BOOK SIXTH.

Argument

HITHERTO THE ARGUMENT HAS BEEN CONDUCTED AGAINST THOSE WHO BELIEVE
THAT THE GODS ARE TO BE WORSHIPPED FOR THE SAKE OF TEMPORAL ADVANTAGES,
NOW IT IS DIRECTED AGAINST THOSE WHO BELIEVE THAT THEY
ARE TO BE WORSHIPPED FOR THE SAKE OF ETERNAL LIFE. AUGUSTINE
DEVOTES THE FIVE FOLLOWING BOOKS TO THE CONFUTATION OF THIS LATTER
BELIEF, AND FIRST OF ALL SHOWS HOW MEAN AN OPINION OF THE GODS
WAS HELD BY VARRO HIMSELF, THE MOST ESTEEMED WRITER ON HEATHEN
THEOLOGY. OF THIS THEOLOGY AUGUSTINE ADOPTS VARRO’S DIVISION INTO
THREE KINDS, MYTHICAL, NATURAL, AND CIVIL; AND AT ONCE DEMONSTRATES
THAT NEITHER THE MYTHICAL NOR THE CIVIL CAN CONTRIBUTE
ANYTHING TO THE HAPPINESS OF THE FUTURE LIFE.

PREFACE.

In the five former books, I think I have sufficiently disputed
against those who believe that the many false gods,
which the Christian truth shows to be useless images, or unclean
spirits and pernicious demons, or certainly creatures, not
the Creator, are to be worshipped for the advantage of this
mortal life, and of terrestrial affairs, with that rite and service
which the Greeks call λατρεία, and which is due to the one
true God. And who does not know that, in the face of
excessive stupidity and obstinacy, neither these five nor any
other number of books whatsoever could be enough, when it is
esteemed the glory of vanity to yield to no amount of strength
on the side of truth,—certainly to his destruction over whom
so heinous a vice tyrannizes? For, notwithstanding all the
assiduity of the physician who attempts to effect a cure, the
disease remains unconquered, not through any fault of his, but
because of the incurableness of the sick man. But those who
thoroughly weigh the things which they read, having understood
and considered them, without any, or with no great and
excessive degree of that obstinacy which belongs to a long-cherished
error, will more readily judge that, in the five
books already finished, we have done more than the necessity[Pg 229]
of the question demanded, than that we have given it less
discussion than it required. And they cannot have doubted
but that all the hatred which the ignorant attempt to bring
upon the Christian religion on account of the disasters of this
life, and the destruction and change which befall terrestrial
things, whilst the learned do not merely dissimulate, but encourage
that hatred, contrary to their own consciences, being
possessed by a mad impiety;—they cannot have doubted, I say,
but that this hatred is devoid of right reflection and reason,
and full of most light temerity, and most pernicious animosity.

1. Of those who maintain that they worship the gods not for the sake of
temporal, but eternal advantages.

Now, as, in the next place (as the promised order demands),
those are to be refuted and taught who contend that the gods
of the nations, which the Christian truth destroys, are to be
worshipped not on account of this life, but on account of that
which is to be after death, I shall do well to commence my
disputation with the truthful oracle of the holy psalm, “Blessed
is the man whose hope is the Lord God, and who respecteth
not Vanities and lying follies.”[226] Nevertheless, in all vanities
and lying follies the philosophers are to be listened to with
far more toleration, who have repudiated those opinions and
errors of the people; for the people set up images to the
deities, and either feigned concerning those whom they call
immortal gods many false and unworthy things, or believed
them, already feigned, and, when believed, mixed them up
with their worship and sacred rites.

With those men who, though not by free avowal of their
convictions, do still testify that they disapprove of those things
by their muttering disapprobation during disputations on the
subject, it may not be very far amiss to discuss the following
question: Whether, for the sake of the life which is to be
after death, we ought to worship, not the one God, who made
all creatures spiritual and corporeal, but those many gods who,
as some of these philosophers hold, were made by that one God,
and placed by Him in their respective sublime spheres, and are
therefore considered more excellent and more noble than all the
others?[227] But who will assert that it must be affirmed and[Pg 230]
contended that those gods, certain of whom I have mentioned
in the fourth book,[228] to whom are distributed, each to each, the
charges of minute things, do bestow eternal life? But will those
most skilled and most acute men, who glory in having written
for the great benefit of men, to teach on what account each god
is to be worshipped, and what is to be sought from each, lest
with most disgraceful absurdity, such as a mimic is wont for
the sake of merriment to exhibit, water should be sought from
Liber, wine from the Lymphs,—will those men indeed affirm
to any man supplicating the immortal gods, that when he
shall have asked wine from the Lymphs, and they shall have
answered him, “We have water, seek wine from Liber,” he
may rightly say, “If ye have not wine, at least give me
eternal life?” What more monstrous than this absurdity?
Will not these Lymphs,—for they are wont to be very easily
made laugh,[229]—laughing loudly (if they do not attempt to
deceive like demons), answer the suppliant, “O man, dost
thou think that we have life (vitam) in our power, who thou
hearest have not even the vine (vitem)?” It is therefore most
impudent folly to seek and hope for eternal life from such
gods as are asserted so to preside over the separate minute
concernments of this most sorrowful and short life, and whatever
is useful for supporting and propping it, as that if anything
which is under the care and power of one be sought
from another, it is so incongruous and absurd that it appears
very like to mimic drollery,—which, when it is done by
mimics knowing what they are doing, is deservedly laughed
at in the theatre, but when it is done by foolish persons, who
do not know better, is more deservedly ridiculed in the world.
Wherefore, as concerns those gods which the states have
established, it has been cleverly invented and handed down to
memory by learned men, what god or goddess is to be supplicated
in relation to every particular thing,—what, for
instance, is to be sought from Liber, what from the Lymphs,
what from Vulcan, and so of all the rest, some of whom I
have mentioned in the fourth book, and some I have thought
right to omit. Further, if it is an error to seek wine from
Ceres, bread from Liber, water from Vulcan, fire from the[Pg 231]
Lymphs, how much greater absurdity ought it to be thought,
if supplication be made to any one of these for eternal life?

Wherefore, if, when we were inquiring what gods or goddesses
are to be believed to be able to confer earthly kingdoms
upon men, all things having been discussed, it was shown
to be very far from the truth to think that even terrestrial
kingdoms are established by any of those many false deities,
is it not most insane impiety to believe that eternal life,
which is, without any doubt or comparison, to be preferred
to all terrestrial kingdoms, can be given to any one by any of
these gods? For the reason why such gods seemed to us not
to be able to give even an earthly kingdom, was not because
they are very great and exalted, whilst that is something small
and abject, which they, in their so great sublimity, would
not condescend to care for, but because, however deservedly
any one may, in consideration of human frailty, despise the
falling pinnacles of an earthly kingdom, these gods have presented
such an appearance as to seem most unworthy to have
the granting and preserving of even those entrusted to them;
and consequently, if (as we have taught in the two last books
of our work, where this matter is treated of) no god out of all
that crowd, either belonging to, as it were, the plebeian or to
the noble gods, is fit to give mortal kingdoms to mortals, how
much less is he able to make immortals of mortals?

And more than this, if, according to the opinion of those
with whom we are now arguing, the gods are to be worshipped,
not on account of the present life, but of that which is to be
after death, then, certainly, they are not to be worshipped on
account of those particular things which are distributed and
portioned out (not by any law of rational truth, but by mere
vain conjecture) to the power of such gods, as they believe they
ought to be worshipped, who contend that their worship is necessary
for all the desirable things of this mortal life, against whom
I have disputed sufficiently, as far as I was able, in the five preceding
books. These things being so, if the age itself of those
who worshipped the goddess Juventas should be characterized
by remarkable vigour, whilst her despisers should either die
within the years of youth, or should, during that period, grow
cold as with the torpor of old age; if bearded Fortuna should[Pg 232]
cover the cheeks of her worshippers more handsomely and more
gracefully than all others, whilst we should see those by whom
she was despised either altogether beardless or ill-bearded;
even then we should most rightly say, that thus far these
several gods had power, limited in some way by their functions,
and that, consequently, neither ought eternal life to be sought
from Juventas, who could not give a beard, nor ought any
good thing after this life to be expected from Fortuna Barbata,
who has no power even in this life to give the age itself at
which the beard grows. But now, when their worship is
necessary not even on account of those very things which
they think are subjected to their power,—for many worshippers
of the goddess Juventas have not been at all vigorous at that
age, and many who do not worship her rejoice in youthful
strength; and also many suppliants of Fortuna Barbata have
either not been able to attain to any beard at all, not even an
ugly one, although they who adore her in order to obtain a
beard are ridiculed by her bearded despisers,—is the human
heart really so foolish as to believe that that worship of the
gods, which it acknowledges to be vain and ridiculous with
respect to those very temporal and swiftly passing gifts, over
each of which one of these gods is said to preside, is fruitful
in results with respect to eternal life? And that they are able
to give eternal life has not been affirmed even by those who,
that they might be worshipped by the silly populace, distributed
in minute division among them these temporal
occupations, that none of them might sit idle; for they had
supposed the existence of an exceedingly great number.

2. What we are to believe that Varro thought concerning the gods of the nations,
whose various kinds and sacred rites he has shown to be such that he
would have acted more reverently towards them had he been altogether
silent concerning them.

Who has investigated those things more carefully than
Marcus Varro? Who has discovered them more learnedly?
Who has considered them more attentively? Who has distinguished
them more acutely? Who has written about them
more diligently and more fully?—who, though he is less
pleasing in his eloquence, is nevertheless so full of instruction
and wisdom, that in all the erudition which we call[Pg 233]
secular, but they liberal, he will teach the student of things
as much as Cicero delights the student of words. And even
Tully himself renders him such testimony, as to say in his
Academic books that he had held that disputation which is
there carried on with Marcus Varro, “a man,” he adds, “unquestionably
the acutest of all men, and, without any doubt,
the most learned.”[230] He does not say the most eloquent or
the most fluent, for in reality he was very deficient in this
faculty, but he says, “of all men the most acute.” And
in those books,—that is, the Academic,—where he contends
that all things are to be doubted, he adds of him,
“without any doubt the most learned.” In truth, he was so
certain concerning this thing, that he laid aside that doubt
which he is wont to have recourse to in all things, as if,
when about to dispute in favour of the doubt of the Academics,
he had, with respect to this one thing, forgotten
that he was an Academic. But in the first book, when he
extols the literary works of the same Varro, he says, “Us
straying and wandering in our own city like strangers, thy
books, as it were, brought home, that at length we might
come to know of who we were and where we were. Thou
hast opened up to us the age of the country, the distribution
of seasons, the laws of sacred things, and of the priests; thou
hast opened up to us domestic and public discipline; thou
hast pointed out to us the proper places for religious ceremonies,
and hast informed us concerning sacred places. Thou
hast shown us the names, kinds, offices, causes of all divine
and human things.”[231]

This man, then, of so distinguished and excellent acquirements,
and, as Terentian briefly says of him in a most elegant
verse,

“Varro, a man universally informed,”[232]

who read so much that we wonder when he had time to write,
wrote so much that we can scarcely believe any one could have
read it all,—this man, I say, so great in talent, so great in[Pg 234]
learning, had he been an opposer and destroyer of the so-called
divine things of which he wrote, and had he said that they
pertained to superstition rather than to religion, might perhaps,
even in that case, not have written so many things
which are ridiculous, contemptible, detestable. But when he
so worshipped these same gods, and so vindicated their
worship, as to say, in that same literary work of his, that
he was afraid lest they should perish, not by an assault
by enemies, but by the negligence of the citizens, and that
from this ignominy they are being delivered by him, and are
being laid up and preserved in the memory of the good by
means of such books, with a zeal far more beneficial than that
through which Metellus is declared to have rescued the sacred
things of Vesta from the flames, and Æneas to have rescued
the Penates from the burning of Troy; and when he, nevertheless,
gives forth such things to be read by succeeding ages
as are deservedly judged by wise and unwise to be unfit to
be read, and to be most hostile to the truth of religion; what
ought we to think but that a most acute and learned man,—not,
however, made free by the Holy Spirit,—was overpowered
by the custom and laws of his state, and, not being able to be
silent about those things by which he was influenced, spoke
of them under pretence of commending religion?

3. Varro’s distribution of his book which he composed concerning the antiquities
of human and divine things.

He wrote forty-one books of antiquities. These he divided
into human and divine things. Twenty-five he devoted to
human things, sixteen to divine things; following this plan in
that division,—namely, to give six books to each of the four
divisions of human things. For he directs his attention to
these considerations: who perform, where they perform, when
they perform, what they perform. Therefore in the first six
books he wrote concerning men; in the second six, concerning
places; in the third six, concerning times; in the fourth and
last six, concerning things. Four times six, however, make
only twenty-four. But he placed at the head of them one
separate work, which spoke of all these things conjointly.

In divine things, the same order he preserved throughout,
as far as concerns those things which are performed to the[Pg 235]
gods. For sacred things are performed by men in places and
times. These four things I have mentioned he embraced in
twelve books, allotting three to each. For he wrote the first
three concerning men, the following three concerning places,
the third three concerning times, and the fourth three concerning
sacred rites,—showing who should perform, where they
should perform, when they should perform, what they should
perform, with most subtle distinction. But because it was
necessary to say—and that especially was expected—to whom
they should perform sacred rites, he wrote concerning the gods
themselves the last three books; and these five times three
made fifteen. But they are in all, as we have said, sixteen.
For he put also at the beginning of these one distinct book,
speaking by way of introduction of all which follows; which
being finished, he proceeded to subdivide the first three in
that fivefold distribution which pertain to men, making the
first concerning high priests, the second concerning augurs,
the third concerning the fifteen men presiding over the sacred
ceremonies.[233] The second three he made concerning places,
speaking in one of them concerning their chapels, in the
second concerning their temples, and in the third concerning
religious places. The next three which follow these, and pertain
to times,—that is, to festival days,—he distributed so as
to make one concerning holidays, the other concerning the
circus games, and the third concerning scenic plays. Of the
fourth three, pertaining to sacred things, he devoted one to
consecrations, another to private, the last to public, sacred
rites. In the three which remain, the gods themselves follow
this pompous train, as it were, for whom all this culture has
been expended. In the first book are the certain gods, in the
second the uncertain, in the third, and last of all, the chief
and select gods.

4. That from the disputation of Varro, it follows that the worshippers of the
gods regard human things as more ancient than divine things.

In this whole series of most beautiful and most subtle distributions[Pg 236]
and distinctions, it will most easily appear evident
from the things we have said already, and from what is to be
said hereafter, to any man who is not, in the obstinacy of his
heart, an enemy to himself, that it is vain to seek and to hope
for, and even most impudent to wish for eternal life. For
these institutions are either the work of men, or of demons,—not
of those whom they call good demons, but, to speak more
plainly, of unclean, and, without controversy, malign spirits,
who with wonderful slyness and secretness suggest to the
thoughts of the impious, and sometimes openly present to
their understandings, noxious opinions, by which the human
mind grows more and more foolish, and becomes unable to
adapt itself to and abide in the immutable and eternal truth,
and seek to confirm these opinions by every kind of fallacious
attestation in their power. This very same Varro testifies
that he wrote first concerning human things, but afterwards
concerning divine things, because the states existed first, and
afterward these things were instituted by them. But the
true religion was not instituted by any earthly state, but
plainly it established the celestial city. It, however, is
inspired and taught by the true God, the giver of eternal life
to His true worshippers.

The following is the reason Varro gives when he confesses
that he had written first concerning human things, and afterwards
of divine things, because these divine things were instituted
by men:—”As the painter is before the painted
tablet, the mason before the edifice, so states are before those
things which are instituted by states.” But he says that he
would have written first concerning the gods, afterwards concerning
men, if he had been writing concerning the whole
nature of the gods,—as if he were really writing concerning
some portion of, and not all, the nature of the gods; or as if,
indeed, some portion of, though not all, the nature of the gods
ought not to be put before that of men. How, then, comes it
that in those three last books, when he is diligently explaining
the certain, uncertain, and select gods, he seems to pass
over no portion of the nature of the gods? Why, then, does
he say, “If we had been writing on the whole nature of the
gods, we would first have finished the divine things before we[Pg 237]
touched the human?” For he either writes concerning the
whole nature of the gods, or concerning some portion of it,
or concerning no part of it at all. If concerning it all, it is
certainly to be put before human things; if concerning some
part of it, why should it not, from the very nature of the case,
precede human things? Is not even some part of the gods
to be preferred to the whole of humanity? But if it is too
much to prefer a part of the divine to all human things, that
part is certainly worthy to be preferred to the Romans at
least. For he writes the books concerning human things, not
with reference to the whole world, but only to Rome; which
books he says he had properly placed, in the order of writing,
before the books on divine things, like a painter before the
painted tablet, or a mason before the building, most openly
confessing that, as a picture or a structure, even these divine
things were instituted by men. There remains only the third
supposition, that he is to be understood to have written concerning
no divine nature, but that he did not wish to say
this openly, but left it to the intelligent to infer; for when
one says “not all,” usage understands that to mean “some,”
but it may be understood as meaning none, because that which
is none is neither all nor some. In fact, as he himself says,
if he had been writing concerning all the nature of the gods,
its due place would have been before human things in the
order of writing. But, as the truth declares, even though
Varro is silent, the divine nature should have taken precedence
of Roman things, though it were not all, but only some. But
it is properly put after, therefore it is none. His arrangement,
therefore, was due, not to a desire to give human things priority
to divine things, but to his unwillingness to prefer false things
to true. For in what he wrote on human things, he followed
the history of affairs; but in what he wrote concerning those
things which they call divine, what else did he follow but
mere conjectures about vain things? This, doubtless, is what,
in a subtle manner, he wished to signify; not only writing
concerning divine things after the human, but even giving
a reason why he did so; for if he had suppressed this, some,
perchance, would have defended his doing so in one way, and
some in another. But in that very reason he has rendered,[Pg 238]
he has left nothing for men to conjecture at will, and has sufficiently
proved that he preferred men to the institutions of
men, not the nature of men to the nature of the gods. Thus
he confessed that, in writing the books concerning divine
things, he did not write concerning the truth which belongs
to nature, but the falseness which belongs to error; which
he has elsewhere expressed more openly (as I have mentioned
in the fourth book[234]), saying that, had he been founding a new
city himself, he would have written according to the order of
nature; but as he had only found an old one, he could not
but follow its custom.

5. Concerning the three kinds of theology according to Varro, namely, one
fabulous, the other natural, the third civil.

Now what are we to say of this proposition of his, namely,
that there are three kinds of theology, that is, of the account
which is given of the gods; and of these, the one is called
mythical, the other physical, and the third civil? Did the
Latin usage permit, we should call the kind which he has
placed first in order fabular,[235] but let us call it fabulous,[236] for
mythical is derived from the Greek μῦθος, a fable; but that
the second should be called natural, the usage of speech now
admits; the third he himself has designated in Latin, calling
it civil.[237] Then he says, “they call that kind mythical which
the poets chiefly use; physical, that which the philosophers
use; civil, that which the people use. As to the first I have
mentioned,” says he, “in it are many fictions, which are contrary
to the dignity and nature of the immortals. For we
find in it that one god has been born from the head, another
from the thigh, another from drops of blood; also, in this
we find that gods have stolen, committed adultery, served
men; in a word, in this all manner of things are attributed
to the gods, such as may befall, not merely any man, but
even the most contemptible man.” He certainly, where
he could, where he dared, where he thought he could do
it with impunity, has manifested, without any of the haziness
of ambiguity, how great injury was done to the nature
of the gods by lying fables; for he was speaking, not concerning
natural theology, not concerning civil, but concerning[Pg 239]
fabulous theology, which he thought he could freely find fault
with.

Let us see, now, what he says concerning the second kind.
“The second kind which I have explained,” he says, “is that
concerning which philosophers have left many books, in which
they treat such questions as these: what gods there are, where
they are, of what kind and character they are, since what time
they have existed, or if they have existed from eternity;
whether they are of fire, as Heraclitus believes; or of number,
as Pythagoras; or of atoms, as Epicurus says; and other such
things, which men’s ears can more easily hear inside the walls
of a school than outside in the Forum.” He finds fault with
nothing in this kind of theology which they call physical, and
which belongs to philosophers, except that he has related their
controversies among themselves, through which there has arisen
a multitude of dissentient sects. Nevertheless he has removed
this kind from the Forum, that is, from the populace, but he
has shut it up in schools. But that first kind, most false and
most base, he has not removed from the citizens. Oh, the religious
ears of the people, and among them even those of the
Romans, that are not able to bear what the philosophers dispute
concerning the gods! But when the poets sing and stage-players
act such things as are derogatory to the dignity and
the nature of the immortals, such as may befall not a man
merely, but the most contemptible man, they not only bear,
but willingly listen to. Nor is this all, but they even consider
that these things please the gods, and that they are
propitiated by them.

But some one may say, Let us distinguish these two kinds
of theology, the mythical and the physical,—that is, the
fabulous and the natural,—from this civil kind about which
we are now speaking. Anticipating this, he himself has distinguished
them. Let us see now how he explains the civil
theology itself. I see, indeed, why it should be distinguished
as fabulous, even because it is false, because it is base, because
it is unworthy. But to wish to distinguish the natural from
the civil, what else is that but to confess that the civil itself
is false? For if that be natural, what fault has it that it
should be excluded? And if this which is called civil be not[Pg 240]
natural, what merit has it that it should be admitted? This,
in truth, is the cause why he wrote first concerning human
things, and afterwards concerning divine things; since in
divine things he did not follow nature, but the institution
of men. Let us look at this civil theology of his. “The
third kind,” says he, “is that which citizens in cities, and
especially the priests, ought to know and to administer. From
it is to be known what god each one may suitably worship,
what sacred rites and sacrifices each one may suitably perform.”
Let us still attend to what follows. “The first theology,”
he says, “is especially adapted to the theatre, the second
to the world, the third to the city.” Who does not see to
which he gives the palm? Certainly to the second, which
he said above is that of the philosophers. For he testifies
that this pertains to the world, than which they think there
is nothing better. But those two theologies, the first and the
third,—to wit, those of the theatre and of the city,—has he
distinguished them or united them? For although we see
that the city is in the world, we do not see that it follows
that any things belonging to the city pertain to the world.
For it is possible that such things may be worshipped and
believed in the city, according to false opinions, as have no
existence either in the world or out of it. But where is the
theatre but in the city? Who instituted the theatre but the
state? For what purpose did it constitute it but for scenic
plays? And to what class of things do scenic plays belong
but to those divine things concerning which these books of
Varro’s are written with so much ability?

6. Concerning the mythic, that is, the fabulous, theology, and the civil,
against Varro.

O Marcus Varro! thou art the most acute, and without
doubt the most learned, but still a man, not God,—now lifted
up by the Spirit of God to see and to announce divine things,
thou seest, indeed, that divine things are to be separated from
human trifles and lies, but thou fearest to offend those most
corrupt opinions of the populace, and their customs in public
superstitions, which thou thyself, when thou considerest them
on all sides, perceivest, and all your literature loudly pronounces
to be abhorrent from the nature of the gods, even[Pg 241]
of such gods as the frailty of the human mind supposes to
exist in the elements of this world. What can the most
excellent human talent do here? What can human learning,
though manifold, avail thee in this perplexity? Thou
desirest to worship the natural gods; thou art compelled to
worship the civil. Thou hast found some of the gods to be
fabulous, on whom thou vomitest forth very freely what thou
thinkest, and, whether thou willest or not, thou wettest therewith
even the civil gods. Thou sayest, forsooth, that the
fabulous are adapted to the theatre, the natural to the world,
and the civil to the city; though the world is a divine work,
but cities and theatres are the works of men, and though the
gods who are laughed at in the theatre are not other than
those who are adored in the temples; and ye do not exhibit
games in honour of other gods than those to whom ye immolate
victims. How much more freely and more subtly
wouldst thou have decided these hadst thou said that some
gods are natural, others established by men; and concerning
those who have been so established, the literature of the poets
gives one account, and that of the priests another,—both of
which are, nevertheless, so friendly the one to the other,
through fellowship in falsehood, that they are both pleasing
to the demons, to whom the doctrine of the truth is hostile.

That theology, therefore, which they call natural, being
put aside for a moment, as it is afterwards to be discussed,
we ask if any one is really content to seek a hope for
eternal life from poetical, theatrical, scenic gods? Perish
the thought! The true God avert so wild and sacrilegious
a madness! What, is eternal life to be asked from those
gods whom these things pleased, and whom these things propitiate,
in which their own crimes are represented? No one,
as I think, has arrived at such a pitch of headlong and
furious impiety. So then, neither by the fabulous nor by
the civil theology does any one obtain eternal life. For the
one sows base things concerning the gods by feigning them,
the other reaps by cherishing them; the one scatters lies, the
other gathers them together; the one pursues divine things
with false crimes, the other incorporates among divine things
the plays which are made up of these crimes; the one sounds[Pg 242]
abroad in human songs impious fictions concerning the gods,
the other consecrates these for the festivities of the gods
themselves; the one sings the misdeeds and crimes of the
gods, the other loves them; the one gives forth or feigns, the
other either attests the true or delights in the false. Both
are base; both are damnable. But the one which is theatrical
teaches public abomination, and that one which is of the city
adorns itself with that abomination. Shall eternal life be
hoped for from these, by which this short and temporal life
is polluted? Does the society of wicked men pollute our life
if they insinuate themselves into our affections, and win our
assent? and does not the society of demons pollute the life,
who are worshipped with their own crimes?—if with true
crimes, how wicked the demons! if with false, how wicked
the worship!

When we say these things, it may perchance seem to some
one who is very ignorant of these matters that only those
things concerning the gods which are sung in the songs of
the poets and acted on the stage are unworthy of the divine
majesty, and ridiculous, and too detestable to be celebrated,
whilst those sacred things which not stage-players but priests
perform are pure and free from all unseemliness. Had this
been so, never would any one have thought that these theatrical
abominations should be celebrated in their honour, never
would the gods themselves have ordered them to be performed
to them. But men are in nowise ashamed to perform these
things in the theatres, because similar things are carried on
in the temples. In short, when the fore-mentioned author
attempted to distinguish the civil theology from the fabulous
and natural, as a sort of third and distinct kind, he wished it
to be understood to be rather tempered by both than separated
from either. For he says that those things which the poets
write are less than the people ought to follow, whilst what
the philosophers say is more than it is expedient for the people
to pry into. “Which,” says he, “differ in such a way, that
nevertheless not a few things from both of them have been
taken to the account of the civil theology; wherefore we will
indicate what the civil theology has in common with that of
the poet, though it ought to be more closely connected with[Pg 243]
the theology of philosophers.” Civil theology is therefore not
quite disconnected from that of the poets. Nevertheless, in
another place, concerning the generations of the gods, he says
that the people are more inclined toward the poets than toward
the physical theologists. For in this place he said what ought
to be done; in that other place, what was really done. He
said that the latter had written for the sake of utility, but the
poets for the sake of amusement. And hence the things from
the poets’ writings, which the people ought not to follow, are
the crimes of the gods; which, nevertheless, amuse both the
people and the gods. For, for amusement’s sake, he says, the
poets write, and not for that of utility; nevertheless they write
such things as the gods will desire, and the people perform.

7. Concerning the likeness and agreement of the fabulous and civil theologies.

That theology, therefore, which is fabulous, theatrical, scenic,
and full of all baseness and unseemliness, is taken up into
the civil theology; and part of that theology, which in its
totality is deservedly judged to be worthy of reprobation and
rejection, is pronounced worthy to be cultivated and observed;—not
at all an incongruous part, as I have undertaken to
show, and one which, being alien to the whole body, was
unsuitably attached to and suspended from it, but a part
entirely congruous with, and most harmoniously fitted to
the rest, as a member of the same body. For what else
do those images, forms, ages, sexes, characteristics of the
gods show? If the poets have Jupiter with a beard, and
Mercury beardless, have not the priests the same? Is the
Priapus of the priests less obscene than the Priapus of the
players? Does he receive the adoration of worshippers in a
different form from that in which he moves about the stage
for the amusement of spectators? Is not Saturn old and
Apollo young in the shrines where their images stand, as well
as when represented by actor’s masks? Why are Forculus,
who presides over doors, and Limentinus, who presides over
thresholds and lintels, male gods, and Cardea between them
feminine, who presides over hinges? Are not those things
found in books on divine things, which grave poets have
deemed unworthy of their verses? Does the Diana of the[Pg 244]
theatre carry arms, whilst the Diana of the city is simply a
virgin? Is the stage Apollo a lyrist, but the Delphic Apollo
ignorant of this art? But these things are decent compared
with the more shameful things. What was thought of Jupiter
himself by those who placed his wet nurse in the Capitol?
Did they not bear witness to Euhemerus, who, not with the
garrulity of a fable-teller, but with the gravity of an historian
who had diligently investigated the matter, wrote that all such
gods had been men and mortals? And they who appointed
the Epulones as parasites at the table of Jupiter, what else did
they wish for but mimic sacred rites? For if any mimic had
said that parasites of Jupiter were made use of at his table,
he would assuredly have appeared to be seeking to call forth
laughter. Varro said it,—not when he was mocking, but when
he was commending the gods did he say it. His books on
divine, not on human, things testify that he wrote this,—not
where he set forth the scenic games, but where he explained
the Capitoline laws. In a word, he is conquered, and
confesses that, as they made the gods with a human form, so
they believed that they are delighted with human pleasures.

For also malign spirits were not so wanting to their own
business as not to confirm noxious opinions in the minds of
men by converting them into sport. Whence also is that
story about the sacristan of Hercules, which says that, having
nothing to do, he took to playing at dice as a pastime, throwing
them alternately with the one hand for Hercules, with the
other for himself, with this understanding, that if he should
win, he should from the funds of the temple prepare himself
a supper, and hire a mistress; but if Hercules should win
the game, he himself should, at his own expense, provide the
same for the pleasure of Hercules. Then, when he had been
beaten by himself, as though by Hercules, he gave to the god
Hercules the supper he owed him, and also the most noble
harlot Larentina. But she, having fallen asleep in the temple,
dreamed that Hercules had had intercourse with her, and had
said to her that she would find her payment with the youth
whom she should first meet on leaving the temple, and that
she was to believe this to be paid to her by Hercules. And
so the first youth that met her on going out was the wealthy[Pg 245]
Tarutius, who kept her a long time, and when he died left her
his heir. She, having obtained a most ample fortune, that she
should not seem ungrateful for the divine hire, in her turn
made the Roman people her heir, which she thought to be
most acceptable to the deities; and, having disappeared, the
will was found. By which meritorious conduct they say that
she gained divine honours.

Now had these things been feigned by the poets and acted
by the mimics, they would without any doubt have been said
to pertain to the fabulous theology, and would have been judged
worthy to be separated from the dignity of the civil theology.
But when these shameful things,—not of the poets, but of the
people; not of the mimics, but of the sacred things; not of
the theatres, but of the temples, that is, not of the fabulous,
but of the civil theology,—are reported by so great an author,
not in vain do the actors represent with theatrical art the
baseness of the gods, which is so great; but surely in vain do
the priests attempt, by rites called sacred, to represent their
nobleness of character, which has no existence. There are
sacred rites of Juno; and these are celebrated in her beloved
island, Samos, where she was given in marriage to Jupiter.
There are sacred rites of Ceres, in which Proserpine is sought
for, having been carried off by Pluto. There are sacred rites
Venus, in which, her beloved Adonis being slain by a boar’s
tooth, the lovely youth is lamented. There are sacred rites of
the mother of the gods, in which the beautiful youth Atys,
loved by her, and castrated by her through a woman’s jealousy,
is deplored by men who have suffered the like calamity, whom
they call Galli. Since, then, these things are more unseemly
than all scenic abomination, why is it that they strive to
separate, as it were, the fabulous fictions of the poet concerning
the gods, as, forsooth, pertaining to the theatre, from the
civil theology which they wish to belong to the city, as though
they were separating from noble and worthy things, things unworthy
and base? Wherefore there is more reason to thank
the stage-actors, who have spared the eyes of men, and have
not laid bare by theatrical exhibition all the things which are
hid by the walls of the temples. What good is to be thought
of their sacred rites which are concealed in darkness, when[Pg 246]
those which are brought forth into the light are so detestable?
And certainly they themselves have seen what they transact
in secret through the agency of mutilated and effeminate men.
Yet they have not been able to conceal those same men miserably
and vilely enervated and corrupted. Let them persuade
whom they can that they transact anything holy through such
men, who, they cannot deny, are numbered, and live among
their sacred things. We know not what they transact, but
we know through whom they transact; for we know what
things are transacted on the stage, where never, even in a
chorus of harlots, hath one who is mutilated or an effeminate
appeared. And, nevertheless, even these things are acted by
vile and infamous characters; for, indeed, they ought not to
be acted by men of good character. What, then, are those
sacred rites, for the performance of which holiness has chosen
such men as not even the obscenity of the stage has admitted?

8. Concerning the interpretations, consisting of natural explanations, which the
pagan teachers attempt to show for their gods.

But all these things, they say, have certain physical, that
is, natural interpretations, showing their natural meaning;
as though in this disputation we were seeking physics and
not theology, which is the account, not of nature, but of God.
For although He who is the true God is God, not by opinion,
but by nature, nevertheless all nature is not God; for there
is certainly a nature of man, of a beast, of a tree, of a stone,—none
of which is God. For if, when the question is concerning
the mother of the gods, that from which the whole
system of interpretation starts certainly is, that the mother of
the gods is the earth, why do we make further inquiry? why
do we carry our investigation through all the rest of it?
What can more manifestly favour them who say that all those
gods were men? For they are earth-born in the sense that
the earth is their mother. But in the true theology the earth
is the work, not the mother, of God. But in whatever way
their sacred rites may be interpreted, and, whatever reference
they may have to the nature of things, it is not according to
nature, but contrary to nature, that men should be effeminates.
This disease, this crime, this abomination, has a recognised
place among those sacred things, though even depraved men[Pg 247]
will scarcely be compelled by torments to confess they are
guilty of it. Again, if these sacred rites, which are proved to
be fouler than scenic abominations, are excused and justified
on the ground that they have their own interpretations, by
which they are shown to symbolize the nature of things, why
are not the poetical things in like manner excused and justified?
For many have interpreted even these in like fashion, to such
a degree that even that which they say is the most monstrous
and most horrible,—namely, that Saturn devoured his own
children,—has been interpreted by some of them to mean
that length of time, which is signified by the name of Saturn,
consumes whatever it begets; or that, as the same Varro
thinks, Saturn belongs to seeds which fall back again into the
earth from whence they spring. And so one interprets it in
one way, and one in another. And the same is to be said
of all the rest of this theology.

And, nevertheless, it is called the fabulous theology, and is
censured, cast off, rejected, together with all such interpretations
belonging to it. And not only by the natural theology,
which is that of the philosophers, but also by this civil theology,
concerning which we are speaking, which is asserted to pertain
to cities and peoples, it is judged worthy of repudiation, because
it has invented unworthy things concerning the gods.
Of which, I wot, this is the secret: that those most acute and
learned men, by whom those things were written, understood
that both theologies ought to be rejected,—to wit, both that
fabulous and this civil one,—but the former they dared to
reject, the latter they dared not; the former they set forth to
be censured, the latter they showed to be very like it; not that
it might be chosen to be held in preference to the other,
but that it might be understood to be worthy of being rejected
together with it. And thus, without danger to those who
feared to censure the civil theology, both of them being brought
into contempt, that theology which they call natural might
find a place in better disposed minds; for the civil and the
fabulous are both fabulous and both civil. He who shall
wisely inspect the vanities and obscenities of both will find
that they are both fabulous; and he who shall direct his
attention to the scenic plays pertaining to the fabulous theology[Pg 248]
in the festivals of the civil gods, and in the divine rites
of the cities, will find they are both civil. How, then, can
the power of giving eternal life be attributed to any of those
gods whose own images and sacred rites convict them of being
most like to the fabulous gods, which are most openly reprobated,
in forms, ages, sex, characteristics, marriages, generations,
rites; in all which things they are understood either to have
been men, and to have had their sacred rites and solemnities
instituted in their honour according to the life or death of
each of them, the demons suggesting and confirming this error,
or certainly most foul spirits, who, taking advantage of some
occasion or other, have stolen into the minds of men to deceive
them?

9. Concerning the special offices of the gods.

And as to those very offices of the gods, so meanly and so
minutely portioned out, so that they say that they ought to be
supplicated, each one according to his special function,—about
which we have spoken much already, though not all that is to
be said concerning it,—are they not more consistent with
mimic buffoonery than divine majesty? If any one should
use two nurses for his infant, one of whom should give nothing
but food, the other nothing but drink, as these make use of
two goddesses for this purpose, Educa and Potina, he should
certainly seem to be foolish, and to do in his house a thing
worthy of a mimic. They would have Liber to have been
named from “liberation,” because through him males at the
time of copulation are liberated by the emission of the seed.
They also say that Libera (the same in their opinion as Venus)
exercises the same function in the case of women, because they
say that they also emit seed; and they also say that on this
account the same part of the male and of the female is placed
in the temple, that of the male to Liber, and that of the female
to Libera. To these things they add the women assigned to
Liber, and the wine for exciting lust. Thus the Bacchanalia
are celebrated with the utmost insanity, with respect to which
Varro himself confesses that such things would not be done
by the Bacchanals except their minds were highly excited.
These things, however, afterwards displeased a saner senate,
and it ordered them to be discontinued. Here, at length, they[Pg 249]
perhaps perceived how much power unclean spirits, when held
to be gods, exercise over the minds of men. These things,
certainly, were not to be done in the theatres; for there they
play, not rave, although to have gods who are delighted with
such plays is very like raving.

But what kind of distinction is this which he makes between
the religious and the superstitious man, saying that the gods
are feared[238] by the superstitious man, but are reverenced[239] as
parents by the religious man, not feared as enemies; and that
they are all so good that they will more readily spare those
who are impious than hurt one who is innocent? And yet he
tells us that three gods are assigned as guardians to a woman
after she has been delivered, lest the god Silvanus come in
and molest her; and that in order to signify the presence of
these protectors, three men go round the house during the night,
and first strike the threshold with a hatchet, next with a pestle,
and the third time sweep it with a brush, in order that these
symbols of agriculture having been exhibited, the god Silvanus
might be hindered from entering, because neither are trees cut
down or pruned without a hatchet, neither is grain ground
without a pestle, nor corn heaped up without a besom. Now
from these three things three gods have been named: Intercidona,
from the cut[240] made by the hatchet; Pilumnus, from the
pestle; Diverra, from the besom;—by which guardian gods the
woman who has been delivered is preserved against the power
of the god Silvanus. Thus the guardianship of kindly-disposed
gods would not avail against the malice of a mischievous god,
unless they were three to one, and fought against him, as it
were, with the opposing emblems of cultivation, who, being an
inhabitant of the woods, is rough, horrible, and uncultivated.
Is this the innocence of the gods? Is this their concord?
Are these the health-giving deities of the cities, more ridiculous
than the things which are laughed at in the theatres?

When a male and a female are united, the god Jugatinus presides.
Well, let this be borne with. But the married woman
must be brought home: the god Domiducus also is invoked.
That she may be in the house, the god Domitius is introduced.
That she may remain with her husband, the goddess Manturnæ[Pg 250]
is used. What more is required? Let human modesty
be spared. Let the lust of flesh and blood go on with the
rest, the secret of shame being respected. Why is the bedchamber
filled with a crowd of deities, when even the groomsmen[241]
have departed? And, moreover, it is so filled, not that
in consideration of their presence more regard may be paid to
chastity, but that by their help the woman, naturally of the
weaker sex, and trembling with the novelty of her situation,
may the more readily yield her virginity. For there are the
goddess Virginiensis, and the god-father Subigus, and the
goddess-mother Prema, and the goddess Pertunda, and Venus,
and Priapus.[242] What is this? If it was absolutely necessary
that a man, labouring at this work, should be helped by the
gods, might not some one god or goddess have been sufficient?
Was Venus not sufficient alone, who is even said to be named
from this, that without her power a woman does not cease to
be a virgin? If there is any shame in men, which is not in
the deities, is it not the case that, when the married couple
believe that so many gods of either sex are present, and busy
at this work, they are so much affected with shame, that the
man is less moved, and the woman more reluctant? And
certainly, if the goddess Virginiensis is present to loose the
virgin’s zone, if the god Subigus is present that the virgin
may be got under the man, if the goddess Prema is present
that, having been got under him, she may be kept down, and
may not move herself, what has the goddess Pertunda to do
there? Let her blush; let her go forth. Let the husband
himself do something. It is disgraceful that any one but himself
should do that from which she gets her name. But perhaps
she is tolerated because she is said to be a goddess, and
not a god. For if she were believed to be a male, and were
called Pertundus, the husband would demand more help against
him for the chastity of his wife than the newly-delivered
woman against Silvanus. But why am I saying this, when
Priapus, too, is there, a male to excess, upon whose immense
and most unsightly member the newly-married bride is commanded[Pg 251]
to sit, according to the most honourable and most
religious custom of matrons?

Let them go on, and let them attempt with all the subtlety
they can to distinguish the civil theology from the fabulous,
the cities from the theatres, the temples from the stages, the
sacred things of the priests from the songs of the poets,
as honourable things from base things, truthful things from
fallacious, grave from light, serious from ludicrous, desirable
things from things to be rejected, we understand what they
do. They are aware that that theatrical and fabulous theology
hangs by the civil, and is reflected back upon it from the songs
of the poets as from a mirror; and thus, that theology having
been exposed to view which they do not dare to condemn, they
more freely assail and censure that picture of it, in order that
those who perceive what they mean may detest this very face
itself of which that is the picture,—which, however, the gods
themselves, as though seeing themselves in the same mirror,
love so much, that it is better seen in both of them who and
what they are. Whence, also, they have compelled their worshippers,
with terrible commands, to dedicate to them the uncleanness
of the fabulous theology, to put them among their
solemnities, and reckon them among divine things; and thus
they have both shown themselves more manifestly to be most
impure spirits, and have made that rejected and reprobated
theatrical theology a member and a part of this, as it were,
chosen and approved theology of the city, so that, though the
whole is disgraceful and false, and contains in it fictitious
gods, one part of it is in the literature of the priests, the other
in the songs of the poets. Whether it may have other parts
is another question. At present, I think, I have sufficiently
shown, on account of the division of Varro, that the theology
of the city and that of the theatre belong to one civil theology.
Wherefore, because they are both equally disgraceful, absurd,
shameful, false, far be it from religious men to hope for eternal
life from either the one or the other.

In fine, even Varro himself, in his account and enumeration
of the gods, starts from the moment of a man’s conception.
He commences the series of those gods who take charge of
man with Janus, carries it on to the death of the man decrepit[Pg 252]
with age, and terminates it with the goddess Nænia,
who is sung at the funerals of the aged. After that, he begins
to give an account of the other gods, whose province is not
man himself, but man’s belongings, as food, clothing, and all
that is necessary for this life; and, in the case of all these,
he explains what is the special office of each, and for what
each ought to be supplicated. But with all this scrupulous
and comprehensive diligence, he has neither proved the existence,
nor so much as mentioned the name, of any god from
whom eternal life is to be sought,—the one object for which
we are Christians. Who, then, is so stupid as not to perceive
that this man, by setting forth and opening up so diligently
the civil theology, and by exhibiting its likeness to that fabulous,
shameful, and disgraceful theology, and also by teaching
that that fabulous sort is also a part of this other, was labouring
to obtain a place in the minds of men for none but that
natural theology which he says pertains to philosophers, with
such subtlety that he censures the fabulous, and, not daring
openly to censure the civil, shows its censurable character by
simply exhibiting it; and thus, both being reprobated by the
judgment of men of right understanding, the natural alone remains
to be chosen? But concerning this in its own place, by
the help of the true God, we have to discuss more diligently.

10. Concerning the liberty of Seneca, who more vehemently censured the civil
theology than Varro did the fabulous.

That liberty, in truth, which this man wanted, so that
he did not dare to censure that theology of the city, which
is very similar to the theatrical, so openly as he did the
theatrical itself, was, though not fully, yet in part possessed
by Annæus Seneca, whom we have some evidence to show to
have flourished in the times of our apostles. It was in part
possessed by him, I say, for he possessed it in writing, but
not in living. For in that book which he wrote against
superstition,[243] he more copiously and vehemently censured
that civil and urban theology than Varro the theatrical and
fabulous. For, when speaking concerning images, he says,
“They dedicate images of the sacred and inviolable immortals
in most worthless and motionless matter. They give them[Pg 253]
the appearance of man, beasts, and fishes, and some make
them of mixed sex, and heterogeneous bodies. They call
them deities, when they are such that if they should get
breath and should suddenly meet them, they would be held
to be monsters.” Then, a while afterwards, when extolling
the natural theology, he had expounded the sentiments of
certain philosophers, he opposes to himself a question, and
says, “Here some one says, Shall I believe that the heavens
and the earth are gods, and that some are above the moon
and some below it? Shall I bring forward either Plato or the
peripatetic Strato, one of whom made God to be without a
body, the other without a mind?” In answer to which he
says, “And, really, what truer do the dreams of Titus Tatius,
or Romulus, or Tullus Hostilius appear to thee? Tatius declared
the divinity of the goddess Cloacina; Romulus that of
Picus and Tiberinus; Tullus Hostilius that of Pavor and Pallor,
the most disagreeable affections of men, the one of which
is the agitation of the mind under fright, the other that of the
body, not a disease, indeed, but a change of colour.” Wilt
thou rather believe that these are deities, and receive them
into heaven? But with what freedom he has written concerning
the rites themselves, cruel and shameful! “One,”
he says, “castrates himself, another cuts his arms. Where
will they find room for the fear of these gods when angry,
who use such means of gaining their favour when propitious?
But gods who wish to be worshipped in this fashion should
be worshipped in none. So great is the frenzy of the mind
when perturbed and driven from its seat, that the gods are
propitiated by men in a manner in which not even men of
the greatest ferocity and fable-renowned cruelty vent their
rage. Tyrants have lacerated the limbs of some; they never
ordered any one to lacerate his own. For the gratification of
royal lust, some have been castrated; but no one ever, by
the command of his lord, laid violent hands on himself to
emasculate himself. They kill themselves in the temples.
They supplicate with their wounds and with their blood. If
any one has time to see the things they do and the things
they suffer, he will find so many things unseemly for men of
respectability, so unworthy of freemen, so unlike the doings[Pg 254]
of sane men, that no one would doubt that they are mad, had
they been mad with the minority; but now the multitude of
the insane is the defence of their sanity.”

He next relates those things which are wont to be done
in the Capitol, and with the utmost intrepidity insists that
they are such things as one could only believe to be done
by men making sport, or by madmen. For, having spoken
with derision of this, that in the Egyptian sacred rites Osiris,
being lost, is lamented for, but straightway, when found, is
the occasion of great joy by his reappearance, because both
the losing and the finding of him are feigned; and yet that
grief and that joy which are elicited thereby from those who
have lost nothing and found nothing are real;—having, I say,
so spoken of this, he says, “Still there is a fixed time for
this frenzy. It is tolerable to go mad once in the year. Go
into the Capitol. One is suggesting divine commands[244] to a
god; another is telling the hours to Jupiter; one is a lictor;
another is an anointer, who with the mere movement of his
arms imitates one anointing. There are women who arrange
the hair of Juno and Minerva, standing far away not only
from her image, but even from her temple. These move their
fingers in the manner of hair-dressers. There are some women
who hold a mirror. There are some who are calling the gods
to assist them in court. There are some who are holding up
documents to them, and are explaining to them their cases.
A learned and distinguished comedian, now old and decrepit,
was daily playing the mimic in the Capitol, as though the gods
would gladly be spectators of that which men had ceased to
care about. Every kind of artificers working for the immortal
gods is dwelling there in idleness.” And a little after he says,
“Nevertheless these, though they give themselves up to the
gods for purposes superfluous enough, do not do so for any
abominable or infamous purpose. There sit certain women in
the Capitol who think they are beloved by Jupiter; nor are
they frightened even by the look of the, if you will believe
the poets, most wrathful Juno.”

[Pg 255]

This liberty Varro did not enjoy. It was only the poetical
theology he seemed to censure. The civil, which this man
cuts to pieces, he was not bold enough to impugn. But if we
attend to the truth, the temples where these things are performed
are far worse than the theatres where they are represented.
Whence, with respect to these sacred rites of the
civil theology, Seneca preferred, as the best course to be followed
by a wise man, to feign respect for them in act, but to
have no real regard for them at heart. “All which things,”
he says, “a wise man will observe as being commanded by
the laws, but not as being pleasing to the gods.” And a little
after he says, “And what of this, that we unite the gods in
marriage, and that not even naturally, for we join brothers
and sisters? We marry Bellona to Mars, Venus to Vulcan,
Salacia to Neptune. Some of them we leave unmarried, as
though there were no match for them, which is surely needless,
especially when there are certain unmarried goddesses,
as Populonia, or Fulgora, or the goddess Rumina, for whom
I am not astonished that suitors have been awanting. All
this ignoble crowd of gods, which the superstition of ages has
amassed, we ought,” he says, “to adore in such a way as to remember
all the while that its worship belongs rather to custom
than to reality.” Wherefore, neither those laws nor customs
instituted in the civil theology that which was pleasing to the
gods, or which pertained to reality. But this man, whom
philosophy had made, as it were, free, nevertheless, because
he was an illustrious senator of the Roman people, worshipped
what he censured, did what he condemned, adored
what he reproached, because, forsooth, philosophy had taught
him something great,—namely, not to be superstitious in the
world, but, on account of the laws of cities and the customs
of men, to be an actor, not on the stage, but in the temples,—conduct
the more to be condemned, that those things which
he was deceitfully acting he so acted that the people thought
he was acting sincerely. But a stage-actor would rather
delight people by acting plays than take them in by false
pretences.

11. What Seneca thought concerning the Jews.

Seneca, among the other superstitions of civil theology,[Pg 256]
also found fault with the sacred things of the Jews, and
especially the sabbaths, affirming that they act uselessly in
keeping those seventh days, whereby they lose through idleness
about the seventh part of their life, and also many
things which demand immediate attention are damaged. The
Christians, however, who were already most hostile to the
Jews, he did not dare to mention, either for praise or blame,
lest, if he praised them, he should do so against the ancient
custom of his country, or, perhaps, if he should blame them,
he should do so against his own will.

When he was speaking concerning those Jews, he said,
“When, meanwhile, the customs of that most accursed nation
have gained such strength that they have been now received in
all lands, the conquered have given laws to the conquerors.”
By these words he expresses his astonishment; and, not knowing
what the providence of God was leading him to say, subjoins
in plain words an opinion by which he showed what
he thought about the meaning of those sacred institutions:
“For,” he says, “those, however, know the cause of their rites,
whilst the greater part of the people know not why they perform
theirs.” But concerning the solemnities of the Jews,
either why or how far they were instituted by divine authority,
and afterwards, in due time, by the same authority taken
away from the people of God, to whom the mystery of eternal
life was revealed, we have both spoken elsewhere, especially
when we were treating against the Manichæans, and also intend
to speak in this work in a more suitable place.

12. That when once the vanity of the gods of the nations has been exposed, it
cannot be doubted that they are unable to bestow eternal life on any one,
when they cannot afford help even with respect to the things of this temporal
life.

Now, since there are three theologies, which the Greeks
call respectively mythical, physical, and political, and which
may be called in Latin fabulous, natural, and civil; and since
neither from the fabulous, which even the worshippers of
many and false gods have themselves most freely censured,
nor from the civil, of which that is convicted of being a part,
or even worse than it, can eternal life be hoped for from any
of these theologies,—if any one thinks that what has been[Pg 257]
said in this book is not enough for him, let him also add to
it the many and various dissertations concerning God as the
giver of felicity, contained in the former books, especially the
fourth one.

For to what but to felicity should men consecrate themselves,
were felicity a goddess? However, as it is not a
goddess, but a gift of God, to what God but the giver of
happiness ought we to consecrate ourselves, who piously love
eternal life, in which there is true and full felicity? But I
think, from what has been said, no one ought to doubt that
none of those gods is the giver of happiness, who are worshipped
with such shame, and who, if they are not so worshipped,
are more shamefully enraged, and thus confess that
they are most foul spirits. Moreover, how can he give eternal
life who cannot give happiness? For we mean by eternal life
that life where there is endless happiness. For if the soul
live in eternal punishments, by which also those unclean
spirits shall be tormented, that is rather eternal death than
eternal life. For there is no greater or worse death than
when death never dies. But because the soul from its very
nature, being created immortal, cannot be without some kind
of life, its utmost death is alienation from the life of God in
an eternity of punishment. So, then, He only who gives true
happiness gives eternal life, that is, an endlessly happy life.
And since those gods whom this civil theology worships have
been proved to be unable to give this happiness, they ought
not to be worshipped on account of those temporal and terrestrial
things, as we showed in the five former books, much less
on account of eternal life, which is to be after death, as
we have sought to show in this one book especially, whilst
the other books also lend it their co-operation. But since the
strength of inveterate habit has its roots very deep, if any one
thinks that I have not disputed sufficiently to show that this
civil theology ought to be rejected and shunned, let him attend
to another book which, with God’s help, is to be joined to this
one.

[Pg 258]