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| Chapter XLII.
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Chapter
XLII.
But we are called to account as harm-doers on
another138
| 138 [Elucidation IX. See
Kaye, p. 361.] | ground, and are accused of being useless in
the affairs of life. How in all the world can that be the case with
people who are living among you, eating the same food, wearing the same
attire, having the same habits, under the same necessities of
existence? We are not Indian Brahmins or Gymnosophists, who dwell in
woods and exile themselves from ordinary human life. We do not forget
the debt of gratitude we owe to God, our Lord and Creator; we reject no
creature of His hands, though certainly we exercise restraint upon
ourselves, lest of any gift of His we make an immoderate or sinful use.
So we sojourn with you in the world, abjuring neither forum, nor
shambles, nor bath, nor booth, nor workshop, nor inn, nor weekly
market, nor any other places of commerce. We sail with you, and fight
with you,139
and till the ground
with you; and in like manner we unite with you in your
traffickings—even in the various arts we make public property of
our works for your benefit. How it is we seem useless in your ordinary
business, living with you and by you as we do, I am not able to
understand. But if I do not frequent your religious ceremonies, I am
still on the sacred day a man. I do not at the Saturnalia bathe myself
at dawn, that I may not lose both day and night; yet I bathe at a
decent and healthful hour, which preserves me both in heat and blood. I
can be rigid and pallid like you after ablution when I am dead. I do
not recline in public at the feast of Bacchus, after the manner of the
beast-fighters at their final banquet. Yet of your resources I
partake, wherever I may chance to eat. I do not buy a crown for
my head. What matters it to you how I use them, if nevertheless the
flowers are purchased? I think it more agreeable to have them free and
loose, waving all about. Even if they are woven into a crown, we smell
the crown with our nostrils: let those look to it who scent the perfume
with their hair. We do not go to your spectacles; yet the articles that
are sold there, if I need them, I will obtain more readily at their
proper places. We certainly buy no frankincense. If the Arabias
complain of this, let the Sabæans be well assured that their more
precious and costly merchandise is expended as largely in the burying
of Christians140
as in the fumigating
of the gods. At any rate, you say, the temple revenues are every day
falling off:141
| 141 An index of the growth
of Christianity. | how few now throw in
a contribution! In truth, we are not able to give alms both to your
human and your heavenly mendicants; nor do we think that we are
required to give any but to those who ask for it. Let Jupiter then hold
out his hand and get, for our compassion spends more in the streets
than yours does in the temples. But your other taxes will acknowledge a
debt of gratitude to Christians; for in the faithfulness which keeps us
from fraud upon a brother, we make conscience of paying all their dues:
so that, by ascertaining how much is lost by fraud and falsehood in the
census declarations—the calculation may easily be made—it
would be seen that the ground of complaint in one department of revenue
is compensated by the advantage which others derive.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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