Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series • VOLUME 2
Augustine — City of God & Christian Doctrine
SECTION 41
Chapter 13.--By What Right or Agreement The Romans Obtained Their First Wives.
Chapter 13.--By What Right or Agreement The Romans Obtained Their First Wives. How is it that neither Juno, who with her husband Jupiter even then cherished "Rome's sons, the nation of the gown," [140] nor Venus herself, could assist the children of the loved Æneas to find wives by some right and equitable means? For the lack…
731 wordsSECTION 42Chapter 14.--Of the Wickedness of the War Waged by the Romans Against the Albans, and of the Victories Won by the Lust of Power.
Chapter 14.--Of the Wickedness of the War Waged by the Romans Against the Albans, and of the Victories Won by the Lust of Power. But what happened after Numa's reign, and under the other kings, when the Albans were provoked into war, with sad results not to themselves alone, but also to the Romans? The long peace of Numa had be…
1,347 wordsSECTION 43Chapter 15.--What Manner of Life and Death the Roman Kings Had.
Chapter 15.--What Manner of Life and Death the Roman Kings Had. And what was the end of the kings themselves? Of Romulus, a flattering legend tells us that he was assumed into heaven. But certain Roman historians relate that he was torn in pieces by the senate for his ferocity, and that a man, Julius Proculus, was suborned to g…
1,816 wordsSECTION 44Chapter 17.--Of the Disasters Which Vexed the Roman Republic After the Inauguration of the Consulship, and of the Non-Intervention of the Gods of Rome.
Chapter 17.--Of the Disasters Which Vexed the Roman Republic After the Inauguration of the Consulship, and of the Non-Intervention of the Gods of Rome. After this, when their fears were gradually diminished,--not because the wars ceased, but because they were not so furious,--that period in which things were "ordered with justi…
1,800 wordsSECTION 45Chapter 18.--The Disasters Suffered by the Romans in the Punic Wars, Which Were Not Mitigated by the Protection of the Gods.
Chapter 18.--The Disasters Suffered by the Romans in the Punic Wars, Which Were Not Mitigated by the Protection of the Gods. In the Punic wars, again, when victory hung so long in the balance between the two kingdoms, when two powerful nations were straining every nerve and using all their resources against one another, how man…
814 wordsSECTION 46Chapter 19.--Of the Calamity of the Second Punic War, Which Consumed the Strength of Both Parties.
Chapter 19.--Of the Calamity of the Second Punic War, Which Consumed the Strength of Both Parties. As to the second Punic war, it were tedious to recount the disasters it brought on both the nations engaged in so protracted and shifting a war, that (by the acknowledgment even of those writers who have made it their object not s…
1,384 wordsSECTION 47Chapter 21.--Of the Ingratitude of Rome to Scipio, Its Deliverer, and of Its Manners During the Period Which Sallust Describes as the Best.
Chapter 21.--Of the Ingratitude of Rome to Scipio, Its Deliverer, and of Its Manners During the Period Which Sallust Describes as the Best. Omitting many things, that I may not exceed the limits of the work I have proposed to myself, I come to the epoch between the second and last Punic wars, during which, according to Sallust,…
729 wordsSECTION 48Chapter 22.--Of the Edict of Mithridates, Commanding that All Roman Citizens Found in Asia Should Be Slain.
Chapter 22.--Of the Edict of Mithridates, Commanding that All Roman Citizens Found in Asia Should Be Slain. These things, I say, I pass in silence; but I can by no means be silent regarding the order given by Mithridates, king of Asia, that on one day all Roman citizens residing anywhere in Asia (where great numbers of them wer…
751 wordsSECTION 49Chapter 25.--Of the Temple of Concord, Which Was Erected by a Decree of the Senate on the Scene of These Seditions and Massacres.
Chapter 25.--Of the Temple of Concord, Which Was Erected by a Decree of the Senate on the Scene of These Seditions and Massacres. A pretty decree of the senate it was, truly, by which the temple of Concord was built on the spot where that disastrous rising had taken place, and where so many citizens of every rank had fallen. [1…
765 wordsSECTION 50Chapter 27.--Of the Civil War Between Marius and Sylla.
Chapter 27.--Of the Civil War Between Marius and Sylla. But when Marius, stained with the blood of his fellow-citizens, whom the rage of party had sacrificed, was in his turn vanquished and driven from the city, it had scarcely time to breathe freely, when, to use the words of Cicero, "Cinna and Marius together returned and too…
856 wordsSECTION 51Chapter 29.--A Comparison of the Disasters Which Rome Experienced During the Gothic and Gallic Invasions, with Those Occasioned by the Authors of the Civil Wars.
Chapter 29.--A Comparison of the Disasters Which Rome Experienced During the Gothic and Gallic Invasions, with Those Occasioned by the Authors of the Civil Wars. What fury of foreign nations, what barbarian ferocity, can compare with this victory of citizens over citizens? Which was more disastrous, more hideous, more bitter to…
1,472 wordsSECTION 52Book IV. [160]
Book IV. [160] ------------------------ Argument--In this book it is proved that the extent and long duration of the Roman empire is to be ascribed, not to Jove or the gods of the heathen, to whom individually scarce even single things and the very basest functions were believed to be entrusted, but to the one true God, the au…
1,209 wordsSECTION 53Chapter 3.--Whether the Great Extent of the Empire, Which Has Been Acquired Only by Wars, is to Be Reckoned Among the Good Things Either of the Wise or the Happy.
Chapter 3.--Whether the Great Extent of the Empire, Which Has Been Acquired Only by Wars, is to Be Reckoned Among the Good Things Either of the Wise or the Happy. Now, therefore, let us see how it is that they dare to ascribe the very great extent and duration of the Roman empire to those gods whom they contend that they worshi…
887 wordsSECTION 54Chapter 5.--Of the Runaway Gladiators Whose Power Became Like that of Royal Dignity.
Chapter 5.--Of the Runaway Gladiators Whose Power Became Like that of Royal Dignity. I shall not therefore stay to inquire what sort of men Romulus gathered together, seeing he deliberated much about them,--how, being assumed out of that life they led into the fellowship of his city, they might cease to think of the punishment …
857 wordsSECTION 55Chapter 7.--Whether Earthly Kingdoms in Their Rise and Fall Have Been Either Aided or Deserted by the Help of the Gods.
Chapter 7.--Whether Earthly Kingdoms in Their Rise and Fall Have Been Either Aided or Deserted by the Help of the Gods. If this kingdom was so great and lasting without the aid of the gods, why is the ample territory and long duration of the Roman empire to be ascribed to the Roman gods? For whatever is the cause in it, the sam…
1,349 wordsSECTION 56Chapter 9.--Whether the Great Extent and Long Duration of the Roman Empire Should Be Ascribed to Jove, Whom His Worshippers Believe to Be the Chief God.
Chapter 9.--Whether the Great Extent and Long Duration of the Roman Empire Should Be Ascribed to Jove, Whom His Worshippers Believe to Be the Chief God. Therefore omitting, or passing by for a little, that crowd of petty gods, we ought to inquire into the part performed by the great gods, whereby Rome has been made so great as …
1,290 wordsSECTION 57Chapter 11.--Concerning the Many Gods Whom the Pagan Doctors Defend as Being One and the Same Jove.
Chapter 11.--Concerning the Many Gods Whom the Pagan Doctors Defend as Being One and the Same Jove. Let them therefore assert as many things as ever they please in physical reasonings and disputations. One while let Jupiter be the soul of this corporeal world, who fills and moves that whole mass, constructed and compacted out o…
1,143 wordsSECTION 58Chapter 12.--Concerning the Opinion of Those Who Have Thought that God is the Soul of the World, and the World is the Body of God.
Chapter 12.--Concerning the Opinion of Those Who Have Thought that God is the Soul of the World, and the World is the Body of God. Ought not men of intelligence, and indeed men of every kind, to be stirred up to examine the nature of this opinion? For there is no need of excellent capacity for this task, that putting away the d…
1,102 wordsSECTION 59Chapter 16.--What Was the Reason Why the Romans, in Detailing Separate Gods for All Things and All Movements of the Mind, Chose to Have the Temple of Quiet Outside the Gates.
Chapter 16.--What Was the Reason Why the Romans, in Detailing Separate Gods for All Things and All Movements of the Mind, Chose to Have the Temple of Quiet Outside the Gates. But I wonder very much, that while they assigned to separate gods single things, and (well nigh) all movements of the mind; that while they invoked the go…
978 wordsSECTION 60Chapter 19.--Concerning Fortuna Muliebris. [174]
Chapter 19.--Concerning Fortuna Muliebris. [174] To this supposed deity, whom they call Fortuna, they ascribe so much, indeed, that they have a tradition that the image of her, which was dedicated by the Roman matrons, and called Fortuna Muliebris, has spoken, and has said, once and again, that the matrons pleased her by their …
1,414 wordsSECTION 61Chapter 22.--Concerning the Knowledge of the Worship Due to the Gods, Which Varro Glories in Having Himself Conferred on the Romans.
Chapter 22.--Concerning the Knowledge of the Worship Due to the Gods, Which Varro Glories in Having Himself Conferred on the Romans. What is it, then, that Varro boasts he has bestowed as a very great benefit on his fellow-citizens, because he not only recounts the gods who ought to be worshipped by the Romans, but also tells w…
1,670 wordsSECTION 62Chapter 24.--The Reasons by Which the Pagans Attempt to Defend Their Worshipping Among the Gods the Divine Gifts Themselves.
Chapter 24.--The Reasons by Which the Pagans Attempt to Defend Their Worshipping Among the Gods the Divine Gifts Themselves. We may, however, consider their reasons. Is it to be believed, say they, that our forefathers were besotted even to such a degree as not to know that these things are divine gifts, and not gods? But as th…
1,120 wordsSECTION 63Chapter 27.--Concerning the Three Kinds of Gods About Which the Pontiff Scævola Has Discoursed.
Chapter 27.--Concerning the Three Kinds of Gods About Which the Pontiff Scævola Has Discoursed. It is recorded that the very learned pontiff Scævola [179] had distinguished about three kinds of gods--one introduced by the poets, another by the philosophers, another by the statesmen. The first kind he declares to be trifling, be…
983 wordsSECTION 64Chapter 29.--Of the Falsity of the Augury by Which the Strength and Stability of the Roman Empire Was Considered to Be Indicated.
Chapter 29.--Of the Falsity of the Augury by Which the Strength and Stability of the Roman Empire Was Considered to Be Indicated. For what kind of augury is that which they have declared to be most beautiful, and to which I referred a little ago, that Mars, and Terminus, and Juventas would not give place even to Jove, the king …
748 wordsSECTION 65Chapter 30.--What Kind of Things Even Their Worshippers Have Owned They Have Thought About the Gods of the Nations.
Chapter 30.--What Kind of Things Even Their Worshippers Have Owned They Have Thought About the Gods of the Nations. Cicero the augur laughs at auguries, and reproves men for regulating the purposes of life by the cries of crows and jackdaws. [182] But it will be said that an academic philosopher, who argues that all things are …
1,501 wordsSECTION 66Chapter 32.--In What Interest the Princes of the Nations Wished False Religions to Continue Among the People Subject to Them.
Chapter 32.--In What Interest the Princes of the Nations Wished False Religions to Continue Among the People Subject to Them. Varro says also, concerning the generations of the gods, that the people have inclined to the poets rather than to the natural philosophers; and that therefore their forefathers,--that is, the ancient Ro…
961 wordsSECTION 67Book V. [188]
Book V. [188] ------------------------ Argument--Augustin first discusses the doctrine of fate, for the sake of confuting those who are disposed to refer to fate the power and increase of the Roman empire, which could not be attributed to false gods, as has been shown in the preceding book. After that, he proves that there is …
1,058 wordsSECTION 68Chapter 2.--On the Difference in the Health of Twins.
Chapter 2.--On the Difference in the Health of Twins. Cicero says that the famous physician Hippocrates has left in writing that he had suspected that a certain pair of brothers were twins, from the fact that they both took ill at once, and their disease advanced to its crisis and subsided in the same time in each of them. [190…
1,081 wordsSECTION 69Chapter 4.--Concerning the Twins Esau and Jacob, Who Were Very Unlike Each Other Both in Their Character and Actions.
Chapter 4.--Concerning the Twins Esau and Jacob, Who Were Very Unlike Each Other Both in Their Character and Actions. In the time of the ancient fathers, to speak concerning illustrious persons, there were born two twin brothers, the one so immediately after the other, that the first took hold of the heel of the second. So grea…
1,332 wordsSECTION 70Chapter 6.--Concerning Twins of Different Sexes.
Chapter 6.--Concerning Twins of Different Sexes. But even in the very conception of twins, which certainly occurs at the same moment in the case of both, it often happens that the one is conceived a male, and the other a female. I know two of different sexes who are twins. Both of them are alive, and in the flower of their age;…
1,349 wordsSECTION 71Chapter 8.--Concerning Those Who Call by the Name of Fate, Not the Position of the Stars, But the Connection of Causes Which Depends on the Will of God.
Chapter 8.--Concerning Those Who Call by the Name of Fate, Not the Position of the Stars, But the Connection of Causes Which Depends on the Will of God. But, as to those who call by the name of fate, not the disposition of the stars as it may exist when any creature is conceived, or born, or commences its existence, but the who…
2,730 wordsSECTION 72Chapter 10.--Whether Our Wills are Ruled by Necessity.
[194] De Divinat.ii. [195] Ps. xiv. 1. [196] Book iii. [197] Ps. lxii. 11, 12. Chapter 10.--Whether Our Wills are Ruled by Necessity. Wherefore, neither is that necessity to be feared, for dread of which the Stoics labored to make such distinctions among the causes of things as should enable them to rescue certain things fr…
922 wordsSECTION 73Chapter 11.--Concerning the Universal Providence of God in the Laws of Which All Things are Comprehended.
Chapter 11.--Concerning the Universal Providence of God in the Laws of Which All Things are Comprehended. Therefore God supreme and true, with His Word and Holy Spirit (which three are one), one God omnipotent, creator and maker of every soul and of every body; by whose gift all are happy who are happy through verity and not th…
2,557 wordsSECTION 74Chapter 13.--Concerning the Love of Praise, Which, Though It is a Vice, is Reckoned a Virtue, Because by It Greater Vice is Restrained.
[198] Sallust, Cat. vii. [199] Augustin notes that the name consul is derived from consulere, and thus signifies a more benign rule than that of a rex (from regere), or dominus (from dominari). [200] Æneid, viii. 646. [201] Ibid. i. 279. [202] Ibid. vi. 847. [203] Sallust, in Cat. c. xi. [204] Sallust, in Cat. c. 54. [205…
1,253 wordsSECTION 75Chapter 15.--Concerning the Temporal Reward Which God Granted to the Virtues of the Romans.
Chapter 15.--Concerning the Temporal Reward Which God Granted to the Virtues of the Romans. Now, therefore, with regard to those to whom God did not purpose to give eternal life with His holy angels in His own celestial city, to the society of which that true piety which does not render the service of religion, which the Greeks…
2,935 wordsSECTION 76Chapter 19.--Concerning the Difference Between True Glory and the Desire of Domination.
How could these, and whatever like things are found in the Roman history, have become so widely known, and have been proclaimed by so great a fame, had not the Roman empire, extending far and wide, been raised to its greatness by magnificent successes? Wherefore, through that empire, so extensive and of so long continuance, so i…
1,350 wordsSECTION 77Chapter 20.--That It is as Shameful for the Virtues to Serve Human Glory as Bodily Pleasure.
Chapter 20.--That It is as Shameful for the Virtues to Serve Human Glory as Bodily Pleasure. Philosophers,--who place the end of human good in virtue itself, in order to put to shame certain other philosophers, who indeed approve of the virtues, but measure them all with reference to the end of bodily pleasure, and think that t…
1,114 wordsSECTION 78Chapter 22.--The Durations and Issues of War Depend on the Will of God.
Chapter 22.--The Durations and Issues of War Depend on the Will of God. Thus also the durations of wars are determined by Him as He may see meet, according to His righteous will, and pleasure, and mercy, to afflict or to console the human race, so that they are sometimes of longer, sometimes of shorter duration. The war of the …
1,140 wordsSECTION 79Chapter 24.--What Was the Happiness of the Christian Emperors, and How Far It Was True Happiness.
Chapter 24.--What Was the Happiness of the Christian Emperors, and How Far It Was True Happiness. For neither do we say that certain Christian emperors were therefore happy because they ruled a long time, or, dying a peaceful death, left their sons to succeed them in the empire, or subdued the enemies of the republic, or were a…
734 wordsSECTION 80Chapter 26.--On the Faith and Piety of Theodosius Augustus.
Chapter 26.--On the Faith and Piety of Theodosius Augustus. And on this account, Theodosius not only preserved during the lifetime of Gratian that fidelity which was due to him, but also, after his death, he, like a true Christian, took his little brother Valentinian under his protection, as joint emperor, after he had been exp…
1,383 wordsSource & rights
Historical text source: Christian Classics Ethereal Library. The downloaded text itself records Public Domain.