19. If we similarly investigate the Gospels, what could be more unreasonable than the command which simple readers think the Saviour gave to His Apostles, "Salute no man by the way." Again, what is said about the smiting on the right cheek is incredible; for when a man strikes, if he acts naturally, he strikes the left cheek with his right hand. And we cannot take literally the passage in the Gospel in which the right eye is said to cause one to stumble. For even granting the possibility of sight making any one to stumble, why, when the two eyes see, should we put the blame on the right eye. Would any man when he condemns himself for looking on a woman to lust after her, put the blame on the right eye only, and cast it from him? Again, the Apostle lays down the law thus: "Was any man called being circumcised? let him not become uncircumcised?" Any one may see that the Apostle has something in view other than the literal context; for, in the first place, such an insertion when he is giving precepts concerning marriage and purity must appear unmeaning. And, in the second place, who will say that, in order to escape from the disgrace mostly connected with circumcision, a man |21 does wrong in endeavouring, if he can, to become un-circumcised.