77. Therefore that
bitterness of persecution of which you speak is our deliverance and not
persecution, and our ill-treatment will not bring evil upon us, but
will lead us to the light of liberty. As if some senseless and
stupid fellow were to think that he never punished a man who had been
put into prison3917
| 3917
The ms. and both Roman edd. read
in carcerem natum inegressum; LB. and later edd. have received
from the margin of Ursinus the reading translated above, datum,
omitting the last word altogether, which Oehler, however, would retain
as equivalent to “not to be passed from.” |
with
severity and
cruelty, unless he were to
rage against the very
prison,
break its
stones in pieces, and
burn its
roof, its wall, its
doors; and
strip,
overthrow, and
dash to the ground its other parts, not knowing
that thus he was giving
light to him whom he seemed to be injuring, and
was taking from him the accursed
darkness: in like manner, you
too, by the
flames, banishments,
tortures, and monsters with which you
tear in pieces and rend asunder our bodies, do not
rob us of
life, but
relieve us of our skins, not knowing that, as
far as you
assault and
seek to
rage against these our
shadows and forms, so
far you free us
from pressing and heavy chains, and cutting our bonds, make us fly up
to the light.
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