Testimonia

{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p>But will they perhaps remind us of the schools of the\r\nphilosophers, and their disputations? In the first place, these\r\nbelong not to Rome, but to Greece; and even if we yield to\r\nthem that they are now Roman, because Greece itself has\r\nbecome a Roman province, still the teachings of the philosophers\r\nare not the commandments of the gods, but the discoveries\r\nof men, who, at the prompting of their own speculative\r\nability, made efforts to discover the hidden laws of nature, and\r\nthe right and wrong in ethics, and in dialectic what was consequent\r\naccording to the rules of logic, and what was inconsequent\r\nand erroneous. And some of them, by God's help,\r\nmade great discoveries; but when left to themselves they\r\nwere betrayed by human infirmity, and fell into mistakes. And\r\nthis was ordered by divine providence, that their pride might\r\nbe restrained, and that by their example it might be pointed\r\nout that it is humility which has access to the highest regions.<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_56\">[Pg 56]</a></span>\r\nBut of this we shall have more to say, if the Lord God of\r\ntruth permit, in its own place.<a id=\"FNanchor_92_92\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_92_92\">[92]</a> However, if the philosophers\r\nhave made any discoveries which are sufficient to guide men\r\nto virtue and blessedness, would it not have been greater\r\njustice to vote divine honours to them? Were it not more\r\naccordant with every virtuous sentiment to read Plato's writings\r\nin a \"Temple of Plato,\" than to be present in the temples\r\nof devils to witness the priests of Cybele<a id=\"FNanchor_93_93\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_93_93\">[93]</a> mutilating themselves,\r\nthe effeminate being consecrated, the raving fanatics\r\ncutting themselves, and whatever other cruel or shameful, or\r\nshamefully cruel or cruelly shameful, ceremony is enjoined by\r\nthe ritual of such gods as these? Were it not a more suitable\r\neducation, and more likely to prompt the youth to virtue, if\r\nthey heard public recitals of the laws of the gods, instead of\r\nthe vain laudation of the customs and laws of their ancestors?\r\nCertainly all the worshippers of the Roman gods, when once\r\nthey are possessed by what Persius calls \"the burning poison\r\nof lust,\"<a id=\"FNanchor_94_94\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_94_94\">[94]</a> prefer to witness the deeds of Jupiter rather than to\r\nhear what Plato taught or Cato censured. Hence the young\r\nprofligate in Terence, when he sees on the wall a fresco representing\r\nthe fabled descent of Jupiter into the lap of Danaë\r\nin the form of a golden shower, accepts this as authoritative\r\nprecedent for his own licentiousness, and boasts that he is an\r\nimitator of God. \"And what God?\" he says. \"He who\r\nwith His thunder shakes the loftiest temples. And was I, a\r\npoor creature compared to Him, to make bones of it? No;\r\nI did it, and with all my heart.\"<a id=\"FNanchor_95_95\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_95_95\">[95]</a></p>","headings":["THE WORKS OF AURELIUS AUGUSTINE,","BOOK SECOND.","ARGUMENT."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg45304-paragraph-130"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"cc69f441946c4a40800ef6902d4c15903dadf1c4c7e6c260ef7956605cbf484c","edition_title":"The City of God, Volume I","edition_translators":["Marcus Dods","George Wilson (Book IV)","J. J. Smith (Books V-VIII)"],"edition_year":1871,"explicit_reference_candidates":[],"headings":[],"id":"pg45304-Footnote_94_94","license_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html","public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"original-editor-translator-note","review_required":["work and recension attribution","original-work chronology","Bible reference numbering and citation kind","English edition rights and attribution"],"review_status":"needs_review","rights_evidence":"Provider catalog reports public domain in the USA. Original transcription title leaves state T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1871; printed translator allocation retained. Gutenberg credits Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries without an exact scan identifier. Full provider license preserved with acquired original; republication and per-work metadata remain unreviewed.","source_anchor":"Footnote_94_94","source_ebook":45304,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\">\n<p><a id=\"Footnote_94_94\"></a><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#FNanchor_94_94\"><span class=\"label\">[94]</span></a> Persius, <i>Sat.</i> iii. 37.</p></div>","source_sha256":"d89e9a2b80bb59f394f0fb1bf313b39fab162f06af6642166d62c5912c1195f1","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45304/pg45304-images.html#Footnote_94_94","text_sha256":"2523b63cbc15417236cd2cacd85b9740759fd24b1d6fe19f9ae7cfab0a6178ea","verified":false,"work_id":null}

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