The City of God, Volume I by Saint of Hippo Augustine

This, rather, is the religion worthy of your desires, O admirable Roman race,--the progeny of your Scævolas and Scipios, of Regulus, and of Fabricius. This rather covet, this distinguish from that foul vanity and crafty malice of the devils. If there is in your nature any eminent virtue, only by true piety is it purged and perfected, while by impiety it is wrecked and punished. Choose now what you will pursue, that your praise may be not in yourself, but in the true God, in whom is no error. For of popular glory you have had your share; but by the secret providence of God, the true religion was not offered to your choice. Awake, it is now day; as you have already awaked in the persons of some in whose perfect virtue and sufferings for the true faith we glory: for they, contending on all sides with hostile powers, and conquering them all by bravely dying, have purchased for us this country of ours with their blood; to which country we invite you, and exhort you to add yourselves to the number of the citizens of this city, which also has a sanctuary[113] of its own in the true remission of sins. Do not listen to those degenerate sons of thine who slander Christ and Christians, and impute to them these disastrous times, though they desire times in which they may enjoy rather impunity for their wickedness than a peaceful life. Such has never been Rome's ambition even in regard to her earthly country. Lay hold now on the celestial country, which is easily won, and in which you will reign truly and for ever. For there shalt thou find no vestal fire, no Capitoline stone, but the one true God "No date, no goal will here ordain: But grant an endless, boundless reign."[114] No longer, then, follow after false and deceitful gods; abjure them rather, and despise them, bursting forth into true liberty. Gods they are not, but malignant spirits, to whom your eternal happiness will be a sore punishment. Juno, from whom you deduce your origin according to the flesh, did not so bitterly grudge Rome's citadels to the Trojans, as these devils whom yet ye repute gods, grudge an everlasting seat to the race of mankind. And thou thyself hast in no wavering voice passed judgment on them, when thou didst pacify them with games, and yet didst account as infamous the men by whom the plays were acted. Suffer us, then, to assert thy freedom against the unclean spirits who had imposed on thy neck the yoke of celebrating their own shame and filthiness. The actors of these divine crimes thou hast removed from offices of honour; supplicate the true God, that He may remove from thee those gods who delight in their crimes,--a most disgraceful thing if the crimes are really theirs, and a most malicious invention if the crimes are feigned. Well done, in that thou hast spontaneously banished from the number of your citizens all actors and players. Awake more fully: the majesty of God cannot be propitiated by that which defiles the dignity of man. How, then, can you believe that gods who take pleasure in such lewd plays, belong to the number of the holy powers of heaven, when the men by whom these plays are acted are by yourselves refused admission into the number of Roman citizens even of the lowest grade? Incomparably more glorious than Rome, is that heavenly city in which for victory you have truth; for dignity, holiness; for peace, felicity; for life, eternity. Much less does it admit into its society such gods, if thou dost blush to admit into thine such men. Wherefore, if thou wouldst attain to the blessed city, shun the society of devils. They who are propitiated by deeds of shame, are unworthy of the worship of right-hearted men. Let these, then, be obliterated from your worship by the cleansing of the Christian religion, as those men were blotted from your citizenship by the censor's mark. But, so far as regards carnal benefits, which are the only blessings the wicked desire to enjoy, and carnal miseries, which alone they shrink from enduring, we will show in the following book that the demons have not the power they are supposed to have; and although they had it, we ought rather on that account to despise these blessings, than for the sake of them to worship those gods, and by worshipping them to miss the attainment of these blessings they grudge us. But that they have not even this power which is ascribed to them by those who worship them for the sake of temporal advantages, this, I say, I will prove in the following book; so let us here close the present argument. FOOTNOTES: [81] Ps. xciv. 4. [82] 2 Tim. iii. 7. [83] "Pluvia defit, causa Christiani." Similar accusations and similar replies may be seen in the celebrated passage of Tertullian's _Apol._ c. 40, and in the eloquent exordium of Arnobius, _C. Gentes_. [84] Augustine is supposed to refer to Symmachus, who similarly accused the Christians in his address to the Emperor Valentinianus in the year 384. At Augustine's request, Paulus Orosius wrote his history in confutation of Symmachus' charges. [85] Tertullian (_Apol._ c. 24) mentions Cœlestis as specially worshipped in Africa. Augustine mentions her again in the 26th chapter of this book, and in other parts of his works. [86] Berecynthia is one of the many names of Rhea or Cybele. Livy (xxix. 11) relates that the image of Cybele was brought to Rome the day before the ides of April, which was accordingly dedicated as her feast-day. The image, it seems, had to be washed in the stream Almon, a tributary of the Tiber, before being placed in the temple of Victory; and each year, as the festival returned, the washing was repeated with much pomp at the same spot. Hence Lucan's line (i. 600), 'Et lotam parvo revocant Almone Cybelen,' and the elegant verses of Ovid, _Fast._ iv. 337 et seq. [87] "Fercula," dishes, or courses. [88] See Cicero, _De Nat. Deor._ ii. 24. [89] Prov. vi. 26. [90] Fugalia. Vives is uncertain to what feast Augustine refers. Censorinus understands him to refer to a feast celebrating the expulsion of the kings from Rome. This feast, however (celebrated on the 24th February), was commonly called "Regifugium." [91] Persius, _Sat._ iii. 66-72. [92] See below, books viii.-xii. [93] "Galli," the castrated priests of Cybele, who were named after the river Gallus, in Phrygia, the water of which was supposed to intoxicate or madden those who drank it. According to Vitruvius (viii. 3), there was a similar fountain in Paphlagonia. Apuleius (_Golden Ass_, viii.) gives a graphic and humorous description of the dress, dancing, and imposture of these priests; mentioning, among other things, that they lashed themselves with whips and cut themselves with knives till the ground was wet with blood. [94] Persius, _Sat._ iii. 37. [95] Ter. _Eun._ iii. 5. 36; and cf. the similar allusion in Aristoph. _Clouds_, 1033-4. It may be added that the argument of this chapter was largely used by the wiser of the heathen themselves. Dionysius Hal. (ii. 20) and Seneca (_De Brev. Vit._ c. xvi.) make the very same complaint; and it will be remembered that his adoption of this reasoning was one of the grounds on which Euripides was suspected of atheism. [96] This sentence recalls Augustine's own experience as a boy, which he bewails in his _Confessions_. [97] Labeo, a jurist of the time of Augustus, learned in law and antiquities, and the author of several works much prized by his own and some succeeding ages. The two articles in Smith's Dictionary on Antistius and Cornelius Labeo should be read. [98] "Lectisternia," feasts in which the images of the gods were laid on pillows in the streets, and all kinds of food set before them. [99] According to Livy (vii. 2), theatrical exhibitions were introduced in the year 392 A. U. C. Before that time, he says, there had only been the games of the circus. The Romans sent to Etruria for players, who were called "histriones," "hister" being the Tuscan word for a player. Other particulars are added by Livy. [100] See the _Republic_, book iii. [101] Comp. Tertullian, _De Spectac._ c. 22. [102] The Egyptian gods represented with dogs' heads, called by Lucan (viii. 832) _semicanes deos_. [103] The Fever had, according to Vives, three altars in Rome. See Cicero, _De Nat. Deor._ iii. 25, and Ælian, _Var. Hist._ xii. 11. [104] Cicero, _De Republica_, v. Compare the third _Tusculan Quæst._ c. ii. [105] In the year A.U. 299, three ambassadors were sent from Rome to Athens to copy Solon's laws, and acquire information about the institutions of Greece. On their return the Decemviri were appointed to draw up a code; and finally, after some tragic interruptions, the celebrated Twelve Tables were accepted as the fundamental statutes of Roman law (_fons universi publici privatique juris_). These were graven on brass, and hung up for public information. Livy, iii. 31-34. [106] Possibly he refers to Plautus' _Persa_, iv. 4. 11-14. [107] Sallust, _Cat. Con._ ix. Compare the similar saying of Tacitus regarding the chastity of the Germans: "Plusque ibi boni mores valent, quam alibi bonæ leges" (_Germ._ xix.). [108] The same collocation of words is used by Cicero with reference to the well-known mode of renewing the appetite in use among the Romans. [109] _Æneid_, ii. 351-2. [110] 2 Cor. xi. 14. [111] Cicero, _C. Verrem_, vi. 8. [112] Cicero, _C. Catilinam_, iii. 8. [113] Alluding to the sanctuary given to all who fled to Rome in its early days. [114] Virgil, _Æneid_, i. 278. BOOK THIRD. ARGUMENT. AS IN THE FOREGOING BOOK AUGUSTINE HAS PROVED REGARDING MORAL AND SPIRITUAL CALAMITIES, SO IN THIS BOOK HE PROVES REGARDING EXTERNAL AND BODILY DISASTERS, THAT SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF THE CITY THE ROMANS HAVE BEEN CONTINUALLY SUBJECT TO THEM; AND THAT EVEN WHEN THE FALSE GODS WERE WORSHIPPED WITHOUT A RIVAL, BEFORE THE ADVENT OF CHRIST, THEY AFFORDED NO RELIEF FROM SUCH CALAMITIES.