Testimonia

{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p>How, then, can men hope for a favourable introduction to\r\nthe friendship of the gods by such mediators as these, who\r\nare, like men, defective in that which is the better part of\r\nevery living creature, viz. the soul, and who resemble the gods\r\nonly in the body, which is the inferior part? For a living\r\ncreature or animal consists of soul and body, and of these two\r\nparts the soul is undoubtedly the better; even though vicious\r\nand weak, it is obviously better than even the soundest and\r\nstrongest body, for the greater excellence of its nature is not<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_364\">[Pg 364]</a></span>\r\nreduced to the level of the body even by the pollution of vice,\r\nas gold, even when tarnished, is more precious than the purest\r\nsilver or lead. And yet these mediators, by whose interposition\r\nthings human and divine are to be harmonized, have an\r\neternal body in common with the gods, and a vicious soul in\r\ncommon with men,—as if the religion by which these demons\r\nare to unite gods and men were a bodily, and not a spiritual\r\nmatter. What wickedness, then, or punishment has suspended\r\nthese false and deceitful mediators, as it were head downwards,\r\nso that their inferior part, their body, is linked to the gods\r\nabove, and their superior part, the soul, bound to men beneath;\r\nunited to the celestial gods by the part that serves, and miserable,\r\ntogether with the inhabitants of earth, by the part that\r\nrules? For the body is the servant, as Sallust says: \"We\r\nuse the soul to rule, the body to obey;\"<a id=\"FNanchor_342_342\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_342_342\">[342]</a> adding, \"the one we\r\nhave in common with the gods, the other with the brutes.\"\r\nFor he was here speaking of men; and they have, like the\r\nbrutes, a mortal body. These demons, whom our philosophic\r\nfriends have provided for us as mediators with the gods, may\r\nindeed say of the soul and body, the one we have in common\r\nwith the gods, the other with men; but, as I said, they\r\nare as it were suspended and bound head downwards, having\r\nthe slave, the body, in common with the gods, the master,\r\nthe soul, in common with miserable men,—their inferior part\r\nexalted, their superior part depressed. And therefore, if any\r\none supposes that, because they are not subject, like terrestrial\r\nanimals, to the separation of soul and body by death, they\r\ntherefore resemble the gods in their eternity, their body must\r\nnot be considered a chariot of an eternal triumph, but rather\r\nthe chain of an eternal punishment.</p>","headings":["THE WORKS OF AURELIUS AUGUSTINE,","BOOK NINTH.","ARGUMENT."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg45304-paragraph-642"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"54ffbf655a9cafa688e9036f7b22c022ba867bad8919bf14fb7d6fce96fc07c7","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_342_342","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_342_342","source_ebook":45304,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\">\n<p><a id=\"Footnote_342_342\"></a><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#FNanchor_342_342\"><span class=\"label\">[342]</span></a> <i>Cat. Conj.</i> i.</p></div>","source_sha256":"d89e9a2b80bb59f394f0fb1bf313b39fab162f06af6642166d62c5912c1195f1","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45304/pg45304-images.html#Footnote_342_342","text_sha256":"304a15d5d647740455576f0f02964fc901675659ceedfe8a9e6ba83b95bd5e24","verified":false,"work_id":null}

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