taxation demanded from the poor. You may ask how

it is, when their assessment has already reached a maximum figure, and the

payments due from them are very large, that the rich can possibly wish to

increase the total. But I did not say that they increase their own payments, for

they permit the increase simply because it does not cost them anything

additional.

Let me explain. Frequently there come from the highest imperial officials new

envoys, new bearers of dispatches, sent under recommendation to a few men of

note, for the ruin of the many. In their honor new contributions and tax levies

are decreed. The mighty determine what sums the poor shall pay; the favor of the

rich decrees what the masses of the lowly shall lose; for they themselves are

not at all involved in these exactions.

Do you

say that

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it is impossible not to

give due honor and entertainment to the envoys sent by our superiors? Then be

the first to contribute, you men of wealth, who are first to pass such decrees;

be first to lavish your property who are first in largess of mere words. You who

give, give of mine and thine alike; though absolute justice would require that

any one who wishes sole claim on the resulting favor should also bear the

expense alone. However, we poor men accede to the wish of the rich. What you few

order let us all pay. What is so just and humane as this? Your decree burdens us

with new debts; at least let this indebtedness be shared between us. What can be

more unjust or unworthy than that you alone should be free from debt, who are

making us all debtors?

The poor, indeed, in the extremes of their misery, pay all the exactions of

which I have spoken, in utter ignorance of the object or reason of the payments.

For who is allowed to discuss the payments, or inquire into the reasons for the

amounts due? The sum is openly published only when the rich fall out with one

another, and some of them feel slighted because they learn that assessments have

been passed without their advice and management. Then you will hear some among

them say: "What an unconscionable crime! Two or three decide the ruin of

the many; a few powerful men determine what is to be paid for by many poor

wretches!" For each individual rich man thinks it due to his honor to

object to any decree passed in his absence, but he does not consider it due to

justice to object to any wrong being enacted in his presence.

Finally, what they have criticized in others they themselves afterward

establish in law, either in requital for the earlier contempt, or as proof of

their power. As a result the most unhappy poor are like men far out at sea,

buffeted by conflicting winds; they are overwhelmed by the billows that break

over them now from one side, now from the other.

But surely, you say,

those who are unjust in this respect are known to be moderate and just in

another, and atone for their

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wickedness in the one matter by their generosity in the other. For in proportion

as they burden the poor with the weight of new indictions they sustain them by

proffering new alleviations; in proportion as the lesser men are weighed down by

new tributes, they are relieved by new remedies.

But this is not the case, for the injustice is alike in both the exactions

and the remedies. As the poor are the first to receive the burden, they are the

last to obtain relief. For whenever, as happened lately,

the ruling powers have thought best to take measures to help the bankrupt cities

to lessen their taxes in some measure, at once we see the rich alone dividing

with one another the remedy granted to all alike. Who then remembers the poor?

Who summons the needy and humble to share in the common benefit? Who allows the

man who is always first in bearing the burden to have even the last place in

receiving relief? What more can I say? Only that the poor are not reckoned as

taxpayers at all, except when the weight of taxation is being imposed on them;

they are outside the number when remedies are being distributed.

Under such circumstances can we think ourselves undeserving of God's severe

punishment when we ourselves continually so punish the poor? Can we believe that

God ought not to exercise his judgment against us all, when we are constantly

unjust? For where, or among what people, do these evils exist save only among

the Romans? Who commit such grave acts of injustice as ours? Take the Franks,

they are ignorant of this wrong; the Huns are immune to it; there is nothing of

the sort among the Vandals, nothing among the Goths. For in the Gothic country

the barbarians are so far from tolerating this sort of oppression that not even

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Romans who live among them have to bear it. Hence all the Romans in that region

have but one desire, that they may never have to return to the Roman

jurisdiction. It is the unanimous prayer of the Roman people in that district

that they may be permitted to continue to lead their present life among the

barbarians.

Yet we are surprised that the Goths are not conquered by our resistance, when

the Romans would rather live among them than at home. Not only have our kinsmen

no desire at all to escape from them to us, but they even leave us to take

refuge with them. I could find occasion to wonder why all the poor and needy

taxpayers

do not follow their example, except

for the one factor that hinders them, namely, that they cannot transfer their

poor possessions and homes and their households. For, since many of them leave

their tiny fields and shops to escape the enforced payment of taxes, how could

they help wishing to take off with them, if it were at all possible, the

property they are compelled to abandon? They are not capable of doing what they

would probably prefer, hence they do the one thing they can. They put themselves

under the care and protection of the powerful, make themselves the surrendered

captives of the rich and so pass under their jurisdiction.

Still I should not consider this a serious or unfitting procedure; on the

contrary, I should laud the public spirit of the powerful to whom the poor

entrust themselves, if they did not sell their patronage, if the defence they

claim to give the poor were

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due to

their humanity and not to their greed. It is a serious and grievous situation,

that the rich make a show of protecting the poor only in order to rob them, that

they defend the wretched only on condition of making them more wretched still by

this defence. For all those who seem to be enjoying protection assign to their

patrons the bulk of their property before they receive any help, and thus the

sons' inheritance is destroyed that the fathers may be secure.

Protection for the parents is assured by the beggary of the children. See then

the aid and patronage afforded by the great: they do nothing for the benefit of

those who come under their care, but only for their own. Some aid is granted the

parents for the time being, but only on condition that in the future the

children shall lose everything. It is a mere process of sale, and certain of the

great are sure to demand a very dear price for everything they offer. I said it

was a process of sale ---- I wish they would sell in the ordinary sense of the

term, for in that case perhaps they would leave something to the purchaser! But

this is a new sort of buying and selling; the seller gives nothing and receives

everything, while the buyer receives nothing and loses all that he had. Now

practically every sales agreement has this characteristic, that the element of

desire is on the side of the buyer, and that of need on that of the seller,

inasmuch as the buyer wishes to increase his substance and the seller to

diminish his. This, however, is an unheard-of sort of trading, in which the

property of the sellers increases while nothing remains to the buyers but sheer

beggary.

What an intolerable and monstrous thing it is, one that human hearts can

hardly endure, that one can hardly bear to hear spoken of, that many of the

wretched poor, despoiled of their tiny holdings, after they have completely lost

their property, must still pay taxes for what they have lost! Though possession

has been forfeited, the

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assessment

is not cancelled:

they are without property but

are overwhelmed with taxes. Who can fairly estimate this evil? The poor wretches

pay taxes for the invaders who have swooped down on their estates. After the

father's death, the sons have no claim on the little farms that should rightly

be theirs, but are forced to pay ruinous taxes for them. As a result, what else

is accomplished by this great wrongdoing except that men stripped naked by

private robbery, die under the public exactions, and taxation ends the lives of

those whose property has been carried off by plunderers?

Therefore some of those of whom I speak, who are either shrewder than the

rest or have been sharpened by necessity, have lost their homes and farms by

such encroachments, or have fled before the taxgatherers, because they cannot

hold their property, and seek out the farms of the rich and great, to become

their

coloni

Those who are driven by the terror of the enemy flee to the forts,

and those who have lost their immunity as free men take refuge in some asylum

out of sheer desperation. So also these men, who are no longer able to guard the

home and condition of their birth, subject themselves to the lowly yoke of

serfdom. They have been reduced to such a necessitous state that they are cut

off not only from their former possessions, but also from their rank. They are

exiled not alone from their property but from their very selves; losing all that

was theirs along with their freedom, they

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lack any title to their holdings and forfeit the very rights of liberty.

Even this might

through sheer necessity seem somehow tolerable, if there were not further

misfortune to follow. Their lot is made more bitter by a worse injustice still.

For they are received as strangers; they become natives only on the terms of

their present condition. Recalling the example of that evil sorceress of old who

is said to have changed men into beasts, we might say that all who are received

on the farms of the rich are transformed as if by Circe's potions. For the

owners begin to count those whom they have received as outsiders and aliens, as

their own property; they turn into slaves men known to be free-born. Do we

wonder that the barbarians are able to capture us, when we take our brothers

captive? It is not at all strange that our states are being devastated and

destroyed. We have long been providing by the oppression of the multitude for

our own eventual capture, falling into captivity by our enslavement of others.

Much later than we deserve, do we now at length suffer the treatment that we

have meted out to others, and in the words of the Holy Scripture, eat the labor

of our own hands.

Under the judgment of a just

God we are paying what we owe. We showed no mercy to exiles; behold, we

ourselves are in exile: we deceived wanderers; behold, we ourselves, now

wanderers, are deceived in turn: we took advantage of circumstances to ruin

free-born men; behold, we ourselves are beginning to live on alien soil, and

fear the same ruin.

How great is the deceptive blindness of sinful minds! We are suffering from

the condemnation of God's judgment and still do not acknowledge that we are

being judged. Some of the saints wonder that the others who have thus far not

endured any such

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fate are not

reformed by our example! Not even those of us who are already smitten by God are

being corrected by the torments justly due to our wickedness. What intolerable

pride is ours! However many are enduring the punishment that their sins require,

no one deigns to acknowledge the cause of his trouble. The reasons for our pride

are perfectly obvious: even though we are at last suffering a little, we do not

yet suffer as we deserve. So great is the mercy of God that he does not wish us

to endure the full penalties for our misdeeds, but only a part of what is due;

he chastens the wicked, but not to the full measure of their sin. He wishes us

to acknowledge our misdoings rather than to endure their penalties, to the end

that by his loving and salutary correction he may show us what we deserve to

suffer, but not inflict on us the stripes we deserve. In this he follows the

words of the blessed apostle, who said: "Dost thou not know that the

goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance? But after thy hardness and

impenitent heart thou treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of

wrath."

In truth our actions suit the words of the apostle, for God calls us to

repentance, but we treasure up wrath; he invites us to receive pardon, but we

daily heap up our offences. We bring force to bear on him by our iniquities; we

ourselves arm the divine wrath against us. We compel God against his will to

take vengeance on our monstrous crimes; we give him scarcely any opportunity to

spare us. For although no token of injustice can ever light on him or appear in

him, our actions are such that if he did not take vengeance on our sins he would

seem to be unjust.

10.

Surely, you say, a

man who has once been a sinner may have ceased to do wrong. Is there any end to

wrongdoing? Do not men give up life sooner than iniquity? What man does not die

in his evil pursuits, to be buried with his sins and crimes? Truly, one might

apply to such men the words of the prophet: "Their

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graves are their homes forever, and they are compared to foolish cattle, and are

become like them."

If only they were like

cattle! It would at least have been something gained, to have gone astray

through mere brute folly. To have sinned, not through ignorance, but in despite

of God, is worse and deserves a heavier penalty. Do you claim that this is the

case with the laity only, and not with even a few among the clergy? With worldly

men only, and not with many of the religious also, or rather men given over to

worldly vices under the empty show of religion? These, to be sure, after the

shameful guilt of their past misdeeds, have gained themselves the honorary name

of sanctity. They have altered in their profession but not in their actual way

of life, and, thinking that the service of God depends on costume more than on

action, have changed their garments but not their hearts. Why should men think

their guilt less hateful, who, though they are said to have performed a sort of

penance, do not put off their old habits when they lay aside their former style

of dress? Their actions as a whole are such that there is less reason to suppose

that they have already done penance for their misdeeds than that they afterwards

repented of their penitence. There is less ground to think that they have

repented their evil life than that they have since regretted their promise of a

good one.

Many men know that I am speaking the truth, and can even bear witness to my

words in their own conscience. Chief among these are the religious who have

gained some reputation by a general repentance and now seek after new honors,

and buy powers they formerly lacked. They are so anxious to be not merely men of

the world, but more than worldly, that what they were before their repentance

does not now suffice them unless they may become greater than they were in the

past. Do they not repent of their conversion?

So also do those men repent of their conversion and their brief

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thought of God, who, abstaining from intercourse with their wives, do not

refrain from invasion of other men's property; who, professing physical

continence, run riot in incontinence of spirit. A strange sort of conversion,

truly! They do not do what is permissible, but commit forbidden sins. They

refrain from lawful wedded life but not from rapine.

What vain delusion is this? Sins were forbidden us by God, not marriage. Your

deeds do not suit your convictions; you who call yourselves adherents of virtue

should not consort with crime. What you are doing is utterly absurd; this is not

conversion to God but aversion from him. If, as is rumored, you have left off

long since the functions even of lawful wedlock, now at last give up your sin.

It is indeed just that you should refrain from crime of all sorts, but if you

think this impossibly difficult, at least give up your greatest and most

monstrous sins. Grant, whoever you are, that the neighbors whose land adjoins

yours cannot remain prosperous; grant that the poor cannot support life near

you; grant that you persecute the indigent and plunder the wretched; grant that

you cause affliction to all men, provided that they are outside your own circle:

still, I beg, at least spare your own family. And if you think it too hard and

burdensome to spare all who are yours, then spare those who have preferred you

not only to their other relatives and kinsmen, but even to those most closely

bound to them and their dearly loved children. Yet why should I speak of their

loved ones and their children, when they have preferred you almost to their very

life and hope? There is nothing praiseworthy in this, as everyone who has

committed the error now recognizes. But what has that to do with you, whom even

their mistakes have advantaged? Your debt to such men is the greater because

they have erred from too great trust in you. They were indeed blinded by

devotion, and consequently are branded and censured by all; but even so you are

under greater obligations to them because they have incurred the blame of all

for love of you.

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11.

What is there to

compare with this among the barbarous Goths? Who among them injures those who

love him, attacks his friends, and cuts the throats of his dear ones with his

own dagger? You attack those who love you, you cut off the hands of those who

offer gifts, you kill your closest friends, and do you not fear and tremble?

What would you do if you had not felt the present judgment of God in the

scourging you have just received? You increase the count and constantly add new

crimes to your former misdeeds. Think what punishment awaits your worse deeds,

when even lesser faults are regularly punished by demons. Be content now, I

pray, with robbing your friends and companions. Let it be enough that the poor

have been harried and beggars despoiled by you, that hardly any one can keep

from trembling in your presence, no one can feel secure. Torrents rushing down

from Alpine crags, or flames driven by the wind, are more easily borne. No such

death as this ---- to use a well known figure ---- do sailors die, devoured by

the engulfing whirlpool or by Scylla's proverbial dogs. You evict your neighbors

from their little farms, those nearest you from their houses and property. Would

you "be placed alone in the midst of the earth,"

as it is written? This is the one end you cannot gain. Seize all that you can,

occupy by force all that you can, still you shall always find a neighbor.

Consider, please, other men, whom even you, willingly or not, regard with honor;

consider others, whom even you, willingly or not, admire. They are above others

in honor, but on a level with them in their own estimation; they are greater in

their power and less in their humility. You yourself, to whom I am now speaking,

surely know whom I mean, and you of whom I now complain ought to recognize whom

I honor by this praise. I only wish that there were many who deserve such

praise; the nobility of a great number might work healing for all.

But suppose that you do not wish to win praise; tell me, why do you wish to

be worthy of condemnation? Why is nothing dearer

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to you than injustice, nothing more delightful than avarice, nothing more

cherished than the seizure of other men's goods? Why do you judge nothing more

precious than wickedness, nothing more excellent than rapine? Learn the true

good from a pagan, who says: "One should be fenced about by charity and

goodwill, not by arms."

So your delusions lead you astray; the wickedness of your blind and evil

heart deceives you. If you wish to be upright, to be powerful, to be great, you

ought to surpass other men not in ill will but in honor. I once read somewhere:

"No one is wicked but a fool; for if he were wise, he would prefer to be

good." Do you, therefore, if you can at last return to sanity, put off your

wickedness, if you wish wisdom. For if you hope to be at all wise or sane, you

must discard all that you have been and change completely. Deny yourself that

you may not be denied by Christ; cast yourself off that you may be received by

him; lose yourself, that you may not perish. For the Savior says: "

Whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it."

Wherefore love this profitable loss, that you may gain true safety. For God

will never set you free, unless you have first condemned yourself.

[Footnotes moved to the end]

(1 Timothy 1. 8-10).

The rest of this chapter is quoted in an

abridged translation by Voltaire in his

Dictionnaire philosophique, s.v.

"Hérésie,"

with the prefatory remark that it is the most sensible attack on the spirit of

intolerance that can be found. Voltaire had apparently forgotten or not read

Augustine's treatise

Contra epistolam Manichaei

(Migne, PL, XLII, col.

173), in which (c. 1) he prays for "a mind calm and tranquil, thinking

rather of your correction than your subversion. For although the Lord through

his servants overturns the realms of error, yet he bids the men themselves, in

so far as they are men, be amended rather than destroyed."

See (Luke 12. 47-48).

Orosius' account of the conversion of

the Goths, while agreeing with Salvian's on the responsibility of the Romans for

the heresy of the Goths, illuminates by contrast the comprehension and sympathy

with which Salvian states the absence of moral responsibility on the part of the

barbarians for a heresy that appeared to them orthodox. Salvian's attitude is

the more remarkable in one whose devotion to Christ is so strong that at times

he has Christ overshadow the other Persons of the Trinity. Orosius says (VII.

33. 19) : "Before this the Goths sent ambassadors to ask that bishops be

sent from whom they might learn the precepts of the Christian faith. Valens the

emperor, with damnable perversity, sent teachers of the Arian creed. The Goths

have held to the instructions of the first faith that they received. So by a

just judgment of God they burned alive the man through whose fault they, when

they die, are doomed to burn for their vicious error."

See IV. 2

supra.

As Zschimmer (

op.

cit.,

58 n.l.) points out, this is a very notable statement. Salvian clearly

understands the historical connection of Roman Arianism with that of the

Germans; either he actually knew that Ulfilas in his translation of the Bible

made alterations to suit the Arian doctrines, or he is merely repeating some of

the usual charges brought against Ulfilas and other Arian missionaries by

contemporaries of the orthodox faith.

(John 13. 35).

For the efforts of the state to prevent

such injustice, cf. especially Cod. Theod. XI. 1. 20, 26.

See Cod. Theod. XI. 7. 16, 20; 11.1, for

the penalties for undue aggression by minor officials.

See III. 5

supra.

For the reverse

of the picture, note the text of the contemporary decree of Theodosius and

Valentinian issued a.d. 443 (Cod. Just. V. 27. 2) beginning: "If any man

whether free or bound in the toils of the curia ..." In his own eyes the

curial had become a slave rather than a tyrant, and in those of the government

as well, but the necessity of tyranny toward the taxpayers was thereby

increased. For the obligations of the office and the difficulty of filling it at

this time, see Cod. Theod. XII. 1,

De decurionibus.

10.

That similar conditions

prevailed also in the eastern portion of the empire at this time is shown by the

account of the Roman regime given by the Greek whom Priscus found at Attila's

court (Priscus, "Historia Gothica," in De Boor,

Excerpta

Constantiniana I,

135-138; see also Bury,

History of the Later Roman

Empire,

I, 213-223): "Their oppressions in time of peace are much more

bitter than the calamities due to war, both on account of the harsh tributes and

on account of the oppression of the wicked, since the laws are not enforced for

all alike. If a rich or powerful man transgresses them, he does not pay the

penalty for his misdeed; but if a needy man, who does not know how to conduct

his affairs, transgresses, he must expect the penalty ordained by law; unless

perhaps, before the sentence is decided, when much time has been spent in

continual litigation and great amounts of money expended beside, his life ends.

But the worst injustice of all is that law and justice are to be obtained only

by bargaining and bribery. For no one will open the courts to any injured man

before he turns over his money to the use of the judge and his assistants."

Priseus countered with a description of the general justice of the Roman law and

government, to which the exile replied that the laws of the Roman state were

indeed good and the empire gloriously constituted, but the magistrates, less

public-spirited than of old, were weakening and perverting it.

11.

(Psalms 82. 4).

12.

Ibid.

14. 3.

13.

Elsewhere Salvian speaks in the same

vein (

Ad ecclesiam

IV. 8) : "In such a situation what do those men

do whom Christ has appointed to speak? They displease God, if they are silent;

men, if they speak. But, as the apostle said in answer to the Jews, it is more

expedient to obey God than men."

14.

An important bit of contemporary

evidence for a fundamental step in the transition from the Roman regime in the

country districts to feudalism.

15.

Orosius' similar statement in the

case of Spain has already been cited; cf. IV. 4

supra.

Sidonius

(Ep.

V.

7) speaks of the officials whose oppression of Gaul stands out in marked

contrast to the clemency of the surrounding barbarians. The account given by

Paulinus of Pella of Roman life among the Gothic invaders corroborates Salvian's

statements, in a situation in which the victory of the Goths and the plundering

before their departure made, his favorable account the more remarkable. He

lamented (

Eucharisticos

285-290) the disadvantage of having had no Goths

quartered in his house to protect him from the ravages when their tribe

withdrew: "for we know that certain of the Goths worked with the greatest

humanity to benefit their hosts by their protection." Later his prayer (

Ibid.

424-425) that "some share of my ancestral fortune might remain from the

barbarian plundering by right of war, and from the Roman crime, which has at

various seasons fattened freely on my losses, against all justice" was

answered by a Goth's payment to him for a part of his old estate, which had

fallen to the honest barbarian as part of his booty.

16.

A similar distaste is expressed by

Sidonius (

Carmen

XII) in his description of the difficulties of composing

six-foot verses when seven-foot barbarians breathe onions and garlic into your

face at daybreak.

17.

Strictly speaking the Bagaudae were

not barbarians, but revolted peasants from among the Roman citizenry, whose

long-continued revolts had invested them in Roman eyes with a quasi-barbarian

character; for the other barbarians note that in VII. 15 the Franks are

described as especially hospitable.

18.

So the tribune of the soldiers at

Jerusalem said to Paul: "With a great price obtained I this freedom,"

i.e., Roman citizenship. (Acts 22.28.)

19.

The revolt of the Bagaudae, analogous

in many respects to that of the Jacquerie in the 14th century, broke out in Gaul

in A.D. 283-4 because of oppression in that province, due especially to

overheavy taxation. The empire was engaged in war against usurpers, and the

revolt spread rapidly. Maximian won great praise for suppressing it, but the

Bagaudae continued to plunder the country districts and towns, and spread

through Gaul and Spain, adding seriously to the difficulty of guarding the

frontiers. In the 5th century their revolt again assumed serious proportions;

their troops were now regular armies and their local units closely equivalent to

the individual German states in menace to the unity of the empire, breeding

increasing discontent with the official oppression. The last mention of the

Bagaudae in the Chronicle of Idatius is in the year A.D. 449, and the movement

seems to have come to an end not long after this. For the contemporary

references, of which Salvian's account is the most detailed, cf. Seeck,

s.v.

"Bagaudae,"

in Pauly-Wissowa,

Real-Encyclopädie.

20.

That a man should not be held

responsible for a crime committed under compulsion is recognized by a decree of

Honorius and Theodosius in a.d. 416 (Cod. Theod. XV. 14. 14) prohibiting suits

for crimes committed during the barbarian raids, "either through flight or

through the herding together of refugees . . . for an act done to escape death

is not considered a crime."

21.

Salvian uses the term

Bagaudae,

apparently a word of Celtic origin, for which Seeck suggests the meaning

"warlike," as equivalent to "outlawed rebels."

22.

The ten chief men of each town

were responsible for handing over to the agents of the central government all

that was due from their district in payment of the

indiction,

the term

used from the time of Diocletian for the general provincial taxation on the

basis of the amount of arable land, cattle and laborers in each locality. The

periodical revisions of the taxable property also depended largely on the town

officers, and usually caused much oppression of the poorer taxpayers, as Salvian

here says. In this case, also, as in so many others, the rich could more easily

gain substantial relief by bribery than the poor could do.

23.

See Cod. Theod. XI. 1. 7 for the

decree of Constantius and Constans in A.D. 361 relieving of payments

pro his

qui aufugerint

any senators who could prove that they possessed none of the

property of fugitive holders; and XI. 1. 31 for the similar decree of Honorius

and Theodosius in a.d. 412. Salvian's description is closely paralleled by the

passage from Priscus quoted in note 10.

24.

The contrast between these practices

and the imperial theory is shown by the five decrees in Cod. Theod. VIII. 11:

"That the heralds of public good fortune are to receive no gifts from

public levies or from forced payments."

25.

See IV. 6

supra.

No writer

gives further details on these measures, and they are not mentioned in the

Codex. Salvian's description of the profit made by the rich out of attempts at

relief is confirmed by phrases in Cod. Theod. XII. 1.173, of A.D. 410: "For

relieving the fortunes of the poorer curials and restraining the oppression of

the powerful. . . . Let them fear the knowledge of your power and dare make no

attempt at relieving the rich and destroying the needy."

26.

That is, free farmers, not

coloni,

for the latter would not be liable to direct taxation. The constant use of

diminutives in reference to their property ----

agelli, resculae,

habitatiunculae

---- shows the type of small farmer meant. The passage is an

important one as an indication of the existence of independent small landholders

in Gaul in Salvian's time.

27.

See Cod. Theod. XII. 1. 146 of a.d.

395: "We have noted that many hide under the shadow of the powerful to

defraud their country of the payments due"; and, in general, Cod. Theod.

XI. 24;

De patrociniis vicorum

. A

decree of a.d. 319 (

ibid.

XI.

3. 1) recognized as the cause of many arrears in the taxes that "some men,

taking advantage of the temporary needs of others, get possession of the best

farms on condition of holding them tax free without making up their arrears to

the fiscus."

28.

In Cod. Just. XI. 54. 1, a.d. 468, an

attempt is made to prevent patronage by making testaments in such eases invalid;

in Cod. Theod. XI. 24. 4 such patronage is made subject to very heavy fines.

29.

Salvian uses the word

capitatio,

winch, as Haemmerle (

op. cit.

II. 11) points out, must be here

equivalent to

iugatio,

not to the poll tax.

30.

For attempts to remedy this

wrong, ef. Cod. Theod. XI. 3. 1-5, providing for proper registration and payment

of arrears on land acquired " in any way whatsoever."

31.

That is, they give up their full

citizen status, and become bound to the soil, being no longer subject to direct

taxation. This would seem a harsher alternative than the preceding, yet actual

conditions lead Salvian to reckon it as the wiser course.

32.

Castella

had already become

frequent sanctuaries in exposed territories.

33.

Churches had taken the right of

sanctuary formerly held by pagan temples; cf. Cod. Theod. IX. 45.

34.

Compare the commentary on their

status in Haemmerle, op.

cit.

II. 19-25, where Salvian's use of the terms

coloni

and

inquilini

as interchangeable is discussed.

35.

(Psalms 128. 2).

36.

(Romans 2. 4-5).

37.

(Psalms 49.11-12).

38.

(Isaiah 5. 8).

39.

Pliny

Panegyric

49: "In

vain has he girded himself with terror, who was not fenced about with charity;

for arms are stirred up by arms."

40.

(Luke 9. 24).

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.157-188.

Book 6

Book VI. : On the ruinous influence of circuses and spectacles

1. The infection of evil.

2. The evil influence of the public games.

3. The circuses and theaters.

4. God's hatred of the theaters.

5. The contrast between the circus and Christ's precepts.

6. On renunciation of the devil and his pomps.

7. How men desert the churches for the spectacles.

8. On their folly in the midst of ruin.

9. How the disasters of Rome have failed to bring repentance.

10. That no dishonor to God can be trivial.

11. Men's unworthiness of God's gifts.

12. The failure of adversity to amend men's lives.

13. The capture of Treves.

14. The destruction of other cities.

15. Destruction and the circuses.

16. On the corrective of peace.

17. The gratitude due for peace.

18. The captivity of the Romans.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE SIXTH BOOK

I have been dealing

with personalities for a long time now, and seem to have exceeded the rules of

argument. For undoubtedly the reader (if anyone for Christ's sake does read

these words written from love of Christ) is thinking or saying of me:

"Since the subject he is pursuing is a general one, of what use is it to

heap up so many accusations against a single person? Suppose ---- for it is

credible ---- that the man of whom he speaks is as he describes him; still how

can one man's goodness be blocked by another's guilt, or ---- a point of much

greater importance ---- how is the general cause injured by one individual's

crime?"

The injury indeed I can prove by clear examples. For instance, Achar

once stole a part of an accursed thing, and the trespass of one man was the ruin

of all. David ordered the children of Israel to be numbered, and the Lord

punished his fault by the destruction of the whole people.

Rapsaces spoke scornfully of God, and God smote a hundred and eighty-five

thousand men because the froward tongue of one profane man spoke evil of him.

Hence it was not without justice that the blessed apostle Paul ordered a noxious

sinner cast out of the church and showed why he gave this order, saying: "A

little leaven leaveneth the whole lump."

From

this we clearly see that even one evil man very often works the destruction of

many. Nor is this without justice. The reader should recognize that what I said

above concerning one wicked man is not beside the point, since we read in the

Scriptures that the wrath of the Divine Majesty has very frequently been kindled

on account of

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one man's guilt. But

my argument is not limited by this consideration, for we do not need to assume

that one man blocks the way of all, since all are blocking each other; it is not

fitting to consider that all are imperilled by one, since they are all

imperilled by their own actions. For all men are rushing headlong into

destruction, or at least, to put it somewhat more mildly, almost all. Where can

the Christian people find such good fortune that the number of evildoers may be

less than the number of the good, or failing that, be merely equivalent to it?

How lamentable and grievous is our present wretchedness! How changed is the

Christian people now from its former character! Of old, Peter, the chief of the

apostles, punished with death the falsehood of Ananias and Sapphira.

The most blessed Paul also expelled one wicked man from the church, that he

might not infect a great number by his presence.

But we are content to have an equal number of good and evil men. Why should I

say we are content? We ought rather to exult and dance for joy, if we could

achieve such an equal balance. See to what depths we have fallen, to what state

we have been reduced after that glorious purity of the Christian people which

kept them all unspotted, for now we think that the church would be happy if it

contained even as much good as evil. How could we fail to consider it blessed if

half its members were guiltless, since now we lament that they are almost all

guilty?

Since this is the case, it was useless, useless indeed, to speak so long of

one evil man, useless to weep for one man's crimes, since all or almost all

require our tears and lamentations. There are many who are of this sort or who

wish to be so, which is no less incriminating, and who strive by their zeal for

evil to seem guilty of the charge. On this account, even if their lesser

capacity accomplishes less evil, they are themselves as wicked as the rest, for

it is

|159

their lack of ability and

not their will that prevents them. Their hopes alone are within their own

control, and in these they are criminals; they yield to none in their desire for

wrongdoing, and in this, as far as their means permit, they strive to excel.

Different though the two cases are, their rivalry is like that of good men, for

as the good desire to outdo all others in honorable aims, so the evil yearn to

surpass in depravity. As the glory of good men is to grow daily better, even so

the glory of the wicked is to become worse; and as the best wish to reach the

height of all virtues, so the worst hope to claim the palm in all vices. To our

misfortune this is particularly characteristic of us, the Christians, since, as

I have already said, we think wickedness is wisdom. Of these God spoke

particularly: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring to

nothing the understanding of the prudent."

When the apostle cried, "if any man seemeth to be wise, let him become a

fool, that he may be wise,"

he meant that if

a man wishes to be wise, he should be good, for no one is truly wise unless he

is truly good. We, on the contrary, through the viciousness of our perverse

spirits and our "reprobate minds" ---- to use the scriptural phrase

----reject goodness in favor of folly. Loving corruption more than wisdom, we

think we become daily wiser in proportion as our depravity increases.

Yet what hope of

betterment is there in us, I ask, who are not led into evil by mistaken opinion,

but strive with all the eagerness of our perverted natures to appear constantly

worse and worse? This is the reason why I have long lamented that we are much

worse than the barbarians, for ignorance of the law excuses them, whereas our

knowledge of it accuses us. They prefer the evil to the good through

inexperience of the truth, because they do not know what things are good; we, by

our knowledge of the truth, know very

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well what things are good, [but consider them inferior to the evil in many]

ways.

In the first place, there is almost no crime or vice that does not accompany

the games.

In these the greatest pleasure is to

have men die, or, what is worse and more cruel than death, to have them torn in

pieces, to have the bellies of wild beasts gorged with human flesh; to have men

eaten, to the great joy of the bystanders and the delight of onlookers, so that

the victims seem devoured almost as much by the eyes of the audience as by the

teeth of beasts.

That such things may take place

the whole world is ransacked; great is the care with which the search is carried

on and perfected. Hidden retreats are entered, pathless ravines are searched,

impenetrable forests traversed, the cloud-bearing Alps are climbed, the depths

of valleys plumbed, and in order that the flesh of men may be devoured by wild

beasts, the last secrets of the world of nature are revealed.

My opponents object that this is not done all the time. True,

|161

and a glorious excuse it is for wrongdoing, that it is not constantly carried on

---- as if any time were appropriate for actions that injure God! Are evil deeds

well done because they are not done incessantly? Even murderers are not always

employed in murder, but they are still murderers when they are not actually

killing, for their hands are at all times stained with bloodshed. Bobbers do not

steal all the time, but they do not cease to be robbers, for when they are not

engaged in theft, their minds are occupied with it. Certainly men who take

pleasure in the animal fights of the arena are by no means free from the guilt

involved in such spectacles, even when they are not actually looking at them.

Would they not enjoy watching them always if they could?

Nor is this the only possible example of our sins, but there are still

greater ones. For instance, do not the consuls even now have hens fed after the

custom of the sacrilegious pagans? Are not auguries still sought from the flight

of birds, and almost all those superstitions kept up which even pagan writers of

old thought laughable?

Now when the very men who

give their names to the years and with whose office the years themselves begin

do such things, are we to believe that years begun under these auspices can

continue their course propitiously?

I wish that

these actions might pollute only the consuls who are responsible for them. But

the situation is the more desperate because while such things are done with the

public consent, the honor of a very limited number becomes the guilt of all, and

so, although only two men are inaugurated in any given year, scarcely any one in

the whole world escapes infection.

|162

Let this much suffice

about the games, seeing that they are, as you say, not performed all the time.

We shall speak, instead, of everyday obscenities. These the hosts of demons have

contrived of such a sort and so innumerable that even honest and upright hearts,

though they can scorn and tread down some among them, yet can scarcely find a

way to overcome them all completely. Armies about to engage in battle are said

either to intersect with pitfalls the places through which they expect the

troops of the enemy to march, or plant them with stakes, or fill them with

caltrops, so that even if some of their snares fail to entrap a victim, none of

the enemy can fail to be caught. In like manner the demons have prepared so many

treacherous lures in this life for the human race that even though one escapes

many of them, he is finally caught by one or another.

And since indeed it would take too long to tell of all these snares, that is,

the amphitheaters, the concert halls, games, parades, athletes, rope dancers,

pantomimes and other monstrosities of which one is ashamed to speak, since it is

shameful even to know of such wickedness, I shall describe only the vices of the

circuses and theaters. For the evils that are performed in these are such that

no one can mention them, or even think of them without being polluted.

Other vices as a rule claim only some one portion of our being; for instance,

base thoughts affect the mind only, immodest glances the eyes, shameful sounds

the ears, so that when any one of these has gone astray, the rest can still be

free from wrongdoing. But in the theaters no part of our bodies is free from

guilt, for our minds are polluted by evil desires, our ears by hearing and our

eyes by what they see, and all these are so disgraceful that a man cannot even

describe them without loss of decency.

Who without injuring his modesty can tell of those representations of base

acts, those obscenities of words and voice, those

|163

disgraceful motions and foul gestures? The very fact that they forbid

description shows what great sin there is in all these. Some of the very

greatest crimes can be named and discussed without injury to the character of

the speaker, as homicide, robbery, adultery, sacrilege and so forth; it is only

the vice of the theaters that cannot even be attacked without loss of modesty.

So in arraigning these vile and disgraceful abuses the prosecutor has a strange

experience, in that, although the honesty of the would-be accuser is

unquestioned, he cannot without prejudice to his honor relate or attack them.

All other evils pollute those who perform them, not those who merely see or hear

them. You may, for instance, hear a man blaspheme, but since your mind

disapproves of his sacrilege you are not polluted by it. Or if you happen to be

present during a robbery, you are not denied by the act, inasmuch as it is

abhorrent to your principles. The indecencies of the spectacles alone involve

actors and audience in substantially the same guilt. For all those who approve

such performances and take pleasure in seeing them perform them through the

medium of their sight and approval. To such men the words of the apostle apply

with a peculiar force, since not only "they which commit such things are

worthy of death" but also "those who have pleasure in them that do

them."

Therefore in these pictures of vice the whole people commits fornication

mentally, and any who happen to come to the spectacle chaste go home from it

adulterers. They are guilty of this fornication not only when they go home, but

also when they come to the theater, for the very desire of the obscene makes a

man unchaste who is hurrying toward an impure spectacle.

You see then in what

actions all or the majority of Romans participate. None the less, we who do such

things say we are forsaken by God, though we ourselves are forsaking him. Let us

suppose that our Lord would like to watch us even though we do not deserve it:

can he do so? See countless thousands of Christians daily

|164

spending their time at shows representing shameful acts. Can God look at them at

such a time? Can God watch over men who are revelling in the circuses and

wantoning in the theaters? Or do we perhaps think it fitting and desirable that

when God sees us in the circuses and theaters, he should see with us what we

ourselves see there, and look with us at the disgraceful sights at which we

gaze? One of two things must happen; either, if he deigns to look on us, he must

also see our surroundings, or if he averts his eyes from them, which he surely

does, then he must avert them equally from us, who are among them.

In spite of this, without interruption we continue to do those thing's of

which I speak. Do we perhaps suppose that, like the ancient pagans, we have a

god of theaters and circuses? For they built the theaters and circuses long ago

because they believed that such vanities were a delight to their idols.

How can we imitate them in this, who surely know that our God hates such things?

Of course, if we know that these vile shows please God, there can be no

objection to our performing them incessantly. But if in our hearts we know that

God abhors and abominates them, that as they are the devil's food so are they

also a cause of offence to God, then how can we say that we worship God in the

church, we who always serve the devil in the obscene games with full knowledge

and understanding and with deliberate intention? What hope, I ask, shall we have

before God, who injure him not by chance or by ignorance, but after the manner

of those old giants of whom we read that they attempted to scale the heavens in

their mad ambition and climbed, as it were, into the clouds? So we, by the

injuries that we constantly inflict on God throughout the world, as if by common

consent, are making war on heaven.

Therefore we offer up to Christ ---- O monstrous folly! ---- to Christ we

offer up circuses and mimes, and we do this chiefly when we receive some benefit

from him, when some mark of prosperity is

|165

granted us by him, or a victory over the enemy is bestowed on us by his divine

favor! How do we seem in this to differ from a man who injures a generous

benefactor, or responds to endearments with cutting abuse, or pierces with his

dagger the lips that seek to kiss him? I ask all the rich and powerful men of

this world, what punishment they think fitting for a slave who plots evil

against a good and loving master, who quarrels with a master who deserves only

good of him, and returns only foul words for the liberty that he has received.

Undoubtedly he is guilty of the greatest wrongdoing who returns evil for good,

when he should not even feel free to return evil for evil. But this is what we

do who are called Christians: we arouse a merciful God against us by our

licentious acts, we insult him by our filthy deeds when he is propitious, we

lash him with abusive words when he speaks gently to us.

To Christ then ---- O

monstrous folly ! ---- we offer circuses and mimes, to Christ in return for his

benefits, we offer the obscenities of the theaters, to Christ we dedicate the

vilest shows as sacrificial offerings. Was this the teaching given us by the

Savior, incarnate for our sake? Was this his preaching, or that of his apostles?

For this did he endure the humiliation of human nativity and take upon himself a

shameful origin in his mortal birth? For this he lay in a manger, whom angels

served as he lay there. For this he willed to be wrapped in swaddling clothes,

and wearing them ruled heaven; for this he hung upon the cross, whom the world

feared as he hung there. "Who though he was rich," the apostle said,

"yet for your sakes became poor, that ye through his poverty might become

rich."

"And being in the form of

God," I quote farther, "he humbled himself unto death, even the death

of the cross."

These then are

the precepts that Christ gave us at the time of his passion. A glorious return

we are making for his suffering, who, having received redemption by his death,

offer him in return

|166

most disgraceful lives! The blessed Paul said: "For the grace of our

Lord Jesus Christ hath appeared, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and

worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present

world; looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the great God and

our Savior Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from

all iniquity and purify unto himself a people worthy of acceptance, zealous of

good works.

Where are men who do those things for which the apostle says Christ came?

Where are those who flee from worldly lusts? Where are those who live righteous

and godly lives, who show in their good works that they hold the blessed hope,

and by living immaculate lives prove that they await the kingdom of God, since

they deserve to receive it? "The Lord Jesus Christ," Paul said,

"came to purify unto himself a people worthy of acceptance, zealous of good

works." Where is that pure people, that acceptable people, that people of

good works, that people of righteousness? "Christ," the Scripture

says, "suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow his

steps."

So we follow the Savior's steps in the circuses; we

follow the Savior's steps in the theaters. Is this the example Christ left for

us? We read that he wept, not that he laughed. In both he gave us an example,

for weeping is the remorse of the heart, laughter the corruption of uprightness.

For this reason he said: "Woe unto you that laugh now; for ye shall

weep;" and again: "Blessed are ye that weep now, for ye shall

laugh."

But we do not think it enough to laugh and rejoice,

unless we rejoice in sin and madness, unless our laughter is mixed with impure

and disgraceful actions.

Who can describe this delusion of ours, this folly? Are we really unable

to enjoy ourselves day by day, and to laugh, without turning our laughter and

joy into crime? or do we perhaps

|167

consider wholesome enjoyment profitless and find no pleasure in innocent

laughter? What wickedness is this, I ask, and what insanity? Let us laugh

indeed, let us rejoice unstintedly, and as constantly as you please, if only we

do so innocently. What folly and madness it is for us to think laughter and joy

worthless unless they involve injury to God! Injury indeed, and a very great

one. The spectacles involve a sort of apostasy from the faith, a fatal violation

of the creed itself and of the divine sacraments. For what is the first

confession of faith made by Christians in baptism for their salvation? What else

than their vow to renounce the devil and his pomps and spectacles and his works?

So in the very words of our profession of faith spectacles and pomps are the

works of the devil

How then, O Christian, shall you after baptism

seek the spectacles, which you confess are the work of the devil? You have once

renounced the devil and his spectacles, and therefore as a rational and

intelligent being must recognize that in resorting again to them, you are

returning to the devil. For you have renounced them both at the same time and

declared them to be one and the same. If you return to one, you return to them

both. For your words were: "I renounce the devil, his pomps and spectacles

and his works."

What follows in your baptismal vows? "I

believe in

|168

God the Father Almighty and in Jesus Christ his Son." First then, you

renounced the devil that you might believe in God, for he who does not renounce

the devil does not believe in God and therefore he who returns to the devil

forsakes God.

Furthermore, the devil is present in his spectacles and pomps, and therefore

when we return to the devil's spectacles, we abandon our Christian faith. Thus

all the sacraments of our belief are broken, and all that follows in the creed

is shaken and totters

;

for nothing that follows remains intact if the

chief clause has fallen. Tell me then, you who are a Christian, how you think

you are keeping the latter portions of the creed, whose first clauses you have

abandoned? The limbs without the head are worth nothing, and everything depends

on its own first principles; these surely, if they perish, will drag all the

rest down with them to destruction. If the main stock is removed, the other

parts either cease to exist or if they continue are useless, for without its

head nothing can subsist.

If any one thinks the wickedness of the spectacles a trivial matter, let him

consider well all that I have said, and he will see that in them is not pleasure

but death. For what else is it but death, to have lost the source of life?

When

the foundations of our creed are overthrown, life itself is strangled.

I must return again to my oft-repeated contention, what have the

barbarians like this? Where in their lands are circuses, where are theaters,

where those other wicked vices that are the ruin of our hope and salvation? Even

if they had such things, being pagans, their error would involve less offence to

what is sacred, and less guilt, for though such sights as these are impure,

still they would not involve violation of a sacrament.

But as for us, how can we answer in our own behalf? We hold the creed and

overthrow it. We are equally ready to confess the

|169

gift of salvation and to deny it. Where then is our Christianity, when we

only receive the sacrament of salvation

to the end that falling

from grace we may thereafter sin more grievously than before? We prefer vain

shows to God's churches, we scorn his altars and honor the theaters. To

conclude, we love and honor everything else; only God, in contrast with worldly

pleasures, is vile in our sight.

One case in itself proves the truth of my contention, disregarding all the

rest. Whenever it happens, as it does only too often, that on the same day we

are celebrating a feast of the church and the public games,

I ask

it of everyone's conscience, which is it that collects greater crowds of

Christians, the rows of seats at the public games or the court of God? Do all

men throng to the temple in preference to the theater, love the words of the

Gospel more than those of the stage ---- the words of life or of death, the

words of Christ or of a mime? Without doubt; we love more that which we place

first. For on every day when the fatal games are given, whatever festival of the

church it may be, not only do men who claim to be Christians fail to come to the

services, but any who do happen to have come unwittingly, if they chance to

hear, while in the church, that games are being given, leave the building at

once. The temple of God is scorned for a rush to the theater; the church is

emptied and the circus filled; we leave Christ alone on the altar and feast our

adulterous eyes on the foulest sights of the vile games. So it is with the

greatest justice that the Lord God says to us:

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"For your filthiness you have been driven out in banishment." And

again he says: "The altars of this laughter shall be brought to

nothing."

At least, you say, this answer can be made, that such things are not done

in all the cities of the Romans. True, and I shall even go so far as to say that

they are not now being done in all places where they have been hitherto. For

instance, no shows are given now in Mayence, but this is because the city has

been destroyed and blotted out;

nor at Cologne, for it is overrun

by the enemy. They are not being performed in the most noble city of Treves,

which has been laid low by a destruction four times repeated,

nor

finally in many other cities of Gaul and Spain. Then woe to us and our

iniquities, woe to us and our impurities! What hope have Christian congregations

in the sight of God when these evils cease to exist in the Roman cities only

from the time when the cities themselves

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have come into subjection to barbarian jurisdiction? This mark of vice and

impurity seems to be a native characteristic of the Romans, an inborn trait, for

wherever there are Romans, these evils prevail. Do you think that this is a

serious and unjust accusation? Serious indeed, if it is without foundation. But

how can it fail to be false, since the activities of which I spoke are now

carried on in only a few Roman cities? Most of our cities, you claim, are not

now polluted by the taint of these vices; even though they are the same places

which were the homes of our old wickedness, still their former indulgences have

ceased.

So we must now consider the question, why those cities still seem to be the

haunts of the games, whereas the games have ceased. They are still the homes and

abiding places of disgraceful vice because all sorts of vile deeds have hitherto

been enacted in them. Moreover, the only reason for the cessation of the games

themselves is that they cannot be given at the present time because of the

misery and poverty in which we live. That they were presented before was due to

our depravity; that they are not given now, to our necessity. For the collapse

of the imperial fiscus and the beggary of the Roman treasury do not permit money

to be lavished on trifling matters that make no return. Let men squander as much

as they please, casting their money into the mire; they cannot lose as much as

they could formerly, for they have not as much to lose. In respect of our

lustful desires and our base pleasures we should certainly like to have more

abundance, if only that we might be able to transmute our wealth into

disgraceful filth. The amounts squandered in our beggary are an indication of

what we should like to spend if we were rich and magnificent. The bane and ruin

of our present depraved condition is that though our poverty has nothing left to

lose, our sinful souls yearn for more wealth to cast away.

We cannot therefore console ourselves at all on these grounds, that is, by

saying that the former extravagances are not now being

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committed in all our cities. For the only reason for their abandonment is that

cities where they were carried on in the past are no longer in existence, or

that in the places where such things used to be

done, [means are lacking]

to perform them. Thus the spectacles

are no longer possible in the cities where they were formerly performed; as God

himself said to sinners through his prophet: "The Lord remembered these

things and it came into his mind, and the Lord could no longer bear, because of

the evil of your doings and because of the abominations which ye have committed;

therefore is your land a desolation, and an astonishment and a curse."

So it has come to pass that the greater part of the Roman world is become a

desolation and an astonishment and a curse.

Would that these abominations had only been committed of old and that

Roman depravity would at length cease such performances! Then perhaps, as it is

written, God would be merciful to our sins. But we do not so act as to

propitiate him. We constantly add evils to evils and pile sins upon sins, and

though many of us have already perished we seek to complete our own destruction.

Who, tell me, seeing another man killed beside him is not in terror for himself?

Who can see his neighbor's house burn and not try by every means in his power to

keep his own from being set on fire? But we not only see our neighbors burning

but know that the flames have already spread over the greater part of our own

bodies. What unspeakable evil is this that we are suffering? We are on fire, on

fire, I say, and yet we do not fear the flames that burn us. That the evils

committed formerly are at last diminishing is the result of our miseries, not

the fruit of a true repentance.

This is easily proved; only give back our former prosperity and

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you shall see at once the old interests everywhere restored. Note this also:

as far as men's wishes are concerned, even if the games are no longer actually

being given in many places, yet they still exist as of old, for the Roman people

everywhere wish them given. When nothing but sheer necessity hinders a man from

an evil deed, the mere desire for a base act is as much to be condemned as the

action. For if, as I said, according to the words of our Lord: "Whosoever

looketh on a woman to lust after her is guilty of the adultery conceived in his

heart,"

we can understand that while of necessity we do not

commit disgraceful acts worthy of condemnation, we are nevertheless guilty if we

only desire forbidden things.

Why should I mention desire? Most men actually do these things whenever they

can. When the inhabitants of other cities come to Ravenna or Rome they join the

Roman plebs in the circus, and the people of Ravenna in the theater. Therefore

let no one consider himself acquitted on the ground of his distance from the

spectacles. All are united in the turpitude of their actions who join one

another in their desire for disgraceful deeds.

Yet we flatter ourselves on the uprightness of our ways, the rarity of our

vices. So I shall carry my charges farther: not only do men still yield as of

old to the pollution of those infamous games but their guilt in this is much

greater than before. For in the past the various members of the Roman world

flourished unimpaired; the public wealth had made the storehouses inadequate;

the citizens of all the towns had abundance of riches and delights, and amid

such overflowing prosperity the authority of religion could hardly exercise due

censorship of conduct. Then indeed those who exploited base desires found rich

grazing on all sides, but there was no lack of wealth to satisfy their greed; no

one worried about the public disbursements and expenses, for the cost was not

felt. The state indeed seemed in a way to seek an opportunity to squander

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what it could scarcely continue to hold. Thus the heaped-up wealth that had

already begun to exceed just bounds furnished abundance for lavishness even in

trivial matters.

But of the present situation what can we say? Our old abundance has deserted

us; the resources of former times are gone, and we are in a wretched state, but

do not cease our frivolities. Although even orphan wastrels are usually

benefited by poverty, leaving off the error of their ways as soon as they have

squandered their wealth, we seem to be a new class of profligates, in whom

opulence has ceased to dwell, but dissipation persists. The causes of our

corruption lie not as with other men in outside enticements, but in our hearts,

and our minds are the source of our depravity, so that [we] are not [moved] to

amend our ways by the loss of our wealth, but [go on]

sinning

through love of wickedness.

10.

Although I may have shown sufficiently what serious vices the Romans

have, from which the barbarian tribes are free, still 1 shall add many points

that I have omitted. But before I continue, let me remind you that a fault of

any sort which dishonors God should in no sense seem a trivial matter to anyone.

It is never permissible to dishonor an illustrious and powerful man, and anyone

who dishonors such a one is held guilty in the eyes of the law and is condemned

in due course as responsible for the injurious action. How much more difficult

of atonement is the accusation of injury to God! The fault of the wrongdoer

always increases in proportion to the position of the person injured, since

necesssarily the greater the person of the man who suffers abusive action, the

greater is the guilt of the man who commits such action. Wherefore we read in

the law that even those who seem to have committed only slight offence against

the sacred ordinances have nevertheless been most severely punished; to the end

that we might know that nothing pertaining to God should be considered

unimportant. Even

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what seemed to be a petty fault became a grave one, inasmuch as it was an

injury to the divine power.

What did Oza, the Levite of God, do against the divine commandment, when he

tried to steady the ark of the Lord? There was no law laid down regarding this.

Yet immediately he took hold of it, he was struck down, apparently not because

he did anything in an impudent fashion or with an undutiful intention, but his

very service was undutiful because he exceeded his orders.

When a man of the Israelites had gathered wood on the Sabbath, he was struck

down and killed by the judgment and command of God, who is truly a most gentle

and merciful judge, who would doubtless have preferred to spare rather than to

kill, if the consideration of severity had not outweighed consideration of

mercy. For one incautious man perished to save many from perishing thereafter

through lack of caution.

But why do I speak of single individuals? The children of Israel in their

journey through the desert, because they longed for their accustomed meat, lost

a part of their number. The desire for meat had not yet been forbidden them, but

God, I think, wished to further the observance of the law by the suppression of

rebellious desires. He intended the whole people to learn the more easily how

earnestly one should avoid what God forbade in his divine writings, since even

those acts injured him which he had not yet forbidden by law.

The same people also murmured at the hardships they underwent, and for this

reason were punished by the Lord's rods, not because it is forbidden a man to

groan at hardships, but because their murmurs were displeasing to God, inasmuch

as they seemed to accuse him of causing them too much labor. From this we should

learn how much a man enjoying the blessings of good fortune ought

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to seek to please God, since it is not even permitted to complain of those

ills that seem painful.

11.

What is the purpose of these examples? What else than that nothing should

seem trivial that causes injury to God? For we were talking of the public games,

which are truly mockeries of our hopes, mockeries of our life. While we sport in

the theaters and circuses, we perish, according to the Sacred Word which says:

"It is as sport to a fool to do mischief."

So we too,

when we laugh amidst disgraceful and shameful sights, are committing crimes, and

crimes of no slight extent. Our wrongdoing is the more worthy of punishment for

this very reason, that though it seems to be of a most trivial nature, it is

really pestilential and deadly in its outcome. There are two chief evils, for a

man to destroy himself and for him to injure God; both of these are committed in

the public games, where through criminal and shameful sights the eternal

salvation of the Christian people is utterly destroyed, and through a

sacrilegious superstition the divine majesty is violated. There can be no doubt

that the games injure God, consecrated as they are to idols. For Minerva is

worshipped and honored in the gymnasia, Venus in the theaters, Neptune in the

circuses, Mars in the arena, Mercury in the palaestra, and thus the

superstitious worship varies according to the character of its sponsors.

Impure actions of all sorts are performed in the theaters; there is wanton

luxury in the palaestras, immoderate vice in the circuses, madness in the

arenas. In one of these is wantonness, in another lasciviousness, in another

intemperance, in another insanity, in them all the devil; nay, in each

individual place where shows are held, not merely one devil, but devils of all

varieties, for they preside over the places dedicated to their worship.

Therefore in spectacles of this sort neither allurements nor vices are found

alone. It is sacrilege for a Christian to mingle with this superstition, sharing

in the worship of those in

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whose festivals he takes delight. While such a thing is always serious

enough, it becomes more intolerable when either our adversity or our prosperity,

exceeding the ordinary measure of our life, makes our acts more blameworthy. In

adversity there is double need to appease God, and in prosperity to avoid

grieving him. Surely he must be appeased when he is angry, and must not be

alienated when he is propitious; for our adversities come to us through his

wrath, our prosperity through his favor. But we do everything by contraries.

How, do you ask? Listen. First, if won over by his own mercy ----for we never

so live that we deserve his favor ---- if, as I say, at any time won over by his

own mercy God gives us peaceful seasons, plentiful crops, tranquillity rich in

all good things and abundance increasing beyond our hopes, we let ourselves be

so corrupted by great prosperity and fortune, we let ourselves be so depraved by

insolent manners that we altogether forget God and ourselves. Although the

apostle says that every benefit of the peace given by God depends on this:

"That we lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and

honesty,"

the only use we make of the quiet he gives is to

live in drunkenness and luxury, in wantonness and rapine, in all manner of crime

and wickedness. We look on his goodly gift of peace as an opportunity for

licentiousness, and take the quiet given by his truce as a chance to sin more

freely and safely.

Therefore we are unworthy of heavenly gifts, who make no good use of God's

kindness, and see in the means of good works only material for vice. Hence it

comes that the peace which we so abuse itself works against us, and is actually

harmful to us, since we use it to our detriment. Is this worthy of belief? We

change nature itself by our wickedness, and the good things that God has made as

his loving gift to us are turned to evil by our wanton lives.

12.

We who are corrupted by prosperity, you say, are corrected

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through adversity. Long peace had made us unruly, but we are brought back by

strife to moderation. In what cases have the dwellers in our cities, who were

licentious in prosperity, begun to be chaste in adversity? When has drunkenness,

which increased in the time of our peace and prosperity, ceased under the

ravages of the enemy?

Italy has already been devastated by many disasters: have the vices of the

Italians therefore ended? The city of Rome has been besieged and taken by storm:

have the Romans therefore ceased their mad blasphemy? Barbarous nations have

overrun the states of Gaul: have the crimes of the Gauls therefore changed in

character, as far as their evil habits are concerned? Tribes of Vandals have crossed over into the Spanish countryside: the fortune of the Spaniards

has indeed changed, but not their corruption. Lastly, that no part of the world

might be immune from fatal destruction, wars have begun to cross the seas, they

have devastated and overthrown cities shut off by the waves, in Sardinia and

Sicily, the imperial granaries. Having, as it were, cut off the vital channels

of the empire, they captured Africa, which may be called its heart. What then?

As barbarians entered that land, did its vices cease, even through fear? Or, as

even the most worthless slaves are usually reformed for the time being, did

terror drive them to modesty and self-restraint? Who can rightly estimate this

evil? The barbarians' arms clashed about the walls of Cirta and Carthage

while the Christian congregation of the city raved in the circuses and wantoned

in the theaters. Some had their throats cut

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without the walls, while others still committed fornication within; part of

the people were captive to the enemy without, while part within the city were

captive to their own vices. It is hard to decide which suffered the worse

misfortune. The former indeed were captive externally in the flesh, the latter

inwardly in the soul. Of the two deadly evils, it is less, I think, for a

Christian to endure captivity of the body than of the soul, according to the

teachings of the Savior himself in the Gospel, that the death of the soul is

much more fatal than that of the body.

Or do we perhaps believe that those men were not captive in soul, who then

rejoiced in the time of their people's captivity? Was he not captive in mind and

heart, who laughed amid the punishments of his people, who did not know that his

throat was being cut along with theirs, that in their deaths he also died?

Outside the walls, as I have said, and inside them too, was heard the din of

battle and of the games; the voices of dying men mingled with the voices of

revellers; the outcry of the people slain in the war could scarcely be

distinguished from the clamor of those who shouted in the circus. What was

accomplished by this but the hastening of the destruction of the people who

chose such a course, though God perhaps did not yet wish to destroy them?

13.

These places, however, are far away, almost removed to another world, and

seem irrelevant to the discussion when I consider that even in my own country,

in the Gallic states, almost all men of high degree have been made worse by

their misfortunes. I myself have seen men of lofty birth and honor, though

already despoiled and plundered,

still less ruined in fortunes than

in morality; for, ravaged and stripped though they were, something still

remained to them of their property, but nothing of their character. They were so

much more hostile to themselves than to alien

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enemies that, though they had already been ruined by the barbarians, they now

completed their own destruction. It is sad to tell what we saw there; honored

old men, feeble Christians, when the ruin of their state was already imminent,

making themselves slaves to appetite and lust. What are the first grounds of

accusation? That they were honored, old, Christians, or in danger? Who would

deem it possible that such things should be done by old men even in utter

security, or by boys in a crisis, or at any time whatever by Christians? They

reclined at feasts, forgetful of their honor, forgetting justice, forgetting

their faith and the name they bore. There were the leaders of the state, gorged

with food, dissolute from winebibbing, wild with shouting, giddy with revelry,

completely out of their senses, or rather, since this was their usual condition,

precisely in their senses. In spite of all this, what I have next to say is

still worse: not even the destruction of their towns put an end to their

excesses. The wealthiest city of Gaul was taken by storm no less than four

times.

It is easy to recognize the city of which I speak. The first

captivity should surely have sufficed to mend the ways of the citizens, so that

the renewal of their sins would not have renewed the destruction. But what

followed? The tale is incredible. The constant repetition of misfortunes in that

city increased its crimes. Like that fabulous monster whose heads multiplied as

they were cut off,

so also in the most excellent city of

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Gaul, wickedness gathered strength from the very blows that punished it. You

would have thought that the punishment intended to end the crimes of its people

acted instead as the begetter of vice. What then? By the daily multiplication of

swarming evils it has come to such a pass that the city could more easily exist

without inhabitants than any of its citizens could do without crime.

So much then for this city. What of another not far distant but of almost

equal magnificence?

Has it not suffered the same ruin of fortunes

and of morals? For aside from all else, when it was utterly demoralized by the

two chief evils common to all, avarice and drunkenness, it finally reached such

a state of rabid greed for wine that the very rulers of the city did not rise

from their feasts when the enemy were actually entering the gates. God wished to

make clear to them why they perished, since at the moment of their final

disaster they were leading the very life through which they had come to ruin. I

myself saw lamentable sights there, with no distinction between boys and old

men. The scurrility and levity of all were alike; all vices reigned at once ----

extravagance, drinking bouts, wantonness ---- all the people revelled together.

They drank, gamed, committed adultery. Old and honored men waxed wanton at their

feasts; men already almost too feeble to live proved mighty in their cups; men

too weak to walk were strong in drinking; those whose steps tottered were nimble

dancers. What more can be said? Through all that I have recounted they became so

degraded that the words of the Sacred Scripture were fulfilled in them:

"Wine and women make men of understanding to fall away from God."

For while they drink, dice, rape and play the

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madman, men begin to deny Christ. After all this do we wonder that men who have

long since undergone moral ruin suffer the ruin of their fortunes? Let no one

think that such a city perished only at the time of its physical destruction,

for the deeds of its people had brought its ruin long before their death.

14.

I have told the fate of the most famous cities. What of the many others

in various parts of Gaul? Have they not fallen, too, because of like vices on

the part of their citizens? All were so completely possessed by their crimes

that they did not fear any danger they had foreknowledge of captivity and did

not dread it. Fear indeed was taken away from these sinful men to prevent them

from the exercise of caution. Therefore, though the barbarians were settled

almost within their sight, men felt no fear, the cities remained unguarded. Such

was the blindness of their hearts, or rather of their sins, that although

doubtless no one wished to die, no one did anything to ward off death.

Everything was in the grip of carelessness and sloth, negligence and gluttony,

drunkenness and sleep, as has been written of such men: "Because a deep

sleep from the Lord was fallen upon them."

A deep sleep

indeed fell upon them that destruction might follow closely. For when, as it is

written, a sinner's iniquity is full

and he is due to perish,

foreknowledge is taken from him, that he may not escape his doom. But enough of

this. I have made my point sufficiently clear, I think, that not even in the

time of the greatest danger did the vices of the people come to an end before

the actual overthrow of their cities.

15.

Perhaps such things have occurred in the past, but have now come to an

end, or will do so at some future time. Yes, forsooth, if today any city or

province that has been smitten by God's scourge or devastated by the enemy

appears humbled, converted and amended, if practically all who bear the Roman

name do not

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prefer death to reformation, the end of their life to the end of their vices!

This can be quickly tested by the example of the greatest city of Gaul, three

times destroyed by successive captures,

yet when the whole city had

been burned to the ground, its wickedness increased even after its destruction.

Those whom the enemy had not killed when they pillaged the city were overwhelmed

by disaster after the sack; those who had escaped death in the capture did not

survive the ruin that followed. Some died lingering deaths from deep wounds,

others were burned by the enemy's fires and suffered tortures even after the

flames were extinguished. Some perished of hunger, others of nakedness, some

wasting away, others paralyzed with cold, and so all alike by diverse deaths

hastened to the common goal.

Worse than all this, other cities suffered from the destruction of this

single town. There lay all about the torn and naked bodies of both sexes, a

sight that I myself endured. These were a pollution to the eyes of the city, as

they lay there lacerated by birds and dogs. The stench of the dead brought

pestilence on the living: death breathed out death. Thus even those who had

escaped the destruction of the city suffered the evils that sprang from the fate

of the rest.

What followed these calamities? Who can assay such utter folly? The few men

of rank who had survived destruction demanded of the emperors

circuses as the sovereign remedy for a ruined city. O that I might here and now

be gifted with eloquence adequate to cope with this shocking event, that there

might be at least as much

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virtue in my complaint as there is sorrow at its cause! Who can even decide

what chiefly merits accusation in the tale, irreverence or stupidity,

extravagance or insanity? In these terms the whole is comprised. What is more

irreverent than a petition that works injury to God? What is more stupid than

not to consider your petition carefully? What so clear a proof of hopeless

extravagance as to desire luxuries in a time of general mourning? Or more insane

than to be in the midst of evils without any understanding of them?

Among these, however, insanity is the least culpable, for the will is not at

fault when sin is committed through sheer madness. Therefore those of whom I

speak deserved the greater blame, because, though sane, they acted senselessly.

Do you, O citizens of Treves, long for circuses when you have been plundered and

captured, after slaughter and bloodshed, after stripes and captivity, and the

repeated destruction of your ruined city? What is more lamentable than this

stupidity, more grievous than this folly? I confess I thought you most miserable

when you were suffering destruction, but I see that you are now more miserable

when you demand public shows. At first I thought you had lost only your material

property in the capture of your city; I did not know that you had lost also your

intelligence and control of your senses. Do you then ask for theaters, and

demand a circus from our emperors? For what condition, I ask, what people and

what city? A city burned and destroyed, a people captive and killed, who have

perished, or mourn their dead; a city of which nothing survives but sheer

calamity, whose people are altogether anxious in their grief, worn out by tears,

prostrate in bereavement, so that it is hard to say whether the lot of the

living or the dead is worse to bear. So great are the miseries of the survivors

that they surpass the ill fortune of the dead.

Do you then seek public shows, O citizen of Treves? Where, pray, are they to

be given? Over the pyres and ashes, the bodies and blood of the dead? For what

part of your city is free from these? Where

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has blood not been shed, where are bodies and mangled limbs not strewn?

Everywhere the city's appearance betrays its capture, everywhere are the horror

of captivity and the image of death.

The remains of a most unhappy

people lie on the graves of their dead, yet you ask for circuses; the city is

blackened by fire, yet you put on a festive countenance; all things mourn, but

you rejoice! Yea more, by your infamous pleasure you provoke God, and by your

vile superstitions arouse his divine wrath. Can there be any wonder that such a

fate has befallen you, when threefold destruction has not corrected you, so that

you richly deserved to perish by the fourth?

16.

I have given the above account in somewhat full detail to prove that we

have borne all our sufferings not through the failure of God's providence or

through his neglect, but because of his justice and judgment ---- a most just

dispensation and worthy retribution ---- and that no portion whatever of the

Roman world and Roman name, however greatly chastised by afflictions sent from

heaven, has ever been corrected. Thus we prove that we do not deserve to enjoy

prosperity, since we are not corrected by adversity.

Good gifts are given us from time to time, however, unworthy though we are.

The good God, like a most indulgent father, sometimes lets us be humbled for our

sins, but does not suffer us to be afflicted long. So at one time he chastises

his children by adversity, in accordance with his discipline, and again favors

them with peace, according to his mercy. As the best and most skilful doctors

give different cures for various diseases and succor some by sweet, others by

bitter drugs; cure certain ills by cautery, others by soothing poultices; employ

ruthless surgery for some, but pour healing oil on others; seeking the same good

health by utterly different cures: so also our God, when he restrains us by

harsher blows, is seeking to cure us by cautery and surgery; when he favors us

with good fortune he is offering us soothing oil and poultices ---- for by means

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of different treatments he wishes to restore us all to the same good health.

Gentle treatment usually corrects even the most incorrigible slaves whom

punishment has failed to reform, and kindness subdues those whom the lash failed

to make submissive to their masters. Babies, too, and almost all stubborn

children, whom threats and blows do not make amenable, are often led to

obedience by goodies and endearments. Hence we should realize that we are more

worthless than the worst slaves, and more stupid than foolish children, since

torments do not correct us as they do bad slaves, nor coaxings win us over as

they do naughty children.

17.

I think I have now proved adequately that punishment has not corrected

any part of the Roman people; it remains to prove that neither the gifts nor the

gentle words of God correct us. What then are the gifts and gentle words of God?

What indeed but our peace and quiet, the calmness of prosperity that attends on

our hopes and wishes? Let me give you a particular instance, since the case

demands it.

Whenever we are in fear, distress and danger, when cities are besieged by the

enemy or provinces devastated, or the members of the state wounded by any other

adversities, and we offer prayers and vows to the heavenly hosts for help, then

if by the aid of the divine mercy our cities are saved, the devastation ended,

the hostile armies routed and all fear removed by God's grace, what do we

immediately do? Do we endeavor to recompense our Lord God by our worship, honor

and reverence for the benefits we have received at his hands? For this is the

fitting action and in accordance with human custom, that those who give us gifts

may receive due return for them. This then perhaps we do, giving God recompense

in human fashion, and making a good return for the good we have received of him.

So we run at once to the Lord's house, and prostrate ourselves on the ground,

we supplicate him, our joy mixed with tears, and

|187

bedeck his doorway with, votive garlands, we adorn his altars with gifts, and

since we ourselves are making a festival of gifts to him, transfer the joy of

our countenance to his temples also. Or at least, an act no less pleasing to

him, we renounce the vices of our former lives, we give good works as a

sacrifice to him, and offer up a new conversion in return for our new joys.

Lastly we declare a holy war on all uncleanliness, shun the madness of the

circus, curse the vileness of the shows in the theater, vow a new life to the

Lord and, to obtain his protection forever, dedicate ourselves to God.

18.

Although all that I have described should be given to God for his recent

benefits, let us consider what we actually do. Men run at once to the games, fly

off to their old insanity, the folk pour into the theaters, the whole people

riot madly at the circuses. God gives us good gifts to assure our merit, but we,

as often as we receive his benefits, multiply our crimes. He by his mercies

calls us to righteousness, but we rush headlong into wickedness; he by his

mercies calls us to repentance, but we rush to destruction; he calls us to

chastity, but we rush into impurity. A noble response we make to his holy

favors, nobly do we recognize and honor his gifts, who repay the kindness we

have received from him by an equal measure of injustice! Is this not injury to

our God, or can any injury be less deserved, [when] great and frequent

[gratitude] is needed instead?

But since by the taint of wickedness ingrained in our nature we cannot fail

to be prey to vice except by ceasing to live at all, what hope of good is there

in us? Those who sin through ignorance correct themselves when they learn their

error; those who do not know the true religion begin to change their way of life

when they change their faith. Lastly, those who are spoiled by excessive

abundance and security, as I said, cease their depravity when they are no longer

secure. "We do not err through ignorance, nor are we

|188

outside the true religion, nor corrupted by prosperity and security: quite

the reverse. We know the true religion, so ignorance cannot serve as our excuse;

we lack the peace and wealth of our former days; all that we had has been taken

from us or changed ---- only our vices have been increased. Nothing remains of

our former peace and plenty but our crimes, which have made our prosperity

cease. Where are now the old resources and honors of Rome? The Romans were of

old the mightiest of men, now they are without strength; of old they were

feared, but now they live in fear; barbarous nations paid tribute to them, but

to these same nations they are now tributary.

The enemy sell us the

very daylight; almost our whole safety is purchased for a price. Alas for our

misfortunes! to what a pass have we come! For this we give thanks to the

barbarians, that we are allowed to ransom ourselves from them at a price. What

could be more abjectly wretched than to live on such terms? Yet after all this

we think that we are living, we whose lives depend on tribute! We even make

ourselves additionally ridiculous by pretending that the gold we pay is merely a

gift. We call it a gift, yet it is really a ransom ---- but a ransom paid on

unusually hard and wretched terms. When captives have been redeemed, they gain

their liberty, whereas we pay ransom constantly and are never free. The

barbarians deal with us like those masters who hire out for wages slaves not

needed for their own service. In like fashion, we are never free of the payments

due: we pay ransom constantly in order to have the privilege of continuing

endlessly to pay.

[Footnotes moved to the end]

See Joshua 7, where the name is

given as

Achan.

II Samuel 24.

Isaiah 36-37.

I Corinthians 5.6.

Acts 5.

I Corinthians 5.

ibid.

1.19.

Ibid.

3.18.

(Romans 1. 28).

10.

Here there is a lacuna in the MSS. I

have followed Pauly's conjecture to fill out the sense, but am inclined to agree

with Zschimmer,

op. cit.,

p. 35, that the abrupt introduction of the

subject of the games indicates a more substantial loss in the text.

11.

Salvian's diatribe against the games

has been one of the most quoted portions of his work as Gregoire and Collombet

note (

Oeuvres de Salvien,

II, 476), it was much used by the French clergy

in the 18 th century, especially as a source for Lenten sermons. The Italian

translation by S. Carlo Borromeo (Milan, 1579) is actually entitled

Libro di

Salviano Vescovo di Marsiglia contra, gli spettacoli ed altre vanità del mondo.

The subject was one on which the majority of the Fathers wrote with

vehemence, and there is naturally a considerable degree of similarity in their

attacks. Salvian's chapters on the spectacles are perhaps closest to Tertullian,

De spectaculis,

and to what Lactantius has to say on the subject in

various sections of his

Institutiones divinae.

12.

This sentence shows that in spite of

all attempts to check the custom, men were still being "thrown to the

lions" in the middle of the 5th century. Constantine in a.d. 325 decreed

(Cod. Just. XI. 44) : "Bloody spectacles in a time of civil peace and

domestic quiet do not meet with our favor, wherefore we absolutely prohibit the

existence of gladiators." Rittershausen aptly queries whether the spectacle

of men torn and devoured by wild beasts was more suited to civil peace and quiet

than were gladiatorial combats.

13.

See Minucius Felix

Octavius

26.

14.

Already in the fourth century the

chief functions of the consuls at Rome had come to be the giving of their names

to the official year, and giving games to the people; this example therefore has

an added pertinence in the discussion of the games. See Seneca

De ira

III.

31, in the importance of the

consul ordinarius

as compared with the

consuls later in the year, who were deprived of that immortality for their

names, which until the general adoption of the Christian era was really

considerable.

15.

See Seneca

Ep.

VII. 2:

"Nothing is so ruinous to good character as to spend time at any

spectacle."

16.

(Romans 1. 32).

17.

See Lactantius

Inst. div.

VI.

20.

18.

II Corinthians 8. 9.

19.

(Philippians 2. 6), 8.

20.

(Titus 2. 11-14).

21.

I Peter 2. 21.

22.

(Luke 6. 25), 21.

23.

Tertullian makes a similar connection between

spectacula

and

pompa diaboli

De spectaculis

4. On his other uses of

the phrase, and its generally symbolic meaning at this time, cf. P. de

Labriolle's article, "Pompa Diaboli,"

Bulletin du Cange,

II (1926), 170-181. The actual word

spectacula

was not included in

the baptismal vow, but in Salvian's interpretation was inherent in the pomp and

works of the devil. So Tertullian, in the passage cited above, says: "If

then the whole apparatus of the spectacles is proven to consist of idolatry,

there is no doubt that our vow of renunciation at the font refers also to the

spectacles, which are by their idolatry in the service of the devil and his pomp

and angels."

24.

See Isidore,

Etymologiae

XVIII. 59: "These

spectacles of cruelty and vanity were instituted not only by the vices of men

but by the orders of demons also. Therefore a Christian should have nothing to

do with the insanity of the circus, with the indecency of the theater, with the

cruelty of the amphitheater, with the atrocities of the arena, with the

voluptuousness of the games. For he who prefers such sights denies God, being

made a traitor to the Christian faith, who seeks again what he once renounced at the font; that

is, the devil, his pomps and works."

25.

That is, baptism.

26.

Another instance of popular disregard for imperial edicts.

Cod. Theod. II. 8. 20, in a.d. 392, forbade circuses on Sunday except when the

emperor's birthday fell on that day. Another decree,

ibid.

II. 8. 23, of

a.d. 399, forbade theaters and races and all sorts of public shows, with the

same exception. In a.d. 409

(ibid.

II. 8. 25), the prohibition hold even

for the emperor's birthday and the anniversaries of his rule. A few years after

Salvian's book was published, the emperors Leo and Anthemius in the East (Cod.

Just. III. 12. 9, a.d. 469) inflicted heavy penalties for presence at the

spectacles on Sunday, and on any officials who should authorize such

performances "on the pretext of public business."

27.

Sources? Compare (Isaiah 16.4) and 10.

28.

Haemmerle,

op. cit.,

I. 27-28, puts the destruction of

Mayence in A.D. 405-406 (see Jerome,

Ep.

123; Migne, PL, XXII, col.

1057), and that of Cologne between 438 and 440, as it is here connected with the

fourth sack of Treves. Salvian,

Ep.

I, agrees with this in his account of

the effect on his relatives of the recent sack of the city.

29.

The dates of the four destructions of Treves here mentioned

have been much discussed with widely differing conclusions. The 12th century

Gesta

Treverorum

described four captures of the city, but, ranging as they do from

that of the "Greeks" under the Arian Constans in a.D. 380 to that of

the Franks in 463, they do not suit the conditions required by Salvian's text.

The recent tendency has been to ascribe all four captures of the city to the

Franks, and to set them fairly close together, emphasizing the phrase

ter

continuatis vicibus

in VI. 15

infra.

Rudolph and Kenterich (

Quellen

zur Rechts- und Wirtschaftsgebiete der rheinischen Stadte: kurtrierische Stadte:

I. Trier,

Bonn 1915, 5-6) incline to date the first capture in A.D. 411-412,

the second and third in the period from 412 to 416, and the fourth in 427-428,

dates that connect well with Salvian's account and with local conditions. The

earlier and later dates assigned by some commentators, while suitable as far as

the history of Treves is concerned, are less consistent with the conditions

required by Salvian's account. For summaries of various opinions on this point,

see Haemmerle,

Studia Salviana

I, 19-26. Haemmerle himself suggests the

date 406 as that of a sack by the Vandals, and 411-413, 418, 438-439 or earlier,

as Frankish destructions of the city. This conjecture is not far from that of

Rudolph and Kenterich.

30.

The text is badly corrupted, and no satisfactory emendation has

been proposed. The bracketed words are supplied on the basis of the preceding

sentence.

31.

(Jeremiah 44. 21-22).

32.

Baluze, referring this phrase to the burning of Treves,

somewhat gratuitously concluded that Salvian could not have been a native of

that city.

33.

(Matthew 5. 28).

34.

The corrupt text is here emended according to Pauly's

conjectures.

35.

II Samuel 6. 6-7.

36.

(Numbers 15. 32-36).

37.

Ibid.

11.

38.

(Proverbs 10. 23).

39.

See Tertullian

De spectaculis

10-11.

40.

I Timothy 2. 2.

41.

That the reference here is to the sack of Rome by Alaric in

A.D. 410 is clearly shown by the order of events cited; if it had been intended,

as those who use this passage to prove that Salvian's book was written after

A.D. 455 assume, to refer to the Vandal sack, it would hardly have been made the

first of a series of events ending with the Vandal destruction of Carthage some

years before their sack of Rome.

42.

Gaiseric captured Carthage in A.D. 439, after ten years of

general Vandal control in Africa. The orthodox clergy were given their choice of

slavery or exile, as were the nobles. Church property was given over to the

Arians.

43.

(Luke 9. 24-25).

44.

This phrase was overlooked by those commentators who held

that Salvian was born in the province of Africa.

45.

That is, in the first sack of the city of Treves.

46.

The reference to Treves is obvious. This estimate of the city

is supported by the general testimony of the writers of the early empire.

Ausonius puts Treves in the fourth place in his

Ordo urbium clarissimarum,

the

first being assigned to Rome, the second to Constantinople and Carthage, and

third to Antioch, so that Treves is second only to Rome in western Europe. The

choice of the city as the seat of the praetorian prefect of Gaul is a

significant indication of its preeminence. See also Cod. Theod. XIII. 3. 11,

medicis et professoribus

(a.D. 376): "For the most glorious city of

Treves we have thought best to make a somewhat more ample allowance, that thirty

annonae

be paid to a teacher of rhetoric, twenty to a teacher of Latin

grammar, and twelve to one of Greek, if a worthy one can be found."

47.

That is, the Lernaean hydra. The labors of Heracles were a

popular subject for light verse; cf. Ausonius

Monosticha de XII aerumnis

Herculis.

48.

Brouwer,

Antiquitatum et Annalium Treverensium libri XXV

(1671),

V. 14, p. 275, identified this city as Mayence, which seems to fit better than

Metz or Cologne, the description of utter ruin. In VI. 8

supra,

Salvian

mentioned Mayence especially as having been destroyed, while Cologne was only

spoken of as being full of the enemy. Haemmerle,

op. cit.,

I. 18, follows

Baluze in identifying the city here mentioned with Cologne instead.

49.

(Ecclesiasticus 19. 2).

50.

I Samuel 26. 12.

51.

(Genesis 15. 16).

52.

This phrase offers some support for the adoption of dates

for the first three captures of the city close to each other in point of time:

c.f. note 29

supra.

53.

Haemmerle,

op. cit.,

I. 22-23, pointed out

the importance of this plural for dating the third sack of Treves, since the

joint rule of Honorius and Constantius, a.d. 420-421, was the only possible date

before Salvian's withdrawal to Lerins, when there could have been two

imperatores

in the West to whom such an appeal could have been made. Hence the third

sack of the city must have taken place at about 420. He suggests further that

the people of Treves hoped by the circuses to attract more residents for the

rebuilding of the city.

54.

The Vergilian phrase,

imago mortis

(

Aeneid

II.360).

55.

5 5

The lacuna indicated by Halm is supplied according to Pauly's conjecture.

56.

Tribute had been paid to barbarians in return for guarantees of

the integrity of the frontier since the early empire: beginning with the fourth

century such tributes came to be due more and more to weakness, rather than to

policy, till the condition was reached which Salvian here describes.

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.189-223. Book

Book VII. : Wherein Roman vice is contrasted with Vandal virtue

1. On the wretched gaiety of Rome.

2. On the corruption of southern Gaul.

3. On the lusts of its men.

4. The corruption of their households.

5. That their vices are increased by their distress.

6. On the chastity of the Goths.

7. The Vandals in Spain.

8. The punishment due to presumption.

9. Humility and pride.

10. God's judgment in time of battle.

11. The judgment of God shown in the strength of the enemy.

12. On the invasions of the barbarians.

13. The Vandals in Africa.

14. Their devastation of Africa.

15. The wickedness of Africa.

16. Its obscenity.

17. The corruption of the African churches.

18. The continuance of their general guilt.

19. Their prevalent vice of effeminacy.

20. The contrast between the Romans and the Vandals.

21. On the discipline of the Vandals.

22. On the reform of Africa.

23. On the regulation of marriage.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE SEVENTH BOOK

My description, at

the end of the previous book, of the weakness and misery of the Romans, may seem

to be at variance with my general proposition. I admitted that the very people

who, as pagans, conquered and ruled the world, are being conquered and enslaved,

now that they have become Christians. Is not this clear evidence of God's

neglect of human affairs? The charge is easily refuted by what I said long ago

about the pagan nations. Those who know the law of God and neglect it are more

guilty than those who fail to observe it through lack of knowledge.

However, if God is willing, since we have reached the point in our

undertaking at which something should be said of the old Romans, we shall, with

God's help, prove that his favor to them in the past was as just as is his

present severity toward us, and that his help to them in former times was as

fully deserved as is our punishment now.

Would that this same punishment were of benefit to us! Much harder and more

grievous than punishment is the fact that no amendment follows. The Lord wishes

to cure us by his chastisement, but improvement does not result. How can we

explain this evil? Cattle and flocks are cured by surgery; when the diseased

organs of mules, asses and swine have been cauterized they acknowledge the

healing effect of the fire, and at once when the corruption of the infected

parts has been burned away or cut out, living flesh grows in place of the dead

tissue. But we are burned and cut, yet are not healed by the surgeon's tools or

the burning of the cautery.

|190

What

is more serious, such care makes us even worse. It is not mere chance that we

undergo the same treatment as flocks and cattle afflicted by incurable diseases.

For in all parts of the world, since the healing care that is given us has no

effect, our lives are being brought to an end by death and destruction. Indeed,

not to repeat what I said some time ago, how can we define these disorders

except by saying that we are at the same time living in misery and in luxury?

Grant that luxury is the vice of the fortunate (though no one can be both

infamous and happy at the same time, since there is no true happiness without

honor), grant that these are the vices of a long peace and plentiful security,

why then are they found where there is no longer peace or security? Almost

throughout the Roman world peace and security have ceased. Why do only the vices

they engender survive? Who can tolerate licentiousness in a needy man?

Wantonness in poverty earns the more reproach, and a worthless fellow is more

heavily censured if his condition is wretched.

The whole Roman world is at once wretched and voluptuous. What poor man is

also wanton? What man awaiting captivity thinks of the circus? Who laughs in the

shadow of death? Yet we, in the fear of captivity, continue to frequent the

games, and shadowed by the fear of death, we laugh. You would think the whole

Roman people had been steeped in Sardonic herbs:

they are dying, yet they laugh. So in almost every part of the world tears

follow close upon our laughter; and the saying of our Lord comes home to us at

the present time: "Woe unto you that laugh, for ye shall weep."

The great length at

which I have spoken of the disgraceful character of the public spectacles may

have led you to assume that the abstinence of the barbarians from this

particular vice of

|191

ours is their

only point of moral superiority to us, inasmuch as we are not polluted as they

are by the crime of carnal lust and the filth of mortal fornication. Let us

then, if you please, compare the Romans in this respect also with other nations.

I cannot indeed think of any with whom we may be more justly compared than those

whom God has put into the very bosom of the state and made owners and lords of

the Roman land. Although there was absolutely no ground to dispute his judgment

in this, still, since he has taken away from us the best part of our territory,

and given it to the barbarians, let us see whether he seems to have exercised

justice in this transfer.

No one questions that the Aquitanians and the Nine Peoples

had the very marrow of the Gallic provinces, rich in every sort of

fertility, and not in fertility alone, but in qualities sometimes ranked above

this, charm, beauty and luxury. Almost all that district is still covered with

close-planted vines, flowering meadows, plowed fields, fruit orchards, charming

groves, springing fountains, flowing streams or waving grain, so that the owners

and masters of the land truly seem to have taken for their own not so much a

section of ground as a likeness of paradise. What conclusion can be drawn from

this? Unquestionably those men ought to have been more fervent in service to God

whom he had especially enriched by the most abundant evidence of his favor. What

is more right and fitting than that those whom their Lord seemed especially to

have favored by his gifts should themselves make an earnest effort to please him

by their religious worship, particularly since God lays no heavy or burdensome

demands on us? For he does not call on us to plow or hoe, to spade up the earth

or prepare the ground for vines, nor, to sum up, does he exact from his slaves

what we require of ours. What does he himself say? "Come unto me, all ye

that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest; take my yoke

|192

upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find

rest unto your souls

;

for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

So we see that the Lord calls us not to labor but to rest. What does he exact

of us, what does he order us to offer him, save only faith, chastity, humility,

sobriety, mercy and sanctity? All these assuredly do not burden but adorn us.

Nor is this all; they adorn our present life to the end that they may adorn even

more the life to come. O good and loving master, of inestimable mercy! He has

given us the gifts of religion at the present time that he may later reward us

for the gifts he now gives! These virtues, then, all the Aquitanians should have

cultivated, and indeed, as I said before, they should have made more especial

efforts in this direction, since they had received the especial gifts of God.

What resulted from their prosperity? What was bound to result? Was it not the

exact reverse of what should have happened? In all the provinces of Gaul these

men who are first in wealth, are first also in vice: nowhere is pleasure more

shameless, life more vicious, or moral standards more corrupt. This is the

return they have given God for his sacred gifts, that as far as by his

generosity he had drawn them to his favor, so far they by their abuse have

labored to arouse his anger.

Or is this perhaps

false, and are all my statements due to envy rather than truth? I shall not use

the method of proof some men employ in the courts, bringing in as witnesses

outsiders or persons unsuitable to testify for some other reason. I shall

cross-question the very men by whom these things have been done. I have spoken

falsely if they deny me. They confess, and indeed, which is much more serious,

they confess without any apparent grief. For now in their confession they have

the same attitude as in their commission of the fault. Just as then they were

not ashamed to perform disgraceful acts, so now they do not in the least repent

having

|193

performed them. We must

indeed make exception for a very small number of men distinguished for their

holiness, who, as one of their number has said, "have given their wealth to

redeem their crime."

Of these we must make an

exception, men who, we believe, were actually guilty only of lesser crimes even

in the midst of the almost universal entanglements of vice, and who merited

conversion by God's divine power. Now one for whom favor is reserved has not

been altogether injurious to his master in his actions. What more can I say? I

think that a man whom God has persuaded at last to cease from his wrongdoing has

always had God in mind, even in the midst of his error.

The rest, however, at least the great majority and the most noble, are all

very nearly of a kind: the intemperance of all is a devouring whirlpool, their

life a brothel. Why should I speak of brothels? Even those I think are less

wicked than the men of whom I spoke. For the prostitutes in them have not

experienced the marriage bond, and so do not defile what they do not know; their

shameless lives require atonement, it is true, but they are not liable to the

charge of adultery. Add to this that such haunts are few, and few the

prostitutes who have condemned themselves to a most unhappy life in them. Among

the Aquitanians, on the other hand, what city in its richest and most elegant

quarters was not practically a brothel? What rich and powerful man did not live

in lustful vice? Who among them did not plunge into the pit of the most sordid

associations? Who honored his wife by a faithful observance of his marriage

vows? Nay, as far as passive endurance of their lust is concerned, who among

them did not reduce his wife to the status of his maidservants and degrade the

sacrament of holy matrimony so far that no woman in the house was made to seem

|194

contemptible by her husband's

conduct than she who was made chief in it by the dignity of marriage?

Perhaps some one is

thinking that what I say is not strictly accurate; for the matrons of southern

Gaul did continue to exercise their rights and to hold honor and power as

mistresses of their households. That is true. Many of them indeed did keep

unimpaired their right of government, but scarcely one kept her marriage rights

unpolluted. Our present object of investigation is not the power of women, but

the infamous conduct of their husbands. However, I should not even say that the

matrons kept their power uninjured, since a wife who has not kept her connubial

rights safe and inviolate has not kept her full rights of domination. When the

master of the house acts as husband of the maidservants, the mistress is not far

removed from the mean position of the slave. Who among the rich men of Aquitania

did not so act? Who among them has not been considered by his shameless maids,

and with good, reason, as either adulterer or husband? For, as the prophet said:

''They were as fed horses in the morning; everyone neighed after his neighbor's

wife."

Those of whom he spoke sinned perhaps

less grievously, and, I think, with less intention of wrong than did our men.

The Aquitanians more truly resembled the post horses: they whinnied not after a

few women merely, but after all their household maids ---- that is, after their

own herds ---- and, like those; beasts called the stallions of the herd, they

waxed wanton with the heat of their intoxicating passion, and attacked whatever

woman was first exposed to the onslaught of their shameless lust. Since this is

the case, I ask the wise what sort of families they think were found where such

men were heads of the households? What corruption do they think there would be

among the slaves, where there Avas such great vice among the masters? For if the

head is diseased no part of the body is sound, and no member performs its

functions when the dominating part is not functioning. Moreover,

|195

the master's relation to his house is that of the head to the body, its very

life, setting up standards of living for all its members. The most unfortunate

aspect of the matter is that all follow the worse example more readily, and evil

associations corrupt good manners more easily than good ones will correct the

evil. Furthermore, since even good and honorable heads of families cannot make

their slaves good, what do you think becomes of the household morality when the

master himself sets an example of lewdness? And yet in such a case we have not

only an example of immorality but a sort of enforced necessity, since the slave

women are compelled to obey their wanton masters against their will, and the

lust of those in power is the compulsion of their subjects. From this we may see

how great was the filth of shameless vice when women subject to the most

depraved of masters were not allowed to be chaste even when they wished.

It may be difficult,

you think, to prove this, and no traces are likely to be found remaining of the

past debauchery and lust. See, then, how many of these men, even though they no

longer have any country, and are living as paupers in comparison with their past

wealth, are really worse than before. They are worse not only in that they

continue to live as they did formerly, but in the very fact that their crimes

never cease. Indeed their evil deeds, though not worse than before in character,

are more numerous; thus, even though no new devices lend novelty to their sins,

the number of their misdoings is increased.

Add to this that, as I have said, it is old men, and poor ones, who live in

such a fashion; for each of these points increases the evil. Surely it is less

shocking for young men and rich to sin. But what hope of cure is there for men

who are not recalled from their wonted vice either by miserable poverty or by

extreme age? Some of them, I suppose, are relying on a foolish assurance of long

life or the intention of eventual penitence; is it not a strange prodigy that

men should be given over to vice even at the very time of

|196

death? This being the case, what more can be said? I add one more point,

however, that many are living in this fashion today, even among the enemy, and

subject as captives to daily fear and danger, and although it was on account of

the excessive wickedness of their lives that God surrendered them into the hands

of the enemy, they do not forsake their vice even among the barbarians.

Perhaps those among

whom they now live are of such a character that these vices please them, and

they would be most grievously offended if they were to see the Romans living

chastely in the midst of their vices. If this were the ease, still the

wickedness of others ought not to make us wicked. It should be of more

importance in every man's eyes to be good on his own account than to be wicked

for another. We should strive to please God by our uprightness rather than men

by our vices. Consequently, even if a man lives among unchaste barbarians, he

ought to seek chastity, which is of service to him, rather than lewdness, which

pleases his lustful enemies. But note a point that serves to increase our guilt:

among chaste barbarians we ourselves are unchaste.

I shall say even more; the barbarians themselves are offended by our vices.

Among the Goths no one is permitted to indulge in fornication; only the Romans

in their land, by national and titular prerogative, are allowed this vice. What

hope, I ask, have we then in the sight of God? We love vice, while the Goths

execrate it; we flee from purity, while they love it; fornication with them is a

perilous vice, but with us a mark of honor. Do we think that we can stand before

God, do we think that we can attain salvation, when every crime of impurity,

every disgraceful vice, is committed by the Romans and censured by the

barbarians? At this point I ask those who consider us better than the barbarians

to tell me which of these evils are committed by even a very few of the Goths,

and which of them are not committed by all or nearly all of the Romans? Yet

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we wonder that the lands of the Aquitanians and of us all have been given by God

to the barbarians, though those same barbarians are now purifying by their

chastity the places polluted by the fornication of the Romans.

Is this the case in

Aquitania alone? Let us pass under review other parts of the world also, and not

speak exclusively of the Gauls. Have not the same crimes or greater ones

destroyed the provinces of Spain? Even if the divine wrath had handed these

lands over to any other barbarians you might name, the enemies of chastity in

them would have suffered tortures worthy of their vices. But as an added

evidence of the condemnation of their shamelessness they were delivered into

the hands of the Vandals, the most shamefast of barbarians. In the captivity of

Spain God wished to give a twofold evidence of his hatred of carnal lust and

love of chastity, when he put the Vandals in command solely on account of their

preeminent chastity and subjected the Spaniards to them solely on account of

their surpassing lewdness. What do I mean by this? Were there not anywhere in

the world stronger barbarians to whom the Spanish lands might be surrendered?

Many, without doubt, nay, all of them were stronger, if I am not mistaken.

But he handed the people of Spain over to the weakest of the enemy expressly to

show that it was not the strength but the merit of the Vandals that conquered,

and that we were not being overwhelmed by the power of our foes, who then seemed

most unheroic, but only by the wickedness of our vices, that the saying of the

Lord to the Jews might be fulfilled in us: ''According to their uncleanness and

according to their transgressions have I done unto them, and hid my face from

them.''

Elsewhere speaking to the same people,

he said: ''The Lord shall bring a nation against them from far . . .

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with the hoofs of his horses shall they tread down all thy streets; they shall

slay thy people by the sword."

So all that the Lord said has been fulfilled in us, and our punishment has

vindicated the force of his divine words.

Since the majority of

barbarian nations have drunk Roman blood and torn our flesh, we may ask why it

is especially into the power of those once considered the most cowardly of the

enemy that the Lord has delivered the greatest resources of the state and the

wealthiest people who bear the Roman name. Why else indeed, except to make us

recognize, as I said before, that the outcome depended on merit, not on

strength, and that this should serve to confound and punish us, that we were

given into the power of the weakest, and must recognize the correction of God's

hand in the fact that not the bravest but the most despised of our enemies

overcame us. For we read that whenever God has willed that men should clearly

see his great works, the action has been performed through the medium of a few

men, of men of the lowest sort, so that his divine handwork might not be

ascribed to human power.

Thus indeed Sisera, the captain before whom the Hebrew army trembled, was

laid low by a woman;

a woman's hand struck down

Abimelech, the stormer of cities,

and the

ironclad hosts of the Assyrians were routed by the help of a widow. Not to speak

of women only, did not the Lord wish Benedad, king of Syria, whom thirty-two

kings and armies of like proportions served, as well as countless thousands of

his own people, to be conquered by a few serving-men, so that God himself might

be recognized as the author of so great a victory?

Against the Midianites also, who, as the Book of Judges relates, had filled

all the land like locusts, Gideon was ordered to fight with a few men, not

because he had not more in his army, but he was forbidden to lead many men to

battle for

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fear that a multitude

might claim some share in the victory as their own. When Gideon had gathered

together thirty thousand armed men, the Lord spoke thus to him: "The people

that are with thee are too many for me to give Midian into their hands."

What followed? He left Gideon, to fight against countless thousands of

barbarians, only three hundred men. Indeed, he commanded the force of soldiers

to be reduced to such a scanty number in order that their lack of men might

prevent any claim of credit for a victory divinely won. Why he did this, the

Lord himself declared most plainly: "Lest Israel vaunt themselves against

me, saying: 'Mine own hand hath saved me.' ''

Let all the wicked hearken, I say, let all the presumptuous hearken, and all

who excel in power; let all men hear what the Lord says: "Lest Israel vaunt

themselves against me, saying, 'Mine own hand hath saved me.' "

Let all men hear, I

repeat, who utter blasphemies against the Lord, let all hear who put their trust

in man. God declares that all men speak against him who presume to think that

they can be freed by their own might. Who is there among the Romans who does not

hold this opinion? Who is there in our number who does not blaspheme in this

respect almost constantly? It is common knowledge that the state has no longer

any strength, yet not even now do we acknowledge to whose favor we owe it that

we still live. Whenever God gives us a degree of prosperity beyond our hopes and

deserts, one man ascribes it to fate, another to chance, another to the strategy

of our leaders, another to their foresight, another to the administration,

another to his patron, but none to God.

Yet we wonder that his divine hand fails to give us some things for which we

wish, though we deny him credit for what he has given in the past. What else are

we doing, when we ascribe the good things he gives us to the blind workings of

chance, the ability of our leaders, or any other minor agencies? Following such

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arguments we ought to thank the earth for our yearly harvests, the vineyards for

the vintage, the sea for hauls of fish, the forests for the wood we cut, the

sheep for our clothing, and other beasts for the meat with which we are filled.

What sense is there in our willingness to be grateful to God for his other gifts

when we deny him gratitude for his greatest benefits? What man of our condition

would be satisfied to have another thank him for some minor favor if he had

denied him credit for his greatest gifts? So though we cannot thank God

worthily, we shall fall far short of what is due him if we are grateful to him

only for the means of daily life, and withhold from him our gratitude for

helping us in time of trouble, freeing us in the midst of dangers and preserving

us by his constant protection when we are placed in the midst of barbarous

nations.

Not so do the Goths or the Vandals regard him, being better in this respect

than ourselves, though trained by heretical teachers. However, I have grounds to

suspect that certain men are offended by what I say. Since the truth must

outweigh the fear of giving offence I shall say it nevertheless, and say it

repeatedly: not so do the Goths or the Vandals act, for when they are in danger

they beg help of God and they call their prosperity the gift of his divine love.

In fact our misfortune in the last war furnished proof of this difference

between us. For the Goths through fear put their hope in God, and we through

presumption put ours in the Huns. The Goths sought peace and we denied it; they

sent bishops to make terms and we rejected them; they honored God even in the

person of alien priests and we despised him in our own. Was not the outcome of

these events consonant with the actions of each side? To them in the depths of

fear was given the palm of victory; to us in the height of confidence was given

confusion, so that the words of our Lord were clearly exemplified in us and in

them: "For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased, and he that

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humbleth himself shall be exalted."

To them

was given exaltation for their humility and to us humiliation for our pride.

10.

This the general of

our forces learned when he entered as a captive the same city of the enemy that

he had boasted he would enter that same day as victor.

He proved indeed the words of the prophet: "For a man's way is not his own,

nor is it in his own power to walk and direct his steps.''

Since he thought his actions were under his own control, he could neither direct

his steps nor find the way of safety. So we read: "He poureth contempt upon

the prince and causeth him to wander in the wilderness where there is no way. .

. . He has been brought to nothing, even as the waters which run

continually."

In him, indeed, in addition

to his actual misfortune, the present judgment of God was clearly shown. He has

endured all the sufferings that he had boasted he would inflict on others.

Because he trusted that the enemy could be taken without God's aid and consent,

he has himself been captured; he claimed foreknowledge and wisdom and has met

with disgrace for his presumption; he himself has worn the chains he prepared

for others.

What clearer proof, I ask, could there have been of the judgment of God, than

that the general who boasted of plundering should be counted as booty; that he

who counted his triumph already won should be led in another's triumph ---- be

surrounded, seized, and bound, his arms twisted behind his back; that he should

see those hands tied whose prowess he vaunted; that he should become a spectacle

for women and children, see barbarians making sport of him, endure the derision

of both sexes, and though he had

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the greatest pride in his bravery, meet a coward's death? Would that this might

have been a speedy cure for his wrongdoing, without longer suffering! But, as

befits the greatness of his punishment, wasted by the days of his captivity and

by the prolonged anguish of a barbarian prison,

he was reduced to such misery that he roused the pity of the enemy, and this

most men think harder and more bitter to bear than the imprisonment itself. Why

did these things happen? Surely because, as I have already indicated, the enemy

were humble before God, whereas we were rebellious; they believed the victory

lay in his hand, we that it lay in our own ---- a sacrilegious and wicked

conception that makes our sin so much the worse and more injurious to us.

Lastly, we learn from an authentic report that the king of the enemy

himself lay on haircloth and prayed up to the very day of the conflict; when

battle was imminent he lay in prayer, and rose only to fight. Before he assumed

command in the battle he fought in prayer, and so went forth to the fight with

confidence in a victory already earned by his prayers.

11.

Moreover, the

experience of the Vandals was not dissimilar: when our people went against them

in Spain and had as much confidence in a complete victory as they had recently

against the Goths, the same overweening pride engulfed them in the same

disastrous ruin.

Then the words of the prophet

were fulfilled for our army: "The Lord shall reject thy confidence and thou

shalt not prosper in it."

For we trusted in our own wisdom and strength against the

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command of the Lord, who said: "Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom,

neither the mighty man in his might, but let him that glorieth glory in this,

that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord."

So we have not been conquered undeservedly, for the enemy sought better aid

than we did. While we prided ourselves on arms and auxiliaries, on the side of

the enemy the Book of the Divine Law opposed us. To its help most of all the

fear and terror of the Vandals then resorted, to oppose to us the Divine Word

and to open up to those who came against them in rivalry the writings of the

Sacred Book which may be called the very voice of God. At this point I ask: who

of our number ever did this, or who would not have been derided if he had

thought it should be done? He would have been scorned indeed, as almost all

religious acts are derided among us. Then what value can our claim to a

religious title have for us, what use is it to say we are catholic, to boast

that we possess the true faith, to despise the Goths and Vandals, reviling them

as heretics, when we are living in a truly heretical depravity? The words of the

Divine Scripture addressed to the Jews who trusted in the law are most fittingly

applied to us: "How do you say, 'We are wise and the law of the Lord is

with us?' . . . Trust ye not in lying words, saying, 'The temple of the Lord,

the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, are these.' For if ye thoroughly

amend your ways and your doings; if ye oppress not the stranger and the

fatherless and the widow and shed not innocent blood in this place, then will I

cause you to dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers for

ever and ever.''

By this surely it is shown that

if we do not amend our ways, it is useless for us to vaunt our claims to

Catholicism.

Enough of this has been said already, and more must perhaps be said later,

though there seems little need to discuss the point

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further, since the judgment of God is constantly manifested. Recent history

shows his verdict both upon us and upon the Goths and Vandals; they increase

daily while we diminish; they gain in power while we are humbled; they flourish

and we wither away. So the words of the Holy Scriptures concerning Saul and

David may be truly spoken of us also: ''David waxed stronger and stronger, and

the house of Saul waxed weaker and weaker."

For the Lord is righteous, as the prophet says: "He is righteous and his

judgments are upright."

12.

We are judged by

the ever-present judgment of God, and thus a most slothful race has been aroused

to accomplish our destruction and shame. They go from place to place, from city

to city, and destroy everything. First they poured out from their native land

into Germany, which lay nearest them, a country called barbarous, but under

Roman control. After its destruction, the country of the Belgae burst into

flames, then the rich estates of the luxurious Aquitanians, and after these the

whole body of the Gallic provinces. This ruin spread gradually, however, in

order that while one part was being visited with destruction, another might be

reformed by its example.

But when has there been

any amendment among us, or what part of the Roman world, whatever its

affliction, is corrected by it? As we read: "They are all gone out of the

way, they are altogether become useless."

And in like manner the prophet cried out to the Lord, saying: "Thou hast

stricken them but they have not grieved; thou hast consumed them, but they have

refused to receive correction; they have made their faces harder than a rock;

they have refused to return.''

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How truly this applies to us the present situation shows. Gaul long endured

devastation; did Spain, her near neighbor, mend her ways? Not undeservedly,

since they showed no fear whatever, and no reform, the people of Spain began to

catch fire from the flames by which the Gauls were consumed.

The worst and most evil aspect of all this is, as I have said before, that the

fires which, to speak figuratively, consumed the bodies of these sinful men, did

not burn away their vices.

Thus God has been compelled by our crimes to scatter the enemy's forces as a

scourge for our sins, from place to place, from city to city, and to send

nations aroused almost from the very ends of the earth even across the sea, to

punish the crimes of our people in Africa. Why was this? Having been led forth

from their own country, could the Vandals not have remained within the Gallic

states? Could fear have prevented these tribes from abiding there, who had

already devastated all the land without injury from us? But suppose they had

cause for alarm in Gaul, why should they have feared to settle and stay in

Spain, where they had completely crushed our armies in battle, where they were

already triumphantly victorious, having reached such a height of valor as to

learn that after trial in a war long anticipated, the strength of the Roman

state, even with barbarian reinforcements, could not equal theirs?

13.

They could have

stayed there, then, and were not afraid, but surely the heavenly hand that had

dragged them thither to punish the vices of the Spanish compelled them also to

cross the straits to devastate Africa. In fact, they themselves confessed that

they did not act of their own volition, for they were driven and urged on by a

divine command. From this we may learn how great are our misdoings, since to

destroy and punish us the barbarians are compelled

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to move against their will, following the words of the devastator of the land of

Israel, the king of the Assyrians, when he said: '' And now without the will of

the Lord am I come up against this land? The Lord said unto me, 'Go up against

this land, to destroy it.' "

And elsewhere

the Sacred Word says: "Therefore thus saith the Lord of Hosts, the God of

Israel: 'Behold, I will send and take Nabuchodonosor

the king of Babylon, my servant, and when he cometh, he shall smite the land of

Egypt.' "

From this we may know that all things which are afflicted are indeed smitten

by the judgment of God; their overthrow, however, as I have often remarked, is

due to sin. So whatever is done on account of sin is not to be ascribed to God,

since a deed is rightly ascribed to that cause which has made it unavoidable.

For example, a murderer sentenced to death by the judge is actually punished by

his own crime; a thief or a man who has committed sacrilege is consumed not by

the flames that burn his body, but by his own sin. Whence we see that the

Vandals did not cross to Africa because of God's severity but because of the

sins of the Romans in that country. By their grave and long continued iniquity

these people were forcing the Vandals to come before they actually left their

native land. Therefore we must understand that only God's mercy postponed the

punishment so long due, and their misdeeds and crimes at length brought upon

these sinful people the chastisement they deserved. Or are we to believe that

they did not deserve their fate? Have any people better deserved ruin than

these, in whom all sorts of shameful and indecent lust have flourished at once?

For the rest of the world, though bound by some disgraceful vices, has some

virtue still remaining: men who are subject to drunkenness are free from

malevolence; those who live in a fever of lust do not suffer from raging greed;

finally, many who are

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accused of

physical incontinence are commended by the simplicity of their minds. But among

the people of Africa, with few exceptions, you will find none with an equal

measure of good and evil, for almost the whole population is evil. So the purity

of their original nature has been shut out and their vices have, as it were,

created a new character among them.

14.

Indeed, aside from

a very few servants of God, what was the whole territory of Africa but one house

of vice, like that bronze vessel of which the prophet said: "Woe to the

bloody city! to the bronze vessel whose scum is therein, and whose scum hath not

gone out from it, because the blood shall not go out from it!"

He compared the city, as we see, to a bronze vessel and its iniquity to blood,

that we might know that the iniquity of the people in a city is like blood

seething in a brazen pot. And again, not unlike this is another saying of the

Sacred Word: "The houses of Israel have all been made a mixture before me

of brass and iron and tin and lead, in the midst is silver mixed with the mass.

Therefore say this; thus saith the Lord God: 'Inasmuch as ye are all made one

mass I shall blow upon you and melt you in the fires of my wrath.' "

How are the very dissimilar metals that the Scriptures have named melted

together in one furnace? Surely in the diversity of metals the unlike qualities

of men are figured. Thus even silver, that is, metal of the nobler sort, is cast

in the same fires as the rest because men have debased the gifts of their nobler

natures by their degenerate lives. Even so we read that the Lord spoke also of

the king of Tyre through his prophet: ''Son of man, take up a lamentation upon

the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, 'Thus saith the Lord God: thou hast been

the seal of likeness, and a crown of beauty in the delights of paradise

;

every

precious stone was thy covering, the sardius and topaz and emerald.' "

Again he says:

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''With silver and

with gold hast thou filled thy treasuries, from the multitude of commerce hast

thou filled thy storehouses."

Do not all

these things seem to have been said expressly of the people of Africa? Where are

greater treasuries, where is greater commerce, where are fuller storehouses?

"With gold," he says, "hast thou filled thy treasuries from the

multitude of thy commerce." I add more: Africa was once so rich that the

abundance of her commerce seems to have filled not only her own treasuries but

those of the whole world as well.

What did the prophet say next? '' Thine heart was lifted up because of thy

beauty, because of the multitude of thine iniquities have I cast thee to the

ground."

How does this apply to the power

of Africa, and how does that land seem to have been laid prostrate on the

ground? How except that when she lost the height of her former power, she also

lost her almost celestial honor? "And I shall bring forth," said the

prophet, "a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee." '

What could be truer than this? The fire of sin went forth from the midst of

their iniquity, and devoured the happiness of former times. "And all they

that know thee among the people shall be sore afflicted over thee."

We might think that this phrase did not apply to them, were it not that the

destruction of Africa is the sorrow of the human race. "Thou art become

destruction," said the prophet, "and never shalt thou be any

more."

It is only too well known that

everything in that province has been completely destroyed; all that we can do is

to prevent those evils which are now being punished from being continued

forever.

15.

May God in his

merciful kindness not permit this! Indeed, as far us the deserts of our crimes

are concerned, there is no reason

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why he should not. What misdeeds are not constantly committed there? I shall not

speak of them all, for their enormity is such that they cannot be known or

discussed. I shall talk chiefly of the obscene nature of their indecencies, and,

which is more serious still, of their acts of sacrilege. I pass over their

insane greed, a vice shared by the whole human race; I pass over their inhuman

avarice, an evil characteristic of most of the Romans; let their drunkenness be

left unmentioned, since it is common to noble and base alike; let swelling pride

be omitted, for this is so particularly the province of the rich, that they

would perhaps think they were losing something of their just due if anyone else

wished to claim any share in it. Finally, let almost all the wickedness

involving frauds, forgeries and perjuries be passed over, for no Roman city was

ever free from these evils. Yet this crime was the especial prerogative of all

the people of Africa. For just as the filth of a boat is washed down into the

bilge water in its depths, so vices seem to have flowed into their habits from

the whole world. I know of no wickedness that did not abound there, whereas even

pagan and barbarous nations, though they have evil ways especially

characteristic of their own races, still do not merit reproach in all things.

The race of the Goths is treacherous but chaste, the Alans unchaste but not

treacherous; the Franks are deceitful but hospitable, the Saxons savage in their

cruelty but admirable for their chastity; to conclude, all races have their own

peculiar vices accompanied by their own good qualities. But among the people of

Africa practically without exception there is nothing but evil. If inhumanity is

the subject of our accusation they are inhuman; if drunkenness, they are

drunken; if falsehood, they are most false; if deceit,, they are unexcelled in

deceitfulness; if greed, they are surpassingly greedy; if perfidy, theirs is

unequalled. Their impurity and blasphemy must not be confused with these other

sins, since in the evils of which I have spoken above they have surpassed the

vices of other nations, but in these they have outdone their own.

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16.

To speak first of

their impurity ---- who does not know that all Africa has always flamed with the

torches of obscenity, so that you would think it not a land and abiding place of

men, but an Aetna of unclean fires? As Aetna has always seethed with certain

inner flames of heat implanted in it by nature, so also has Africa with the

abominable fires of fornication. I do not wish you to believe my words alone in

this matter, but to seek the corroboration of the whole human race. Who can fail

to recognize that all the people of Africa are unchaste unless they happen to

have been converted to God, and changed by their religious faith? This however

is as rare and strange as to see a Gaius who is not a Gaius or a Seius who is

not a Seius.

It is as unusual and rare for an

African not to be unchaste as for him not to be an African.

So general is the vice of impurity among them that whoever ceases to be

indecent seems to be no longer an African. I shall not discuss the individual

cities nor mention all the different localities, for fear of seeming to search

out examples too curiously. I shall content myself with one city instead, the

chief of all the cities of that land, and in a way the mother of them all, the

eternal rival of Rome's citadel, of old in arms and courage, afterwards in

splendor and dignity. It is Carthage of which I speak, the greatest rival of the

city of Rome, and a sort of Rome in the African world; she alone suffices as an

example and witness of my words, since she has contained within herself all the

resources and governance of statecraft in the world.

There you would find all the appurtenances of the public offices, schools of

the liberal arts, the studies of the philosophers, training schools in languages

and ethics; there also were military forces and the powers that control the

army, there was the office of the

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proconsul, there the daily judge and ruler of the province ---- in name, indeed,

proconsul, but in power a very consul; there lastly were the administrators of

the state properties, their honors differing

from one another in rank

and name ---- procurators, as I may call them, of the public streets and

crossroads ---- governing all the wards of the city and all sections of the

people. With this one city we may well be content as an example of the others,

and as evidence of their condition, so that having seen the character of the

city where the officials have always been of the highest grade, we may infer

what those towns were like that had the supervision of less honored men.

At this point I almost repent of my promise made above, to omit almost all

the vices of the people of this province and to speak chiefly of their

obscenities and blasphemies. For I see the city overflowing with vice, boiling

over with every sort of iniquity ----full indeed of people, but even fuller of

dishonor, full of riches but fuller still of vice; men striving to outdo one

another in depravity and lust, some vying with their mates in rapacity, others

in indecency. Some are languid with wine, others distended with feasting-, some

garlanded with flowers, others smeared with unguents, all wasted by various

forms of dissipation, but sunk in the same mortal error. Not all, indeed, were

intoxicated with winebibbing-, but all were drunk with their sins.

You would judge such a people lacking in sanity, not in full possession of

their senses, steady neither in mind nor in gait, attacking each other in a mob

like drunken men. Now we must consider also another charge of a serious kind,

unlike this in its nature but not unlike it in gravity, unless its greatness

sets it in a different class. I mean the proscriptions of orphans, the

afflictions of widows and the crucifixion of the poor. All these made their moan

daily to God, and prayed for an end of their sufferings. Nay, what is worse,

they were sometimes driven by their bitter woes even to pray for the arrival of

the enemy. These have now at last obtained from

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God the privilege of enduring with the rest such ruin from the barbarians as

they formerly suffered alone from the Romans!

17.

But let us pass

over these matters, for they may be paralleled in practically every part of the

Roman world, and I promised to mention them only briefly. As to the unchastity

and impurity which I have been discussing, would these not have been sufficient

of themselves to destroy Africa? What part of the state was not full of

indecency, what street or bypath was not a place of shame? Lust had so cut off

most of the crossroads and streets with its snares, and entangled them with its

nets, that even those who utterly abhorred such vices could scarcely avoid them.

You might compare them to brigands lurking in ambush and snatching their spoils

from passers-by; they so hedged in the paths, the winding roads and byways with

their close-set traps, that scarcely anyone could be cautious enough not to fall

into some of their treacherous snares, however many he escaped. All the citizens

reeked, if I may use the expression, with the stench of lust, all inhaled the

fetid odors of their mutual impurity. Yet this horrid condition inspired no

loathing in them, for the same plague had infected them all. You would think the

city a sinkpot of lust and fornication, like the muck collected from the

offscourings of all the streets and sewers. What hope could there be in such a

place, where, except for the temple of the Lord, there was nothing to be seen

but filth?

Yet why should I except the temple of God? The church was, to be sure,

completely under the care of the priests and clergy, whom I prefer not to

discuss. I am bound by reverence for my Lord's ministry, and think that those

men who served at the altars alone preserved their purity, as we read that Lot

stood alone on the mountain when the people of Sodom perished. As for the

people, however, who among such countless numbers was chaste? Chaste, did I say?

Who was not guilty of fornication, or adultery, and that too without ceasing?

Therefore must I cry out again ---- what hope could there be in that people? One

adulterer sometimes

|213

pollutes a

whole church congregation, but there you could scarcely find one chaste man

among thousands, if you searched most diligently, even in the church.

I have much more than this to say. Would that what I have said included the

whole accusation, and that these men in their indecency had been content to

satisfy their lust with fornication of fallen women only! Their fault was still

more serious and wicked than this, for nearly all the vices of which the blessed

apostle Paul complained so bitterly existed in Africa. "The men leaving the

natural use of women burned in their lust toward one another; men with men

working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of

their error which was meet. And even as they did not like to retain God in their

knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are

not convenient."

Was it not of barbarous

and savage races that the blessed apostle spoke? Nay verily, but of us, that is,

expressly of the Romans, whom indeed the people of Africa, since they were not

able of old to overcome them in power and might, have now outdone in the only

way left to them, to wit, in lust. Whoever thinks he has a right to be angry at

my words should rather be incensed at the apostle, for what I have said of the

character of the inhabitants of Africa, he once said of their masters, the

Romans.

18.

Perhaps the vices

of which I spoke were hidden, or the men in charge of the public morals in

different places took care that the diffusion of such crimes should not sully

the eyes of the people. If this had been done, however many had been defiled by

the actions themselves, all would not have been injured by the sight and thought

of them. However disgraceful a vice is, it does not as a rule deserve full

credence when it is committed secretly. But to commit the greatest sins and feel

no shame for what one has done, demands censure passing that of the sins

themselves. What more prodigious wrong could have been performed there? In a

|214

Christian city, in a church which the apostles founded by their teachings,

which martyrs had crowned by their passion, men took upon themselves the

functions of women, without any shame to cloak their action, without the shield

of modesty; as if their sin would be too slight if only the authors of these

evils were stained by them, through the public knowledge of their vice it became

the wrong-doing of the whole city. The entire city saw this and suffered it, the

judges saw and condoned it, the people saw and applauded, and thus when

fellowship in disgraceful lust was spread through the city, the general consent

made it common to all. But, you say, perhaps there was at length an end to the

evil and some emendation of the wrong. Who could believe or even hear calmly

that men converted to a feminine passivity not only their natural functions but

even their looks, their step, their clothing and everything characteristic of

the male sex and appearance? So completely was nature reversed in them that

although nothing should be more shameful to men than to seem to have any

feminine characteristics,

nothing

seemed to certain of these men more disgraceful than to seem in any respect

masculine.

19.

You may argue that

this disgrace was that of a few men only, and what was not perpetrated by the

majority could not injure all. Indeed, I have said before that very often among

the people of God the crime even of one man has been the ruin of many, as the

people were betrayed by the theft of Achar, a pestilence arose from the jealousy

of Saul, and a plague came from the numbering of the people by the blessed

David. For the church of God is like an eye. If even a little mote fall into the

eye, it blinds the whole sight; so, if even a few men in the body of the church

|215

act indecently, it darkens the whole light of the church. Therefore the Savior

called the chief part of the church its eye, saying: ''The light of the body is

the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of

light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness,"

Whence the apostle asked: ''Know ye not that a

little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?"

I should not say, however, that there was in Africa a little of this evil,

but overmuch, not that most of the people there were effeminate, but that the

effeminacy of the few was the corruption of the many. Even if there are few who

live disgracefully there are many who are stained by the filth of the few. As

one harlot makes many commit fornication, so the abominable unions of the

effeminate few infect the vast majority of the people.

Nor do I know which of them are worse in the sight of God, since in the

Sacred Scriptures they are condemned by one and the same decree. "Neither

effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, shall inherit the kingdom of

God,"

said the apostle. This makes it the

more lamentable and deplorable that such a sin should appear to be the

wrongdoing of the whole city, and that the honor of the Roman name should be

branded with the infamy of prodigious wickedness. Men took the garb of women and

made their steps more mincing than women do; they wrought for themselves the

tokens of a monstrous impurity and swathed their heads with the wrappings of

feminine veils. And this they did publicly in a Roman city, the greatest and

most famous city in that region! Was this not a disgrace to the Roman power,

which permitted a most execrable wrong to be openly committed in the very bosom

of the commonwealth? A great and strong power, capable of preventing the

greatest crime, must approve the actions which with full knowledge it suffers to

be committed, for he who has prohibitory power sanctions any action that he does

not prevent.

|216

20.

Once again,

impelled by my grief, I ask those who are angry at my words in what barbarian

nations such things have at any time been done or permitted with general

impunity? Finally, to save the necessity of longer discussion or investigation

of this point, let us compare the actual devastators of Africa with the people

whom they conquered. What actions of this sort have been performed by the

Vandals? Surely barbarians, swollen with pride, puffed up with victory, rendered

lax by the abundance of riches and luxuries, would have been changed by their

unusual good fortune and prosperity, however chaste and continent they had

always been before. They had, as it is written in the Scriptures, entered

"a land flowing with milk and honey,"

a fertile land, so rich in all delicacies as to be almost intoxicating in its

plenty. Under these conditions it would be no cause for surprise that a

barbarous tribe should wax wanton where nature herself seems unrestrained. Who

would doubt that the Vandals, upon entering such a country, would plunge into

all manner of filthy and unclean vice? Or, to speak more moderately, that they

would at least copy the constant behavior of the people of Africa, into whose

province they had come? Indeed, if that were all they did, they would deserve to

be judged most continent and moderate, whom good fortune had not rendered more

corrupt. For how often do you find a wise man whom prosperity does not change,

whose faults do not increase with his fortunes? It is certain that the Vandals

were most temperate, if they, the victors, merely resembled their captive

subjects. In such great abundance of wealth and luxury, however, not one of them

was rendered effeminate. Does that seem a small matter? Certainly the Romans of

noble birth made effeminacy a regular practice. What more have I to add? Not one

of the Vandals was polluted by the incest of the effeminate Romans about him.

Certainly, effeminacy had long been considered by the Romans as a virtue rather

than a vice, and those men thought themselves models

|217

of manly strength who had put others to the basest uses. For this reason the

attendant boys, who once followed the soldiers, were given as a reward for

services well performed on campaign, the privilege of being shamefully used as

women, since they had proved themselves brave men. What a crime was this! Such

were the actions of Romans, and Romans not of the present time; nevertheless

---- not to accuse the men of old ---- they were not the ancient Romans, but

those who had already become corrupt and dissolute, no longer living up to their

former reputation, but resembling Greeks more than Romans. Hence, as I have

often said before, it should cause no surprise that the Roman state is at length

suffering what it has long deserved.

21.

This vice began

among the Romans before Christ's Gospel, but that it did not cease after the

Gospel was preached among them is still more grievous. After recalling this

fact, who can help admiring the Vandals? They entered the wealthiest cities,

where such vices were common, and took over the riches of dissolute men in such

a way that they rejected their corrupting customs and now possess and use those

things that are good, and avoid the degrading influence of those that are evil.

This ought to be enough in their praise even if I add nothing more; for they

have abominated the illicit acts of men. Still more noteworthy is it that they

have also abstained from the corruption of women; they have shrunk from evil

haunts and brothels, they have avoided illicit unions and the company of

harlots. Can it be credible that the Romans permitted these things and

barbarians abhorred them? Is there anything more to be said after this? There is

indeed, and much more. That they have avoided foul actions is the lesser part;

for a man can abhor disgraceful deeds without abolishing them. Their great and

singular merit is that not only do they themselves avoid pollution by this

|218

stain, but they take care that others shall not be polluted. Indeed, a man is in

some sort a guardian of human welfare who not only endeavors to be good himself,

but also strives to bring it about that others may cease to be evil.

What I have said is a great point, surely, great and of preeminent

importance. Who could believe that the Vandals in the Roman cities committed

such sins? Sexual vice has been completely abolished by them. How was it

removed? Not as some crimes are wont to be prohibited by the Romans, who decree

that there shall be no theft, and go on thieving; who decree that there shall be

no adultery, and are first to commit it. Yet I should scarcely say that they

commit theft, for theirs is no mere theft but highway robbery. A judge punishes

a petty theft in another though he is himself a robber: he punishes rapine,

though he is himself guilty of the same crime ; he punishes the cutthroat,

though he himself wields a sword; he punishes those who break down bars and

doors, though he himself destroys cities; he punishes those who burglarize

houses, though he himself robs the provinces. Would that this were true only of

those who are set in positions of power and to whom the very honor conferred on

them gives some right to carry on their robberies; it is worse and more

intolerable that even private citizens do the same, that is, men who have

previously held high office. The honor once given them affords them this much

advantage, that they may keep forever the legal right to plunder. So even when

they have ceased to wield public administrative power, they do not cease to

enjoy the private right of plundering. Thus the power they had as judges is

slighter than that they have as private citizens, for in the former case

successors were sure to be appointed for them, but now they have no successors.

See then how much legal decrees are worth, what profit we gain from the

passage of ordinances which those men most scorn who administer them! The humble

and lowly are forced to obey, the poor are compelled to accede to the orders of

their superiors, and if

|219

they fail

in their obedience, they are punished. The same rule is observed in this case as

in that of the taxes: the poor are the only ones to obey the public decrees, as

they alone pay the taxes. Thus in the laws themselves and in the execution of

justice, injustice is most criminally wrought, since the lesser men are

compelled to observe as sacred the laws that their betters continually trample

under foot as of no importance.

22.

Indignation has led

me to exceed somewhat the appointed order of my discourse; let me now return to

the original topic. I said that the cities of Africa were full of monstrous

vices, and especially the queen and mistress of them all, but that the Vandals

were not polluted. How unlike the Romans: did these barbarians prove themselves,

in cleansing the stains of our disgrace! For they have removed from every part

of Africa the vice of effeminacy, they have even abhorred intercourse with

harlots, and have not only shunned or done away with it for the time being, but

have made it absolutely cease to exist. O kindly Master, O good Savior! How much

the desire of discipline accomplishes with your help, through which the vices of

nature can be changed, as they have been by the Vandals! Let us see how they

have been changed, since it is important to show not only the results of this

action, but also the method by which it was made effective. It is difficult to

have lewdness removed by a word or order, unless it has been done away in fact,

and to have decency required by a command unless it has been enjoined before.

Knowing this to be true, they removed unchastity while preserving the unchaste;

they did not kill the unfortunate women, lest they should stain their prevention

of vice with cruelty, and sin themselves in the very act of destroying the sins

they desired to abolish. But they corrected the erring in such a way that the

change should be a medicine, not a penalty. They ordered and compelled all

prostitutes to marry; they transformed harlots into wives, fulfilling the word

and command of the apostle that every woman should have her husband and every

man his wife,

that

|220

since incontinence cannot be restrained without some permissible indulgence of

the flesh, sexual desire might have this legitimate outlet without sinful lust.

In this, indeed, provision was made not only that women who could not live

without husbands should have them, but also that through their domestic

guardians those who did not know how to protect themselves should be safe. While

the marriage bond constantly bound them, even if the customary unchastity of

their former lives enticed them to sin, their husbands' guardianship should keep

them from going astray. The Vandals also added severe requirements of chastity

to prevent lust, coercing lewdness by the sword with the obvious purpose of

preserving the chastity of both sexes by conjugal affection at home, and the

fear of the laws in public. Thus purity should rest on a double basis of love at

home and fear abroad. Moreover, the laws they possessed were not at all like

those enactments that removed a part of the wickedness without preventing all of

its obscenity, or like those Roman decrees that cut off adulterers from other

men's wives but left them free access to single women, forbidding adultery while

encouraging houses of ill fame.

Those seem to

have feared that men would be too chaste and pure if sexual vice were entirely

forbidden. Not such are those of whom we speak, who have forbidden loose living

as well as adultery, who wish women to be women only to their husbands and men

to exercise their male functions only with their wives; who do not permit sexual

desires to stray beyond the marriage bed, but order their laws after the pattern

of the divine law, so that they think nothing permissible to them in this matter

that God did not wish to permit. So they did not think any man should be given

license by them to do anything that is not permitted to all by the divine power.

23.

I know that what I

say may seem to some intolerable, but

|221

I must treat these matters, in the light of reason, not oil personal prejudices.

Let anyone who is angry at what I say tell me this, has not Socrates always been

considered the wisest of all men, and that too on the testimony of the Delphic

demon, who might be called the prince of philosophers, as he was the prince of

demons? Let us then consider what laws Socrates decreed as to chastity and what

those men of whom we have been speaking have ordained about it.

Socrates said: "Let no man have a wife of his own, for marriage should

be common to all; for so there will be greater harmony among the states, if all

men have intercourse indiscriminately with all women, and all women with all

men, and if all men become husbands of all women, and all women wives of all

men."

Have we ever known any madman, or any

possessed or driven out of his senses by any sort of insanity, say such a thing

as this? You say, O chief of philosophers, that by the terms of this ordinance

all men will be the husbands of all women, and all women the wives of all men,

and all their children the offspring of all parents. But I maintain that no man

would then be any woman's husband, no woman the wife of any man, and no child

the offspring of any parents, for where all is promiscuous and confused, no one

can claim anything as his own. And some men say that it was not sufficient for

the wisest of philosophers to teach others such ideas, but he must needs carry

them out for himself, handing his wife over to another man, as indeed the Roman

Cato, that second Socrates of Italian birth, actually did.

See then the examples given us by the Roman and Attic wisdom; as far as in them

lay, they made all husbands

|222

panders of their wives. Yet Socrates outdid the rest, for he wrote books on the

subject, and handed his shameful ideas down to posterity.

So he had the more reason to glory in his teachings; as far as his principles

were concerned, he made a brothel of the world. He is said to have been unjustly

condemned by the judges. That is true, for it would have been better for the

whole human race to condemn a man for preaching such doctrines. Without doubt it

has condemned him. Since, indeed, as far as this theory goes all have repudiated

his doctrines, all have condemned him not only by the authority of the sentence

passed at his trial, but even more by their choice of a way of life, and rightly

too.

Let us now compare with his statutes those of the men whom God has recently

ordered to rule in Africa. Socrates decreed that no one should have a wife of

his own, they that no one should have one not his own. He wished every woman to

be subject to all men, they that no woman should know any man but her husband.

He wished a mixed and promiscuous generation, they one purely born and

regulated. He ordained that all houses should be of evil reputation, and they

that there should be none such. He tried to build evil resorts in every

dwelling, they removed them even from entire cities. He wished to prostitute all

maidens, they made the prostitutes chaste.

Would that Socrates' error had been his alone, and not that of many, or even

the majority of Romans! These follow Socrates' precepts in this matter even if

they accept his teachings in nothing else, for many men have more than one wife

apiece, and countless women have many husbands each. Are not all our cities full

of dens of vice, and reeking with houses of ill fame? When I said all, I meant

of course the noblest and loftiest, for such is the

|223

prerogative of dignity and honor in our great cities that they excel others as

much in indecency as they do in size.

What hope, I ask you, can there be for the Roman state when barbarians are

more chaste and pure than the Romans? What I say is all too little: what hope of

life or pardon, I ask, can we have in the sight of God when we see chastity in

the barbarians and even so are not willing to be chaste ourselves? Should we not

feel shame and confusion at this? Already among the Goths you will find none

impure except the Romans, none unchaste among the Vandals except the Romans. So

much has the desire for chastity accomplished for the barbarians, so much has

the severity of their moral code gained, that not only are they themselves

chaste, but ---- though it is so new and strange an event as to be almost

incredible ---- they have even made some Romans chaste.

If my human frailty permitted, I should wish to shout beyond my strength, to

make my voice ring through the whole world: Be ashamed, ye Roman people

everywhere, be ashamed of the lives you lead. No cities are free of evil haunts,

no cities anywhere are free from indecency, except those in which barbarians

have begun to live. Do we then wonder that we are wretched who are so impure,

that we are conquered by the enemy who are outdone by them in honor, that they

possess our properties who abjure our wickedness? It is neither the natural

strength of their bodies that makes them conquer nor the weakness of our nature

that makes us subject to defeat. Let no one think or persuade himself otherwise

---- it is our vicious lives alone that have conquered us.

[Footnotes moved to the end]

Since this promise is not carried out,

we have here a clear indication that Salvian's book either was not finished, or

has since been mutilated. The manner of his projected proof of the point raised

may be surmised from his description in Book I. 10 of the virtues of the early

Romans.

One of the best known of ancient

proverbial expressions; cf. Isidore,

Etymologiae

XIV. 6. 40: "the

herb recalled by many writers and poets, which, contracts men's jaws and kills

them while they seem to laugh."

(Luke 6. 25).

The inhabitants of Novem Populana, the

southwestern province of Gaul, between Aquitania and Spain.

(Matthew 11. 28-30).

See Paulinus of Nola

Ep.

33. 3.

The passage was identified by C. Weyman, "Salvianus und Paulinus von

Nola,"

Historisches Jahrbuch

XV (1894), 372-373. This is the only

case in which Salvian gives a clue to the personal identity of the rare

exceptions he makes to the general vice of prominent men; he could scarcely have

chosen a more appropriate one.

(Jeremiah 5. 8).

The chastity of the Germans had long

been a Roman tradition; cf. Tacitus

Germania

19.

It was not until Gaiseric's capture

and sack of Carthage and later of Rome that the Vandals took on in the eyes of

the Romans the character that has since made their name proverbial.

10.

(Ezekiel 39. 24).

11.

(Deuteronomy 28. 49); Ezekiel 26.

11.

12.

Judges 4.

13.

Ibid.

9.53.

14.

1 Kings 20.

15.

(Judges 7. 2).

16.

(Luke 14. 11).

17.

Litorius had been put in command in

Gaul by Aetius. Made overconfident by his success at Narbonne, he undertook in

A.D. 439 to besiege Toulouse, then the Gothic capital, with the aid of Hunnish

auxiliaries, but was defeated and captured.

18.

See (Proverbs 16. 9); 20. 24.

19.

(Psalms 107.40); 58. 7.

20.

Idatius (

Chronicon

A.D. 439)

gives a different version: "He himself was wounded and captured, and after

a few days was put to death." His notorious paganism and dependence on

soothsayers made Litorius a particularly apt contrast to the piety of the

barbarian king.

21.

Theodoric I, king of the Visigoths.

22.

In a.d. 432 when Boniface and

Castinus were conducting the war in Spain against the Vandals with an army

largely Gothic, the jealousy of the two leaders led to a disastrous defeat of

the Romans in battle, when the Vandals had been almost at the point of surrender

due to famine. The defeat ended the Roman rule in Spain.

23.

(Jeremiah 2. 37).

24.

(Jeremiah 9. 23-24).

25.

Ibid.

8.8; 7.4-7.

26.

II Samuel 3. 1.

27.

(Psalms 119. 137).

28.

The

Germany

of this

account was, of course, the Roman military district along the Rhine. The pauses

in the course of the invasion are naturally explained by the custom of the

Germanic tribes of ''following up with the plow their conquests by the sword.''

29.

(Psalms 14. 3) ; 53. 3.

30.

(Jeremiah 5. 3).

31.

Orosius' account of the Vandal

conquest of Spain furnishes a parallel for Salvian's estimate of the barbarians

(

Historia adv. paganos

VII. 40. 10) : "After grave destruction of

property and men, of which they themselves now repent, they drew lots and

distributed the land and still live in possession of it."

32.

(Isaiah 36. 10).

33.

That is, Nebuchadnezzar.

34.

(Jeremiah 25. 8-9); 43. 11.

35.

(Ezekiel 24. 6).

36.

Ibid.

22. 18-20.

37.

Ibid.

28.12-13.

38.

Ibid.

28. 4-5.

39.

Ibid.

28. 17.

40.

Ibid.

28. 18.

41.

Ibid.

28. 19.

42.

Ibid.

28. 19.

43.

Gaius and Seius appear frequently as

the John Doe and Richard Roe of Latin authors. Gaius is most commonly used,

perhaps because of the

Ubi tu Gaius, ego Gaia,

of the marriage ceremony.

In Cod. Just. Titius is used instead of Seius. Tertullian uses Gaius Seius and

Lucius Titius; cf.

Ad nationes

I. 4.

44.

(Romans 1.27-28).

45.

Tertullian, himself a native of

Africa, does not include Carthage in the list of apostolic churches (

Liber de

praescriptionibus

32), but in Salvian's time the orthodox church of Africa

claimed an apostolic origin in their controversy with the Donatists, and it was

natural that Salvian should accept their claim.

46.

See Tertullian

De idololatria

16:

"Finally I find no type of clothing censured by God, save the feminine when

worn by a man."

47.

(Matthew 6. 22-23).

48.

I Corinthians 5. 6.

49.

Ibid.

6.9-10.

50.

(Exodus 13. 5).

51.

That Salvian spoke too soon is

suggested by Procopius

Be Bello Vandalico

II. 6. His description of the

habits of the Vandals ''since the time when they gained possession of

Libya" includes all the luxuries and vices that Salvian thinks they

rejected.

52.

I Corinthians 7. 2.

53.

Note the phrasing in Cod. Theod. IX.

7.1 (a.D. 326): "

. . .

those women, the vileness of whose lives has

proved them unworthy of the protection of the law."

54.

With this chapter compare

Lactantius

hist. div.

III. 21.

55.

The ultimate source of this

passage is of course Plato

Republic

V. 457; it is not clear through what

channel Salvian derived it. He does not appear to have read Greek, and the Latin

of the paragraph does not suggest Cicero's

De re publica

as a direct

source. It was, however, a well-known topic, and may have been the subject of

rhetorical exercises in the schools.

56.

The

locus classicus

for

this is Lucan

Be bello civili

II. 329-333, from which Augustine (

Bon.

coniug.

21) clearly drew his example of the Younger Cato, handing his wife

Marcia to a friend "to fill another's house with sons." See Souter,

Classical

Review,

XIV (1900), 164. This was a popular

exemplum,

especially

among Christian writers, as is shown by H. Kohl,

De scholasticarum

declamationum argumentis ex historia petitis

(Paderborn, 1915), p.

104.

57.

Salvian here confused Socrates with

the "Socratic dialogues" of Plato.

58.

Compare Augustine

Sermo de tempore

barbarico

(Migne, PL, XL, col. 703) : "Neither by the enemy, nor by the

barbarians, but by their own action are all men slain in their souls by seeing,

consenting and not preventing. We have all abided in quiet, and as long as we do

not wish the perverse peace of our state disturbed, we do not receive the true

peace that we deserve. We scorn to preserve the peace of a good life, and so the

peace of our times has come to an end."

This text was transcribed by Roger Pearse, 2005. All material on this page is in the public domain - copy freely.

Greek text is rendered using the Scholars Press SPIonic font, free from

here

Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts

Salvian, On the Government of God (1930) pp.224-231.

Book 8

Book VIII. : That the sins of the Romans are alone responsible for

their ruin

1. The responsibility for Rome's misfortunes.

2. The blasphemies of Africa.

3. Of their injury to God.

4. On persecution.

5. On the recompense due.

[Translated by Eva M. Sanford]

THE EIGHTH BOOK

I think, nay, I am

certain, that the great length of my argument will arouse distaste in many,

especially since it upbraids our vicious lives. For most men wish praise, and no

one enjoys censure. Worse than this, however evil a man is, however profligate,

he would rather be falsely praised than rightly reproved, and prefers to be

deceived by the mockery of false praise than healed by the most salutary

admonitions. Since this is true, what are we to do? Must we accede to the will

of wicked men? Or if they wish even empty praise conferred on them, is it

fitting to proffer silly and meaningless eulogies? Surely we must consider that,

as men of honor should not mock even those who wish to make themselves

ridiculous, so they should not laud in lying phrases those who yearn to be

adorned by praise, however false.

We must not take

into account the preferences of individuals, but rather what is fitting for us

to say, especially since the prophet said: "Woe unto them that put bitter

for sweet and sweet for bitter."

We must by every means hold fast to the truth, so that what a thing is in

fact, it may also be in words, and those that contain sweetness be called sweet,

and those that contain bitterness, bitter. This is the more obligatory in the

present discussion of a sacred matter, when our iniquities are made by many a

cause of wrath against God, and men try to avoid seeming themselves worthy of

|225

accusation by first accusing him. When they blasphemously call him careless and

neglectful of human affairs, and say that he does not govern according to

justice, or even that he does not govern at all, what else are they doing but

accusing God of laziness and abuse and injustice? Alas for the blindness of

human folly! for the madness of insane audacity! It is God, O man, that you call

careless and neglectful. If you injured any freeborn man with such slanders, you

would be accused at law of malicious abuse; if you so attacked any illustrious

or eminent man you would be sentenced in the courts. Such slanders are chiefly

hurled at prodigal wards; it is the special byword for profligate youths, to

call them wastrels and careless and negligent about their property. What

sacrilegious words! what profane impudence! We use such terms of God as we would

not employ of any men except those of the most abandoned sort. Yet this is not

all the abuse given him: as I said before, men even brand him as unjust. If we

claim that we do not deserve our sufferings and are unworthy to endure our

present misfortunes, surely we are calling God, who bids us endure undeserved

evils, unjust. You say, however, that he does not bid, but merely permits us to

endure them. Suppose we grant this point, still I ask how far he is from

ordering what he permits? For he who knows we endure such woes and can prevent

our suffering them, proves beyond a doubt that we ought to endure whatever he

permits. From this it is manifest that his acquiescence is part of his judgment,

and that we are enduring a sentence from heaven. As all things, are subject to

sacred authority and the will of God rules everything, whatever evils and

whatever punishments we bear daily are the censure of his divine hand, which

censure, indeed, we constantly arouse and kindle by our sins. We kindle the fire

of the celestial wrath and arouse the flames by which we are burned, so that the

words of the prophet may rightly be used against us as often as we endure such

ills: "Make your way into the flames of the fire that you have

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kindled.''

From this we see that according to the

sacred sentence each sinner is preparing for himself the suffering that he

endures. None of our misfortunes can be imputed to God; we are the authors of

our own misery. For God is gracious and merciful and, as the Scripture says, he

wishes no one to perish or be injured. So whatever is done against us is done by

our own actions;

there is nothing more cruel to us than ourselves; we, I

say, are torturing ourselves even against God's will.

But, forsooth, I seem to be contradicting myself; whereas I said before that

we are punished by God on account of our sins, now I say that we are punishing

ourselves. Both are true; we are indeed punished by God, but we ourselves force

him to punish us. Inasmuch as we cause our own punishment, who can doubt that we

are chastising ourselves by our crimes? For whoever gives cause for his

punishment chastises himself, according to the saying: "Every one is bound

by the chains of his sins."

If wicked men are

bound by the chains of their sins, every sinner doubtless binds himself when he

sins.

Since I have already

spoken at length of the unchastity of Africa, let me now briefly discuss its

blasphemies, for the paganism of the majority has had no interruption. They have

indeed confined within their own walls their native crime, by which of course I

mean that "Celestial" demon of the Africans,

to which I suppose the pagans of old gave so fair-sounding a title in order that

having no divinity it should at least have a name, and lacking any virtue

derived from actual power should gain honor from its designation. Who among them

has not been initiated into the worship of that idol? Who has not been dedicated

to it by his very family and birth? I am not speaking now of men who are pagans

as much by profession and name as in their way of life, and whose name

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indicates their heathen error. Paganism is certainly more tolerable and less

evil in men avowedly pagan; the more deadly peril lies in the fact that many who

have made their vows to Christ continue to give their real devotion to idols.

For did not those who were called Christians turn from the worship of Christ to

that of the "Celestial deity," or ---- which is far worse ---- worship

her even before they paid their devotions to him? Who among them did not cross

the Lord's threshold redolent of the odor of demoniacal sacrifices and go up to

the altar of Christ reeking with the foulness of very demons, so that it would

be less monstrous not to come at all to the Lord's temple than to come in such a

fashion? For a Christian who does not come to church is guilty of neglect, but

one who comes in such a way is guilty of sacrilege. It is less difficult to

atone for failure to honor God than for direct insult to him. So we see that any

who have acted thus have not given honor to God, but have taken it away from

him. They have even in a way given the attention due to the church of God to an

idol, because that to which priority is accorded gains in honor from that which

is relegated to second place. See then the faith of the Africans, and especially

of the noblest among them! See what their religion and their Christianity have

been! It was in scorn of Christ that men called them Christians. Though the

apostle cries: "Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of devils;

ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table and of the table of devils,"

it was not enough for them to drink the cup of the Lord with the cup of devils,

but they must take the latter first. It was not enough for them to match the

table of devils with the Lord's table, unless they came to the temple of God

fresh from the worship of infamous superstitions and breathed on the holy altars

of Christ the foul miasma of the diabolical spirit itself.

But, you say, they do

not all do these things ---- only the highest and most powerful are guilty of

these wrongs. Suppose

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I agree to

this. Still, since the greater part of a city is made up of the richest and most

powerful households, you see that the whole city was polluted by the

sacrilegious superstition of a few great men. No one indeed can doubt that all

the households are either like the masters who rule them, or worse, and usually

worse! Therefore, since even good masters as a general rule have bad slaves, it

is easy to decide what sort of households all of these were, in which servile

minds, already disposed to evil, were made more vicious by the wickedness of

their masters.

Suppose for the sake of the argument that what we said was true only of all

the most powerful and noble. Were the vices that were common to noble and

ignoble alike less serious? I mean the hatred and abuse of all holy men, for

surely it is a sort of sacrilege to hate those who worship God. Just as the man

who injures our slaves thereby harms us, and the man who flogs another's sons

tortures the father's affection by his children's suffering, so anyone who

injures a servant of God violates the divine majesty, as the Lord said to his

apostle: "He that receiveth you, receiveth me, and he that despiseth you,

despiseth me.''

Our most gracious and loving Lord

shared his honor and disgrace alike with his servants, to the end that no one

who injured a servant of God should think that the man alone was hurt by his

action, since injury to God would undoubtedly be mingled with the harm inflicted

on his followers. Of this God gave us proof, according to his most indulgent

love, in these words: "For he that toucheth you toucheth the pupil of my

eye.''

To express the tenderness of his love he

used the most tender part of the body, that we might clearly understand that God

is injured by a contempt of his saints as slight as the touch required to injure

the eyesight. So the people of Africa injured and hated the servants of God and

God himself in them.

But perhaps the

question will be asked: "In what ways was

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their hatred manifested?'' In the same manner, of course, in which also the

Jews' hatred of Christ was declared when they said to him: ''Thou art a

Samaritan and hast a devil,''

when they mocked and

cursed him, when they breathed into his face and gnashed their teeth over his

head. Whence also the Savior himself says in the Psalms: "All they that saw

me laughed me to scorn; they shot out their lips and shook their heads.''

And elsewhere he says: "They have tempted me and laughed me to scorn, they

gnashed upon me with their teeth."

So is

the hatred of the Africans for the monks ---- that is, for the servants of God

---- proved, because they mocked at and cursed them, because they attacked and

execrated them, because they did practically everything against them that the

wickedness of the Jews contrived against our Savior before they actually shed

his divine blood. But they, you say, did not kill the saints, while we read that

the Jews did.

Whether they killed or not, I do not know; I make no claims of that, but yet

how great a defence is it that the only element of pagan persecution lacking was

the very end of persecution? Let us assume that the saints were not killed

there; what then shall we make of the fact that they are not far from killing

who hate with the desire to kill, especially as the Lord himself says:

''Whosoever hateth his brother without a cause is a murderer?"

Yet it was not without cause that they persecuted the servants of God. For

who can say that it was without a cause, seeing that these men differed from

them in all the characteristics of their life and habits, that in them they saw

nothing that was theirs, since all was God's? The greatest cause of discord is

diversity of interests, because it is nearly or quite impossible that a man

should love in another that with which he himself is at variance. So it was

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not without cause, as I said, that they hated those in whom they saw everything

hostile and inimical to them. For they lived in constant wickedness, but the

saints in constant innocence; they lived in lust, these in chastity; they in

evil dens, these in monasteries; they almost constantly with the devil, and

these incessantly with Christ. It was not without cause that within the cities

of Africa, and especially within the walls of Carthage, a people as unhappy as

they were unfaithful could scarcely look without reviling and curses at a man

pale and in monkish garb, his flowing locks cut even to the shaved skin. And if

ever any servant of God from the monasteries of Egypt or the sacred places of

Jerusalem or the holy and venerable retreats of the desert came to that city in

performance of his sacred mission, as soon as he appeared to the people, he met

with contumely, sacrilege and curses. Nor was this all, he was flayed by the

vile derision of dissolute men and hissing mockery of the coarsest sort; so that

if any man uninformed of these things witnessed the scene, he would not think

that a man was being mocked, but that some strange and unheard-of monster was

being expelled from the city.

Consider the faith of

the Africans and especially the people of Carthage. It was safer for the

apostles of old to enter the cities of the pagans, and those wild and barbarous

assemblies had less hatred of their arrival and presence. The holy vessel of

election, Paul the apostle, spoke of the worship and majesty of one God, and the

people of the Athenians, most superstitious though they were, heard him

patiently.

The Lycaonians also so marvelled at

the apostles that, seeing their divine strength, they thought they were not men.

But in Carthage the servants of God were scarcely allowed to appear in the

streets and public squares without mockery and cursing. Certain men think that

this was not persecution

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because

they were not actually killed. You know that brigands have a proverb that those

they spare owe their lives to them.

But in

Carthage this benefit was due less to the men than to the laws, for the laws of

the Twelve Tables forbade a man to be put to death without a trial. Hence we see

that the power of the Lord's religion was indeed great in a place where his

servants were only permitted to escape death at the hands of Christians because

they were defended by pagan law. Yet we wonder that such Christians are now

suffering at the hands of the barbarians, when they themselves inflicted

barbarous treatment on the saints.

So God is just and his judgments are righteous, for, as the Scripture says:

"What men have sowed, that shall they also reap."

God seems to have referred to the wickedness of the people of Africa, when he

said: "Recompense her according to her work; according to all that she hath

done do unto her; for she hath been proud against the Lord."

Let us

then be surprised and angry that they now

endure some few trials at the hands of men! Their conduct toward God has been

far worse than any treatment they have received, especially if one compares

their sufferings and their misdeeds with due consideration of the distinction

between the persons concerned.

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[Footnotes moved to the end]

Compare Sidonius

Ep.

VIII.

10: "If you had had any consideration for my modesty you would have kept in

mind the saying of Symmachus: 'as true praise adorns, so false praise reproves.'

" The saying is not found in Symmachus' writings, but Gregoire and

Collombet cite it as used by Caesarius of Arles in his 25th homily to the monks

of Lerins, which I have been unable to trace, and by Pope Pelagius I in a letter

to Sapaudus, bishop of Aries, as the saying of a

vir doctissimus.

(Isaiah 5. 20).

Ibid..

50.11.

See (Proverbs 5. 22).

That is, the goddess Tanit, frequently

called

Dea Caelestis

by Latin authors.

(1 Corinthians 10. 21).

(Matthew 10. 40) (Luke 10. 16).

(Zechariah 2. 8).

(John 8. 48).

10.

(Psalms 22. 7).

11.

(Jeremiah 20. 7) (Psalms 35. 16).

12.

(1 John 3.15).

13.

(Acts 17.16-34). One scarcely expects

to find the Athenian Ecclesia cited as an example of a wild and barbarous

assembly.

14.

Acts 14.

15.

See Cicero

Or. Philippica

II.

3. 5.

16.

(Galatians 6. 7).

17.

(Jeremiah 50. 29).

18.

Here Pauly inserted the negative

minime,

for which the MSS give no authority. I have omitted it as unnecessary;

without it the sentence furnishes a characteristic example of Salvian's irony.

See H. K. Messenger,

op. cit.,

sec. 48.

19.

Here ends the text as it is preserved

in the MSS. Whether the succeeding chapters have been lost, or the author left

his work unfinished, cannot now be determined. In view, however, of the many

years between the composition of the book and Salvian's death, the former

alternative seems the more probable.

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Early Church Fathers - Additional Texts