EUSEBIUS PAMPHILUS OF CAESAREA
ORATION IN PRAISE OF THE EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, PRONOUNCED ON THE THIRTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF HIS REIGN.
EUSEBIUS PAMPHILUS OF CAESAREA
ORATION IN PRAISE OF THE EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, PRONOUNCED ON THE THIRTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF HIS REIGN.
I. Prologue to the Oration
I COME not forward prepared with
a fictitious narrative, nor with elegance of language to captivate the
ear, desiring to charm my hearers as it were, with a siren's voice; nor
shall I present the draught of pleasure in cups of gold decorated with
lorry flowers (I mean the graces of style) to those who are pleased with
such things. Rather would I follow the precepts of the wise, and admonish
all to avoid and turn aside from the beaten road, and keep themselves from
contact with the vulgar crowd. I come, then, prepared to celebrate our
emperor's praises in a newer strain; and, though the number be infinite
of those who desire to be my companions in my present task, I am resolved
to shun the common track of men, and to pursue that untrodden path which
it is unlawful to enter on with unwashed feet. Let those who admire a vulgar
style, abounding in puerile subtleties, and who court a pleasing and popular
muse, essay, since pleasure is the object they have in view, to charm the
earn of men by a narrative of merely human merits. Those, how- ever who
are initiated into the universal science, and have attained to Divine as
well as human knowledge, and account the choice of the latter as the real
excellence, will prefer those virtues of the emperor which Heaven itself
approves, and his pious actions, to his merely human accomplishments; and
will leave to inferior encomiasts the task of celebrating his lesser merits.
For since our emperor is gifted as well with that sacred wisdom which has
immediate reference to God, as with the knowledge which concerns the interests
of men; let those who are competent to such a task describe his secular
acquirements, great and transcendent as they are, and fraught with advantage
to man- kind (for all that characterizes the emperor is great and noble),
yet still inferior to his diviner qualifies, to those who stand without
the sacred precincts. Let those, however, who are within the sanctuary,
and have access to its inmost and untrodden recesses, close the doors against
every profane ear, and unfold, as it were, the secret mysteries of our
emperors character to the initiated alone. And let those who have purified
their ears in the streams of piety, and raised their thoughts on the soaring
wing of the mind itself, join the company which surrounds the Sovereign
Lord of all, and learn in silence the divine mysteries. Meanwhile let the
sacred oracles, given, not by the spirit of divination (or rather let me
say of madness and folly), but by the inspiration of Divine truth, be our
instructors in these mysteries; speaking to us of sovereignty, generally:
the heavenly array which surrounds the Lord of all; of that exemplar of
imperial power which is before us, and that counterfeit coin: and, lastly,
of the consequences which result from both. With these oracles, then, to
initiate us in the knowledge of the sacred rites, let us essay, as follows,
the commencement of our divine mysteries.
CHAPTER I: The Oration.
TODAY is the festival of our
great emperor: and we his children rejoice therein, feeling the inspiration
of our sacred theme. He who presides over our solemnity is the Great Sovereign
himself; he, I mean, who is truly great; of whom I affirm (nor will the
sovereign who hears me be offended, but will rather approve of this ascription
of praise to God), that HE is above and beyond all created things, the
Highest, the Greatest, the most Mighty One; whose throne is the arch of
heaven, and the earth the footstool of his feet. His being none can worthily
comprehend; and the ineffable splendor of the glory which surrounds him
repels the gaze of every eye from his Divine majesty. His ministers are
the heavenly hosts; his armies the supernal powers, angels, the companies
of archangels, the chorus of holy spirits, draw from and reflect his radiance
as from the fountains of everlasting light. Yea every light, and specially
those divine and incorporeal intelligences whose place is beyond the heavenly
sphere, celebrate this august Sovereign with lofty and sacred strains of
praise. The vast expanse of heaven, like an azure veil is interposed between
those without, and those who inhabit his royal mansions: while round this
expanse the sun and moon, with the rest of the heavenly luminaries (like
torch- bearers around the entrance of the imperial palace), perform, in
honor of their sovereign, their appointed courses; holding forth, at the
word of his command, an ever-burning light to those whose lot is cast in
the darker regions without the pale of heaven. And surely when I remember
that our own victorious emperor renders praises to this Mighty Sovereign,
I do well to follow him, knowing as I do that to him alone we owe that
imperial power under which we live. The pious Caesars, instructed by their
father's wisdom, acknowledge him as the source of every blessing: the soldiery,
the entire body of the people, both in the country and in the cities of
the empire, with the governors of the several provinces, assembling together
in accordance with the precept of their great Saviour and Teacher,, worship
him. In short, the whole family of mankind, of every nation, tribe, and
tongue, both collectively and severally, however diverse their opinions
on other subjects, are unanimous in this one confession; and, in obedience
to the reason implanted in them, and the spontaneous and uninstructed impulse
of their own minds, unite in calling on the One and only God.
Nay, does not the universal
frame of earth acknowledge him her Lord, and declare, by the vegetable
and animal life which she produces her subjection to the will of a superior
Power? The rivers, flowing with abundant stream, and the perennial fountains,
springing from hidden and exhaust-less depths, ascribe to him the cause
of their marvellous source. The mighty waters of the sea, enclosed in chambers
of unfathomable depth, and the swelling surges, which lift themselves on
high, and menace as it were the earth itself, shrink back when they approach
the shore, checked by the power of his Divine law. The duly measured fall
of winter's rain, the rolling thunder, the lightning's flash, the eddying
currents of the winds, and the airy courses of the clouds, all reveal his
presence to those to whom his Person is invisible. The all-radiant sun,
who holds his constant career through the lapse of ages, owns him Lord
alone, and obedient to his will, dares not depart from his appointed path.
The inferior splendor of the moon, alternatively diminished and increased
at stated periods, is subject to his Divine command. The beauteous mechanism
of the heavens, glittering with the hosts of stars, moving in harmonious
order, and preserving the measure of each several orbit, proclaims him
the giver of all light: yea, all the heavenly luminaries maintaining at
his will and word a grand and perfect unity of motion, pursue the track
of their ethereal career, and complete in the lapse of revolving ages their
distant course. The alternate recurrence of day and night, the changing
seasons, the order and proportion of the universe, all declare the manifold
wisdom of [his boundless power]. To him the unseen agencies which hold
their course throughout the expanse of space, render the due tribute of
praise. To him this terrestrial globe itself, to him the heavens above,
and the choirs beyond the vault of heaven, give honor as to their mighty
Sovereign: the angelic hosts greet him with ineffable songs of Praise;
and the spirits which draw their being from incorporeal light, adore him
as their Creator. The everlasting ages which were before this heaven and
earth, with other periods beside them, infinite, and antecedent to all
visible creation acknowledge him the sole and supreme Sovereign and Lord.
Lastly, he who is in all, before, and after all, his only begotten, pre-
existent Word, the great High Priest of the mighty God, elder than all
time and every age, devoted to his Father's glory, first and alone makes
intercession with him for the salvation of mankind. Supreme and pre- eminent
Ruler of the universe, he shares the glory of his Father's kingdom: for
he is that Light, which, transcendent above the universe, encircles the
Father's Person, interposing and dividing between the eternal and uncreated
Essence and all derived existence: that Light which, streaming from on
high, proceeds from that Deity who knows not origin or end, and illumines
the super-celestial regions, and all that heaven itself contains, with
the radiance of wisdom bright beyond the splendor of the sun. This is he
who holds a supreme dominion over this whole world, who is over and in
all things, and pervades all things visible and invisible; the Word of
God. From whom and by whom our divinely favored emperor, receiving, as
it were a transcript of the Divine sovereignty, directs, in imitation of
God himself, the administration of this world's affairs.
CHAPTER II.
THIS only begotten Word of
God reigns, from ages which had no beginning, to infinite and endless ages,
the partner of his Father's kingdom. And [our emperor] ever beloved by
him, who derives the source of imperial authority from above, and is strong
in the power of his sacred title, has controlled the empire of the world
for a long period of years. Again, that Preserver of the universe orders
these heavens and earth, and the celestial kingdom, consistently with his
Father's will. Even so our emperor whom he loves, by bringing those whom
he rules on earth to the only begotten Word and Saviour renders them fit
subjects of his kingdom. And as he who is the common Saviour of mankind,
by his invisible and Divine power as the good shepherd, drives far away
from his flock, like savage beasts, those apostate spirits which once flew
through the airy tracts above this earth, and fastened on the souls of
men; so this his friend, graced by his heavenly favor with victory over
all his foes, subdues and chastens the open adversaries of the truth in
accordance with the usages of war. He who is the pre-existent Word, the
Preserver of all things, imparts to his disciples the seeds of true wisdom
and salvation, and at once enlightens and gives them understanding in the
knowledge of his Father's kingdom. Our emperor, his friend, acting as interpreter
to the Word of God, aims at recalling the whole human race to the knowledge
of God; proclaiming clearly in the ears of all, and declaring with powerful
voice the laws of truth and godliness to all who dwell on the earth. Once
more, the universal Saviour opens the heavenly gates of his Father's kingdom
to those whose course is thitherward from this world. Our emperor, emulous
of his Divine example, having purged his earthly dominion from every stain
of impious error, invites each holy and pious worshiper within his imperial
mansions, earnestly desiring to save with all its crew that mighty vessel
of which he is the appointed pilot. And he alone of all who have wielded
the imperial power of Rome, being honored by the Supreme Sovereign with
a reign of three decennial periods, now celebrates this festival, not,
his ancestors might have done, in honor of infernal demons, or the apparitions
of seducing spirits, or of the fraud and deceitful arts of impious men;
but as an act of thanksgiving to him by whom he has thus been honored,
and in acknowledgment of the blessings he has received at his hands. He
does not, in imitation of ancient usage, defile his imperial mansions with
blood and gore, nor propitiate the infernal deities with fire and smoke,
and sacrificial offerings; but dedicates to the universal Sovereign a pleasant
and acceptable sacrifice, even his own imperial soul, and a mind truly
fitted for the service of God. For this sacrifice alone is grateful to
him: and this sacrifice our emperor has learned, with purified mind and
thoughts, to present as an offering without the intervention of fire and
blood, while his own piety, strengthened by the truthful doctrines with
which his soul is stored, he sets forth in magnificent language the praises
of God, and imitates his Divine philanthropy by his own imperial acts.
Wholly devoted to him, he dedicates himself as a noble offering, a first-fruit
of that world, the government of which is intrusted to his charge. This
first and greatest sacrifice our emperor first dedicates to God; and then,
as a faithful shepherd, he offers, not "famous hecatombs of firstling lambs,"
but the souls of that flock which is the object of his care, those rational
beings whom he leads to the knowledge and pious worship of God.
CHAPTER III.
AND gladly does he accept and
welcome this sacrifice, and commend the presenter of so august and noble
an offering, by protracting his reign to a lengthened period of years,
giving larger proofs of his beneficence in proportion to the emperor's
holy services to himself. Accordingly he permits him to celebrate each
successive festival during great and general prosperity throughout the
empire, advancing one of his sons, at the recurrence of each decennial
period, to a share of his own imperial power. The eldest, who bears his
father's name, he received as his partner in the empire about the close
of the first decade of his reign: the second, next in point of age, at
the second; and the third in like manner at the third decennial period,
the occasion of this our present festival. And now that the fourth period
has commenced, and the time of his reign is still further prolonged, he
desires to extend his imperial authority by calling still more of his kindred
to partake his power; and, by the appointment of the Caesars, fulfills
the predictions of the holy prophets, according to what they uttered ages
before: "And the saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom." And thus
the Almighty Sovereign himself accords an increase both of years and of
children to our most pious emperor, and renders his sway over the nations
of the world still fresh and flourishing, as though it were even now springing
up in its earliest vigor. He it is who appoints him this present festival,
in that he has made him victorious over every enemy that disturbed his
peace: he it is who displays him as an example of true godliness to the
human race. And thus our emperor, like the radiant sun, illuminates the
most distant subjects of his empire through the presence of the Caesars,
as with the far piercing rays of his own brightness. To us who occupy the
eastern regions he has given a son worthy of himself; a second and a third
respectively to other departments of his empire, to be, as it were, brilliant
reflectors of the light which proceeds from himself. Once more, having
harnessed, as it were, under the self-same yoke the four most noble Caesars
as horses in the imperial chariot, he sits on high and directs their course
by the reins of holy harmony and concord; and, himself every where present,
and observant of every event, thus traverses every region of the world.
Lastly, invested as he is with a semblance of heavenly sovereignty, he
directs his gaze above, and frames his earthly government according to
the pattern of that Divine original, feeling strength in its conformity
to the monarchy of God. And this conformity is granted by the universal
Sovereign to man alone of the creatures of this earth: for he only is the
author of sovereign power, who decrees that all should be subject to the
rule of one. And surely monarchy far transcends every other constitution
and form of government: for that democratic equality of power, which is
its opposite, may rather be described as anarchy and disorder. Hence there
is one God, and not two, or three, or more: for to assert a plurality of
gods is plainly to deny the being of God at all. There is one Sovereign;
and his Word and royal Law is one: a Law not expressed in syllables and
words, not written or engraved on tablets, and therefore subject to the
ravages of time; but the living and self- subsisting Word, who himself
is God, and who administers his Father's kingdom on behalf of all who are
after him and subject to his power. His attendants are the heavenly hosts;
the myriads of God's angelic ministers; the super- terrestrial armies,
of unnumbered multitude; and those unseen spirits within heaven itself,
whose agency is employed in regulating the order of this world. Ruler and
chief of all these is the royal Word, acting as Regent of the Supreme Sovereign.
To him the names of Captain, and great High Priest, Prophet of the Father,
Angel of mighty counsel, Brightness of the Father's light, Only begotten
Son, with a thousand other titles, are ascribed in the oracles of the sacred
writers. And the Father, having constituted him the living Word, and Law
and Wisdom the fullness of all blessing, has presented this best and greatest
gift to all who are the subjects of his sovereignty. And he himself, who
pervades all things, and is every where present, unfolding his Father's
bounties to all with unsparing hand, has accorded a specimen of his sovereign
power even to his rational creatures of this earth, in that he has provided
the mind of man, who is formed after his own image, with Divine faculties,
whence it is capable of other virtues also, which flow from the same heavenly
source. For he only is wise, who is the only God: he only is essentially
good: he only is of mighty power, the Parent of justice, the Father of
reason and wisdom, the Fountain of light and life, the Dispenser of truth
and virtue: in a word, the Author of empire itself, and of all dominion
and power.
CHAPTER IV.
BUT whence has man this knowledge,
and who has ministered these truths to mortal ears? Or whence has a tongue
of flesh the power to speak of things so utterly distinct from fleshly
or material substance? Who has gazed on the invisible King, and beheld
these perfections in him? The bodily sense may comprehend elements and
their combinations, of a nature kindred to its own: but no one yet has
boasted to have scanned with corporeal eye that unseen kingdom which governs
all things nor has mortal nature yet discerned the beauty of perfect wisdom.
Who has beheld the face of righteousness through the medium of flesh? And
whence came the idea of legitimate sovereignty and imperial power to man?
Whence the thought of absolute dominion to a being composed of flesh and
blood? Who declared those ideas which are invisible and undefined, and
that incorporeal essence which has no external form, to the mortals of
this earth? Surely there was but one interpreter of these things;
the all-pervading Word of God. For he is the author of that rational
and intelligent being which exists in man; and, being himself one with
his Father's Divine nature, he sheds upon his offspring the outflowings
of his Father's bounty. Hence the natural and untaught powers of thought,
which all men, Greeks or Barbarians, alike possess: hence the perception
of reason and wisdom, the seeds of integrity and righteousness, the understanding
of the arts of life, the knowledge of virtue, the precious name of wisdom,
and the noble love of philosophic learning. Hence the knowledge of all
that is great and good: hence apprehension of God himself, and a life worthy
of his worship: hence the royal authority of man, and his invincible lordship
over the creatures of this world. And when that Word, who is the
Parent of rational beings, had impressed a character on the mind of man
according to the image and likeness of God, and had made him a royal creature,
in that he gave him alone of all earthly creatures capacity to rule and
to obey (as well as forethought and foreknowledge even here, concerning
the promised hope of his heavenly kingdom, because of which he himself
came, and, as the Parent of his children, disdained not to hold converse
with mortal men); he continued to cherish the seeds which himself had sown,
and renewed his gracious favors from above; holding forth to all the promise
of sharing his heavenly kingdom. Accordingly he called men, and exhorted
them to be ready for their heavenward journey, and to provide themselves
with the garment which became their calling. And by an indescribable power
he filled the world in every part with his doctrine, expressing by the
similitude of an earthly kingdom that heavenly one to which he earnestly
invites all mankind, and presents it to them as a worthy object of their
hope.
CHAPTER V.
AND in this hope our divinely-favored
emperor partakes even in this present life, gifted as he is by God with
native virtues, and having received into his soul the out- flowings of
his favor. His reason he derives from the great Source of all reason: he
is wise, and good, and just, as having fellowship with perfect Wisdom,
Goodness, and Righteousness: virtuous, as following the pattern of perfect
virtue: valiant, as partaking of heavenly strength. And truly may he deserve
the imperial title, who has formed his soul to royal virtues, according
to the standard of that celestial kingdom. But he who is a stranger to
these blessings, who denies the Sovereign of the universe, and owns no
allegiance to the heavenly Father of spirits; who invests not himself with
the virtues which become , an emperor, but overlays his soul with moral
deformity and baseness; who for royal clemency substitutes the fury of
a savage beast; for a generous temper, the incurable venom of malicious
wickedness; for prudence, folly; for reason and wisdom, that recklessness
which is the most odious of all vices, for from it, as from a spring of
bitterness, proceed the most pernicious fruits; such as inveterate profligacy
of life, covetousness, murder, impiety and defiance of God; surely one
abandoned to; such vices as these, however he may be deemed powerful through
despotic violence, has no true title to the name of Emperor. For how should
he whose soul is impressed with a thousand absurd images of false deities,
be able to exhibit a counterpart of the true and heavenly sovereignty?
Or how can he be absolute lord of others, who has subjected himself to
the dominion of a thousand cruel masters? a slave of low delights and ungoverned
lust, a slave of wrongfully-extorted wealth, of rage and passion, as well
as of cowardice and terror; a slave of ruthless demons, and soul-destroying
spirits? Let, then, our emperor, on the testimony of truth itself, be declared
alone worthy of the title; who is dear to the Supreme Sovereign himself;
who alone is free, nay, who is truly lord: above the thirst of wealth,
superior to sexual desire; victorious even over natural pleasures; controlling,
not controlled by, anger and passion. He is indeed an emperor, and bears
a title corresponding to his deeds; a VICTOR in truth, who has gained the
victory over those passions which overmaster the rest of men: whose character
is formed after the Divine original a of the Supreme Sovereign, and whose
mind reflects, as in a mirror, the radiance of his virtues. Hence is our
emperor perfect in discretion, in goodness, in justice, in courage, in
piety, in devotion to God: he truly and only is a philosopher, since he
knows himself, and is fully aware that supplies of every blessing are showered
on him from a source quite external to himself, even from heaven itself.
Declaring the august title of supreme authority by the splendor of his
vesture, he alone worthily wears that imperial purple which so well becomes
him. He is indeed an emperor, who calls on and implores in prayer
the favor of his heavenly Father night and day, and whose ardent desires
are fixed on his celestial kingdom. For he knows that present things, subject
as they are to decay and death, flowing on and disappearing like a river's
stream, are not worthy to be compared with him who is sovereign of all;
therefore it is that he longs for the incorruptible and incorporeal kingdom
of God. And this kingdom he trusts he shall obtain, elevating his mind
as he does in sublimity of thought above the vault of heaven, and filled
with inexpressible longing for the glories which shine there, in comparison
with which he deems the precious things of this present world but darkness.
For he sees earthly sovereignty to be but a petty and fleeting dominion
over a mortal and temporary life, and rates it not much higher than the
goatherd's, or shepherd's, or herdsman's power: nay, as more burdensome
than theirs, and exercised over more stubborn subjects.The acclamations
of the people, and the voice of flattery, he reckons rather troublesome
than pleasing, because of the steady constancy of his character, and genuine
discipline of his mind. Again, when he beholds the military service
of his subjects, the vast array of his armies, the multitudes of horse
and foot, entirely devoted to his command, he feels no astonishment, no
pride at the possession of such mighty power; but turns his thoughts inward
on himself, and recognizes the same common nature there. He smiles at his
vesture, embroidered with gold and flowers, and at the imperial purple
and diadem itself, when he sees the multitude gaze in wonder, like children
at a bugbear, on the splendid spectacle. Himself superior to such feelings,
he clothes his soul with the knowledge of God, that vesture, the broidery
of which is temperance, righteousness, piety, and all other virtues; a
vesture such as truly becomes a sovereign. The wealth which others so much
desire, as gold, silver, or precious gems, he regards to be, as they really
are, in themselves mere stones and worthless matter, of no avail to preserve
or defend from evil. For what power have these things to free from disease,
or repel the approach of death? And knowing as he does this truth by personal
experience in the use of these things, he regards the splendid attire of
his subjects with calm indifference, and smiles at the childishness of
those to whom they prove attractive. Lastly, he abstains from all excess
in food and wine, and leaves superfluous dainties to gluttons, judging
that such indulgences, I however suitable to others, are not so to him,
and deeply convinced of their pernicious tendency, and their effect in
darkening the intellectual powers of the soul. For all these reasons, our
divinely taught and noble-minded emperor, aspiring to higher objects than
this life affords, calls upon his heavenly Father as one who longs for
his kingdom; exhibits a pious spirit in each action of his life; and finally,
as a wise and good instructor, imparts to his subjects the knowledge of
him who is the Sovereign Lord of all.
CHAPTER VI.
AND God himself, as an earnest
of future reward, assigns to him now as it were tricennial crowns composed
of prosperous periods of time; and now, after the revolution of three circles
of ten years, he grants permission to all mankind to celebrate this general,
nay rather, this universal festival. And while those on earth thus rejoice,
crowned as it were with the flowers of divine knowledge, surely, we may
not unduly suppose that the heavenly choirs, attracted by a natural sympathy,
unite their joy with the joy of those on earth: nay, that the Supreme Sovereign
himself, as a gracious father, delights in the worship of duteous children,
and for this reason is pleased to honor the author and cause of their obedience
through a lengthened period of time; and, far from limiting his reign to
three decennial circles of years, he extends it to the remotest period,
even to far distant eternity. Now eternity in its whole extent is
beyond the power of decline or death: its beginning and extent alike incapable
of being scanned by mortal thoughts. Nor will it suffer its central point
to be perceived, nor that which is termed its present duration to be grasped
by the inquiring mind. Far less, then, the future, or the past: for the
one is not, but is already gone; while the future has not yet arrived,
and therefore is not. As regards what is termed the present time, it vanishes
even as we think or speak, more swiftly than the word itself is uttered.
Nor is it possible in any sense to apprehend this time as present; for
we must either expect the future, or contemplate the past; the present
slips from us, and is gone, even in the act of thought. Eternity, then,
in its whole extent, resists and refuses subjection to mortal reason. But
it does not refuse to acknowledge its own Sovereign and Lord, and bears
him as it were mounted on itself, rejoicing in the fair trappings which
he bestows. And he himself, not binding it, as the poet imagined, with
a golden chain, but as it were controlling its movements by the reins of
ineffable wisdom, has adjusted its months and seasons, its times and years,
and the alterations of day and night, with perfect harmony, and has thus
attached to it limits and measures of various kinds. For eternity, being
in its nature direct, and stretching onward into infinity, and receiving
its name, eternity, as having an everlasting existence, and being similar
in all its parts, or rather having no division or distance, progresses
only in a line of direct extension. But God, who has distributed it by
intermediate sections, and has divided it, like a far extended line, in
many points, has included in it a vast number of portions; and though it
is in its nature one, and resembles unity itself, he has attached to it
a multiplicity of numbers, and has given it, though formless in itself,
an endless variety of forms. For first of all he framed in it formless
matter, as a substance capable of receiving all forms. He next, by the
power of the number two, imparted quality to matter, and gave beauty to
that which before was void of all grace. Again, by means of the number
three, he framed a body compounded of matter and form, and presenting the
three dimensions of breadth, and length, and depth. Then, from the doubling
of the number two, he devised the quaternion of the elements, earth, water,
air, and fire, and ordained them to be everlasting sources for the supply
of this universe. Again, the number four produces the number ten. For the
aggregate of one, and two, and three, and four, is ten. And three multiplied
with ten discovers the period of a month: and twelve successive months
complete the course of the sun. Hence the revolutions of years, and changes
of the seasons, which give grace, like variety of color in painting, to
that eternity which before was formless and devoid of beauty, for the refreshment
and delight of those whose lot it is to traverse therein the course of
life. For as the ground is defined by stated distances for those who run
in hope of obtaining the prize; and as the road of those who travel on
a distant journey is marked by resting- places and measured intervals,
that the traveler's courage may not fail at the interminable prospect;
even so the Sovereign of the universe, controlling eternity itself within
the restraining power of his own wisdom, directs and turns its course as
he judges best. The same God, I say, who thus clothes the once undefined
eternity as with fair colors and blooming flowers, gladdens the day with
the solar rays; and, while he overspreads the night with a covering of
darkness, yet causes the glittering stars, as golden spangles, to shine
therein. It is he who lights up the brilliancy of the morning stab the
changing splendor of the moon, and the glorious companies of the starry
host, and has arrayed the expanse of heaven, like some vast mantle, in
colors of varied beauty. Again, having created the lofty and profound expanse
of air, and caused the world in its length and breadth to feel its cooling
influence, he decreed that the air itself should be graced with birds of
every kind, and left open this vast ocean of space to be traversed by every
creature, visible or invisible, whose course is through the tracts of heaven.
In the midst of this atmosphere he poised the earth, as it were its center,
and encompassed it with the ocean as with a beautiful azure vesture. Having
ordained this earth to be at once the home, the nurse, and the mother of
all the creatures it contains, and watered it both with rain and water-springs,
he caused it to abound in plants and flowers of every species, for the
enjoyment of life. And when he had formed man in his own likeness, the
noblest of earthly creatures, and dearest to himself, a creature gifted
with intellect and knowledge, the child of reason and wisdom, he gave him
dominion over all other animals which move and live upon the earth. For
man was in truth of all earthly creatures the dearest to God: man, I say,
to whom, as an indulgent Father, he has subjected the brute creation; for
whom he has made the ocean navigable, and crowned the earth with a profusion
of plants of every kind; to whom he has granted reasoning faculties for
acquiring all science; under whose control he has placed even the creatures
of the deep, and the winged inhabitants of the air; to whom he has permitted
the contemplation of celestial objects, and revealed the course and changes
of the sun and moon, and the periods of the planets and fixed stars. In
short, to man alone of earthly beings has he given commandment to acknowledge
him as his heavenly Father, and to celebrate his praises as the Supreme
Sovereign of eternity itself. 8. But the unchangeable course of eternity
the Creator has limited by the four seasons of the year, terminating the
winter by the approach of spring, and regulating as with an equal balance
that season which commences the annual period. Having thus graced the eternal
course of time with the varied productions of spring, he added the summer's
heat; and then granted as it were a relief of toil by the interval of autumn:
and lastly, refreshing and cleansing the season by the showers of winter,
he brings it, rendered sleek land glossy, like a noble steed, by these
abundant rains, once more to the gates of spring. As soon, then, as the
Supreme Sovereign had thus connected his own eternity by these cords of
wisdom with the annual circle, he committed it to the guidance of a mighty
Governor, even his only begotten Word, to whom, as the Preserver of all
creation, he yielded the reins of universal power. And he, receiving this
inheritance as from a beneficent Father, and uniting all things both above
and beneath the circumference of heaven in one harmonious whole, directs
their uniform course; providing with perfect justice whatever is expedient
for his rational creatures on the earth, appointing its allotted limits
to human life, and granting to all alike permission to anticipate even
here the commencement of a future existence. For he has taught them that
beyond this present world there is a divine and blessed state of being,
reserved for those who have been supported here by the hope of heavenly
blessings; and that those who have lived a virtuous and godly life will
remove hence to a far better habitation; while he adjudges to those who
have been guilty and wicked here a place of punishment according to their
crimes. Again, as in the distribution of prizes at the public games, he
proclaims various crowns to the victors, and invests each with the rewards
of different virtues: but for our good emperor, who is clothed in the very
robe of piety, he declares that a higher recompense of his toils is prepared;
and, as a prelude to this recompense, permits us now to assemble at this
festival, which is composed of perfect numbers, of decades thrice, and
triads ten times repeated. The first of these, the triad, is the offspring
of the unit, while the unit is the mother of number itself, and presides
over all months, and seasons, and years, and every period of time. It may,
indeed, be justly termed the origin, foundation, and principle of all number,
and derives its name from its abiding character. For, while every other
number is diminished or increased according to the subtraction or addition
of others, the unit alone continues fixed and steadfast, abstracted from
all multitude and the numbers which are formed from it, and resembling
that indivisible essence which is distinct from all things beside, but
by virtue of participation in which the nature of all things else subsists.
For the unit is the originator of every number, since all multitude is
made up by the composition and addition of units; nor is it possible without
the unit to conceive the existence of number at all. But the unit itself
is independent of multitude, apart from and superior to all number; forming,
indeed, and making all, but receiving no increase from any. Kindred
to this is the triad; equally indivisible and perfect, the first of those
sums which are formed of even and uneven numbers. For the perfect number
two, receiving the addition of the unit, forms the triad, the first perfect
compound number. And the triad, by explaining what equality is, first taught
men justice, having itself an equal beginning, and middle, and end. And
it is also an image of the mysterious, most holy, and royal Trinity, which,
though itself without beginning or origin, yet contains the germs, the
reasons, and causes of the existence of all created things. Thus the power
of the triad may justly be regarded as the first cause of all things. Again,
the number ten, which contains the end of all numbers, and terminates them
in itself, may truly be called a full and perfect number, as comprehending
every species and every measure of numbers, proportions, concords, and
harmonies. For example, the units by addition form and are terminated by
the number ten; and, having this number as their parent, and as it were
the limit of their course they round this as the goal of their career.
Then they perform a second circuit, and again a third, and a fourth, until
the tenth and thus by ten decades they complete the hundredth number. Returning
thence to the first starting point, they again proceed to the number ten,
and having ten times completed the hundredth number, again they recede,
and perform round the same barriers their protracted course, proceeding
from themselves back to themselves again, with revolving motion. For the
unit is the tenth of ten, and ten units make up a decade, which is itself
the limit, the settled goal and boundary of units: it is that which terminates
the infinity of number; the term and end of units. Again, the triad combined
with the decade, and performing a threefold circuit of tens, produces that
most natural number, thirty. For as the triad is in respect to units, so
is the number thirty in respect to tens. It is also the constant limit
to the course of that luminary which is second to the sun in brightness.
For the course of the moon from one conjunction with the sun to the next,
completes the period of a month; after which, receiving as it were a second
birth, it recommences a new light, and other days, being adorned and honored
with thirty units, three decades, and ten triads. In the same manner is
the universal reign of our victorious emperor distinguished by the giver
of all good, and now enters on a new sphere of blessing, accomplishing,
at present, this tricennalian festival, but reaching forward beyond this
to far more distant intervals of time, and cherishing the hope of future
blessings in the celestial kingdom; where, not a single sun, but infinite
hosts of light surround the Almighty Sovereign, each surpassing the splendor
of the sun, glorious and resplendent with rays derived from the everlasting
source of light. There the soul enjoys its existence, surrounded
by fair and unfading blessings; there is a life beyond the reach of sorrow;
there the enjoyment of pure and holy pleasures, and a time of unmeasured
and endless duration, extending into illimitable space; not defined by
intervals of days and months, the revolutions of years, or the recurrence
of times and seasons, but commensurate with a life which knows no end.
And this life needs not the light of the sun, nor the lustre of the moon
or the starry host, since it has the great Luminary himself, even God the
Word, the only begotten Son of the Almighty Sovereign. Hence it is that
the mystic and sacred oracles reveal him to be the Sun of righteousness,
and the Light which far transcends all light. We believe that he illumines
also the thrice-blessed powers of heaven with the rays of righteousness,
and the brightness of wisdom, and that he receives truly pious souls, not
within the sphere of heaven alone, but into his own bosom, and confirms
indeed the assurances which he himself has given. No mortal eye has seen,
nor ear heard, nor can the mind in its vesture of flesh understand what
things are prepared for those who have been here adorned with the graces
of godliness; blessings which await thee too, most pious emperor, to whom
alone since the world began has the Almighty Sovereign of the universe
granted power to purify the course of human life: to whom also he has revealed
his own symbol of salvation, whereby he overcame the power of death, and
triumphed over every enemy. And this victorious trophy, the scourge of
evil spirits, thou hast arrayed against the errors of idol worship, and
hast obtained the victory not only over all thy impious and savage foes,
but over equally barbarous adversaries, the evil spirits themselves.
CHAPTER VII.
FOR whereas we are composed
of two distinct natures, I mean of body and spirit, of which the one is
visible to all, the other invisible, against both these natures two kinds
of barbarous and savage enemies, the one invisibly, the other openly, are
constantly arrayed. The one oppose our bodies with bodily force the other
with incorporeal assaults besiege the naked soul itself. Again, the visible
barbarians, like the wild nomad tribes, no better than savage beasts, assail
the nations of civilized men, ravage their country, and enslave their cities,
rushing on those who inhabit them like ruthless wolves of the desert, and
destroying all who fall under their power. But those unseen foes, more
cruel far than barbarians, I mean the soul-destroying demons whose course
is through the regions of the air, had succeeded, through the snares of
vile polytheism, in enslaving the entire human race, insomuch that they
no longer recognized the true God, but wandered in the mazes of atheistic
error. For they procured, I know not whence, gods who never anywhere existed,
and set him aside who is the only and the true God, as though he were not.
Accordingly the generation of bodies was esteemed by them a deity, and
so the opposite principle to this, their dissolution and destruction, was
also deified. The first, as the author of generative power, was honored
with rites under the name of Venus: the second, as rich, and mighty in
dominion over the human race, received the names of Pluto, and Death. For
men in those ages, knowing no other than naturally generated life, declared
the cause and origin of that life to be divine: and again, believing in
no existence after death, they proclaimed Death himself a universal conqueror
and a mighty god. Hence, unconscious of responsibility, as destined to
be annihilated by death, they lived a life unworthy of the name, in the
practice of actions deserving a thousand deaths. No thought of God could
enter their minds, no expectation of Divine judgment, no recollection of,
no reflection on, their spiritual existence: acknowledging one dread superior,
Death, and persuaded that the dissolution of their bodies by his power
was final annihilation, they bestowed on Death the title of a mighty, a
wealthy god, and hence the name of Pluto. Thus, then, Death became to them
a god; nor only so, but whatever else they accounted precious in comparison
with death, whatever contributed to the luxuries of life. Hence animal
pleasure became to them a god; nutrition, and its production, a god; the
fruit of trees, a god; drunken riot, a god; carnal desire and pleasure,
a god. Hence the mysteries of Ceres and Proserpine, the rape of the latter,
and her subsequent restoration, by Pluto: hence the orgies of Bacchus,
and Hercules overcome by drunkenness as by a mightier god: hence the adulterous
rites of Cupid and of Venus: hence Jupiter himself infatuated with the
love of women, and of Ganymede: hence the licentious legends of deities
abandoned to effeminacy and pleasure. Such were the weapons of superstition
whereby these cruel barbarians and enemies of the Supreme God afflicted,
and indeed entirely subdued, the human race; erecting everywhere the monuments
of impiety, and rearing in every corner the shrines and temples of their
false religion. Nay, so far were the ruling powers of those times enslaved
by the force of error, as to appease their gods with the blood of their
own countrymen and kindred; to whet their swords against those who stood
forward to defend the truth; to maintain a ruthless war and raise unholy
hands, not against foreign or barbarian foes, but against men l bound to
them by the ties of family and affection, against brethren, and kinsmen,
and dearest friends, who had resolved, in the practice of virtue and true
piety, to honor and worship God. Such was the spirit of madness with which
these princes sacrificed to their demon deities men consecrated to the
service of the King of kings. On the other hand their victims, as noble
martyrs in the cause of true godliness, resolved to welcome a glorious
death in preference to life itself, and utterly despised these cruelties.
Strengthened, as soldiers of God, with patient fortitude, they mocked at
death in all its forms; at fire, and sword, and the torment of crucifixion;
at exposure to savage beasts, and drowning in the depths of the sea; at
the cutting off and searing of limbs, the digging out of eyes, the mutilation
of the whole body; lastly, at famine, the labor of the mines, and captivity:
nay, all these sufferings they counted better than any earthly good or
pleasure, for the love they bore their heavenly King. In like manner women
also evinced a spirit of constancy and courage not inferior to that of
men. Some endured the same conflicts with them, and obtained a like reward
of their virtue: others, forcibly carried off to be the victims of violence
and pollution, welcomed death rather than dishonor; while many, very many
more, endured not even to hear the same threats wherewith they were assailed
by the provincial governors, but boldly sustained every variety of torture,
and sentence of death in every form? Thus did these valiant soldiers of
the Almighty Sovereign maintain the conflict with steadfast fortitude of
soul against the hostile forces of polytheism: and thus did these enemies
of God and adversaries of man's salvation, more cruel far than the ferocious
savage, delight in libations of human blood: thus did their ministers drain
as it were the cup of unrighteous slaughter in honor of the demons whom
they served, and prepare for them this dread and impious banquet, to the
ruin of the human race. In these sad circumstances, what course should
the God and King of these afflicted ones pursue? Could he be careless of
the safety of his dearest friends or abandon his servants in this great
extremity? Surely none could deem him a wary pilot, who, without an effort
to save his fellow- mariners should suffer his vessel to sink with all
her crew: surely no general could be found so reckless as to yield his
own allies, without resistance, to the mercy of the foe: nor can a faithful
shepherd regard with unconcern the straying of a single sheep from his
flock, but will rather leave the rest in safety, and dare all things for
the wanderer's sake, even, if need be, to contend with savage beasts. The
zeal, however, of the great Sovereign of all was for no unconscious sheep:
his care was exercised for his own faithful host, for those who sustained
the battle for his sake: whose conflicts in the cause of godliness he himself
approved, and honored those who had returned to his presence with the prize
of victory which he only can bestow, uniting them to the angelic choirs.
Others he still preserved on earth, to communicate the living seeds of
piety to future generations; to be at once eye- witnesses of his vengeance
on the ungodly, and narrators of the events. After this he outstretched
his arm in judgment on the adversaries, and utterly destroyed them with
the stroke of Divine wrath, compelling them, how reluctant soever to confess
with their own lips and recant their wickedness, but raising from the ground
and exalting gloriously those who had long been oppressed and disclaimed
by all. Such were the dealings of the Supreme Sovereign, who ordained an
invincible champion to be the minister of his heaven-sent vengeance (for
our emperor's surpassing piety delights in the title of Servant of God),
and him he has, proved victorious over all that opposed him, having raised
him up, an individual against many foes. For they were indeed numberless,
being the friends of many evil spirits (though in reality they were nothing,
and hence are now no more); but our emperor is one, appointed by, and the
representative of, the one Almighty Sovereign. And they, in the very spirit
of impiety, destroyed the righteous with cruel slaughter: but he, in imitation
of his Saviour, and knowing only how to save men's lives, has spared and
instructed in godliness the impious themselves. And so, as truly worthy
the name of VICTOR, he has subdued the twofold race of barbarians; soothing
the savage tribes of men by prudent embassies, compelling them to know
and acknowledge their superiors, and reclaiming them from a lawless and
brutal life to the governance of reason and humanity; at the same time
that he proved by the facts themselves that the fierce and ruthless race
of unseen spirits had long ago been vanquished by a higher power. For he
who is the preserver of the universe had punished these invisible spirits
by an invisible judgment: and our emperor, as the delegate of the Supreme
Sovereign, has followed up the victory, bearing away the spoils of those
who have long since died and mouldered into dust, and distributing the
plunder with lavish hand among the soldiers of his victorious Lord.
CHAPTER VIII.
FOR as soon as he understood
that the ignorant multitudes were inspired with a vain and childish dread
of these bugbears of error, wrought in gold and silver, he judged it right
to remove these also, like stumbling- stones thrown in the path of men
walking in the dark, and henceforward to open a royal road, plain and unobstructed,
to all. Having formed this resolution, he considered that no soldiers or
military force of any sort was needed for the repression of the evil: a
few of his own friends sufficed for this service, and these he sent by
a simple expression of his will to visit each several province. Accordingly,
sustained by confidence in the emperor's piety and their own personal devotion
to God, they passed through the midst of numberless tribes and nations,
abolishing this ancient system of error in every city and country. They
ordered the priests themselves, in the midst of general laughter and scorn,
to bring their gods from their dark recesses to the light of day. They
then stripped them of their ornaments, and exhibited to the gaze of all
the unsightly reality which had been hidden beneath a painted exterior:
and lastly, whatever part of the material appeared to be of value they
scraped off and melted in the fire to prove its worth, after which they
secured and set apart whatever they judged needful for their purposes,
leaving to the superstitious worshipers what was altogether useless, as
a memorial of their shame. Meanwhile our admirable prince was himself engaged
in a work similar to that we have described. For at the same time that
these costly images of the dead were stripped, as we have said, of their
precious materials, he also attacked those composed of brass; causing those
to be dragged from their places with ropes, and, as it were, carried away
captive, whom the dotage of mythology had esteemed as gods. The next care
of our august emperor was to kindle, as it were, a brilliant torch, by
the light of which he directed his imperial gaze around, to see if any
hidden vestiges of error might yet exist. And as the keen-sighted eagle
in its heavenward flight is able to descry from its lofty height the most
distant objects on the earth: so did he whilst residing in the imperial
palace of his own fair city, discover, as from a watch- tower, a hidden
and fatal snare of souls in the province of Phoenicia. This was a grove
and temple, not situated in the midst of any city, or in any public place,
as for splendor of effect is generally the case, but apart from the beaten
and frequented road, on part of the summit of Mount Lebanon, and dedicated
to the foul demon known by the name of Venus. It was a school of wickedness
for all the abandoned rotaries of impurity and such as destroyed their
bodies with effeminacy. Here men undeserving the name forgot the dignity
of their sex, and propitiated the demon by their effeminate conduct: here
too unlawful commerce of women, and adulterous intercourse, with other
horrible and infamous practices, were perpetrated in this temple as in
a place beyond the scope and restraint of law.
Meantime these evils remained unchecked
by the presence of any observer, since no one of fair character ventured
to visit such scenes.These proceedings, however, could not escape the vigilance
of our august emperor, who, having himself inspected them with characteristic
forethought, and judging that such a temple was unfit for the light of
heaven, gave orders that the building with its offerings should be utterly
destroyed. Accordingly, in obedience to the imperial edict, these engines
of an impure superstition were immediately abolished, and the hand of military
force was made instrumental in purging the place. And now those who had
heretofore lived without restraint, learned, through the imperial threat
of punishment, to practice self-control. Thus did our emperor tear the
mask from this system of delusive wickedness, and expose it to the public
gaze, at the same time proclaiming openly his Saviour's name to all. No
advocate appeared; neither god nor demon, prophet nor diviner, could lend
his aid to the detected authors of the imposture. For the souls of men
were no longer enveloped in thick darkness: but enlightened by the rays
of true godliness, they deplored the ignorance and pitied the blindness
of their forefathers, rejoicing at the same time in their own deliverance
from such fatal error.
9. Thus speedily, according to the
counsel of the mighty God, and through our emperor's agency, was every
enemy, whether visible or unseen, utterly removed: and henceforward peace,
the happy nurse of youth, extended her reign throughout the world. Wars
were no more, for the gods were not: no more did warfare in country or
town, no more did the effusion of human blood, distress mankind, as heretofore,
when demon- worship and the madness of idolatry prevailed.
CHAPTER IX.
AND now we may well compare
the present with former things, and review these happy changes in contrast
with the evils that are past, and mark the elaborate care with which in
ancient times porches and sacred precincts, groves and temples, were prepared
in every city for these false deities, and how their shrines were enriched
with abundant offerings. The sovereign rulers of those days had indeed
a high regard for the worship of the gods. The nations also and people
subject to their power honored them with images both in the country and
in every city, nay, even in their houses and secret chambers, according
to the religious practice of their fathers. The fruit, however, of this
devotion, far different from the peaceful concord which now meets our view,
appeared in war, in battles, and seditions, which harassed them throughout
their lives, and deluged their countries with blood and civil slaughter.
Again, the objects of their worship could hold out to these sovereigns
with artful flattery the promise of prophecies, and oracles, and the knowledge
of futurity: yet could they not predict their own destruction, nor forewarn
themselves of the coming ruin: and surely this was the greatest and most
convincing proof of their imposture. Not one of those whose words once
were heard with awe and wonder, had announced the glorious advent of the
Saviour of mankind, or that new revelation of divine knowledge which he
came to give. Not Pythius himself, nor any of those mighty gods, could
apprehend the prospect of their approaching desolation; nor could their
oracles point at him who was to be their conqueror and destroyer. What
prophet or diviner could foretell that their rites would vanish at the
presence of a new Deity in the world, and that the knowledge and worship
of the Almighty Sovereign should be freely given to all mankind? Which
of them foreknew the august and pious reign of our victorious emperor,
or his triumphant conquests everywhere over the false demons, or the overthrow
of their high places? Which of the heroes has announced the melting down
and conversion of the lifeless statues from their useless forms to the
necessary uses of men? Which of the gods have yet had power to speak of
their own images thus melted and contemptuously reduced to fragments? Where
were the protecting powers, that they should not interpose to save their
sacred memorials, thus destroyed by man? Where, I ask, are those who once
maintained the strife of war, yet now behold their conquerors abiding securely
in the profoundest peace? And where are they who upheld themselves in a
blind and foolish confidence, and trusted in these vanities as gods; but
who, in the very height of their superstitious error, and while maintaining
an implacable war with the champions of the truth, perished by a fate proportioned
to their crimes? Where is the giant race whose arms were turned against
heaven itself; the hissings of those serpents whose tongues were pointed
with impious words against the Almighty King? These adversaries of the
Lord of all, confident in the aid of a multitude of gods, advanced to the
attack with a powerful array of military force, preceded by certain images
of the dead, and lifeless statues, as their defense. On the other, side
our emperor, secure in the armor of godliness, opposed to the numbers of
the enemy the salutary and life-giving Sign, as at the same time a terror
to the foe, and a protection against every harm; and returned victorious
at once over the enemy and the demons whom they served? And then, with
thanksgiving and praise, the tokens of a grateful spirit, to the Author
of his victory, he proclaimed this triumphant Sign, by monuments as well
as words, to all mankind, erecting it as a mighty trophy against every
enemy in the midst of the imperial city, and expressly enjoining on all
to acknowledge this imperishable symbol of salvation as the safeguard of
the power of Rome and of the empire of the world. Such were the instructions
which he gave to his subjects generally; but especially to his soldiers,
whom he admonished to repose their confidence, not in their weapons, or
armor, or bodily strength, but to acknowledge the Supreme God as the giver
of every good, and of victory itself. Thus did the emperor himself, strange
and incredible as the fact may seem, become the instructor of his army
in their religious exercises, and teach them to offer pious prayers in
accordance with the divine ordinances, uplifting their hands towards heaven,
and raising their mental vision higher still to the King of heaven, on
whom they should call as the Author of victory, their preserver, guardian,
and helper. He commanded too, that one day should be regarded as a special
occasion for religious worship; I mean that which is truly the first and
chief of all, the day of our Lord and Saviour; that day the name of which
is connected with light, and life, and immortality, and every good. Prescribing
the same pious conduct to himself, he honored his Saviour in the chambers
of his palace, performing his devotions according to the Divine commands,
and storing his mind with instruction through the hearing of the sacred
word. The entire care of his household was intrusted to ministers devoted
to the service of God, and distinguished by gravity of life and every other
virtue; while his trusty body-guards, strong in affection and fidelity
to his person, found in their emperor an instructor in the practice of
a godly life. Again, the honor with which he regards the victorious Sign
is founded on his actual experience of its divine efficacy. Before this
the hosts of his enemies have disappeared: by this the powers of the unseen
spirits have been turned to flight: through this the proud boastings of
God's adversaries have come to nought, and the tongues of the profane and
blasphemous been put to silence. By this Sign the Barbarian tribes were
vanquished: through his the rites of superstitious fraud received a just
rebuke: by this our emperor, discharging as it were a sacred debt, has
performed the crowning good of all, by erecting triumphant memorials of
its value in all parts of the world, raising temples and churches on a
scale of royal costliness, and commanding all to unite in constructing
the sacred houses of prayer. Accordingly these signal proofs of our emperor's
magnificence forthwith appeared in the provinces and cities of the empire,
and soon shone conspicuously in every country; convincing memorials of
the rebuke and overthrow of those impious tyrants who but a little while
before had madly dared to fight against God, and, raging like savage dogs,
had vented on unconscious buildings that fury which they were unable to
level against him; had thrown to the ground and Upturned the very foundations
of the houses of prayer, causing them to present the appearance of a city
captured and abandoned to the enemy. Such was the exhibition of that wicked
spirit whereby they sought as it were to assail God himself, but soon experienced
the result of their own madness and folly. But a little time elapsed, when
a single blast of the storm of Heaven's displeasure swept them utterly
away, leaving neither kindred, nor offspring, nor memorial of their existence
among men: for all, numerous as they were, disappeared as in a moment beneath
the stroke of Divine vengeance. Such, then, was the fate which awaited
these furious adversaries of God: but he who, armed with the salutary Trophy,
had alone opposed them (nay rather, not alone, but aided by the presence
and the power of him who is the only Sovereign), has replaced the ruined
edifices on a greater scale, and made the second far superior to the first.
For example, besides erecting various churches to the honor of God in the
city which bears his name, and adorning the Bithynian capital with another
on the greatest and most splendid scale, he has distinguished the principal
cities of the other provinces by structures of a similar kind. Above all,
he has selected two places in the eastern division of the empire, the one
in Palestine (since from thence the life- giving stream has flowed as from
a fountain for the blessing of all nations), the other in that metropolis
of the East which derives its name from that of Antiochus; in which, as
the head of that portion of the empire, he has consecrated to the service
of God a church of unparalleled size and beauty. The entire building is
encompassed by an enclosure of great extent, within which the church itself
rises to a vast elevation, of an octagonal form, surrounded by many chambers
and courts on every side, and decorated with ornaments of the richest kind.
Such was his work here. Again, in the province of Palestine, in that city
which was once the seat of Hebrew sovereignty, on the very site of the
Lord's sepulchre, he has raised a church of noble dimensions, and adorned
a temple sacred to the salutary Cross with rich and lavish magnificence,
honoring that everlasting monument, and the trophies of the Saviour's victory
over the power of death, with a splendor which no language can describe.
In the same country he discovered three places venerable as the localities
of three sacred caves: and these also he adorned with costly structures,
paying a fitting tribute of reverence to the scene of the first manifestation
of the Saviour's presence; while at the second cavern he hallowed the remembrance
of his final ascension from the mountain top; and celebrated his mighty
conflict, and the victory which crowned it, at the third. All these places
our emperor thus adorned in the hope of proclaiming the symbol of redemption
to all mankind; that Cross which has indeed repaid his pious zeal; through
which his house and throne alike have prospered, his reign has been confirmed
for a lengthened series of years, and the rewards of virtue bestowed on
his noble sons, his kindred, and their descendants. And surely it is a
mighty evidence of the power of that God whom he serves, that he has held
the balances of justice with an equal hand, and has apportioned to each
party their due reward. With regard to the destroyers of the houses of
prayer, the penalty of their impious conduct followed hard upon them: forthwith
were they swept away, and left neither race, nor house, nor family behind.
On the other hand, he whose pious devotion to his Lord is conspicuous in
his every act, who raises royal temples to his honor, and proclaims his
name to his subjects by sacred offerings throughout the world, he, I say,
has deservedly experienced him to be the preserver and defender of his
imperial house and race. Thus clearly have the dealings of God been manifested,
and this through the sacred efficacy of the salutary Sign.
CHAPTER X.
MUCH might indeed be said of
this salutary Sign, by those who are skilled in the mysteries of our Divine
religion. For it is in very truth the symbol of salvation, wondrous to
speak of, more wondrous still to conceive; the appearance of which on earth
has thrown the fictions of all false religion from the beginning into the
deepest shade, has buried superstitious error in darkness and oblivion,
and has revealed to all that spiritual light which enlightens the souls
of men, even the knowledge of the only true God. Hence the universal change
for the better, which leads men to spurn their lifeless idols, to trample
under foot the lawless rites of their demon deities, and laugh to scorn
the time-honored follies of their fathers. Hence, too, the establishment
in every place of those schools of sacred learning, wherein men are taught
the precepts of saving truth, and dread no more those objects of creation
which are seen by the natural eye, nor direct a gaze of wonder at the sun,
the moon, or stars; but acknowledge him who is above all these, that invisible
Being who is the Creator of them all, and learn to worship him alone. Such
are the blessings resulting to mankind from this great and wondrous Sign,
by virtue of which the evils which once existed are now no more, and virtues
heretofore unknown shine everywhere resplendent with the light of true
godliness. Discourses, and precepts, and exhortations to a virtuous and
holy life, are proclaimed in the ears of all nations. Nay, the emperor
himself proclaims them: and it is indeed a marvel that this mighty prince,
raising his voice in the hearing of all the world, like an interpreter
of the Almighty Sovereign's will, invites his subjects in every country
to the knowledge of the true God. No more, as in former times, is the babbling
of impious men heard in the imperial palace; but priests and pious worshipers
of God together celebrate his majesty with royal hymns of praise. The name
of the one Supreme Ruler of the universe is proclaimed to all: the gospel
of glad tidings connects the human race with its Almighty King, declaring
the grace and love of the heavenly Father to his children on the earth.
His praise is everywhere sung in triumphant strains: the voice of mortal
man is blended with the harmony of the angelic choirs in heaven; and the
reasoning soul employs the body which invests it as an instrument for sounding
forth a fitting tribute of praise and adoration to his name. The nations
of the East and the West are instructed at the same moment in his precepts:
the people of the Northern and Southern regions unite with one accord,
under the influence of the same principles and laws, in the pursuit of
a godly life, in praising the one Supreme God, in acknowledging his only
begotten Son their Saviour as the source of every blessing, and our emperor
as the one ruler on the earth, together with his pious sons. He himself,
as a skillful pilot, sits on high at the helm of state, and directs the
vessel with unerring course, conducting his people as it were with favoring
breeze to a secure and tranquil haven. Meanwhile God himself, the great
Sovereign, extends the right hand of his power from above for his protection,
giving him victory over every foe, and establishing his empire by a lengthened
period of years: and he will bestow on him yet higher blessings, and confirm
in every deed the truth of his own promises. But on these we may not at
present dwell; but must await the change to a better world: for it is not
given to mortal eyes or ears of flesh, fully to apprehend the things of
God.
CHAPTER XI.
AND now, victorious and mighty
Constantine, in this discourse, whose noble argument is the glory of the
Almighty King, let me lay before thee some of the mysteries of his sacred
truth: not as presuming to instruct thee, who art thyself taught of God;
nor to disclose to thee those secret wonders which he himself, not through
the agency of man, but through our common Saviour, and the frequent light
of his Divine presence has long since revealed and unfolded to thy view:
but in the hope of leading the unlearned to the light, and displaying before
those who know them not the causes and motives of thy pious deeds. True
it is that thy noble efforts for the daily worship and honor of the Supreme
God throughout the habitable world, are the theme of universal praise.
But those records of gratitude to thy Saviour and Preserver which thou
hast dedicated in our own province of Palestine, and in that city from
which as from a fountain-head the Saviour Word has issued forth to
all mankind; and again, the hallowed edifices and consecrated temples which
thou hast raised as trophies of his victory over death; and those lofty
and noble structures, imperial monuments of an imperial spirit, which thou
hast erected in honor of the everlasting memory of the Saviour's tomb the
cause, I say, of these things is not equally obvious to all. Those, indeed,
who are enlightened in heavenly knowledge by the power of the Divine Spirit,
well understand the cause, and justly admire and bless thee for that counsel
and resolution which Heaven itself inspired. On the other hand the ignorant
and spiritually blind regard these designs with open mockery and scorn,
and deem it a strange and unworthy thing indeed that so mighty a prince
should waste his zeal on the graves and monuments of the dead. "Were it
not better," such a one might say, "to cherish those rites which are hallowed
by ancient usage to seek the favor of those gods and heroes whose worship
is observed in every province; instead of rejecting and disclaiming them,
because subject to the calamities incident to man? Surely they may claim
equal honors with him who himself has suffered: or, if they are to be rejected,
as not exempt from the sorrows of humanity, the same award would justly
be pronounced respecting him." Thus, with important and contracted brow,
might he give utterance in pompous language to his self-imagined wisdom.
Filled with compassion for this ignorance, the gracious Word of our most
beneficent Father freely invites, not such a one alone, but all who are
in the path of error, to receive instruction in Divine knowledge; and has
ordained the means of such instruction throughout the world, in every country
and village, in cultivated and desert lands alike, and in every city: and,
as a gracious Saviour and Physician of the soul, calls on the Greek and
the Barbarian, the wise and the unlearned, the rich and the poor, the servant
and his master, the subject and his lord, the ungodly, the profane, the
ignorant, the evil-doer, the blasphemer, alike to draw near, and hasten
to receive his heavenly cure. And thus in time past had he clearly announced
to all the pardon of former transgressions, saying, "Come unto me, all
ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." And again,
"I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance." And
he adds the reason, saying, "For they that are whole need not a physician,
but they that are sick." And again, "I desire not the death of a
sinner, but rather that he should repent."
Hence it is only for those
who are themselves instructed in Divine things and understand the motives
of that zeal of which these works are the result, to appreciate the more
than human impulse by which our emperor was guided, to admire his piety
toward God, and to believe his care for the memorial of our Saviour's resurrection
to be a desire imparted from above, and truly inspired by that Sovereign,
to be whose faithful servant and minister for good is his proudest boast.
In full persuasion, then, of thy approval, most mighty emperor, I desire
at this present time to proclaim to all the reasons and motives of thy
pious works. I desire to stand as the interpreter of thy designs, to explain
the counsels of a soul devoted to the love of God. I propose to teach all
men, what all should know who care to understand the principles on which
our Saviour God employs his power, the reasons for which he who was the
pre-existent Controller of all things at length descended to us from heaven:
the reasons for which he assumed our nature, and submitted even to the
power of death. I shall declare the causes of that immortal life which
followed, and of his resurrection from the dead. Once more, I shall adduce
convincing proofs and arguments, for the sake of those who yet need such
testimony: and now let me commence my appointed task. Those who transfer
the worship due to that God who formed and rules the world to the works
of his hand; who hold the sun and moon, or other parts of this material
system, nay, the elements themselves, earth, water, air, and fire, in equal
honor with the Creator of them all; who give the name of gods to things
which never would have had existence, or even name, except as obedient
to that Word of God who made the world: such persons in my judgment resemble
those who overlook the master hand which gives its magnificence to a royal
palace; and, while lost in wonder at its roofs and walls, the paintings
of varied beauty and coloring which adorn them, and its gilded ceilings
and sculptures, ascribe to them the praise of that skill which belongs
to the artist whose work they are: whereas they should assign the cause
of their wonder, not to these visible objects, but to the architect himself,
and confess that the proofs of skill are indeed manifest, but that he alone
is the possessor of that skill who has made them what they are. Again,
well might we liken those to children, who should admire the seven-stringed
lyre, and disregard him who invented or has power to use it: or those who
forget the valiant warrior, and adorn his spear and shield with the chaplet
of victory: or, lastly, those who hold the squares and streets, the public
buildings, temples, and gymnasia of a great and royal city in equal honor
with its founder; forgetting that their admiration is due, not to lifeless
stones, but to him whose wisdom planned and executed these mighty works.
Not less absurd is it for those who regard this universe with the natural
eye to ascribe its origin to the sun, or moon, or any other heavenly body.
Rather let them confess that these are themselves the works of a higher
wisdom, remember the Maker and Framer of them all, and render to him the
praise and honor above all created objects. Nay rather, inspired by the
sight of these very objects, let them address themselves with full purpose
of heart to glorify and worship him who is now invisible to mortal eye,
but perceived by the clear and unclouded vision of the soul, the supremely
sovereign Word of God. To take the instance of the human body: no one has
yet conferred the attribute of wisdom on the eyes, or head, the hands,
or feet, or other members, far less on the outward clothing, of a wise
and learned man: no one terms the philosopher's household furniture and
utensils, wise: but every rational person admires that invisible and secret
power, the mind of the man himself. How much more, then, is our admiration
due, not to the visible mechanism of the universe, material as it is, and
formed of the selfsame elements; but to that invisible Word who has moulded
and arranged it all, who is the only-begotten Son of God, and whom the
Maker of all things, who far transcends all being, has begotten of himself,
and appointed Lord and Governor of this universe? For since it was
impossible that perishable bodies, or the rational spirits which he had
created, should approach the Supreme God, by reason of their immeasurable
distance from his perfections, for he is unbegotten, above and beyond all
creation, ineffable, inaccessible, unapproachable, dwelling, as his holy
word assures us, in the light which none can enter; but they were created
from nothing, and are infinitely far removed from his unbegotten Essence;
well has the all-gracious and Almighty God interposed as it were an intermediate
Power between himself and them, even the Divine omnipotence of his
only-begotten Word. And this Power, which is in perfect nearness and intimacy
of union, with the Father which abides in him, and shares his secret counsels,
has yet condescended, in fullness of grace, as it were to conform itself
to those who are so far removed from the supreme majesty of God. How else,
consistently with his own holiness could he who is far above and beyond
all things unite himself to corruptible and corporeal matter? Accordingly
the Divine Word, thus connecting himself with this universe, and receiving
into his hands the reins, as it were, of the world, turns and directs it
as a skillful charioteer according to his own will and pleasure. The proof
of these assertions is evident. For supposing that those component parts
of the world which we call elements, as earth, water, air, and fire, the
nature of which is manifestly without intelligence, are self-existent;
and if they have one common essence, which they who are skilled in natural
science call the great receptacle, mother, and nurse of all things; and
if this itself be utterly devoid of shape and figure, of soul and reason;
whence shall we say it has obtained its present form and beauty? To what
shall we ascribe the distinction of the elements, or the union of things
contrary in their very nature? Who has commanded the liquid water to sustain
the heavy element of earth? Who has turned back the waters from their downward
course, and carried them aloft in clouds? Who has bound the force of fire,
and caused it to lie latent in wood, and to combine with substances most
contrary to itself? Who has mingled the cold air with heat, and thus reconciled
the enmity of opposing principles? Who has devised the continuous succession
of the human race, and given it as it were an endless term of duration?
Who has moulded the male and female form, adapted their mutual relations
with perfect harmony, and given one common principle of production to every
living creature? Who changes the character of the fluid and corruptible
seed, which in itself is void of reason, and gives it its prolific power?
Who is at this moment working these and ten thousand effects more wonderful
than these, nay, surpassing all wonder, and with invisible influence is
daily and hourly perpetuating the production of them all? Surely
the wonder-working and truly omnipotent Word of God may well be deemed
the efficient cause of all these things: that Word who, diffusing himself
through all creation, pervading height and depth with incorporeal energy,
and embracing the length and breadth of the universe within his mighty
grasp, has compacted and reduced to order this entire system, from whose
unreasoned and formless matter he has framed for himself an instrument
of perfect harmony, the nicely balanced chords and notes of which he touches
with all-wise and unerring skill. He it is who governs the sun, and moon,
and the other luminaries of heaven by inexplicable laws, and directs their
motions for the service of the universal whole. It is this Word of God
who has stooped to the earth on which we live, and created the manifold
species of animals, and the fair varieties of the vegetable world. It is
this same Word who has penetrated the recesses of the deep, has given their
being to the finny race, and produced the countless forms of life which
there exist. It is he who fashions the burden of the womb, and informs
it in nature's laboratory with the principle of life. By him the fluid
and heavy moisture is raised on high, and then, sweetened by a purifying
change, descends in measured quantities to the earth, and at stated seasons
in more profuse supply. Like a skillful husbandman, he fully irrigates
the land, tempers the moist and dry in just proportion, diversifying the
whole with brilliant flowers, with aspects of varied beauty, with pleasant
fragrance, with alternating varieties of fruits, and countless gratifications
for the taste of men. But why do I dare essay a hopeless task, to recount
the mighty works of the Word of God, and describe an energy which surpasses
mortal thought? By some, indeed, he has been termed the Nature of the universe,
by others, the World- Soul, by others, Fate. Others again have declared
him to be the most High God himself, strangely confounding things most
widely different; bringing down to this earth, uniting to a corruptible
and material body, and assigning to that supreme and unbegotten Power who
is Lord of all an intermediate place between irrational animals and rational
mortals on the one hand, and immortal beings on the other.
CHAPTER XII.
ON the other hand, the sacred
doctrine teaches that he who is the supreme Source of good, and Cause of
all things, is beyond all comprehension, and therefore inexpressible by
word, or speech, or name; surpassing the power, not of language only, but
of thought itself. Uncircumscribed by place, or body; neither in heaven,
nor in ethereal space, nor in any other part of the universe; but entirely
independent of all things else, he pervades the depths of unexplored and
secret wisdom. The sacred oracles teach us to acknowledge him as the only
true God, apart from all corporeal essence, distinct from all subordinate
ministration. Hence it is said that all things are from him, but not through
him. And he himself dwelling as Sovereign in secret and undiscovered regions
of unapproachable light, ordains and disposes all things by the single
power of his own will. At his will whatever is, exists; without that will,
it cannot be. And his will is in every case for good, since he is essentially
Goodness itself. But he through whom are all things, even God the Word,
proceeding in an ineffable manner from the Father above, as from an everlasting
and exhaustless fountain, flows onward like a river with a full and abundant
stream of power for the preservation of the universal whole. And now let
us select an illustration from our own experience. The invisible and undiscovered
mind within us, the essential nature of which no one has ever known, sits
as a monarch in the seclusion of his secret chambers, and alone resolves
on our course of action. From this proceeds the only-begotten word from
its father's bosom, begotten in a manner and by a power inexplicable to
us; and is the first messenger of its father's thoughts, declares his secret
counsels, and, conveying itself to the ears of others, accomplishes his
designs. And thus the advantage of this faculty is enjoyed by all: yet
no one has ever yet beheld that invisible and hidden mind, which is the
I parent of the word itself. In the same manner, or rather in a manner
which far surpasses all likeness or comparison, the perfect Word of the
Supreme God, as the only-begotten Son of the Father (not consisting in
the power of utterance, nor comprehended in syllables and parts of speech,
nor conveyed by a voice which vibrates on the air; but being himself the
living and effectual Word of the most High, and subsisting personally as
the Power and Wisdom of God), proceeds from his Father's Deity and kingdom.
Thus, being the perfect Offspring of a perfect Father, and the common Preserver
of all things, he diffuses himself with living power throughout creation,
and pours from his own fullness abundant supplies of reason, wisdom, light,
and every other blessing, not only on objects nearest to himself, but on
those most remote, whether in earth, or sea, or any other sphere of being.
To all these he appoints with perfect equity their limits, places, laws,
and inheritance, allotting to each their suited portion according to his
sovereign will. To some he assigns the super-terrestrial regions, to others
heaven itself as their habitation: others he places in ethereal space,
others in air, and others still on earth. He it is who transfers mankind
from hence to another sphere, impartially reviews their conduct here, and
be- stows a recompense according to the life and habits of each. By him
provision is made for the life and food, not of rational creatures only,
but also of the brute creation, for the service of men; and while to the
latter he grants the enjoyment of a perishable and fleeting term of existence,
the former he invites to a share in the possession of immortal life. Thus
universal is the agency of the Word of God: everywhere present, and pervading
all things by the power of his intelligence, he looks upward to his Father,
and governs this lower creation, inferior to and consequent upon himself,
in accordance with his will, as the common Preserver of all things. Intermediate,
as it were, and attracting the created to the uncreated Essence, this Word
of God exists as an unbroken bond between the two, uniting things most
widely different by an inseparable tie. He is the Providence which rules
the universe; the guardian and director of the whole: he is the Power and
Wisdom of God the only-begotten God, the Word begotten of God himself.
For "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the
Word was God. All things were made by him and without him was not any.
thing made that hath been made"; as we learn from the words of the sacred
writer.Through his vivifying power all nature grows and flourishes, refreshed
by his continual showers, and invested with a vigor and beauty ever new.
Guiding the reigns of the universe, he holds its onward course in conformity
to the Father's will and moves, as it were, the helm of this mighty ship.
This glorious Agent, the only-begotten Son of the Supreme God, begotten
by the Father as his perfect Offspring, the Father has given to this world
as the highest of all goods infusing his word, as spirit into a lifeless
body, into unconscious nature; imparting light and energy to that which
in itself was a rude, inanimate, and formless mass, through the Divine
power. Him therefore it is ours to acknowledge and regard as everywhere
present, and giving life to matter and the elements of nature: in him we
see Light, even the spiritual offspring of inexpressible Light: one indeed
in essence, as being the Son of one Father; but possessing in himself many
and varied powers. The world is indeed divided into many parts; yet let
us not therefore suppose that there are many independent Agents nor, though
creation's works be manifold, let us thence assume the existence of many
gods. How grievous the error of those childish and infatuated advocates
of polytheistic worship, who deify the constituent parts of the universe,
and divide into many that system which is only one! Such conduct resembles
theirs who should abstract the eyes of an individual man, and term them
the man himself, and the ears, another man, and so the head: or again,
by an effort of thought should separate the neck, the breast and shoulders,
the feet and hands,: or other members, nay, the very powers of sense, and
thus pronounce an individual to be a multitude of men. Such folly must
surely be rewarded with contempt by men of sense. Yet such is he who from
the component parts of a single world can devise for himself a multitude
of gods, or even deem that world which is the work of a Creator, and consists
of many parts, to be itself a god: not knowing that the Divine Nature can
in no sense be divisible into parts; since, if compounded, it must be so
through the agency of another power; and that which is so compounded can
never be Divine. How indeed could it be so, if composed of unequal and
dissimilar, and hence of worse and better elements? Simple, indivisible,
uncompounded, the Divine Nature exists at an infinite elevation above the
visible constitution of this world. And hence we are assured by the clear
testimony of the sacred Herald, that the Word of God, who is before all
things, must be the sole Preserver of all intelligent beings: while God,
who is above all, and the Author of the generation of the Word, being himself
the Cause of all things, is rightly called the Father of the Word, as of
his only-begotten Son, himself acknowledging no superior Cause. God, therefore,
himself is One, and from him proceeds the one only-begotten Word, the omnipresent
Preserver of all things. And as the many-stringed lyre is composed of different
chords, both sharp and flat, some slightly, others tensely strained, and
others intermediate between-the two extremes, yet all attuned according
to the rules of harmonic art; even so this material world, compounded as
it is of many elements, containing opposite and antagonist principles,
as moisture and dryness, cold and heat, yet blended into one harmonious
whole, may justly be termed a mighty instrument framed by the hand of God:
an instrument on which the Divine Word, himself not composed of parts or
opposing principles, but indivisible and uncompounded, performs with perfect
skill, and produces a melody at once accordant with the will of his Father
the Supreme Lord of all, and glorious to himself. Again, as there are manifold
external and internal parts and members comprised in a single body, yet
one invisible soul, one undivided and incorporeal mind pervades the whole;
so is it in this creation, which, consisting of many parts, yet is but
one: and so the One mighty, yea, Almighty Word of God, pervading all things,
and diffusing himself with undeviating energy throughout this universe,
is the Cause of all things that exist therein. Survey the compass of this
visible world. Seest thou not how the same heaven contains within itself
the countless courses and companies of the stars? Again, the sun is one,
and yet eclipses many, nay all other luminaries, by the surpassing glory
of his rays. Even so, as the Father himself is One, his Word is also One,
the perfect Son of that perfect Father. Should any one object because they
are not more, as well might he complain that there are not many suns, or
moons, or worlds, and a thousand things beside; like the madman, who would
fain subvert the fair and perfect course of Nature herself. As in the visible,
so also in the spiritual world: in the one the same sun diffuses his light
throughout this material earth; in the other the One Almighty Word of God
illumines all things with invisible and secret power. Again, there is in
man one spirit, and one faculty of reason, which yet is the active cause
of numberless effects. The same mind, instructed in many things, will essay
to cultivate the earth, to build and guide a ship, and construct houses:
nay, the one mind and reason of man is capable of acquiring knowledge in
a thousand forms: the same mind shall understand geometry and astronomy,
and discourse on the rules of grammar, and rhetoric, and the healing art.
Nor will it excel in science only, but in practice too: and yet no one
has ever supposed the existence of many minds in one human form, nor expressed
his wonder at a plurality of being in man, because he is thus capable of
varied knowledge. Suppose one were to find a shapeless mass of clay, to
mould it with his hands, and give it the form of a living creature; the
head in one figure, the hands and feet in another, the eyes and cheeks
in a third, and so to fashion the ears, the mouth and nose, the breast
and shoulders, according to the rules of the plastic art. The result, indeed,
is a variety of figure, of parts and members in the one body; yet must
we not suppose it the work of many hands, but ascribe it entirely to the
skill of a single artist, and yield the tribute of our praise to him who
by the energy of a single mind has framed it all. The same is true of the
universe itself, which is one, though consisting of many parts: yet surely
we need not suppose many creative powers, nor invent a plurality of gods.
Our duty is to adore the all-wise and all- perfect agency of him who is
indeed the Power and the Wisdom of God, whose undivided force and energy
pervades and penetrates the universe, creating and giving life to all things,
and furnishing to all, collectively and severally, those manifold supplies
of which he is himself the source. Even so one and the same impression
of the solar rays illumines the air at once, gives light to the eyes, warmth
to the touch, fertility to the earth, and growth to plants. The same luminary
constitutes the course of time, governs the motions of the stars, performs
the circuit of the heavens, imparts beauty to the earth, and displays the
power of God to all: and all this he performs by the sole and unaided force
of his own nature. In like manner fire has the property of refining gold,
and fusing lead, of dissolving wax, of parching clay, and consuming wood;
producing these varied effects by one and the same burning power. So also
the Supreme Word of God, pervading all things, everywhere existent, everywhere
present in heaven and earth, governs and directs the visible and invisible
creation, the sun, the heaven, and the universe itself, with an energy
inexplicable in its nature, irresistible in its effects. From him, as from
an everlasting fountain, the sun, the moon, and stars receive their light:
and he forever rules that heaven which he has framed as the fitting emblem
of his own greatness. The angelic and spiritual powers, the incorporeal
and intelligent beings which exist beyond the sphere of heaven and earth,
are filled by him with light and life, with wisdom and virtue, with all
that is great and good, from Iris own peculiar treasures. Once more, with
one and the same creative skill, he ceases not to furnish the elements
with substance, to regulate the union and combinations, the forms and figures,
and the innumerable qualities of organized bodies; preserving the varied
distinctions of animal and vegetable life, of the rational and the brute
creation; and supplying all things to all with equal power: thus proving
himself the Author, not indeed of the seven-stringed lyre, but of that
system of perfect harmony which is the workmanship of the One world- creating
Word.
CHAPTER XIII.
AND now let us proceed to explain
the reasons for which this mighty Word of God descended to dwell with men.
Our ignorant and foolish race, incapable of comprehending him who is the
Lord of heaven and earth, proceeding from his Father's Deity as from the
supreme fountain, ever present throughout the world, and evincing by the
clearest proofs his providential care for the interests of man; have ascribed
the adorable title of Deity to the sun, and moon, the heaven and the stars
of heaven. Nor did they stop here, but deified the earth itself, its products,
and the various substances by which animal life is sustained, and devised
images of Ceres, of Proserpine, of Bacchus, and many such as these. Nay,
they shrank not from giving the name of gods to the very conceptions of
their own minds, and the speech by which those conceptions are expressed;
calling the mind itself Minerva, and language Mercury, and affixing the
names of Mnemosyne and the Muses to those faculties by means of which science
is acquired. Nor was even this enough: advancing still more rapidly in
the career of impiety and folly, they deified their own evil passions,
which it behooved them to regard with aversion, or restrain by the principles
of self-control. Their very lust and passion and impure disease of soul,
the members of the body which tempt to obscenity, and even the very uncontrol
in shameful pleasure, they described under the titles of Cupid, Priapus,
Venus, and other kindred terms. Nor did they stop even here. Degrading
their thoughts of God to this corporeal and mortal life, they deified their
fellow-men, conferring the names of gods and heroes on those who had experienced
the common lot of all, and vainly imagining that the Divine and imperishable
Essence could frequent the tombs and monuments of the dead. Nay, more than
this: they paid divine honors to animals of various species, and to the
most noxious reptiles: they felled trees, and excavated rocks; they provided
themselves with brass, and iron, and other metals, of which they fashioned
resemblances of the male and female human form, of beasts, and creeping
things; and these they made the objects of their worship. Nor did this
suffice. To the evil spirits themselves which lurked within their statues,
or lay concealed in secret and dark recesses, eager to drink their libations,
and inhale the odor of their sacrifices, they ascribed the same divine
honors. Once more, they endeavored to secure the familiar aid of these
spirits, and the unseen powers which move through the tracts of air, by
charms of forbidden magic, and the compulsion of unhallowed songs and incantations.
Again, different nations have adopted different persons as objects of their
worship. The Greeks have rendered to Bacchus, Hercules, AEsculapius, Apollo,
and others who were mortal men, the titles of gods and heroes. The Egyptians
have deified Horus and Isis, Osiris, and other mortals such as these. And
thus they who boast of the wondrous skill whereby they have discovered
geometry, astronomy, and the science of number, know not, wise as they
are in their own conceit, nor understand how to estimate the measure of
the power of God, or calculate his exceeding greatness above the nature
of irrational and mortal beings. Hence they shrank not from applying the
name of gods to the most hideous of the brute creation, to venomous reptiles
and savage beasts. The Phoenicians deified Melcatharus, Usorus, and others;
mere mortals, and with little claim to honor: the Arabians, Dusaris and
Obodas: the Getae, Zamolxis: the Cicilians, Mopsus: and the Thebans, Amphiaraus:
in short, each nation has adopted its own peculiar deities, differing in
no respect from their fellow- mortals, being simply and truly men. Again,
the Egyptians with one consent, the Phoenicians, the Greeks, nay, every
nation beneath the sun, have united in worshiping the very parts and elements
of the world, and even the produce of the ground itself. And, which is
most surprising, though acknowledging the adulterous, unnatural, and licentious
crimes of their deities, they have not only filled every city, and village,
and district with temples, shrines, and statues in their honor, but have
followed their evil example to the ruin of their own souls. We hear of
gods and the sons of gods described by them as heroes and good genii, titles
entirely opposed to truth, honors utterly at variance with the qualifies
they are intended to exalt. It is as if one who desired to point out the
sun and the luminaries of heaven, instead of directing his gaze thitherward,
should grope with his hands on the ground, and search for the celestial
powers in the mud and mire. Even so mankind, deceived by their own folly
and the craft of evil spirits, have believed that the Divine and spiritual
Essence which is far above heaven and earth could be compatible with the
birth, the affections, and death, of mortal bodies here below. To such
a pitch of madness did they proceed, as to sacrifice the dearest objects
of their affection to their gods, regardless of all natural ties, and urged
by frenzied feeling to slay their only and best beloved children. For what
can be a greater proof of madness, than to offer human sacrifice, to pollute
every city, and even their own houses, with kindred blood? Do not the Greeks
themselves attest this, and is not all history filled with records of the
same impiety? The Phoenicians devoted their best beloved and only children
as an annual sacrifice to Saturn. The Rhodians, on the sixth day of the
month Metageitnion, offered human victims to the same god. At Salamis,
a man was pursued in the temple of Minerva Agraulis and Diomede, compelled
to run thrice round the altar, afterwards pierced with a lance by the priest,
and consumed as a burnt offering on the blazing pile. In Egypt, human sacrifice
was most abundant. At Heliopolis three victims were daily offered to Juno,
for whom king Amoses, impressed with the atrocity of the practice, commanded
the substitution of an equal number of waxen figures. In Chios, and again
in Tenedos, a man was slain and offered up to Omadian Bacchus. At Sparta
they immolated human beings to Mars. In Crete they did likewise, offering
human sacrifices to Saturn. In Laodicea of Syria a virgin was yearly slain
in honor of Minerva, for whom a hart is now the substitute. The Libyans
and Carthaginians appeased their gods with human victims. The Dumateni
of Arabia buried a boy annually beneath the altar. History informs us that
the Greeks without exception, the Thracians also, and Scythians, were accustomed
to human sacrifice before they marched forth to battle. The Athenians record
the immolation of the virgin children of Leus, and the daughter of Erechtheus.
Who knows not that at this day a human victim is offered in Rome itself
at the festival of Jupiter Latiaris? And these facts are confirmed by the
testimony of the most approved philosophers. Diodorus, the epitomizer of
libraries, affirms that two hundred of the noblest youths were sacrificed
to Saturn by the Libyan people, and that three hundred more were voluntarily
offered by their own parents. Dionysius, the compiler of Roman history,
expressly says that Jupiter and Apollo demanded human sacrifices of the
so-called Aborigines, in Italy. He relates that on this demand they offered
a proportion of all their produce to the gods; but that, because of their
refusal to slay human victims, they became involved in manifold calamities,
from which they could obtain no release until they had decimated themselves,
a sacrifice of life which proved the desolation of their country. Such
and so great were the evils which of old afflicted the whole human race.Nor
was this the full extent of their misery they groaned beneath the pressure
of other evils equally numerous and irremediable. All nations, whether
civilized or barbarous, throughout the world, as if actuated by a demoniac
frenzy, were infected with sedition as with some fierce and terrible disease:
insomuch that the human family was irreconcilably divided against itself;
the great system of society was distracted and torn asunder; and in every
corner of the earth men stood opposed to each other, and strove with fierce
contention on questions of law and government. Nay, more than this: with
passions aroused to fury, they engaged in mutual conflicts, so frequent
that
their lives were passed as it were in uninterrupted warfare. None could
undertake a journey except as prepared to encounter an enemy in the very
country and villages the rustics girded on the sword, provided themselves
with armor rather than with the implements of rural labor, and deemed it
noble exploit to plunder and enslave any who belonged to a neighboring
state. Nay, more than this: from the fables they had themselves devised
respecting their own deities, they deduced occasions for a vile and abandoned
life, and wrought the ruin of body and soul by licentiousness of every
kind. Not content with this, they even overstepped the bounds which nature
had defined, and together committed incredible and nameless crimes, "men
with men (in the words of the sacred writer) working unseemliness, and
receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was due."
Nor did they stop even here; but perverted their natural thoughts of God,
and denied that the course of this world was directed by his providential
care, ascribing the existence and constitution of all things to the blind
operation of chance, or the necessity of fate. Once more: believing that
soul and body were alike dissolved by death, they led a brutish life, unworthy
of the name: careless of the nature or existence of the soul, they dreaded
not the tribunal of Divine justice, expected no reward of virtue, nor thought
of chastisement as the penalty of an evil life. Hence it was that whole
nations, a prey to wickedness in all its forms, were wasted by the effects
of their own brutality: some living in the practice of most vile and lawless
incest with mothers, others with sisters, and others again corrupting their
own daughters. Some were found who slew their confiding guests; others
who fed on human flesh; some strangled, and then feasted on, their aged
men; others threw them alive to dogs. The time would fail me were I to
attempt to describe the multifarious symptoms of the inveterate malady
which had asserted its dominion over the whole human race. Such, and numberless
others like these, were the prevailing evils, on account of which the gracious
Word of God, full of compassion for his human flock, had long since, by
the ministry of his prophets, and earlier still, as well as later, by that
of men distinguished by pious devotion to God, invited those thus desperately
afflicted to their own cure; and had, by means of laws, exhortations, and
doctrines of every kind, proclaimed to man the principles and elements
of true godliness. But when for mankind, distracted and torn as I have
said, not indeed by wolves and savage beasts, but by ruthless and soul-
destroying spirits of evil, human power no longer sufficed, but a help
was needed superior to that of man; then it was that the Word of God, obedient
to his all-gracious Father's will, at length himself appeared, and most
willingly made his abode amongst us. The causes of his advent I have already
described, induced by which he condescended to the society of man; not
in his wonted form and manner, for he is incorporeal, and present everywhere
throughout the world, proving by his agency both in heaven and earth the
greatness of his almighty power, but in a character new and hitherto unknown.
Assuming a mortal body, he deigned to associate and converse with men;
desiring, through the medium of their own likeness, to save our mortal
race.
CHAPTER XIV.
AND now let us explain the cause
for which the incorporeal Word of God assumed this mortal body as a medium
of intercourse with man. How, indeed, else than in human form could that
Divine and impalpable, that immaterial and invisible Essence manifest itself
to those who sought for God in created and earthly objects, unable or unwilling
otherwise to discern the Author and Maker of all things? As a fitting means,
therefore, of communication with mankind, he assumed a mortal body, as
that with which they were themselves familiar; for like, it is proverbially
said, loves its like. To those, then, whose affections were engaged by
visible objects, who looked for gods in statues and lifeless images, who
imagined the Deity to consist in material and corporeal substance, nay,
who conferred on men the title of divinity, the Word of God presented himself
in this form. Hence he procured for himself this body as a thrice- hallowed
temple, a sensible habitation of an intellectual power; a noble and most
holy form, of far higher worth than any lifeless statue. The material and
senseless image, fashioned by base mechanic hands, of brass or iron, of
gold or ivory, wood or stone, may be a fitting abode for evil spirits:
but that Divine form, wrought by the power of heavenly wisdom, was possessed
of life and spiritual being; a form animated by every excellence, the dwelling-place
of the Word of God, a holy temple of the holy God. Thus the indwelling
Word conversed with and was known to men, as kindred with themselves;
yet yielded not to passions such as theirs, nor owned, as the natural soul,
subjection to the body. He parted not with aught of his intrinsic greatness,
nor changed his proper Deity. For as the all-pervading radiance of the
sun receives no stain from contact with dead and impure bodies; much less
can the incorporeal power of the Word of God be injured in its essential
purity, or part with any of its greatness, from spiritual contact with
a human body. Thus, I say, did our common Saviour prove himself the benefactor
and preserver of all, displaying his wisdom through the instrumentality
of his human nature, even as a musician uses the lyre to evince his skill.
The Grecian myth tells us that Orpheus had power to charm ferocious beasts,
and tame their savage spirit, by striking the chords of his instrument
with a master hand: and this story is celebrated by the Greeks, and generally
believed, that an unconscious instrument could subdue the untamed brute,
and draw the trees from their places, in obedience to its melodious power.
But he who is the author of perfect harmony, the all-wise Word of God,
desiring to apply every remedy to the manifold diseases of the souls of
men, employed that human nature which is the workmanship of his own wisdom,
as an instrument by the melodious strains of which he soothed, not indeed
the brute creation, but savages endued with reason; healing each furious
temper, each fierce and angry passion of the soul, both in civilized and
barbarous nations, by the remedial power of his Divine doctrine. Like a
physician of perfect skill, he met the diseases of their souls who sought
for God in nature and in bodies, by a fitting and kindred remedy, and showed
them God in human form. And then, with no less care for the body than the
soul, he presented before the eyes of men wonders and signs, as proofs
of his Divine power, at the same time instilling into their ears of flesh
the doctrines which he himself uttered with a corporeal tongue. In short,
he performed all his works through the medium of that body which he had
assumed for the sake of those who else were incapable of apprehending his
Divine nature. In all this he was the servant of his Father's will, himself
remaining still the same as when with the Father; unchanged in essence,
unimpaired in nature, unfettered by the trammels of mortal flesh, nor hindered
by his abode in a human body from being elsewhere present. Nay, at the
very time of his intercourse with men, he was pervading all things, was
with and in the Father, and even then was caring for all things both in
heaven and earth. Nor was he precluded, as we are, from being present everywhere,
or from the continued exercise of his Divine power. He gave of his own
to man, but received nothing in return: he imparted of his Divine power
to mortality, but derived no accession from mortality itself. Hence his
human birth to him brought no defilement; nor could his impassible Essence
suffer at the dissolution of his mortal body. For let us suppose a lyre
to receive an accidental injury, or its chord to be broken; it does not
follow that the performer on it suffers: nor, if a wise man's body undergo
punishment, can we fairly assert that his wisdom, or the soul within him,
are maimed or burned.Far less can we affirm that the inherent power of
the Word sustained any detriment from his bodily passion, any more than,
as in the instance we have already used, the solar rays which are shot
from heaven to earth contract defilement, though in contact with mire and
pollution of every kind. We may, indeed, assert that these things partake
of the radiance of the light, but not that the light is contaminated, or
the sun defiled, by this contact with other bodies. And indeed these things
are themselves not contrary to nature; but the Saviour, the incorporeal
Word of God, being Life and spiritual Light itself, whatever he touches
with Divine and incorporeal power must of necessity become endued with
the intelligence of light and life. Thus, if he touch a body, it becomes
enlightened and sanctified, is at once delivered from all disease, infirmity,
and suffering, and that which before was lacking is supplied by a portion
of his fullness. And such was the tenor of his life on earth; now proving
the sympathies of his human nature with our own, and now revealing himself
as the Word of God: wondrous and mighty in his works as God; foretelling
the events of the far distant future; declaring in every act, by signs,
and wonders, and supernatural powers, that Word whose presence was so little
known; and finally, by his Divine teaching, inviting the souls of men to
prepare for those mansions which are above the heavens.
CHAPTER XV.
WHAT now remains, but to account
for those which are the crowning facts of all; I mean his death, so far
and widely known, the manner of his passion, and the mighty miracle of
his resurrection after death: and then to establish the truth of these
events by the clearest testimonies? For the reasons detailed above
he used the instrumentality of a mortal body, as a figure becoming his
Divine majesty, and like a mighty sovereign employed it as his interpreter
in his intercourse with men, performing all things consistently with his
own Divine power. Supposing, then, at the end of his sojourn among men,
he had by any other means suddenly withdrawn himself from their sight,
and, secretly removing that interpreter of himself, the form which he had
assumed, had hastened to flee from death, and afterwards by his own act
had consigned his mortal body to corruption and dissolution: doubtless
in such a case he would have been deemed a mere phantom by all. Nor would
he have acted in a manner worthy of himself, had he who is Life, the Word,
and the Power of God, abandoned this interpreter of himself to corruption
and death. Nor, again, would his warfare with the spirits of evil have
received its consummation by conflict. with the power of death. The place
of his retirement must have remained unknown; nor would his existence have
been believed by those who had not seen him for themselves. No proof would
have been given that he was superior to death nor would he have delivered
mortality from the law of its natural infirmity. His name had never been
heard throughout the world nor could he have inspired his disciples with
contempt of death, or encouraged those who. embraced his doctrine to hope
for the enjoyment of a future life with God. Nor would he have fulfilled
the assurances of his own promise, nor have accomplished the predictions
of the prophets concerning himself. Nor would he have undergone the last
conflict of all; for this was to be the struggle with the power of death.
For all these reasons, then, and inasmuch as it was necessary that the
mortal body which had rendered such service to the Divine Word should meet
with an end worthy its sacred occupant, the manner of his death was ordained
accordingly. For since but two alternatives remained: either to consign
his body entirely to corruption, and so to bring the scene of life to a
dishonored close, or else to prove himself victorious over death, and render
mortality immortal by the act of Divine power; the former of these alternatives
would have contravened his own promise. For as it is not the property of
fire to cool, nor of light to darken, no more is it compatible with life,
to deprive of life, or with Divine intelligence, to act in a manner contrary
to reason. For how would it be consistent, with reason, that he who had
promised life to others, should permit his own body, the form which he
had chosen, to perish beneath the power of corruption? That he who had
inspired his disciples with hopes of immortality, should yield this exponent
of his Divine counsels to be destroyed by death? The second alternative
was therefore needful I mean, that he should assert his dominion over the
power of death. But how? should this be a furtive and secret act, or openly
performed and in the sight of all? So mighty an achievement, had it remained
unknown and unrevealed, must have failed of its effect as regards the interests
of men; whereas the same event, if openly declared and understood, would,
from its wondrous character, redound to the common benefit of all. With
reason, therefore, since it was needful to prove his body victorious over
death, and that not secretly but before the eyes of men, he shrank not
from the trial, for this indeed would have argued fear, and a sense of
inferiority to the power of death, but maintained that conflict with the
enemy which has rendered mortality immortal; a conflict undertaken for
the life, the immortality, the salvation of all. Suppose one desired to
show us that a vessel could resist the force of fire; how could he better
prove the fact than by casting it into the furnace and thence withdrawing
it entire and unconsumed? Even thus the Word of God who is the source of
life to all, desiring to prove the triumph of that body over death which
he had assumed for man's salvation, and to make this body partake his own
life and immortality, pursued a course consistent with this object. Leaving
his body for a little while, and delivering it up to death in proof of
its mortal nature, he soon redeemed it from death, in vindication of that
Divine power whereby he has manifested the immortality which he has promised
to be utterly beyond the sphere of death. The reason of this is clear.
It was needful that l his disciples should receive ocular proof of the
certainty of that resurrection on which he had taught them to rest their
hopes as a motive for rising superior to the fear of death. It was indeed
most needful that they who purposed to pursue a life of godliness should
receive a clear impression of this essential truth: more needful still
for those who were destined to declare his name in all the world, and to
communicate to mankind that knowledge of God which he had before ordained
for all nations. For such the strongest conviction of a future life was
necessary, that they might be able with fearless and unshrinking zeal to
maintain the conflict with Gentile and polytheistic error: a conflict the
dangers of which they would never, have been prepared to meet, except as
habituated to the contempt of death. Accordingly, in arming his disciples
against the power of this last enemy, he delivered not his doctrines in
mere verbal precepts, nor attempted to prove the soul's immortality, by
persuasive and probable arguments; but displayed to them in his own person
a real victory over death. Such was the first and greatest reason of our
Saviour's conflict with the power of death, whereby he proved to his disciples
the nothingness of that which is the terror of all mankind, and afforded
a visible evidence of the reality of that life which he had promised; presenting
as it were a first-fruit of our common hope, of future life and immortality
in the presence of God. The second cause of his resurrection was, that
the Divine power might be manifested which dwelt in his mortal body. Mankind
had heretofore conferred Divine honors on men who had yielded to the power
of death, and had given the titles of gods and heroes to mortals like themselves.
For this reason, therefore, the Word of God evinced his gracious character,
and proved to man his own superiority over death, recalling his mortal
body to a second life, displaying an immortal triumph over death in the
eyes of all, and teaching them to acknowledge the Author of such a victory
to be the only true God, even in death itself. I may allege yet a third
cause of the Saviour's death. He was the victim offered to the Supreme
Sovereign of the universe for the whole human race: a victim consecrated
for the need of the human race, and for the overthrow of the errors of
demon worship. For as soon as the one holy and mighty sacrifice, the sacred
body of our Saviour, had been slain for man, to be as a ransom for all
nations, heretofore involved in the guilt of impious superstition, thenceforward
the power of impure and unholy spirits was utterly abolished, and every
earth-born and delusive error was at once weakened and destroyed. Thus,
then, this salutary victim taken from among themselves, I mean the mortal
body of the Word, was offered on behalf of the common race of men. This
was that sacrifice delivered up to death, of which the sacred oracles speak:
Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."
And again, as follows: "He was led as a sheep to the slaughter, and as
a lamb before the shearer is dumb." They declare also the cause, saying:
"He bears our sins, and is pained for us: yet we accounted him to be in
trouble, and in suffering, and in affliction. But he was wounded on account
of our sins, and bruised because of our iniquities: the chastisement of
our peace was upon him; and by his bruises we were healed. All we as sheep
have gone astray; every one has gone astray in this way; and the Lord gave
him up for our sins.''
Such were the causes which led to
the offering of the human body of the Word of God. But forasmuch as he
was the great high priest, consecrated to the Supreme Lord and King, and
therefore more than a victim, the Word, the Power, and the Wisdom of God;
he soon recalled his body from the grasp of death, presented it to his
Father as the first- fruit of our common salvation, and raised this trophy,
a proof at once of his victory over death and Satan, and of the abolition
of human sacrifices, for the blessing of all mankind.
CHAPTER XVI.
AND now the time is come for us to
proceed to the demonstration of these things; if indeed such truths require
demonstration, and if the aid of testimony be needful to confirm the certainty
of palpable facts. Such testimony, however, shall be here given; and let
it be received with an attentive and gracious ear. Of old the nations of
the earth, the entire human race, were variously distributed into provincial,
national, and local governments, subject to kingdoms and principalities
of many kinds. The consequences of this variety were war and strife, depopulation
and captivity, which raged in country and city with unceasing fury. Hence,
too, the countless subjects of history, adulteries, and rapes of women;
hence the woes of Troy, and the ancient tragedies, so known among all peoples.The
origin of these may justly be ascribed to the delusion of polytheistic
error. But when that instrument of our redemption, the thrice holy body
of Christ, which proved itself superior to all Satanic fraud, and free
from evil both in word and deed, was raised, at once for the abolition
of ancient evils, and in token of his victory over the powers of darkness;
the energy of these evil spirits was at once destroyed. The manifold forms
of government, the tyrannies and republics, the siege of cities, and devastation
of countries caused thereby, were now no more, and one God was proclaimed
to all mankind. At the same time one universal power, the Roman empire,
arose and flourished, while the enduring and implacable hatred of nation
against nation was now removed: and as the knowledge of one God, and one
way of religion and salvation, even the doctrine of Christ, was made known
to all mankind; so at the self-same period, the entire dominion of the
Roman empire being vested in a single sovereign, profound peace reigned
throughout the world. And thus, by the express appointment of the same
God, two roots of blessing, the Roman empire, and the doctrine of Christian
piety, sprang up together for the benefit of men. For before this time
the various countries of the world, as Syria, Asia, Macedonia, Egypt, and
Arabia, had been severally subject to different rulers. The Jewish people,
again, had established their dominion in the laud of Palestine. And these
nations, in every village, city, and district, actuated by some insane
spirit, were engaged in incessant and murderous war and conflict. But two
mighty powers, starting from the same point, the Roman empire, which henceforth
was swayed by a single sovereign, and the Christian religion, subdued and
reconciled these contending elements. Our Saviour's mighty power destroyed
at once the many governments and the many gods of the powers of darkness,
and proclaimed to all men, both rude and civilized, to the extremities
of the earth, the sole sovereignty of God himself. Meantime the Roman empire,
the causes of multiplied governments being thus removed, effected an easy
conquest of those which yet remained; its object being to unite all nations
in one harmonious whole; an object in great measure already secured, and
destined to be still more perfectly attained, even to the final conquest
of the ends of the habitable world, by means of the salutary doctrine,
and through the aid of that Divine power which facilitates and smooths
its way. And surely this must appear a wondrous fact to those who will
examine the question in the love of truth, and desire not to cavil at these
blessings. The falsehood of demon superstition was convicted: the inveterate
strife and mutual hatred of the nations was removed: at the same time One
God, and the knowledge of that God, were proclaimed to all: one universal
empire prevailed; and the whole human race, subdued by the controlling
power of peace and concord, received one another as brethren, and responded
to the feelings of their common nature. Hence, as children of one God and
Father, and owning true religion as their common mother, they saluted and
welcomed each other with words of peace. Thus the whole world appeared
like one well-ordered and united family: each one might journey unhindered
as far as and whithersoever he pleased: men might securely travel from
West to East, and from East to West, as to their own native country: in
short, the ancient oracles and predictions of the prophets were fulfilled,
more numerous than we can at present cite, and those especially which speak
as follows concerning the saving Word. "He shall have dominion from sea
to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth." And again, "In his
days shall righteousness spring up; and abundance of peace." "And they
shall beat their swords into plough- shares, and their spears into sickles:
and nation shall not take up sword against nation, neither shall they learn
to war any more.'' These words, predicted ages before in the Hebrew tongue,
have received in our own day a visible fulfillment, by which the testimonies
of the ancient oracles are clearly confirmed. And now, if thou still desire
more ample proof, receive it, not in words, but from the facts themselves.
Open the eyes of thine understanding expand the gates of thought; pause
awhile, and consider; inquire of thyself as though thou weft another, and
thus diligently examine the nature of the case. What king or prince in
any age of the world, what philosopher, legislator, or prophet, in civilized
or barbarous lands, has attained so great a height of excellence, I say
not after death, but while living still, and full of mighty power, as to
fill the ears and tongues of all mankind with the praises of his name?
Surely none save our only Saviour has done this, when, after his victory
over death, he spoke the word to his followers, and fulfilled it by the
event, saying to them, "Go ye, and make disciples of all nations in my
name.'' He it was who gave the distinct assurance, that his gospel must
be preached in all the world for a testimony to all nations, and immediately
verified his word: for within a little time the world itself was filled
with his doctrine. How, then, will those who caviled at the commencement
of my speech be able to reply to this? For surely the force of ocular testimony
is superior to any verbal argument. Who else than he, with an invisible
and yet potent hand, has driven from human society like savage beasts that
ever noxious and destructive tribe of evil spirits who of old had made
all nations their prey, and by the motions of their images had practiced
many a delusion among men? Who else, beside our Saviour, by the invocation
of his name, and by unfeigned prayer addressed through him to the Supreme
God, has given power to banish from the world the remnant of those wicked
spirits to those who with genuine and sincere obedience pursue the course
of life and conduct which he has himself prescribed? Who else but our Saviour
has taught his followers to offer those bloodless and reasonable sacrifices
which are performed by prayer and the secret worship of God? Hence
is it that throughout the habitable world altars are erected, and churches
dedicated, wherein these spiritual and rational sacrifices are offered
as a sacred service by every nation to the One Supreme God. Once more,
who but he, with invisible and secret power, has suppressed and utterly
abolished those bloody sacrifices which were offered with fire and smoke,
as well as the cruel and senseless immolation of human victims; a fact
which is attested by the heathen historians themselves? For it was not
till after the publication of the Saviour's Divine doctrine, about the
time of Hadrian's reign, that the practice of human sacrifice was universally
abandoned. Such and so manifest are the proofs of our Saviour's power and
energy after death. Who then can be found of spirit so obdurate as to withhold
his assent to the truth, and refuse to acknowledge his life to be Divine?
Such deeds as I have described are done by the living, not the dead; and
visible acts are to us as evidence of those which we cannot see. It is
as it were an event of yesterday that an impious and godless race disturbed
and confounded the peace of human society, and possessed mighty power.
But these, as soon as life departed, lay prostrate on the earth, worthless
as dung, breathless, motionless, bereft of speech, and have left neither
fame nor memorial behind. For such is the condition of the dead; and he
who no longer lives is nothing: and how can he who is nothing be capable
of any act? But how shall his existence be called in question, whose active
power and energy are greater than in those who are still alive? And though
he be invisible to the natural eye, yet the discerning faculty is not in
outward sense. We do not comprehend the rules of art, or the theories of
science, by bodily sensation; nor has any eye yet discerned the mind of
man. Far less, then, the power of God: and in such cases our judgment is
formed from apparent results. Even thus are we bound to judge of our Saviour's
invisible power, and decide by its manifest effects whether we shall acknowledge
the mighty operations which he is even now carrying on to be the works
of a living agent; or whether they shall be ascribed to one who has no
existence; or, lastly, whether the inquiry be not absurd and inconsistent
in itself. For with what reason can we assert the existence of one who
is not? Since all allow that that which has no existence is devoid of that
power, and energy, and action, for these are characteristics of the living,
but the contrary is characteristic of the dead.
CHAPTER XVII.
AND now the time is come for us to
consider the works of our Saviour in our own age, and to contemplate the
living operations of the living God. For how shall we describe these mighty
works save as living proofs of the power of a living agent, who truly enjoys
the life of God? If any one inquire the nature of these works, let him
now attend. But recently a class of persons, impelled by furious zeal,
and backed by equal power and military force, evinced their enmity against
God, by destroying his churches, and overthrowing from their foundations
the buildings dedicated to his worship. In short, in every way they directed
their attacks against the unseen God, and assailed him with a thousand
shafts of impious words. But he who is invisible avenged himself with an
invisible hand. By the single fiat of his will his enemies were utterly
destroyed, they who a little while before had been flourishing in great
prosperity, exalted by their fellow men as worthy of divine honor, and
blessed with a continued period of power and glory, so long as they
had maintained peace and amity with him whom they afterwards opposed. As
soon, however, as they dared openly to resist his will, and to set their
gods in array against him whom we adore; immediately, according to the
will and power of that God against whom their arms were raised, they all
received the judgment due to their audacious deeds. Constrained to yield
and flee before his power, together they acknowledged his Divine nature,
and hastened to reverse the measures which they had before essayed. Our
Saviour, therefore, without delay erected trophies of this victory everywhere,
and once more adorned the world with holy temples and consecrated houses
of prayer; in every city and village, nay, throughout all countries, and
even in barbaric wilds, ordaining the erection of churches and sacred buildings
to the honor of the Supreme God and Lord of all. Hence it is that these
hallowed edifices are deemed worthy to bear his name, and receive not their
appellation from men, but from the Lord himself, from which circumstances
they are called churches (or houses of the Lord). And now let him who will
stand forth and tell us who, after so complete a desolation, has restored
these sacred buildings from foundation to roof? Who, when all hope appeared
extinct, has caused them to rise on a nobler scale than heretofore? And
well may it claim our wonder, that this renovation was not subsequent to
the death of those adversaries of God, but whilst the destroyers of these
edifices were still alive; so that the recantation of their evil deeds
came in their own words and edicts. And this they did, not in the sunshine
of prosperity and ease (for then we might suppose that benevolence or clemency
might be the cause), but at the very time that they were suffering under
the stroke of Divine vengeance. Who, again, has been able to retain in
obedience to his heavenly precepts, after so many successive storms of
persecution, nay, in the very crisis of danger, so many persons throughout
the world devoted to philosophy, and the service of God and those holy
choirs of virgins who had dedicated themselves to a life of perpetual chastity
and purity? Who taught them cheerfully to persevere in the exercise of
protracted fasting, and to embrace a life of severe and consistent self-denial?
Who has persuaded multitudes of either sex to devote themselves to the
study of sacred things, and prefer to bodily nutriment that intellectual
food which is suited to the wants of a rational soul? Who has instructed
barbarians and peasants, yea, feeble women, slaves, and children, in short,
unnumbered multitudes of all nations, to live in the contempt of death;
persuaded of the immortality of their souls, conscious that human actions
are observed by the unerring eye of justice, expecting God's award to the
righteous and the wicked, and therefore true to the practice of a just
and virtuous life? For they could not otherwise have persevered in the
course of godliness. Surely these are the acts which our Saviour, and he
alone, even now performs. And now let us pass from these topics,
and endeavor by inquiries such as these that follow to convince the objector's
obdurate understanding. Come forward, then, whoever thou art, and speak
the words of reason: utter, not the thoughts of a senseless heart, but
those of an intelligent and enlightened mind: speak, I say, after deep
solemn converse with thyself. Who of the sages whose names have yet been
known to fame, has ever been fore-known and proclaimed from the remotest
ages, as our Saviour was by the prophetic oracles to the once divinely-favored
Hebrew nation? But his very birth-place, the period of his advent the manner
of his life, his miracles, and words and mighty acts, were anticipated
and recorded in the sacred volumes of these prophets. Again, who so present
an avenger of crimes against himself; so that, as the immediate consequence
of their impiety, the entire Jewish people were scattered by an unseen
power, their royal seat utterly removed, and their very temple with its
holy things levelled with the ground? Who, like our Saviour, has uttered
predictions at once concerning that impious nation and the establishment
of his church throughout the world, and has equally verified both by the
event? Respecting the temple of these wicked men, our Saviour said: "Your
house is left unto you desolate": and, "There shall not be left one stone
upon another in this place, that shall not be thrown down." And again,
of his church he says: "I will build my church upon a rock, and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it." How wondrous, too, must that
power be deemed which summoned obscure and unlettered men from their fisher's
trade, and made them the legislators and instructors of the human race!
And how clear a demonstration of his deity do we find in the promise so
well performed, that he would make them fishers of men: in the power and
energy which he bestowed, so that they composed and published writings
of such authority that they were translated into every civilized and barbarous
languages were read and pondered by all nations, and the doctrines contained
in them accredited as the oracles of God! How marvelous his predictions
of the future, and the testimony whereby his disciples were forewarned
that they should be brought before kings and rulers, and should endure
the severest punishments, not indeed as criminals, but simply for their
confession of his name! Or who shall adequately describe the power with
which he prepared them thus to suffer with a willing mind, and enabled
them, strong in the armor of godliness, to maintain a constancy of spirit
indomitable in the midst of conflict? Or how shall we enough admire that
steadfast firmness of soul which strengthened, not merely his immediate
followers but their successors also, even to our present age, in the joyful
endurance of every infliction, and every form of torture, in proof of their
devotion to the Supreme God? Again, what monarch has prolonged his government
through so vast a series of ages? Who else has power to make war after
death, to triumph over every enemy, to subjugate each barbarous and civilized
nation and city, and to subdue his adversaries with an invisible and secret
hand? Lastly, and chief of all, what slanderous lip shall dare to question
that universal peace to which we have already referred; established by
his power throughout the world. For thus the mutual concord and harmony
of all nations coincided in point of time with the extension of our Saviour's
doctrine and preaching in all the world: a concurrence of events predicted
in long ages past by the prophets of God. The day itself would fail me,
gracious emperor, should I attempt to exhibit in a single view those cogent
proofs of our Saviour's Divine power which even now are visible in their
effects; for no human being, in civilized or barbarous nations, has ever
yet exhibited such power of Divine virtue as our Saviour. But why do I
speak of men, since of the beings whom all nations have deemed divine,
none has appeared on earth with power like to his? If there has, let the
fact now be proved. Come forward, ye philosophers, and tell us what god
or hero has yet been known to fame, who has delivered the doctrines of
eternal life and a heavenly kingdom as he has done who is our Saviour?
Who, like him, has persuaded multitudes throughout the world to pursue
the principles of Divine wisdom, to fix their hope on heaven itself, and
look forward to the mansions there reserved for them that love God? What
god or hero in human form has ever held his course from the rising to the
setting sun, a course co-extensive as it were with the solar light, and
irradiated mankind with the bright and glorious beams of his doctrine,
causing each nation of the earth to render united worship to the One true
God? What god or hero yet, as he has done, has set aside all gods and heroes
among civilized or barbarous nations has ordained that divine honors should
be withheld from all, and chimed obedience to that command: and then, though
singly conflicting with the power of all, has utterly destroyed the opposing
hosts; victorious over the gods and heroes of every age, and causing himself
alone, in every region of the habitable world, to be acknowledged by all
people as the only Son of God? Who else has commanded the nations inhabiting
the continents and islands of this mighty globe to assemble weekly on the
Lord's day, and to observe it as a festival, not indeed for the pampering
of the body, but for the invigoration of the soul by instruction in Divine
truth? What god or hero, exposed, as our Saviour was, to so sore a conflict,
has raised the trophy of victory over every foe? For they indeed, from
first to last, unceasingly assailed his doctrine and his people: but he
who is invisible, by the exercise of a secret power, has raised his servants
and the sacred houses of their worship to the height of glory.
But why should we still vainly aim
at detailing those Divine proofs of our Saviour's power which no language
can worthily express; which need indeed no words of ours, but themselves
appeal in loudest tones to those whose mental ears are open to the truth?
Surely it is a strange, a wondrous fact, unparalleled in the annals of
human life; that the blessings we have described should be accorded to
our mortal race, and that he who is in truth the only, the eternal Son
of God, should thus be visible on earth.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THESE words of ours, however, [gracious]
Sovereign, may well appear superfluous in your ears, convinced as you are,
by frequent and personal experience, of our Saviour's Deity; yourself also,
in actions still more than words, a her-aid of the truth to all mankind.
Yourself, it may be, will vouchsafe at a time of leisure to relate to us
the abundant manifestations which your Saviour has accorded you of his
presence, and the oft-repeated visions of himself which have at-tended
you in the hours of sleep. I speak not of those secret suggestions which
to us are unrevealed: but of those principles which he has instilled into
your own mind, and which are fraught with general interest and benefit
to the human race. You will yourself relate in worthy terms the visible
protection which your Divine shield and guardian has extended in the hour
of battle; the ruin of your open and secret foes; and his ready aid in
time of peril. To him you will ascribe relief in the midst of perplexity;
defence in solitude; expedients in extremity; foreknowledge of events yet
future; your fore thought for the general weal; your power to investigate
uncertain questions; your conduct of most important enterprises; your administration
of civil affairs; your military arrangements, and correction of abuses
in all departments; your ordinances respecting public right; and, lastly,
your legislation for the common benefit of all. You will, it may be, also
detail to us those particulars of his favor which are secret to us, but
known to you alone, and treasured in your royal memory as in secret storehouses.
Such, doubtless, are the reasons, and such the convincing proofs of your
Saviour's power, which caused you to raise that sacred edifice which presents
to all, believers and unbelievers alike, a trophy of his victory over death,
a holy temple of the holy God: to consecrate those noble and splendid monuments
of immortal life and his heavenly kingdom: to offer memorials of our Almighty
Saviour's conquest which well become the imperial dignity of him by whom
they are bestowed. With such memorials have you adorned that edifice which
witnesses of eternal life: thus, as it were in imperial characters, ascribing
victory and triumph to the heavenly Word of God: thus proclaiming to all
nations, with clear and unmistakable voice, in deed and word, your own
devout and pious confession of his name.
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from Volume I, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers,
2nd Series, ed. P. Schaff and H. Wace
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