thou shalt find in thy owne person the proofe of so rare a miracle Thinke on what thou wast before created thou wert nothing For if any thing before thou wouldst remember it Thou then that wert nothing before thy creation and when cease to live shalt returne to nothing why canst thou not once againe bee brought out of nothing by the will of the same Creator who created thee of nothing will there come any new thing unto thee Thou who before wert not art made again after thou ceasest to live heere thou shalt bee restored in the resurrection and after this wee would have thee aske by what meanes God will rayse thee up againe But seeing hee made no difficulty to make thee what before thou wert thou oughtest not to thinke that hee finds any to an easier thing that is to make thee what thou wert heeretofore Can one doubt of the power of God that hath made this vast and immense bodie of the world of that which was not of nothing and out of a Chaos and who at the same moment animated this world with a spirit that giveth life to all things hee hath given testimonies that witnesse and sets forth examples to us of the resurrection of man Wee see every day the light after ir hath lost its darkenesse takes it againe and by turnes the darkenesse dissipates it selfe and succeeds to light againe the Starrs deprived of their splendor as if they were not in being clothed with their luster seeme to bee re-animated the time begins at the same terme where it finished the fruits fall off the trees and come again in their season the corne puts not forth its eares plentifully till after its former graine is corrupted and rotten in the earth all things in perishing are conserved spring againe after dead and thou O man that shouldst bee so glorious by the excellency of thy nature if thou knewest it and that learnest also by the Oracle of Apollo thy selfe to bee master of all creatures as well of them that die not to live again as of those must die to rise again Is it possible thou shouldst die to bee no more and that thy death ought not have a return to life again No certainly in what place soever thy soul is separated form thy body whatsoever element hath destroyed thy being swallowed up consumed and reduced thee to nothing it shall render thee all entire because nothing and all the Universe appertain to one and the same Lord. It follows by this discourse say you that we must alwayes die and always rise again and I answer you If God the great Lord of all things hath so ordayned it so it shall bee whether you like of it or no but that which his providance hath ordayned touching the Resurrection of man is conducted by a more equitable order It s a mystery newly revealed by his only Son Jesus Christ This wisdome that hath composed the Universe with substances of different natures and makes it subsist in a body by the uniting of so many contrary qualities of voyd and solid of things animate and inanimate of that in our power and that above us of life and death the same hath ordayned time with this difference of conditions that this first part in which wee live since the very Creation of the World was perpetually to the terme that must accomplish the number of its yeares and the other part that followes and which we stay for is infinite in its durance and perpetuates unto eternity Betweene these two there is a middle time which after arrived to its end the beauty of this Universe which must end one day also and is for the present hung up before all eternity shall change face and then all mankind shall arise and appeare before the same God to bee recompensed according to all the good or evill we have done upon earth either with infinite joy or paine in the world to come After which wee shall neither die nor rise againe any more But without other change keepe still the being wee appeare in at the howre of our Universall resurrection that is to say the servants of God being clothed with the substance of eternity which is that of the Angels shall remaine alwayes united to God and the Prophane and those that violate the lawes of God be buried in flames where suffer perpetually without consuming because pertake of the nature of this fire which is of such a sublime quality as shall make them live in paines without being subject to corruption The Philosophers acknowledge the difference betweene hidden fire and fire discovered to our eyes so the fire ordained for the use of man is other then that which serves for the justice of God whether it formes the lightnings which heaven darts upon the earth or disgorgeth it selfe from the deepe Cavernes of mountaines it consumes not that it burnes it repaires rather that it destroyes so that the mountaines maintaine themselves in their order and man is strucke with the lightening without offending his body or being reduced to ashes by the fire wherewith hee hath been touched This miracle is a proofe of the nature of these eternall flames and an example of the vertue they have by the decree of the judgement of God to preserve punishments wherewith his justice will punish the wicked the mountaines burne and remaine intire why should it not so come to passe with men found hainous offenders before God and enemies of their Creator CHAP. XLIX THese things while wee declare to you under the notion of truth in us alone you hold for presumptuous assertions when the self same uttered by your Philosophers you esteem admirable lights of mind and sublime sciences They are wise we simple they deserve to be honoured wee to bee laughed at yea I dare say more severly punished But suppose the doctrine wee preach false admit it consists in vain opinions if vain they are necessary for the salvation of mens souls If follies wonderfull profitable in regard they who beleeve them are thereby excited to live well for fear of eternall punishment if they doe not and againe if they doe in hope of eternall felicity Therefore it behooves us not to call these things false and impertinent which so much import us to find true neyther condemne that which produceth nothing but good which granted the opinions you have for persecuting our doctrine rather then the doctrine wee professe should passe for imaginations conceived without ground Again this doctrine of ours being so profitable to men deserves not to bee held impertinent if notwithstanding you will have it to bee false and ridiculous you must yet acknowledge its innocency and consequently that it deserves not to draw punishments upon the Christians Know we not that when other men have given way to vain and fabulous opinions they have not beene reprooved your Lawes have not been armed with so much severity as to punish them they having told freely their thoughts without being
that day as other dayes During the Saturnalls I goe not into the bath before day because I will not employ the houres of night and day unprofitably yet I wash my selfe at a convenient houre that the bath may serve to preserve my health and conserve my life and blood is it not enough When I am dead that all my body growes stiffe and pale after it is washed the daies on which are represented games in honour of your Gods I eate not publikely as you doe according to the custome of these wretched creatures who at the instant they are to bee devoured by wild beasts fill their bellies before all the world for their last repast yet in any other place where I eate I eate the same meats as you doe I buy no flowers to make a garland to put on my head what is it to you what use I make of the flowers I have bought mee thinks they are more pleasing to mee when they are free unbound and scattered without order But if wee must put them into the forme of a garland wee are used when they are in this condition to put them neer our noses to smell to them Let them that put them on their heads try if it be more to purpose to smell by the haires or by the organ of the smelling part I am not at your shewes but if my appetite mooves mee to tast the good bitts that are sold in these assemblyes I will rather buy them in the places where they are ordinarily sold I buy no incense if the marchants of Arabia complaine on it let these strangers know more wares are spent and with greater profusenesse in burying Christians then to sume the images of the God You say the tributes of the temples are lesse every day by the malice of men that there is lesse given to them that keepe those holy places but hardly can wee suffice to give comfort both to men and to your gods that implore our charity Wee think it is enough to use liberallity towards them that aske it of us Let Jupiter give us his hand and hee shall not take it away empty wee will doe him the favour which our mercy refuseth to no body Wee distribute more goods in every street then your Religion with all its sacrifices doe in all your temples and on the other side if the tributes of the temple suffer any diminution the republicke is oblieged for her owne to the piety of the Christians because they pay what they owe with the same fidelity which makes them abstaine from all frauds by which men are wont to retaine unjustly the goods of others If one consider but the losse the publicke receives by these trickes and lies where you strive to frustrate her rights it will bee found that the dammage your evil conscience causeth to the State in this onely ran-counter carries away quite al the good you can do in any other thing whatsoever CHAP. XLIII I Acknowledge there are certaine persons that have reason to complaine of us and may truely say there is nothing to be gained for them of the Christians They are first these infamous corrupters of chastity these brokers of foule pleasures and dishonest loves these wretched creatures that serve the vildest ministers of unchastitie after these Murtherers they which meddle with giving of poyson and Magicians and finally southsayers Deviners and Astrologers But it is very profitable in this life to be unusefull to these people Yet in what manner soever it be that our Religion causeth dammage to your affaires it hath neither lost where withall to recompence you by the helpe you may expect from it How much do you esteeme them I say not them that deliver you from the power of Divells them that pray for you to the true God But them you may have neere you as assured guards from whom there is nothing to be feared CHAP. XLIIII IN effect there is cause to wonder your passion is so irregular that in prosecuting the Christians you make no difficulty to take away the life of men that are profitable to the common wealth The State receives by your injustice an evident damage and important losse and yet no bodie lookes to it no body weighs of what consequence the sufferings are of so many persons of good life and the punishment of so great a number of innocents We speake as boldly of the Christians you put to death for wee have an unreproachable testimony of their integrity which wee take also from your registers Sirs who are employed every day in judging those that are kept in prisons and who terminate their processes by the sentences you give against them of all the malefactors accused before you of so many sorts of crimes is there any of them charged with Murther Robberie Sacriledge and other faults to whom they impute also that hee is a Christian or else when Christians are presented to be punished as Criminalls because they are Christians is there any amongst them whose life like that of other prisoners all the faulty wherewith your prisons are so filled that they are overcharged are of your Religion they are also of your Religion that make the mines groane under the weight of their blowes they are the wretched creatures of the same Religion you are wherewith the wilde beasts fill their enttayles All these poore criminalls your Citizens breed up to make them cruelly kill one another before a bloody people have the same opinion you have of the deity Finally among all these wretched creatures ther 's not one Christian unlesse hee be charged by iustice because of his name Christian Or if there be found a Christian attainted of any crime hee hath no more the name Christian because he hath lost that Divine qualitie in losing his innocence CHAP. XLV ARe there none then in the world innocent but we what marvaile it must needs bee so and otherwise it cannot bee Forasmuch as God having taught us innocency wee know it perfectly as revealed from a perfect master and keep it faithfully as dispensed by one who will not bee mocked by us in a seeming obedience unto what hee commands As for you its the opinion of men that makes you innocent and their rules that governe all thence it comes your injunctions establish not fully the truth of this excellent vertue and as the things most offectuall to perfection are there wanting so have they not the power of imprinting feare in the hearts of those that owe them obedience For tell me what light hath humane learning to teach that which is truely good What authority humane power to free men from embracing the true happinesse If it bee easie to bee deceived by the one it is no lesse common to neglect the other Let us consider a little your lawes and compare them with those of our God which law is more accomplished that which saith Thou shalt not kill or that which saith Thou shalt not bee angry which perfecter that which forbids
Christians thought they should offend God if in shewing their affection to the Emperour they mingled themselves in these dissolutions but their piety passing with the Infidels for a crime their enemies tooke occasion thereby to exclame against them as against the enemies of the Emperour Some think that Severus after hee had caused many Noble persons to bee put to death of Niger or Albinius party went to make War against the Parthians and leaving the Government of the City of Rome to Plautianus this man naturally cruell and continuing the search after all those who had favoured the one or the other of these two parties filling Rome with Funeralls and mourning began also the fifth Persecution against the Christians not as complices of the factions which now began to be extinguished but as guilty of high Treason in neglecting to render to the Emperour at his return from Gaule their duties in like maner as his other people did They that writ this fifth Persecution were stirred up at Rome on this subject on the only authority of Plautianus have also writ it was in this time that Tertullian made this Apologie or Defence to make known to the Gentiles the injustice of the usage the Christians had And upon their account this Peece was published the seventh yeare of the Empire of Severus which fell in the year of our Lord 201. But others more probably say it was in the year of our Salvation 204. the tenth year of the Empire of Severus when this Prince after he had overcome the Parthians and established peace in the Empire willing to smother the seed of troubles wher with it had beene so violently agitated for bad unlawfull assemblies and factious meetings upon this occasion pretence is taken to persecute the Christians with authority as if in meeting to prayse GOD they had violated the prohibition of the Emperour Tertullian in his Apologie or Defence affirms this last opinion to be the truest shewing Christian meetings not to be factious meetings Concluding it was not for this cause that the before mentioned Inhibition was put forth Neither is it unlikely but this Apologie or Defence that justifies Christian Religion from the guilt of faction practise and conspiracie against the State was after the Edict of Severus who commanding the Judges to punish all seditious confederacies had kindled againe the fire of Persecution against the guiltlesse Howsoever it was certaine it is Tertullian composed this Apologie or Defence in the reigne of Severus during the greatest heat of punishing the Christians he was then at Rome and published this Book without putting his name to it that bee might not expose himselfe to inevitable danger Sparing the name of Severus for the respect born to his dignity he addrest this Book to the Magistrates who sate every day in judgement upon the faithfull and condemned the true Religion without knowing it It s impossible seriously to consider this Peece without being ravisht therewith Riches it hath that puts it into the rank of great Workes and of force to make us consesse that if it be to bee esteemed for the reputation of its Author it is also of more esteem for its own merit We may see therin rare vivacity of wit incredible store of high thoughts and a mervaillous power of perswading Wee may receive there the light of an eminent Doctrine We meet there with an infinite number of choice things The conduct of it is admirable Art hath nothing excellent which is not judicially there observed All the parts therof are agreeable with the whole In fine it s a perfect body to which the Learned have given this commendation that of all the Works of Tertullian there is none to bee compared to this All the following Ages have acknowledged that the Church hath nothing more accomplished and that Religion could not bee better defended nor better perswaded then it is in this Divine Peece The truth is the stile is not so glorious the phrase rude and obscure and it seems as if every one of its periods contayned a mystery the sense therof is so hid But we must pardon an Affrican if it be not expressed with all the grace of the Latine Tongue the fault is not so much in him as in his Countrey If his speech hath not much Eloquence it hath much vigor His discourse flatters not the ears but works with vehemence and impresseth powerfully on the mind of the Readers that which will perswade him Now although Terrullian hath not loftinesse of speech yet we may say hee hath written purely and not used tearms which were not fit to declare vigorously what he conceived and which are not found in the Authors of Humane Learning and of civill right all his words are Latin but his phrase strange and rellisheth of the stile of the Greeks to which he was accustomed by his ordinary reading of their Books It s this mixture that makes it obscure that the most able men meet with difficulties in his Workes and the reason his Apologie or Defence shewes not its beauty to all those that makes use of it There have crept in some opinions not now received and which in that time were not condemned He writes Divels were ingendred by the conjunction of revolted Angels with the daughters of men he speaks of the birth of the soule as well as of that of the body beleeving the child takes both his soul and his body from the substance of his father he sayes the soul cannot suffer alone but he is not constant in his opinion and teaches that the souls of the wicked suffer in hell although separated from the matter and their bodies rest in the grave which is the doctrine of the Catholicke Church Hee mentions Paradise as a place of delights different from that in heaven and separated from the world by the interposition of a Zone of fire where he beleeves the just goe after death to remain till the day of the Lord. And in conclusion le ts slip something from his pen of the age of a thousand years interposed between the end of this world and eternity He is of opinion also that during the course of these thousand yeares Iesus Christ shall raign on the earth with his elect that in the mean time the just being raysed out of their graves shall live with abundance of spirituall felicity and that this age being come to its period the Son of God shall then make his universall judgement It is enough wee have taken notice of these opinions which were not yet errors in the time of Tertullian the Church then not having pronounced any thing to the contrary they conâ—â—ated themselves then to preach the truth of one God in three Persons the mystery of the Birth Life and Death of Iesus Christ the institution of the Sacraments the judgement of the Lord the glory of the blessed in heaven and eternall punishments prepared for the wicked in hell Our Tertullian hath so wel1 establisht this doctrine
are impious and the wicked feare lesse to be seen then the good So you must confess you know nothing of our doings but by common bruit uncertain proofe of the weakeness whereof there is no man ignorant Is there any who knows not the nature of it One of your Authours said same is the swiftest of all evils why thinke you call they it an evill is it because of its swiftness or because its principall office is to discover hidden things or that it often declareth lies indeed it hath this evill quality even when reporting something of truth it cannot forbeare to mingle the same with leasing or falshood Truth never passeth purely through fames mouth either she adds something to or takes something from or makes some notable change in it besides she hath also this fault her credit lasts no longer then she lies she hath no life but so long as she certainly proves nothing so soon as make evident her proofe she ceaseth to be any longer Fame whose property is to make relation of nothing but what 's not certainly knowne so soone â—s delivered for certaine the assurance of the thing delivered succeeds immediatly into its place as being no longer a bruit but a knowne and profess'd truth At what time and when such a thing is known we say not it 's so reported or so the bruit goes but so or so it is without doubt For example we use to say such a man hath got such a government in such a Province when wee know certainly hee hath got the same and when not it is so famed or so reported After we are assured of a thing we make no more reekoning of Fame which is an expression of doubt and uncertainty So there are none but fools ground themselves upon reports wise men believe nothing but what is certain and what time also hath verified on her behalfe And certainly as generall and diffused as same may bee what beliefe soever she hath got with men and with what assurance soever they esteeme her wee must alwayes consider she had a beginning since she hath passed through divers tongues and eares which have given her the vogue shee hath in the world Her originall is ordinarily weake and vicious but together with all her faults she authoriseth and covers all that is added to her from her birth because no body mounts up to the sourse and troubles himselfe to know whether or no the first Author of the relation thereof began with a lie which falls out often either through hatred to them same teares in peeces or liberty usurped to make evill judgments upon simple suspitions or the pleasure some take in lying a pleasure not new among men and to which many are so naturally inclined But God be thanked time reveals the truth of all things it is a sentence wee have from you and whereof wee make use against you the established order of nature cannot suffer any thing long to remaine hid but in the end makes that appear which fame had not discovered Judge then if it be as reasonable you should still persecute us seeing after so long time ther 's nothing but bare report to informe you in the knowledge of the crimes we are supposed to commit nothing proved against us by you but her restimony which is so much the more evill because shee cannot yet prove what she bath heeretofore invented to make us appeare odious and which for so many yeares shee hath affirmed upon the opinion onely of certaine men CHAP. VIII IT is not enough to shew you the weakenesse of the proofes you imploy against us I will make knowne our innocence by your own judgement to overthrow the opinion you have conceived against our life I demand but the testimony of nature who is your mother as well as ours Suppose Christians promise Eternall life as a recompence for all these crimes so full of horrour You may believe it if you list but I would also know if after perswaded by such blacke actions a man might merit Heaven you would bee so barbarous as to desire it at such a rate Can it be imagined one should say these words or the like unto you come on hither die your sword in the bloud of a Child I say in a Childs bloud whose tender age ought to have no enemy who cannot be guilty of injuring any body and whom every one with a fatherly Love ought to cherish Or if the charge of shedding a Childs bloud bee committed to another can it be supposed we should use this discourse unto you Be present at the bloody death of an infant who meets with the end of his life in the beginning of his dayes see a soule depart out of a body so soone as it came in take this blood newly animated dip your bread in it and fill your selfe with the substance thereof Againe while at Table marke well where your Mother and Sister are seated that you may not faile to find them out after they are left in the darke by dogs overthrowing the Candles consequently extinguishing the lignt For you must know you cannot but be faulty if you commit not incest If profiting by these our instructions you square your Faith by the practise of such actions assure your selfe you shall receive everlasting life Answer me now would you to get this never fading selicity do things so contrary to all humanity If nature it selfe be of force sufficient to divert your owne minds from acting such irregular courses you cannot I perswade my selfe be induced to believe that other men would bee faulty therein Yea though yee certainly believe this the onely way to eternall happinesse I dare say you would not by such meanes so barberously difile your selves no neither if you had any such desire have the courage to performe the same Judge then of us by your selves and know wee can no more commit these crimes then you or if wee can your selves as liable thereunto as we But what do you thinke our judgements different form yours that Christians of another race of mankind then you are do you take us for the Cynocephales Sciapodes Monsters of India Lybia do you believe we are made otherwise then other men that the faculties of our bodies otherwise disposed and by a savagenesse more then the most brutish of all people us onely to feed on blood and violate the Lawes of nature in the use embracements which it forbids Certainly if believe these things of Christians ther 's som what in it that you should doe so we are men as well as you And therefore if your souls abhor such like actions you ought not imagine us in regard men as well as Christians to commit them You acknowledge these crimes contrary to nature but you say we deceive them who know us not as if the calumnies you invented against the Christians were not publicke or any could be ignorant thereof That which all the world knowes cannot be dissembled and those who have
to whom they gave charge to keep him carefully This suspicious people feared his Disciples should come and take away his body and having committed this theft perswade them hee was risen because hee had said that in three dayes hee would rise from the grave and triumph over death But the third day being come the earth shooke on a sudden the stone that shut the mouth of the Sepulchre was overturned the Souldiers astonished and troubled with fear and not one of his Disciples durst appeare that they might be accused of taking away his body which not being found there remained nothing in the grave but the linnen wherewith he was wrapt Yet notwithstanding the High Priests divulged this bruit that the body of Jesus was taken away by his Disoiples They had reason to publish this false theft that they might turne away the people from embracing this Doctrine otherwise themselves should lose the authority they had over the People and the profits they drew from them if they had knowne that hee whom they had crucified was truly the son of God Their mindes being thus abused by the ambition and avarice of the Priests they remained in the darknesse of errour for Jesus Christ shewed himselfe not to the People because hee would not doe this favour to the wicked to make them become faithfull in presenting before their eyes his glorious body and it must be that the faith that promis'd such great recompences should bee wrapt up with some difficulties After his resurrection he stayes with some of his Disciples sorty dayes in Galile one of the Provinces in Judea where hee taught them what they should preach to men and having given them to declare his Doctrine throughout all the Earth a cloud invironed him where with received up to Heaven a truth far more certain then any humane testimonies given of your Proculus touching his seeing a Romulus or other of your Princes mounting up into the same place Pilate who in his heart believed in Jesus Christ at the same time wrote all this History to the Emperour Tiberius whereupon the Cesars themselves had worshipped our Master if their government in so doing had been consistent with the men of this world and Christians permitted to have beene saluted Caesars The Disciples of Jesus following the order hee had given them went over all parts of the knowne world to publish the Law of the Gospel But the Jewes their declared Enemies made them indure many punishments which they suffered generously because they knew they were hated only for preaching the truth In the end these Insidels taking advantage of the cruelty of Nero caused the bloud of the Christians inhumanly to be shed But remember when wee told you of the gods you worship we said we would produce them as sit witnesses of the Godhead of Jesus Christ Is it not strange we should imploy them whom you withold from being Christians to make you believe the Doctrine of Christians yet you shall see by and by that your gods beare witness in favour of our Religion against your Idolatry This wee shall tell you when come to declare to you wherin consists all the mystery of our instirution then you shall know both the originall of out Religion the name and the Author thereof Let none therefore object to us any more these crimes so full of infamy let none any more conceive these strange opinions of our lives you must needs belleve what wee declare to you touching the worship we render to God Religion is a sacred thing where it is not permitted to seigne and where lies are counted sacrilegious Every man that saith he worships other God then whom he pretends truly to worship is an Insidell to his God and takes from him the honour hee should render him to transfer the same to another and in transferring it acknowledgeth not his Godhead any longer because hee violates it in denying him We say openly we are Christians we avow it publickly yea even in the midst of tortures the which you make use of to make us deny it When we are torne in pieces and covered with our bloud we cry out as far as our voices will extend wee worship God in Jesus Christ believe if you will Jesus Christ to be man onely It is by him and in him nevertheless that God will bee known and honoured So to the end wee may answer the Jewes Have not they learn'd to worship God on earth by Moses a man whom God sent to teach them to serve him and that he made use of Moses as a man to publish his Law as for the Greeks were not they men that instructed them in their superstitions to wit Orpheus on the mountain of Pierius Museus at Atbens Melampus at Argos and Trophonius in Beotia Then if I should cast mine eyes upon you who are the Masters of all the world do I not finde it was a man a Numa Pompilius that put upon you a Religion so full of ridiculous mysteries and troublesome ceremonies Why should it not be permitted Jesus Christ also to declare his Divinity he to whom only the Divinity appertained and to make himselfe acknowledged for the God of Heaven and Earth He ought not to be suspected for an Impostor as others for hee was not like to a Numa who would not soften the wilde spirits of these savage people and barbarous in filling them with astonishment by the infinite number of gods which made them afraid Hee address'd himself to men pollishe perfectly knowing in the prudence of the world and yet withall their wisedome were blinde as concerning Heaven He came to enlighten and discover to them the truth they knew not Informe your selves whether the God-head of Jesus Christ be the true God-head we ought to worship Whether it change their manners that believe it and makes them become better then they were all the other Deities must bee condemned as false and principally that which is under the names and Images of dead men by the artisice of certaine supposed signes of the miracles they counterfet and the deceitfull Oracles they render passe for a true Divinity although it is knowne that all it doth is but the worke of Divels CHAP. XXII VVE say then that there is in Nature certain spiritual substances to whom the name of Divels is given This name is not new the Philosopher had the knowledge of it and Socrates did nothing Without the permission of his Divell So they say that from his infancy this Divell was alwayes by him and abandoned him not so long as the lived Certes this spirit was not proper but to turne him away from the love of good things The Poets also knew what the Divels were and the ignorant common people have them in their mouths when they would pronounce a malediction It is by an inward motion of the soule that in those imprecations in calling the evill spirits in effect they call Satan who is the Prince of this cursed Company Blato did
at Sirmion the seventeenth of March the chiefest Priest of that goddesse this venerable chiefe of the Evnuches the soure and twentieth of the same Month of March with the horrour and impurity of the bloud he spilt and which came from the wounds hee made in his body rendred his vowes as hee was wont for the preservation of this Prince after he was dead O sleepie Courtiers O tedious dispatchers whose tarrying the cause that Cybele was not acquainted sooner with the Emperours death truly Christians could not choose but make derision at such a goddesse But had it beene in the power of Jupiter to dispose as he thought good of the Empire of the world would he have suffered the power of the Romans to put his Isle of Creet insubjection Would you think the remembrance of the cave of Mount Ida with the noise the Corybantes made in beating on their head attires and playing on their cymballs to hinder those childish cries from discovering him again the acceptable smel of the breath of his nurse should not obliege him rather to oppose himselfe against this conquest would hee not have preferred the place of his buriall before all the greatnesse of the Capitol would hee not rather have enclined to have raysed up above all the countries of the earth that which enclosed his ashes would juno have taken it well that Carthage which she preferred before samos should be overcome and destroyed even by the race of AEneas if I bee not deceived Hic illius Arma Hic currus fuit hoc regnum dea gentibus esse si qua fata sinant jam tum tendetque fovetque Englished thus by John Ogleby out of Virgill Here her Arms and here Her Charriot was that this Earth sway should beare If Fates permit she fosters and intends This unfortunate sister and wife of Jupiter had not the credit of changing the decrees of destiny Fato stat Jupiter esse To Fate was Jupiter himself conforme And yet the Romans have not done them so much honour although they put Carthage under their power against the designe and desires of Juno as to an unchast whore and a villanous and an infamous Larentine now of all the gods you honour its certaine there are many of them that have raigned in the would if they had now the power to give Empires and kingdomes whilst they were kings and commanded maen of whom recived they their authority what gods have beene worshipped by Saturn and by Jupiter it may be t was some Sterculus to whom they gave immortallity because the first found out the invention of dunging the earth but hee lived since their death with the people that inhabited the territory of Rome If any of your gods have not had the Soveraigue power heere below in their time there were Kings that rendred them not as yet Divine honours because they were not as yet acknowledged for gods from whence it followes that it belongs to others then to them to give kingdomes because there were kings established a long time before they consecrated these deities But see how ridiculous a thing it is to attribute the greatnesse of the Romans to the merit of their piety and care had or Religion seeing their Religion became much more pompous and costly since their estate grew powerfull and their dominion enlarged For although Numa was author of all your superstitious mysteries yet in his time the Romans served their gods without Images and Temples their Reliligion being then void of all costlinesse and ostentation their ceremonies then neither rich nor magnificent wee saw not as then Capitolls raised up to Heaven but onely altars of turfe made in hast as served occasion and upon necessity te vessels for their sacrifices were as then but of earth from whence onely issued the odor of all the bloud of the beasts which were sacrificed Engraven representations of the gods then no where appeared For the Greeks and Tuscans who first invented the art of making carved images to the gods were n ot as then spred in the City of Rome It s true therefore the Romans were powerfull before they were Religious neither was it their piety that was the cause of their greatnesse For how should the care of Religion become great to them who owe their greatness to impietie and sacriledge for it I bee not deceived Kingdomes and Empires are established by disorders of war and increase by victories Wars and victories ordinarily produce the taking and ruine of Cities Which things cannot bee done without offending the gods Fury at the same time indifferently assaulting the walls of Temples and Cities slaughters involving Priests and Citizens without distinction and the Souldier eager for his prey sparing no more sacred things then prophane In which regard the Romans committed as many sacrilodges as they obtained conquests triumphed as often over their gods as Over men all Images of strange and captive gods yet in your Temples remaine as so many booties taken form people overcome by you and these gods suffer their enemies to worship them giving an endless Empire to them whose outrages they should rather have punished then recompensed after that sort their sacrilegious flatteries But as it 's unprofitable to honour these gods that have neither sense nor knowledge so it 's as little dangerous to offend them Certes true pietie permits not to believe that this people who as aforesaid encreased Religion by scandalizing it againe scandalized Religion in labouring for its judgement should get this great power to which arrived by any reverence borne by them to divine things neither is it otherwise in like manner to be believed that those Nations whose Countries conduced in their being conquered by them unto the Roman greatness before losing their Countreys should bee destitute of all manner of Religion CHAP. XXVI REturne then into your selves and examine if it bee not more likely that it 's hee distril utes Kingdomes he to whom the World belongs which kings governe and whom Kings depend upon who command on the Earth that it 's hee that hath ordained the change of Emperours in the sequell of times and course of ages who was before all times and who from times hath composed the ages that raiseth up estates and makes them fall from their greatness whom men have acknowledged for their Authour before they had established among them any societie confess your errour Rome this Citie heeretofore a field in ancienter then any of your gods she had her Laws reverenced before she built this vast and magnificent worke of the Capitol The Babylonians reigned before the creation of your high Priests The Medes before that of the fifteene men whom you propounded to consult on the Sybils Bookes The AEgyptians Assyrians and Amazones possessed great Empires before we heard speak of the Saliens Lupercals and Vestall Virgins After all if the gods of the Romans disposed of Kingdomes the Jewish Nation who alwaies neglected these kindes of Deities had never formed an Estate powerfull