Jerome answers the second, third, and fourth propositions of Jovinianus.
I. (c. 1-4). That those who have become regenerate cannot be overthrown by the devil, Jerome (c. 1) puts it that they cannot he tempted by the devil. He quotes 1 John i. 8-ii. 2, as shewing that faithful men can be tempted and sin and need an advocate. The expressions (3) in Heb. vi. as to those who crucify the Son of God afresh do not apply to ordinary sins after baptism, as supposed by Montanus and Novatus. The epistles to the Seven Churches show that the lapsed may return. The Angels, and even our Lord Himself, (4) could be tempted.
II. (c. 5-I7). That there is no difference (morally) between one who fasts and one who takes food with thanksgiving. Jovinian has quoted (5) many texts of Scripture to show that God has made animals for men's food. But (6) there are many other uses of animals besides food. And there are many warnings like 1 Cor. vi. 13, as to the danger arising from food, There are among the heathen (7) many instances of abstinence. They recognize (8) the evil of sensual allurements, and often, like Crates the Theban, (9) have cast away what would tempt them; the senses, they teach. (10) should be subject to reason; and, that (11) except for athletes (Christians do not want to be like Milo of Crotona) bread and water suffice. Horace (12), Xenophon and other eminent Greeks (13), the Essenes and the Brahmans (14), as well as philosophers like Diogenes, testify to the value of abstinence. The Old Testament stories (15) of Esau's pottage, of the lusting of Israel for the flesh-pots of Egypt, and those in the New Testament of Anna, Cornelius, &c., commend abstinence. If some heretics inculcate fasting (16) in such a way as to despise the gifts of God, and weak Christians are not to be judged for their use of flesh, those who seek the higher life (17) will find a help in abstinence.
III. (c. 18-34). The fourth proposition of Jovinianus, that all who are saved will have equal reward, is refuted (19) by the various yields of thirty, sixty, and a hundred fold in the parable of the sower, by(20) the "stars differing in glory" of I Cor. xv. 41. It is strange (21) to find the advocate of self-indulgence now claiming equality to the saints. But (22) as there were differences in Ezekiel between cattle and cattle, so in St. Paul between those who built gold or stubble on the one foundation. The differences of gifts (23), of punishments (24), of guilt (25), as in Pilate and the Chief Priests, of the produce of the good seed (26), of the mansions promised in heaven (27-29), of the judgment upon sins both in the church and in Scripture (30-31), of those called at different times to the vineyard (32) are arguments for the diversity of rewards. The parable of the talents (33) holds out as rewards differences of station, and so does the church (34) in its different orders.
Jerome now recapitulates (35) and appeals(36)against the licentious views of Jovinianus, which have already induced many virgins to break their vows; and which, as the new Roman heresy (37), he calls upon the Imperial City (38) to reject.
1. The second proposition of Jovinianus is that the baptized cannot be temptedhyperlink by the devil. And to escape the imputation of folly in saying this, he adds: "But if any are tempted, it only shows that they were baptized with water, not with the Spirit, as we read was the case with Simon Magus." Hence it is that John says,hyperlink "Whosoever is begotten of God doeth no sin, because his seed abideth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is begotten of God. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the Devil." And at the end of the Epistle,hyperlink "Whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not; but his being begotten of God keepeth him, and the evil one toucheth him not."
2. This would be a real difficulty and one for ever incapable of solution were it not solved by the witness of John himself, who immediately goes on to say,hyperlink "My little children, guard yourselves from idols." If everyone that is born of God sinneth not, and cannot be tempted by the devil, how is it that he bids them beware of temptation? Again in the same Epistle we read:hyperlink "If we say that we have no sins, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us." I suppose that John was baptized and was writing to the baptized: I imagine too that all sin is of the devil. Now John confesses himself a sinner, and hopes for forgiveness of sins after baptism. My friend Jovinianus says,hyperlink "Touch me not, for I am clean." What then? Does the Apostle contradict himself? By no means. In the same passage he gives his reason for thus speaking:hyperlink "My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye may not sin. But if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world. And hereby know we that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily hath the love of God been perfected. Hereby know we that we are in him: he that saith he abideth in him ought himself also to walk even as he walked." My reason for telling you, little children, that everyone who is born of God sinneth not, is that you may not sin, and that you may know that so long as you sin not I you abide in the birth which God has given you. Yea, they who abide in that birth cannot sin.hyperlink "For what communion hath light with darkness? Or Christ with Belial?" As day is distinct from night, so righteousness and unrighteousness, sin and good works, Christ and Antichrist cannot blend. If we give Christ a lodging-place in our hearts, we banish the devil from thence. If we sin and the devil enter through the gate of sin, Christ will immediately withdraw. Hence David after sinning says:hyperlink "Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation," that is, the joy which he had lost by sinning.hyperlink "He who saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him." Christ is called the truth:hyperlink "I am the way, the truth, and the life." In vain do we make our boast in him whose commandments we keep not. To him that knoweth what is good, and doeth it not, it is sin.hyperlink "As the body apart from the spirit is dead, even so faith apart from works is dead." And we must not think it a great matter to know the only God, when even devils believe and tremble. "He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also to walk even as he walked." Our opponent may choose whichever of the two he likes; we give him his choice. Does he abide in Christ, or not? If he abide, let him then walk as Christ walked. But if there ishyperlink rashness in professing to copy the virtues of our Lord, he does not abide in Christ, for he does not walk as did Christ.hyperlink "He did not sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: when he was reviled, he reviled not again, and as a lamb is dumb before its shearer, so opened he not his mouth." To Him came the prince of this world, and found nothing in Him: although He had done no sin, God made Him sin for us. But we, according to the Epistle of James,hyperlink "all stumble in many things," andhyperlink "no one is pure from sin, no not if his life be but a day long."hyperlink For who will boast "that he has a clean heart? or who will be sure that he is pure from sin?" And we are held guilty after the similitude of Adam's transgression. Hence David says,hyperlink "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." And the blessed Job,hyperlink "Though I be righteous my mouth will speak wickedness, and though I be perfect, I shall be found perverse. If I wash myself with snow water and make my hands never so clean, yet wilt thou plunge me in the ditch and mine own clothes shall abhor me." But that we may not utterly despair and think that if we sin after baptism we cannot be saved, he immediately checks the tendency:hyperlink "And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins. And not for ours only, but also for the whole world." He addresses this to baptized believers, and he promises them the Lord as an advocate for their offences. He does not say: If you fall into sin, you have an advocate with the Father, Christ, and He is the propitiation for your sins: you might then say that he was addressing those whose baptism had been destitute of the true faith: but what he says is this, "We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, and he is the propitiation for our sins." And not only for the sins of John and his contemporaries, but for those of the whole world. Now in "the whole world" are included apostles and all the faithful, and a clear proof is established that sin after baptism is possible. It is useless for us to have an advocate Jesus Christ, if sin be impossible.
3. The apostle Peter, to whom it was said,hyperlink "He that is bathed needeth not to wash again," andhyperlink "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church," through fear of a maid-servant denied Him. Our Lord himself says,hyperlink "Simon, Simon, behold Satan asked to have you, that he might sift you as wheat. But I made supplication for thee, that thy faith fail not." And in the same place, "Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." If you reply that this was said before the Passion, we certainly say after the Passion, in the Lord's prayer,hyperlink "Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one." If we do not sin after baptism, why do we ask that we may be forgiven our sins, which were already forgiven in baptism? Why do we pray that we may not enter into temptation, and that we may be delivered from the evil one, if the devil cannot tempt those who are baptized? The case is different if this prayer belongs to the Catechumens, and is not adapted to faithful Christians. Paul, the chosen vessel,hyperlink chastised his body, and brought it into subjection, lest after preaching to others he himself should be found a reprobate, andhyperlink he tells that there was given to him "a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to buffet" him. And to the Corinthians he writes:hyperlink "I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is toward Christ." And elsewhere:hyperlink "But to whom ye forgive anything, I forgive also: for what I also have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, for your sakes have I forgiven it in the person of Christ: that no advantage may be gained over us by Satan: for we are not ignorant of his devices." And again:hyperlink "There hath no temptation taken you, but such as man can bear; but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation make also the way of escape, that ye may be able to endure it." And,hyperlink "Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall." And to the Galatians:hyperlink "Ye were running well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?" And elsewhere:hyperlink "We would fain have come unto you, I Paul once and again; and Satan hindered us." And to the married he says:hyperlink "Be together again, that Satan tempt you not because of your incontinency." And again:hyperlink "But I say, walk by the Spirit and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are contrary the one to the other: that ye may not do the things that ye would." We are a compound of the two, and must endure the strife of the two substances. And to the Ephesians:hyperlink "Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places." Does any one think that we are safe, and that it is right to fall asleep when once we have been baptized? And so, too, in the epistle to the Hebrews:hyperlink "For as touching those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come, and then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame." Surely we cannot deny that they have been baptized who have been illuminated, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God. Butif the baptized cannot sin, how is it now that the Apostle says, "And have fallen away"?hyperlink Montanus andhyperlink Novatus would smile at this, for they contend that it is impossible to renew again through repentance those who have crucified to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame. He therefore corrects this mistake by saying:hyperlink "But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak; for God is not unrighteous to forget your work and the love which ye shewed towards his name, in that ye ministered unto the Saints, and still do minister." And truly the unrighteousness of God would be great, if He merely punished sin, and did not welcome good works. I have so spoken, says the Apostle, to withdraw you from your sins, and to make you more careful through fear of despair. But, beloved, I am persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation. For it is not accordant with the righteousness of God to forget good works, and the fact that you have ministered and do minister to the Saints for His name's sake, and to remember sins only. The Apostle James also, knowing that the baptized can be tempted, and fall of their own free choice, says:hyperlink "Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he hath been approved, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to them that love him." And that we may not think that we are tempted by God, as we read in Genesis Abraham was, he adds: "Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, and He Himself tempteth no man. But each man is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. Then the lust, when it hath conceived, beareth sin: and the sin, when it is full grown, bringeth forth death." God created us with free will, and we are not forced by necessity either to virtue or to vice. Otherwise, if there be necessity, there is no crown. As n good works it is God who brings them to perfection, for it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that pitieth and gives us help that we may be able to reach the goal: so in things wicked and sinful, the seeds within us give the impulse, and these are brought to maturity by the devil. When he sees that we are building upon the foundation of Christ, hay, wood, stubble, then he applies the match. Let us then build gold, silver, costly stones, and he will not venture to tempt us: although even thus there is not sure and safe possession. For the lion lurks in ambush to slay the innocent.hyperlink "Potters' vessels are proved by the furnace, and just men by the trial of tribulation." And in another place it is written:hyperlink "My son, when thou comest to serve the Lord, prepare thyself for temptation." Again, the same James says:hyperlink "Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only. For if any one is a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror: for he beholdeth himself, and goeth away, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was." It was useless to warn them to add works to faith, if they could not sin after baptism. He tells us thathyperlink "whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is become guilty of all." Which of us is without sin?hyperlink "God hath shut up all unto disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all." Peter also says:hyperlink "The Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptation." And concerning false teachers:hyperlink "These are springs without water, and mists driven by a storm; for whom the blackness of darkness hath been reserved. For, uttering proud wordsof vanity, they entice in the lusts of the flesh, by lasciviousness, those who had just escaped, and have turned back to error." Does not the Apostle in these words seem to you to have depicted the new party of ignorance? For, as it were, they open the fountains of knowledge and yet have no water: they promise a shower of doctrine like prophetic clouds which have been visited by the truth of God, and are driven by the storms of devils and vices. They speak great things, and their talk is nothing but pride:hyperlink "But every one is unclean with God who is lifted up in his own heart." Like those who had just escaped from their sins, they return to their own error, and persuade men to luxury, and to the delights of eating and the gratification of the flesh. For who is not glad to hear them say: "Let us eat and drink, and reign for ever"? The wise and prudent they call corrupt, but pay more attention to the honey-tongued. John the apostle, or rather the Saviour in the person of John, writes thus to the angel of the Church of Ephesus:hyperlink "I know thy works and thy toil and patience, and that thou didst bear for my name's sake, and hast not grown weary. But I have this against thee, that thou didst leave thy first love. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come to thee, and will move thy candlestick out of its place, except thou repent." Similarly He urges the other churches, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea, to repentance, and threatens them unless they return to the former works. And in Sardis He says He has a few who have not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with Him in white, for they are worthy. But they to whom He says: "Remember from whence thou art fallen "; and, "Behold the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried"; and, "I know where thou dwellest, even where Satan's throne is"; and, "Remember how thou hast received, and didst hear, and keep it, and repent," and so on, were of course believers, and baptized, who once stood, but fell through sin.
4. I delayed for a little while the production of proofs from the Old Testament, because, wherever the Old Testament is against them they are accustomed to cry out thathyperlink the Law and the Prophets were until John. But who does not know that under the other dispensation of God all the saints of past times were of equal merit with Christians at the present day? As Abraham in days gone by pleased God in wedlock, so virgins now please him in perpetual virginity. He served the Law and his own times; let us now serve the Gospel and our times,hyperlink upon whom the ends of the ages have come. David the chosen one, the man after God's own heart, who had performed all His pleasure, and who in a certain psalm had said,hyperlink "Judge me, O Lord, for I have walked in mine integrity: I have trusted also in the Lord and shall not slide. Examine me, O Lord, and prove me; try my reins and my heart," even he was afterwards tempted by the devil; and repenting of his sin said,hyperlink "Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving-kindness." He would have a great sin blotted out by great loving-kindness. Solomon, beloved of the Lord, and to whom God had twice revealed Himself, because he loved women forsook the love of God. It is related in thehyperlink Book of Days that Manasses the wicked king was restored after the Babylonish captivity to his former rank. And Josiah, a holy man,hyperlink was slain by the king of Egypt on the plain of Megiddo.hyperlink Joshua also, the son of Josedech and high-priest, although he was a type of our Saviour Who bore our sins, and united to Himself a church of alien birth from among the Gentiles, is nevertheless, according to the letter of Scripture,represented in filthy garments after he attained to the priesthood, and with the devil standing at his right hand; and white raiment is afterwards restored to him. It is needless to tell how Moses and Aaronhyperlink offended God at the water of strife, and did not enter the land of promise. For the blessed Job relates that even the angels and every creature can sin.hyperlink "Shall mortal man," he says, "be just beforeGod? Shall a man be spotless in his works? If he putteth no trust in his servants, and chargeth his angels with folly, how much more them that dwell in houses of clay," amongst whom are we, and made of the same clay too.hyperlink "The life of man is a warfare upon earth."hyperlink Lucifer fell who was sending to all nations, and he who was nurtured in a paradise of delight as one of the twelve precious stones, was wounded and went down to hell from the mount of God. Hence the Saviour says in the Gospel:hyperlink "I beheld Satan falling as lightning from heaven." If he fell who stood on so sublime a height, who may not fall? If there are falls in heaven, how much more on earth! And yet though Lucifer be fallen (the old serpent after his fall),hyperlink "his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the muscles of his belly. The great trees are overshadowed by him, and he sleepeth beside the reed, the rush, and the sedge."hyperlink He is king over all things that are in the waters-that is to say in the seat of pleasure and luxury, of propagation of children, and of the fertilisation of the marriage bedhyperlink "For who can strip off his outer garment? Who can open the doors of his face? Nations fatten upon him, and the tribes of Phenicia divide him." And lest haply the reader in his secret thought might imagine that those tribes of Phenicia and peoples of Ethiopia only are meant by those to whom the dragon was given for food, we immediately find a reference to those who are crossing the sea of this world, and are hastening to reach the haven of salvation:hyperlink "His head stands in the ships of the fishermen like an anvil that cannot be wearied:hyperlink he counteth iron as straw, and brass as rotten wood. And all the gold of the sea under him is as mire. He maketh the deep to boil like a pot: he values the sea like a pot of ointment, and the blackness of the deep as a captive. He beholdeth everything that is high." And my friend Jovinianus thinks he can gain an easy mastery over him. Why speak of holy men and angels, who, being creatures of God, are of course capable of sin? He dared to tempt the Son of God, and though smitten through and through with our Lord's first and second answer, nevertheless raised his head, and when thrice wounded, withdrew only for a time, and deferred rather than removed the temptation. And we flatter ourselves on the ground of our baptism, which though it put away the sins of the past, cannot keep us for the time to come, unless the baptized keep their hearts with all diligence.
5. At length we have arrived at the question of food, and are confronted by our third difficulty. "All things were created to serve for the use of mortal men.' And as man, a rational animal, in a sense the owner and tenant of the world, is subject to God, and worships his Creator, so all things living were created either for the food of men, or for clothing, or for tilling the earth, or conveying the fruits thereof, or to be the companions of man, and hence, because they are man'shyperlink helpers, they have their name jumenta.hyperlink `What is man,' says David, `that thou art mindful of him? And the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him but little lower than the angels, and crownest him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thine hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: all sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field: the fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.' Granted, he says, that the ox was created for ploughing, the horse for riding, the dog for watching, goats for their milk, sheep for their fleeces. What is the use of swine if we may not eat their flesh? of roes, stags, fallow-deer, boars, hares, and such like game? of geese, wild and tame? of wild ducks andhyperlink fig-peckers? of woodcocks? of coots? of thrushes? Why do hens run about our houses? If they are not eaten, all these creatures were created by God for nothing. But what need is there of argument when Scripture clearly teaches that every moving creature, like herbs and vegetables, were given to us for food, and the Apostle cries aloudhyperlink `All things are clean to the clean, and nothing is to be rejected, if it be received with thanksgiving,' andhyperlink tells us that men will come in the last days, forbidding to marry, and to eat meats, which God created for use? The Lord himself was called by the Pharisees a wine-bibber and a glutton, the friend of publicans and sinners, because he did not decline the invitation of Zacchaeus to dinner, and went to the marriage-feast. But it is a different matter if, as you may foolishly contend, he went to the dinner intending to fast, and after the manner of deceivers said, I eat this, not that; I do not drink the wine which I created out of water. He did not make water, but wine, the type of his blood. After the resurrection he ate a fish and part of a honey-comb, not sesame nuts and service-berries. The apostle, Peter, did not wait like a Jew for the stars to peep, but went upon the house-top to dine at the sixth hour. Paul in the ship broke bread, not dried figs. When Timothy's stomach was out of order, he advised him to drink wine, not perry. In abstaining from meats they please their own fancy: as though superstitious Gentiles did not observe thehyperlink rites of abstinence connected with the Mother of the Gods and with Isis."
6. I will follow in detail the views now expounded, and before I come to Scripture and show by it that fasting is pleasing to God, and chastity accepted by him, I will meet philosophic argument with argument, and will prove that we are not followers of Empedocles and Pythagoras, who on account of their doctrine of the transmigration of souls think nothing which lives and moves should be eaten, and look upon him who fells a fir-tree or an oak as equally guilty with the parricide or the poisoner: but that we worship our Creator Who made all things for the use of man. And as the ox was created for ploughing, the horse for riding, dogs for watching, goats for milk, sheep for their wool: so it was with swine and stags, and roes and hares, and other animals: but the immediate purpose of their creation was not that they might serve for food, but for other uses of men. For if everything that moves and lives was made for food, and prepared for the stomach, let my opponents tellme why elephants, lions, leopards, and wolves were created; why vipers, scorpions, bugs, lice, and fleas; why the vulture, the eagle, the crow, the hawk; why whales, dolphins, seals, and small snails were created. Which of us ever eats the flesh of a lion, a viper, a vulture, a stork, a kite, or the worms that crawl upon our shores? As then these have their proper uses, so may we say that other beasts, fishes, birds, were created not for eating, but for medicine. In short, to how many uses the flesh of vipers, from which we make our antidotes against poison, may be applied, physicians know well. Ivory dust is an ingredient in many remedies. Hyena's gall restores brightness to the eyes, and its dung and that of dogs cures gangrenous wounds. And (it may seem strange to the reader) Galen asserts in his treatise on Simples, that human dung is of service in a multitude of cases. Naturalists say that snake-skin, boiled in oil, gives wonderful relief in ear-ache. What to the uninitiated seems so useless as a bug? Yet, suppose a leech to have fastened on the throat, as soon as the odour of a bug is inhaled the leech is vomited out, and difficulty in urinating is relieved by the same application. As for the fat of pigs, geese, fowls, and pheasants, how useful they are is told in all medical works, and if you read these books you will see there that the vulture has as many curative properties as it has limbs. Peacock's dung allays the inflammation of gout. Cranes, storks, eagle's gall, hawk's blood, the ostrich, frogs, chameleons, swallow's dung and flesh-in what diseases these are suitable remedies, I could tell if it were my purpose to discuss bodily ailments and their cure. If you think proper you may read Aristotle andhyperlink Theophrastus in prose, orhyperlink Marcellus of Side, and ourhyperlink Flavius, who discourse on these subjects in hexameter verse; thehyperlink second Pliny also, andhyperlink Dioscorides, and others, both naturalists and physicians, who assign to every herb, every stone, every animal whether reptile, bird, or fish, its own use in the art of which they treat. So then when you ask me why the pig was created, I immediately reply, as if two boys were disputing, by asking you why were vipers and scorpions? You must not judge that anything from the hand of God is superfluous, because there are many beasts and birds which your palate rejects. But this may perhaps look more like contentiousness and pugnacity than truth. Let me tell you therefore that pigs and wild-boars, and stags, and the rest of living creatures were created, that soldiers, athletes, sailors, rhetoricians, miners, and other slaves of hard toil, who need physical strength, might have food: and also those who carry arms and provisions, who wear themselves out with the work of hand or foot, who ply the oar, who need good lungs to shout and speak, who level mountains and sleep out rain or fair. But our religion does not train boxers, athletes, sailors, soldiers, or ditchers, but followers of wisdom, who devote themselves to the worship of God, and know why they were created and are in the world from which they are impatient to depart. Hence also the Apostle says:hyperlink "When I am weak, then am I strong." And.hyperlink "Though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day." Andhyperlink "I have the desire to depart and be with Christ." And,hyperlink "Make not provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof." Are all commandedhyperlink not to have two coats, nor food in their scrip, money in their purse, a staff in the hand, shoes on the feet? or to sell all they possess and give to the poor, and follow Jesus? Of course not: but the command is for those who wish to be perfect. On the contrary John the Baptist lays down one rule for the soldiers, another for the publicans. But the Lord says in the Gospel to him who had boasted of having kept the whole law:hyperlink "If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and come, follow me." That He might not seem to lay a heavy burden on unwilling shoulders, He sent His hearer away with full power to please himself, saying "If thou wilt be perfect." And so I too say to you: If you wish to be perfect, it is good not to drink wine, and eat flesh. If you wish to be perfect, it is better to enrich the mind than to stuff the body. But if you are an infant and fond of the cooks and their preparations, no one will snatch the dainties out of your mouth. Eat and drink, and, if you like, with Israel rise up and play, and singhyperlink "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we shall die." Let him eat and drink, who looks for death when he has feasted, and who says with Epicurus, "There is nothing after death, and death itself is nothing." We believe Paul when he says in tones of thunder:hyperlink "Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats. But God will destroy both them and it."
7. I have quoted these few passages of Scripture to show that we are at one with the philosophers. But who does not know that no universal law of nature regulates the food of all nations, and that each eats those things of which it has abundance? For instance, the Arabians and Saracens, and all the wild tribes of the desert live on camel's milk and flesh: for the camel, to suit the climate and barren soil of those regions, is easily bred and reared. They think it wicked to eat the flesh of swine. Why? Because pigs which fatten on acorns, chestnuts, roots of ferns, and barley, are seldom or never found among them: and if they were found, they would not afford the nourishment of which we spoke just now. The exact opposite is the case with the northern peoples. If you were to force them to eat the flesh of asses and camels, they would think it the same as though they were compelled to devour a wolf or a crow. In Pontus and Phrygia a paterfamilias pays a good price for fat white worms with blackish heads, which breed in decayed wood. And as with us the woodcock and fig-pecker, the mullet and scar, are reputed delicacies, so with them it is a luxury to eat thehyperlink xylophagus. Again, because throughout the glowing wastes of the desert clouds of locusts are found, it is customary with the peoples of the East and of Libya to feed on locusts. John the Baptist proves the truth of this. Compel a Phrygian or a native of Pontus to eat a locust, and he will think it scandalous. Force a Syrian, an African, or Arabian to swallow worms, he will have the same contempt for them as for flies, millepedes, and lizards, although the Syrians are accustomed to eat land-crocodiles, and the Africans even green lizards. In Egypt and Palestine, owing to the scarcity of cattle no one eats beef, or makes the flesh of bulls or oxen, or calves, a portion of their food. Moreover, in my provincehyperlink it is considered a crime to eat veal. Accordingly the Emperor Valens recently promulgated a law throughout the East, prohibiting the killing and eating of calves. He had in view the interests of agriculture, and wished to check the bad practice of the commoner sort of the people who imitated the Jews in devouring the flesh of calves, instead of fowls and sucking pigs. The Nomad tribes, and thehyperlink Troglodytes, and Scythians, and the barbaroushyperlink Huns with whom we have recently become acquainted, eat flesh half raw. Moreover the Icthyophagi, a wandering race on the shores of the Red Sea, broil fish on the stones made hot by the sun, and subsist on this poor food. Thehyperlink Sarmatians, thehyperlink Chuadi, thehyperlink Vandals, and countless other races, delight in the flesh of horses and wolves. Why should I speak of other nations when I myself, a youth on a visit to Gaul. heard that the Atticoti, a British tribe, eat human flesh, and that although they find herds of swine, and droves of large or small cattle in the woods, it is their custom to cut off the buttocks of the shepherds and the breasts of their women, and to regard them as the greatest delicacies? The Scots have no wives of their own; as though they read Plato's Republic and took Cato for their leader, no man among them has his own wife, but like beasts they indulge their lust to their hearts' content. The Persians, Medes, Indians, and Ethiopians, peoples on a par with Rome itself, have intercourse with mothers and grandmothers, with daughters and granddaughters. Thehyperlink Massagetae andhyperlink Derbices think those persons most unhappy who die of sickness-and when parents, kindred, or friends reach old age, they are murdered and devoured. It is thought better that they should be eaten by the people themselves than by the worms. Thehyperlink Tibareni crucify those whom they have loved before when they have grown old. Thehyperlink Hyrcani throw them out half alive to the birds and dogs: the Caspians leave them dead for the same beasts. The Scythians bury alive with the remains of the dead those who were beloved of the deceased. The Bactrians throw their old men to dogs which they rear for the very purpose, and when Stasanor, Alexander's general, wished to correct the practice, he almost lost his province. Force an Egyptian to drink sheep's milk: drive, if you can, a Pelusiote to eat an onion. Almost every city in Egypt venerates its own beasts and monsters, and whatever be the object of worship, that they think inviolable and sacred. Hence it is that their towns also are named after animals Leonto, Cyno, Lyco, Busyris, Thmuis, which is, being interpreted, a he-goat. And to make us understand what sort of gods Egypt always welcomed, one of their cities was recently calledhyperlink Antinous after Hadrian's favourite. You see clearly then that not only in eating, but also in burial, in wedlock, and in every department of life, each race follows its own practice and peculiar usages, and takes that for the law of nature which is most familiar to it. But suppose all nations alike ate flesh. and let that be everywhere lawful which the place produces. How does it concern us whose conversation is in heaven? who, as well as Pythagoras and Empedocles and all lovers of wisdom, are not bound to the circumstances of our birth, but of our new birth: who by abstinence subjugate our refractory flesh, eager to follow the allurements of lust? The eating of flesh, and drinking of wine, and fulness of stomach, is the seed-plot of lust. And so the comic poet says,hyperlink "Venus shivers unless Ceres and Bacchus be with her."
8. Through the five senses, as through open windows, vice has access to the soul. The metropolis and citadel of the mind cannot be taken unless the enemy have previously entered by its doors. The soul is distressed by the disorder they produce, and is led captive by sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. If any one delights in the sports of the circus, or the struggles of athletes, the versatility of actors, the figure of women, in splendid jewels, dress, silver and gold, and other things of the kind, the liberty of the soul is lost through the windows of the eyes, and the prophet's words are fulfilled:hyperlink "Death is come up into our windows." Again, our sense of hearing is flattered by the tones of various instruments and the modulations of the voice; and whatever enters the ear by the songs of poets and comedians, by the pleasantries and verses of pantomimic actors, weakens the manly fibre of the mind. Then, again, no one but a profligate denies that the profligate and licentious find a delight in sweet odours, different sorts of incense, fragrant balsam,hyperlink kuphi,hyperlink oenanthe, and musk, which is nothing but the skin of a foreign rat. And who does not know that gluttony is the mother of avarice, and, as it were, fetters the heart and keeps it pressed down upon the earth? For the sake of a temporary gratification of the appetite, land and sea are ransacked, and we toil and sweat our lives through, that we may send down our throats honey-wine and costly food. The desire to handle other men's persons, and the burning lust for women, is a passion bordering on insanity. To gratify this sense we languish, grow angry, throw ourselves about with joy, indulge envy, engage in rivalry, are filled with anxiety, and when we have terminated the pleasure with more or less repentance, we once more take fire, and want to do that which we again regret doing. Where, then, that which we may call the thin edge of disturbance, has entered the citadel of the mind through these doors, what will become of its liberty, its endurance, its thought of God, particularly since the sense of touch can picture to itself even bygone pleasures, and through the recollection of vice forces the soul to take part in them, and after a manner to practice what it does not actually commit?
Footnotes
1 This, according to i. 3, is "cannot be overthrown."
2 1 John iii. 9, 1 John iii. 10.
3 1 John v. 18.
4 1 John v. 21.
5 1 John i. 8 sq.
6 Is. lxv. 5. Quoted from memory. The LXX and Vulg. have like A. V. and Rev., "Come not near me."
7 1 John ii. 1.
8 2 Cor. vi. 14, 2 Cor. vi. 15.
9 Ps. li. 12.
10 1 John ii. 4.
11 1 John xiv. 6.
12 James ii. 26.
13 Jerome is perhaps hinting at the opinions of Jovinianus, that there was no other distinction between men than the grand division into righteous and wicked, and drawing from this the inference that whoever had been truly baptized had nothing further to gain by progress in the Christian life.
14 1 Peter ii. 22.
15 James iii. 2.
16 Job xiv. 4, Job xiv. 5, Sept.
17 Prov. xx. 9.
18 Ps. li. 5.
19 Job ix. 20, Job ix. 30. Sept.
20 1 John ii. 1, 1 John ii. 2.
21 S. John xiii. 10.
22 S. Matt. xvi. 18.
23 S. Luke xxi. 31.
24 S. Matt. vi. 12.
25 1 Cor. ix. 27.
26 2 Cor. xii. 7.
27 2 Cor. xi. 3.
28 2 Cor. ii. 10, 2 Cor. ii. 11.
29 1 Cor. x. 13.
30 1 Cor. x. 12.
31 Gal. v. 7.
32 1 Thess. ii. 18.
33 1 Cor. vii. 5.
34 Gal. v. 16, Gal. v. 17.
35 Eph. vi. 12.
36 Heb. vi. 4 sq.
37 Various dates, ranging between a.d. 126 and a.d. 173, are assigned to the origin of Montanism. In addition to the tenet, that the church has no power to remit sin after baptism (though the power was claimed for the Montanistic prophets) and that some sins exclude for ever from the communion of the saints on earth, although the mercy of God may be extended to them hereafter, Montanus held second marriages to be no better than adultery, proscribed military service and secular life in general, denounced profane learning and amusements of every kind, advocated extreme simplicity of female dress, practised frequent and severe fasting, and inculcated the most rigorous asceticism. The sect produced a great effect on the church and lasted until the sixth century. As is well known, Tertullian in middle life lapsed into Montanism, and he was the most distinguished of its champions. Montanism has been described as an anticipation of the mediaeval system of Rome.
38 The founder of the schism which afterwards bore the name of Novatian was Novatus, a presbyter of Carthage who went to Rome (about a.d. 250) and there co-operated with Novatianus, one of the most distinguished of the clergy of that city. The Novatianists, whose doctrines were near akin in many respects to those of Montanists, assumed the name of Cathari, or Puritans.
39 Heb. vi. 9.
40 James i. 12 sq.
41 Ecclus. xxvii. 5.
42 Ecclus. ii. 1.
43 James i. 22 sq.
44 James ii. 10.
45 Rom. xi. 32.
46 2 Pet. ii. 9.
47 2 Pet. ii. 17, 2 Pet. ii. 18.
48 Prov. xvi. 5. Sept.
49 Apoc. ii. 2 sq.
50 Matt. xi. 13.
51 1 Cor. x. ix.
52 Ps. xxvi. 1, Ps. xxvi. 2.
53 Ps. li. 1.
54 2 Chron. xxxiii. 12, 2 Chron. xxxiii. 13.
55 2 Kings xxiii. 29 sq. 2 Chron. xxxv. 20 sq.
56 Zech. iii. 1 sq.
57 Numb. xx. 13. Ps. cvi. 32.
58 Job v. 17.
59 Job vii. 1.
60 Jerome blends two passages, Is. xiv. 12 (in which the Sept. reading is "that sendest to;" R. V. "didst lay low") and Ezek. xxviii. 13 sq. In the passage from Isaiah the king of Babylon is compared to Lucifer, i.e. the shining one, the morning star, whose movements the Babylonians had been the first to record. See Sayce, Fresh Light from the Ancient Monuments, p. 178, and Cheyne's Isaiah. The subject of Ezekiel's prophecy is the Prince of Tyre.
61 Luke x. 18.
62 Job xl. 16, Job xl. 21. R. V. "He lieth under the lotus trees, in the covert of the reed and the fen."
63 Job xli. 34. Sept. R. V. "King over the sons of pride."
64 Job xli. 13 sq. R. V. for the latter part of the verse has "Round about his teeth is terror, his strong scales are his pride." Jerome's words are not found in the existing Septuagint.
65 The Septuagint omits much in this portion of the Book of Job.
66 xli. 27.
67 That is, deriving jumenta from juvo. The derivation, however, is from jungo.
68 Ps. viii. 5 sq.
69 The Italian beccafico.
70 1 Rom. xiv. 20: 1 Tim. iv. 5.
71 1 Tim. iv. 3.
72 Castum. Another reading is Cossum i.e. wood-worms, which were considered a delicacy in Pontus and Phrygia. The reading Castum is supported by Tert., De Iejun. cap. 16: In nostris xerophagiis blasphemias ingerens. Casto Isidis et Cybeles eos adaequas. Compare Arnob. Bk. V., and Jerome's Letter cvii. ad Laetam c. 10, and below c. 7.
73 See note on p. 383.
74 That is, of Side in Pamphylia. He lived in the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus Plus, a.d. 117-161. Only two fragments remain of his Greek poem in forty-two books.
75 He appears to be Flavius the Grammarian to whom reference is made in the Book on Illustrious Men, chap. 80:-Firmianus, quiet Lactantius, Arnobii discipulus, sub Diocletiano principe accitus cure Flavio grammatico, cujus de Medicinalibus versu compositi exstant libri, etc.
76 Born a.d. 23. His Historia Naturalis embraces astronomy, meteorology, geography, mineralogy, zoölogy, and botany and comprises according to the author's own account 20,000 matters of importance drawn from 2,000 volumes.
77 A native of Cilicia, who probably lived in the second century of the Christian era. He was a Greek physician and wrote a treatise on Materia Medica, in 5 books, which is still extant.
78 2 Cor. xii. 14.
79 2 Cor. iv. 16.
80 Phil. i. 23.
81 Rom. xiii. 14.
82 Matt. x. 9, Matt. xix. 21: Mark vi. 8.
83 Matt. xix. 21.
84 Cor. xv. 85.
85 1 Cor. vi. 13.
86 That is, the wood-worm just referred to.
87 Pannonia, of which Valens also was a native.
88 This name, which signifies dwellers in caves, was applied by Greek geographers to various peoples, but especially to the uncivilized inhabitants of the west coast of the Red Sea, along the shores of Upper Egypt and Aethiopia. The whole coast was called Troglodytice.
89 In 376 the Goths were driven out of their country by the Huns. They were allowed by Valens to cross the Danube, but war soon broke out and the emperor was defeated with great slaughter on Aug. 9, 378.
90 The Sarmatians dwelt on the N. E. of the Sea of Azov, E. of the river Don.
91 They were located in the S. E. of Germany.
92 The name given to the great confederacy of German peoples who in a.d. 409 traversed Germany and Gaul, and invaded Spain. In 429 they conquered all the Roman dominions in Africa, and in 455 they plundered Rome. Their kingdom was destroyed by Belisarius in 535.
93 A people of Central Asia. Cyrus the Great was slain in an expedition against them.
94 On the Oxus near its entrance into the Caspian Sea.
95 An agricultural people on the W. coast of Pontus.
96 Hyrcania was a province of the Persian Empire, on the S. and S. E. shores of the Caspian or Hyrcanian Sea Jerome draws many of these details from the treatise of Porphyry Peri apoxhj emyuxiwn.
97 Antinous was drowned in the Nile. a.d. 122. The emperor's grief was so great that he enrolled his favourite amongst the gods, caused a temple to be erected to his honour at Mantines, and founded the city of Antinoopolis.
98 Ter. Eunuch. iv. 5, 6.
99 Jer. ix. 21.
100 An Egyptian perfuming powder.
101 Probably an ointment made from the grape of the wild vine.
102 The celebrated Cynic philosopher. He died at Corinth, at the age of nearly 90, b.c. 323.
