Legum Allegoriarum Libri I-III

For of what advantage would it be to make our assertions clear and distinct, but nevertheless false? For it follows inevitably that if this were allowed the hearer would be deceived, and would reap the greatest possible injury with ignorance and delusion. For what would be the advantage of my speaking to a boy distinctly and clearly, and telling him, when I show him the letter A, that it is G, or that the letter E is O? Or what would be the good of a musician pointing out to a pupil who comes to him to learn the rudiments of his art that the harmonic scale was the chromatic; or the chromatic, the diatonic; or that the highest string was the middle one; or that conjoined sounds were separated; or that the highest tone in the tetrachord scale was a supernumerary note?

No doubt, a man who said this might speak clearly and distinctly, but he would not be speaking truly, but by such assertions he would be implanting wickedness in language. But when he joins both distinctness and truth, then he makes his language profitable to him who is seeking information,

Moses, therefore, says that discreet discourse, having its own peculiar virtues, is placed on the breast of Aaron, that is to say, of anger, in order that it may in the first instance be guided by reason, and may not be injured by its own deficiency in reason, and, in the second place, by distinctness, for there is no natural influence which makes anger a friend to distinctness. At all events, not only are the ideas of angry men, but all their expressions also, full of disorder and confusion, and therefore it is very natural for the want of clearness on the part of anger to be rectified by clearness,

and, in addition, by truth; for, among other things, anger has also this particular property of being inclined to misrepresent the truth. At all events, of all those who give way to this disposition scarcely any one speaks the strict truth, as if it were his soul and not his body that is under the influence of its intoxication. These, then, are the chief remedies suitable for that part of the soul which is influenced by anger, namely, reason, disinterestedness of language, and truth of language, for the three things are in power only one, namely, reason, curing anger, which is a pernicious disease of the soul, by means of the virtues truth and perspicuity.

To whom, or to what, then, does it belong to bear these things? Not to my mind, or to that of any chance person, but to the consecrated and purely sacrificial intellect, that, namely, of Aaron. And not even to this at all times, for it is frequently subject to change, but only when it is going on unchangeably, when it is entering into the holy place, when reason is entering in together with holy opinions, and is not abandoning them.

But it often happens that the mind is at the same time entering into sacred and holy and purified opinions, but still such as are only human; such, for instance, as opinions on what is expedient; opinions on successful actions; opinions on what is in accordance with established law; opinions concerning virtue as it exists among men. Nor is the mind, when disposed in this way, competent to bear the oracle on its breast together with the virtues, but only that one which is going in before the Lord, that is to say, that one which doeth everything for the sake of God, and which estimates nothing as superior to the things of God; but attributes to them

For, in a mind which is thus disposed, anger will be directed by purified reason, which takes away its irrational part, and remedies what there is confused and disorderly in it by the application of distinctness, and eradicates its falsehood by truth.

Aaron, therefore, for he is a second Moses, restraining the breast, that is to say, the angry passions, does not allow them to be carried away by undistinguishing impulse, fearing lest, if they obtain complete liberty, they may become restiff, like a horse, and so trample down the whole soul. But he attends to and cures it, and bridles it in the first instance by reason, that so, being under the guidance of the best of charioteers, it may not become exceedingly unmanageable, and in the second place, by the virtues of language, distinctness, and truth. For, if the angry passions were educated in such a way as to yield to reason and distinctness, and to cultivate the virtue of truthfulness, they would deliver themselves from great irritation and make the whole soul propitious.

But he, as I have already said, having this passion, endeavours to cure it by the saving remedies already enumerated. But Moses thinks that it is necessary completely to extirpate and eradicate anger from the soul, being desirous to attain not to a state of moderation in the indulgence of the passions, but to a state in which they shall have absolutely no existence whatever, and the most Holy Scriptures bear witness to what I am here saying; for it says, Moses having taken the breast took it that it might be an offering before the Lord, from the ram of consecration, and this was Moses’s part.[*](Leviticus viii. 29. )

Speaking very accurately, for it was the conduct of one who was both a lover of virtue and a lover of God, after having contemplated the whole soul, to take hold of the breast, which is the seat of the angry passions, and to take it away and eradicate it, that so when the warlike part had been wholly removed, the remainder might enjoy peace. And he removes this part not from any chance animal, but from the ram of consecration, although, indeed, a young heifer had been sacrificed; but, passing by the heifer, he came to the ram, because that is by nature an animal inclined to pushing and full of anger and impetuosity, in

This ramlike and impetuous and undistinguishing character in us, therefore, is something fond of contention, and contention is the mother of anger. In reference to which fact, they who are somewhat quarrelsome are very easily made angry in investigations and other discussions. Moses, therefore, does very properly endeavour to eradicate anger, that pernicious offspring of a contentious and quarrelsome soul, in order that the soul may become barren of such offspring and may cease from bringing forth mischievous things, and may become a portion consistent with the character of a lover of virtue, not being identical with either the breast or with anger, but with the absence of those qualities, for God has endowed the wise man with the best of all qualities, the power, namely, of eradicating his passions. You see, then, how the perfect man is always endeavouring to attain to a complete emancipation from the power of the passions. But he who eradicates them being next to him, that is Aaron, labours to arrive at a state in which the passions have only a moderate power, as I have said before;

for he is unable to eradicate the breast and the angry passions. But he bears the oracle, on which is distinctness and truth even beyond the guide himself, together with the appropriate and kindred virtues of language.

And he will, moreover, make the difference more evident to us by the following expression:—For the wave-breast and the heave-shoulder have I taken of the children of Israel from off the sacrifices of their peace offerings, and have given them to Aaron the priest, and unto his sons, for ever.[*](Leviticus vii. 34. )

You see here that they are not able to take the breast alone, but they must take it with the shoulder; but Moses can take it without the shoulder. Why is this? Because he, being perfect, has no inadequate or lowly ideas, nor is he willing to remain in a state in which the passions have even a moderate influence; but he, by his exceeding power, does utterly extirpate the whole of the passions, root and branch. But the others, who go with faint endeavours and with but slight strength to war against the passions, are inclined to a reconciliation with them, and make terms with them, proposing terms of accommodation,

And the shoulder is a symbol of labour and of the endurance of hardship; and such a person is he who has the charge of and the care of administering the holy things, being occupied with constant exercise and labour. But he has no labour to whom God has given his perfect good things in great abundance, and he who attains to virtue by labour will be found to be less vigorous and less perfect than Moses, who received it as a gift from God without any labour or difficulty. For the mere fact of labouring is of itself inferior to and worse than the condition of being exempt from labour, so, also, what is imperfect is inferior to that which is perfect, and that which learns anything to that which has knowledge spontaneously and naturally. On this account it is that Aaron can only take the breast with the shoulder, but Moses can take it without the shoulder.

And he calls it the heave-shoulder for this reason, because reason ought to be set over and to be predominant above the violence of anger, as a charioteer who is driving a hard-mouthed and restiff horse. And then the shoulder is no longer called the heave-shoulder, but the shoulder of removal, on this account, because it is fitting that the soul should not attribute to itself labour in the cause of virtue, but should remove it from itself and attribute it to God, confessing that it is not its own strength or its own power which has thus acquired what is good, but He who gave it a love for goodness.

And so neither the breast nor the shoulder is taken, except from the virtue which bringeth salvation, as is natural, for then the soul is sacred when the angry passions are under the guidance of reason, and when labour does not bring conceit to the labourer, but when he owns his inferiority to God, his benefactor.

Now that pleasure dwells not only in the breast but also in the belly, we have already stated, showing that the belly is the most appropriate situation for pleasure; for we may almost call pleasure the vessel which contains all the pleasures; for when the belly is filled, then the desires for all other pleasures are intense and vigorous, but when it is empty, then they are tranquil and steady.

On which account Moses says, in another place, Every animal that goeth upon its belly, every animal which goeth on four legs at all times, and

This much having been premised, behold again the difference between the perfect man and him who is still advancing towards perfection. As, therefore, the perfect man was, just now, found to be competent to eradicate the whole of the angry feelings from the contentious soul and to make it submissive and manageable, and peaceable and gentle to every one, both in word and deed; and as he who is still advancing towards perfection is not able wholly to eradicate passion, for he bears the breast about with him, though he does educate it by the aid of judicious language, which is invested with two virtues perspicuity and truth. So, also, now he who is perfectly wise, that is, Moses, will be found to have utterly shaken off and discarded the pleasures. But he who is only advancing towards perfection will be found to have escaped not from every pleasure, but to cling still to such as are desirable and simple, and to deprecate those which are superfluous and extravagant as unnecessary additions,