{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p>204. \"What,\" say you, \"have you to do with the kings of\r\nthis world, in whom Christianity has never found anything\r\nsave envy towards her?\" Having said this, you endeavoured\r\nto reckon up what kings the righteous had found to be their\r\nenemies, and did not consider how many more might be enumerated\r\nwho have proved their friends. The patriarch Abraham\r\nwas both most friendly treated, and presented with a token\r\nof friendship, by a king who had been warned from heaven\r\nnot to defile his wife.<a id=\"FNanchor_951_951\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_951_951\">[951]</a> Isaac his son likewise found a king\r\nmost friendly to him.<a id=\"FNanchor_952_952\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_952_952\">[952]</a> Jacob, being received with honour by\r\na king in Egypt, went so far as to bless him.<a id=\"FNanchor_953_953\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_953_953\">[953]</a> What shall I\r\nsay of his son Joseph, who, after the tribulation of a prison,\r\nin which his chastity was tried as gold is tried in the fire,\r\nbeing raised by Pharaoh to great honours,<a id=\"FNanchor_954_954\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_954_954\">[954]</a> even swore by the\r\nlife of Pharaoh,<a id=\"FNanchor_955_955\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_955_955\">[955]</a>—not as though puffed up with vain conceit,\r\nbut being not unmindful of his kindness. The daughter of a\r\nking adopted Moses.<a id=\"FNanchor_956_956\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_956_956\">[956]</a> David took refuge with a king of\r\nanother race, compelled thereto by the unrighteousness of the\r\nking of Israel.<a id=\"FNanchor_957_957\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_957_957\">[957]</a> Elijah ran before the chariot of a most\r\nwicked king,—not by the king's command, but from his own\r\nloyalty.<a id=\"FNanchor_958_958\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_958_958\">[958]</a> Elisha thought it good to offer of his own accord to\r\nthe woman who had sheltered him anything that she might\r\nwish to have obtained from the king through his intercession.<a id=\"FNanchor_959_959\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_959_959\">[959]</a>\r\nBut I will come to the actual times when the people of God\r\nwere in captivity, in which, to use a mild expression, a strange\r\nforgetfulness came over you. For, wishing to prove that\r\nChristianity has never found anything in kings saving envy\r\ntowards her, you made mention of the three children and<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_369\">[Pg 369]</a></span>\r\nDaniel, who suffered at the hands of persecuting kings, and\r\nyou could not derive instruction from circumstances not occurring\r\nnear, but in the very same passages, viz. from the conduct\r\nof the king himself after the miracle of the flames which\r\ndid no hurt, whether as shown in praising and setting forth\r\nthe name of God, or in honouring the three children themselves,\r\nor from the esteem in which the king held Daniel, and\r\nthe gifts with which he honoured him, nothing loth to receive\r\nthem, when he, rendering the honour that was due to the\r\nking's power, as sufficiently appears from his own words, did\r\nnot hesitate to use the gift with which he was endowed by\r\nGod, in interpreting the king's dream. And when, in consequence,\r\nthe king was compelled by the men who envied the\r\nholy prophet, and heaped calumnies upon him with sacrilegious\r\nmadness, most unwillingly to cast him into the den of\r\nlions, sadly though he did it, yet he had the conviction that\r\nhe would be safe through the help and protection of his God.\r\nAccordingly, when Daniel, by the miraculous repression of\r\nthe lions' rage, had been preserved unhurt, when the friendly\r\nvoice of the king spoke first to him in accents of anxiety,\r\nhe himself replied with benediction from the den, \"O king,\r\nlive for ever!\"<a id=\"FNanchor_960_960\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_960_960\">[960]</a> How came it that, when your argument was\r\nturning on the very same subject, when you were yourself\r\nquoting the examples of the servants of God in whose case\r\nthese things were done, you either failed to see, or were unwilling\r\nto see, or seeing and knowing, were silent, in a manner\r\nwhich I know not how you will defend, about those instances\r\nof friendship felt by kings for the saints? But if it were not\r\nthat, as a defender of the basest cause, you are hindered by\r\nthe desire of building up falsehood, and thereby turned away\r\neither as unwilling or as ignorant from the light of truth,\r\nthere can be no doubt that you could, without any difficulty,\r\nrecall some good kings as well as some bad ones, and some\r\nfriendly to the saints as well as some unfriendly. And we\r\ncannot but wonder that your Circumcelliones thus throw themselves\r\nfrom precipices. Who was running after you, I pray?\r\nWhat Macarius, what soldier was pursuing you? Certainly\r\nnone of our party thrust you into this abyss of falsehood.<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_370\">[Pg 370]</a></span>\r\nWhy then did you thus run headlong with your eyes shut, so\r\nthat when you said, \"What have you to do with the kings of\r\nthis world?\" you did not add, In whom Christianity has\r\noften found envy towards herself, instead of boldly venturing\r\nto say, \"In whom Christianity has never found anything save\r\nenvy towards her?\" Was it really true that you neither\r\nthought yourself, nor considered that those who read your\r\nwritings would think, how many instances of kings there\r\nwere that went against your views? Does he not know\r\nwhat he says?</p>","headings":["WRITINGS IN CONNECTION WITH THE DONATIST CONTROVERSY.","BOOK SECOND."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg45843-paragraph-633"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"3df61af55ee9f08ce3724c96a74cd5ec92dcfb6a1c0b072e3d7095397486f76a","edition_title":"Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy","edition_translators":["John Richard King"],"edition_year":1872,"explicit_reference_candidates":[],"headings":[],"id":"pg45843-Footnote_957_957","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. Title leaves identify J. R. King, T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1872; catalog identifies translator John Richard King (1835-1907). Gutenberg credits Internet Archive/American Libraries without an exact scan identifier. Full provider license preserved with acquired original; republication and per-work metadata remain unreviewed.","source_anchor":"Footnote_957_957","source_ebook":45843,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\">\n<p><a id=\"Footnote_957_957\"></a><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#FNanchor_957_957\"><span class=\"label\">[957]</span></a> 1 Sam. xxvii.</p></div>","source_sha256":"a7a04003f4d3c49eb73db6c5936713979fcecadd86884373a9914ac54373ac5b","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45843/pg45843-images.html#Footnote_957_957","text_sha256":"f075bccd14c4e6418458909ca15e50d86e39d1a7bba22479815b4abbd6284e86","verified":false,"work_id":null}