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Consequences of revering Man more than God. [7.] Let us not then desire' any others to applaud us. For ICOR.4. this is to insult Him; hastening by Him, as if insufficient to 1 δεόμε admire us, we make the best of our way to our fellow servants. . tort. For just as they, who contend in a small theatre, seek a large διώμεθα. one, as if this were insufficient for their display; so also do they, who, contending in the sight of God, afterwards seek the applause of men; losing the greater praise and eager for the less, they draw upon themselves severe punishment. What but this hath turned every thing upside down? this puts the whole world into confusion, that we do all things with an eye to men, and, even for our good things, we esteem it nothing to have God as an admirer, but seek the approbation which cometh from our fellow-servants : and for the contrary things again, despising Him, we fear men. And yet surely they shall stand with us before that tribunal, doing us no good. But God, whom we despise now, shall Himself pass the sentence upon us.

But yet, though we know these things, we still gape after men, which is the first of sins. Thus, were a man looking on, no one would choose to commit fornication; but even though be be ten thousand times on fire with that plague, the tyranny of the passion is conquered by his reverence for men. But in God's sight, men not only cominit adultery and fornication; but other things also much more dreadful, many have dared and still dare to do. This then alone, is it not enough to bring down from above ten thousand thunderbolts? Adulteries, did I say, and fornications? Nay, things even far less than these we fear to do before men: but in God's sight, we fear no longer. From hence, in fact, all the world's evils have originated; because, in things so bad, we reverence not God but men.

On this account, you see, both things which are truly good, not accounted such by the generality, become objects of our aversion: we not investigating the nature of the things, but having respect unto the opinion of the many: and again, in the case of evil things, acting on this same principle Certain things therefore not really good, but seeming fair unto the many, we pursue, as goods, through the same habit. So that on either side we go to destruction.

[8.] Perhaps many may find this remark somewhat obscure. Wherefore we must express it more clearly. When we

XII.

156

Instances of the World's Tyranny:

HOMIL. Commit uncleanness, (for we must begin from the instances alleged,) we fear men more than God. When therefore we have thus subjected ourselves unto them, and made them lords over us; there are many other things also, which seem unto these our lords to be evil, not being such; these also we flee for our part in like manner. For instance; To live in poverty, many account disgraceful: and we flee poverty, not because it is disgraceful nor because we are so persuaded, but because our masters count it disgraceful; and we fear them. Again, to be unhonoured, and contemptible, and void of all authority, seems likewise unto the most part a matter of shame and great vileness. This again we flee; not condemning the thing itself, but because of the sentence of our masters.

Again, on the contrary side also we undergo the same mischief. As, wealth is counted a good thing, and pride, and pomps, and to be conspicuous. Accordingly, this again we pursue, not either in this case from considering the nature of the things as good, but persuaded by the opinion of our masters. For the people is our master; and the great 18 road, mobl is a savage master, and a severe tyrant: not so much

as a command being needed in order to make us listen to him; it is enough that we just know what he wills, and without a command we submit: so great good will do we bear towards him. Again, God threatening and admonishing day by day, is not heard: but the common people, full of disorder, made up of all manner of dregs, has no occasion for one word of command; enough for it, only to signify with what it is well pleased, and in all things we obey immediately.

[9.] "But how," says some one," is a man to flee from these masters?" By getting a mind greater than their's; by looking into the nature of things; by condemning the voice of the multitude; before all, by training himself in things really disgraceful to fear not men, but the unsleeping Eye; and again, in all good things, to seek the crowns which come from Him. For thus neither in the other sort of things shall we be able to tolerate them. For whoso, when he doeth right, judges them unworthy to know his good deeds, and contents himself with the suffrage of God; neither will he take account of them in matters of the contrary sort.

"And how can this be?" you will say. Consider what man

of its corrupt and erroneous Judgment.

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LXX.

is, what God; whom thou desertest, and unto whom thou fliest 1COR.4. for refuge and thou wilt soon be right altogether. Man lieth under the same sin as thyself, and the same condemnation, and the same punishment. Man is like to vanity', and hath Psalm not true judgment, and needs the correction from above. 144. 4. Man is dust and ashes, and if he bestow praise, he will often bestow it at random, or out of favour, or ill will. And if he calu mniate and accuse, this again will he do out of the same kind of purpose. But God doeth not so: rather irreprovable is His sentence, and pure His judgment. Wherefore we must always flee to Him for refuge; and not for these reasons alone, but because He both made, and more than all spares thee, and loves thee better than thou dost thyself.

θαυμα

Why then, neglecting to have so aweful' an approver, betake? we ourselves unto man, who is nothing, all rashness, all at """. random? Doth he call thee wicked and polluted, when thou art not so? So much the more do thou pity him, and weep because he is corrupt; and despise his opinion, because the eyes of his understanding are darkened. For even the Apostles were thus evil reported of; and they laughed to scorn their calumniators. But doth he call thee good and kind? If such indeed thou art, yet be not at all puffed up by the opinion: but if thou art not such, despise it the more, and esteem the thing to be mockery.

Wouldest thou know the judgments of the greater part of men, how corrupt they are, how useless, and worthy of ridicule; some of them fit only for raving and distracted persons, others for children at the breast? Hear what hath been from the beginning. I will tell thee of judgments, not of the people only, but also of those who passed for the wisest, of those who were legislators from the earliest period. For who would be counted wiser among the multitude, than the person considered worthy of legislating for cities and people? But yet to these wise men fornication seems to be nothing evil, nor worthy of punishment. At least no one of the heathen laws makes it penal, or brings men to trial on account of it. And should any one bring another into court for things of that kind, the multitude laughs it to scorn, and the judge will not suffer it. Dice-playing, again, is exempt from all their punishments: nor did any one among

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158

Infatuation of Theatrical Entertainments.

HOMIL. them ever incur penalty for it. Drunkenness and gluttony, so far from being a crime, are considered by many, even as a fine thing. And in military carousals it is a point of great emulation; and they who most of all need a sober mind and a strong body, these are most of all given over to the tyranny of drunkenness; both utterly weakening the body and darkening the soul. Yet of the lawgivers not one hath punished this fault. What can be worse than this madness?

Is then the good word of men so disposed an object of desire to thee, and dost thou not hide thyself in the earth? For even though all such admired thee, oughtest thou not to feel ashamed, and cover thy face, at being applauded by men of such corrupt judgment?

Again, blasphemy by legislators in general is accounted nothing terrible. At any rate, no one for having blasphemed God was ever brought to trial and punished. But if a man steal another's garment, or cut his purse, his sides are flayed, and he is often given over unto death: while he that blasphemeth God hath nothing laid to his charge by the heathen legislators. And if a man seduce a female servant, when he hath a wife, it seems nothing to the heathen laws, nor to men in general.

[10.] Wilt thou hear besides of some things of another class which shew their folly? For as they punish not these things, so there are others which they enforce by law. What then are these? They collect crowds to fill theatres, and there they introduce choirs of harlots and children of fornication, yea such as trample on nature herself; and they make the whole people sit on high, and so they captivate their city; so they crown those mighty kings whom they are perpetually admiring for their trophies and victories. And yet, what can be colder than this honour? what more undelightful than this delight? From among these then seekest thou judges to applaud thy deeds? And is it in company with dancers, and effeminate, and buffoons, and harlots, that thou art fain to enjoy the sound of compliment? answer me.

How can these things be other than proofs of extreme infatuation? For I should like to ask them, is it, or is Savile, it not, a dreadful thing to subvert the laws of nature, and áv introduce unlawful intercourse? They will surely say, it is

1 πάντως

Bened.

1

Inconsistency of the World concerning them.

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6.

dreadful at any rate, they make a shew of inflicting a 1COR.4. penalty on that crime. Why then dost thou bring on the stage those abused wretches; and not only bring them in, but honour them also, with honours innumerable, and gifts not to be told? In other places thou punishest those who dare such things; but here even as on common benefactors of the city, thou spendest money upon them, and supportest them at the public expense.

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"However," thou wilt say," they are infamous 11." then train them up?? Why choose the infamous to honour to kings withal? And why ruin our cities? why spend so much upon these persons? Since, if be infamous, expulsion is properest for the infamous. why didst thou render them infamous? in praise or in a you. condemnation? Of course in condemnation. Is the next 17. thing to be, that although as after condemnation you make them infamous, yet as if they were honourable you run to see them, and admire, and praise, and applaud? Why need I speak of the sort of charm which is found in the horse races? or in the contests of the wild beasts? For those places too being full of all senseless excitement, are a school ever open for the populace to acquire a merciless and savage and inhuman kind of temper, and practise them in seeing men torn in pieces, and blood flowing, and the ferocity of wild beasts confounding all things. Now all these our wise lawgivers from the beginning introduced, being so many plagues; and our cities applaud and admire.

[11.] But if thou wilt, dismissing these things, which clearly and confessedly are absurd, but seemed not [so] to the heathen legislators, let us proceed to their grave precepts; and

a Bingham (b. xvi. c. 4. §. 10.) proves that actors and the like, were debarred from the Sacraments, except they renounced their calling, from very early times: from S. Cyprian, Ep. 61. who says, "I think it inconsistent both with the Majesty of God and the discipline of the Gospel, to allow the Chastity and Glory of the Church to be defiled with so base contagion;" from Tertullian; de Spectac. 4; de Cor. Mil. 13; and from the Apostolical Constitutions,

viii. 32.

b Gibbon, c. 31. from Ammianus, relates, that on occasion of a scarcity, when all strangers were expelled from Rome, an exception was made in favour of the actors, singers, dancers, &c.

μayyavsías. Compare S. Augustine's account in the Confessions of the way in which some persons were bewitched by the gladiatorial shows; of which his friend Alypius in his youth was a remarkable instance. b. vi.§. 13.

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