Migne Reading Room
PL 1 · cols. 559–608
Tertullian, To the Nations, Books I-II (Ad nationes)
Book I
QUINTI SEPTIMII FLORENTIS TERTULLIANI
[THE WORK] OF QUINTUS SEPTIMIUS FLORENS TERTULLIANUS
AD NATIONES
TO THE NATIONS
LIBER PRIMUS.
BOOK ONE.
1. Testimonium ignorantiae vestrae, quae iniquitatem dum defendit, revincit, in promptu est, quod omnes, qui vobiscum retro ignorabant et vobiscum oderant, simul eis contigit scire, desinunt odisse qui desinunt ignorare, imo fiunt et ipsi quod oderant, et incipiunt odisse quod fuerant. Adeo quotidie adolescentem numerum Christianorum ingemitis. Obsessam vociferamini civitatem; in agris, in castellis, in insulis Christianos; omnem sexum, omnem aetatem, omnem denique dignitatem transgredi a vobis quasi detrimento doletis. Nec tamen hoc ipso ad aestimationem alicujus latentis boni animos promovetis; non licet rectius suspicari, non libet propius experiri; hic tantum curiositas humana torpescit. Amatis ignorare, quod alii gaudeant invenisse; mavultis nescire, quia jam odistis, quasi certe non odituros vos sciatis. Atquin, si nullum erit odii, reperietur optimum utique ab injustitia priore discedere; sin vero caussa constiterit, nihil odio detrahetur, quod adeo amplius justitiae scientia cumulabitur, nisi si emendari pudet aut excusari piget. Scio plane, qua responsione soletis redundantiae nostrae testimonium convenire: non utique eo bonum praejudicari, quia plerosque convertat et sibi rapiat, inquitis. Novi demutationem mentis et malas partes. Quot desertores bonae vitae? quot transfugae in perversum? Multi bona fide, imo jam plures pro extremitatibus temporum. Verum deficit adaequatio comparationis istius. Nam de malo ita constat apud omnes, ut ne ipsi quidem rei, qui ad malum transeunt et a vobis in perversa divertunt, defendere malum pro bono audeant. Turpia timori, pudori impia habent; denique gestiunt latere, devitant apparere, trepidant deprehensi, negant accusati; ne torti quidem facile aut semper confitentur, certe damnati moerent; exprobrant etenim quod erant in semetipsos:
1. The proof of your ignorance, which convicts your iniquity even while it defends it, is ready to hand: all who formerly were ignorant along with you and hated along with you, as soon as it befalls them to know, cease to hate, those who cease to be ignorant; indeed they themselves become what they used to hate, and begin to hate what they had been. So it is that daily you groan over the growing number of Christians. You cry out that the city is besieged; that in the fields, in the fortified towns, in the islands there are Christians; you lament, as though at a loss, that every sex, every age, in short every rank is passing over from you. And yet not even by this very fact do you move your minds to the estimation of some hidden good; you may not suspect more rightly, you do not care to make closer trial; here alone does human curiosity grow torpid. You love to be ignorant of what others rejoice to have found; you prefer not to know, because you already hate, as though you surely knew that you would not hate. Yet if there will be no [cause] for hatred, it will surely be found best to depart from the former injustice; but if a cause is established, nothing will be taken from the hatred, which will rather be heaped up the more by the knowledge of its justice, unless perhaps one is ashamed to be corrected or loath to be excused. I know well with what answer you are accustomed to meet the witness of our increase: that it is certainly not prejudged to be good by the fact that it converts very many and seizes them for itself, you say. I know too the change of mind to the bad side. How many deserters of the good life are there? how many runaways into perversity? Many in good faith, indeed now more, in keeping with the extremities of the times. But the matching of this comparison of yours fails. For concerning evil it is so agreed among all, that not even the guilty themselves, who pass over to evil and turn aside from you into perverse ways, dare to defend evil as good. Shameful things they regard with fear, impious things with shame; in short they strive to lie hidden, they avoid appearing, they tremble when caught, they deny when accused; not even under torture do they readily or always confess; certainly when condemned they mourn; for they reproach themselves with what they were:
Editors' notes and page, col. 559
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIENTES. (printed under page 316)
Page
- running head: 559 TERTULLIANI (the head spans the page; its other half is over col. 560)
- marginal letters: A opus immortalis memoriae vir (editors' prose); B 1. Testimonium ignorantiae; C riositas humana torpescit; D apud omnes, ut ne ipsi
- old-edition numerals: (none)
- other: The column opens with the last lines of the editors' Dissertatio (Mosheim), not set ("opus immortalis memoriae vir ... speciminis loco. Petri Thomae"). Ad nationes begins at the full-width caption below them (QUINTI SEPTIMII FLORENTIS TERTULLIANI / AD NATIONES / LIBER PRIMUS), spanning cols 559-560; its right half was read from the col. 560 images. "accusati ;]" carries a stray type mark, not set. "Novi" is printed with a damaged o (reads like "Nuvi"). "si nullum erit odii" is set as printed (a noun such as causa understood). Page foot holds LECTIONES VARIANTES and COMMENTARIUS (not set).
malae mentis ab innocentia transitum vel fato imputant; adeo nolunt suum esse, quia malum negare non possunt. Christiani vero quid tale consequuntur? Neminem pudet, neminem poenitet, nisi tantum pristinorum. Si denotatur, gloriatur: si trahitur, non subsistit. Si accusatur, non defendit; interrogatus, confitetur; damnatus, gloriatur. Quod hoc malum est, in quo mali natura cessat?
they even impute to fate the passage of an evil mind from innocence; so unwilling are they that it should be their own, because they cannot deny that it is evil. But do Christians undergo anything of the kind? No one is ashamed, no one repents, except only of his former [ways]. If he is pointed out, he glories; if he is dragged off, he does not resist. If he is accused, he makes no defence; questioned, he confesses; condemned, he glories. What evil is this, in which the nature of evil ceases?
2. In quo ipsi etiam contra formam indicandorum malorum judicatis. Nam nocentes quidem perductos, si admissum negent, tormentis urgetis ad confessionem, Christianos vero sponte confessos tormentis comprimitis ad negationem. Quae tanta perversitas, ut confessioni repugnetis, tormentorum officia mutetis, gratis reum evadere, invitum compellentes negare? Praesides extorquendae veritatis, de solis nobis mendacium exquiritis, ut dicamus nos non esse quod sumus. Opinor, non vultis nos malos esse, ideoque gestitis de isto nomine excludere. Sane caeteros ad hoc tenditis et carnificatis, ut negent esse quod esse dicuntur. Atquin illis negantibus non creditis; nobis, si negaverimus, statim creditis. Si certi estis nos nocentissimos esse, cur etiam in hoc aliter quam nocentes a vobis agimur? Non dico quod neque accusationi neque recusationi spatium commodetis; soletis et inaccusatos et indefensos non temere damnare. Sed verbi gratia si de homicida confutatur, non statim confesso eo nomen homicidae dispuncta caussa est aut satiata cognitio. Quanquam confessis difficile creditis; verum insuper consequentia exigitis, quotiens caedem egerit, quibus in locis, quibus spoliis, sociis, receptoribus, ne quid omnino mali hominis delitescat, aut desit aliquid instruendae ad sententiam veritati. Porro de nobis, quos atrocioribus ac pluribus criminibus deputatis, breviora ac leviora elogia conficitis.
2. In this you yourselves also judge contrary to the form of judging evil deeds. For guilty men who are brought before you, if they deny the deed, you press with torments to confession; but Christians who have confessed of their own accord you crush with torments into denial. What great perversity is this, that you fight against confession and change the offices of torture, compelling the accused to escape for nothing, the unwilling to deny? You, presiding over the wringing out of truth, seek a lie from us alone, that we may say we are not what we are. I suppose you do not want us to be evil, and therefore you are eager to exclude us from that name. Others, to be sure, you stretch on the rack and butcher for this, that they may deny being what they are said to be. Yet when they deny you do not believe them; us, if we deny, you believe at once. If you are certain that we are most guilty, why even in this are we dealt with by you otherwise than the guilty? I do not say that you allow room neither for accusation nor for objection; you are accustomed not lightly to condemn even the unaccused and undefended. But, for example, if a murderer is being convicted, the case is not at once closed, nor the inquiry satisfied, as soon as he has confessed the name of murderer. Although you believe those who confess with difficulty; but you further require the attendant circumstances: how often he committed murder, in what places, with what spoils, what accomplices, what receivers, so that nothing at all of the evil man may lie hidden, or anything be lacking to the truth that is to be set in order for the sentence. But concerning us, whom you charge with more atrocious and more numerous crimes, you draw up briefer and lighter indictments.
Editors' notes and page, col. 560
Footnotes
(1) ‹anchor: Sane caeteros ad hoc tenditis› · call in col 560
Le Pr. leg. tunditis.
Le Prieur reads tunditis ("you beat").
(printed under page 316)
(2) ‹anchor: si de homicida confutatur› · call in col 560
Rigalt conjecit : consultatur.
Rigault conjectured: consultatur ("is inquired into").
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 316)
(a) ‹anchor: Christiani vero› · call in col 560
Christiani vero. Christiani nulla vi coacti Christianos se dicebant, eaque de re summopere gloriabantur. sic Apolog. c. I. Si denotatur, gloriatur; si accusatur, non defendit, interrogatus vel ultro confitetur; damnatus, gratias agit. qui vero id ultro fatebantur, ideo damnati aut rei non erant. Le Pr.
But Christians. Christians, under no compulsion, declared themselves Christians, and gloried in it above all things. So Apology ch. 1: "If he is marked out, he glories; if accused, he makes no defence; questioned, or even unasked, he confesses; condemned, he gives thanks." But those who confessed it of their own accord were not for that reason condemned or accused. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 316)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 560 (continuing the head begun over col. 559)
- marginal letters: A du FOSSE vitam TERTULLIANI (editors' prose); B malae mentis ab innocentia; C ut confessioni repugnetis; D satiata cognitio
- old-edition numerals: (none)
Credo, non vultis oneratos, quos omni opere perditos vultis, aut non putatis requirenda quae nostis. Hoc ergo perversius, si cogitis negare, de quibus certissime scitis, imo, quod magis odio vestro competebat, seposita forma judicandi, proprio studio non ad negationem certare, ne quos odistis liberaretis, sed ad confessionem singulorum scelerum, quo magis inimicitiae satiarentur ex aggeratione poenarum, dum recognoscitur, quot quisque jam convivia illa celebrasset, quotiens in tenebris incursionis incesta. Quid? quod eradicandi generis diffundenda erat requisitio, porrigenda quaestio in socios consciosque. Perducerentur infantarii et coqui et ipsi canes pronubi, emendata res esset. Etiam spectaculis gratia aggregaretur; quanto enim studio in caveam conveniretur, depugnaturo aliquo, qui centum infantes devorasset? Sed enim tam horrenda tamque monstruosa de nobis deferuntur. Utique erui debuerunt, ne incredibilia viderentur, et odium in nos publicum refrigesceret. Nam et plerique fidem talium temperant, horrentes naturam quaerere pabulum ferinum, quam concubitus ab humano genere praeclusit.
I suppose you do not want those to be burdened whom you want ruined by every means, or you do not think that what you know needs inquiring into. This then is the more perverse, if you compel men to deny things of which you know most certainly; whereas, what better suited your hatred, you should have set aside the form of judging and striven with your own zeal not for denial, lest you set free those whom you hate, but for the confession of each several crime, that your enmity might be the more glutted by the heaping up of punishments, while it was reviewed how many of those banquets each had already celebrated, how many incests in the darkness of the onset. What of this, that the search ought to have been spread abroad for uprooting the race, the inquiry extended to associates and accomplices? Let the infant-slayers be brought forward, and the cooks, and the very dogs who act as bridal attendants: the matter would have been put right. Favour, too, would have been won for the shows; for with what zeal would people throng into the arena, when someone was to fight to the death who had devoured a hundred infants? But indeed such horrible and such monstrous things are reported of us. Surely they ought to have been dug out, lest they seem incredible, and the public hatred against us grow cool. For indeed very many temper their belief in such things, shrinking from [the thought] that a nature should seek the food of wild beasts which intercourse has shut off from the human race.
3. Vos igitur, alias diligentissimi ac pertinacissimi discussores scelerum longe minorum, cum talibus tam horrendis et omnem impietatem supergressis eam diligentiam deseratis, neque confessionem recipiendo judicantibus semper laborandam, neque exquisitionem digerendo damnatoribus semper consulendam: jam apparet, omne in nos crimen non alicujus sceleris sed nominis dirigi. Adeo, si de criminum veritate constaret, ipsa criminum nomina damnatis accommodarent, ut ita pronuntiaretur in nos: illum homicidam, vel incestum, vel quodcumque jactamur, duci, suffigi, ad bestias dari placet. Porro sententiae
3. You therefore, at other times most diligent and most persistent investigators of far lesser crimes, since in things so horrible, which surpass all impiety, you abandon that diligence, neither receiving the confession that judges must always labour for, nor setting out the inquiry that those who condemn must always take into account: it is now apparent that every charge against us is directed not at some crime but at the name. So true is this that, if there were certainty about the truth of the crimes, [the judges] would apply the very names of the crimes to the condemned, so that sentence would be pronounced against us thus: "It is decreed that this murderer, or this incestuous man, or whatever we are cried up as, be led away, be fastened to the cross, be given to the beasts." Moreover, of the sentence
Editors' notes and page, col. 561
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIENTES. (printed under page 317)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 561
Hav. corr. ne prob. falsae, etc.
Havercamp corrects: ne prob. falsae, etc.
(printed under page 317)
(a) ‹anchor: Perducerentur› · call in col 561
Perducerentur infantarii, et coqui, et ipsi canes pronubi. Trium nempe criminum postulabantur : impietatis. Thyestaearum epularum, et concubitus incesti, sic Athenagoras τρία ἐπιφημίζουσιν ἡμῖν ἐγκλήματα, ἀθεότητα, Θυέστεια δεῖπνα, Οἰδιποδείους μίξεις, aiebant enim Ethnici Christianos, ubi convenissent, mactare solitos infantem cujus carne manducata et epoto sanguine foedus inter se inire, ac post convivium cum quibus-vis mulieribus promiscue commisceri, adeoque adhibere canes in more erat ad candelabra alligatos, qui offa injecta candelabra everterent, extinctisque luminibus tunc fieri dicebant foedissimarum illarum commixtionum scelera. Le Pr.
Let the child-dealers be brought in, and the cooks, and the very dogs that act as bridesmen. They were indicted, that is, on three charges: impiety, Thyestean banquets, and incestuous intercourse; so Athenagoras: "they lay three charges against us: atheism, Thyestean feasts, Oedipodean unions." For the heathen said that the Christians, when they had assembled, were accustomed to slaughter an infant, and having eaten its flesh and drunk its blood, to enter into a compact among themselves, and after the banquet to mingle promiscuously with any women whatever; and that it was their custom to bring dogs tied to the lampstands, which, when a morsel was thrown to them, would overturn the lampstands, and they said that then, with the lights put out, the crimes of those most foul couplings were committed. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 317)
(b) ‹anchor: et ipsi canes› · call in col 561
Et ipsi canes pronubi. In Apologetico, Lenones dicuntur, qui hic Pronubi, eversores luminum. Rig.
And the very dogs that act as bridesmen. In the Apology they are called "panders", who here are "bridesmen", the overturners of the lights. Rigault.
(printed under page 317)
(c) ‹anchor: emendata res esset› · call in col 561
Emendata res esset. Tum demum justa et legitima inquirendi ratio esset, si perducerentur infantarii, coqui, etc. Idem.
The matter would be set right. Only then would the method of inquiry be just and lawful, if the child-dealers, the cooks, etc., were brought in. The same.
(printed under page 317)
(d) ‹anchor: horrentes› · call in col 561
Horrentes naturam quaerere pabulum ferinum quam conc. Sic restituimus quae in codice Agobardi leguntur absque ullo sensu. Nam ita sunt depravata : Honorantes naturam quaerere pabulum ferinum, quam concubitus ab humano genere praeclusit. Ait Tertullianus, tam horrenda, tamque monstrosa de nobis deferuntur, ut plerique fidem talium temperent, hoc est, fidem talibus non adhibeant ; horrentes naturam quaerere pabulum ferinum ; nempe homines ita natos, ut quaerant et appetant pabulum ferinum ; naturam adeo ferinam, ut carnibus humanis libenter vescantur, quae natura est ferarum. Eam vero naturam ferarum, id est, feras ipsas, concubitus ab humano genere praeclusit. Unde igitur homines nati, ferum genus? Naturam quaerere dixit Graeco more, quod ita factum et natum est ut quaerat. Idem.
Shuddering that a nature should seek a wild beast's food, which intercourse has shut off from the human race. So we have restored what is read in the Agobard codex without any sense. For it is corrupted thus: "Honouring a nature to seek a wild beast's food, which intercourse has shut off from the human race." Tertullian says: such horrible and monstrous things are reported of us that most people check their belief in them, that is, do not give credence to them; shuddering that a nature should seek a wild beast's food; namely, that men should be so born as to seek and crave a wild beast's food; a nature so bestial that they gladly feed on human flesh, which is the nature of wild beasts. But that nature of wild beasts, that is, the wild beasts themselves, intercourse has shut off from the human race. Whence then were men born a wild breed? He said "a nature to seek" in the Greek manner, meaning what was so made and born that it seeks. The same.
(printed under page 317)
Page
- running head: 561 AD NATIONES LIB[ER] (the head spans the page; its end is over col. 562)
- marginal letters: A ficitis. Credo, non vultis; B conveniretur, depugnaturo aliquo; C veritate constaret, ipsa criminum; D (beside the Commentarius, "quibus-vis mulieribus")
- old-edition numerals: (none)
vestrae nihil nisi Christianum confessum notant; nullum criminis nomen exstat, nisi nominis crimen est: haec etenim est revera ratio totius odii adversus nos. Nomen in caussa est, quod quaedam occulta vis per vestram ignorantiam oppugnat, ut nolitis scire pro certo, quod vos pro certo nescire certi estis, et ideo nec creditis quae non probantur, et, ne probentur facile, non vultis inquirere, ut nomen inimicum sub praesumptione criminum puniatur: adeo ut de nomine inimico recedatur, ideo negare compellimur, dehinc negantes liberamur tota impunitate praeteritorum: jam non cruenti, neque incesti, quia nomen illud amisimus. Sed dum haec ratio suo loco ostenditur, vos quam insequimini ad expugnationem nominis, edite: quod nominis crimen, quae offensa, quae culpa? Praescribitur enim vobis, non posse crimina objicere, quae neque institutum dirigit, neque probatio assignat, neque sententia enumerat. Quod praesidi offeratur, quod de reo inquiratur, quod respondetur vel negatur, quod de consilio recitatur, id reum agnosco. Itaque de nominis merito, si qui reatus est nominum, si qua accusatio vocabulorum, ego arbitror nullam esse vocabulo aut nomini querelam, nisi cum quid aut barbarum sonat, aut infaustum sapit, vel impudicum, vel aliter quam enuntiantem delectet. Haec vocabulorum aut nominum crimina, sicuti verborum atque sermonum barbarismus est vitium et solecismus et insulsior figura. Christianum vero nomen, quantum significatio est, de unctione interpretatur; etiam cum corrupte a vobis Christiani pronuntiamur (nam ne nominis quidem ipsius liquido certi estis), sic quoque de suavitate vel bonitate modulatum est. Detinetis igitur in hominibus innoxiis etiam nomen innoxium nostrum, non incommodum
of your [sentence] mark nothing but a confessed Christian; no name of a crime is on record, but there is the crime of a name: for this in truth is the reason for all the hatred against us. The name is the cause, which a certain hidden power assails through your ignorance, so that you are unwilling to know for certain what you are certain you do not know for certain; and therefore you do not believe things that are not proved, and, lest they be easily proved, you do not wish to inquire, so that the hostile name may be punished under a presumption of crimes: so much so that, in order that the hostile name may be given up, we are compelled for that reason to deny, and then on denying we are set free with complete impunity for the past: no longer bloody, nor incestuous, because we have lost that name. But while this argument is set out in its own place, do you declare what you are pursuing in your assault on the name: what crime of a name is there, what offence, what fault? For the plea is entered against you that you cannot charge crimes which neither a statute directs, nor proof assigns, nor sentence enumerates. What is brought before the governor, what is inquired into concerning the accused, what is answered or denied, what is read out from the council: that I recognize as guilt. Therefore concerning the desert of the name, if there is any guilt in names, any accusation against words, I judge that there is no complaint against a word or a name except when it sounds somewhat barbarous, or smacks of ill omen, or of indecency, or pleases otherwise than him who utters it. These are the crimes of words or of names, just as barbarism is a fault of words and speech, and solecism, and too insipid a figure. But the name Christian, so far as its meaning goes, is interpreted from anointing; even when we are pronounced by you, corruptly, Christians (for you are not clearly certain even of the name itself), so too it is formed from sweetness or goodness. In innocent men, then, you lay hold of our innocent name too, a name not awkward
Editors' notes and page, col. 562
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: neque probatio› · call in col 562
Rig. prolatio. — In seqq. scrib. respondeatur vel negetur — recitetur.
Rigault: prolatio ("production"). — In what follows, write respondeatur vel negetur — recitetur.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 317)
(e) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 562
Nomen in causa est. Quoniam penuria criminum laborabant gentiles, ut Christianos opprimerent, nomen ipsum accusabant, qua de re hic multis Tertullianus, et antea in Apologetico. Erant quippe tunc Christiani ὑπὸ συκοφαντῶν σφαττόμενοι, inquit Athenagoras in Apologia pro Christianis. In jus vocabantur et condemnabantur propter unum nomen, neque enim quaerebatur an mali quidquam perpetrassent Christiani, inquit idem, ἀλλ' εἰς τὸ ὄνομα, ὡς εἰς ἀδίκημα, lis scribebatur ; Nam Christianorum nullus in ullo est facinore deprehensus οὐδεὶς ἀδικῶν Χριστιανὸς ἐλήλεγκται. Nominis tantum ubique ratio et crimen erat, οὐδὲν δὲ ὄνομα, ἐφ' ἑαυτοῦ καὶ δι' αὐτοῦ, οὐ πονηρὸν οὔτε χρηστὸν νομίζεσθαι, et antea, οὐ γὰρ τὰ ὀνόματα μίσους ἄξια, λλὰ τὸ ἀδίκημα δίκης καὶ τιμωρίας. Sic passim Athenagoras sub initium Apolog. Le Pr.
The name is the issue. Since the gentiles suffered from a dearth of charges with which to crush the Christians, they accused the name itself, a matter on which Tertullian says much here, and earlier in the Apology. For the Christians were then "slaughtered by informers", says Athenagoras in his Apology for the Christians. They were summoned to court and condemned for the name alone; for no inquiry was made whether the Christians had committed any wrong, says the same author, but "against the name, as against a crime", the suit was drawn up; for none of the Christians was caught in any misdeed: "no Christian has been convicted of wrongdoing". Everywhere the only ground and charge was the name, "but no name in and of itself is held to be either bad or good", and earlier, "for it is not names that deserve hatred, but wrongdoing that deserves trial and punishment". So, repeatedly, Athenagoras near the beginning of his Apology. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 317)
(f) ‹anchor: neque institutum› · call in col 562
Neque institutum dirigit. Hoc est, mandatum. infra, pag. 51. Institutum Neronianum. Rig.
Which no ordinance directs. That is, a mandate. Below, p. 51: "the Neronian ordinance". Rigault.
(printed under page 317)
(g) ‹anchor: modulatum est› · call in col 562
De suavitate vel bonitate. De suavitate, Christianus : De bonitate, Chrestianus. Rig.
From sweetness or goodness. From sweetness, Christianus; from goodness, Chrestianus. Rigault.
(printed under page 317)
Page
- running head: AD NATIONES LIB. I. 562 (continuing the head begun over col. 561)
- marginal letters: A vestrae nihil nisi Christianum; B quae culpa? Praescribitur; C pronuntiamur (nam ne nominis; D (beside the Commentarius, "laborabant gentiles")
- old-edition numerals: (none)
linguae, non auribus asperum, non homini malum, non patriae infestum, sed et graecum aliis et sonorum et interpretatione jucundum. Et utique non gladio aut cruce aut bestiis punienda sunt nomina.
for the tongue, not harsh to the ears, not harmful to a man, not hostile to the fatherland, but both Greek, like others, and sonorous, and pleasing in its meaning. And surely names are not to be punished with sword or cross or beasts.
4. Sed dicitis, sectam nomine puniri sui auctoris. Primo quidem, sectam de auctoris appellatione notari, utique probum usitatumque jus est, dum philosophi quoque de auctoribus cognominentur, Pythagorici et Platonici, ut medici Erasistratei, et grammatici Aristarchii. Itaque si ob auctorem malum mala secta, tradux mali nominis plectitur. Atquin temeritate praesumeretur; prius erat cognoscere auctorem, ut cognosceretur secta, quam de secta inspectionem auctoris retinere. At nunc necessario ignorando sectam, qui ignoratis auctorem, aut non recensendo auctorem, quia nec sectam recensetis, in solum nomen impingitis, quasi in illo detinentes sectam et auctorem quos omnino non nostis. Et tamen Philosophis patet libertas transgrediendi a vobis in sectam et auctorem et suum nomen, nec quisquam illis odium movet, cum in mores, ritus, cultus, victusque vestros palam ac publice omnem eloquii amaritudinem elatrent, cum legum contemptu, sine respectu personarum, ut quidam etiam in principes ipsos libertatem suam impune jaculentur. Sed veritatem seculo operosissimam philosophi quidem affectant, possident autem Christiani; ideoque qui possident, magis displicent, quia qui affectat, illudit, qui possidet, defendit: denique Socrates ex ea parte damnatus est, quia propius tentaverat veritatem, deos vestros destruendo: quanquam nondum tunc in terris nomen christianum, tamen veritas semper damnabatur. Itaque et sapientem non negabitis, cui etiam Pythius vester testimonium dixerat: Virorum, inquit, omnium Socrates sapientissimus. Vicit Apollinem veritas, ut ipse adversus se pronuntiaret; confessus
4. But you say that a sect is punished in the name of its founder. In the first place, that a sect should be designated by its founder's name is certainly an upright and customary right, since philosophers too take their surnames from their founders, Pythagoreans and Platonists, as physicians are called Erasistrateans, and grammarians Aristarchians. So if a sect is evil on account of an evil founder, it is punished as the offshoot of an evil name. Yet this would be presumed by rashness; one ought first to have known the founder, so that the sect might be known, rather than withhold the examination of the founder on account of the sect. But as it is, being necessarily ignorant of the sect, you who are ignorant of the founder, or not reviewing the founder because you do not review the sect either, you strike at the name alone, as though in it you were laying hold of a sect and a founder whom you do not know at all. And yet to the philosophers the freedom lies open to pass over from you into a sect, and a founder, and a name of their own; nor does anyone stir up hatred against them, though they bark out openly and publicly all the bitterness of their eloquence against your morals, rites, worship and way of life, in contempt of the laws, without respect of persons, so that some even hurl their freedom against the emperors themselves with impunity. But the truth, which costs the world so much toil, the philosophers indeed affect, whereas the Christians possess it; and therefore those who possess it displease the more, because he who affects it plays with it, he who possesses it defends it. In short, Socrates was condemned on that score, because he had come nearer to the truth by destroying your gods: although the Christian name was not yet then on earth, yet truth was always being condemned. And so you will not deny that he was wise, to whom even your Pythian [god] had borne witness: "Of all men," he said, "Socrates is the wisest." Truth overcame Apollo, so that he pronounced against himself; for he confessed
Editors' notes and page, col. 563
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 318)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 563
Le Prior. conj. Alii, quos, etc.
Le Prieur conjectures: Alii, quos, etc.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 318)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 563
Pythagorici et Platonici. Dixerat antea in apol. Nonne Philosophi de auctoribus suis nuncupantur Platonici, Epicurei, Pythagorici? Sic Christiani gloriosum sibi ducebant ducis sui nomine indigetari, unde Chrysostomus de B. Luciano. ποίας εἶ πατρίδος; Χριστιανός εἰμι, φησί. τί ἔχεις ἐπιτήδευμα; Χριστιανός εἰμι. τίνας προγόνους; ὁ δὲ πρὸς ἅπαντα ἔλεγεν, ὅτι Χριστιανός εἰμι: cujus es religionis? Christianus sum. Quam artem profiteris? Christianus sum. Quos habes majores? Is vero ad omnia reponebat, Christianus sum. Le Pr.
Pythagoreans and Platonists. He had said earlier in the Apology: "Are not philosophers named after their founders, Platonists, Epicureans, Pythagoreans?" So the Christians held it glorious to be called by the name of their leader; whence Chrysostom on St Lucian: "'Of what country are you?' 'I am a Christian,' he says. 'What is your occupation?' 'I am a Christian.' 'Who are your forebears?' And to everything he answered, 'I am a Christian'": What is your religion? I am a Christian. What craft do you profess? I am a Christian. Whom do you have as forebears? And to all he replied, I am a Christian. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 318)
(b) ‹anchor: qui affectat, illudit› · call in col 563
Quia qui affectat includit. Includit, in Apologetico. Adulterat. Rig.
Because he who affects it shuts it in. "Shuts in", in the Apology: "adulterates". Rigault.
(printed under page 318)
(c) ‹anchor: Socrates sapientissimus› · call in col 563
Virorum, inquit, omnium Socrates. Vulgare est Apollinis oraculo Socratem mortalium omnium fuisse sapientissimum : Ἀνδρῶν ἁπάντων Σωκράτης σοφώτατος : unde Valerius Max. lib. III. c. 4. Socrates non solum hominum consensu, verum etiam Apollinis oraculo sapientissimus judicatus est. Et Salvianus lib. 8. de gubernatione : Contra seipsum tamen Apollo Pythius locutus est, et veritas superior exstitit, dum enim Socratem hominum sapientissimum pronuntiavit, se deum esse negavit. Socrates quippe quod de diis male sentiret, ab Atheniensibus fuit in judicium vocatus, et morte damnatus. Attendenda vero sunt quae Minutius Felix : Quanquam si philosophandi libido est, Socratem sapientiae Principem, quisquis vestrum tantus est, si potuerit, imitetur. Ejus viri, quoties de coelestibus rogabatur, nota responsio est : Quae supra nos, nihil ad nos. Idem.
Of all men, he says, Socrates. It is common knowledge that by Apollo's oracle Socrates was the wisest of all mortals: "Of all men Socrates is wisest"; whence Valerius Maximus, book III, ch. 4: "Socrates was judged wisest not only by the consent of men but also by the oracle of Apollo." And Salvian, On the Government of God, book 8: "Yet Pythian Apollo spoke against himself, and the truth prevailed; for when he pronounced Socrates the wisest of men, he denied that he himself was a god." For Socrates, because he thought ill of the gods, was brought to trial by the Athenians and condemned to death. But what Minucius Felix says is to be noted: "Yet if you have a passion for philosophising, let whoever of you is great enough imitate, if he can, Socrates, the prince of wisdom. That man's answer, whenever he was asked about heavenly things, is well known: What is above us is nothing to us." The same.
(printed under page 318)
Page
- running head: 563 TERTULLIANI (the head spans the page; its other half is over col. 564)
- marginal letters: A modum linguae, non auribus; B sendo auctorem, quia nec; C truendo: quanquam nondum; D (beside the Commentarius, "cujus es religionis")
- old-edition numerals: (none)
est enim, se deum non esse, sed eum quoque sapientissimum affirmans, qui deos abnuebat; porro apud vos eo minus sapiens, quia deos abnuens, cum ideo sapiens, quia deos abnuens. Quo more etiam nobis soletis: bonus vir Lucius Titius, tantum quod Christianus; item alius: ego miror Caium Seium gravem virum factum Christianum. Pro stultitiae caecitate laudant quae sciunt, vituperant quae nesciunt, et id quod sciunt eo quod nesciunt vitiant. Nemini subvenit: ne ideo bonus quis et prudens, quia Christianus; aut ideo Christianus, quia prudens et bonus; cum sit humanius occulta manifestis adjudicare, quam manifesta de occulto praejudicare. Aliquos retro ante hoc nomen vagos, viles, improbos norant, emendatos repente mirantur, et tamen mirari quam assequi norunt. Alii tanta obstinatione certant, ut cum suis utilitatibus depugnent, quas de commercio istius nominis capere possunt. Scio maritum unum atque alium, anxium retro de uxoris suae moribus, qui, ne mures quidem in cubiculum irrepentes sine gemitu suspicionis sustinebat, comperta caussa novae sedulitatis et inusitatae captivitatis, omnem uxori patientiam obtulisse, negasse zelotypum, maluisse lupae quam Christianae maritum; ipsi suam licuit in perversum demutare naturam, mulieri non permisit in melius reformari. Pater filium, de quo queri desierat, exhaeredavit. Dominus servum, quem praeterea necessarium senserat, in ergastulum dedit. Simul quis intellexerit Christianum, mavult nocentem. Nam et ipsa per se traducitur disciplina, nec aliunde prodimur, quam de bono nostro. Si et mali de suo malo radiant, cur nos soli contra instituta naturae pessimi de bono denotamur? Quid enim insigne praeferimus, nisi primam sapientiam, qua frivola humanae manus opera non adoramus; abstinentiam, qua ab alieno temperamus; pudicitiam, quam nec
that he was not a god, affirming that the man was the wisest who denied the gods; but among you he is the less wise because he denied the gods, whereas he is wise precisely because he denied the gods. In the same fashion you are accustomed to speak of us too: "A good man, Lucius Titius, only that he is a Christian"; and another likewise: "I am amazed that Gaius Seius, a man of weight, has become a Christian." In the blindness of folly they praise what they know, blame what they do not know, and spoil what they know by what they do not know. It occurs to no one that a man may be good and prudent for this very reason, that he is a Christian; or a Christian for this reason, that he is prudent and good; though it is more humane to judge hidden things by manifest ones than to prejudge manifest things from what is hidden. Some whom formerly, before they bore this name, they knew as vagrant, worthless and wicked, they marvel at as suddenly amended, and yet they know better how to marvel than to follow. Others contend with such obstinacy that they fight against their own advantage, which they could gain from intercourse with this name. I know of more than one husband, formerly anxious about his wife's morals, who could not bear even mice creeping into the bedroom without a groan of suspicion, who, on discovering the cause of her new diligence and her unwonted keeping at home, offered his wife every indulgence, disowned his jealousy, preferred to be the husband of a harlot rather than of a Christian woman; he was free to change his own nature for the worse, but he did not allow the woman to be reformed for the better. A father disinherited a son of whom he had ceased to complain. A master sent to the slave-prison a servant whom he had besides found indispensable. As soon as anyone has discovered a man to be a Christian, he would rather have him guilty. For the discipline is exposed by itself, and we are betrayed from no other quarter than our own good. If the wicked too are made conspicuous by their own evil, why are we alone, against the ordinances of nature, branded as the worst on account of good? For what distinction do we display, except the first wisdom, by which we do not adore the trifling works of the human hand; abstinence, by which we refrain from what is another's; chastity, which not even
Editors' notes and page, col. 564
Footnotes
(d) ‹anchor: ne mures› · call in col 564
Ne mures quidem irrepentes. Cum haec scriberet Septimius, habebat in mente illud Juvenalis, Testiculi sibi conscius unde fugit mus. Rig.
Not even mice creeping in. When Septimius wrote this he had in mind that line of Juvenal: "conscious of the testicle, whence the mouse has fled." Rigault.
(printed under page 318)
(e) ‹anchor: inusitatae captivitatis› · call in col 564
Inusitatae captivitatis. Quae jam Christiana facta, domo pedem vix efferebat, rebus domesticis attenta, quasi ipsa sibi captivitatem indixisset, quae antea vaga et effreni libidine huc illuc ferebatur. Idem.
Of unaccustomed captivity. She who, now become a Christian, scarcely set foot outside the house, intent on household affairs, as if she had imposed captivity on herself, she who before had roamed here and there, driven by unbridled lust. The same.
(printed under page 318)
(f) ‹anchor: omnem› · call in col 564
Omnem uxori patientiam. Gentilium consuetudinem et pessimos mores ac corruptissimos tangit, apud quos maritus profundo somno involutum sepultumque se veluti ebrium simulat, et ut habet Juven. Sat. I. Doctus spectare lacunar, Doctus et ad calicem vigilanti stertere naso. Hic in Christianis nihil ejusmodi ait occurrere. Le Pr.
Every indulgence to his wife. He touches the custom and the very bad and corrupt morals of the gentiles, among whom the husband pretends to be wrapped and buried in deep sleep, as if drunk, and, as Juvenal has it, Satire I: "skilled at gazing at the ceiling, skilled too at snoring over his cup with a wakeful nose." He says nothing of the kind occurs among Christians. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 318)
(g) ‹anchor: Si et mali› · call in col 564
Mali de suo malo non radiant. Insignes fiunt, demonstrantur, denominantur. Rig.
The wicked do not shine with their own wickedness. They become conspicuous, are pointed out, are named. Rigault.
(printed under page 318)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 564 (continuing the head begun over col. 563)
- marginal letters: A est enim, se deum non esse; B assequi norunt. Alii; C tem. Nam et ipsa; D (beside the Commentarius, "Septimius, habebat in mente")
- old-edition numerals: (none)
oculis contaminamus; misericordiam, qua super indigentes flectimur; ipsam veritatem, qua offendimus; ipsam libertatem, pro qua mori novimus? Qui vult intelligere qui sint Christiani, istis indicibus utatur necesse est.
we defile with our eyes; mercy, by which we are bent over the needy; truth itself, by which we give offence; liberty itself, for which we know how to die? Whoever wishes to understand who the Christians are must needs use these marks.
5. Quod ergo dicitis: pessimi et probrosissimi avaritia, luxuria, improbitate; non negabimus quosdam; sufficit et hoc ad testimonium nominis nostri: si non omnes; si non plures. Necesse est in corpore, [et] quantum velis integro aut puro, ut naevus aliquis effruticet, aut verrucula exsurgat, aut lentigo sordescat. Coelum ipsum nulla serenitas tam colata purgat, ut non alicujus nubeculae flocculo resignetur. Modica macula in fronte, in parte quadam exemplari visa, quo universitas munda est: major boni portio modico malo ad testimonium sui utitur. Cum tamen aliquos de nostris malos probatis, jam hoc ipso Christianos non probatis; quaerite, secta cui malitiae deputatur? Ipsi in colloquio, si quando adversus nos, cur ille, inquitis, fraudator, si abstinentes Christiani? cur immitis, si misericordes? Adeo testimonium redditis, non esse tales Christianos, dum cur tales sint qui dicuntur Christiani, retorquetis. Multum distantiae inter crimen et nomen, inter opinionem et veritatem. Nam et nomina sic sunt instituta, ut fines suos habeant inter dici et esse. Quot denique philosophi dicuntur, nec tamen legem philosophiae adimplent? Omnes nomen de professionibus gestant; seducant nomen professionis praestantia, qui superficie vocabuli infamant veritatem. Non statim sunt, qui dicuntur; sed quia non sunt, frustra dicuntur, et fallunt eos, qui rem nomini addicunt cum de re status nominis competat. Et tamen ejusmodi neque congregant neque participant nobiscum, facti per delicta denuo vestri; quando ne illis quidem misceamur, quos vestra vis atque saevitia ad negandum subegit. Utique enim facilius inter nos inviti desertores disciplinae, quam voluntarii continerentur. Caeterum sine caussa vocatis Christianos, quos ipsi negant Christiani, qui se negare non norunt.
5. As for what you say, then, that we are "the worst and most disgraceful in avarice, luxury and dishonesty": we will not deny that some are; and this too suffices for the testimony of our name, if not all, if not the greater number. It must needs be that in a body, [even] as sound or as pure as you please, some mole should sprout, or a little wart rise up, or a freckle discolour the skin. No clear weather purges the sky itself so finely strained that it is not marked by the tuft of some little cloud. A small spot on the forehead, seen in some one part, is the sample [that shows] how clean the whole is: the greater portion of good uses a small evil as testimony to itself. Yet when you prove some of ours to be evil, by this very fact you prove that they are not Christians; ask then, to what sect is the wickedness assigned? You yourselves in conversation, whenever it is against us, say: "Why is that man a cheat, if Christians are abstinent? why harsh, if they are merciful?" So you bear witness that Christians are not such, while you turn round and ask why those who are called Christians are such. There is a great distance between a crime and a name, between opinion and truth. For names too are so established as to have their boundaries between being called and being. How many, in short, are called philosophers, and yet do not fulfil the law of philosophy? All bear the name from their professions; those who by the mere surface of the word defame the reality lead the name astray from the excellence of the profession. Men are not at once what they are called; but because they are not, they are called so in vain, and they deceive those who bind the thing to the name, whereas the standing of the name ought to depend on the thing. And yet such men neither assemble nor have fellowship with us, having become yours again through their offences; since we do not mix even with those whom your violence and cruelty have forced to deny. For surely unwilling deserters of the discipline would more easily be kept among us than willing ones. For the rest, it is without cause that you call those Christians whom the Christians themselves disown, men who do not know how to disown themselves.
6. His propositionibus responsionibusque nostris, quas veritas de suo suggerit, quotiens comprimitur et coarctatur consciencia vestra, tacitae ignorantiae suae testis, confugitis aestuantes ad arulam quamdam, id est, legum auctoritatem, quod utique non plecterent
6. Whenever, by these propositions and answers of ours, which truth supplies from its own store, your conscience is pressed and hemmed in, witness to its own silent ignorance, you flee in agitation to a sort of little altar, namely the authority of the laws, because surely they would not punish
Editors' notes and page, col. 565
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 319)
(a) ‹anchor: se negare non norunt› · call in col 565
Qui se negare non norunt. Erant enim pro fratribus suis mori invicem parati : atque hanc mutuae caritatis constantiam Ethnici mirabantur. Unde illa in Apologetico : vide, inquiunt, ut invicem se diligant, et ut pro alterutro mori sint parati. Rig.
Who do not know how to deny themselves. For they were ready to die for their brethren one for another, and the heathen marvelled at this constancy of mutual charity. Hence that saying in the Apology: "See," they say, "how they love one another, and how they are ready to die for each other." Rigault.
(printed under page 319)
Page
- running head: 565 AD NATIONES LIB[ER] (the head spans the page; its end is over col. 566)
- marginal letters: A oculis contaminamus; B visa, quo universitas munda est; C dicuntur; sed quia non sunt; D id est, legum auctoritatem
- old-edition numerals: (none)
sectam istam, nisi de meritis apud conditores legum constitisset. Quid ergo prohibuit apud executores quoque legum proinde constare, cum de caeteris criminibus, quae similiter legibus arcentur ac puniuntur, nisi prius requiratur, poena cessat? verbi gratia, homicidam, adulterum lege, discutitur tamen de ordine admissi; et tamen cognitum est omnibus genus facti. Christianum puniunt leges. Si quod est factum Christiani, erui debet; nulla lex prohibet inquirere. Atquin pro legibus facit inquisitio. Quomodo enim legem observabis cavendo quod lege prohibetur, adempta diligentia cavendi per defectum agnoscendi quid observes. Nulla sibi lex debet conscientiam justitiae suae, sed eis a quibus captat obsequium. Caeterum suspecta lex est, si probari se non vult. Merito igitur tamdiu justae in Christianos et reverendae et observandae censentur, quamdiu ignoratur quod persequuntur; merito, post agnitionem iniquissimae repertae, cum suis machaeris et patibulis et leonibus despuuntur; legis injustae honor nullus est. Ut opinor autem, dubitatur de iniquitate legum quarumdam, cum quotidie novis consultis constitutisque duritias nequitiasque earum temperetis.
this sect unless its deserts had been established before the founders of the laws. What, then, has prevented its being likewise established before the executors of the laws also, when in the case of other crimes, which are equally restrained and punished by the laws, the penalty stops short unless inquiry is first made? For example, the murderer, the adulterer [is condemned] by law; yet the course of the deed committed is examined, and that although the kind of deed is known to all. The laws punish a Christian. If there is any deed of a Christian, it ought to be dug out; no law forbids inquiry. Indeed inquiry works on behalf of the laws. For how will you observe a law by guarding against what the law forbids, if the diligence of guarding is taken away through failure to know what you are to observe? No law owes the consciousness of its own justice to itself, but to those from whom it seeks obedience. Besides, a law is suspect if it does not wish to be approved. Rightly, then, are they deemed just against Christians, and worthy to be revered and observed, so long as what they persecute is unknown; rightly, after recognition, being found most unjust, they are spat upon with their swords and gibbets and lions: an unjust law has no honour. But, as I think, there is doubt about the iniquity of certain laws, since daily you temper their harshness and wickedness by new decrees and constitutions.
7. Unde ergo, inquitis, tantum de vobis famae licuit, cujus testimonium suffecerit forsitan conditoribus legum? Quis, oro, sponsor aut illis tunc aut exinde vobis de fide? Fama est. Nonne haec est:
7. Whence then, you say, has rumour been allowed so much about you, whose testimony perhaps sufficed the founders of the laws? Who, I pray, was surety for its credit, either to them then or to you since? It is rumour. Is not this she:
Fama malum, quo non aliud velocius ullum. (Virg. Aeneid. IV, 174.)
Rumour, an evil than which no other is swifter. (Virgil, Aeneid IV, 174.)
Cur malum, si vera semper sit, non mendacio plurimum? quae ne tum quidem cum vera defert, a libidine mendacii cessat, ut non falsa veris intexat adjiciens, detrahens, varietate confundens. Quid, quod ea conditio illi, ut nonnisi cum mentitur perseveret; tamdiu enim vivit, quamdiu non probat quidquam; siquidem approbata cadit, et quasi officio nuntiandi functa decedit; exinde res tenetur, res nominatur; nec quisquam dicit, verbi gratia: hoc Romae aiunt factum; aut: fama est, illum provinciam sortitum; sed: ille provinciam sortitus est, et: hoc factum est Romae. Nemo famam nominat, nisi incertus, quia nemo sit fama, sed conscientia certus; nemo famae credit, nisi stultus, quia sapiens non credit incerto. Fama, quantacumque ambitione diffusa est, ab uno aliquando ore exorta sit necesse est, exinde in traduces quodammodo linguarum et aurium
Why an evil, if she is always true, and not for the most part by falsehood? She who not even when she reports true things ceases from the lust of lying, but weaves false things into true, adding, subtracting, confounding by variety. What of this, that her condition is such that she survives only while she lies? For she lives so long as she proves nothing; since once proved she falls and, as though she had discharged the office of announcing, withdraws; thenceforth the fact is held, the fact is named; and no one says, for example, "They say this was done at Rome," or "Rumour has it that he has been allotted a province," but "He has been allotted a province," and "This was done at Rome." No one names rumour unless he is uncertain, because no one is certain by rumour but by knowledge; no one believes rumour but a fool, because a wise man does not believe what is uncertain. Rumour, however wide the circuit over which she has been spread, must of necessity have sprung at some time from one mouth, and thence into the offshoots, as it were, of tongues and ears
<!-- head: NATIONES LIB. I. 566 (left part "AD" over col 565) -->
<!-- margin: A ‹rent sectam istam›; B ‹vult. Merito igitur›; C ‹plurimum? quae ne tum›; D ‹exinde in traduces› -->
<!-- oldnum: (none) -->
<!-- misprint: (none) -->
<!-- note: Opening "rent" completes "plecte-rent" set in col 565. Footnote calls (b) after "Fama" in the verse, (1) after "mendacio", (c) after "plurimum" removed. Virgil verse set as its own line with Migne's reference. "homicidam, adulterum lege" set as printed (a verb appears wanting). "non mendacio plurimum": Rigault's note (c) emends to "mendacior"; rendered as printed. -->
Editors' notes and page, col. 566
Footnotes
(1) ‹anchor: non mendacio› · call in col 566
Rig. assentiente Haverc. emend. mendacior.
Rigault, with Havercamp agreeing, emends to mendacior ("more lying").
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 319)
(b) ‹anchor: Fama› · call in col 566
Nonne haec est fama. Apologetici capite septimo famam descripserat, levem, mendacem, injustam : hic eadem repetit, quasi illius falsitatem iterum argueret. Crederes Tertullianum respicere ad Martialem qui lib. VII. epigr. 5. de Domitiani reditu sic ait : Certus abest auctor, sed vox hoc nuntiat omnis · Credo tibi, verum dicere, fama, soles. Ut nimirum illum falsitatis cum fama deprehendat et convincat. Legendus Plutarchus in quaestionibus Romanis quaest. 5. διὰ τί τοὺς τεθνάναι φημισθέντας ἐπὶ ξένης ψευδῶς, κἂν ἐπανέλθωσιν, οὐ δέχονται κατὰ θύρας, ἀλλὰ τῷ κεράμῳ προσβαίνοντες εἴσω καθιᾶσιν αὐτούς; fama quippe ἀθυρόστομος seu ut habet Nicetas Choniates in Andronico ἀθυρόγλωττος. Sic Thebaidos 3. facta infecta loqui posse dicitur, et apud Claud. contra Eutrop. lib. II. Jam vaga pallentem densis terroribus aulam Fama quatit.
Is not this rumour? In chapter seven of the Apology he had described rumour as fickle, lying, unjust; here he repeats the same, as if to prove its falsehood once again. You would think Tertullian had in view Martial, who, book VII, epigram 5, on Domitian's return, says: "No sure source is at hand, but every voice announces it: I believe you, Rumour; you are wont to speak the truth"; so that, plainly, he catches and convicts him [Martial] of falsehood together with rumour. Plutarch is to be read, Roman Questions, question 5: "Why do they not receive at the door those falsely reported to have died abroad, even if they return, but climb onto the roof tiles and let them down inside?" For rumour is "unbridled of mouth", or, as Nicetas Choniates has it in his Andronicus, "unbridled of tongue". So in Thebaid 3 it is said to be able to tell things done and undone; and in Claudian, Against Eutropius book II: "Now roaming Rumour shakes the court, pale with thick terrors."
(printed under page 319)
(c) ‹anchor: plurimum› · call in col 566
Non mendacio plurimum. Sic habet exemplar Agobardi. Emendabimus reddita litterula quae excidit, Non mendacior plurimum. Rig.
Not most of all by a lie. So the Agobard copy has it. We shall emend by restoring the small letter that dropped out: Non mendacior plurimum ("not most lying"). Rigault.
(printed under page 319)
Page
- placed: Tertullian's text recovered by the filter re-test of 2026-10-19 is set in this column (placed 2026-10-24) and read against the page (QA Q2, 2026-10-24).
serpit et modicum originum vitium rumores obscurat, ut nemo recogitet, ne primum illud os mendacia seminaverit, quod saepe fit aut aemulationis ingenio, aut suspicionis arbitrio, aut etiam nova mentiendi voluptate. Sed bene, quod omnia tempus revelat, testibus sententiis et proverbiis vestris, ipsaque natura, quae ita ordinata est, ut nihil lateat, etiam quod fama non prodidit. Videte, qualem prodiciam adversus nos subornastis, quia quod semel detulit tantoque tempore ad fidem corroboravit, usque adhuc probare non potuit. Principe Augusto nomen hoc ortum est, Tiberio disciplina ejus illuxit, sub Nerone damnatio invaluit, ut jam hinc de persona persecutoris ponderetis: si pius ille princeps, impii Christiani, si justus, si castus, injusti et incesti Christiani, si non hostis publicus, nos publici hostes; quales simus damnator ipse demonstravit, utique aemula sibi puniens. Et tamen permansit erasis omnibus hoc solum institutum Neronianum, justum denique ut dissimile sui auctoris. Igitur aetati nostrae nondum anni CCL. Tot iniqui interea, tot cruces divinitatem consecutae, tot infantiae trucidatae, tot panes cruentati, tot strages lucernarum, tot errores nuptiarum, et adhuc Christianis sola fama decernit. Habet quidem grande fundamentum de vitio ingenii humani, felicius in acerbis atrocibusque mentitur; quanto enim proni ad malitiam, tanto ad mali fidem opportuni estis, facilius denique falso malo, quam vero bono creditur. Si quem tamen apud vos prudentiae locum iniquitas reliquisset, ad explorandam famae fidem, utique justitia poscebat dispicere, a quibus potuisset fama in vulgus, et ita in totum orbem dari. Ab ipsis enim Christianis non opinor, cum vel ex forma ac lege omnium mysteriorum silentii fides debeatur; quanto magis talium, quae prodita non evitarent interim humana animadversione praesentaneum supplicium? Si ergo non ipsi proditores sui, sequitur ut extranei. Oro vos, extraneis unde notitia, cum etiam justa et
creeps on, and the rumours obscure the small fault of their origins, so that no one reconsiders whether that first mouth may not have sown lies, as often happens either through the bent of jealousy, or the whim of suspicion, or even the novel pleasure of lying. But it is well that time reveals all things, as your own maxims and proverbs witness, and nature herself, which is so ordered that nothing lies hid, not even what rumour has not divulged. See what kind of informer you have suborned against us, since what she once reported and over so long a time strengthened into belief she has not been able to prove to this day. Under the emperor Augustus this name arose; under Tiberius its discipline shone forth; under Nero its condemnation gained strength, so that from this alone you may weigh [it] by the person of the persecutor: if that prince was pious, the Christians are impious; if he was just, if chaste, the Christians are unjust and incestuous; if he was not a public enemy, we are public enemies. What we are, our condemner himself has shown, punishing, surely, what was the rival of himself. And yet, when all else was erased, this one institution of Nero's has remained: just, forsooth, as being unlike its author. So then, our age is not yet two hundred and fifty years. So many wicked men meanwhile, so many crosses that have attained divinity, so many infants slaughtered, so many loaves bloodied, so many overthrowings of lamps, so many confusions of marriages, and still rumour alone gives sentence against Christians. It has indeed a great foundation in the fault of the human mind: it lies more successfully in bitter and atrocious things; for the more prone you are to malice, the readier you are to believe evil; in short, a false evil is more easily believed than a true good. If, however, iniquity had left any room among you for prudence, justice surely required, for testing the credit of rumour, that you discern by whom the rumour could have been given out to the common people and so to the whole world. Not by the Christians themselves, I think, since by the very form and law of all mysteries the pledge of silence is owed; how much more for such things as, if betrayed, would not escape immediate punishment from human justice in the meantime? If, then, they did not betray themselves, it follows that outsiders did. Tell me, whence did outsiders have knowledge, since even lawful and
<!-- head: 567 TERTULLIANI (centred over both columns, page 567–568) -->
<!-- margin: A ‹serpit et modicum originum›; B ‹cesti Christiani, si non hostis›; C ‹men apud vos prudentiae›; D (beside the Commentarius only) -->
<!-- oldnum: (none) -->
<!-- misprint: (none) -->
<!-- note: Footnote calls (a) after "prodiciam", (b) after "Augusto", (c) after "nostrae", (d) after "cruces" removed. "Tot iniqui interea" set as printed; UNSURE whether a word is corrupt there. -->
Editors' notes and page, col. 567
Footnotes
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 320)
(a) ‹anchor: prodiciam› · call in col 567
Qualem prodiciam. Prodiciam hic vocat quam in Apologetico, Indicem. Hanc, inquit, indicem adversus nos profertis, quae quod aliquando jactavit, tantoque spatio in opinionem corroboravit, usque adhuc probare non valuit. Rig.
What kind of informer. Here he calls prodicia what in the Apology he calls index. "This informer," he says, "you bring forward against us, which in all this time has not yet been able to prove what it once flung about and over so long a span hardened into belief." Rigault.
(printed under page 320)
(b) ‹anchor: Principe Augusto› · call in col 567
Principe Augusto, etc. Dum rerum potiebatur Augustus Imp. natus est Christus Dominus, regnante Tiberio mortis supplicium perpessus est; At Imperante Nerone persecutio gravissima exorta est, in qua nimirum interempti sunt sancti Petrus et Paulus. Le Pr.
Under the emperor Augustus, etc. While the Emperor Augustus held power, Christ the Lord was born; in the reign of Tiberius He suffered the penalty of death; and under the Emperor Nero a most severe persecution arose, in which, as we know, Saints Peter and Paul were put to death. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 320)
(c) ‹anchor: aetati nostrae› · call in col 567
Igitur aetati nostrae nondum anni CCL. A nato Christo ad Severum sub quo vixit Tertullianus nondum anni CCL. effluxerant. Nam Eboraci in Britannia majoris filii Caracallae insidiis periit circa an. Ch. 211. regnavitque octodecim fere annis, unde patet nondum effluxisse annos 50. aetatis Christianorum. Idem.
So our age is not yet 250 years old. From the birth of Christ to Severus, under whom Tertullian lived, not yet 250 years had passed. For he died at York in Britain, through the plots of his elder son Caracalla, about the year of Christ 211, and he reigned nearly eighteen years; whence it is clear that 50 years of the Christians' age had not yet passed. The same.
(printed under page 320)
(d) ‹anchor: tot cruces› · call in col 567
Tot cruces divinitatem, etc. Tiberii immanitas hic reprehenditur; cujus ea fuit saevitia, et sanguinis fundendi sitis, ut a Constantino Manasse in Annal. dicatur, Lutum sanguine permistum πηλὸς αἵματι πεφυρμένος. Le Pr.
So many crosses [have attained] divinity, etc. The savagery of Tiberius is censured here; such was his cruelty and his thirst for shedding blood that Constantine Manasses in his Annals calls him "mud mixed with blood", pēlos haimati pephyrmenos. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 320)
Page
- placed: Tertullian's text recovered by the filter re-test of 2026-10-19 is set in this column (placed 2026-10-24) and read against the page (QA Q2, 2026-10-24).
- The variant note (1) printed under page 320 belongs to col 568 (call after "non et"); it is set in n568.
licita mysteria omnem arbitrii extraneum caveant? nisi inclita minus spernunt. Atquin extraneis tam honorare quam confingere magis competit... domesticorum curiositas furata est per rimulas et cavernas. Quid, cum domestici eos vobis prodant? Omnes a nullis magis prodimur, quanto magis, si atrocitas tanta sit, quae justitia indignationis omnem familiaritatis fidem rumpit, non potuerit continere, quod horruit, mens, quod expavit, oculus? Hoc quoque mirum, si et ille, qui tanto impatientiae jure prosiluit, deferre et non probare gestit, et ille, qui audiit, non et videre curavit; siquidem par fructus est et delatoris, si quod detulit probet, et auditoris, si quod audit etiam sibi credat. Tunc, inquitis, primo delatum et exhibitum est, auditum et inspectum est, atque exinde famae commendatum. Hoc quidem superscendit omnem admirationem, si semel deprehensum est quod semper admittitur, nisi desivimus jam talia factitare. Atquin et idem vocamur, et in iisdem deputamur, et de die redundamus; quo plures, hoc pluribus odiosi; magis increscit odium, increscente materia; proficiente multitudine reorum, quid ita non proficit multitudo nuntiatorum? Quod sciam, et conversatio notior facta est; scitis et dies conventuum nostrorum; itaque et obsidemur et opprimimur, et in ipsis arcanis congregationibus detinemur. Quis unquam tamen semeso puero supervenit? quis in cruentato pane vestigia dentium deprehendit? quis tenebris repentino lumine irruptis immunda aliqua, ne dixerim incesta, indicia, recognovit? Si praemio impetramus, ne tales in publicum extrahamur, quare et opprimimur? Possumus et omnino non extrahi; quis enim proditionem criminis alicujus sine crimine ipso aut vendit aut redimit? Sed quid extraneis speculatoribus et indicibus detractem, qui talia objiciatis, quae non ab ipsis nobis cum maxima vociferatione publicentur, aut statim audita, si prius demonstrantur, aut postea reperta, si interim celentur? Sine dubio enim initiatum volentibus mos est prius
lawful mysteries shut out every outside witness? unless they scorn the renowned ones less. And yet it befits outsiders rather to honour than to invent... the curiosity of the household has stolen [it] through chinks and crannies. What, when the household betray them to you? By none are we all betrayed more; how much more, if the atrocity be so great, which by the justice of indignation breaks every pledge of familiarity, could the mind not contain what it shuddered at, the eye what it was terrified at? This too is a wonder, if both he who sprang forth with so just a cause of impatience is eager to inform and not to prove, and he who heard took no care to see as well; since the reward is equal both for the informer, if he prove what he reported, and for the hearer, if he believe for himself also what he hears. "Then," you say, "at first it was reported and exhibited, heard and inspected, and thence committed to rumour." This indeed passes all wonder, if what is always being committed was detected only once, unless we have now ceased to do such things. And yet we are called by the same [name], and reckoned under the same [charges], and we abound from day to day; the more we are, the more people we are hateful to; the hatred grows the more as its material grows; as the multitude of the accused advances, why does the multitude of informers not advance likewise? So far as I know, our way of life too has become better known; you know even the days of our assemblies; and so we are both besieged and overwhelmed, and held fast in our very secret gatherings. Yet who ever came upon a half-eaten child? who detected the marks of teeth in a bloodied loaf? who, when the darkness was broken in upon by sudden light, recognized any unclean, not to say incestuous, traces? If we obtain by a bribe that we are not dragged into public as such, why are we overwhelmed nonetheless? We could also avoid being dragged out altogether; for who either sells or buys off the betrayal of any crime without the crime itself? But why should I disparage outside spies and informers, when you charge us with such things as would not be published by us ourselves with the greatest outcry, either heard at once, if they are shown beforehand, or found out afterwards, if they are meanwhile concealed? For without doubt, for those who wish to be initiated, it is the custom first
<!-- head: TERTULLIANI 568 (centred over both columns, page 567–568) -->
<!-- margin: A ‹licita mysteria omnem›; B ‹atque exinde famae commendatum›; C ‹ne dixerim incesta, indicia›; D (beside the Commentarius only) -->
<!-- oldnum: (none) -->
<!-- misprint: (none) -->
<!-- note: Footnote calls (1) after "non et", (2) after "quo", (e) after "puero" removed. The "..." after "competit" is printed (a lacuna marked by the editor). "nisi inclita minus spernunt" set as printed; sense UNSURE. "superscendit" set as printed. -->
Editors' notes and page, col. 568
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 320)
(1) ‹anchor: non et videre› · call in col 568
Rigalt. non et probare — et non videre.
Rigault: non et probare — et non videre.
(printed under page 320)
(2) ‹anchor: quo plures› · call in col 568
Rig. quod.
Rigault: quod.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 320)
(e) ‹anchor: semeso puero› · call in col 568
Semeso puero supervenit. Variis argumentis impietatem illam quae Christianis impingebatur arcet, facitque sua eloquentia ut crimen illud infanticidii non haereat in Christianis. Notissimum esse debet calumniam illam desumptam fuisse ex infamibus sacris Saturni, quae in Africa fieri consueverant in quibus mactabantur infantes. Prudentius lib. 2. adv. Symmachum : Caedibus infantum fument Saturnia sacra, Flebilibusque truces resonent vagitibus arae. Nihil magis obvium apud Lactantium, Minutium ; et caeteros. Ipse Tertullianus contra Gnosticos haec habet. Sed enim Scytharum Dianam, aut Gallorum Mercurium, aut Afrorum Saturnum, hominum victima placari apud saeculum licuit. Le Pr.
Came upon a half-eaten child. With various arguments he wards off the impiety that was thrust upon the Christians, and by his eloquence ensures that the charge of infanticide does not stick to them. It should be very well known that this slander was drawn from the infamous rites of Saturn, which used to be performed in Africa and in which infants were slaughtered. Prudentius, Against Symmachus book 2: "Let Saturn's rites smoke with the slaughter of infants, and the cruel altars resound with pitiful wailing." Nothing is more common in Lactantius, Minucius and the rest. Tertullian himself has this against the Gnostics: "But in the world it has been lawful to appease the Diana of the Scythians, or the Mercury of the Gauls, or the Saturn of the Africans, with human victims." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 320)
Page
- placed: Tertullian's text recovered by the filter re-test of 2026-10-19 is set in this column (placed 2026-10-24) and read against the page (QA Q2, 2026-10-24).
ad magistrum sacrorum vel patrem adire. Tum ille dicet: Infans tibi qui adhuc vagit necessarius, qui immoletur, et panis aliquantum, qui in sanguine infringatur, praeterea candelabra, quae canes annexi deturbent, et offulae, quae eosdem canes: sed et mater aut soror tibi necessaria est. Quid, si nullae erunt? opinor, legitimus Christianus esse non poteris? Haec, oro vos, denuntiata ab aliis sustinent prodi? Diversum opus non est scire illos; prius fallaciae negotium perpetratur, ignaris et dapes et nuptiae subjiciuntur. Nihil enim unquam retro de Christianis mysteriis audierunt. Tamen postea cognoscant necesse est vel aliis quos inducunt praeministranda. Caeterum quam vanum est profanos scire quod nesciat sacerdos? Tacent igitur, et accepto ferunt, et nihil tragoediae Thyestae vel Oedipodis erumpunt, et non protrahunt ad populum, fide in ministros et magistris et de ipsis potiores morsus jam doctis... rapiunt. Si nihil tale probetur, grande nescio quid aestimari oportet, cujus compensatio tantarum atrocitatum tolerantia constat. Miserae atque miserandae nationes, ecce proponimus vobis disciplinae nostrae sponsionem. Vitam aeternam sectatoribus et conservatoribus suis spondet, e contrario profanis et aemulis supplicium aeternum aeterno igni comminatur; ad utramque caussam mortuorum resurrectio praedicatur. Viderimus de fide istorum, dum suo loco digeruntur; interim credite, quemadmodum nos. Volo enim scire, si per talia scelera adire parati estis, quemadmodum nos? Veni, si quis es, demerge ferrum in infantem; vel si alterius officium est, tum modo specta morientem animam, antequam vixit, certe excipe rudem sanguinem in quo panem tuum saties, vescere libenter; interea discumbens dinumera loca, ubi mater aut soror torum presserit; nota diligenter, ut cum tenebrae irruerint, tentantes scilicet diligentiam singulorum, non erres extraneam incursans: piaculum feceris, nisi incestum. Haec cum expunxeris, vives in aevum. Cupio respondeas, si tanti facias aeternitatem? imo idcirco nec credis, et jam si credideris, nego te velle, et jam si velles, nego te posse. Cur autem alii possint, si vos non potestis? cur non possitis, si alii possunt? Impunitatem, aeternitatem quanto constare vultis? An hae nobis omni modo redimendae videntur? an alii ordines dentium Christianorum, et alii specus
to approach the master of the rites, or the father. Then he will say: "You need an infant still wailing, to be sacrificed, and some bread, to be broken into its blood; besides, candlesticks, for dogs tied to them to overturn, and morsels, [to draw] those same dogs; but you also need a mother or a sister." What if there are none? You will not, I suppose, be able to be a lawful Christian? Would such things, I ask you, once announced by others, bear being divulged? It is no separate task that they should know [them]: first the business of the deceit is carried through, and on the unknowing both the feast and the nuptials are imposed. For they have never before heard anything of the Christian mysteries. Yet afterwards they must needs learn them, or else [they are things] to be supplied beforehand to the others whom they bring in. Besides, how idle it is that the profane should know what the priest does not know! They keep silence, then, and take it as received, and burst out with nothing of the tragedy of Thyestes or of Oedipus, and do not drag it out before the people, faith [being kept] towards the ministers and teachers, and from these very men, already taught, they snatch the choicer bites… If nothing of the kind is proved, one must reckon it some great thing or other, whose recompense is purchased at the cost of enduring such great atrocities. Wretched and pitiable nations, see, we set before you the promise of our discipline. It promises eternal life to its followers and keepers; on the contrary, to the profane and to its rivals it threatens eternal punishment in eternal fire; for both ends the resurrection of the dead is preached. We shall see about the credibility of these things when they are treated in their own place; meanwhile, believe as we do. For I wish to know whether you are ready to come at it through such crimes as we [are said to]. Come, whoever you are, plunge the iron into the infant; or if that is another's office, then only watch the soul dying before it has lived; at least catch the raw blood, sate your bread in it, eat with relish; meanwhile, as you recline, count the places where mother or sister has pressed the couch; mark them carefully, so that when the darkness rushes in, putting to the test, of course, the diligence of each, you may not go astray and fall upon a stranger: you will have committed a sacrilege, unless it is incest. When you have accomplished these things, you will live for ever. I want you to answer: do you value eternity so highly? Rather, that is just why you do not believe; and even if you should believe, I deny that you would wish it; and even if you wished, I deny that you could. But why should others be able, if you are not able? Why should you not be able, if others are able? At how high a price would you have impunity, eternity, cost? Or do these seem to us things to be bought back at any price? Or are there other rows of teeth in Christians, and other caverns
Editors' notes and page, col. 569
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 321)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 569
Codd. Mss. vagetur.
The manuscripts: vagetur.
(printed under page 321)
(2) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 569
Apol. 8. « offulae, quae illos ad eversionem luminum extendant. » Quod voc. extendant hic aut restituendum aut subintelligendum esse censet Haverc.
Apology 8: "morsels, to stretch them towards overturning the lights." Havercamp holds that the word extendant must here be either restored or understood.
(printed under page 321)
(3) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 569
Rig. Diversum opus. Non est scire illos, etc.
Rigault: Diversum opus. Non est scire illos, etc.
(printed under page 321)
(4) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 569
Rig. Cynopennae; sed cf. Apol 8.
Rigault: Cynopennae; but compare Apology 8.
(printed under page 321)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 569
Cynopennae aliqui, vel Sciapodes? Legit Pamelius, quem sequitur Lacerda, Cynophane, sicque sensus est : sumusne canino vultu aut canina impudentia ut homicidium tam facile spectemus seu infanticidium? Vowerenius Cyclopes legit, At Desid. Heraldus habet Cynopennae. Le Pr.
Are some Cynopennae, or Sciapodes? Pamelius, whom Lacerda follows, reads Cynophane, and the sense is: are we dog-faced or of dog-like shamelessness, that we should look so easily on homicide, or infanticide? Wouwer reads Cyclopes; but Didier Hérault has Cynopennae. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 321)
(b) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 569
De subterranea Antipodes. Lib. de Anima, pag. 531. dixit, Animalia subterraneum viventia. Rig.
Antipodes from underground. In the book On the Soul, p. 531, he said: "animals living underground". Rigault.
(printed under page 321)
Page
- running head: 569 AD NATIONES LIB[ER ...] (right part of the head cut off at the image edge)
- marginal letters: A ‹ad magistrum sacrorum vel patrem adire. Tum ille›; B ‹ferunt, et nihil tragoediae Thyestae vel Oedipodis›; C ‹es, demerge ferrum in infantem; vel si alterius offi-›; D ‹An hae nobis omni modo redimendae videntur? an›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
faucium, et alii ad incesti libidinem nervi? Non, opinior; satis enim est nobis sola veritate a vestra positione discerni. Tertium genus dicimur, cynopennae aliqui, vel sciapodes, vel aliqui de subterranea antipodes.
…of jaws, and other sinews for the lust of incest? No, I think; for it is enough for us to be distinguished from your position by truth alone. We are called the third race: some sort of dog-faced men, or shadow-feet, or some antipodes from under the earth.
8. Si qua istic, apud vos saltem ratio est, edatis velim primum et secundum genus, ut ita de tertio constet. Psammetichus quidem putavit tibi se ingenio exploratus, si de prima generis: dicitur enim infantes recenti e partu seorsum a commercio hominum alendos tradidisse nutrici, quam et ipsam propterea elinguaverat, ut in totum exsules vocis humanae non auditu formarent loquelam, sed suo promentes eam primam nationem designarent, cujus sonum natura dictasset. Prima vox Bekkos renuntiata est; interpretatio ejus Panis apud Phrygas nomen est; Phryges primi genus exinde habentur. Sed hoc unum erit de vanitatibus vestrarum fabularum non otiose nobis retractandum, quo fidem vestram vanitatibus quam veritatibus deditam demonstrare gestimus. An omnino credibile sit, tali membro desecto, vastato ipsius animae organo et utique radicitus caeso, castratis faucibus, quae etiam extrinsecus periculose vulnerantur, exinde tabo in praecordia refluente, postremo aliquamdiu cessantibus alimentis, vitam nutrici perdurasse? Age nunc, perseveraverit Philomelae medicamentis.... quam et ipsam prudentiores, non linguae caede, sed pudoris rubore mutam interpretantur. Si ergo vixit, potuit effutire aliquid obtusum et exarticulatum sonum tinnitumque, sine modulatu labellorum, expanso ore, lingua stupente, de solis faucibus cogi licet: id fors tunc infantes, quia unicum, facilius commentati, paulo modulatius, utpote linguatuli, in ventum alicujus interpretationis impegerint. Sint nunc primi Phryges, non tamen tertii Christiani; quantae enim aliae gentium series post Phrygas? Verum recogitate, ne quos tertium genus dicitis, principem locum obtineant, siquidem non ulla gens non Christiana; itaque quaecumque gens prima, nihilominus Christiana. Ridicula dementia, novissimos dicitis et tertios nominatis. Sed de superstitione tertium genus deputamur, non de ratione, ut sint Romani, Judaei, dehinc Christiani. Ubi autem Graeci? vel si in Romanorum superstitionibus censentur, quandoquidem
8. If there is any reason here, among you at least, I should like you to set forth the first and the second race, so that the matter of the third may thus be settled. Psammetichus indeed thought that by his ingenuity he had found out for you [which was] the first of the race: for he is said to have handed over infants fresh from birth, to be reared apart from all intercourse with men, to a nurse whom he had for that very reason deprived of her tongue, so that, utter exiles from the human voice, they might form their speech not by hearing, but, bringing it out of their own [nature], might point to that nation as the first whose sound nature had dictated. The first word reported was "Bekkos"; its meaning is the name for bread among the Phrygians; thenceforth the Phrygians are held to be the first race. But this one of the vanities of your fables we shall not go over idly, since by it we are eager to show that your belief is given over to vanities rather than to truths. Is it at all credible that, such a member having been cut out, the very organ of the soul laid waste and indeed cut away at the root, the throat mutilated (which is dangerously wounded even from without), the gore then flowing back into the breast, and finally nourishment failing for some while, the nurse's life should have held out? Come now, suppose she held out by the remedies of Philomela… whom, too, the more prudent interpret as mute not through the cutting of her tongue but through the blush of shame. If, then, she lived, she could blurt out something dull, an inarticulate sound and ringing, such as may be forced from the throat alone, without the modulation of the lips, the mouth gaping, the tongue benumbed: this perhaps the infants then, because it was the only [sound], more easily rehearsed and, being little tongue-endowed creatures, a little more tunefully, and so struck it into the wind of some meaning. Let the Phrygians now be first; yet Christians are not third, for how many other successions of nations [come] after the Phrygians? But consider again, lest those whom you call the third race hold the first place, since there is no nation that is not Christian; so whatever nation is first is none the less Christian. Ridiculous madness! You call us the newest and you name us third. But it is on the ground of superstition that we are reckoned the third race, not of reason, so that there are Romans, Jews, then Christians. But where are the Greeks? Or if they are counted among the superstitions of the Romans, since
Editors' notes and page, col. 570
Footnotes
(5) ‹anchor: Bekkos› · call in col 570
Codd. Mss. Pactos. Cf. Herod. 2, 2.
The manuscripts: Pactos. Compare Herodotus 2.2.
(printed under page 321)
(6) ‹anchor: veritatibus› · call in col 570
Scrib. van potius quam rev.
Write van[itatibus] rather than rev.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 321)
(c) ‹anchor: Prima vox› · call in col 570
Prima vox Beccos renuntiata est. Depravatum est quod in codice Agobardi legitur, Pactos. Nam apud Herodotum et alios, qui hanc historiam Septimio tradidere, scribitur. Βέκκος Apud Galenum quoque lib II. De diff. ἀλλ' εἰ καὶ βέκκος ἐθέλεις τὸν ἄρτον καλεῖν, ὥσπερ οἱ Φρύγες, οὐδὲν ἡμῖν διαφέρει. Idem.
The first word uttered was "Beccos". What is read in the Agobard codex, Pactos, is corrupt. For in Herodotus and the others who handed this story down to Septimius it is written Bekkos. In Galen too, book II, On the Differences: "but if you wish to call bread bekkos, as the Phrygians do, it makes no difference to us." The same.
(printed under page 321)
(d) ‹anchor: in ventum› · call in col 570
In ventum alicujus interpretationis impegerint. Hoc est, Temerario linguae in contrarium ventum sive aerem appulsu sonum alicujus interpretationis ediderint. Idem.
Thrust it into the wind of some meaning. That is, by a rash striking of the tongue against the wind or air in the opposite direction they produced a sound of some meaning. The same.
(printed under page 321)
Page
- running head: NATIONES LIB. I. 570 (left part of the head lies over column 569)
- marginal letters: A ‹faucium, et alii ad incesti libidinem nervi? Non,›; B ‹sonum natura dictasset. Prima vox Bekkos›; C ‹effutire aliquid obtusum et exarticulatum sonum tin-›; D ‹dehinc Christiani. Ubi autem Graeci? vel si in Roma-›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
etiam deos Graeciae Roma sollicitavit, ubi saltem Aegyptii, et ipsi, quod sciam, privatae curiosaeque religionis? Porro, si tam monstruosi, qui tertii loci, quales habendi, qui primo et secundo antecedunt?
…Rome even solicited the gods of Greece, where are the Egyptians at least, they too, so far as I know, of a private and curious religion? Further, if those of the third place are so monstrous, what are those to be thought who go before them in the first and second?
9. Sed quid ego mirer vana vestra, cum ex forma naturali concorporata et concreta intercessit malitia et stultitia sub eodem mancipe erroris? Sane, quia non miror, enumerem necesse est, et vos recognoscendo miremini, in quantam stultitiam incidatis, qui omnis cladis publicae vel injuriae nos caussas esse vultis. Si Tiberis redundaverit, si Nilus non redundavit, si coelum stetit, si terra movit.... tiva vastavit, si fames afflixit, statim omnium vox: Christi.... tum. Quasi modicum habeant aut aliud metuere! Quid igitur? Opinor, ut contemptores deorum vestrorum haec jacula eorum provocamus. Ut supra edidimus, aetatis nostrae nondum anni trecenti, quantae clades ante id spatium supra universum orbem ad singulas urbes et provincias ceciderunt? quanta bella externa et intestina? quot pestes, fames, ignes, hiatus motusque terrarum seculum digessit? Ubi tunc Christiani, cum res Romana tot historias laborum suorum subministravit? ubi tunc Christiani, cum Hierenappe et Delphos et Rhodos et Creta insulae multis cum millibus hominum pessumierunt; vel quam Plato memorat majorem Asiam aut Africam in Atlantico mari mersam; cum Vulsinios de coelo, Tarpeios de suo monte perludit ignis, cum terrae motu mare Corinthium ereptum est, cum totum orbem cataclysmus abolevit? Ubi tunc, non dicam contemptores deorum Christiani, sed ipsi dei vestri, quos clade illa posteriores loca, oppida approbant, in quibus nati, morati, sepulti sunt, etiam quae condiderunt? non alias enim superfuissent ad hodiernum, nisi posthuma cladis illius. Sed relegere et revolvere non curatis testimonia temporum aliter vobis renuntiata, imprimis ne deos vestros injustissimos pronuntietis, qui propter contemptores etiam cultores suos laedunt; tunc enim vosmetipsos errare probatis, si deos traditis, qui vos a meritis profanorum non discernunt. Quod si, ut unus atque alius..... mus ait, idcirco vobis quoque irascuntur, quoniam de
9. But why should I wonder at your vanities, when, out of a natural form, malice and folly have come in, embodied together and grown together under the same dealer in error? Indeed, because I do not wonder, I must needs enumerate, so that you, in recognizing it, may wonder into how great a folly you fall, you who will have us to be the causes of every public disaster or injury. If the Tiber has overflowed, if the Nile has not overflowed, if the sky has stood still, if the earth has moved… has laid waste, if famine has afflicted, at once the cry of all: "The Christi[ans]…" As though they had little else to fear! What then? I suppose that, as despisers of your gods, we call down these darts of theirs. As we set forth above, our era is not yet three hundred years old: how great the disasters that fell before that span upon the whole world, upon single cities and provinces! How many wars, foreign and civil! How many plagues, famines, fires, chasms and quakings of the earth has the age dealt out! Where were the Christians then, when the Roman state supplied so many histories of its own toils? Where were the Christians then, when Hierenappe and Delphos and Rhodes and Crete, islands, perished with many thousands of men; or [the land], greater than Asia or Africa, which Plato records as sunk in the Atlantic sea; when fire from heaven [struck] the Vulsinians, and the Tarpeians from their own hill; when by an earthquake the Corinthian sea was snatched away; when the deluge blotted out the whole world? Where then, I will not say were the Christians, despisers of the gods, but your gods themselves, whom places later than that disaster, the towns in which they were born, dwelt and were buried, even those they founded, attest? For otherwise they would not have survived to this day, unless [they were] later than that disaster. But you do not care to read again and unroll the testimonies of the times reported to you otherwise, above all lest you pronounce your gods most unjust, who for the sake of their despisers harm even their worshippers; for then you prove that you yourselves err, if you hand down gods who do not distinguish you from the deserts of the profane. But if, as one or another… says, they are angry with you too for this reason, because…
Editors' notes and page, col. 571
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 322)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image (the note concerns "Hierenappe et Delphos et Rhodos")› · call in col 571
Scrib. Hiera, Anaphe (vel Napea) et delos etc., Cf. Apol. 40.
Write Hiera, Anaphe (or Napea) et Delos, etc. Compare Apology 40.
(printed under page 322)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 571
Deos Graeciae Roma sollicitavit. In omnibus Graecos imitati sunt Romani, usque ad errores et vitia: si quae in Graecia nata aut exculta fuit superstitio, statim Romam convolavit, ubi magno hominum plausu excipiebatur. Sollicitabant etiam, hoc est numina illa et vanitates barbarorum advocabant, sic Cybele mater Deorum ultro Pessinunte Romam advolavit. Le pr.
Rome enticed the gods of Greece. The Romans imitated the Greeks in everything, even in their errors and vices: if any superstition was born or cultivated in Greece, it at once flew to Rome, where it was received with great applause. They also enticed, that is, they summoned those deities and vanities of the barbarians; thus Cybele, mother of the gods, flew of her own accord from Pessinus to Rome. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 322)
(b) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 571
Sub eodem mancipe erroris. Malum sive Satanam intelligit, magnarium illum fraudis et malitiae negotiatorem. Rig.
Under the same contractor of error. He means the Evil One, or Satan, that wholesale dealer in fraud and malice. Rigault.
(printed under page 322)
(c) ‹anchor: aetatis nostrae (call printed as (b) in the text)› · call in col 571
Aetatis nostrae nondum, etc. Mox dixerat, nondum anni CCL. Hic vere nondum anni trecenti. In eo tamen tam brevi spatio, tot clades exstiterunt, tanta strages edita Christianorum in omnibus orbis partibus, ut incredibile omnino id habeatur parum attente considerantibus. Le pr.
Our age not yet, etc. He had said just before, "not yet 250 years". Here, truly, "not yet three hundred years". Yet in so short a span there were so many disasters, such slaughter of Christians in every part of the world, that it is held altogether incredible by those who consider it too little attentively. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 322)
(d) ‹anchor: Hierenappe (call printed as (c) in the text)› · call in col 571
Hierennape. Pro Hierenape, ut supra, Cynopenne pro Cynopene. Rig.
Hierennape. For Hierenape, as above Cynopenne for Cynopene. Rigault.
(printed under page 322)
(e) ‹anchor: et Rhodos (call printed as (d) in the text)› · call in col 571
Et Delphos et Rhodos. Apologetici cap. illud tractavit; vide quae habet et quae annotata sunt. Nescio an corrigendum esset, Hiera, et Anaphe pro Hierenappe, et Delos pro Delphos. Ammianus quippe lib. 17. ut in Asia Delos emersit, et Hiera, et Anaphe, et Rhodus. Le pr.
And Delphi and Rhodes. He dealt with this in a chapter of the Apology; see what he says there and the notes on it. I wonder whether one should correct to Hiera and Anaphe for Hierenappe, and Delos for Delphos. For Ammianus, book 17: "as in Asia Delos emerged, and Hiera, and Anaphe, and Rhodes." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 322)
Page
- running head: 571 TERTULLIANI (right part of the head cut off at the image edge)
- marginal letters: A ‹etiam deos Graeciae Roma sollicitavit, ubi sal-›; B ‹Quid igitur? Opinor, ut contemptores deorum ves-›; C ‹cum terrae motu mare Corinthium ereptum est, cum›; D ‹printed below the text, beside variant (1) in the LECTIONES VARIANTES›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
nostra eradicatione negligitis, absolutum est de infirmitate et mediocritate eorum: nam non irascerentur vobis in animadversione cessantibus, si ipsi exsequi possent; quanquam et alias confitemini istud, si quando illos supplicio nostro videmini ulcisci. Abaliud a majore defenditur.
…you neglect our uprooting, the matter of their weakness and mediocrity is settled: for they would not be angry with you for slackening in punishment if they could carry it out themselves; though you confess this in other ways too, whenever you think you are avenging them by our punishment. What is other is defended by the greater.
10. Pudeat igitur deos ab homine defendi. Effundite jam omnia venena, omnia calumniae tela infligite huic nomini, non cessabo ultra repellere; at postmodum obtundentur expositione totius nostrae disciplinae; nunc vero eadem ipsa de nostro corpore vulsa in vos retorquebo, eadem vulnera criminum in vobis defossa monstrabo, quo machaeris vestris admentationibusque cadatis. Jam primo, quod in nos generali accusatione dirigitis, divortium ab institutis majorum, considerate etiam atque etiam, ne vobiscum communicemus crimen istud. Ecce enim per omnia vitae ac disciplinae corruptam, imo delatam in vobis antiquitatem recognosco. De legibus quidem jam supra dictum est, quod eas novis de die consultis constitutisque obruistis. De reliqua vero conversationis humanae dispositione palam subjacet, quanto a majoribus mutaveritis, cultu, habitu, apparatu, ipsoque victu, ipsoque sermone. Nam pristinum ut rancidum relegatis, exclusa ubique antiquitas in negotiis, in officiis; totam auctoritatem majorum vestra auctoritas dejecit. Sane, quod vobis magis probro est, laudatis semper vetustates, et nihilominus recusatis. Qua perversitate tant...... majorum apud vos permanere probari debuerunt, cum ea quae probatis recusetis? Sed et ipsum quod videmini a majoribus traditum fidelissime custodire et defendere, vel quo maxime reos non transgressionis postulatis, de quo totum odium christiani nominis animatur, deorum dico culturam, perinde a vobis destrui ac despici ostendam, nisi quod non perinde; nos enim contemptores deorum haberi nulla ratio est, quia nemo contemnit quod sciat omnino non esse. Quod omnino est, id contemni potest, quod nihil est, nihil patitur. Igitur quibus est, ab eis patiatur necesse esse, Quo magis oneramini, credentes esse et contemnentes, colentes et despuentes, honorantes et lacessentes! Licet etiam hinc recognoscere, inprimis, cum alii alios deos colitis, eos quos non colitis,
10. Let it shame, then, that gods should be defended by a man. Pour out now all your poisons, hurl every dart of calumny at this name: I shall not cease to repel them further; and afterwards they will be blunted by the exposition of our whole discipline; but now I will turn back upon you those very [darts], plucked out of our body, and show the same wounds of crimes sunk deep in you, so that you may fall by your own swords and javelins. Now first, as to what you level at us in a general accusation, the abandonment of the institutions of the ancestors: consider again and again whether we do not share that crime with you. For see, I find antiquity corrupted among you in every part of life and discipline, nay, done away with. Of the laws, indeed, it has already been said above that you have buried them under new decrees and enactments day by day. As for the rest of the ordering of human life, it lies open to view how far you have changed from your ancestors, in dress, bearing, furnishing, in your very food, in your very speech. For you banish what is ancient as stale; antiquity is shut out everywhere, in business, in public duties; your authority has thrown down the whole authority of the ancestors. Indeed (what is more to your reproach) you are always praising the old ways, and none the less rejecting them. By what perversity… of the ancestors ought to have been proved to remain among you, when you reject the things you approve? But even the very thing you seem to guard and defend most faithfully as handed down by your ancestors, the thing on which above all you arraign us as guilty of transgression, by which the whole hatred of the Christian name is fired — I mean the worship of the gods — I will show to be destroyed and despised by you just as much, except that it is not just as much; for there is no reason why we should be held despisers of the gods, since no one despises what he knows not to exist at all. What exists at all can be despised; what is nothing suffers nothing. Therefore it must be at the hands of those for whom it exists that it suffers. So much the more are you burdened, believing that they are and despising them, worshipping and spitting upon them, honouring and assailing them! One may recognize this from the following too: first, since you worship some one god, some another, those whom you do not worship…
Editors' notes and page, col. 572
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: admentationibusque› · call in col 572
Rig. adment. i. e. jaculis.
Rigault: adment[ationibus], that is, "javelins".
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 322)
(f) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 572
Ab aliud a majore defenditur. Sic omnino legitur in vetustiss. codice. Dixit autem Abaliud, eadem forma qua Graeci Ἔξαλλον. Abaliud, quod refertur ad aliud, a quo est aliud ; ut Deus, aliud ab homine ; Homo, aliud a Deo. Rig.
Is defended as other from the greater. So it is plainly read in the very old codex. He said abaliud in the same form as the Greeks say exallon. Abaliud: what is referred to another, from which it is other; as God is other than man, man other than God. Rigault.
(printed under page 322)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 572 (left part of the head lies over column 571)
- marginal letters: A ‹nostra eradicatione negligitis, absolutum est de infir-›; B ‹considerate etiam atque etiam, ne vobiscum commu-›; C ‹debuerunt, cum ea quae probatis recusetis? Sed et›; D ‹printed below the text, beside variant (2) in the LECTIONES VARIANTES›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
utique contemnitis; praelatio alterius sine alterius contumelia esse non potest, nec ulla electio non reprobatione componitur. Qui de pluribus suscipit aliquem, eum quem non suscipit despexit. Sed tot ac tanti ab omnibus coli non possunt. Jam ergo tunc primo contempsistis, non veriti scilicet ita instituere, ut omnes coli non possent. At enim illi sapientissimi ac prudentissimi majores, quorum institutis renuntiare non nostis, maxime in persona deorum vestrorum, ipsi quoque impii deprehenduntur. Mentior, si nunquam censuerant, ne qui imperator fanum, quod in proelio vovisset, prius dedicasset quam senatus probasset, ut contigit M. Aemilio, qui voverat Alburno deo. Utique enim impiisimum, imo contumeliosissimum admissum est, in arbitrio et libidine sententiae humanae locare honorem divinitatis, ut deus non sit, nisi cui esse permiserit senatus. Saepe censores inconsulto populo adsolaverunt; certe Liberum patrem cum sacro suo consules senatus auctoritate urbe non solummodo, verum tota Italia eliminaverunt. Caeterum Serapem et Isidem et Harpocratem et Anubem prohibitos Capitolio Varro commemorat, eorumque statuas a senatu dejectas, nonnisi per vim popularium restructas. Sed tamen et Gabinius consul Kalendis Januariis, cum vix hostias probaret, prae popularium coetu, quia nihil de Serape et Iside constituisset, potiorem habuit senatus censuram, quam impetum vulgi, et aras institui prohibuit. Habetis igitur in majoribus vestris, etsi non nomen, attamen sectam christianam, quae deos negligit. Herum, si vos saltem integrum honoribus vestris rei esse laesae religionis: sed invenio conspirasse a vobis tam superstitionis quam impietatis profectum. Quanto enim irreligiosiores deprehendimini? Privatos enim deos, quos Lares et Penates domestica consecratione perhibetis, domestica licentia inculcatis, venditando, pignerando pro necessitate ac voluntate. Essent quidem tolerabiliora ejusmodi contumaciae sacrilegia, nisi quod eo jam contumeliosiora, quod modica. Sed aliquo solatio privatorum et domesticorum deorum querelae juvantur, quod publicos turpius contumeliosiusque tractetis. Jam primum, quos in hastarium regessistis,
…you certainly despise; the preferring of one cannot be without insult to another, and no choice is made without a rejection. He who out of many takes up one has despised the one he does not take up. But gods so many and so great cannot be worshipped by all. So you despised them already at the very first, not afraid, it seems, to order things so that all could not be worshipped. But indeed those most wise and most prudent ancestors, whose institutions you know not how to renounce, are themselves also found impious, above all in the matter of your gods. I lie, if they had never decreed that no general should dedicate a shrine he had vowed in battle before the senate had approved it, as befell M. Aemilius, who had vowed one to the god Alburnus. For surely it is a most impious, nay a most insulting deed, to place the honour of divinity in the discretion and caprice of human opinion, so that he is no god unless the senate has allowed him to be one. Often the censors, without consulting the people, have razed [their shrines] to the ground; certainly the consuls, by authority of the senate, banished Father Liber with his rites not only from the city but from all Italy. Moreover Varro records that Serapis and Isis and Harpocrates and Anubis were forbidden the Capitol, and their statues thrown down by the senate and set up again only through the violence of the populace. But even so Gabinius the consul, on the Kalends of January, when he was scarcely approving the victims before a crowd of the populace, because he had decreed nothing about Serapis and Isis, held the judgement of the senate weightier than the clamour of the mob, and forbade altars to be set up. You have, then, in your ancestors, if not the name, yet the Christian sect, which neglects the gods. Of these, if you at least [were] whole in your honours, [they would be] guilty of injured religion: but I find that from you there has proceeded a progress, in league, of superstition as much as of impiety. For how much more irreligious are you found to be! Your private gods, whom you name Lares and Penates by domestic consecration, you trample on with domestic licence, selling them, pawning them, as need or fancy takes you. Such sacrileges of insolence would indeed be more bearable, were they not the more insulting for being petty. But the complaints of the private and household gods are eased by some comfort, in that you treat the public gods more basely and more insultingly. First, those whom you have put back into the auction-room…
Editors' notes and page, col. 573
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 323)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 573
Ex Apol. 13. in corrig. sine reprobatione.
From Apology 13, correct to sine reprobatione ("without rejection").
(printed under page 323)
(2) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 573
Haverc. ex Apol. 13. emend. subditatis.
Havercamp, from Apology 13, emends to subditatis.
(printed under page 323)
(3) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 573
Hav. ex Apol., 13. emend. conducitur divinitas sub eadem voce, etc.
Havercamp, from Apology 13, emends: conducitur divinitas sub eadem voce, etc. ("godhead is hired out under the same cry").
(printed under page 323)
(4) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 573
Cod. ms. captivitate notae poena. Rigalt. captivitatis notae; sed voc. poenae non est delendum. Cf. Apol. 13.
The manuscript: captivitate notae poena. Rigault: captivitatis notae; but the word poenae should not be deleted. Compare Apology 13.
(printed under page 323)
(a) ‹anchor: Liberum patrem (call printed as (e) in the text)› · call in col 573
Certe Liberum patrem. Ablata fuisse olim et abrogata sacra Bacchi fere omnes testantur scriptores. S. Augustinus lib. VI. de Civ. Livius l. XXXIX. et alii. Locum hic addam Ciceronis ex lib. I. de legibus. Quid ergo, inquit, aget Jacchus, Eumolpidaeque nostri, et augusta illa mysteria, siquidem sacra nocturna tollimus. Le pr.
Certainly Father Liber. Almost all writers testify that the rites of Bacchus were once taken away and abolished: St Augustine, City of God book VI; Livy book XXXIX; and others. I will add here a passage of Cicero from book I of On the Laws: "What then," he says, "will Iacchus do, and our Eumolpidae, and those august mysteries, if we abolish nocturnal rites?" Le Prieur.
(printed under page 323)
(b) ‹anchor: Isidem› · call in col 573
Caeterum Serapem et Isidem. Idem fere objicit lib. II. Arnobius, Quid ? vos] Aegyptiaca numina, quibus Serapis atque Isis est nomen, non post Pisonem et Gabinium coss. in numerum vestrorum retulistis deorum ? Dixerat etiam Lucanus : Nos in templa tuam Romana accepimus Isim, Semideosque canes, et sistra jubentia luctus. Quibus ex locis hujus loci expositio colligi potest. Idem.
But Serapis and Isis. Arnobius makes almost the same objection in book II: "What? Did you not, after the consulship of Piso and Gabinius, enrol among the number of your gods the Egyptian deities named Serapis and Isis?" Lucan too had said: "We have received your Isis into Roman temples, and the half-divine dogs, and the sistra that bid men mourn." From these passages the explanation of this place can be gathered. The same.
(printed under page 323)
(c) ‹anchor: domestica licentia› · call in col 573
Domestica licentia, etc. Quod vanitatem maxime arguit in fictis illis diis, solebant veteres vendere, subhastare, et mutare deos suos sicut dixit Apolog. 13. mutantes aliquando Saturnum in cacabulum, Minervam in trullam, pro affectu aut necessitate. Idem.
By household licence, etc. Which above all proves the vanity of those invented gods: the ancients used to sell their gods, auction them, and change them, as he said in Apology 13, "sometimes changing Saturn into a cooking pot, Minerva into a ladle, as fancy or need dictated." The same.
(printed under page 323)
Page
- running head: 573 AN NATIONES LI[B. ...] (head prints "AN" for "AD"; right part cut off at the image edge)
- marginal letters: A ‹utique contemnitis; praelatio alterius sine alterius con-›; B ‹nae locare honorem divinitatis, ut deus non sit, nisi›; C ‹integrum honoribus vestris rei esse laesae religionis:›; D ‹printed below the text, beside variant (5) in the LECTIONES VARIANTES›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
publicanis subd... tis, omni quinquennio inter vectigalia vestra proscriptos addicitis. Sic Serapeum, sic Capitolium petitur, addicitur, conducitur..... sub eadem voce praeconis, eadem exactione quaestoris. Sed enim agri tributo onusti viliores, hominum capita stipendio censa ignobiliora; nam haec sunt captivitatis notae et poenae. Dei vero, qui magis tributarii, magis sancti, imo qui magis sancti magis tributarii. Majestas constituitur in quaestum, negotiatio religione proscribitur, sanctitas locationem mendicat; exigitis mercedem pro solo templi, pro aditu sacri, pro stipitibus, pro ostiis; venditis totam divinitatem, non licet eam gratis coli; plus denique publicanis reficitur, quam sacerdotibus. Non suffecerat vectigalium deorum contumelia, de contemptu scilicet aestimanda, nec contenti estis deis honorem non habuisse, nisi etiam, quemcumque habetis, depretietis aliqua indignitate. Quid enim omnino ad honorandos eos facitis, quod etiam non mortuis vestris ex aequo praebeatis? Exstruitis deis templa, aeque mortuis templa; exstruitis aras deis, aeque mortuis aras, eisdem titulis superscribitis litteras, easdem statuis inducitis formas, ut cuique ars aut negotium aut aetas fuit: senex de Saturno, imberbis de Apolline, virgo de Diana figuratur, et miles in Marte, et Vulcano faber ferri consecratur. Nihil itaque mirum, si hostias easdem mortuis, quas et deis caeditis, eosdemque odores crematis. Quis istam contumeliam excuset, quae ut aut mortuos cum deis deputet? Regibus quidem etiam sacerdotia adscripta sunt, sacrique apparatus, ut tensae et currus et solisternia et lectisternia.... tie et ludi. Plane, quoniam illis coelum patet, hoc quoque non sine contumelia deorum: primo quidem, quod non decuerit alios eis annumerari, quibus datum sit post mortem deos fieri; secundum, quod tam libere atque manifeste coram populo pejeraret contemplator Proculus in coelum recepti, nisi contemneret quos dejeraret, quam ipse, quam ii, qui ei pejerare permittant; consentiunt enim ipsi nihil esse quod dejerant, imo insuper et praemio afficiunt, quia publice contempserit perjurii vindices; quanquam perjurii apud vos unusquisque pu
…you subject to the tax-farmers; every five years you knock them down, among your revenues, as men proscribed. So the Serapeum, so the Capitol is bid for, knocked down, leased out… under the same cry of the auctioneer, the same exaction of the quaestor. But indeed fields burdened with tribute are the cheaper, and the heads of men assessed for tax the less noble; for these are the marks and penalties of captivity. But the gods: the more tributary, the more holy; nay rather, the more holy, the more tributary. Majesty is made a source of gain; traffic is proscribed by religion; sanctity begs for a lease. You demand a fee for the ground of the temple, for access to the sacred [place], for the posts, for the doors; you sell divinity whole, it may not be worshipped for nothing; in short, more comes in to the tax-farmers than to the priests. The insult of the gods' revenues had not been enough (to be reckoned, of course, as contempt), nor are you content to have shown the gods no honour, unless you also cheapen whatever [honour] you do show with some indignity. For what at all do you do to honour them that you do not equally provide for your dead as well? You build temples to the gods, temples likewise to the dead; you build altars to the gods, altars likewise to the dead; you write the same letters on the inscriptions, you give the same forms to the statues, according to each one's art or business or age: an old man is figured after Saturn, a beardless youth after Apollo, a maiden after Diana, and a soldier is consecrated in Mars, and a smith in Vulcan. No wonder, then, if you slay for the dead the same victims as for the gods, and burn the same perfumes. Who could excuse that insult, which counts the dead along with the gods? To kings, indeed, priesthoods too have been assigned, and sacred apparatus, such as ceremonial carriages and chariots, and solisternia and lectisternia… and games. Plainly, since heaven lies open to them, this too is not without insult to the gods: first, because it would not have been fitting that others should be numbered with them, to whom it has been granted to become gods after death; second, because Proculus, the beholder of one received into heaven, would not have perjured himself so freely and openly before the people unless he despised those by whom he swore, both he and they who allow him to perjure himself; for they themselves agree that what they swear by is nothing; nay, over and above, they even reward him, because he publicly despised the avengers of perjury. Yet among you each one … of perjury
Editors' notes and page, col. 574
Footnotes
(5) ‹anchor: superscribitis litteras› · call in col 574
Ita Rigalt. : Semler (vel Schütz) : aras eisdem tit. superscriptis litt.
So Rigault; Semler (or Schütz): aras eisdem tit[ulis] superscriptis litt[eris] ("altars with the same titles written above in letters").
(printed under page 323)
(6) ‹anchor: quae ut aut› · call in col 574
Haverc. ad Apol. 21. emend. utut mortuos.
Havercamp, on Apology 21, emends to utut mortuos.
(printed under page 323)
(7) ‹anchor: tie› · call in col 574
Rig. et feriae et ludi.
Rigault: et feriae et ludi ("and holidays and games").
(printed under page 323)
(8) ‹anchor: apud vos› · call in col 574
Cod. ms. quanquam perjurii apud vos, quod un. p.
The manuscript: quanquam perjurii apud vos, quod un. p.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 323)
(d) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 574
Negotiatio religione proscribitur. Aut, Negotiatione Religio. Rig.
Trade is proscribed by religion. Or: religion by trade. Rigault.
(printed under page 323)
(e) ‹anchor: et ludi (call printed as (a) in the text)› · call in col 574
Ut tensae et currus et solisternia et lectisternia. Legendum et supplendum : « ut tensae et currus (continues)
Such as the processional cars and chariots and seat-feasts and couch-feasts. It should be read and supplied: "such as the processional cars and chariots (continues)
(printed under page 323)
Page
- running head: NATIONES LIB. I. 574 (left part of the head lies over column 573)
- marginal letters: A ‹publicanis subd... tis, omni quinquennio inter›; B ‹aestimanda, nec contenti estis deis honorem non ha-›; C ‹quidem etiam sacerdotia adscripta sunt, sacrique ap-›; D ‹printed below the text, beside variant (5) in the LECTIONES VARIANTES›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
rus est. Imo jam per deos dejerandi periculum evanuit, potiore habita religione per Caesarem dejerandi, quod et ipsum ad offuscationem pertinet deorum vestrorum; facilius enim per Caesarem pejerantes punirentur, quam per ullum Jovem. Sed contemptus honestior est, habens quamdam superbiae gloriam: venit enim aliquando etiam de fiducia vel conscientiae securitate vel naturali sublimitate animi. Derisus vero quanto lascivior, tanto denotatior ad contumeliae morsum. Recognoscite igitur, quam derisores inveniamini numinum vestrorum, non dico quales sitis in sacrificando, quod enecta et tabida quaeque mactatis; de opimis autem et integris supervacua esui capitula et ungulas et plumarum setarumque praevulsa, et si quid domi quoque habituri non fuissetis. Omitto quae vulgae aut sacrilegae gulae videbuntur majorum prope religionem convenire; atquin doctissimi gravissimi, quatenus gravitas atque prudentia de doctrina proficere credunt, et irreverentissimi erga deos vestros semper existunt, nec eis cessit litteratura, quam ut aut turpia aut vana aut falsa de deis inferat. Ab ipso exordiar Homero vestro, ejus unda omnis et omne aequor, cui quantum honorem additis, tantum deis vestris derogastis, magnificando qui de eis lusit. Adhuc meminimus Homeri; ille, opinor, est, qui divinam majestatem humana conditione tractavit, casibus et passionibus humanis deos imbuens, qui de illis favore diversis gladiatoria quodammodo paria commisit: Venerem sauciat sagitta humana, Martem tredecim mensibus in vinculis detinet fortasse periturum, eadem Jovem poene perpessum a coelitum plebe traducit, aut lacrymas ejus super Sarpedonem excutit, aut luxuriantem cum Junone foedissime inducit, commendato libidinis desiderio per commemorationem amicarum. Exinde quis non poetarum ex auctoritate principis
[pu]re. Nay, the danger of forswearing by the gods has by now vanished, the religion of forswearing by Caesar being held the weightier; and this itself also tends to the obscuring of your gods, for men perjuring themselves by Caesar would sooner be punished than by any Jupiter. But contempt is the more honourable, having a certain glory of pride: for it springs at times even from confidence, or from security of conscience, or from natural loftiness of mind. Derision, however, the more wanton it is, the more marked is it for the bite of insult. Recognize, then, what deriders of your deities you are found to be. I do not speak of what you are like in sacrificing: that you slaughter every worn-out and wasting beast, and of the fat and sound ones [you offer] what is useless for eating, the little heads and the hooves, and the plucked-off feathers and bristles, and anything you would not have kept even at home. I pass over what will seem to a vulgar or sacrilegious gullet to come near the religion of the ancestors; and yet the most learned and gravest men, inasmuch as they believe that gravity and wisdom are advanced by learning, always prove also the most irreverent towards your gods, nor has their learning turned out otherwise than to bring forth shameful or vain or false things about the gods. I will begin with your Homer himself, whose is every wave and every sea, to whom, as much honour as you add, so much you have taken away from your gods, by magnifying the man who made sport of them. We remember Homer still; he it is, I think, who handled the divine majesty according to the human condition, steeping the gods in human mishaps and passions, who matched them against one another, by contrary favour, in pairs, as it were, of gladiators: he wounds Venus with a human arrow, he keeps Mars thirteen months in chains, perhaps to perish there, he exposes Jupiter as having nearly suffered the same at the hands of the commons of the heaven-dwellers, or he shakes out his tears over Sarpedon, or brings him in wantoning most foully with Juno, commending the desire of his lust by the recital of his mistresses. Thenceforth which of the poets, on the authority of their prince, does not…
Editors' notes and page, col. 575
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIENTES. (printed under page 324)
(1) ‹anchor: Jovem› · call in col 575
Hav. corr. per parvulum Jovem.
Havercamp corrects to per parvulum Jovem ("by a little Jupiter").
(printed under page 324)
(2) ‹anchor: supervacua› · call in col 575
Rigalt. supervacui; cf. Apol. 14.
Rigault: supervacui; compare Apology 14.
(printed under page 324)
(3) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 576
Rigalt. heram, sed hircum scribendum esse docet Apol. 14.
Rigault: heram; but Apology 14 shows that hircum ("he-goat") should be written.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 324)
(a) ‹anchor: rus est› · call in col 575
Quanquam perjurii apud vos unusquisque purus est. Nam quis haberi perjurii reus debeat, ubi falsae divinitatis religio nulla? In cod. Agobardi legitur : quamquam perjurii apud vos quod unusquisque pures est. Unde aliquis conjiciat legengendum, Quanquam perjurii apud vos quotusquisque purus est? Augustinus lib. III de Civ. Dei. Corruptissimis moribus, ad hoc mos jurandi servabatur antiquus, non ut a sceleribus metu religionis prohiberentur, sed ut perjuria quoque sceleribus caeteris adderentur. Rig.
Although among you everyone is clear of perjury. For who should be held guilty of perjury where there is no religion of a false divinity? In the Agobard codex is read: quamquam perjurii apud vos quod unusquisque pures est. Whence someone might conjecture that we should read: "Although of perjury among you how few are clear?" Augustine, City of God book III: "Amid the most corrupt morals the ancient custom of swearing was kept up, not so that men might be held back from crimes by fear of religion, but so that perjuries too might be added to the other crimes." Rigault.
(printed under page 324)
(b) ‹anchor: evanuit› · call in col 575
Per deos dejerandi periculum evanuit. Tolerabilius erat apud Gentiles, si quis in suorum Deorum non jam eorum numen jurasset, quam si Principis nomen aut fortunam non jurasset; unde Christiani aliquando sollicitabantur ut non deos, non Jovem lapidem, sed Caesaris fortunam jurarent, quod etiam ex Eusebio probavimus in Apolog. Le pr.
The danger of swearing falsely by the gods has vanished. Among the gentiles it was more tolerable for someone to have sworn not by the deity of his own gods than not to have sworn by the name or fortune of the Emperor; hence the Christians were at times pressed to swear not by the gods, not by Jupiter the Stone, but by Caesar's fortune, as we have also shown from Eusebius in the Apology. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 324)
(c) ‹anchor: Homero› · call in col 575
Ab ipso exordiar Homero. Nihil illustrius habere se credebant antiqui Gentiles, Homero suo, qui tamen absurda plurima, ut et vana et falsa de diis scribit. Idem.
I will begin with Homer himself. The ancient gentiles believed they had nothing more illustrious than their Homer, who nevertheless writes a great many absurd, as well as empty and false, things about the gods. The same.
(printed under page 324)
(d) ‹anchor: omne aequor› · call in col 575
Ejus unda omnis et omne aequor. a quo ceu fonte perenni Vatum Pieriis ora rigantur aquis. Rig.
Every wave and every sea is his: he from whom, as from a perennial spring, the mouths of the bards are watered with Pierian waters. Rigault.
(printed under page 324)
(e) ‹anchor: super Sarpedonem› · call in col 575
Super Sarpedonem. Haec habentur apud Homerum Iliados 16. ubi Sarpedonem intuitus Jupiter, Junonem alloquitur, summumque quem ex ejus morte futura hauriebat dolorem, indicat : Ὤμοι ἐγὼν, ὅτι μοι Σαρπηδόνα φίλτατον ἀνδρῶν, Μοῖρ' ὑπὸ Πατρόκλοιο Μενοιτιάδαο δαμῆναι. Quod ut alia infinita deo non solum aut heroe, sed viro forti indigna sunt. Le Pr.
Over Sarpedon. This is found in Homer, Iliad 16, where Jupiter, looking on Sarpedon, addresses Juno and shows the very great grief he was drawing from his coming death: "Woe is me, that Sarpedon, dearest of men to me, is fated to be overcome by Patroclus, son of Menoetius." This, like countless other things, is unworthy not only of a god or a hero but of a brave man. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 324)
Page
- running head: 575 TERTULLIA[NI] (right part of the head cut off at the image edge)
- marginal letters: A ‹rus est. Imo jam per deos dejerandi periculum›; B ‹non fuissetis. Omitto quae vulgae aut sacrilegae gulae›; C ‹sibus in vinculis detinet fortasse periturum, eadem Jo-›; D ‹printed in the COMMENTARIUS below the text, beside "nium. Idem."›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
- other: footnote (3) is listed here but its call stands in col. 576 (with Commentarius (f)); col. 574 ends with the first half of "purus", whose tail "rus" opens this column (the word should be set whole at the end of col. 574; noted for that column, not changed here).
sui in deos insolens, aut vera prodendo aut falsa fingendo? Et tragici quidem aut comici pepercerunt, ut non aerumnas ac poenas dei praefarentur? Taceo de philosophis, quos superbia severitatis et duritia disciplinae ab omni timore securos, nonnullus etiam afflatus veritatis adversus deos erigit: denique et Socrates in contumeliam eorum quercum et canem et hircum jurat. Nam et si idcirco damnatus est, cum poenituerit Athenienses damnationis, discriminatores quoque impenderit, restituitur testimonium Socrati, et possum retorquere, probatum esse in illo, quod nunc reprobatur in nobis. Sed et Diogenes nescio quid in Herculem lusit, et Romani stili Diogenes, Varro trecentos Joves, seu Jupiteres dicendum est, sine capitibus inducit. Caetera lasciviae ingenia etiam voluptates vestras per dedecus deorum administrant. Dispicite apud vos Lentulorum et Hostiorum sacrilegas venustates, utrum mimos an deos vestros in strophis et jocis rideatis; sed et histrionicas litteras magna cum voluptate suscipitis, quae omnem foeditatem designant deorum. Constuprantur coram vobis majestates in corpore impuro. Famosum et diminutum caput imago cujuslibet dei vestit. Luget Sol filium fulmine extinctum laetantibus vobis, Cybela pastorem suspirat fastidiosum non erubescentibus vobis, et sustinetis Jovis elogia modulari. Plane religiosiores estis in gladiatorum cavea, ubi super sanguinem humanum, super inquinamenta poenarum, proinde saltant dei vestri, argumenta et historias nocentibus erogandis, aut in ipsis dei nocentes puniuntur. Vidimus saepe castratum Attin deum a Pessinunte, et qui vivus cremabatur Herculem induerat. Risimus et meridiani ludi de deis lusum, quo Dis Pater, Jovis frater, gladiatorum exsequias cum malleo deducit, quo Mercurius, in calvitio pennatulus, in caduceo ignitulus, corpora ex
…in his own insolence against the gods, either by betraying truths or by inventing falsehoods? And have the tragic or comic poets spared them, so as not to set forth in their prologues the woes and punishments of a god? I say nothing of the philosophers, whom the pride of severity and the hardness of their discipline, secure from all fear, and even some breath of truth, raise up against the gods: in short, Socrates too, in insult to them, swears by an oak and a dog and a he-goat. For even if he was condemned on that account, yet since the Athenians repented of the condemnation, and even punished his accusers, testimony is restored to Socrates, and I can turn the point back: what is now condemned in us was approved in him. Diogenes, too, made some sport or other against Hercules; and the Diogenes of the Roman pen, Varro, brings on three hundred Joves, or Jupiters as one should say, without heads. The other talents of wantonness likewise serve up your pleasures through the disgrace of the gods. Consider among you the sacrilegious elegances of the Lentuli and the Hostii: is it the mimes or your gods that you laugh at in their tricks and jests? And you take up with great pleasure the writings of the stage too, which portray every foulness of the gods. Majesties are defiled before your eyes in an unclean body. The likeness of any god you please clothes an infamous and degraded head. The Sun mourns his son struck dead by the thunderbolt while you rejoice; Cybele sighs for the disdainful shepherd and you do not blush; and you bear to have the eulogies of Jupiter sung. Plainly you are more religious in the gladiators' arena, where your gods dance just the same over human blood, over the filth of punishments, as they furnish plots and stories for the guilty who are to be put to death, or else the guilty are punished in the persons of the gods themselves. We have often seen Attis, the god from Pessinus, castrated, and a man who was being burned alive had put on Hercules. We have laughed too at the sport made of the gods at the midday show, in which Father Dis, Jupiter's brother, leads off the funerals of the gladiators with a hammer, in which Mercury, feather-capped on his bald head, fiery in his caduceus, [tests] the bodies…
Editors' notes and page, col. 576
Footnotes
(f) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 576
Quercum et canem et feram jurat. Alii habent hircum, sic legimus in Apolog. solebat etiam jurare anserem et platanum, ἢ (sic) Σωκράτην ὀμνύειν τὸν κύνα καὶ τὸν χῆνα καὶ πλάτανον. Theophilus lib. III. ad Autolycum. Idem.
He swears by the oak and the dog and the wild beast. Others have hircum ("he-goat"); so we read in the Apology: "he used also to swear by the goose and the plane tree", or (sic) "that Socrates swore by the dog and the goose and the plane tree": Theophilus, To Autolycus book III. The same.
(printed under page 324)
(g) ‹anchor: pennatulus (call printed as (m) in the text)› · call in col 576
Incalvitio pennatulus. Galero pennato.
Feathered on his bald head. With a feathered cap.
(printed under page 324)
(h) ‹anchor: ignitulus (call printed as (g) in the text)› · call in col 576
In caducaeo ignitulus. Serpentes implexi virgae linguas ignitulas vibrabant. Rig.
Fiery on his caduceus. The serpents twined about the staff flickered little fiery tongues. Rigault.
(printed under page 324)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 576
- marginal letters: A ‹sui in deos insolens, aut vera prodendo aut falsa›; B ‹ingenia etiam voluptates vestras per dedecus deorum›; C ‹centes puniuntur. Vidimus saepe castratum Attin›; D ‹printed in the COMMENTARIUS below the text, beside note (d)›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
animata jam mortemve simulantia e cauterio probat. Singula ista quaeque adhuc investigare quis possit? Si honorem inquietant divinitatis, si majestatis fastigium adsolant, de contemptu utique censentur, quam eorum qui ejusmodi factitant, quam eorum qui ita suscipiunt. Quare nescio, ne plus de vobis dei vestri quam de nobis querantur..... ex alia parte adulamini, redimitis si qua delinquitis, et postremo licet vobis in eos quos esse voluistis; nos vero in totum aversamur.
[ex]animate or already feigning death, he tests with the branding-iron. Who could go on to search out each of these things one by one? If they disturb the honour of divinity, if they raze the summit of majesty to the ground, they are surely to be reckoned as contempt, both on the part of those who practise such things and of those who so receive them. Wherefore I do not know whether your gods do not complain more of you than of us… on the other side you flatter them, you buy yourselves off if you commit any offence, and in the end you may do as you please against those whom you have willed to exist; but we turn away from them altogether.
11. Nec tantum in hoc nomine rei desertae communis religionis, sed superductae monstruosae superstitionis. Nam, ut quidam, somniastis caput asinium esse deum nostrum. Hanc Cornelius Tacitus suspicionem fecit. Is enim in quarta historiarum suarum, ubi de bello judaico digerit, ab origine gentis exorsus et tam de ipsa origine quam de nomine religionis ut voluit argumentatus, Judaeos refert in expeditione vastis in locis aquae inopia laborantes, onagris, qui de pastu aquam petituri aestimabantur, indicibus fontis usos evasisse; ita ob eam gratiam consimilis bestiae superficiem a Judaeis coli, inde opinor praesumptum, nos quoque ut Judaicae religionis propinquos eidem simulacro initiari. At enim idem Cornelius Tacitus, sane ille mendaciorum loquacissimus, oblitus affirmationis suae in posterioribus refert, Ponpeium magnum Judaeis debellatis captisque Hierosolymis templum adisse et perscrutatum nihil simulacri reperisse. Ubi ergo is deus fuerit? utique nusquam magis quam in templo tam memorabili, praesertim omnibus praeter sacerdotibus clauso, quo non vererentur extraneum. Sed quid ego defendam, professus interim confessionem temporalem omnium in vobis ex pari transferendorum? Credatur deus noster asinina aliqua persona; certe negabitis vos eadem habere nobiscum? Sane vos totos asinos colitis et, cum sua Epona, et omnia jumenta et pecora et bestias, quae perinde cum suis praesepibus consecratis. Et hoc forsitan crimini datis, quod inter cultores omnium tantum asinarii sumus. Sed et qui nos crucis antistites affirmat, consecraneus erit noster.
11. Nor are we arraigned under this name only for having deserted the common religion, but for having brought in over it a monstrous superstition. For, like certain others, you have dreamed that an ass's head is our god. Cornelius Tacitus started this suspicion. For in the fourth book of his Histories, where he treats of the Jewish war, beginning from the origin of the nation and reasoning as he pleased both about that origin and about the name of their religion, he relates that the Jews, on an expedition in desert places and suffering from want of water, made their escape by using as guides to a spring wild asses, which were supposed to be going in search of water after grazing; that thus, in gratitude for this, the likeness of a similar beast is worshipped by the Jews; whence, I suppose, it was assumed that we too, as near neighbours of the Jewish religion, are initiated into the same image. But indeed the same Cornelius Tacitus, truly the most garrulous of liars, forgetting his own assertion, relates in later books that Pompey the Great, having subdued the Jews and taken Jerusalem, went into the temple and, having searched it, found nothing of an image. Where, then, could this god have been? Surely nowhere more than in so memorable a temple, especially one closed to all but the priests, where they would not fear a stranger. But why should I make a defence, having for the present professed a temporary confession of all things, to be transferred on equal terms to you? Let our god be believed to be some asinine person; surely you will not deny that you have the same as we? Why, you worship whole asses, along with their Epona, and all beasts of burden and cattle and wild beasts, which you consecrate likewise together with their stalls. And perhaps you lay this to our charge, that among worshippers of everything we are worshippers of asses alone. But he too who declares us priests of the cross will be our fellow-votary.
12. Crucis qualitas, signum est de ligno; etiam de materia colitis penes vos cum effigie; quanquam sicut vestrum humana figura est, ita et nostrum propria. Viderint nunc liniamenta, dum una sit qualitas; viderit forma, dum ipsum sit dei corpus. Quod si de
12. As to the nature of the cross: it is a sign made of wood; you too among you worship the material, with an effigy on it; though as yours is a human figure, so ours too is a figure of its own. Let the outlines be what they may, so long as the nature is one; let the shape be what it may, so long as it is the very body of a god. But if on…
Editors' notes and page, col. 577
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 325)
(1) ‹anchor: indicibus fontis› · call in col 577
Sic recte jussit Haverc. scribi pro vulg.: fontibus; cf. Apol. 16.
So Havercamp rightly directed it to be written, for the common reading fontibus; compare Apology 16.
(printed under page 325)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 577
Pars crucis, et quidem majus est, etc. Cruces nobis reliquuntur, nobis figuntur, at ex eo maximus in nos honos redundat. Apud veteres quippe Christianos crux semper rebus in omnibus adhibebatur, signumque illius ante res omnes imprimebatur. Ipse Tertul. de corona mil. Cyrillus catech. 4 : Ποίει δὲ τοῦτο τὸ σημεῖον, ἐσθίων καὶ πίνων, καθήμενος, κοιταζόμενος, ἀνιστάμενος, λαλῶν, περιπατῶν, ἁπαξαπλῶς ἐν παντὶ πράγματι. Fac illud signum, comedens et bibens, sedens, recubans, erectus, loquens, ambulans, uno verbo in omni occasione. Basilius Mag. l. de S. Spir. c. 27, illud reponit inter traditiones apostolicas non scriptas. Le Pr.
Part of a cross, and indeed it is the greater, etc. Crosses are left to us, are fixed for us, but from this the greatest honour redounds upon us. For among the early Christians the cross was always used in all things, and its sign was impressed before everything. Tertullian himself, On the Soldier's Crown. Cyril, Catechesis 4: "Make this sign eating and drinking, sitting, lying down, rising, speaking, walking, in a word in every matter": make that sign eating and drinking, sitting, reclining, standing, speaking, walking, in a word on every occasion. Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit ch. 27, places it among the unwritten apostolic traditions. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 325)
Page
- running head: 577 AD NATIONES LIB. (right part of the head cut off at the image edge)
- marginal letters: A ‹animata jam mortemve simulantia e cauterio probat.›; B ‹ubi de bello judaico digerit, ab origine gentis exorsus›; C ‹Sed quid ego defendam, professus interim confes-›; D ‹derit forma, dum ipsum sit dei corpus. Quod si de›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
Editors' notes and page, col. 578
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: Ad manifesta jam› · call in col 578
Rigalt. At man. ; Verius Hav. ad man.
Rigault: At man[ifesta]; more correctly Havercamp: ad man[ifesta].
(printed under page 325)
(3) ‹anchor: Con........ one› · call in col 578
Hav. contignatione.
Havercamp: contignatione ("with a framework of beams").
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 325)
(b) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 578
Cum illo sedilis excessu. Sedile Crucis palus fuit brevior, medio stipiti impactus. Excessum vero sedilis dicit, quia palus iste in quo sedebant cruciarii, eminebat in medio stipite ad usum sedilis. Ἐν τῷ μέσῳ πηγνύμενον ξύλον ὡς κέρας, καὶ αὐτὸ ἐξέχον, ἐφ' ᾧ ἐποχοῦνται οἱ σταυρούμενοι, inquit Justinus, Dialogo advers. Tryphonem Judaeum. Irenaeus lib. II, cap. 42. Ipse habitus crucis fines et summitates habet quinque, duos in longitudine, duos in latitudine, et unum in medio ubi requiescit, qui clavis affigitur. Palus iste medianus lib. adv. Judaeos dicitur, Unicornis in medio stipata RIG.
With that projection of a seat. The seat of the cross was a shorter stake driven into the middle of the upright. He speaks of the projection of the seat because this stake, on which the crucified sat, stood out from the middle of the upright to serve as a seat. "The wood fixed in the middle like a horn, itself projecting, on which those who are crucified ride," says Justin, Dialogue against Trypho the Jew. Irenaeus, book II, ch. 42: "The very shape of the cross has five ends and extremities, two in length, two in breadth, and one in the middle, on which rests the one who is fastened with nails." In the book Against the Jews this middle stake is called "the unicorn set firm in the middle". Rigault.
(printed under page 325)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
cruces erunt intestina quodammodo tropaeorum. Itaque in Victoriis et cruces colit castrensis religio, signa adorat, signa dejerat, signa ipsi Jovi praefert. Sed ille imaginum suggestus et totius auri cultus monilia crucum sunt. Sic etiam in cantabris atque vexillis, quae non minore sanctitate militia custodit, siphara illa vestes crucum sunt. Erubescitis, opinor, incultas et nudas cruces colere.
crosses will be, in a manner, the inner framework of trophies. So the religion of the camp worships crosses too, in its Victories; it adores the standards, swears by the standards, sets the standards above Jupiter himself. But that display of images and the cult of all that gold are necklaces of crosses. So also on the cantabra and the banners, which the soldiery guards with no less sanctity, those streamers are the garments of crosses. You blush, I suppose, to worship crosses unadorned and naked.
13. Alii plane humanius solem Christianum deum aestimant, quod innotuerit ad orientis partem facere nos precationem vel die solis laetitiam curare. Quid vos minus facitis? Non plerique affectatione adorandi aliquando etiam coelestia ad solis initium labra vibratis? Vos certe estis, qui etiam in laterculum septem dierum solem recepistis, et ex diebus ipsum praelegistis, quo die lavacrum subtrahatis, aut in vesperam differatis, aut otium et prandium curetis. Quod quidem facitis exorbitantes et ipsi a vestris ad alienas religiones. Judaei enim festi, sabbata [et coena pura, et judaici ritus lucernarum et jejunia cum azymis et orationes litorales, quae utique aliena sunt a diis vestris. Quare, ut ab excessu revertar, qui solem et diem ejus nobis exprobratis, agnoscite vicinitatem; non longe a Saturno et sabbatis vestris sumus.
13. Others, more humanely to be sure, reckon the sun to be the Christian god, because it has become known that we make our prayer towards the region of the east, or keep festivity on the day of the sun. Do you do any less? Do not most of you, in an affectation of worship, sometimes move your lips even towards the heavenly bodies at the sun's rising? It is you, surely, who have even taken the sun into the register of the seven days, and from among the days have preferred it as the day on which you omit the bath, or put it off till evening, or give yourselves to rest and feasting. And in doing this you yourselves too stray from your own religions to foreign ones. For the Jewish feasts, the sabbaths and the pure supper, and the Jewish rites of lamps, and fasts with unleavened bread, and prayers on the shore, are certainly foreign to your gods. Wherefore, to return from this digression, you who reproach us with the sun and its day, recognize your nearness to us: we are not far from your Saturn and your sabbaths.
14. Nova jam de Deo nostro fama suggessit. Adeo nuper quidam perditissimus in ista civitate, etiam suae religionis desertor, solo detrimento cutis Judaeus, utique magis post bestiarum morsus, ad quas se locando quotidie toto jam corpore decutit, cum incedit, picturam in nos proposuit sub ista proscriptione: ONOKOITHZ. Is erat auribus canteriorum, et in toga, cum libro, altero pede ungulato. Et credidit vulgus judaeo. Quod enim aliud genus seminarium est infamiae nostrae? Itaque in tota civitate ὀνοκοίτης praedicatur. Sed et hoc tamque externum et auctoritate temporis destitututum etqualitate auctoris infirmum, libenter excipiam studio retorquendi. Videamus igitur, an hic quoque nobiscum deprehendamini. Neque enim interest qua forma, dum deformia simulacra curemus? Sunt penes vos et canino
14. A new report about our God has lately been put about. Not long ago a certain utterly abandoned fellow in this city, a deserter even of his own religion, a Jew only by the loss of his skin, and all the more so after the bites of wild beasts, to which he hires himself out daily and has by now been stripped of the skin of his whole body, when he goes about, displayed a picture against us under this inscription: ONOKOITES. It had the ears of a gelding, was in a toga, with a book, and had one foot hoofed. And the crowd believed the Jew. For what other kind of people is the seed-bed of our infamy? So throughout the whole city the "onokoites" is proclaimed. But this too, foreign as it is, and destitute of the authority of time, and weak from the character of its author, I will gladly take up out of zeal to turn it back. Let us see, then, whether here also you are not found in our company. For does it matter in what form, so long as we tend misshapen images? You too have among you, with a dog's
Editors' notes and page, col. 579
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 326)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 579
Hav. contignatione.
Havercamp: contignatione ("with a framework of beams").
(printed under page 326)
(2) ‹anchor: ΟΝΟΚΟΙΘΗΣ (call printed as (3) in the text)› · call in col 579
Scribendum esse ὀνοκοίτης ex Apol. 16. apparet; Rig. et hoc in l. et in Apologet. scr. Onochoetes.
From Apology 16 it is clear that onokoitēs should be written; Rigault, both in this place and in the Apology, writes Onochoetes.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 326)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 579
Ad Orientis partem facere nos precationem. Verissimum certissimumque est christianos orientem versus preces suas nuncupare solitos ; illius autem consuetudinis haec erat ratio. Christus dominus in cruce constitutus ad Occasum respiciebat, inde christiani tanquam defixis in Christum oculis versus orientem se obvertebant, S. Hieronymus ad cap 6. prophetae Amos : In mysteriis primum renuntiamus ei, qui in occidente est, nobisque moritur cum peccatis, et sic versi ad Orientem pactum inimus cum Sole justitiae, et ei nos servituros esse promittimus. Profani et gentiles, qui veritatis omnino erant expertes obvertebantur quoque ad Orientem, sed Orientem solem deum suum falso credentes Le Pr.
That we make our prayer towards the East. It is most true and most certain that Christians were accustomed to offer their prayers facing east; and this was the reason for the custom. Christ the Lord, set on the cross, looked towards the west; hence the Christians, as if with their eyes fixed on Christ, turned towards the east. St Jerome on chapter 6 of the prophet Amos: "In the mysteries we first renounce him who is in the west and dies to us together with our sins, and so, turned to the east, we enter into a covenant with the Sun of justice and promise that we will serve him." The profane and the gentiles, who were wholly without the truth, also turned towards the east, but falsely believing the rising sun to be their god. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 326)
(b) ‹anchor: Judaeus› · call in col 579
Utique magis post bestiarum morsus, ad quas se locando. Ipse libro ad Martyras : Quot otiosos affectatio armorum ad gladium locat ? Certe ad feras ipsas affectatione descendunt, et de morsibus et de cicatricibus formosiores sibi videntur. Rig.
Surely more so after the bites of the beasts, to which he hired himself out. He himself in the book To the Martyrs: "How many idlers does a passion for arms hire out to the sword? Certainly they go down to the very beasts out of vanity, and think themselves handsomer for the bites and scars." Rigault.
(printed under page 326)
Page
- running head: 579 TERTULLIANI
- marginal letters: A cruces erunt intestina quodammodo tropaeorum; B praelegistis, quo die lavacrum; C seminarium est infamiae nostrae; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
capite et leonino et de bove et de ariete et hirco cornuti dii, caprigenae vel anguini et alites planta, fronte et tergo. Quid itaque nostrum unicum denotatis?
head, and with a lion's, gods horned from the ox and the ram and the he-goat, goat-bodied or snake-bodied, and winged in the foot, the brow and the back. Why then do you single out our one?
15. Plures Onocoetae penes vos deprehenduntur. Si in deis aequalitate concurrimus, sequitur, ut sacrificii vel sacri quoque inter nos diversitas nulla sit, ut ex alia specie comparationis satis fiat. Nos infanticidio litamus sive initiamus? Vos, si de memoria abierunt, quae caede hominis, quaeque infanticidiis transegisse, recognoscetis suo ordine; nunc enim differimus pleraque, ne eadem videamur ubique retractare. Interim, ut dixi, ex alia parte non deest adaequatio. Nam etsi nos aliter, ⟨t⟩amen non aliter vos quoque infanticidae, qui infantes editos enecantes legibus quidem prohibemini, sed nullae magis leges tam impune, tam secure sub omnium conscientiae unius ae ....... tabellis eluduntur. Sed nec eo distant, si vos non ritu sacri, neque deo necatis. Atquin in hoc asperius, quod frigore et fame, aut bestiis.......... tis, aut longiore in aquis morte demergitis. At et si quo........ dissimilius penes vos fit, eo addicite, quo vestra pignora ex.........s, et supplebitur. Imo superacervabitur in vobis quidquid..... ratione defecerit. Sed de ea impietatis hostia dicimur..... dum ita quoque in vobis recognoscitur, ubi opportunius positum est, non multo secernimur a vestra voracitate, si illa impudica est, nostra vero crudelis, conjungimur si forte natura, qua semper saevitia cum impudicitia concordat.
15. More Onocoetae are found among you. If we meet on equal terms in our gods, it follows that between us there is no difference in sacrifice or rite either, so that the comparison may be satisfied from another kind. Do we offer sacrifice or initiate by infanticide? As for you, if it has slipped your memory, you will recognize in due order what you have carried through by the slaughter of a man and what by infanticides; for now we put off most of it, lest we seem to go over the same things everywhere. Meanwhile, as I said, on the other side an equivalence is not lacking. For though we are infanticides in another way, yet you too are not otherwise infanticides, you who are indeed forbidden by the laws to kill infants once born, but no laws are evaded so much with impunity, so securely, under the knowledge of all, with the tablets of a single ... . Nor do you differ in this, if you kill not by sacred rite, nor for a god. Nay, in this you are harsher, that by cold and hunger, or to beasts ... , or by a longer death in the waters you drown them. And if anything ... is done more unlike among you, add to it the means by which your pledges ... , and it will be made up. Nay, whatever ... falls short in reason will be heaped up over-full in you. But we are said ... of that victim of impiety, while thus also it is recognized in you, where it is more fittingly placed; we are not far separated from your voracity: if yours is unchaste and ours cruel, we are joined perhaps by nature, by which cruelty always agrees with unchastity.
16. Quanquam quid minus, imo quid non amplius facitis? parum scilicet humanis visceribus inhiatis, quia vivos et puberes devoratis? parum humanum sanguinem lambitis, quoniam futurum sanguinem elicitis? parum infante vescimini, quia infantem totum praecoquum perhauritis? Ventum est ad horam lucernarum et caninum ministerium et ingenia tenebrarum. Quo in loco metuo ne cedam. Quid enim tale in vobis detinebo? Verum jam laudate consilium incesti verecundi, quod adulteram noctem commenti sumus, ne aut lucem, aut veram noctem contamina-
16. And yet what do you do less, nay what do you not do more? You gape too little, no doubt, after human entrails, because you devour the living and the grown? You lick up human blood too little, since you draw out blood that is yet to be? You feed too little on an infant, because you drain down a whole infant before its time? We have come to the hour of the lamps, and the service of the dogs, and the devices of darkness. At this point I fear I may give way. For what such thing shall I hold against you? But now praise the plan of a bashful incest, that we have devised an adulterous night, so as not to defile either the light or the true night
Editors' notes and page, col. 580
Footnotes
(c) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 580
Alites planta fronte et tergo. In exemplari legitur : Alites plana fronte et tergo, mendose ; legendum : Planta fronte et tergo. Mercurium enim designat. Idem.
Winged at the sole, the brow and the back. In the copy is read Alites plana fronte et tergo, wrongly; read Planta fronte et tergo. For he means Mercury. The same.
(printed under page 326)
(d) ‹anchor: Nam etsi nos aliter› · call in col 580
Nam etsi nos aliter. Nos infanticidae, cum infantes ad sacrificia nostra caedere dicimur ; vos infanticidae, qui infantes recens editos pro arbitrio vestro necatis ; Nos pro nostra, ut dicitis, religione. Vos pro arbitrio vestro. Vos quidem infantes, aliter ac nos caedere dicimur, caeditis ; verumtamen caeditis. Eo igitur quod caeditis, aeque estis infanticidae. Rig.
For though we otherwise. We are infanticides when we are said to slaughter infants for our sacrifices; you are infanticides, who kill newborn infants at your own pleasure. We, as you say, for our religion; you at your pleasure. You indeed slaughter infants otherwise than we are said to slaughter them; but slaughter them you do. By the fact that you slaughter them, then, you are equally infanticides. Rigault.
(printed under page 326)
(e) ‹anchor: vos› · call in col 580
Tamen non aliter vos. Infanticidii crimen et caetera flagitia in gentiles retorquet, qui christianos earum rerum postulabant quarum erant conscii, et quas soli gnostici perpetrasse dicebantur. Le Pr.
Yet you not otherwise. He turns the charge of infanticide and the other outrages back on the gentiles, who indicted the Christians for things of which they themselves were guilty, and which only the Gnostics were said to have committed. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 326)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 580
- marginal letters: A capite et leonino et de bove; B cantes legibus quidem prohibemini; C elicitis? parum infante vescimini; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
remus, quod etiam luminibus terrenis parcendum existimavimus, quod nostram quoque conscientiam ludimus; quodcumque enim facimus, si volumus, suspicamur. Caeterum incesta vestra pro sua libertate et luce omni et nocte omni et tota coeli conscientia fruuntur, quodque felicius proveniat, cum palam misceatis incesta toto conscio coelo, soli ipsi ignoratis; nos vero etiam in tenebris scelera nostra recognoscere possumus. Plane Persae, Ctesias edit, tam scientes quam non horrentes cum matribus libere fiunt. Sed et Macedones, id quod probaverunt, palam est factitare, siquidem cum primus scenam eorum OEdipus intravit trucidatus oculos, risu ac derisu exceperunt; tragaedus consternatus retracta persona: Numquid, ait, domini, displicui vobis? responderunt Macedones: Imo tu quidem pulchre. Aut scriptor vanissimus si finxit, aut OEdipus dementissimus si ita fecit; atque exinde alter ad alterum, ἤλαυνε dicebat εἰς τὴν μητέρα. Sed una vel alia gens quantula macula totius orbis? Nos enim omnem infecimus solem, omnem polluimus Oceanum! Date igitur aliquam nationem vacantem ab eis, quae omne hominum genus ad incestum trahunt. Si qua gens concubitu ipso et aetatis ac sexus necessitate, ne dixerim libidine et luxuria, caret, ea erit quae carebit incesto; si qua ab humana conditione privata quadam natura remota est, ut neque ignorantiae neque errori neque casui opposita sit, ea erit quae sola Christianis respondere constantius possit. Respicite igitur luxuriam inter errores et ventos fluctuantem, si desunt populi, quos ad hoc sceleris incursent lata vada et aspera erroris. Imprimis cum infantes vestros alienae misericordiae exponitis aut in adoptionem melioribus parentibus, obliviscimini, quanta materia incesti subministratur, quanta occasio casibus aperitur? Plane
-te, in that we have thought that even the earthly lights should be spared, in that we make sport even of our own conscience; for whatever we do, we suspect, if we wish. But your incests, in keeping with their freedom, enjoy every light and every night and the whole knowledge of heaven; and, what may turn out more happily, since you commit incests openly with all heaven aware, you alone are ignorant of them; whereas we can recognize our crimes even in the dark. Plainly the Persians, Ctesias records, become free with their mothers, as knowing it as they are unshrinking. And the Macedonians too, it is evident, practise what they approved, since when Oedipus first came onto their stage with his eyes put out, they greeted him with laughter and derision; the tragic actor, dismayed, drew back his mask: "Have I displeased you, masters?" he said. The Macedonians answered: "No, you did it finely." Either the writer is most empty if he invented this, or Oedipus most mad if he did so; and thereafter one would say to another, "He drove at his mother." But how slight a stain on the whole world is one nation or another? For we have infected the whole sun, we have polluted the whole Ocean! Give, then, some nation free from the things that draw the whole race of men to incest. If any nation lacks sexual union itself and the compulsion of age and sex, not to say lust and wantonness, that will be the nation which will lack incest; if any is removed from the human condition by some peculiar nature, so as to be exposed neither to ignorance nor to error nor to chance, that will be the one which alone can answer the Christians more steadfastly. Look, then, at wantonness tossing amid errors and winds, if there are wanting peoples whom the broad shallows and rough places of error may drive upon this crime. First of all, when you expose your infants to the pity of strangers, or for adoption to better parents, do you forget how much matter for incest is supplied, how great an occasion is opened to chance? Plainly
Editors' notes and page, col. 581
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 327)
(1) ‹anchor: εἰς τὴν μητέρα› · call in col 581
Cf. Apolog. 9.
Compare Apology 9.
(printed under page 327)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 581
Fusciano praefecto. Scio Fusciano senatorii ordinis viro, condiscipulo M. Antonini philosophi imp. Hujus meminit Julius Capitolinus in M. Antonino et in Pertinace : praefectum Urbi, et hominem sincerum fuisse refert. Iterum consulem fuisse tradit Lampridius in Commodo. Fusciani Numidiae legati mentio fit l. 7 de leg. praest. quae est Tryphoni respondentis secundum constitutionem Divi Pii ad Tuscium Fuscianum. Rig.
Under the prefect Fuscianus. I know of a Fuscianus of senatorial rank, fellow-pupil of the emperor Marcus Antoninus the philosopher. Julius Capitolinus mentions him in his Marcus Antoninus and in his Pertinax: he records that he was prefect of the City and an upright man. Lampridius in his Commodus relates that he was consul a second time. Mention of Fuscianus, legate of Numidia, is made in law 7 de leg. praest., which is Tryphoninus answering according to the constitution of the deified Pius to Tuscius Fuscianus. Rigault.
(printed under page 327)
Page
- running head: 581 AD NATIONES LIB.
- marginal letters: A remus, quod etiam luminibus terrenis; B Macedones: Imo tu quidem pulchre; C quos ad hoc sceleris incursent; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
ex aliqua disciplina severiores aut certo respectu ejusmodi eventuum a libidine temperatis quocumque loco domi aut peregre, ut non dispersio seminum et saltus ubique luxuriae nescientibus filios edat, quos aut ipsi postmodum parentes, aut alii..... incursent, quando etiam aetatum moderatio libidine exclusa sit. Quotcumque adulteria, quotcumque stupra, quotcumque publicatae libidinis..... sive stativo vel ambulatorio titulo, tot sanguinis mixtiones, tot compagines generis, tot inde traduces ad incestum; unde adeo mimis et comoedis argumentorum venae fluunt, unde ista quoque talis ante tragoedia erupit. Fusciano praefecto urbi, judicata punitione reatus, fortuita negligentia comitata ultra januam progressus iter, praetereuntibus tractus domo excidit. Graeculus vel a limine Graeculo more captaverat intrans, inde mutatus Asiae aetate Romam in venalicio refertur. Emit imprudens pater et utitur Graeco. Dehinc, ut vestra, adolescentem dominus in agrum et vincula legat. Illic jam dudum paedagogus et nutrix poenas dabant. Repraesentatur eis tota caussa, referunt invicem exitus suos: illi, quod alumnus in pueritia periisset; ille, se quoque a pueritia periisse, caeterum eodem eventu Romae natum honesta domo. Forsitan et signa quaedam retexuerit. Igitur Dei voluntate, ut tanta seculo macula exprobraretur, spiritus dei de die concutit: tempora cum aetate respondent, aliquid et oculi de lineamentis recordantur, proprietates nonnullae in corpore recensentur. Dominos, imo jam parentes tantum prolatae inquisitionis diligentia impellit. Investigatur venaliciarius, infeliciter invenitur. Revelato scelere, parentes sibi laqueo medentur. Bona filio male superstiti praefectus adscribit, non ad haereditatem, sed ad stipendium stupri et incesti. Satis erat unum istud exemplum publicae erubescen-
being stricter from some discipline, or restraining yourselves from lust out of a certain regard for such events, in whatever place, at home or abroad, so that the scattering of seed and the leaps of wantonness everywhere do not bring forth sons to men who know it not, upon whom either the parents themselves afterwards, or others ... may stumble, when even the restraint of ages has been shut out by lust. However many adulteries, however many debaucheries, however many ... of lust made public, whether under a fixed or a wandering placard, so many minglings of blood, so many joinings of kin, so many shoots thence towards incest; whence indeed the veins of plots flow for the mimes and comic poets, whence also there burst forth such a tragedy as this before. When Fuscianus was prefect of the city, and the punishment of a culprit had been adjudged, [a boy,] having gone out beyond the door with his attendants by careless chance, was carried off by passers-by and lost from his home. A Greekling, as he came in, had caught him even at the threshold, Greekling-fashion; then, changed by the age of Asia, he is brought back to Rome to the slave-market. His father buys him unknowing and uses the Greek. Then, as is your way, the master consigns the young man to the field and to chains. There the tutor and the nurse had long been undergoing punishment. The whole case is laid before them; they recount to each other their misfortunes: they, that their charge had been lost in boyhood; he, that he too had been lost from boyhood, but by the same chance had been born at Rome in a respectable house. Perhaps he also unfolded certain tokens. So by the will of God, that so great a stain might be cast in the face of the age, the spirit of God strikes them by the day: the times answer to the age, the eyes too recall something of the features, certain peculiarities on the body are recognized. The diligence of the inquiry, once set on foot, drives the masters, nay now the parents, so far. The slave-dealer is sought out, and unhappily found. The crime revealed, the parents seek their cure in the noose. The prefect assigns the goods to the son who unhappily survives, not as an inheritance, but as the wages of debauchery and incest. That one example of public shame was enough
Editors' notes and page, col. 582
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: captaverat intrans› · call in col 582
Corruptum hunc locum ita emendavit Rigalt. ut pro vulg. senatus scriberet reatus et v. instrans deleret.
Rigault emended this corrupt passage by writing reatus for the common reading senatus, and deleting the word instrans.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 327)
(b) ‹anchor: Graeculo more› · call in col 582
Graeculo more. Hunc morem explicat Julianus Caesar libello quodam acephalo editionis Petavianae pag. 137. ὥσπερ οἱ τὰ παιδία τοῦ πλακοῦντος ἐξαπατῶντες, τῷ καὶ δὶς καὶ τρὶς προϊέσθαι πείθουσιν ἀκολουθεῖν ἑαυτοῖς· εἶθ' ὅταν ἀποστήσωσι πόρρω τῶν οἰκιῶν, ἐμβάλλοντες εἰς ναῦν ἀπέδοντο. Rig.
In the Greek fashion. The Emperor Julian explains this custom in a certain headless little work, Petau's edition, p. 137: "like those who trick children with a cake, persuading them to follow by offering it two or three times; then, when they have drawn them far from their homes, they put them on board a ship and sell them." Rigault.
(printed under page 327)
(c) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 582
Judicata punitione reatus. Hic vero nonnihil indulsimus conjecturis. In exemplari legitur, Judicata punitione Senatus. Quod aperte mendosum est. Nam quid illud tandem significabit ? Tragoedia judicata punitione Senatus. Quare autem meminit Fusciani Praefecti Urbi, si judicata fuerit punitione Senatus ? Imo, nihil hic punitum, neque a Senatu, neque a Praefecto Urbi. Itaque hoc primum statuo, Praecedentia sic esse distinguenda, Unde adeo mimis et comoedis argumentorum vena fluunt. Unde ista quoque, talis ante tragoedia, erupit Ista scilicet vena comici argumenti, quae talis ante tragoedia fuit. Deinde narare incipit tragoediam, casum plane miserandum. Fusciano Praefecto Urbi judicata punitione reatus, facinorosi nimirum alicujus, populo ad spectaculum concurrente, fortuita negligentia comitum ultra januam progressus iter, praetereuntibus tractus, domo excidit. Hoc de puero sex aut circiter annos nato intelligendum esse vel ex eo fit verisimile, quod is meminerit se in pueritia periisse, dehinc mutatum aetate, relatum Romam, et jam adolescentem in vincula legatum. Sic igitur procedat historia : Fortuita negligentia comitum ultra januam progressus iter, praetereuntibus tractus, domo excidit. Sequitur in eodem manuscripto codice, Graeculus vel a limine Graeculo more captaverat intrans, ut haec postrema dictio, intrans, interpretatio videatur ejus quod praecesserat, a limine. Quod si probavimus, eadem opera probabitur, nulla ratione defendi posse quae uncis ideo comprehendi voluimus, ut detrahantur. Quare, sic pergat historia : Graeculus Graeculo more captaverat. Inde mutatus Asiae aetate, etc. Denique, Aetatem Asiae dixerit, in Asia transactam.
When punishment had been decreed for a crime. Here we have indulged somewhat in conjecture. In the copy is read: "When punishment had been decreed by the Senate," which is plainly faulty. For what will that mean? "A tragedy, punishment having been decreed by the Senate." And why mention Fuscianus, Prefect of the City, if the punishment was decreed by the Senate? Indeed, nothing was punished here, either by the Senate or by the Prefect of the City. So I first determine that the preceding words should be punctuated thus: "Whence indeed veins of plots flow for mimes and comedies. Whence also this, such a tragedy before, broke out"; that is, this vein of a comic plot, which before was such a tragedy. Then he begins to narrate the tragedy, a truly pitiable case. "When, under Fuscianus, Prefect of the City, punishment had been decreed for the crime" (of some criminal, that is) "and the people were running to the spectacle, the boy, through the chance carelessness of his attendants, went beyond the door, was carried off by passers-by, and was lost from home." That this is to be understood of a boy of about six is made likely even by the fact that he remembered being lost in childhood, then, changed with age, being brought back to Rome and, already a youth, sent off in chains. So let the story proceed thus: "Through the chance carelessness of his attendants he went beyond the door, was carried off by passers-by, and was lost from home." There follows in the same manuscript: "A Greekling, or from the threshold, had seized him in the Greekling way, entering," so that this last word, intrans, seems a gloss on what preceded, a limine. If we have proved this, we shall at the same stroke prove that there is no defending the words we chose to enclose in brackets so that they may be removed. Let the story therefore continue thus: "A Greekling had seized him in the Greekling way. Then, changed by an age in Asia," etc. Lastly, he will have called it "an age of Asia", meaning one spent in Asia.
(printed under page 327)
(d) ‹anchor: spiritus dei› · call in col 582
Spiritus de die concutit. In exemplari legitur, Spiritus Dei die concutit. Nullo sensu. Vocabulum, Dei, proxime antecedit, neque debet hic reperiri; visum scribere, Spiritus de die concutit. Idem.
The spirit stirs it day by day. In the copy is read Spiritus Dei die concutit, which makes no sense. The word Dei comes just before and ought not to be found here; I decided to write Spiritus de die concutit. The same.
(printed under page 327)
(e) ‹anchor: venaliciarius› · call in col 582
Investigatur Venaliciarius. Hic advertendum ve- (continues)
The slave-dealer is tracked down. Here it must be noted (continues)
(printed under page 327)
Page
- running head: [AD N]ATIONES LIB. I. 582
- marginal letters: A ex aliqua disciplina severiores; B Graeculo more captaverat intrans; C vestigatur venaliciarius; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
tiae ejusmodi scelerum delitescentium in vobis. Nihil semel evenit in rebus humanis, semel plane erui potest. De sacramentis nostrae religionis opinor intentatis, et sunt paria vestris etiam non sacramentis.
-ce for crimes of this kind lying hidden among you. Nothing happens only once in human affairs; plainly it can be dug out once. Regarding the sacraments of our religion, I think, that you charge against us, there are matches for them even in your things that are not sacraments.
17. De Obstinationibus vero vel praesumptionibus, si qua proponitis, ne istae quidem ad communionem comparationis absistunt. Prima obstinatio est, quae secunda ab eis religio constituitur Caesarianae majestatis, quod irreligiosi dicamur in Caesares, neque imagines eorum repropitiando, neque genios dejerando hostes populi nuncupamur. Ita vero sit, cum ex vobis nationibus quotidie Caesares, et Parthici, et Medici, et Germanici. Hoc loco Romana gens viderit, in quibus indomitae et extraneae nationes. Vos tamen de nostris adversus nostros conspiratis. Agnoscimus sane romanam in Caesares fidem. Nulla unquam conjuratio erupit, nullus in senatu vel in palatiis ipsis sanguis Caesaris notam fixit; nulla in provinciis affectata majestas. Adhuc Syriae cadaverum odoribus spirant; adhuc Galliae Rhodano suo non lavant. Sed omitto vesaniae crimina, quia nec ista Romanum nomen admittunt. Vanitatis sacrilegia conveniam, et ipsius vernaculae gentis irreverentiam recognoscam, et festivos libellos, quos statuae sciunt, et illa obliqua nonnunquam dicta a concilio atque maledicta, quae circi sonant. Si non armis, saltem lingua semper rebelles estis. Sed aliud, opinor, est, non jurare per genium Caesaris. Dubitatur enim de perjuris jure, cum ne per deos quidem vestros ex fide dejeretis. Sed non dicimus deum imperatorem; super hoc enim, quod vulgo aiunt, sannam facimus.
17. As to the Obstinacies, or presumptions, if you put forward any, not even these stand apart from a common footing of comparison. The first obstinacy is the one which is set down by them as the second religion, that of the Caesarean majesty: that we are called irreligious towards the Caesars, and are named enemies of the people because we neither propitiate their images nor swear by their genii. So be it, since from you, the nations, there are daily Caesars, Parthian and Median and Germanic. On this point the Roman race may see among what untamed and foreign nations they are. You, however, conspire from among our own against our own. We acknowledge indeed the Roman loyalty towards the Caesars. No conspiracy ever broke out, no blood of Caesar set its mark in the senate or in the very palaces; no majesty was usurped in the provinces. Syria still breathes with the stench of corpses; Gaul still does not wash in its Rhone. But I pass over the crimes of madness, since not even these admit the Roman name. Let me take up the sacrileges of folly, and recognize the irreverence of the native race itself, and the festive lampoons which the statues know, and those sly sayings sometimes from the assembly, and the abuse that the circuses ring with. If not with arms, at least with the tongue you are always rebels. But it is another thing, I suppose, not to swear by the genius of Caesar. For there is doubt about the right of perjurers, since you do not swear in good faith even by your gods. But we do not call the emperor a god; for at this, as the common saying goes, we make a mocking face.
18. Imo qui deum Caesarem dicitis, et deridetis, dicendo quod non est, et male dicitis, quia non vult esse quod dicitis; mavult enim vivere, quam deus fieri. Reliquum obstinationis in illo capitulo colloca-
18. Nay, you who call Caesar a god both mock him, by saying what he is not, and speak ill of him, because he does not wish to be what you call him; for he would rather live than become a god. The rest of the obstinacy you place under that heading
Editors' notes and page, col. 583
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 330)
(1) ‹anchor: sanguis› · call in col 583
Ita Hav.; cod. ms. sanguinis.
So Havercamp; the manuscript: sanguinis.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 330)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 583
Ne istae quidem ad communionem comparationis absistunt. Emendatio in promptu videatur. A communione comparationis absistunt : Verum ita scripsisse Tertullianum existimo, adcommunionem. Etenim amat hujuscemodi compositiones, Adstudendum, Adsacrificium, Adlaederentur. Hic igitur ait, ne ista quidem quae objicitis, absistunt adcommunionem comparationis. hoc est, non impediunt quo minus sistat se adcommunio comparationis. RIG.
Not even these stand off from a sharing of comparison. An emendation might seem ready to hand: "they stand off from a sharing of comparison." But I think Tertullian wrote adcommunionem. For he loves compounds of this kind: adstudendum, adsacrificium, adlaederentur. Here, then, he says that not even these things you object stand off from the adcommunio of comparison; that is, they do not prevent the adcommunio of comparison from presenting itself. Rigault.
(printed under page 330)
(b) ‹anchor: notam fixit› · call in col 583
Vel in palatiis ipsis. Romanorum crudelitatem in suos imperatores arguit, qui in regia, in palatiis, in ipso Senatu Principes confodiebant : cum tamen nulla neque seditio a christianis concitaretur, neque novis unquam rebus studere visi fuerint. LE PR.
Or in the palaces themselves. He exposes the cruelty of the Romans towards their own emperors, who stabbed their princes in the royal house, in the palaces, in the Senate itself; whereas no sedition was ever stirred up by the Christians, nor were they ever seen to aim at revolution. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 330)
(c) ‹anchor: statuae sciunt› · call in col 583
Quos statuae sciunt. Adfixis aut appensis ad statuas tabellis. RIG.
Which the statues know. By little tablets fixed or hung on the statues. Rigault.
(printed under page 330)
(d) ‹anchor: sannam facimus› · call in col 583
Quod vulgo aiunt, sannam facimus. Sanna derisionis species est quae fiebat ore distorto vultuque, aut certa digitorum manuumve conformatione, aut ductu labiorum sine ullo verbo, Sanna graece μύχθων, Adhibitas fuisse illas Sannas et oris distorsiones ad terrefaciendos plorantes pueros patet ex Arnobio lib. V. Usque adeone mortales saeculi illius ac temporis corde fuerant vacui, rationisque sensusque nullius, ut ab actionib. improbis tanquam parvuli, pusiones, personarum monstruosissima torvitate sannis etiam constringerentur, et maniis ? Unde Sannones dicti homines, vultu magis quam facetiis aut dicteriis ridiculi. Genus etiam Sannae quoddam erat, quod ciconia dicebatur, cum nempe ciconiae collum manibus fingebatur, de Sannis et derisionibus apud plerosque multa legas, apud Persium Sat. 1, et 5. LE PR.
As people say, we make a grimace at it. A sanna is a kind of mockery made with a twisted mouth and face, or with a certain shaping of the fingers or hands, or by drawing the lips, without any word; sanna in Greek is mychthōn. That these grimaces and twistings of the mouth were used to frighten crying children is clear from Arnobius, book V: "Were the mortals of that age and time so empty of heart, and of no reason or sense, that like little children, like small boys, they were restrained from wicked actions by the most monstrous grimness of masks, by grimaces and bogeys?" Hence men called sannones, ridiculous more for their faces than for their wit or jests. There was also a kind of sanna called "the stork", when a stork's neck was imitated with the hands. On grimaces and mockeries you may read much in many authors; in Persius, Satires 1 and 5. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 330)
Page
- running head: 583 TERTULLIANI
- marginal letters: A tiae ejusmodi scelerum delitescentium; B sane romanam in Caesares fidem; C Sed non dicimus deum imperatorem; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
tis, quod neque gladios neque cruces neque bestias vestras, non ignem, non tormenta, ob duritatem ac contemptum mortis, animo recusemus. At enim haec omnia apud priores majoresque vestros non contemni modo, sed etiam magna laude pensari ac virtute didicerunt. Gladius quot et quantos viros voluntarios! piget prosequi. Crucis vero novitatem numerosae abstrusae Regulus vester libenter dedicavit. Regina Aegypti bestiis suis usa est. Ignes post Carthaginensem feminam Asdrubale marito in extremis patriae constantiorem docuerat invadere ipsa Dido. Sed et tormenta mulier Attica fatigavit tyranno negans, postremo, ne cederet corpus et sexus, linguam suam pastam exspuit, totum eradicatae confessionis ministerium. Sed vestris ista ad gloriam, nostris ad duritiam deputatis. Destruite nunc gloriam majorum, quo nos quoque destruatis. Contenti estote detrahere etiam laudi parentum ad praesens, ne nobis locum detis. De his forsitan et temporum qualitas robustioris antiquitatis exegerit ingenia duriora, at nunc tranquillitas pacis et ingenia mitiora et mentes hominum etiam in extraneos... Ergo, inquitis, veteribus vos comparate; nobis necesse est in vobis odio prosequi quod a nobis non probatur, quia nec invenitur in nobis. Respondete igitur ad singulas species. Non eadem voce exempla deposco. Si contemptu scilicet mortis gladius de majoribus fabulas fecit, utique non vitae amore gladio vos ad lanistas auctoratis, sed mortis nomen militiae datis. Si feminae alicui de bestiis famosa mors est, medio quotidie pacis sponte libera ad bestias itis. Si crucem, configendi corporis machinam, nullus adhuc ex vobis Regulus pepigit, attamen jam ignis contemptus evasit, ex quo se quidam proxime vestiendum incendiali tunica ad certum usquequaque locum auctoravit. Si flagris mulier insultavit, hoc quoque proxime inter venato-
-e, that out of hardness and contempt of death we do not refuse in spirit either your swords or crosses or beasts, nor fire, nor tortures. But all these things, among your forefathers and ancestors, they learned not only to despise, but even to weigh with great praise and as virtue. The sword: how many and how great men offered themselves to it! I am loath to recount them. The novelty of a cross with its many hidden points your Regulus readily dedicated. The queen of Egypt made use of her beasts. Fire, after the Carthaginian woman, more steadfast than her husband Hasdrubal in her country's last extremity, Dido herself had taught them to rush into. And an Attic woman wore out the tortures, denying the tyrant, and at last, lest her body and sex should give way, spat out her chewed tongue, the whole instrument of confession torn out by the root. But these things in your own people you count as glory, in ours as obstinacy. Destroy now the glory of your ancestors, so that you may destroy us too. Be content to detract even from the praise of your forefathers for the present, so as not to give us room. Perhaps, regarding these, the character of the times of a sturdier antiquity required harder dispositions, but now the tranquillity of peace and milder dispositions and the minds of men even towards strangers... "Then," you say, "compare yourselves with the ancients; we must needs pursue with hatred in you what is not approved by us, because it is not found in us either." Answer, then, to each kind. I do not demand examples in the same words. If, to be sure, by contempt of death the sword made stories of your ancestors, certainly it is not from love of life that you hire yourselves out to the trainers for the sword, but you give in your name to the service of death. If some woman has a famous death by beasts, in the midst of daily peace you go to the beasts of your own free will. If no Regulus among you has yet bargained for the cross, an engine for nailing the body, yet contempt of fire has already come forth, since a certain man lately hired himself out to be clothed in a burning tunic for a fixed distance all the way. If a woman made light of scourges, this too lately among the hunt-
Editors' notes and page, col. 584
Footnotes
(e) ‹anchor: in extraneos› · call in col 584
Etiam in extraneos. Ipse in Apologetico Christianus et extra fidelis vocatur. RIG.
Even towards strangers. In the Apology he himself is called a Christian and faithful even to those outside. Rigault.
(printed under page 330)
(f) ‹anchor: militiae datis› · call in col 584
Sed mortis nomen militiae datis. Nempe armidoctores et ὁπλοδιδασκάλοις appellatis lanistas, ducto de laniena vocabulo. Idem.
But you give your names to the soldiery of death. That is, you call your arms-instructors and hoplodidaskaloi "lanistae", a word taken from the butcher's block. The same.
(printed under page 330)
(g) ‹anchor: evasit› · call in col 584
Evasit. Exarsit, perque omnia membra evasit concremata. Idem.
Has gone out. It has blazed up, and passed out through all the burnt limbs. The same.
(printed under page 330)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 584
- marginal letters: A tis, quod neque gladios neque cruces; B duritiam deputatis. Destruite nunc; C de bestiis famosa mors est; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
rios ordine transcurso remensus est, ut taceam de Laconica gloria.
-ers' line, having run its course, she traversed it again, not to speak of the Laconian glory.
19. Hucusque, opinor, horrenda obstinationum christianarum; quae si vobiscum communicamus, superest deridenda personarum conferamus; quamquam de persuasionibus omnis obstinatio nostra praestruitur: mortuorum enim praesumimus resurrectionem. Spes resurrectionis fastidium est mortis. Ridete igitur quantumlibet stupidissimas mentes, quae moriuntur ut vivant; sed quo facilius rideatis et resolutius decachinnetis, arrepta spongia vel interim lingua delete litteras interim vestras, quae similiter asseverant animas in corpora redituras. Attamen quanto acceptabilior nostra praesumptio est, quae in eadem corpora redituras defendit? vobis autem quanto vanius traditum est, hominis spiritum in cane vel mulo aut pavone rediturum? Item judicium annuntiamus a Deo pro cujusque meritis post interitum destinatum. Id vos Minoi et Radamantho adscribitis, justiore interim Aristide recusato. Eo judicio iniquos aeterno igni, pios et insontes amoeno in loco dicimus perpetuitatem transacturos. Apud vos... quoque Pyriphlegethontis et Elysii non alia conditio disponitur. Nec mythici ac poetici soli talia canunt, sed et philosophi de animorum reciprocatione et judicii distributione confirmant. Quoniam igitur usque, iniquissimae nationes, non agnoscitis, imo insuper exsecramini vestros, si nihil inter vos diversitas habet, si unum et eidem sumus; quia non odistis quod estis: date dextras potius, compingite oscula, miscete complexus, cruenti cum cruentis, incesti cum incestis, conjurati cum conjuratis, obstinati et vani cum aequalibus. Pariter deorum numina
19. Thus far, I suppose, the horrors of the Christian obstinacies; and if we share these with you, it remains that we compare the absurdities of the persons; although every obstinacy of ours is grounded on convictions: for we presume the resurrection of the dead. The hope of resurrection is contempt of death. Laugh, then, as much as you like at minds most stupid, which die that they may live; but that you may laugh the more easily and guffaw the more freely, seize a sponge, or meanwhile your tongue, and blot out meanwhile your own writings, which likewise assert that souls will return into bodies. And yet how much more acceptable is our presumption, which maintains that they will return into the same bodies? whereas how much more empty is what is handed down to you, that a man's spirit will return in a dog or a mule or a peacock? Again, we announce a judgement appointed by God after death according to each one's deserts. This you ascribe to Minos and Rhadamanthus, meanwhile rejecting the juster Aristides. By that judgement we say that the wicked will pass eternity in everlasting fire, the godly and innocent in a pleasant place. Among you ... also no other condition is arranged for Pyriphlegethon and Elysium. Nor do the mythographers and poets alone sing such things, but the philosophers too affirm them concerning the return of souls and the apportioning of judgement. Since, then, so far, most unjust nations, you do not acknowledge, nay, you even execrate your own, if there is no difference between you, if we are one and the same; since you do not hate what you are: rather give right hands, press kisses, join embraces, the bloody with the bloody, the incestuous with the incestuous, conspirators with conspirators, the obstinate and vain with their equals. Alike the deities of the gods
LIBER SECUNDUS.
BOOK II.
1. Nunc de deis vestris, miserandae nationes, congredi vobiscum defensio nostra desiderat, provocans ipsam conscientiam vestram, ad censendum, an vere dei, ut vultis, an falso, ut scire non vultis. Haec enim materia est erroris humani per artificem ejus, ne
1. Now our defence desires to engage with you, pitiable nations, concerning your gods, appealing to your very conscience to judge whether they are truly gods, as you would have it, or falsely, as you do not wish to know. For this is the matter of human error, through its contriver, that
Editors' notes and page, col. 585
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 331)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 585
Inter venatorios. Libro ad Martyras. Inter venatorum taureas. RIGALT.
Among the hunters' [whips]. In the book To the Martyrs: "among the hunters' bull-hide whips". Rigault.
(printed under page 331)
(b) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 585
Ut taceam de Laconica gloria. Sic apud Petronium, Eumolpus, et ego quidem tres plagas Spartana nobilitate concoxi. Le Pr.
To say nothing of the Spartan glory. So in Petronius, Eumolpus: "and I for my part digested three lashes with Spartan nobility." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 331)
(c) ‹anchor: sed et philosophi› · call in col 585
Sed et philosophi. Non solum poetae quibus omnia comminiscendi potestas data est, vana illa somnia et vacui cerebri deliramenta invexerunt ; sed etiam philosophi, iique majorum gentium ut Plato, qui metempsychosin tuitus est. Le Pr.
But philosophers too. Not only the poets, who were given licence to invent everything, brought in those empty dreams and ravings of a vacant brain, but the philosophers too, and those of the first rank, like Plato, who defended the transmigration of souls. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 331)
Page
- running head: 585 AD NATIONES LIB[. I.]
- marginal letters: A rios ordine transcurso remensus est; B vanius traditum est, hominis spiritum; C odistis quod estis; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
laesimus, pariter indignationem eorum provocamus. Habetis et vos tertium genus, etsi non de tertio ritu, attamen de tertio sexu. Illud aptius de viro et foemina, viris et foeminis junctum. Aut numquid ipso vos collegio offendimus? Solet aequalitas aemulationis materiam subministrare. Sic figulus figulo, faber fabro invidet. Imo jam de fine simulata confessio redigit conscientiam ad veritatem et ad constantiam veritatis, (nam omnia ista in nobis solis erunt, et a nobis solis revincuntur, quibus illata sunt;) agnitione scilicet diversae partis, unde scientia instructa et consilium inspirat et judicium gubernat. Vestra denique sententia est, ne caussam quis judicet, nisi duobus auditis. Quod in nobis solis negligitis, naturae vitio satisfacitis, ut quae in nobis non refutetis, in aliis .... tis, aut quorum reatum in vobis memineritis, ea in alios jactetis .... opere occupatiores eritis, in extraneos casti, in vosmetipsos incesti, exsertiores foris, subjecti domi. Haec est iniquitas, ut gnari ab ignaris, absoluti a reis judicemur. Auferte stipulam de oculo vestro, aut trabem de oculo vestro, ut stipulam de alieno extrahatis. Emendate vosmetipsos prius, ut christianos puniatis; nisi quod emendaveritis, non punietis, imo eritis christiani, imo si fueritis christiani, eritis emendati. Discite quod in nobis accusetis, et non accusabitis. Recognoscite quid in vobis non accusetis, et accusabitis. Patet etiam hinc vobis, quantum aperire potuerimus (e paucis istis libellulis), erroris inspectio et veritatis recognitio. Damnate veritatem, sed inspectam si potestis, et probate errorem, sed repertum si putatis. Quodsi praescribitur vobis errorem amare et odisse veritatem; cur quod amatis et odistis, non noveritis?
we have injured, alike we provoke their indignation. You too have a third kind, if not from a third rite, yet from a third sex. That is more fittingly joined of man and woman, to men and women. Or do we offend you by the very fellowship? Equality is wont to supply matter for rivalry. So potter envies potter, smith envies smith. Nay, now at the end, a feigned confession brings the conscience back to the truth and to steadfastness in the truth (for all these things will be in us alone, and are refuted by us alone, upon whom they have been laid), namely by the recognition of the other side, whereby knowledge, once furnished, both inspires counsel and steers judgement. Your own maxim, in fact, is that no one should judge a case unless both parties have been heard. What you neglect in our case alone, you indulge a fault of nature, so that what you do not refute in us, in others ... , or what you remember to be guilt in yourselves, you throw at others ... you will be more taken up with the work, chaste towards strangers, incestuous towards yourselves, more forward abroad, submissive at home. This is the injustice: that we, who know, are judged by those who do not know; we, the acquitted, by the guilty. Take the straw out of your own eye, or the beam out of your own eye, that you may draw the straw out of another's. Amend yourselves first, that you may punish the Christians; only, when you have amended, you will not punish, nay, you will be Christians; nay, if you have become Christians, you will be amended. Learn what you accuse in us, and you will not accuse it. Recognize what you do not accuse in yourselves, and you will accuse it. From this too, so far as we have been able to lay it open (from these few little books of ours), the examination of error and the recognition of truth lies open to you. Condemn the truth, but having examined it, if you can; and approve error, but having found it, if you think so. But if it is laid down for you to love error and to hate the truth, why do you not know what you love and hate?
ignorantia erroris .... quo magis rei sitis. Patent oculi, nec vident; hiant aures, nec audiunt; cor stupet saliens, nescit animus quod agnoscit. Denique, si tantam perversitatem una praescriptione discuti liceret, in expedito esset nuntiatio, cum om-
ignorance of the error ... so that you may be the more guilty. The eyes are open, and do not see; the ears gape, and do not hear; the heart, though beating, is benumbed; the mind does not know what it recognizes. In short, if so great a perversity could be dispelled by a single prescription, the announcement would be ready to hand, since all
Editors' notes and page, col. 586
Footnotes
(1) ‹anchor: de alieno extrahatis› · call in col 586
Haverc. ad Apolog. 39. emend. Auferte trabem de oculo vestro, ut stipulam de alieno extrahatis.
Havercamp, on Apology 39, emends: "Take the beam out of your own eye, that you may draw the straw out of another's."
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 331)
(d) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 586
Habetis et vos tertium genus. Alexander Severus, narrante Lampridio, tertium genus hominum Eunuchos esse dicebat, nec videndum, nec in usu habendum a viris, sed vix a feminis nobilibus. Rig.
You too have a third race. Alexander Severus, as Lampridius relates, used to say that eunuchs were a third race of mankind, neither to be seen nor kept in service by men, and scarcely by noblewomen. Rigault.
(printed under page 331)
(e) ‹anchor: quis judicet› · call in col 586
Ne causam quis judicet. Justitiae leges postulant, ut causae fiat disceptatio, antequam judicium feratur, unde apud Senecam, Medea, act. II, sc. 2. sic Creontem alloquitur : Qui statuit aliquid, parte inaudita altera, Aequum licet statuerit, haud aequus fuit. Le Pr.
Lest anyone judge the case. The laws of justice require that a case be argued before judgement is passed; hence in Seneca, Medea, act II, scene 2, she addresses Creon thus: "He who has decided anything with the other side unheard, though he decided justly, was not just." Le Prieur.
LIBER SECUNDUS. COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 331)
(a) ‹anchor: ignorantia erroris› · call in col 586
Ignorantia erroris....... supplendum, tollatur, aut aliquid simile. Rig.
The ignorance of error ....... Supply tollatur ("let it be removed"), or something similar. Rigault.
(printed under page 331)
Page
- running head: [AD] NATIONES LIB. II. 586
- marginal letters: A laesimus, pariter indignationem eorum; B in aliis .... tis, aut quorum reatum; C testis, et probate errorem; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
nes istos deos ab hominibus institutos, non .... hinc excidere fidem verae divinitatis, quo nihil utique aliquando coeptum divinum videri jure possit. Sed enim multa sunt, quibus teneritas conscientiae obduratur in callositatem voluntarii erroris. Ingenti manu veritas obsidetur; at ipsa de sua virtute secura est. Quidni? quoscumque vult, de ipsis adversariis socios protectoresque sibimet assumit, et omnem illam expugnatorum multitudinem prosternit. Adversus haec igitur nobis negotium est, adversus institutiones majorum, auctoritates receptorum, leges dominantium, argumentationes prudentium; adversus vetustatem, consuetudinem, necessitatem; adversus exempla, prodigia, miracula, quae omnia adulterinam istam divinitatem corroboraverunt. Quare secundum vestros commentarios, quos ex omni theologiae genere copistis, gradum conferens, quoniam major in hujusmodi penes vos auctoritas litterarum, quam rerum est, elegi ad compendium Varronis opera, qui rerum divinarum ex omnibus retro digestis commentatus, idoneum se nobis scopum exposuit. Hunc si interrogem, qui insinuatores deorum? aut philosophos designat aut populos aut poetas. Triplici enim genere deorum censum distinxit: unum esse physicum, quod philosophi retractant; aliud mythicum, quod inter poetas volutetur; tertium gentile, quod populi sibi quique adoptaverunt. Igitur cum philosophi physicum conjecturis concinnarint, poetae mythicum de fabulis traxerint, populi gentile ultro praesumpserint, ubinam veritas collocanda? in conjecturis? sed incerta conceptio est; in fabulis? sed foeda relatio est; in adoptionibus? sed passiva et mancipalis adoptatio est. Denique apud philosophos incerta, quia varia; apud poetas omnia indigna, quia turpia; apud populos passiva omnia, quia voluntaria. Porro divinitas, si veram retractes, ea definitione est, ut istud neque argumentationibus incertis colligatur, neque fabulis indignis contaminetur, neque adoptionibus passivis judicetur; haberi enim debet, sicut
these gods were instituted by men, not .... hence that faith in true divinity falls away, since nothing that has at some time had a beginning can rightly be seen as divine. But there are many things by which the tenderness of conscience is hardened into the callousness of wilful error. Truth is besieged by a mighty host; yet she is secure in her own strength. Why not? Whomever she will, she takes to herself as allies and protectors from among her very adversaries, and lays low that whole multitude of assailants. Against these things, then, is our business: against the institutions of ancestors, the authorities of received men, the laws of rulers, the reasonings of the wise; against antiquity, custom, necessity; against examples, portents, miracles, all of which have strengthened that adulterate divinity. Wherefore, taking my step according to your own commentaries, which you have drawn from every kind of theology, since among you in such matters the authority of literature is greater than that of facts, I have chosen for brevity's sake the works of Varro, who, having written commentaries on divine things digested from all former writers, has set himself before us as a fit target. If I ask him who are the introducers of the gods, he points either to the philosophers or the peoples or the poets. For he divided the register of the gods into a threefold kind: one the physical, which the philosophers handle; another the mythical, which is tossed about among the poets; the third the gentile, which the peoples have each adopted for themselves. Since, then, the philosophers have composed the physical out of conjectures, the poets have drawn the mythical from fables, and the peoples have presumed the gentile of their own accord, where is truth to be placed? In conjectures? But conception there is uncertain. In fables? But the account is foul. In adoptions? But the adoption is passive and a matter of chattels. In short, among the philosophers all is uncertain, because varied; among the poets all is unworthy, because base; among the peoples all is passive, because voluntary. Moreover divinity, if you consider the true one, is of such a definition that it is neither gathered from uncertain reasonings, nor defiled by unworthy fables, nor judged by passive adoptions; for it ought to be held, as
Editors' notes and page, col. 587
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 332)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 587
Ingenti manu veritas obsidetur. Quoniam expugnari non poterant Christiani nisi mendacio obruerentur ; veritatem nationes quantum in se erat premebant, verbisque et calumniis infinitis causae suae licet deploratae patrocinabantur. Veritas nullo fere testimonio indiget, nullo verborum strepitu, ἁπλοῦς ὁ μῦθος τῆς ἀληθείας ἔφυ, qui versus Euripidis ea Phoeniss. citatur a Juliano imp. orat. 7. subjicitque idem Julianus σκιαγραφίας γάρ φησι τὸν ψευδῆ καὶ ἄδικον δεῖσθαι quae verba ex eodem loco Euripidis adducuntur. Sic apud Strobaeum Aeschylus. Theodor. lib. 1. therap. Basil. Caesar. orat. 14. et Simeon Cancellar. orat. 1. Le Pr.
Truth is besieged by a vast host. Because the Christians could not be overcome unless they were overwhelmed by lies, the nations suppressed the truth as far as they could, and with words and endless slanders pleaded their own cause, hopeless though it was. Truth needs hardly any testimony, no din of words: "the word of truth is simple by nature", a line of Euripides from the Phoenician Women, quoted by the Emperor Julian, Oration 7; and the same Julian adds, "for the false and unjust, he says, needs shading", words brought in from the same passage of Euripides. So too Aeschylus in Stobaeus; Theodoret, book 1 of the Therapeutics; Basil of Caesarea, Oration 14; and Simeon the Chancellor, Oration 1. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 332)
(b) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 587
Quoscumque. In exemplari legitur, Quaecumque. Rig.
Whomever. In the copy is read quaecumque ("whatever"). Rigault.
(printed under page 332)
(c) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 587
Expugnatorum multitudinem. In libro Agobardi legitur, expugnatorem multitudinem. Quod defendi posse jam monuimus ad illud Apologetici, cap. 25. Graeciam debellatorem. Sed hic tam facilis fuit lapsus, ut in apice nullius momenti veterem manum sequi velle superstitione non careat. Rig.
The multitude of besiegers. In the Agobard book is read expugnatorem multitudinem, which we have already noted can be defended, on that phrase of the Apology, ch. 25, Graeciam debellatorem. But here the slip was so easy that wishing to follow the old hand in a stroke of no importance would not be free of superstition. Rigault.
(printed under page 332)
(d) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 587
Auctoritates receptorum. Quae jam pridem recepta, consensus publici actoritatem obtendunt. Idem.
The authorities of received things. Things long since received put forward the authority of public consent. The same.
(printed under page 332)
(e) ‹anchor: Varronis opera› · call in col 587
Varronis opera. Ne tergiversari videatur, atque ut gentiles quavis sponsione premat, illorum testimonia, auctoresque apud eosdem probatissimos excutit, Varronem scilicet Romanorum omnium doctissimum. Le Pr.
The works of Varro. So as not to seem to be evading, and to press the gentiles with any wager they please, he examines their testimonies and the authors most approved among them, namely Varro, the most learned of all the Romans. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 332)
Page
- running head: 587 TERTULLIANI
- marginal letters: A nes istos deos ab hominibus institutos; B vestros commentarios, quos ex omni theologiae; C sed incerta conceptio est; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
est, certa, integra, communis, quia scilicet omnium. Caeterum quem Deum credam? quem suspicio aestimavit, quem historia jactavit, quem civitas voluit? Dignius multo neminem credam, quam dubitandum aut pudendum aut adoptivum.
it is, certain, entire, common, since it is, to be sure, the God of all. Otherwise, what God am I to believe? One whom suspicion has reckoned, whom history has bandied about, whom a city has willed? Far more worthily should I believe in none than in one doubtful or shameful or adopted.
2. Sed physicorum auctoritas philosophorum ut mancipium sapientiae patrocinatur. Sane mera sapientia philosophorum, cujus infirmitatem prima haec contestatur varietas opinionum, veniens de ignorantia veritatis. Quis autem sapiens expers veritatis, qui ipsius sapientiae ac veritatis patrem et dominum deum ignoret? .... divina alias enuntiatio Salomonis (Prov. IX. 10; Ps. CXI. 10): Initium, inquit, sapientiae metus in Deum. Porro timoris origo notitia est; quis enim timebit quod ignorat? Ita qui Deum timuerit, omnium notitiam et veritatem assecutus, plenam atque perfectam sapientiam obtinebit. Hoc autem philosophiae non liquido successit. Licet enim per curiositatem omnimodae litteraturae inspiciendae, divinis quoque scripturis ut antiquioribus possint videri incursasse, et inde nonnulla dempsisse, cum tamen ....ut, probant sese aut omnia despexisse aut non omnibus .... Nam et alias veritatis simplicitas per scrupulositatem.... ve fide nutat, et ita accedente libidine gloriae ad proprii ingenii opera mutasse, per quod in incertum abiit etiam quod invenerant, et facta est argumentationum inundatio de stillicidio uno atque alio veritatis; invento enim solummodo eo, non ut invenerant, exposuerunt, ut de qualitate ejus et de natura et jam de sede disceptent: Platonici quidem curantem rerum et arbitrum et judicem; Epicurei otiosum et inexercitum, et ut ita dixerim, neminem; positum vero extra mundum, Stoici; intra mundum, Platonici. Quem non penitus admiserant, neque nosse potuerunt, neque timere, nec inde sapere, exorbitantes scilicet ab initio sapientiae, id est, metu in Deum. Exstant testimonia tam ignoratae quam dubitatae inter philosophos Divinitatis. Diogenes consultus, quid in coelis agatur: Nunquam, inquit, ascendi.
2. But the authority of the physical philosophers pleads for itself as the property of wisdom. Mere wisdom indeed is that of the philosophers, whose weakness this variety of opinions first attests, coming from ignorance of the truth. But who is wise without the truth, who is ignorant of God, the Father and Lord of wisdom itself and of truth? .... the divine utterance of Solomon elsewhere (Prov. 9:10; Ps. 110:10): "The beginning," he says, "of wisdom is fear towards God." Now the origin of fear is knowledge; for who will fear what he does not know? Thus he who fears God, having attained the knowledge of all things and the truth, will possess full and perfect wisdom. But this has not clearly fallen to philosophy. For although, through curiosity in examining every kind of literature, they may be seen to have come upon the divine scriptures too, as being more ancient, and to have taken some things from them, yet ....ut, they prove that they have either despised all things or not ... all things. For elsewhere too the simplicity of truth, through scrupulosity .... wavers in faith, and so, with the lust of glory coming in, [they] changed it into works of their own wit, whereby even what they had found went off into uncertainty, and a flood of reasonings was made from one drop or another of truth; for having found Him only, they did not set Him forth as they had found Him, so that they dispute about His quality and nature and even His seat: the Platonists indeed [make Him] caring for things, and arbiter and judge; the Epicureans idle and unemployed, and, so to speak, no one; placed outside the world, the Stoics; within the world, the Platonists. Him whom they had not wholly admitted, they could neither know, nor fear, nor thence be wise, straying, to be sure, from the beginning of wisdom, that is, fear towards God. There exist testimonies of a Divinity as unknown as it was doubted among the philosophers. Diogenes, consulted as to what goes on in the heavens, said: "I have never gone up."
Editors' notes and page, col. 588
Footnotes
(1) ‹anchor: ve› · call in col 588
Hav. ad Apol. 47. plerumque.
Havercamp, on Apology 47: plerumque ("for the most part").
(printed under page 332)
(2) ‹anchor: de qualitate› · call in col 588
Rigalt. invenerunt — qualitatis; cf. Apolog. 47.
Rigault: invenerunt — qualitatis; compare Apology 47.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 332)
(f) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 588
Mera sapientia philosophorum. Quae nihil christianum, nihil divinum sapit. Rig.
The mere wisdom of the philosophers. Which savours of nothing Christian, nothing divine. Rigault.
(printed under page 332)
(g) ‹anchor: notitia est› · call in col 588
Porro timoris origo, notitia est. Ex illo Salomonis loco verissime argumentatur, ut numen adstruat : Apud gentiles vulgatum erat Primus in orbe Deos fecit timor... Nullusque tunc ferme erat qui non ita sentiret ac loqueretur. Le Pr.
Moreover, the origin of fear is knowledge. From that passage of Solomon he argues most truly, so as to establish the deity. Among the gentiles it was commonly said, "Fear first made gods in the world..."; and there was then hardly anyone who did not think and speak so. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 332)
(h) ‹anchor: ut› · call in col 588
Cum tamen... Lacuna illa sic explenda videtur : Cum tamen credunt, probant sese aut omnia despexisse, aut non omnibus credidisse. Le Pr.
Though nevertheless... That gap seems to be filled thus: "Though nevertheless they believe, they show that they either despised everything or did not believe everything." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 332)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI 588
- marginal letters: A est, certa, integra, communis; B omnium notitiam et veritatem assecutus; C curantem rerum et arbitrum; D (footnotes only)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
item, an dei essent? Nescio, inquit, nisi ut sint expedire. Thales Milesius, Croeso sciscitanti, quid de deis arbitraretur, post aliquot deliberandi commeatus, nihil renuntiavit. Socrates ipse deos istos quasi certus negabat. Idem Aesculapio gallinaceum secari quasi certus jubebat. Et ideo cum tam incerta et inconstans definiendi de Deo philosophia deprehenditur, quem potuit ......re ejus, quem non liquido tenebat determinare? De mundo .... dicimus. Hunc enim physicum theologiae genus cogunt: q.....ta deos tradiderunt, ut Dionysius stoicus trifariam deos dividat, unam vult speciem, quae in promptu sit, ut solem, lunam ..... aliam, quae non compareat, ut Neptunum, reliquam, quae de hominibus ad divinitatem transisse dicitur, ut Herculem, †Amphiaram. Aeque Arcesilaüs trinam formam divinitatis ducit, Olympios, Astra, Titaneos; de Coelo et Terra, ex his, Saturno et Ope, Neptunum, Jovem et Orcum et caeteram successionem. Xenocrates Academicus bifariam facit, Olympios et Titanios, qui de Coelo et Terra. Aegyptiorum plerique quatuor deos credunt, Solem et Lunam, Coelum ac Terram. Cum reliquo igni superno deos ortos Democritus suspicatur, cujus instar vult esse naturam Zeno. Unde et Varro ignem mundi animum facit, ut perinde in mundo ignis omnia gubernet, sicut animus in nobis. Atqui vanissime. Nam cum est, inquit, in nobis, ipsi sumus; cum exivit, emorimur. Ergo et ignis cum de mundo per fulgura proficiscitur, mundus emoritur.
and again, whether there were gods? "I do not know," he said, "except that it is expedient that there should be." Thales of Miletus, when Croesus asked what he thought about the gods, after several respites for deliberation reported back nothing. Socrates himself denied those gods as though certain. The same man ordered a cock to be sacrificed to Aesculapius as though certain. And so, since philosophy is found to be so uncertain and inconsistent in defining about God, whom could it ......, when it did not clearly hold to determine him? Of the world .... we speak. For this physical kind of theology they compel: q.....ta handed down gods, so that Dionysius the Stoic divides the gods threefold: one species he will have to be that which is in plain view, as the sun, the moon .....; another, that which does not appear, as Neptune; the remaining one, that which is said to have passed from men to divinity, as Hercules, Amphiaraus. Likewise Arcesilaus derives a threefold form of divinity: the Olympians, the Stars, the Titans; from Heaven and Earth, and from these, from Saturn and Ops, Neptune, Jupiter and Orcus and the rest of the succession. Xenocrates the Academic makes it twofold, the Olympians and the Titans, who are from Heaven and Earth. Most of the Egyptians believe in four gods, the Sun and the Moon, Heaven and Earth. Democritus supposes that the gods arose together with the rest of the fire on high, after the likeness of which Zeno will have nature to be. Whence also Varro makes fire the soul of the world, so that in the world fire governs all things just as the soul does in us. Yet this is most empty. For when it is in us, he says, we ourselves are; when it has gone out, we die. Therefore also, when fire departs from the world by lightning-flashes, the world dies.
3. His ita expeditis, videmus physicum istud ad hoc subornatum, ut deos elementa contendat, cum his etiam alios deos natos alleget; Dei enim nonnisi de deis nascerentur. Quos quoniam in mythico apud poetas plenius suo loco examinabimus, tamen quod de ipsis interim retractandum est, quod ad praesentem speciem facit, simul et de praesenti specie ad ipsos ......an ostensuri sumus, deos nullo modo videri posse, qui de elementis nati dicuntur, ut jam hinc praejudicatum sit, deos elementa non esse, cum qui de elementis nati dicuntur, Dei non sunt; aeque demonstrando, orta deos non esse, ad illam agnatorum speciem praestruemus recte non esse defendi, quorum parentes, id est elementa dei non sunt. Scitum, deum e deo nasci, quemadmodum de non deo non deum. Igitur quod elementa contineat mundus iste, ut summaliter tractem de universitate, partibus ejus praeministrans; nam quae conditio ejus, eadem utique erit et elementorum et membrorum, aut ab aliquo institutus sit necesse est, qua Platonis humanitas, aut a nullo qua Epicuri duritia. Et si institutus est, habendo initium habebit et finem, ita quod aliquando non fuit ante initium, et quandoque non erit post finem: non capit utique videri deus carens substantia
3. These matters being thus dispatched, we see that this physical [theology] has been got up to this end, that it may contend that the elements are gods, since along with these it alleges that other gods too were born; for gods would not be born except from gods. Since we shall examine these more fully in their place, in the mythical [theology] among the poets, yet what is to be handled about them meanwhile, as bears on the present species, and at the same time from the present species with regard to them ......an we are about to show that those who are said to be born of the elements can in no way be seen to be gods, so that it may be judged from here already that the elements are not gods, since those who are said to be born of the elements are not gods; likewise, by demonstrating that the elements are not gods, we shall lay the ground for that species of their offspring, that they are not rightly defended [as gods] whose parents, that is the elements, are not gods. It is known that a god is born of a god, just as from what is not a god comes what is not a god. Therefore, since this world contains the elements, that I may treat summarily of the whole, attending first to its parts — for whatever the condition of the world, the same will surely be that of the elements and members — it must either have been established by someone, as Plato's kindliness holds, or by no one, as Epicurus's hardness holds. And if it was established, by having a beginning it will have an end too, so that at some time it did not exist, before its beginning, and at some time it will not exist, after its end: it surely does not admit of being seen as a god, lacking substance
Editors' notes and page, col. 589
Footnotes
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 333)
(a) ‹anchor: His ita expeditis› · call in col 589
His ita expeditis. Post turbam illam philosophorum, qui de Deo aut pessime senserunt, aut Deos omnino sustulerunt, validissimis rationibus pugnat ex ipsa re de qua erat quaestio, de ortu scilicet Deorum, de immortalitate, creatione, etc. Le Pr.
These things thus dispatched. After that crowd of philosophers who either thought very badly of God or abolished the gods altogether, he fights with the strongest arguments from the very matter in question, namely the origin of the gods, their immortality, creation, etc. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 333)
Page
- running head: 589 AD NATIONES LIB[...] (right side of head cut off in image)
- marginal letters: A ‹item, an dei essent? Nescio›; B ‹Aeque Arcesilaüs trinam formam›; C ‹hoc subornatum, ut deos›; D ‹ut summaliter tractem de universitate›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
Editors' notes and page, col. 590
Footnotes
(b) ‹anchor: Varroni› · call in col 590
Et tamen unde animalia. Varronem huc attingit qui elementa animalia docuerat, ex eo quod moverentur. In quo illum arguit imperitiae ; debuerat enim motorem investigare, atque ad primum illud principium rationis vi ascendere. Le Pr.
And yet why living beings? Here he touches Varro, who had taught that the elements were living beings because they moved. In this he convicts him of ignorance; for he ought to have searched out the mover and ascended by force of reason to that first principle. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 333)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 591
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 334)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 592
Le Prior. supplevit : convertimur — cognatione.
Le Prieur supplied: convertimur — cognatione.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 334)
(a) ‹anchor: Zeno› · call in col 591
Ecce enim Zeno quoque. Zenonem intelligit Citteium, egregium illum philosophum, qui ab Atheniensibus aurea corona donatus est, et sepulcro magnifico ab iisdem decoratus, ut refert Diogenes Laertius, idque publico decreto sancitum decretumque columnis duabus a scriba publico inscriptum. Le Pr.
For see, Zeno too. He means Zeno of Citium, that distinguished philosopher who was presented by the Athenians with a golden crown and honoured by them with a magnificent tomb, as Diogenes Laertius reports; and this was ratified by public decree, and the decree inscribed on two columns by the public scribe. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 334)
(b) ‹anchor: solis orbem› · call in col 591
Solis orbem pedalem. Inter problemata a discipulis Zenonis proposita et soluta illud recensetur εἰ ὁ ἥλιος τηλικοῦτός ἐστι ἡλίκος φαίνεται an tantus sit sol, quantus apparet ? Idem de luna proponebant ; multa enim a praeceptore hauserant in physicis aliisque partibus a communi opinione aliena. Le Pr.
The sun's disc a foot across. Among the problems proposed and solved by Zeno's disciples is listed this one, "whether the sun is as large as it appears": whether the sun is as great as it looks. They proposed the same about the moon; for they had drawn from their master many views in physics and other branches foreign to common opinion. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 334)
Page
- running head: 591 TERTULLIANI (the head spans the page; its other half is over col. 592)
- marginal letters: A ‹vum, divinitatis inventum›; B ‹quod non sit in promptu, vacat a comparatione eo-›; C ‹appellatio praescribit, quomodo quae sunt in materia,›; D ‹printed in the LECTIONES VARIANTES below the text, beside footnote (1)›
- old-edition numerals: (none)
- other: footnote (1) is listed here, but its call stands in col. 592 (§5, "convertimur … cognatione").
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 592
Footnotes
(c) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 592
Merito ergo Milesius Thales. Physicorum princeps dicitur Apolog. cap. 46. quoniam de rebus physicis ac coelo, primus disputasse fertur. Quod autem ab Aegyptio irrisus fuerit traditur hoc in loco, cum tamen a vetula quadam reprehensum fuisse dicat Laertius his verbis : Σὺ γάρ, ὦ Θαλῆ, τὰ ἐν ποσὶν οὐ δυνάμενος ἰδεῖν τὰ ἐπὶ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ οἴει γνώσεσθαι. Tu quippe, o Thales, cum ad pedes respicere vix possis, coelum putas te posse cognoscere. Antiquis autem excelluisse in Astronomia Thaletem certum est, probatque epigramma iconi ipsius insculptum. Le Pr.
Rightly, then, Thales of Miletus. He is called the prince of the natural philosophers in the Apology, ch. 46, because he is said to have been the first to discuss physical things and the heavens. That he was mocked by an Egyptian is related in this place, though Laertius says he was rebuked by a certain old woman in these words: "For you, Thales, unable to see what lies at your feet, think you will know what is in the heavens": you, Thales, who can scarcely look at your feet, think you can know the heavens. That Thales excelled the ancients in astronomy is certain, and the epigram carved on his likeness proves it. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 334)
(d) [the letter is unclear on the scan; it may read (a)] ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 592
Quin ergo ad humaniorem aliquanto con ... Ora- (continues)
Why not, then, to a somewhat more humane con... (continues)
(printed under page 334)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 593
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 335)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 593
Rigalt. suppl. Et quos tecta opprimunt, non tegulas, etc.
Rigault supplies: Et quos tecta opprimunt, non tegulas, etc. ("and those whom roofs crush, not the tiles", etc.).
(printed under page 335)
(2) ‹anchor: et ..... onem?› · call in col 593
Gothofredus utilitatem seu accessionem? Haverc. ad Apol. 13 : util. et laesionem?
Godefroy: utilitatem seu accessionem? Havercamp, on Apology 13: util[itatem] et laesionem? ("benefit and harm?").
(printed under page 335)
(a) ‹anchor: luna› · call in col 593
Confitetur et Luna. Defectus solis et lunae labores hic attingit ; luna nempe incrementa sua habet a novilunio seu neomenia ad plenilunium, et detrimenta a plenilunio ad novilunium. Le Pr.
The moon too confesses it. He touches here on the eclipses of sun and moon, their "labours"; the moon has its growth from the new moon, or neomenia, to the full, and its waning from the full moon to the new. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 335)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 594
Footnotes
(3) ‹anchor: ad mythic... tes› · call in col 594
Le Prior suppl. ad mythicas artes.
Le Prieur supplies ad mythicas artes ("to the mythic arts").
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 335)
(b) ‹anchor: Amphiaraus› · call in col 594
Et Boeotus Amphiaraus. Alcmaeonis pater fuit Amphiaraus, cujus jussu Eriphilem matrem interemit, conceptoque ex illo scelere immani furore errabundus atque amens vagabatur ; cum vero ad unam ex Echinadibus insulis pervenisset, ex oraculi responsione furore liberatus est. Unde S. Basilius scribens ad B. Gregorium Nazianz. : πάντως γὰρ οὐδὲ Ἀλκμαίων Ἐχινάδας εὑρὼν, ἔτι τῆς πλάνης ἠνέσχετο. Illos autem heroas ac Deos fabularum audacia defendi testatur Gregorius Nazianz. orat. 20 in funere B. Basilii. Le Pr.
And Amphiaraus the Boeotian. Amphiaraus was the father of Alcmaeon, at whose command Alcmaeon killed his mother Eriphyle; and seized by a monstrous frenzy conceived from that crime, he roamed about wandering and out of his mind; but when he reached one of the Echinades islands, he was freed from his frenzy by the answer of an oracle. Hence St Basil, writing to Blessed Gregory Nazianzen: "for surely not even Alcmaeon, once he found the Echinades, still endured his wandering." That those heroes and gods are upheld only by the boldness of myths, Gregory Nazianzen testifies, Oration 20, on the funeral of Blessed Basil. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 335)
(c) ‹anchor: Ille› · call in col 594
Monetam repercutitis. Conflatam scilicet, alterius Principis typo percutitis. Nam reprobi nummi, quia pretii nullius, et commerciis inutiles, ad eos deferebantur quibus erat auri, argenti, aeris flandi et feriundi cura et potestas. Tales fuisse Claudianos Dio tradit, lib. lx. Sed de conflatis fusas Messalinae jussu Mnesteri statuas indignatus. Is fuit histrio, quem illa deperibat. Tales quoque fuisse neronianos arguunt haec Arriani Epictetica : τίνα ἔχει τὸν χαρακτῆρα τοῦτο τὸ τετράσσαρον; Νέρωνος. Ῥίψον ἔξω· ἀδόκιμόν ἐστι, σαπρόν. Rig.
You re-strike their coinage. That is, having melted it down, you strike it with another prince's image. For rejected coins, being of no value and useless in trade, were carried to those who had charge of, and authority over, melting and striking gold, silver and bronze. Dio relates, book 60, that the coins of Claudius were of this kind, but [the emperor was] indignant at the statues of Mnester cast at Messalina's command from the melted coins. He was an actor with whom she was madly in love. That the coins of Nero too were of this kind is shown by this passage of Arrian's Epictetus: "Whose stamp does this sestertius bear? Nero's. Throw it out; it is worthless, rotten." Rigault.
(printed under page 335)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 595
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 336)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 595
Rigalt. Praeverim.
Rigault: Praeverim.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 336)
(a) ‹anchor: Herculeum polluctum› · call in col 595
Herculeum polluctum. Polluctum Herculis erat Esculentorum decima pars, quae Herculi dabatur. Apud Plautum, Herculi pollucere decimam partem. Putabant nimirum id felices ac fortunatos homines reddere. Apud eumdem Plautum, obsonare pollucibiliter, id est splendide et opipare; sic coena pollucibilis. Le Pr.
Hercules' offering-feast. Hercules' polluctum was the tenth part of the food, which was given to Hercules. In Plautus: "to offer Hercules the tenth part". They thought, of course, that this made men happy and fortunate. In the same Plautus, obsonare pollucibiliter, that is, to cater splendidly and sumptuously; so coena pollucibilis, a sumptuous dinner. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 336)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 596
Footnotes
(b) ‹anchor: Joseph› · call in col 596
Serapis iste quidam olim Joseph. Ruffinus Hist. 11, ubi de statua Serapidis. Quidam in honorem nostri Joseph formatum perhibent simulacrum, ob divisionem frumenti, quo famis tempore subvenit Aegyptiis. Ex eo igitur, quod apud Christianos Serapis figura fuit Josephi et Josephus figura Christi, in errorem inductus fuisse videtur Adrianus Aug. in epistola quadam, ubi de Aegypto ad Servianum Cos. scripsit, Illi qui Serapin colunt, christiani sunt : et devoti sunt Serapi, qui se Christi Episcopos dicunt. Idem Joseph, quia Sarae pronepos, Julio Firmico Serapis. Rig. — Nam Serapis iste. Monuimus alibi Isim et Serapim idola fuisse Aegyptiis veneranda, hic tantum addo detestationem aegyptiacae impietatis quae habetur apud Greg. Naz. orat. 24. haec omnia complecti luculenter, eamque more Beati illius patris conscriptam. Le Pr.
That Serapis was once a certain Joseph. Rufinus, History 11, where he speaks of the statue of Serapis: "Some say the image was made in honour of our Joseph, because of the distribution of grain by which he relieved the Egyptians in time of famine." From the fact, then, that among Christians Serapis was a figure of Joseph and Joseph a figure of Christ, the Emperor Hadrian seems to have been led into error in a certain letter in which he wrote about Egypt to the consul Servianus: "Those who worship Serapis are Christians, and those who call themselves bishops of Christ are devoted to Serapis." The same Joseph, because he was Sarah's great-grandson, is Serapis to Julius Firmicus. Rigault. — For that Serapis. We have noted elsewhere that Isis and Serapis were idols to be venerated by the Egyptians; here I add only that the denunciation of Egyptian impiety found in Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 24, embraces all this splendidly, and was written in that blessed father's manner. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 336)
(c) ‹anchor: regis Aegyptiorum› · call in col 596
In familia regis Aegyptiorum. Imo in familia Putipharis Eunuchi Pharaonis, nisi dicamus ipsum Eunuchum in familia regis fuisse. Sed in hac deinceps historia Josephi aberrat Tertullianus iterum ac tertio ab iis quae tradidit Moses Genes. xli. et libro adversus Judaeos, cap. 5, historiam Abelis et Caini tractavit indiligentius. Le Pr.
In the household of the king of the Egyptians. Rather, in the household of Potiphar, Pharaoh's eunuch, unless we say that the eunuch himself belonged to the king's household. But in the rest of this story of Joseph, Tertullian strays again and again from what Moses relates in Genesis 41; and in the book Against the Jews, ch. 5, he treated the story of Abel and Cain rather carelessly. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 336)
(d) ‹anchor: ex suggestu› · call in col 596
Hunc Serapidem ex suggestu. Cumulum et acervum intelligere videtur, quem Graeci Σωρὸν dicunt, Frumenti scilicet cumulum, modii figura designatum. Ruffinus, Cujus caput modius superpositus indicet vitam mortalibus frugum largitate praeberi. Julius Firmicus, Modius, quo esurientibus et ementibus frumenta diviserat, capiti superpositus est. Le Pr.
This one Serapis, from the heap. He seems to mean a heap or pile, which the Greeks call sōros: a heap of grain, that is, represented by the figure of a corn measure. Rufinus: "whose head, with a measure set upon it, would show that life is supplied to mortals by an abundance of grain." Julius Firmicus: "the measure with which he had distributed grain to the hungry and to buyers was set upon his head." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 336)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 597
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES. (printed under page 337)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 597
Mirum hoc v. Le Prior. mutavit in compressatus.
Le Prieur changed this strange word to compressatus.
(printed under page 337)
(2) ‹anchor: omnis superstitio› · call in col 597
Rigalt. substitutio.
Rigault: substitutio.
(printed under page 337)
(3) ‹anchor: vitii pueritiam› · call in col 597
Cod. ms. vitiis pueritatem, Rigalt. vitii pueritatem.
The manuscript: vitiis pueritatem; Rigault: vitii pueritatem.
COMMENTARIUS. (printed under page 337)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 597
Quod sub manu ejus compressatus Aegyptiorum. In ms. legitur, Quod sub manu ejus compressatur Aegyptiorum. In promptu fuit emendatio, Compressatus. Nihil enim deesse mihi videtur ; aut si quid derasum fuerit in extrema linea post dictionem, Ejus, nihil aliud fuerit quam Esse, aut quid ejusmodi. Compressatum dicit Tertullianus, pro vexatione quae oppressura erat Aegyptum, ut habet latina versio Genes. cap. 41. Sic in Scorp. cap. 3. Manus erat super illos in mala, et compressati sunt valde. Le Pr.
Because under his hand the oppression of the Egyptians. In the manuscript is read compressatur. The emendation compressatus was ready to hand. For nothing seems to me to be missing; or if anything was erased at the end of the line after the word ejus, it will have been nothing other than esse, or something of the kind. Tertullian says compressatus for the affliction that was to oppress Egypt, as the Latin version of Genesis ch. 41 has it. So in the Scorpiace, ch. 3: "His hand was upon them for evil, and they were sorely oppressed." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 337)
(b) ‹anchor: recontrans› · call in col 597
Regibus suis recontrans. Recontrans dicit, quod aetati suae proximi scriptores dixere, contrarians. Quod autem hic de Judaeis Septimius, id omnino Lampridius de Gallicanis mentibus in Alexandro Severo. Gallicanae mentes, ut se habent, durae ac retrogradae, et saepe Imperatoribus graves. Rig.
Setting itself against its own kings. He says recontrans for what writers nearest his own age called contrarians. And what Septimius says here of the Jews, Lampridius says entirely of Gallic temper in his Alexander Severus: "Gallic tempers, as they are, hard and contrary, and often troublesome to emperors." Rigault.
(printed under page 337)
(c) ‹anchor: not visible in the image› · call in col 597
Si enim Dei ut bulbi seliguntur. Hoc Tertulliani dictum ab Augustino reprehenditur in principio libri VII. de Civit. Dei, ut facetius, quam verius. Video enim, inquit, etiam ex selectis eligi aliquos ad aliquid majus atque praestantius ; quamobrem non ex hoc quod Dii ex multis quidam selecti sunt, vituperandi sunt ; sed animadvertendum potius quinam isti sint et ad quam rem selecti videantur. Quae reprehensio, si diligentius examinetur, subtilior fortasse judicabitur. Nam quod animadvertendum praecipit, quinam isti Dii sint, et ad quam rem selecti, fecit hoc sane luculenter Septimius, et Apologetico illo nobili, et hisce quidem ad Nationes libris. Sed hic merito ridet Varronianam Deorum selectionem, cum dici Deus non debeat, neque esse possit, nisi qui sit solus omnipotens, aeternus, immensus, indefessus. Huic vero comitem si dederis aut vicarium, plane rem feceris superfluam atque inutilem, verum et divinitati prorsus indecoram. Hoc primum argumento Septimius noster Deorum turbam profligat ; mox et Varronem ex turba seligentem praecipuos, irreligiosum esse dicit; hoc enim non sine reliquorum injuria fecisse, quos esse quidem Deos censuerit, verum dignitate inferiores, aut potestate. Hos igitur non tantum inofficiosi, verum et laesae divinitatis querela agere : adversus hominem de Diis judicare ausum, quasi Deus non sit, nisi cui homo propitius fuerit; quod sane est Deos habere tanquam fungos... pratensibus optima fungis Natura est, aliis male creditur, ait Horatius. Quid autem aliud velle cum Electis suis Varronem, nisi electis illis optimam esse numinis naturam ; aliis male credi ? Quod vero attinet ad exempla quae reprehensioni suae confirmandae affert Augustinus, videndum an conveniant divinitati, sive Deo, cui proprium est unicum esse solum. Itaque ex militibus quidem eliguntur qui fiant centuriones ; ex fidelibus, qui fiant praepositi : ex lapidibus, qui fiant angulares, nec propterea tamen reliqui dicuntur reprobari, quia nempe horum omnium disciplina est, ut ordine ac potestate distinguantur. At Deum esse, non recipit τὸ μᾶλλον καὶ τὸ ἧττον. Rig.
For if gods are picked out like onions. This saying of Tertullian is censured by Augustine at the beginning of book VII of the City of God as more witty than true. "For I see," he says, "that even from among the select some are chosen for something greater and more excellent; so the gods are not to be blamed for the fact that some were selected from many; rather we should consider who they are and for what purpose they appear to have been selected." This censure, if examined more carefully, will perhaps be judged too subtle. For what he bids us consider, who these gods are and for what purpose they were selected, Septimius did very clearly, both in that noble Apology and in these books To the Nations. But here he rightly laughs at Varro's selection of gods, since no one ought to be called God, or can be God, except him who alone is almighty, eternal, immeasurable, unwearied. If you give him a companion or a deputy, you will plainly have made something superfluous and useless, and wholly unbecoming to the divinity. With this argument first our Septimius routs the crowd of gods; next he calls Varro irreligious for picking the chief ones out of the crowd, for he did this not without wrong to the rest, whom he judged indeed to be gods but inferior in dignity or power. These, then, could bring not only a complaint of undutifulness but one of injured divinity, against a man who dared to judge of the gods, as if none were God unless a man were well disposed to him; which is truly to treat gods like mushrooms... "Meadow mushrooms are best by nature; others are ill trusted," says Horace. And what else did Varro mean by his Select gods, but that those select ones have the best nature of deity, and the others are ill trusted? As for the examples Augustine brings to confirm his censure, one must see whether they fit the divinity, that is, God, whose property it is to be one and alone. Thus from soldiers some are chosen to become centurions; from the faithful, some to become overseers; from stones, some to become cornerstones; and yet the rest are not on that account said to be rejected, because the order of all these is that they be distinguished by rank and power. But being God does not admit of more and less. Rigault.
(printed under page 337)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 598
Footnotes
(d) ‹anchor: Aeneas› · call in col 598
Sed et proditor patriae Aeneas. Aeneas ille qui pius Virgilio, hic proditor dicitur, statimque ratio subjicitur, quia ardentem patriam deseruit, et Didonem Sichaei regis viduam. Caetera quae in sequentibus habentur, multis tracta sunt in Apolog. cap. 25 et 50. Le Pr.
But Aeneas too, the betrayer of his country. That Aeneas who is "pious" to Virgil is here called a betrayer, and the reason is at once added: because he deserted his country as it burned, and Dido, widow of King Sychaeus. The rest of what follows is treated at length in the Apology, chs. 25 and 50. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 337)
(e) ‹anchor: subjiciendus› · call in col 598
Foeminae Punicae subjiciendus. Infra foeminam punicam censendus. Rig.
To be ranked beneath a Punic woman. To be reckoned below the Punic woman. Rigault.
(printed under page 337)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
non comitata, raptis secum filiis, formam et patrem sibi habere non in fugam sapit, sed in ignes ardentis Carthaginis ut in amplexus patriae pereuntis incubuit. Pius Aeneas ob unicum puerum et decrepitum senem, Priamo et Astyanacte destitutis. Atquin Romanis magis detestandus, qui pro salute principum et domus eorum adversus liberos et conjuges et omne pignus suum dejerant. Consecrat filium Veneris, et hoc Vulcanus sciens patitur et Juno concedit. Si veredi parentum in coelo sedent, cur non potius Argivi juvenes dei habiti, quod matrem, ne in sacris piaculum committeret, plus quam humano more jugales provexerunt? cur non magis dea, quae magis pia, illa filia patris in carcere fame defecti uberibus suis educatrix? Quid aliud Aeneae gloriosum, nisi quod praelio laurentino nusquam comparuit? Rursus forsitan solito more quasi desertor e praelio fugerit. Romulus aeque post mortem deus, si quia urbem condidit deus, usque in foeminas, urbium auctores. Sane Romulus et fratrem interfecit et alienas virgines dolo rapuit. Ideo Quirinus est, quia tunc parentibus quiritatum est per illum. Quid Sterculus meruit ad divinitatem? Si agros stercoribus juvando diligens fuit, plus fimi Augias conferebat. Si Faunus Pici filius in jus agitabatur mente ictus, curari eum magis quam consecrari decebat. Si Fauni filia pudicitia praecellebat, ut ne conversaretur quidem inter viros, aut barbaria aut conscientia deformitatis aut rubore insaniae paternae, quanto dignior bona dea Penelopa, quae inter utilissimos amatores diversata, obsessam castitatem tenere protexit? Est et sanctus, propter hospitalitatem a rege Plotio fanum consecutus: potuit et Ulixes de humanissimo Alcinoo unum amplius deum vobis contulisse.
unaccompanied, having snatched up her sons with her, she had the sense to keep beauty and father for herself not in flight, but flung herself into the fires of burning Carthage as into the embrace of her perishing country. Pious Aeneas, for the sake of one boy and a decrepit old man, Priam and Astyanax being abandoned! And yet he ought to be the more detested by the Romans, who swear by the safety of their princes and of their house against their children and wives and every pledge of their own. One consecrates the son of Venus, and Vulcan knowingly suffers this and Juno allows it. If the bearers of parents sit in heaven, why were not rather the Argive youths held gods, who, lest she commit an offence in the sacred rites, drew their mother as yoke-beasts in more than human fashion? Why is not rather she a goddess who was more dutiful, that daughter who nourished at her own breasts her father failing from hunger in prison? What else is glorious in Aeneas, except that in the Laurentine battle he appeared nowhere? Perhaps once again, in his usual way, he fled from the battle like a deserter. Romulus likewise is a god after death; if he is a god because he founded a city, then [so are others] down to women, founders of cities. Romulus, to be sure, both killed his brother and carried off other men's virgins by guile. Therefore he is Quirinus, because then the parents cried out for help on account of him. What did Sterculus merit towards divinity? If he was diligent in helping the fields with dung, Augeas contributed more manure. If Faunus, the son of Picus, was driven against right, struck in his mind, it was more fitting that he be treated than consecrated. If the daughter of Faunus so excelled in chastity that she did not even keep company among men, whether from boorishness or from awareness of her ugliness or from shame at her father's madness, how much worthier [to be] the Good Goddess is Penelope, who, lodging among most profitable suitors, tenderly protected her besieged chastity? There is also Sanctus, who obtained a shrine from King Plotius for his hospitality: Ulysses too could have contributed one god more to you out of the most humane Alcinous.
10. Ad foediora festino. Non puduit auctores vestros de Larentina palam facere. Scortum haec meritorium fuit, sive dum Romuli nutrix, et ideo lupa, quia scortum; sive dum Herculis amica est, et jam mortui Herculis, id est, jam dei. Nam ferunt, aedituum ejus solum forte in aede calculis ludentem ut sibi collusorem, quem non habebat, repraesentaret, una manu Herculis nomine, alia ex sua persona lusum inisse, si ipse vicisset, coenulam et scortulum ex stipitibus Herculis sumeret; si vero Hercules, id est manus altera, eadem Herculi exhiberet. Vicit manus Herculis (quoque potuit duodecim titulis ejus adscribi).
10. I hasten to fouler things. Your authors were not ashamed to make public the facts about Larentina. She was a hired harlot, whether while she was the nurse of Romulus, and therefore a she-wolf because a harlot, or while she was the mistress of Hercules, and of Hercules already dead, that is, already a god. For they say that his temple-keeper, happening to be alone in the temple playing at counters, in order to supply himself with the fellow-player whom he did not have, began the game with one hand in the name of Hercules and with the other in his own person: if he himself won, he should take a little supper and a little harlot out of the offerings of Hercules; but if Hercules won, that is, the other hand, he should provide the same for Hercules. The hand of Hercules won (this too could have been added to his twelve labours).
Editors' notes and page, col. 599
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES (printed under page 338)
(1) ‹anchor: de Larentina› · call in col 599
Rigalt. Laurentia; cf. Apol. 13.
Rigault reads Laurentia; compare the Apology, ch. 13.
(printed under page 338)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible on this page foot› · call in col 599 or 600 (above the image)
Si veredi parentum. In Agob. lib. legitur, si bisepte parentum. Forte an scripserit Septimius, viceportae parentum. Hoc est, qui parentes a quibus portati sunt, vicissim portant senio graves; quod fecisse dicitur Æneas. Ric.
Si veredi parentum. In the Agobardine book it reads si bisepte parentum. Perhaps Septimius wrote viceportae parentum: that is, those who in turn carry the parents by whom they were carried, when these are weighed down by old age; which Aeneas is said to have done. Rigault.
(printed under page 338)
(b) ‹anchor: Quid Sterculus› · call in col 599
Sterculus. Vetus scriptura, Stercolus. Ric.
Sterculus. The old reading is Stercolus. Rigault.
(printed under page 338)
(c) ‹anchor: Pici filius in jus› · call in col 599
In jus agitabatur. Contra jus fasque. Ric.
In jus agitabatur ("was driven into law"): that is, against right and divine law. Rigault.
(printed under page 338)
(d) ‹anchor: Larentina (1) palam facere› · call in col 599
Non puduit auctores vestros de Laurentina. Eadem haec erat propudiosa mulier cum Flora illa a qua floralia dicta sunt. Variant hic Critici: legunt alii Laurentina, seu Laurentia; alii vero Larentia; alii etiam distinguunt inter Floram et Larentiam, Minutii felicis testimonio fulti qui ait: Sane et Acca Larentia, et Flora meretrices propudiosae, inter morbos Romanorum et Deos computandae. Le Pr.
Your authors were not ashamed concerning Laurentina. This shameless woman was the same as that Flora from whom the Floralia are named. The critics differ here: some read Laurentina or Laurentia, others Larentia; others again distinguish between Flora and Larentia, relying on the testimony of Minucius Felix, who says: "Indeed both Acca Larentia and Flora, shameless harlots, are to be counted among the diseases and the gods of the Romans." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 338)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI
- marginal letters: A non comitata, raptis secum filiis; B rentino nusquam comparuit; C simos amatores diversata / protexit? Est et sanctus (letter sits between these two lines); D altera, eadem Herculi exhiberet
- old-edition numerals: (none)
Aeditus coenam Herculi dependit, scortum Larentinam conducit: coenat ignis, qui Sol, et ipsius Herculis co.......nia ara consumpsit. Larentina in aede sola dormit......de lenonio ludo jactitat se somniis Herculi functam, et potuit, dum animo contemplatur, somnio pati. Eam de aede progredientem mane primo quidam adolescens, tertius quod aiunt Hercules concupiscit, ad se.............s.............. id dictum sibi ab Hercule, utique............ ceantur. Non enim impune licui.................... dem quoque scribit; mox illa prop ................ per Herculem fuerat insecuta, agrum................. divinitatem et filiabus suis, quas ut ipsas h.................... dium a Larentiniana Romanorum numina digni........... sola de tot uxoribus Herculi cara, sola enim dives.......... or Cerere quae mortuo placuit. Tot exemplis et vo............ quis non deus affirmari potuit? Quis denique Antinoo controversiam divinitatis agitavit, quod decorior Ganymedes aut carior suo amatori....? Apud vos mortuis coelum, viam ab inferis ab astra subigitur. Pass.........ta ascendunt. Ne multum putetis vos praestare regibus vestris.
The temple-keeper pays out a supper to Hercules and hires the harlot Larentina: the fire, which is the Sun, dines, and the altar consumed … of Hercules himself. Larentina sleeps alone in the temple … from the bawd's game boasts that she had done service to Hercules in dreams, and she could, while she contemplates it in her mind, undergo it in a dream. As she comes out of the temple at first light, a certain young man, a third Hercules as they say, lusts after her, to himself … that this had been told her by Hercules, at any rate … For not with impunity … also writes; soon she … had pursued through Hercules, the field … divinity, and to her daughters, whom, so that they themselves … from the Larentinian … worthy deities of the Romans … alone of so many wives dear to Hercules, for she alone was rich … than Ceres, she who pleased him when dead. By so many examples and … who could not have been affirmed a god? Who, in short, raised a dispute over the divinity of Antinous, because Ganymede was more comely or dearer to his lover …? With you heaven belongs to the dead; a way is forced up from the underworld to the stars. … ascend everywhere. Lest you should think that you much surpass your kings.
Non contenti eos deos asseverare, qui visi retro, auditi contrectatique sunt, quorum effigies descriptae, negotia digesta, memoria propagata, umbras nescio quas incorporales, inanimales, et nomina de rebus efflagitant deosque sanciunt, dividentes omnem statum hominis singulis potestatibus ab ipso quidem uteri conceptu, ut si deus Consevius quidam, qui consationibus concubitalibus praesit, et Fluviona, quae infantem in utero ....... hinc Vitumnus, et Sentinus, per quem viviscat infans et sentiat.....: dehinc Diespiter, qui puerum perducat ad partum. Cum prin.......... et Candelifera, quoniam ad candelae lumina pariebant, et quae ............ .......us dictae. Perverse natos ..........to Prosae carmentis esse provin.................... et ab effatu Farmus, et aliis a lo ............. nem ad cavendum sumministrat .......... rix et Albana, et una Rucinia. Mirum .......... non esse provisos. Exinde et primi cibi sum ............ Potina et Eluda, et statuendi infantis sta.........do, Abeona, et Domiducam, et habent Edeam.......ae et malam. Item voluntatis, Volumnum, Voletam......... Paventinam, Pavoris, Spei, Venilliam; voluptatis, Volupiam.....ntiae, Praestitiam; aeque ab actu, Peragenorem: a consiliis Consum; juventam, novorum togatorum;
Not content to assert as gods those who in times past were seen, heard and handled, whose likenesses were portrayed, whose deeds were recorded, whose memory was handed down, they demand certain incorporeal, inanimate shadows and names taken from things, and they establish them as gods, dividing the whole condition of a man among single powers, from the very conception in the womb indeed: so that there is, as it were, a certain god Consevius, who presides over the sowings of the marriage-bed, and Fluviona, who … the infant in the womb …; hence Vitumnus and Sentinus, through whom the infant comes alive and feels …; then Diespiter, who brings the child through to birth. When … and Candelifera, since they used to give birth by the light of a candle, and those who … are called … That those born feet first are the province of Prosa Carmentis … and from speaking, Farmus, and to others from … supplies … for guarding against … and Albana, and one Rucinia. It is a wonder that … were not provided. Thereafter also of the first food … Potina and Eluda, and of setting the infant upright Sta…, Abeona, and Domiduca, and they have Edea … and the bad. Likewise of the will, Volumnus, Voleta … Paventina, of Fear, of Hope, Venillia; of pleasure, Volupia, … Praestitia; likewise from action, Peragenor; from counsels, Consus; Juventa, of the newly togate;
Editors' notes and page, col. 600
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: carior suo amatori› · call in col 600
Gothofredus has lacunas sic explevit: amatori fuerit? — subigitis. Passim alii ita ascendunt. Haverc. ad Apol. 13. amatori? Patet apud vos — subigitis. Passim ita catamiti ascendunt.
Godefroy filled these gaps thus: "amatori fuerit? — subigitis. Passim alii ita ascendunt" ("[dearer] to his lover was? … you subdue. Everywhere others thus ascend"). Havercamp, on the Apology, ch. 13: "amatori? Patet apud vos — subigitis. Passim ita catamiti ascendunt" ("to his lover? It lies open among you … you subdue. Everywhere catamites thus ascend").
COMMENTARIUS (printed under page 338)
(e) ‹anchor: decorior Ganymedes› · call in col 600
Quod decorior Ganymedes. Id inter veterum deliramenta commune est de suo Jove, unde Ovid. lib. X. Metamorph.: Rex superum Phrygii quoniam Ganymedis amore / Arsit, et inventum est aliquid, quod Jupiter esse, / Quam quod erat, mallet.
That Ganymede was more comely. This is common among the ravings of the ancients about their Jove; hence Ovid, Metamorphoses Book X: "Since the king of the gods once burned with love for Phrygian Ganymede, and something was found that Jupiter would rather be than what he was."
(printed under page 338)
Page
- running head: TERTULLIANI
- marginal letters: A Aeditus coenam Herculi dependit; B mortuo placuit. Tot exemplis; C consationibus concubitalibus praesit; D lupiam.....ntiae, Praestitiam
- old-edition numerals: (none)
gatorum; virorum jam, fortuna barbata.......nuptialibus disseram. Afferenda est ab afferendis dotibus ordinata .......dor, et Mutunus et Tutunus, et dea pertunda, et Subigus, et Prema..... parcite, dei impudentes, luctantibus sponsis nemo intervenit... quorum votum est foris gaudentes erubescunt.
of men now, Fortuna Barbata … I shall discuss the nuptial [matters]. There is Afferenda, appointed from the bringing of dowries, … and Mutunus and Tutunus, and the goddess Pertunda, and Subigus, and Prema … Spare [us], shameless gods! No one intervenes with the struggling spouses … those whose vow it is blush outside, though rejoicing.
12. Et quonam usque deos ... quia disserendum, quales deos receperitis, quantum vobis erus.... Rideam vanitatem, an exprobrem caecitatem, est admodum incertum.. Nam quot deos, et quos utique producam? majores, an et minores? veteres, an et novitios? mares, an et foeminas? caelibes, an et le, .....? artifices, an et inertes? rusticos, an et urbanos? cives, an et peregrinos. Tot enim familiae, tot nationes sensus bona fide quaerunt, ut dispici et distingui describique non possint, ut quanto diffusa res est, tanto substringenda nobis erit. Et ideo, quis in ista specie unum tuemur propositum demonstrandi, illos omnes homines fuisse: non quidem ut cognoscatis, nam quasi oblita agitis, compendio ab ipsa despiciendi ratione summam originem generis illorum retractando. Origo enim totius posteritatis. Ea origo deorum vestrorum Saturno, ut opinor, signatur. Neque enim si Varro antiquissimos deos Jovem, Junonem et Minervam refert, nobis excidisse debet, omnem patrem filiis antiquiorem, tam Saturnum Jove, quam Coelum Saturno; de Coelo enim et Terra Saturnus. Et tamen Coeli et Terrae originem omitto. Erant inde caelibes diu et orbi, antequam mariti et parentes. Longo scilicet aevo crescendum illis fuit ad tantam proceritatem. Denique simul coepit et Coelo vox insolescere et ubera terrae lapilliscere, faciunt nuptias inter se. Credo, aut Coelum descendit ad sponsam, aut Terra ascendit ad sponsum! Concepit tamen Terra de Coelo et peperit illa Athos, Athos Saturnum mira ratione. Utri parentum similis? Sed et peperit, certe ante Saturnum neminem procreaverunt, nisi unam postea Opem, exinde de subole cessatum est. Nam Saturnus quidem Coelum castravit dormientem. Legimus Coelum genere masculino; caeterum quomodo pater, nisi masculinus? Sed et unde castrandum? falx illi: hoc s..l... Nondum enim Vulcanus artifex ferri. Terra vero orbata distulit, etsi adhuc juvenili aetate, alii nubere. Sed nec habebat Coelum..... tamen nisi illam Mare amplectitur, sed olet salsuginem ....aquis assueta. Ita Saturnus unicus masculus Coeli atque Terrae. Sed ipse pubescens sorori suae jungitur. Nondum leges, quae
12. And how far … gods … since it must be discussed what sort of gods you have received, how much … to you … Whether I should laugh at the vanity or reproach the blindness is quite uncertain. For how many gods, and which ones in particular, am I to bring forward? The greater, or the lesser too? The old, or the new too? Males, or females too? The unmarried, or the … too? Craftsmen, or the idle too? Rustic, or urban too? Citizens, or foreigners too? For so many households, so many nations seek their senses in good faith that they cannot be discerned, distinguished and described; so that the more diffuse the matter is, the more tightly it will have to be drawn in by us. And therefore, since in this respect we hold to one purpose, of showing that all of them were men (not indeed so that you may learn it, for you behave as though you had forgotten), [we do so] briefly, by going back, by the very method of looking down on them, to the highest origin of their race. For [that is] the origin of the whole posterity. That origin of your gods is marked, I think, by Saturn. For even if Varro reports Jupiter, Juno and Minerva as the most ancient gods, it ought not to have slipped our minds that every father is older than his sons, Saturn than Jupiter as much as Heaven than Saturn; for Saturn is from Heaven and Earth. And yet I pass over the origin of Heaven and Earth. They were, from then on, long unmarried and childless, before they were husband and wife and parents. Doubtless they had to grow for a long age to reach so great a stature. At length, as soon as Heaven's voice began to grow haughty and Earth's breasts to grow stony, they make a marriage between themselves. I suppose either Heaven came down to his bride or Earth went up to her bridegroom! Earth, however, conceived of Heaven and bore Athos, and Athos [bore] Saturn by a wonderful method. Which of his parents did he resemble? But even having borne, certainly before Saturn they begot no one, and afterwards only Ops; thereafter there was a stop to offspring. For Saturn castrated Heaven as he slept. We read "Heaven" in the masculine gender; and indeed how [could he be] a father unless masculine? But whence, too, the means of castrating? He had a sickle: this … For Vulcan was not yet a craftsman of iron. Earth, though bereaved, put off marrying another, although still of youthful age. But neither did she have [another] Heaven … yet apart from her the Sea embraces, but she smells of brine … accustomed to the waters. Thus Saturn [was] the only male of Heaven and Earth. But he himself, on reaching manhood, is joined to his sister. There were not yet laws which
Editors' notes and page, col. 601
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES (printed under page 339)
(1) ‹anchor: not visible on this page foot› · call in col 601 (above the image)
Haverc. suppl. Humano pudori parcite — intervenit, ipsi quorum, etc.
Havercamp supplies: "Spare human modesty — intervenes, they themselves whose", etc.
(printed under page 339)
(a) ‹anchor: not visible on this page foot› · call in col 601 (above the image)
Mutunus et Tutunus. Conficta de Meo et Tuo inter Venereos amplexus vocabula. Ric.
Mutunus and Tutunus. Words coined from "Mine" and "Thine" in the embraces of love. Rigault.
(printed under page 339)
(b) ‹anchor: not visible on this page foot› · call in col 601 (above the image)
Majores an et minores? Majores et minores Deos fuisse nemo ambigit. Deos item magnos duodecim fuisse perspicuum: hic nescio an iidem sint ac ii de quibus lib. de spectaculis cap. 8. Ante has tres arae trinis diis patent, Magnis, potentibus, valentibus; eosdem et Samothracas existimant. A Samothracibus derivatam olim religionem praeter profanos existimat Nazianzenus Theologus contra Julianum imp. aitque θρησκεύειν παρὰ τῶν θρηκῶν deduci; forte ad id conducet quod habet Varro de L. L. lib. 4. Le Pr.
Greater and also lesser? No one doubts that there were greater and lesser gods. It is likewise clear that there were twelve great gods: whether these are the same as those of whom he speaks in On the Shows, ch. 8, I do not know: "Before these, three altars stand open to three gods, the Great, the Mighty, the Strong; they think them the same as the Samothracian gods." Besides the profane writers, Nazianzen the Theologian, against the emperor Julian, holds that religion was once derived from the Samothracians, and says that thrēskeuein ("to worship") is derived from the Thracians; perhaps what Varro has in On the Latin Language, Book 4, will bear on this. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 339)
Page
- running head: AD NATIONES LIB. II.
- marginal letters: A gatorum; virorum jam, fortuna barbata; B describique non possint; C Denique simul coepit et Coelo vox; D Saturnus unicus masculus Coeli
- old-edition numerals: (none)
incesta prohiberent, nec quae parricidium plecterent. Itaque filios virili sexu devorabat; melius ipse, quam lupi, si exponeret; timebat scilicet, ne quis illorum de paterna falce didicisset. Nato mox et abalienato Jove, saxum infantis ementiti deglutivit. Hoc ingenio diu securus, tandem filio, quem nondum digesserat, in tenebris adulto oppressus regnoque privatus est. Hunc vobis patriarcham deorum, Coelum et Terra, poetis obstetricantibus, procreaverunt. Sed eleganter quidam sibi videntur physiologice per allegoricam argumentationem de Saturno interpretari, tempus esse, et ideo Coelum et Terram parentes, ut et ipsos origini nullos, et ideo falcatum, quia tempore omnia dirimantur, et ideo voratorem suorum, quod omnia ex se edita in se ipsum consumat. Nominis quoque testimonium compellant: Cronium dictum graece, ut Chronon; aeque latini vocabuli a sationibus rationem .....ut, qui eum procreatorem conjectantur, per eum seminalia coeli in terram deferri. Opem adjungunt, quod opem videndi semina conferant, et quod opere semina evadant. Quae oro, hujus translationem ..... ponas. Aut Saturnus fuit, aut tempus. Quomodo Saturnus ..... quomodo tempus? Utrumque enim non potes, corporale in eo..... mare. Quid autem prohibuit tempus coli in sua qualitate? ..... hominis, aut fabulam hominis, aut famulam hominis in sua specie, non in tempo.... Quid sibi vult intellectio ista, nisi foedas materias mentitis argumentationibus colorare? Saturnum neque ideo qui.. d.... tempus, aut dum eum tempus facis, jam nec hominem vis fuisse. Pla....s omnino Saturnus in terris humanae qualitatis apud veteres memorias recensetur. Potest incorporaliter fingi quodvis, quod non fuerit omnino; vacat fingendi locus, ubi veritas est. Cum autem Saturnum constat vixisse, frustra demutatis; non conceditur vobis, quem non negabitis fuisse hominem, qui neque deus neque tempus defendi potest. Exstat apud litteras vestras usquequaque Saturni census, legimus apud Cassium Severum, apud Cornelios Nepotem et Tacitum, apud Graecos quoque Diodorum, quive alii antiquitatem canos collegerunt. Nec fideliora vestigia..... quam in ipsa Italia signata sunt. Nam post plurimas tetras et Attica hospitia Italiae, vel, ut tunc vocabatur, Oenotriae, consedit, exceptus ab Jano sive Jane, ut Salii vocant. Mons, quem coluerat, Saturnius dictus; urbs, quam depalaverat, Saturnia usque nunc est; tota denique Italia de Saturno vocabatur:
would forbid incest, nor any that would punish parricide. And so he devoured his sons of the male sex; better he himself than the wolves, if he exposed them; he feared, of course, that one of them might have learned [the use of] the paternal sickle. When Jupiter was born soon after and spirited away, he swallowed a stone that feigned the infant. Secure for a long time by this device, at last he was overthrown by the son whom he had not yet digested, grown up in darkness, and was deprived of his kingdom. This patriarch of the gods Heaven and Earth begot for you, with the poets acting as midwives. But some think themselves elegant in interpreting Saturn physically by allegorical argument: that he is time, and that therefore Heaven and Earth are his parents, since they too have no origin; and that therefore he bears a sickle, because all things are cut off by time; and therefore he is the devourer of his own, because it consumes into itself all things produced from itself. They also press into service the testimony of the name: he is called Kronos in Greek, as it were Chronos; and likewise the reason for the Latin word from sowings … since those who conjecture him to be the procreator [hold] that through him the seeds of heaven are brought down to earth. They join Ops to him, because they bring the seeds help (opem) for seeing, and because the seeds come out by work (opere). I pray you, … the transference of this … set down. Either Saturn was, or time. How [is he] Saturn … how time? For you cannot [have] both, … the corporeal in him … But what prevented time from being worshipped in its own quality? … of a man, or the story of a man, or the servant of a man in its own form, not in time … What does that understanding mean, except to colour foul materials with lying arguments? Saturn neither therefore … time, or, while you make him time, you will no longer have him to have been a man. … Saturn is recorded in the ancient records as wholly of human quality on earth. Anything that never was at all can be feigned as incorporeal; there is no room for feigning where truth is. But since it is established that Saturn lived, you transform him in vain: it is not granted to you that he whom you will not deny to have been a man can be defended as either god or time. Saturn's lineage stands everywhere in your literature: we read it in Cassius Severus, in Cornelius Nepos and Cornelius Tacitus, among the Greeks too in Diodorus, and in any others who have gathered hoary antiquity. Nor are more faithful traces … than are marked in Italy itself. For after very many lands and Attic hospitalities he settled in Italy, or, as it was then called, Oenotria, received by Janus, or Janes, as the Salii call him. The mountain which he had inhabited was called the Saturnian; the city which he had staked out is Saturnia to this day; in short, the whole of Italy was called after Saturn:
Editors' notes and page, col. 602
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: ut Salii› · call in col 602
Rigalt ed. ut si alii vocant. Cf. Apol. 10. ut Salii volunt.
Rigault's edition reads "ut si alii vocant" ("as if others call him"). Compare the Apology, ch. 10: "ut Salii volunt" ("as the Salii will have it").
COMMENTARIUS
(continued) ‹anchor: note begun on the previous page›
Quae hic ut et alia multa non abs re objicit scriptor noster. Le Pr.
Which things, like many others, our writer not without reason casts in their teeth here. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 339)
(c) ‹anchor: tota denique Italia› · call in col 602 (printed in the text as (e))
Tota denique Italia. Italiam dictam fuisse Saturniam ex Ennio patet: . . . . . Saturnius illi / Nomen erat, de quo late Saturnia terra. Et Ovidio lib. Fast. 1: (continues)
Finally, all Italy. That Italy was called Saturnia is plain from Ennius: ". . . Saturnius was his name, from whom far and wide the land is Saturnian." And from Ovid, Fasti Book 1: (continues)
(printed under page 339)
Page
- running head: NATIONES LIB. II.
- marginal letters: A incesta prohiberent; B testimonium compellant; C omnino Saturnus in terris; D dictus; urbs, quam depalaverat
- old-edition numerals: (none)
tali teste terram, quae nunc dominatur orbi etiamsi de origine Saturni dubitatur, de actu tamen constat hominem illum fuisse. Ita si homo Saturnus, procul dubio de [homine], imo quia homo, non utique de coelo atque terra. Sed cujus parentes ignoti, quibusdam facile fuit illum eorum filium dici, quorum possunt omnes videri. Quis enim non coelum ac terram patrem ac matrem venerationis gratia appellet? An de consuetudine humana, qua ignoti quique ex inopinato apparentes de coelo advenisse dicuntur? Proinde.... semper eg.... repentino, ubique inolevit coelitem dici. Nam et vulgo generis incertos terrae filios jactitamus. Nihil allego de statu antiquitatis, qua... rudes tunc agebantur et oculi et mentes hominum, ut cujuslibet novi viri aspectu quasi divino commoverentur, nedum et regis, et quidem primi. Adhuc de Saturno immorabor, quod et caeteris compendium praestruam, satiata primordiorum disputatione; nec praetermittam potiora testimonia divinarum litterarum, quibus fides pro antiquitate superior debetur. Ante enim Sibylla, quam omnis litteratura, exstitit. Illa scilicet Sibylla, veri vera vates et cujus vocabula daemoniorum vatibus induistis. Ea senario versu in hunc sensum de Saturni prosapia et rebus ejus exponit: decima, inquit, genitura hominum, ex quo cataclysmum prioribus accidit, regnavit Saturnus et Titan et Jamfetus, Terrae et Coeli fortissimi filii. Si qua ergo, vel vestris.... oribus litteris vestris superioribus, sed idcirco magis proximis.... in illius aetatis, fides adjacet.
with such a witness, the land which now rules the world: even if there is doubt about Saturn's origin, yet from his deeds it is established that he was a man. So if Saturn was a man, he was without doubt from a [man]; indeed, because he was a man, certainly not from heaven and earth. But since his parents were unknown, it was easy for some to have him called the son of those whose sons all can be thought to be. For who would not call heaven and earth father and mother for veneration's sake? Or [did it come] from the human custom by which any unknown persons appearing unexpectedly are said to have come from heaven? Accordingly … always … sudden, it has everywhere become the custom for him to be called heavenly. For we too commonly call those of uncertain birth sons of the earth. I say nothing of the state of antiquity, in which … the eyes and minds of men were then so untutored that they were moved by the sight of any new man as by that of a divine one, much more by that of a king, and the first king at that. I shall dwell longer still on Saturn, so that I may also lay down a short way for the rest, once the discussion of first beginnings has been given its fill; nor shall I pass over the weightier testimonies of the divine writings, to which a higher credit is owed on account of their antiquity. For the Sibyl existed before all literature: that Sibyl, namely, the true prophetess of the truth, whose titles you have put upon the prophets of demons. She sets out in senarian verse, to this effect, concerning the lineage of Saturn and his deeds: "In the tenth generation of men," she says, "after the flood befell the former ones, there reigned Saturn and Titan and Iapetus, the mightiest sons of Earth and Heaven." If, then, … your … writings, earlier than your writings but for that reason nearer … of that age, credit lies to hand.
13. Satis de Saturno et Prosapia ejus.... um est, homines fuisse. Tenemus compendium, in caeteros originis praescriptionem, ne per singulos evagemur. Qualitas posteritatis a principibus generis ostenditur, mortalia de mortalibus, terrena de terrenis, gradus ad gradus comparantur, nuptiae, conceptus natales cucurrerunt patriae sedes, regna monumenta l.... qui natos non possunt negare, mortuos credant, qui mortuos confitentur, deos non putent. Sed enim manifestis vis sua adsistit; quos a primordio non..... divinitatem, affirmando illos post mortem deos factos, ut Varro, et qui cum eo somniaverunt. Hic igitur consisto..... alle..... in hoc nomen et numen, ut in ordinem senatorium, ..... vestra ..... cedatis jam necesse est, aliquem summum dominatorem ..... allegendi potestatem, et quasi Caesarem; neque quisquam aliis praestare potest, qui non ipse dominetur. Caeterum si potuerunt deos sese facere post mortem, a....
13. Enough concerning Saturn and his lineage … that they were men. We hold a short way, the prescription of origin against the rest, so as not to wander through them one by one. The quality of the posterity is shown by the founders of the race: mortal things from mortal, earthly from earthly; step is matched with step; marriages, conceptions, births ran their course; native seats, kingdoms, monuments … Let those who cannot deny that they were born believe that they died; let those who confess that they died not think them gods. But in truth their own force stands by things that are manifest; those whom from the beginning not … divinity, affirming that they were made gods after death, as Varro does and those who dreamed with him. Here, then, I take my stand … into this name and godhead, as into the senatorial order, … your … you must now grant that there is some supreme lord … the power of enrolling, as it were a Caesar; and no one can bestow [this] on others who is not himself lord. But if they were able to make themselves gods after death, …
Editors' notes and page, col. 603
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES (printed under page 340)
(1) ‹anchor: videri. (1) Quis enim› · call in col 603
Ita h. l. restit. ex Apolog. 10.
So restored in this place from the Apology, ch. 10.
(printed under page 340)
(2) ‹anchor: repentino (2)› · call in col 603
Haverc. ex Apol. 10. emend. Proinde Saturno semper egeno et repentine ubique, etc.
Havercamp emends from the Apology, ch. 10: "Proinde Saturno semper egeno et repentine ubique", etc. ("Accordingly to Saturn, ever needy and suddenly everywhere", etc.).
(printed under page 340)
(3) ‹anchor: rudes (3) tunc› · call in col 603
Leg. qua ita rudes — hominum, ut (alii: et) etc.
Read: "qua ita rudes — hominum, ut" ("in which [the eyes and minds] of men were so rude, that"; others: "et") etc.
(printed under page 340)
(a) ‹anchor: jactitamus (a)› · call in col 603
Terrae filios jactitamus. Quorum scilicet aut origo ignota est aut incerta, ii Terrae et Filii et γηγενεῖς dicuntur. Le Pr.
We boast them sons of Earth. Those, that is, whose origin is either unknown or uncertain are called sons of Earth and gēgeneis, "earth-born". Le Prieur.
(printed under page 340)
(b) ‹anchor: Illa scilicet Sibylla (b)› · call in col 603
Illa scilicet Sibylla. Veram et veridicam fuisse illam Sibyllam ait post multos Juvenalis et cum eo infiniti. Credit me vobis folium recitare sibyllae. Le Pr.
That Sibyl, namely. That this Sibyl was true and truth-telling, Juvenal says after many others, and countless others with him: "He thinks I am reciting you a leaf of the Sibyl." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 340)
(c) ‹anchor: veri vera vates (c)› · call in col 603
Veri vera vates. Arrianus Epict. III. de Apolline. Ὥστε μάντις εἶναι καὶ πηγὴ τῆς ἀληθείας. Ric.
True prophetess of the true. Arrian, Epictetus III, of Apollo: "so as to be a prophet and a fountain of truth." Rigault.
(printed under page 340)
Page
- running head: 603 TERTULLIANI (the column number is blurred in the scan)
- marginal letters: A tali teste terram; B verentur, nedum et regis; C 13. Satis de Saturno; D cesse est, aliquem summum dominatorem (letter sits between this line and the next)
- old-edition numerals: (none)
Editors' notes and page, col. 604
Footnotes
(4) ‹anchor: abusui nundinare (4)› · call in col 604
Hav. ad Apolog. c. 2. Quomodo, quando de fugitivo palam factum, solemus et operam ejus percontando abusui nundinare?
Havercamp, on the Apology, ch. 2: "How, when it has been made public about a runaway slave, are we wont, by inquiring after him, to put even his labour up for sale to be misused?"
COMMENTARIUS
(continued) ‹anchor: note (c) begun on the previous page›
Inde diu genti mansit Saturnia nomen. Urbem autem dictam fuisse Saturniam Virgilius testatur Æneid. VIII. a Saturno conditam. Hanc Saturnus condidit urbem. Le Pr.
"Hence the name Saturnia long remained to the nation." And that the city founded by Saturn was called Saturnia, Virgil testifies in Aeneid VIII: "This city Saturn founded." Le Prieur.
(printed under page 340)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 605
Footnotes
LECTIONES VARIANTES (printed under page 341)
(1) ‹anchor: Malus Jupiter, …sus est (1)› · call in col 605
Rigalt. emend. Malus Jupiter, si fulmem ipsius est.
Rigault emends: "Malus Jupiter, si fulmem ipsius est" ("A wicked Jupiter, if the thunderbolt is his").
(printed under page 341)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 606
Footnotes
(2) ‹anchor: et Levicolam (2)› · call in col 606
Rigalt. emend. Clivicolam.
Rigault emends: Clivicolam ("the dweller on the slope").
(printed under page 341)
(3) ‹anchor: de Ponto (3)› · call in col 606
Leg. de Ponto primus Italiae etc. cf. Apol. 11. 2.
Read: "de Ponto primus Italiae" ("from Pontus first [made known] to Italy") etc.; compare the Apology, 11. 2.
COMMENTARIUS (printed under page 341)
(a) ‹anchor: Septemontium (a)› · call in col 606
Et montium Septemontium. Lib. de Idololatria cap. 10. idem habet. Etiam strenae captandae, et Septemontium, et brumae, etc. Celebritas autem erat quaedam ut nos alibi annotavimus Romanis usitata dicta a septem montibus, quae in mensem Decembrem incidebat, atque in honorem urbis conditae hoc die strenae captari solebant. Le Pr.
And of the hills, the Septimontium. The book On Idolatry, ch. 10, has the same: "New Year's gifts too are to be sought, and the Septimontium, and the midwinter feast", etc. It was, as we have noted elsewhere, a festival customary among the Romans, named from the seven hills, which fell in the month of December; and in honour of the city's founding gifts used to be sought on this day. Le Prieur.
(printed under page 341)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 607
Footnotes
AD NATIONES (end of Book II) — note printed under the text, col 608 C (printed under page 342)
(a) ‹anchor: tenditque fovetque (a)› · call in col 607 (a second call "(a)" stands at "congregavit (a)" in col 608; only one note is printed)
(printed under page 342) (a) Virg. Æneid., I, 20 et seqq.
Virgil, Aeneid I, 20 and following.
DE TESTIMONIO ANIMAE — COMMENTARIUS (printed under page 342)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.
Editors' notes and page, col. 608
Footnotes
(a) ‹anchor: ADVERSUS GENTES (a) (title)› · call in col 608 (title spans cols 607–608)
Tractatus de Testimonio animae cum Apologetico et libris adversus gentes conjunctus est. In hoc enim religionis argumentum, quod in Apologetico, cap. 17 protulerat, animam scilicet naturaliter agnoscere, et quasi invitam, unum duntaxat deum esse, et alteram vitam ista praeterita, extendit latiusque prosequitur. Hoc autem ex sensu natura ipsi insito demonstrat, et ita penitus ei insculpto, ut nulla re deleri queat; adeo ut ipsi imprudenti excidat: ut cum incogitanter jactatur, Deus velit, Quod Deo placitum erit, Adsit mihi Deus, etc., quae supponunt animam Dei notitia imbutam esse, ut mortis timor natura insitus, nomen immortalitati commendandi desiderium, misericordia in defunctos, supponunt aliam ab ista vitam esse. Cum autem hi sensus animae, et singulis hominibus natura sint insiti, a Deo eos manare necesse est. En quod in eo brevi tractatu lepide admodum Tertullianus amplificat. Lump.
The treatise On the Testimony of the Soul is joined to the Apology and the books Against the Nations. For in it he extends and pursues more broadly the argument for religion that he had put forward in the Apology, ch. 17: that the soul naturally acknowledges, even as if unwillingly, that there is only one God, and another life after this one has passed. This he shows from a sense implanted in it by nature, and so deeply engraved in it that nothing can erase it; so much so that it slips out of a man unawares, as when one thoughtlessly exclaims "God willing", "What will please God", "God help me", etc. These presuppose that the soul is imbued with the knowledge of God; just as the fear of death, implanted by nature, the desire to commend one's name to immortality, and pity towards the dead presuppose that there is another life than this. And since these sentiments of the soul are implanted by nature in every single man, they must flow from God. This is what Tertullian enlarges upon very elegantly in that brief treatise. Lumper.
(printed under page 342)
(b) ‹anchor: Magna curiositate (b)› · call in col 608
Magna curiositate. Vox usitata in aevo medio: Vopiscus in Aureliano. Frivola haec fortassis cuipiam, (continues)
With great curiosity. A word in common use in the middle age: Vopiscus, in his Aurelian: "These things, perhaps, [may seem] trifling to someone", (continues)
(printed under page 342)
Page
- gap: Tertullian's text in this column is not set: the setting chunk was blocked by the output filter (2026-10-04). Marked gap (Ray's ruling); the footnotes above are set.