醫治希臘病 第 1 章

Often, when I have fallen in with certain men addicted to the mythology of the Greeks, they have ridiculed our faith, saying that we do nothing more than enjoin upon those whom we instruct in divine matters simply to believe; and they accused the apostles of being unlearned, calling them barbarians who lacked the polish of fine speech.

They also declared that honouring the martyrs was laughable, and that it was utterly senseless for the living to try to procure benefit from the dead.

And they added other things very like these, which this treatise will set forth.

To those men I gave the answers that were fitting, refuting their accusations.

But I judged it impious and ungodly to overlook those of simple character who were being deceived by such men, and not to write down and expose the vanity of these charges.

I have divided the work into twelve discourses, and have given the discussions a relaxed, flowing style;

for I judged this suited to instruction—especially since, making use of the testimonies of Plato and the other philosophers, it was necessary that my own words, not being wholly out of tune with theirs, should be fitted to them and bear some resemblance to them.

The first discourse offers a defence on behalf of faith and of the apostles' lack of formal learning, drawing its proofs from the Greek philosophers.

The second enumerates the opinions held about the first principle of all things by the most renowned sages among the Greeks and by those after them who were called philosophers;

and setting beside them the true theology of Moses, who was older than all of them, it refutes their false teaching and shows the dazzling truth of his doctrine.

The third teaches what has been told in myth among the Greeks concerning those they call the secondary gods, and what divine Scripture teaches us concerning incorporeal but created natures—so that again, by this comparison, the praiseworthiness of what we revere may be displayed, and the foulness and stench of those abominable myths exposed.

The fourth takes as its subject matter and the cosmos, and shows that our account of the world's origin is far more seemly than that of Plato and the others.

Concerning the nature of man, the fifth takes up the contest, displaying both the Greek and the Christian opinions and teaching how great is the difference between them—as of light and darkness.

The sixth place fell to the discourse on providence,

and by natural reasonings it demonstrates that this providence is to be observed in the creation and appears in each of the things brought about by God.

Since it was necessary also to show the superfluity of the sacrifices, the seventh discourse contains this argument, accusing the Greek sacrifices by philosophical arguments, and by prophetic ones exposing the childishness of the Jewish legislation.

Using the testimonies of philosophers and historians, and indeed of poets as well, it shows that the Greeks honoured the dead not only with libations but also with sacrifices, calling some of them gods, some demigods, and some heroes—most of whom had lived in licentiousness.

I judged it useful also to compare our own lawgivers with those who had become most renowned among the Greeks—I mean the fishermen, the leather-worker, and the tax-collectors—and again to show by comparison the difference: that those laws perished, along with their framers, in the gloom of oblivion, whereas the laws of the fishermen flourish not only among Greeks and Romans, but also among Scythians, Sarmatians, Persians, and the other barbarians.

This comparison the ninth discourse contains.

But indeed I also display the difference in practical virtue, since I see the Greek faction giving itself great airs over the philosophers of old and undertaking to extol their lives in their speeches.

The twelfth discourse will therefore show that the life of those men was unworthy not only of philosophers but even of praiseworthy slaves, whereas the life of the apostles and of those who followed them was superior to human nature and like that of beings freed from bodies and ranging about heaven.

The name of the book is The Cure of the Greek Maladies, or The Recognition of Evangelical Truth from Greek Philosophy.

I, then, both for the sake of healing the sick and providing for the benefit of the healthy, have undertaken this labour;

and I exhort those who come upon the labours of others: if everything written is well, to praise the Giver of these things and to render prayers in return to those who have toiled;

but if some things are deficient, not to condemn the whole on account of these, but to gain the profit from what has been well said.

Medical healing exists, I suppose, both for the body, and also indeed for the soul;

for to each of these—to the one and to the other—many afflictions come; but to the body they come involuntarily, while to the soul, for the most part, they are self-chosen.

Knowing this well, God—being all-wise, the Creator of souls and bodies and of all things—assigned to each nature its fitting remedies, and moreover appointed physicians, training some in this science and some in that, and bade them generalship and to fight valiantly against the diseases.

But those whose bodies are not in good condition, both chafing at the disease and longing for health, yield to the physicians, who apply not only gentle remedies but also—even if they cut, even if they cauterize, even if they bid them go hungry, even if they offer cups full of bitter and unpleasant things;

and reaping health through such grievous care, they offer payment to those who heal them thus, and in receiving the treatment they do not pry into the preparation of the remedies;

for they long for salvation, they do not investigate its manner.

But those who have admitted the ruin of unbelief not only are ignorant of their grievous disease, but even suppose themselves to be enjoying the highest good fortune;

and whenever anyone wishes to apply a remedy to their malady, they at once leap away—just like those gripped by frenzy, who shake off the treatment offered them and flee from healing as from a sickness.

Those who pursue this science must, however, both endure them when they grow angry and put up with their abuse—even if they strike with the fist, even if they kick; for such are the offences committed by those who are out of their senses;

and the physicians are not vexed when these things happen, but even apply bonds and forcibly douse their heads and devise every contrivance, so as to drive out the malady and restore to the whole the former harmony of the parts.

This, then, we too must do, and must care for those so disposed as far as we are able.

For even if those enslaved to the malady are very few, and resemble some thick sediment that does not pass through the pores of the strainer because of its thickness, yet they must not be neglected, nor must we overlook them as they perish under the malady; rather, every passage must be sought out, so as to scatter the mist that lies upon them and to display the radiance of the intellectual light.

For no diligent farmer cuts out the many thorns yet leaves the few; rather, even if he finds two, even if one, he tears it up by the root and renders his cornfield clean.

Much more, then, must we do this;

for the law of our husbandry bids us not to cut out, but to transform the thorns.

Come then, let us bring the husbandman's hoe to the thorns, and with the mattock of reasoning open up the furrows of their hearing, so that none of the obstacles lying in the way may check the stream of irrigation;

and indeed let us, as upon the sick, pour out the douche and apply the saving and healing remedies.

First of all, let us heal the malady of conceit.

For indeed some of them, having had a share in poetic and rhetorical learning, and some having tasted of Plato's eloquence, despise the divine oracles as composed in a style not at all finely embellished, and do not deign to learn the truth of Being from fishermen.

And while they pluck the fruits of every craft, they do not meddle with the tongues of the craftsmen;

for they do not require their leather-workers or smiths or carpenters or painters or shipwrights or pilots to be Athenians, but even if they are Scythians, Sarmatians, Iberians, or Egyptians, they enjoy their crafts with pleasure, demanding only the accuracy of these, and not at all minding the difference of their nations.

And when they listen to a lyre-player, they require only the harmony of his playing, and do not at all seek to learn whether he is Greek or barbarian;

yet the learning of the truth alone they are unwilling to receive without fuss, but reckon it a disgrace if a barbarian should teach them this tongue;

and this vanity is held by men who have not even reached the heights of Greek philosophy, but who, as the saying goes, have tasted of only a few things with the tips of their lips, and have gleaned a few scraps from here and there.

But the most illustrious of the Greek philosophers, whose memory is on the lips of the learned and much spoken of even to this day—Pherecydes the Syrian, Pythagoras the Samian, Thales the Milesian, Solon the Athenian, and indeed that Plato, son of Ariston and disciple of Socrates, who surpassed them all in eloquence—did not shrink, for the sake of finding the truth, from journeying about Egypt and Egyptian Thebes and Sicily and Italy; and this, when not a single kingdom then governed those nations, but there were different forms of government in the cities and different laws;

for some embraced democracy, some oligarchy, and some were under tyranny, while others were ruled lawfully by kings.

Yet none of these obstacles held them back from hastening to barbarian peoples and learning from them what they supposed those men knew better than themselves;

namely, to be taught by the Hebrews the things concerning the existent God.

And these things Plutarch the Boeotian teaches, and Porphyry too teaches them—he who raged against the truth—and moreover Numenius the Pythagorean and very many others.

They say that Pythagoras also submitted to circumcision, having learned this from the Egyptians;

and the Egyptians received this law from the Hebrews.

For when Abraham the patriarch received from the God of all the commandment of circumcision, his race kept this;

and they dwelt in Egypt for a very long time, and the Egyptians emulated the Hebrews.

That circumcising infants was not an ancient law among the Egyptians, Pharaoh's daughter is a trustworthy witness;

for when she found Moses cast upon the riverbank, she at once saw the circumcision, recognized his race, and named the infant an offspring of the Hebrews.

Those, then, who had passed through all education had so great a love of learning that they despised even great wars and seas, frequented barbarian men, and gathered from everywhere whatever they judged necessary;

and Socrates, son of Sophroniscus, the best of the philosophers, did not think it beneath philosophy to learn something useful even from women.

But most of these men do not even know the 'Wrath' of Achilles, with which the young are accustomed to begin their studies of the renowned subjects;

while others, having gleaned a little from the poets and a little from the orators, and not having learned even the very names of the philosophers—except for two or three of the notable ones—call the divine Scripture barbarous, and reckon it shameful to learn the truth from it.

And from their ignorance there arises in them the malady of arrogance.

For if they had read the Greek histories, they would surely have known that the Greeks were taught the illustrious sciences and most of the crafts by the barbarians.

For they say the Egyptians were the first to discover geometry and astronomy;

astrology and the casting of nativities are said to be a Chaldean invention;

the Arabs and Phrygians were the first to devise augury;

the rhombus is the work of the Tyrrhenians, and the pipes are the Phrygians'—as the tragedies teach, and the histories teach along with them.

And the Greeks recount that the Phoenicians discovered letters, and that Cadmus first brought these into Greece;

and they say that Apis the Egyptian began the art of medicine, and that Asclepius afterwards augmented the craft;

and they say that the first boat was built in Libya.

And as for the rites of Rhea, or Cybele, or Brimo (or whatever you wish to name her—

for great is the abundance of names among you, though there are no realities underlying them)—nevertheless, that the Greeks transferred from Phrygia into Greece both these festivals and the rites performed in them, the witnesses already summoned plainly teach.

But if the Greeks were taught the crafts and the sciences and the rites of the demons and the first elements by the barbarians, and pride themselves on their teachers, why on earth do you—who cannot even understand what those men wrote—refuse to learn the truth from men who received a God-given wisdom? But if it is because they did not spring from Greece that you are unwilling to lend them your ears, then it is time for you no longer to call Thales wise, nor Pythagoras a philosopher, nor Pherecydes, that man's teacher.

[For Pythagoras was not] an Athenian, nor a Spartan, nor a Corinthian;

Aristoxenus, Aristarchus, and Theopompus say that Pythagoras was a Tyrrhenian, while Neanthes calls him a Tyrian;

and Thales some call a Milesian, but Leandros and Herodotus called him a Phoenician;

and Empedocles was of Acragas, and this is a Sicilian city.

But if indeed you say this—that these men were born and reared outside Greece, yet were trained in the Greek tongue—then first you admit that wise men have arisen also among other nations;

for indeed you marvel at Zamolxis the Thracian and Anacharsis the Scythian for their wisdom, and the fame of the Brahmans is great among you;

and these are Indians, not Greeks.

Next, you are refuted from another quarter too, for setting eloquence above truth not rightly; for you yourselves, I suppose, admit that Socrates, son of Sophroniscus, was the best of the Greek philosophers;

yet this man was born of a stone-cutter father, and for a very long time followed his father's craft.

And many others have said this, and Porphyry too recorded it in the third book of his Philosophical History;

[he says:] Let us tell concerning Socrates the things deemed worthy of memory by others also, sifting briefly the things variously fabricated by learned men, both to his praise and to his blame, but leaving uninvestigated whether he himself practised the stone-cutting craft together with his father, or his father alone.

For this, practised for a short time, in no way hindered him as regards wisdom.

And if indeed he was a sculptor of statues, all the more so;

for the craft is clean and brings no reproach. And what follows holds the same sense;

for he introduces certain men saying that Socrates plied the stone-working craft.

But perhaps he spent his earliest years as a stone-worker, and later, falling in love with poetic and rhetorical discourses, partook of education.

But neither can this be said;

for Porphyry said the very opposite;

[he says] that he was without aptitude for nothing, yet uneducated about everything, to put it simply;

for he scarcely knew his letters at all, but was ridiculous whenever he had to write or read anything, stammering like little children. And Plato too has set down him in the Apology saying such things as these:

'And so now too I make this request of you, which is just, as it seems to me—to disregard the manner of my speech (for perhaps it may be worse, perhaps better), and to consider this very thing and apply your mind to it, whether I speak justly.' Yet though he had an unlearned and uneducated tongue, he was worthier of reverence not only than all the rest, but even than Plato, who surpassed all the Greeks in eloquence.

And this not even the son of Ariston himself would deny.

For how could he, seeing that he attributed and adapted to that man all the discourses he laboured to bring forth, and contrived that they be reckoned the offspring of that man's mind? And that this man too—who eclipsed not only all other men, not only the rest of the Greeks, but even the Athenians themselves in eloquence and beauty of words—enjoined attention not to the elegance of the words, but to the harmony of the thoughts, hear him saying plainly in the Statesman:

'And if you guard against being eager about words, you will appear richer in wisdom as you advance in age.' Hear too in the fifth book of the Republic what he says:

'Shall we then set down all these, and the others who are learners of suchlike things, and the philosophers of the petty crafts, [as philosophers]?' 'By no means,' I said, 'but as like philosophers.'

'And the true ones,' he said, 'whom do you mean?' 'Those,' said I, 'who love the contemplation of truth.'

[Wisdom lies not] in philosophy that has hypotheses, nor in music, which is conjectural, nor in astronomy, which is crammed with natural, flowing, and probable accounts, but in the Good itself, through knowledge and truth. Hear, O men, the philosopher: calling those skilled in music and geometry and the other suchlike things not philosophers but like philosophers, while naming the teachers of truth the truly real philosophers;

and in the third book of the Laws he says this:

'Let this, then, be laid down as resolved and declared: that to those citizens who are ignorant of these things, no office whatever is to be entrusted, and as ignorant they are to be reproached, even if they be ever so skilled in reasoning and have laboured at every refinement and at everything that naturally tends to the soul's growth;

but those who are in the opposite condition, these are to be called wise, even if, as the saying goes, they know neither letters nor swimming, and to them the offices are to be entrusted as to men of understanding.' How could anyone more truly and clearly refute the ignorance and conceit that now prevail? For the crowning point of the philosophers defines wisdom not in the learning of letters, but in the knowledge of truth;

and those who know this truth, even if they do not know even the first elements, he names wise;

but those who have passed through all education, yet do not possess the knowledge of truth and justice, he rejects and drives out and does not permit to rule.

And moreover in the Theaetetus, mocking the babblers about lofty matters, he speaks thus:

'Just as it is said of Thales, O Theodorus, that while doing astronomy and looking upward he fell into a well, and a clever and graceful Thracian serving-maid jeered at him, saying that he was eager to know the things in heaven, while what was behind him and at his very feet escaped his notice.' And again in the same dialogue:

'And such a man [the true philosopher], because of his lack of leisure for it, must inevitably become no less ignorant of such things than a herdsman who throws a wall round his fold in the mountains.'

'And whenever he hears that someone owns ten thousand acres of land or more, as though possessing marvellous wealth, it all seems small to him, accustomed as he is to gazing upon the whole earth.' And besides these things he adds this also:

'For the knowledge and virtue of this man are true, while his ignorance and vice are plain;

but the other cleverness and seeming wisdoms, when they arise in political affairs and in positions of power, are vulgar, and in the crafts, mechanical.' So accurately, then, did even those who had learned every form of discourse know how much more precious truth is than phrases and words, and how ignorance of such refinement in no way harms it.

Why, then, O dear sirs, are you unwilling to learn the meaning of the apostolic teaching, but reproach only its barbarous speech—and that when you hear your own philosophers say that the Greeks strayed from the truth, while the barbarians rather discovered it? For that Porphyry too—who eagerly took up the war against us—in his work On the Philosophy Derived from Oracles spoke thus:

'For brazen-bound is the road to the gods, both steep and rough;

many of its paths the barbarians discovered, but the Greeks went astray;

and those who already held them even corrupted them.'

And if he yoked also the Egyptians and Chaldeans and Phoenicians with these, one must know that the Phoenicians too, being neighbours and borderers of these, learned the truth from them—if indeed they learned it;

[for the Hebrews dwelt in] Egypt for a time;

and the Chaldeans likewise reaped the greatest benefit from these, for having enslaved them they settled them in Babylon;

then, from the wonders that came to pass there concerning the furnace and the lions, they reckoned them worthy teachers of the truth.

And having subdued the Lydians and taken these too under his hand, he surely imparted to his subjects the things he had learned from them.

That the Pythian also bore witness to the Hebrews' truth, and that Porphyry recorded the oracle, it suffices to make plain even these things;

and that this same man again charges the Greek philosophers with the greatest ignorance, hear what he says in the work he wrote To Boethus, On the Soul:

for he says, among many other things, this also:

'For what doctrine in philosophy is not disputable?' And to Anebo the Egyptian he wrote such things as these:

'I will begin my friendship with you from the gods and good demons and the philosophical doctrines akin to these;

concerning which very many things have indeed been said even among the Greek philosophers, yet for the most part they have been said from conjecture, having their first principles from belief.' And again, a little later:

'For among us there is much wrangling of words, since the good is guessed at from human reasonings;

but those for whom union with the higher has been contrived always pass over this part as regards examination.' If, then, the doctrines of the philosophers are disputable—for they are inventions of human reasonings—and there is much strife among them and an implacable wrangling of words, while to certain others Porphyry has borne witness of union and converse with God, then for what reason, O friend, do you cling to human and doubtful arguments, but do not admit the teachings of God-loving men? For if you reject them as barbarians, you would be acting contrary to yourselves;

for you trust even Pythagoras—who according to some was a Tyrrhenian, according to others a Tyrian—and you employ the Stagirite as your teacher, and you marvel at the man of Sinope and the others, who had homelands not Greek but barbarian;

[and so it does not befit you to reject the truth merely because it came from barbarians.]

And we hear too the Egyptian priest saying to Solon—and these things also are written by Plato in the Timaeus:

'O Solon, Solon, you Greeks are always children, and there is no Greek who is an old man;

for you possess no learning grey with time.' But if the learning of the Greeks is newer, while that of the Hebrews is the most ancient and oldest, and has the truth blossoming with age, then plainly it is to be preferred and chosen above the new and doubtful—or rather the false and unconvincingly fabricated.

But neither is the unlearnedness of speech a sufficient excuse for you;

for we have shown that Socrates, the chief of the philosophers, was uninitiated in Greek learning, and that Plato preferred truth above all knowledge and eloquence.

And if you accuse the very name of 'faith'—for I have heard you saying this too, that we offer no proof whatever of our doctrines, but only enjoin those we instruct merely to believe—above all you outright slander our teaching;

for it is the testimony of the facts themselves that we fit to our words;

whereas you, in turn, have been pelted with your own—as the proverb has it—with your own feathers.

For indeed that much-talked-of Pythagoras, son of Mnesarchus and disciple of Pherecydes, who led the Italic school, had laid down a law for his disciples to keep silence for a period of five years and only lend their ears to the discourse, so that they might receive what was said without dispute and without contention, believing it to be so and not meddling as though in doubt.

But if both speakers and hearers reckoned it sufficient ground for belief that the doctrines and teachings were Pythagoras's, who then would be so foolish—or rather so utterly thunderstruck—as to doubt and not believe what is said when the God of all teaches, and not to render to the God of all even as much reverence as those who shared in Pythagoras's teaching rendered to Pythagoras? And how is it not monstrous, O dear sirs, that Plato should enjoin believing even the poets without doubt, while you are angry with us because we exhort men to believe God when He teaches? Or are these not Plato's very words:

'But concerning the other demons, to tell and to know their generation is too great a task for us;

we must believe those who have spoken before, being—as they said—the offspring of gods, and clearly knowing somehow their own ancestors.

It is therefore impossible to disbelieve the children of gods, even though they speak without probable and necessary proofs; but since they profess to report things that are their own, we must, following the law, believe them.' These things Plato said in the Timaeus concerning the poets, and he charged men to believe Homer and Hesiod and the other poets who tell their myths, and was not ashamed to say that they speak without probable and necessary proofs—and that when he elsewhere ridicules the things said by them, as we shall plainly show in another place.

But if Plato bids men believe those who tell those drivelling tales and fashion the most shameful myths, and to demand of them no proof at all, then it is far more holy and just to believe the inspired apostles and prophets, who say nothing shameful, mythical, or implausible, but teach things wholly befitting God, all-holy and saving.

And that even those who followed the opinions of the philosophers, using faith as their guide—some embracing these men's views, some those—anyone may very easily learn by examining the differences of their doctrines.

For some said the soul was immortal, others mortal, and others defined it as a kind of mixture, saying that one part of it is mortal and another immortal;

and as for visible things, some said they were ungenerated, others generated; and some that they were composed from earth, others from matter, others from atoms;

and some that the universe is ensouled, others that it is soulless.

Yet even though they spoke differently, both these and those had some who believed what was said by them;

and neither would the one party have supposed these things, nor the other those, to be sound, had not some faith persuaded them to accept what was said.

Wherefore Plato's Socrates too, in the Gorgias, after saying much about those punished in Hades, and indeed also about those proclaimed as pious, added:

'These things, O Callicles, are what I, having heard them, believe to be true.' Yet they were neither evident nor visible matters, but things hidden from most men and confessed by few;

yet nonetheless he said he believed them to be true, and neither did he himself adduce any proof of his belief, nor did his hearers demand one.

And moreover in the first book of the Laws Plato confirmed the argument concerning faith:

'For if your laws have been even moderately well framed, one of the finest of laws would be this: to permit no young man to inquire which of them are well or not well made, but with one voice and from one mouth all to agree that all are well laid down.' Not even in these matters, then, does Plato allow meddlesome inquiry, but bids men receive faithfully what is enacted as law, and not pry into whether it is good or not.

And Theognis the Sicilian poet too proclaims faith its nursling and says:

'A faithful man is worth weighing against gold and silver, Cyrnus, in grievous strife.'

But if he said that the man faithful in strife is more precious than gold and silver, what equivalent could anyone declare for the man who believes the divine oracles without doubt? Indeed, I think what Heraclitus the Ephesian said fits exactly those who, like you, contradict:

'The uncomprehending, when they have heard, are like the deaf;' and the proverb bears witness to them: 'present, they are absent.'

[And so says] Empedocles of Acragas, speaking thus:

'But to the wicked it is very natural to disbelieve what prevails;

for thus the assurances of our Muse command.'

The unbelieving, then, are of the portion of the wicked, according to the man of Acragas;

and these same are uncomprehending and like the deaf, according to Heraclitus.

Moreover, Parmenides the Eleatic too, the companion of Xenophanes of Colophon, enjoins approaching intelligible things with faith:

'Behold things that, though absent, are firmly present to the mind.'

For it is possible to draw near to intelligible things by the mind alone;

but apart from faith, not even the mind can see the things it contemplates.

And this Solon too hints at:

'It is hardest of all to perceive the unseen measure of judgement, which alone holds the limits of all things.'

But if it is hardest to perceive, then to express it is wholly impossible.

And Empedocles too says concerning invisible things:

'It is not attainable to draw near with our eyes, nor to grasp with our hands;

but it is the greatest highway of persuasion that falls into the mind of men.'

And Antisthenes too, the disciple of Socrates and leader of the Cynic school, cries aloud concerning the God of all:

'He is not made known from any image, He is not seen with the eye, He resembles nothing;

wherefore no one can learn Him from an image.' Faith, then, is necessary for those who wish to behold intelligible things, since it is not possible to find for them even an image that corresponds.

And Xenophon the Athenian, the Socratic, son of Gryllus, has written in concord with these:

'At all events, He who shakes all things and brings them to rest is manifest as some great and mighty one.'

And one might hear Bacchylides too saying in his Paeans:

'For it is by no means easy to find the gates of unutterable words.'

We have need, then, of intellectual eyes for the perception of intelligible things; and just as we need the eyes of the body for the contemplation of visible things, so surely we need faith for the beholding of divine things.

For what the eye is in the body, that faith is in the understanding;

or rather, just as the eye needs light to display visible things, so in turn the mind needs faith to display divine things and to keep firm the opinion concerning them.

Hear how Plato accuses those who are unwilling to contemplate intelligible things:

'For look about you carefully,' he says, 'lest one of the uninitiated overhear;

and these are they who think nothing else exists save what they can grip fast with their hands, but do not accept actions and becomings and all that is invisible as having a share in being.' And of this faction you too are members;

but do not take offence at the refutation;

for you cling fast to visible things alone, and worshipping idols wrought by hand, you do not accept the teaching concerning the nature of the Invisible.

And perhaps Epicharmus the comic poet fitted that iambic line to men so disposed:

'Natures of men—wineskins blown full of wind.'

But it is proper to men of sound mind not to be enslaved to prejudice, nor to be bound to ancestral customs, but to seek the truth and to gather what is useful from every quarter.

Or did not Socrates say such things to Crito?

Thus he persuaded Alcibiades to learn, having first banished the conceit of knowledge.

For first he refuted him as not knowing;

'But do you think I could not find out?' he urged.

'Indeed yes, if you would seek.' And when that man in turn said:

'Then do you not think I would seek?' he replied, taking him up:

'I do, if you came to think you did not know.' The beginning of knowledge, then, is the knowledge of one's ignorance.

And this again Plato taught, saying:

'For it is not lawful for the impure to lay hold of the pure.' And this Orpheus too says:

'I will speak to those for whom it is lawful; but you profane ones, shut the doors.'

And Euripides agrees, crying out:

'Things unutterable, for mortals uninitiated to know.'

For how could one offer divine teachings to the uninitiated? And how could anyone be initiated, if he has not first strengthened within himself by faith the doctrines presented by the teachers? And how could he believe, if he has not first banished from his understanding the wrongly preinstilled lessons? True, then, is that tragic saying which Euripides spoke in the Phoenician Women:

'But the unjust argument, being diseased in itself, needs wise remedies.'

And that God also cooperates with those who desire to enjoy healing, the same tragedian said:

'And to him who labours, God too lends a hand.'

A most serviceable thing, then, is faith;

for according to Epicharmus—the Pythagorean, I mean—'mind sees and mind hears; all else is deaf and blind.'

And Heraclitus again enjoins being led as a stranger by faith, speaking thus:

'If you do not hope, you will not find the unhoped-for, since it is unsearchable and inaccessible.' And again:

'Those who seek gold dig up much earth and find but little.' But if those men, for the sake of a few grains, endure ever so much toil—and indeed danger too—who is so unloving of divine things as to flee the teaching about the truth, which yields a profit ten thousandfold? Let no one, then, O friends, accuse faith.

For indeed Aristotle called faith the criterion of knowledge;

and Epicurus called it a preconception of the understanding;

and the preconception, taking on knowledge in addition, becomes comprehension.

But according to our teaching, faith is the voluntary assent of the soul, or the contemplation of an unseen thing, or a standing firm concerning Being and a comprehension of the invisible, commensurate with nature, or a disposition free from doubt, firmly established in the souls of those who possess it.

For neither does faith arise without knowledge, nor knowledge apart from faith;

yet faith leads the way for knowledge, and knowledge follows faith; and from knowledge proceeds the impulse, and upon this follows the action;

for one must first believe, then learn, and having learned set out, and having set out, act.

For neither is it possible to learn even the first elements without trusting the teacher of letters, that this is how one ought to name the first, and thus the second, and so the rest;

for if one were to contradict at once, asserting that one ought not to call the first 'alpha' but to give it another name, he would not learn the truth, but would inevitably wander about and take falsehood for truth;

but if, trusting the teacher, he receives the lessons according to that man's rules, knowledge will follow upon faith as quickly as possible.

So too one ought to trust the geometer when he teaches that there is a point which is altogether without parts, and that there is a length deprived of breadth;

yet this no one could ever demonstrate by argument;

for if one were to take breadth away from length, the length would surely vanish together with the breadth;

but nevertheless the geometer bids us conceive it thus, and he who reaches out to learn those linear figures readily obeys and believes.

Thus too those who attend astronomers believe them, and tell the number of the stars and measure the distances at which they stand apart from one another, and how many myriads of stades the visible heaven is distant from the earth;

and although there is much disagreement in the measurement—some saying it is four hundred and seventy myriads of stades, others fewer, others far more—nonetheless the disciples are persuaded by their teachers and believe what is said by them.

And again, concerning the sun there is much wrangling of words among them.

For Anaximander and Anaximenes said it was twenty-seven times the size of the earth, Anaxagoras that it was larger than the Peloponnese, and Heraclitus the Ephesian that it was a foot wide. Who, then, could laugh worthily at such discord? For their division was not about some small measure, but about an immense one—as great as one could not represent in words;

[who could set] the reckoning of the pebble-count alongside the measure of a human foot? But nonetheless there are some who side with these, others with those;

and believing, some accept saying these things, others those.

Why on earth, then, do you overlook that most irrational faith, but accuse ours alone—ours that is free from such myths and drivel, and receives divine and intelligible things in an intelligible manner? Besides what has been said, let us consider this also: that each of men, wishing to learn some craft, frequents one who knows how to teach, and is content with the lessons offered by him;

and the leather-worker shows how one must hold the cutting-knife and cut up the hides, and moreover stitch them together and fit them to the last;

and the learner believes what is said and does not contradict the teacher;

and the one possesses the knowledge of what is done, while the other is content with faith, and little by little, through faith, acquires the knowledge.

So too the shipwright instructs the one reaching out to learn how he ought to stretch the line, how it is fitting to move the saw, and how to use the adze and the auger and the drill;

and the apprentice learns each of these, doing all that is bidden and making the teacher's words his laws, and believing that through him he will master the craft.

So too the physician not only teaches the science, but also heals the sick;

and he himself knows the rationale of the healing, while the one wrestling with the disease does not understand this, but believes that he will be delivered from the disease through the medical art.

And moreover, to steer the vessel only those know who understand the pilot's art, while the passengers, through them, believe that they will come safely to harbour in the havens they long for.

Therefore, O friend, faith is something common to all—both to those eager to learn some craft, and to those who sail and farm and consult physicians;

but knowledge is not common to all, but only to those who understand the crafts.

Thus, for instance, if we wish to determine whether gold is genuine and refined, we do not ourselves apply it to the test, but bid one who understands such things to assay it;

and he, applying it either to the touchstone or to the fire, pronounces it either base or genuine;

so too, when we buy costly gems, we do not entrust the discernment of these to ourselves, but to those in whom time and experience have implanted this skill;

and if anyone wishes to buy silken, embroidered, and gold-spangled raiment, he entrusts to those skilled in weaving the task of setting on these their proper price;

and indeed he too who wishes to learn the weight of certain golden or silver vessels or of coins brings these to one skilled in the science of weighing, and learns from him the weight, and believes and does not contradict him when he informs him.

Knowledge, then, is not for all, but for those who have learned it through teaching and time and experience;

but faith is for all who are eager to learn anything.

Faith is, moreover, the foundation and base of knowledge;

for even your own philosophers defined faith as the voluntary assent of the soul, and knowledge as a state unalterable by reason.

And it is absurd and exceedingly grievous that, while the teachers of every craft possess knowledge and the learners faith, in the case of divine instruction alone the order should be overturned, and knowledge be demanded before faith;

for it is above all in the case of invisible things that we have need of the eyes of faith.

Wherefore the divine apostle also cries aloud plainly:

[In the mysteries, the people] behold the things performed, and those called priests carry out the ordinance of the rites, but the hierophant alone knows the meaning of what is done, and to whomever he approves he discloses it;

and for what reason a son of these is so named, and why even into the small image there is inserted a member erect and great, the hierophant of those abominable mysteries knows, and anyone else who has come upon those accursed books;

for pleasure, when it takes on drunkenness besides, produces the erection of the generative members.

If, then, not even these unholy and loathsome rites are known to all, but only those called hierophants knew them, it is plain madness to seek knowledge before faith in the case of the all-holy and divine mysteries.

Or do you not obey Pindar the lyric poet, who plainly forbids

to blurt out the ancient teaching to all? This very same thing Plato too enjoins:

'Take care,' he says, 'lest these things ever fall out among uneducated men;

for there are, I think, no things more ridiculous to hear in the ears of the many than these, nor, on the other hand, anything more marvellous and inspired to the naturally gifted.

But being often spoken and ever heard, over many years they are with difficulty refined, like gold, with much labour.' And you have heard Orpheus too saying in what went before:

'I will speak to those for whom it is lawful; but you profane ones, shut the doors.'

Let faith, therefore, lead the way, and knowledge will follow;

for to those who believe purely and sincerely the trusted Lord grants knowledge, and knowledge, supervening upon faith, perfects the science of the truth;

and he who possesses this is blessed and thrice-blessed.

And this too Plato has made clear in the Laws:

'For he who is to be blessed and happy,' he says, 'must from the very outset be a partaker of the truth, so that he may live as a true man for as long a time as possible.' For to those who have partaken of the truth and have lived worthily of it, heaven is made ready and the dwellings of the angels;

but he who is bereft of it and uninitiated, and uninitiated into the all-holy and divine mysteries, shall be bereft of these good things, and shall be handed over to unending punishments.

And this again Plato has made clear in the Phaedo;

for he says that those who handed down the rites to them declared that whoever arrives at Hades uninitiated and unconsecrated shall lie in the mire, but he who has been purified and initiated, arriving there, shall dwell with the gods. Be persuaded, then, O friends, by your own philosophers, who initiate you beforehand and pre-teach you our own doctrines.

For they are exactly like those songbirds which imitate the human voice but do not understand the meaning of what they say;

for in like manner these men too, when discoursing about divine matters, did not know the truth of the very things they spoke.

Yet they have, I think, some measure of pardon, since they enjoyed neither prophetic torchlight nor apostolic illumination, but had nature alone as their guide—the nature whose God-inscribed letters the deceiver of impiety long ago corrupted;

yet some of these the Maker did not allow to become wholly effaced, displaying His own providence for men through the creation.

And this the divine apostle made clear when he addressed the people at Lystra;

for among many other things he said this also:

'Who in the generations gone by allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways;

and yet He did not leave Himself without witness, in that He did good, giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling your hearts with food and gladness.' For the race of Abraham received both the divine law and enjoyed the grace of prophecy;

but the other nations the Ruler of all guided toward the worship of God through nature and the creation.

And just as the bountiful One sends the rain especially upon the cultivated earth, for the supply of men, but out of His abundance and munificence rains also upon the deserts and the mountains—and the tilled land brings forth cultivated fruits, but the untilled the wild ones;

and we see sometimes fig-trees growing even on tombs and walls—so the gift of knowledge has been bestowed especially upon the pious, but upon those who are not such, as the rain upon the deserts and the thickets.

Whence often these too bring forth certain edible things and imitate the fruits of cultivated plants, yet it is nonetheless evident that they have not received prophetic cultivation;

for a certain roughness and bitterness is mixed in with them;

but those who know how to discern, reaping what is useful, let the rest go—just as those who gather roses leave the thorns but collect the buds.

And indeed this same law is implanted in the bees too;

for settling not only on sweet but also on bitter flowers, they draw up the sweet quality but turn away from the bitter, and out of diverse qualities—bitter and astringent and harsh and pungent—they prepare for men the sweetest honey;

and imitating these, we too, out of your bitter meadows, prepare for you the sweet honey of profit.

And just as those who heal bodies prepare beneficial remedies from venomous beasts, and—casting away some parts of the vipers and boiling others—drive out many diseases by these, so we too, taking in hand the works of your poets and historians and philosophers, leave some aside as poisons, but others, dressing them with the science of teaching, offer you as a healing antidote;

and those whom you supposed to be our adversaries, these we prove to be advocates of our words and show them to be teachers of the faith.

Thus, God willing, we will present to you the rest of our teaching also.

But you, having learned how necessary a thing is faith, embrace the Pythagorean silence and lend your ears quietly to the discourse, receiving faithfully what is said;

for thus indeed, little by little, you will be able to learn the truth.