Against the Wise Men of the World, Who Fancy that the Earthly Bodies of Men Cannot Be Transferred to a Heavenly Habitation.

Chapter 4.—Against the Wise Men of the World, Who Fancy that the Earthly Bodies of Men Cannot Be Transferred to a Heavenly Habitation.

Caput IV. Contra sapientes mundi, qui putant terrena hominum corpora ad caeleste habitaculum non posse transferri.

But men who use their learning and intellectual ability to resist the force of that great authority which, in fulfillment of what was so long before predicted, has converted all races of men to faith and hope in its promises, seem to themselves to argue acutely against the resurrection of the body while they cite what Cicero mentions in the third book De Republica. For when he was asserting the apotheosis of Hercules and Romulus, he says: “Whose bodies were not taken up into heaven; for nature would not permit a body of earth to exist anywhere except upon earth.” This, forsooth, is the profound reasoning of the wise men, whose thoughts God knows that they are vain. For if we were only souls, that is, spirits without any body, and if we dwelt in heaven and had no knowledge of earthly animals, and were told that we should be bound to earthly bodies by some wonderful bond of union, and should animate them, should we not much more vigorously refuse to believe this, and maintain that nature would not permit an incorporeal substance to be held by a corporeal bond? And yet the earth is full of living spirits, to which terrestrial bodies are bound, and with which they are in a wonderful way implicated. If, then, the same God who has created such beings wills this also, what is to hinder the earthly body from being raised to a heavenly body, since a spirit, which is more excellent than all bodies, and consequently than even a heavenly body, has been tied to an earthly body? If so small an earthly particle has been able to hold in union with itself something better than a heavenly body, so as to receive sensation and life, will heaven disdain to receive, or at least to retain, this sentient and living particle, which derives its life and sensation from a substance more excellent than any heavenly body? If this does not happen now, it is because the time is not yet come which has been determined by Him who has already done a much more marvellous thing than that which these men refuse to believe. For why do we not more intensely wonder that incorporeal souls, which are of higher rank than heavenly bodies, are bound to earthly bodies, rather than that bodies, although earthly, are exalted to an abode which, though heavenly, is yet corporeal, except because we have been accustomed to see this, and indeed are this, while we are not as yet that other marvel, nor have as yet ever seen it? Certainly, if we consult sober reason, the more wonderful of the two divine works is found to be to attach somehow corporeal things to incorporeal, and not to connect earthly things with heavenly, which, though diverse, are yet both of them corporeal.

Sed uidelicet homines docti adque sapientes contra uim tantae auctoritatis, quae omnia genera hominum, sicut tanto) ante praedixit, in hoc credendum sperandumque conuertit. acute sibi argumentari uidentur aduersus corporum resurrectionem et dicere quod in tertio de re publica libro a Cicerone commemoratum est. Nam cum Herculem et Romulum ex hominibus deos esse factos adseueraret: ‘Quorum non corpora, inquit, sunt in caelum elata; neque enim natura pateretur, ut id quod esset e terra nisi in terra maneret.’ Haec est magna ratio sapientium, quorum Dominus nouit cogitationes, quoniam uanae sunt. Si enim animae tantummodo essemus, id est sine ullo corpore spiritus, et in caelo habitantes terrena animalia nesciremus nobisque futurum esse diceretur, ut terrenis corporibus animandis quodam uinculo mirabili necteremur: nonne multo fortius argumentaremur id credere recusantes et diceremus naturam non pati, ut res incorporea ligamento corporeo uinciretur? Et tamen plena est terra uegetantibus animis haec membra terrena, miro sibi modo conexa et inplicita. Quur ergo eodem uolente Deo, qui fecit hoc animal, non poterit terrenum corpus in. caeleste corpus adtolli, si animus omni ac per hoc etiam caelesti corpore praestabilior terreno corpori potuit inligari? An terrena particula tam exigua potuit aliquid caelesti corpore melius aput se tenere, ut sensum haberet et uitam, et eam sentientem adque uiuentem dedignabitur caelum suscipere aut susceptam non poterit sustinere, eum de re sentiat et uiuat ista meliore, quam est corpus omne caeleste? Sed ideo nunc non fit, quia nondum est tempus quo id fieri uoluit, qui hoc, quod uidendo iam uiluit, multo mirabilius quam illud, quod ab istis non creditur, fecit. Quur enim non uehementius admiramur incorporeos animos, caelesti corpore potiores, terrenis inligari corporibus quam corpora licet terrena sedibus quamnis caelestibus. tamen corporeis sublimari, nisi quia hoc uidere consueuimus et hoc sumus, illud uero nondum sumus nec aliquando adhuc uidimus? Nam profecto sobria ratione consulta rairabilioris esse diuini operis reperitur incorporalibus corporalia quodam modo adtexere quam licet diuersa, quia illa caelestia, ista terrestria, tamen corpora et corpora copulare.

Chapter 5.—Of the Resurrection of the Flesh, Which Some Refuse to Believe, Though the World at Large Believes It.

Caput V. De resurrectione carnis, quam quidam mundo credentenoncredunt.

But granting that this was once incredible, behold, now, the world has come to the belief that the earthly body of Christ was received up into heaven. Already both the learned and unlearned have believed in the resurrection of the flesh and its ascension to the heavenly places, while only a very few either of the educated or uneducated are still staggered by it. If this is a credible thing which is believed, then let those who do not believe see how stolid they are; and if it is incredible, then this also is an incredible thing, that what is incredible should have received such credit. Here then we have two incredibles,—to wit, the resurrection of our body to eternity, and that the world should believe so incredible a thing; and both these incredibles the same God predicted should come to pass before either had as yet occurred. We see that already one of the two has come to pass, for the world has believed what was incredible; why should we despair that the remaining one shall also come to pass, and that this which the world believed, though it was incredible, shall itself occur? For already that which was equally incredible has come to pass, in the world’s believing an incredible thing. Both were incredible: the one we see accomplished, the other we believe shall be; for both were predicted in those same Scriptures by means of which the world believed. And the very manner in which the world’s faith was won is found to be even more incredible if we consider it. Men uninstructed in any branch of a liberal education, without any of the refinement of heathen learning, unskilled in grammar, not armed with dialectic, not adorned with rhetoric, but plain fishermen, and very few in number,—these were the men whom Christ sent with the nets of faith to the sea of this world, and thus took out of every race so many fishes, and even the philosophers themselves, wonderful as they are rare. Let us add, if you please, or because you ought to be pleased, this third incredible thing to the two former. And now we have three incredibles, all of which have yet come to pass. It is incredible that Jesus Christ should have risen in the flesh and ascended with flesh into heaven; it is incredible that the world should have believed so incredible a thing; it is incredible that a very few men, of mean birth and the lowest rank, and no education, should have been able so effectually to persuade the world, and even its learned men, of so incredible a thing. Of these three incredibles, the parties with whom we are debating refuse to believe the first; they cannot refuse to see the second, which they are unable to account for if they do not believe the third. It is indubitable that the resurrection of Christ, and His ascension into heaven with the flesh in which He rose, is already preached and believed in the whole world. If it is not credible, how is it that it has already received credence in the whole world? If a number of noble, exalted, and learned men had said that they had witnessed it, and had been at pains to publish what they had witnessed, it were not wonderful that the world should have believed it, but it were very stubborn to refuse credence; but if, as is true, the world has believed a few obscure, inconsiderable, uneducated persons, who state and write that they witnessed it, is it not unreasonable that a handful of wrong-headed men should oppose themselves to the creed of the whole world, and refuse their belief? And if the world has put faith in a small number of men, of mean birth and the lowest rank, and no education, it is because the divinity of the thing itself appeared all the more manifestly in such contemptible witnesses. The eloquence, indeed, which lent persuasion to their message, consisted of wonderful works, not words. For they who had not seen Christ risen in the flesh, nor ascending into heaven with His risen body, believed those who related how they had seen these things, and who testified not only with words but wonderful signs. For men whom they knew to be acquainted with only one, or at most two languages, they marvelled to hear speaking in the tongues of all nations. They saw a man, lame from his mother’s womb, after forty years stand up sound at their word in the name of Christ; that handkerchiefs taken from their bodies had virtue to heal the sick; that countless persons, sick of various diseases, were laid in a row in the road where they were to pass, that their shadow might fall on them as they walked, and that they forthwith received health; that many other stupendous miracles were wrought by them in the name of Christ; and, finally, that they even raised the dead. If it be admitted that these things occurred as they are related, then we have a multitude of incredible things to add to those three incredibles. That the one incredibility of the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ may be believed, we accumulate the testimonies of countless incredible miracles, but even so we do not bend the frightful obstinacy of these sceptics. But if they do not believe that these miracles were wrought by Christ’s apostles to gain credence to their preaching of His resurrection and ascension, this one grand miracle suffices for us, that the whole world has believed without any miracles.

Sed hoc incredibile fuerit aliquando: ecce iam credidit mundus sublatum terrenum Christi corpus in caelum; resurrectionem carnis et adscensionem in supernas sedes, paucissimis remanentibus adque stupentibus uel doctis uel indoctis. iam crediderunt et docti et indocti. Si rem credibilem crediderunt, uideant quam sint stolidi, qui non credunt; si autem res incredibilis credita est, etiam hoc utique incredibile est. sic creditum esse, quod incredibile est. Haec igitur duo incredibilia, resurrectionem scilicet nostri corporis in aeternum et rem tam incredibilem mundum esse crediturum, idem Deus, antequam uel unum horum fieret, ambo futura esse praedixit. Unum duorum incredibilium iam factum uidemus, ut, quod erat incredibile, crederet mundus: quur id quod reliquum est desperatur, ut etiam hoc ueniat, quod incredibile credidit mundus, sicut iam uenit, quod similiter incredibile fuit, ut rem tam incredibilem crederet mundus, quando quidem hoc utrumque incredibile, quorum uidemus unum, alterum credimus, in eisdem litteris praedictum sit, per quas credidit mundus? Et ipse modus, quo mundus credidit, si consideretur. incredibilior inuenitur. Ineruditos liberalibus disciplinis et omnino, quantum ad istorum doctrinas adtinet, inpolitos, non peritos grammatica, non armatos dialectica, non rhetorica in flatos, piscatores Christus cum retibus fidei ad mare huius saeculi paucissimos misit adque ita et ex omni genere tam multos pisces et tanto mirabiliores, quanto rariores, etiam. ipsos philosophos cepit. Duobus illis incredibilibus, si placet, immo quia placere debet, addamus hoc tertium. Iam ergo tria sunt incredibilia, quae tamen facta sunt. Incredibile est Christum resurrexisse in carne et in caelum adscendisse cum carne; incredibile est mundum rem tam incredibilem credidisse; incredibile est homines ignobiles, infimos, paucissimos, inperitos rem tam incredibilem tam efficaciter mundo et in illo etiam doctis persuadere potuisse. Horum trium incredibilium primum nolunt isti, cum quibus agimus, credere; secundum coguntur et cernere: quod non inueniunt unde sit factum, si non credunt tertium. Resurrectio certe Christi et in caelum cum carne in qua resurrexit adscensio toto iam mundo praedicatur et creditur; si credibilis non est, unde toto terrarum orbe iam credita est? Si multi, nobiles, sublimes. docti eam se uidisse dixerunt et quod uiderunt diffamare curarunt, eis mundum credidisse non mirum est [sed istos adhuc credere nolle perdurum est; si autem, ut uerum est, paucis, obscuris, minimis, indoctis eam se uidisse dicentibus et scribentibus credidit mundus, quur pauci obstinatissimi, qui remanserunt, ipsi mundo iam credenti adhuc usque non credunt? qui propterea numero exiguo ignobilium, infimorum, inperitorum hominum credidit, quia in tam contemtibilibus testibus multo mirabilius diuinitas se ipsa persuasit. Eloquia namque persuadentium, quae dicebant, mira fuerunt facta, non uerba Qui enim Christum in carne resurrexisse et cum illa in caelum adscendisse non uiderant, id se uidisse narrantibus non loquentibus tantum, sed etiam mirifica facientibus signa credebant. Homines quippe, quos unius uel, ut multum, duarum linguarum fuisse nouerant, repente linguis omnium gentium loquentes mirabiliter audiebant; claudum ab uberibus matris ad eorum uerbum in Christi nomine post quadraginta annos incolumem constitisse, sudaria de corporibus eorum ablata sanandis profuisse languentibus, in uia qua fuerant transituri positos in ordine innumerabiles morbis uariis laborantes, ut ambulantium super eos umbra transiret, continuo salutem solere recipere et alia multa stupenda in Christi nomine per eos facta, postremo etiam mortuos resun-exisse cernebant, Quae si, ut leguntur, gesta esse concedunt, ecce tot incredibilia tribus illis incredibilibus addimus, et ut credatur unum incredibile, quod de carnis resurrectione adque in caelum adscensione dicitur, multorum incredibilium testimonia tanta congerimus et nondum ad credendum horrenda duritia incredulos flectimus. Si uero per apostolos Christi, ut eis crederetur resurrectionem adque adscensionem praedicantibus Christi, etiam ista miracula facta esse non credunt, hoc nobis unum grande miraculum sufficit, quod eam terrarum orbis sine ullis miraculis credidit.

Chapter 6.—That Rome Made Its Founder Romulus a God Because It Loved Him; But the Church Loved Christ Because It Believed Him to Be God.

Caput VI. Quod Roma conditorem suum Romulum diligendo deum fecerit, ecclesia autem Christum Deum credendo dilexerit.

Let us here recite the passage in which Tully expresses his astonishment that the apotheosis of Romulus should have been credited. I shall insert his words as they stand: “It is most worthy of remark in Romulus, that other men who are said to have become gods lived in less educated ages, when there was a greater propensity to the fabulous, and when the uninstructed were easily persuaded to believe anything. But the age of Romulus was barely six hundred years ago, and already literature and science had dispelled the errors that attach to an uncultured age.” And a little after he says of the same Romulus words to this effect: “From this we may perceive that Homer had flourished long before Romulus, and that there was now so much learning in individuals, and so generally diffused an enlightenment, that scarcely any room was left for fable. For antiquity admitted fables, and sometimes even very clumsy ones; but this age [of Romulus] was sufficiently enlightened to reject whatever had not the air of truth.” Thus one of the most learned men, and certainly the most eloquent, M. Tullius Cicero, says that it is surprising that the divinity of Romulus was believed in, because the times were already so enlightened that they would not accept a fabulous fiction. But who believed that Romulus was a god except Rome, which was itself small and in its infancy? Then afterwards it was necessary that succeeding generations should preserve the tradition of their ancestors; that, drinking in this superstition with their mother’s milk, the state might grow and come to such power that it might dictate this belief, as from a point of vantage, to all the nations over whom its sway extended. And these nations, though they might not believe that Romulus was a god, at least said so, that they might not give offence to their sovereign state by refusing to give its founder that title which was given him by Rome, which had adopted this belief, not by a love of error, but an error of love. But though Christ is the founder of the heavenly and eternal city, yet it did not believe Him to be God because it was founded by Him, but rather it is founded by Him, in virtue of its belief. Rome, after it had been built and dedicated, worshipped its founder in a temple as a god; but this Jerusalem laid Christ, its God, as its foundation, that the building and dedication might proceed. The former city loved its founder, and therefore believed him to be a god; the latter believed Christ to be God, and therefore loved Him. There was an antecedent cause for the love of the former city, and for its believing that even a false dignity attached to the object of its love; so there was an antecedent cause for the belief of the latter, and for its loving the true dignity which a proper faith, not a rash surmise, ascribed to its object. For, not to mention the multitude of very striking miracles which proved that Christ is God, there were also divine prophecies heralding Him, prophecies most worthy of belief, which being already accomplished, we have not, like the fathers, to wait for their verification. Of Romulus, on the other hand, and of his building Rome and reigning in it, we read or hear the narrative of what did take place, not prediction which beforehand said that such things should be. And so far as his reception among the gods is concerned, history only records that this was believed, and does not state it as a fact; for no miraculous signs testified to the truth of this. For as to that wolf which is said to have nursed the twin-brothers, and which is considered a great marvel, how does this prove him to have been divine? For even supposing that this nurse was a real wolf and not a mere courtezan, yet she nursed both brothers, and Remus is not reckoned a god. Besides, what was there to hinder any one from asserting that Romulus or Hercules, or any such man, was a god? Or who would rather choose to die than profess belief in his divinity? And did a single nation worship Romulus among its gods, unless it were forced through fear of the Roman name? But who can number the multitudes who have chosen death in the most cruel shapes rather than deny the divinity of Christ? And thus the dread of some slight indignation, which it was supposed, perhaps groundlessly, might exist in the minds of the Romans, constrained some states who were subject to Rome to worship Romulus as a god; whereas the dread, not of a slight mental shock, but of severe and various punishments, and of death itself, the most formidable of all, could not prevent an immense multitude of martyrs throughout the world from not merely worshipping but also confessing Christ as God. The city of Christ, which, although as yet a stranger upon earth, had countless hosts of citizens, did not make war upon its godless persecutors for the sake of temporal security, but preferred to win eternal salvation by abstaining from war. They were bound, imprisoned, beaten, tortured, burned, torn in pieces, massacred, and yet they multiplied. It was not given to them to fight for their eternal salvation except by despising their temporal salvation for their Saviour’s sake.

Recolamus etiam hoc loco illud, quod de Romuli credita diuinitate Tullius admiratur. Verba eius ut scripta sunt inseram. <Magis est, inquit, in Romulo admirandum, quod ceteri. qui di ex hominibus facti esse dicuntur, minus eruditis hominum saeculis fuerunt, ut fingendi procliuis esset ratio. cum inperiti facile ad credendum inpellerentur; Romuli autem aetatem minus his sescentis annis iam inueteratis litteris adque doctrinis omnique illo antiquo ex inculta hominum uita errore sublato fuisse cernimus.’ Et paulo post de eodem Romulo ita loquitur, quod ad hunc pertinet sensum: ‘Ex quointellegi potest, inquit, permultis annis ante Homerum fuisse quam Romulum. ut iam doctis hominibus ac temporibus ipsis eruditis ad fingendum uix quicquam esset loci. Antiquitas enim recipit fabulas, fictas etiam nonnumquam incondite; haec aetas autem iam exculta, praesertim eludens omne quodfieri non potest, respuit.’ Unus e numero doctissimorum hominum idemque eloquentissimus omnium Marcus Tullius Cicero propterea dicit diuinitatem Romuli mirabiliter creditam. quod erudita iam tempora fuerunt, quae falsitatem non reciperent fabularum. Quis autem Romulum deum nisi Roma credidit, adque id parua et incipiens? Tum deinde posteris seruare fuerat necesse quod acceperant a maioribus, ut cum ista superstitione in lacte quodam modo matris ebibita cresceret ciuitas adque ad tam magnum perueniret imperium, ut ex eius fastigio, uelut ex altiore quodam loco, alias quoque gentes, quibus dominaretur, hac sua opinione perfunderet, ut non quidem crederent, sed tamen dicerent deum Romulum, ne ciuitatem, cui seruiebant, de conditore eius offenderent. aliter eum nominando quam Roma, quae id non amore quidem huius erroris, sed tamen amoris errore crediderat. Christum autem quamquam sit caelestis et sempiternae conditor ciuitatis, non tamen eum, quoniam ab illo condita est, Deum credidit, sed ideo potius est condenda, quia credidit. Roma conditorem suum iam constructa et dedicata tamquam deum coluit in templo; haec autem Hierusalem conditorem suum Deum Christum, ut construi posset et dedicari, posuit in fidei fundamento. Illa illum amando esse deum credidit, ista istum Deum esse credendo amauit. Sicut ergo praecessit unde amaret illa et de amato iam libenter etiam falsum bonum crederet: ita praecessit unde ista crederet, ut recta fide non temere -quod falsum, sed quod uerum erat amaret. Exceptis enim tot et tantis miraculis, quae persuaserunt Deum esse Christum. prophetiae quoque diuinae fide dignissimae praecesserunt, quae in illo non sicut a patribus adhuc creduntur inplendae, sed iam demonstrantur inpletae; de Romulo autem, quia condidit Romam in eaque regnauit, auditur legiturue quod factum est. non quod antequam fieret prophetatum; sed quod sit receptus in deos, creditum tenent litterae, non factum docent. Nullis quippe rerum mirabilium signis id ei uere prouenisse monstratur. Lupa quippe illa nutrix, quod uidetur quasi magnum exstitisse portentum, quale aut quantum est ad demonstrandum deum? Certe enim etsi non meretrix fuit lupa illa, sed bestia. cum commune fuerit ambobus, frater tamen eius non habetur deus. Quis autem prohibitus est aut Romulum aut Herculem aut alios tales homines deos dicere et mori maluit quam non dicere? Aut uero aliqua gentium coleret inter deos suos Romulum, nisi Romani nominis metus cogeret? Quis porro numeret, quam multi quantalibet saeuitia crudelitatis occidi quam Christum Deum negare maluerunt? Proinde metus quamlibet leuis indignationis, quae ab animis Romanorum, si non fieret, posse putabatur exsistere, conpellebat aliquas ciuitates positas sub iure Romano tamquam deum colere Romulum; a Christo autem Deo non solum colendo, uerum etiam confitendo tantam per orbis terrae populos martyrum multitudinem metus reuocare non potuit non leuis offensionis animorum, sed inmensarum uariarumque poenarum et ipsius mortis, quae plus ceteris formidatur. Neque tunc ciuitas Christi, quamuis adhuc peregrinaretur in terris et haberet tamen magnorum agmina populorum, aduersus inpios persecutores suos pro temporali salute pugnauit; sed potius, ut obtineret aeternam, non repugnauit. Ligabantur includebantur, caedebantur torquebantur, urebantur laniabantur, trucidabantur — et multiplicabantur. Non erat eis pro salute pugnare nisi salutem pro Saluatore contemnere. Scio in libro Ciceronis tertio, nisi fallor, de re publica disputari nullum bellum suscipi a ciuitate optima, nisi aut pro fide aut pro salute.

I am aware that Cicero, in the third book of his De Republica, if I mistake not, argues that a first-rate power will not engage in war except either for honor or for safety. What he has to say about the question of safety, and what he means by safety, he explains in another place, saying, “Private persons frequently evade, by a speedy death, destitution, exile, bonds, the scourge, and the other pains which even the most insensible feel. But to states, death, which seems to emancipate individuals from all punishments, is itself a punishment; for a state should be so constituted as to be eternal. And thus death is not natural to a republic as to a man, to whom death is not only necessary, but often even desirable. But when a state is destroyed, obliterated, annihilated, it is as if (to compare great things with small) this whole world perished and collapsed.” Cicero said this because he, with the Platonists, believed that the world would not perish. It is therefore agreed that, according to Cicero, a state should engage in war for the safety which preserves the state permanently in existence though its citizens change; as the foliage of an olive or laurel, or any tree of this kind, is perennial, the old leaves being replaced by fresh ones. For death, as he says, is no punishment to individuals, but rather delivers them from all other punishments, but it is a punishment to the state. And therefore it is reasonably asked whether the Saguntines did right when they chose that their whole state should perish rather than that they should break faith with the Roman republic; for this deed of theirs is applauded by the citizens of the earthly republic. But I do not see how they could follow the advice of Cicero, who tell us that no war is to be undertaken save for safety or for honor; neither does he say which of these two is to be preferred, if a case should occur in which the one could not be preserved without the loss of the other. For manifestly, if the Saguntines chose safety, they must break faith; if they kept faith, they must reject safety; as also it fell out. But the safety of the city of God is such that it can be retained, or rather acquired, by faith and with faith; but if faith be abandoned, no one can attain it. It is this thought of a most steadfast and patient spirit that has made so many noble martyrs, while Romulus has not had, and could not have, so much as one to die for his divinity.

Quid autem dicat pro salute uel intellegi quam salutem uelit, alio loco demonstrans: ‘Sed his poenis, inquit, quas etiam stultissimi sentiunt, egestate exsilio, uinculis uerberibus, elabuntur saepe priuati oblata mortis celeritate; ciuitatibus autem mors ipsa poena est, quae uidetur a poena singulos uindicare. Debet enim constituta sic esse ciuitas, ut aeterna sit. Itaque nullus interitus est rei publicae naturalis, ut hominis, in quo mors non modo necessaria est, uerum etiam optanda persaepe. Ciuitas autem cum tollitur, deletur, exstinguitur: simile est quodam modo, ut parua magnis conferamus, ac si omnis hic mundus intereat et concidat.’ Hoc ideo dixit Cicero, quia mundum non interiturum cum Platonicis sentit. Constat ergo eum pro ea salute uoluisse bellum suscipi a ciuitate, qua fit ut maneat hic ciuitas, sicut dicit, aeterna, quamuis morientibus et nascentibus singulis. sicut perennis est opacitas oleae uel lauri adque huius modi ceterarum arborum singulorum lapsu ortuque foliorum. Mors quippe, ut dicit, non hominum singulorum, sed uniuersae poena est ciuitatis, quae a poena plerumque singulos uindicat. Unde merito quaeritur, utrum recte fecerint Saguntini, quando uniuersam ciuitatem suam interire maluerunt quam fidem frangere, qua cum ipsa Romana re publica tenebantur; in quo suo facto laudantur ab omnibus terrenae rei publicae ciuibus. Sed quo modo huic disputationi possent oboedire, non uideo. ubi dicitur nullum suscipiendum esse bellum nisi aut pro fide aut pro salute, nec dicitur, si in unum simul periculum ita duo ista concurrerint, ut teneri alterum sine alterius amissione non possit, quid sit potius eligendum. Profecto enim Saguntini si salutem eligerent, fides eis fuerat deserenda: si fides tenenda, amittenda utique salus, sicut factum est. Salus, autem ciuitatis Dei talis est, ut cum fide ac per fidem teneri uel potius adquiri possit; fide autem perdita ad eam quisque uenire non possit. Quae cogitatio firmissimi ac patientissimi cordis tot ac tantos martyres fecit, qualem ne unum quidem habuit uel habere potuit quando est deus creditus Romulus.

Chapter 7.—That the World’s Belief in Christ is the Result of Divine Power, Not of Human Persuasion.

Caput VII. Quod ut mundus in Christum crederet, uirtutis fuerit diuinae, non persuasionis humanae.

But it is thoroughly ridiculous to make mention of the false divinity of Romulus as any way comparable to that of Christ. Nevertheless, if Romulus lived about six hundred years before Cicero, in an age which already was so enlightened that it rejected all impossibilities, how much more, in an age which certainly was more enlightened, being six hundred years later, the age of Cicero himself, and of the emperors Augustus and Tiberius, would the human mind have refused to listen to or believe in the resurrection of Christ’s body and its ascension into heaven, and have scouted it as an impossibility, had not the divinity of the truth itself, or the truth of the divinity, and corroborating miraculous signs, proved that it could happen and had happened? Through virtue of these testimonies, and notwithstanding the opposition and terror of so many cruel persecutions, the resurrection and immortality of the flesh, first in Christ, and subsequently in all in the new world, was believed, was intrepidly proclaimed, and was sown over the whole world, to be fertilized richly with the blood of the martyrs. For the predictions of the prophets that had preceded the events were read, they were corroborated by powerful signs, and the truth was seen to be not contradictory to reason, but only different from customary ideas, so that at length the world embraced the faith it had furiously persecuted.

Sed ualde ridiculum est de Romuli falsa diuinitate, cum de Christo loquimur, facere mentionem. Verum tamen cum sescentis ferme annis ante Ciceronem Romulus fuerit adque illa aetas iam fuisse doctrinis dicatur exculta, ut quod fieri non potest omne respueret: quanto magis post sescentos annos ipsius tempore Ciceronis maximeque postea sub Augusto adque Tiberio, eruditioribus utique temporibus, resurrectionem carnis Christi adque in caelum adscensionem, tamquam id quod fieri non potest, mens humana ferre non posset eludensque ab auribus cordibusque respueret, nisi eam fieri potuisse adque factam esse diuinitas ipsius ueritatis uel diuinitatis ueritas et contestantia miraculorum signa monstrarent; ut terrentibus et contradicentibus tam multis tamque magnis persecutionibus praecedens in Christo, deinde in ceteris ad nouum saeculum secutura resurrectio adque inmortalitas carnis et fidelissime crederetur et praedicaretur intrepide et per orbem terrae pullulatura fecundius cum martyrum sanguine sereretur. Legebantur enim praeconia praecedentia prophetarum, concurrebant ostenta uirtutum, et persuadebatur ueritas noua consuetudini. non contraria rationi, donec orbis terrae, qui persequebatur furore, sequeretur fide.