De Praemiis Et Poenis Et De Exsecrationibus

And every one of these three individuals has in the account which we have received of him a figurative meaning concealed below it, which we must now consider. Now the moment that any one is taught anything, it happens to him to forsake ignorance and to come over to knowledge; and ignorance is a thing of a multiform character: on this account the first of the three is said to have had many children, but not to have thought any one of them worthy for him to call his son, except one: for in a manner he who learns discards the offspring of ignorance, and repudiates them as inimical and hostile to him.

Now by nature all we who are men, before the reason that is in us is brought to perfection, live on the borders between virtue and vice, without ever inclining as yet to either side: but when the mind, beginning to put forth its wings, sees an appearance of the good with its whole soul, impressing it in all its parts, it immediately bursts through all restraint, and being borne on wings rushes towards it, leaving behind the kindred evil which was born with it, which it flees from, proceeding in the other direction without ever turning back:

this is what he intends to imply by an enigmatical expression when he says that the man who was endowed by nature with a good

But that soul which besides having a good natural disposition has also received a good education, and has been trained by the third mentioned person in the meditations of virtue, so that none of them float at random on the surface, but that they are all firmly glued and fixed in their places, as if united by some compact sinews, acquires health and acquires power, which are followed by a good complexion, owing to modesty, and also good health and beauty.

And thus the soul becoming a perfect company of virtues, by means of these three most excellent patronesses, nature, instruction, and meditation, and not having left one single spot in itself empty, so as to allow of the entrance of anything else, engenders perfect number, namely, two lots of sons, of six in each, being a representation and imitation of the circle of the zodiac, in order to the improvement of everything in them: this is the family exempt from all injury, being continually devoted to the study of the holy scriptures, both in their literal sense and also in the allegories figuratively contained in them: which received as a prize, as I have said before, the supreme authority over each of the tribes of the nation.

Of this house therefore, as it increased and became very populous in process of time, well regulated cities were founded, being schools of wisdom, and justice, and holiness, in which also the means of acquiring all other virtue was investigated in a grave manner suited to the importance of the subject.

Therefore those rewards which were thus long since assigned to the good, both publicly and privately, have now been described though somewhat in outline, but sufficiently to enable anyone to comprehend with tolerable ease what has been omitted. We must now proceed in regular order to consider in turn the punishments appointed for the wicked, speaking of them in a somewhat general way since the time does not allow of my enumerating all the particular instances.

Now there was at the very beginning of the world when

What then could possibly have been inflicted upon him, which would have been an adequate punishment for him, who thus in one single action left no description of violence and impiety unperformed? Perhaps some one will say he should have been put to death at once; this is a human mode of reasoning, fit for one who does not consider the great tribunal of all; for men look upon death as the extreme limit of all punishments, but in the view of the divine tribunal it is scarcely the beginning of them.

Since then the action of this man was a novel one, it was necessary that a novel punishment should be devised for him; and what was it? That he should live continually dying, and that he should in a manner endure an undying and never ending death; for there are two kinds of death; the one that of being dead, which is either good or else a matter of indifference; the other that of dying, which is in every respect an evil; and the more protracted the dying the more intolerable the evil.

Consider now then how it is that death can be said to be never ending in this man’s case; since there are four different affections to which the soul is liable, two of them being conversant with good either present or future, namely, pleasure and desire; and two with evil either present or expected, namely, sorrow and fear; it cuts up the pair of those which are conversant with good by the roots, in order that the man may never receive pleasure from any accident of fortune, nor ever feel a desire even for anything pleasant; and it leaves him only those affections conversant about evil, sorrow without any mixture of cheerfulness, and unmingled fear,

for the scripture says [*]( Genesis iv. 14.) that God laid a curse upon the fratricide, so that he should be continually groaning and trembling. Moreover he put a mark upon him, that he might never be [*]( Genesis iv. 14.)

Therefore, as a man who is being carried away by a torrent shudders at the nearest waves by which he is being hurried away, and still more at those coming upon him from above, since the one is continually and incessantly propelling him forward with violence, but the other being raised above him threatens to overwhelm him utterly, so in the same manner those evils which are present are grievous, but those which proceed from fear of the future are more grievous still; for fear continually supplies sorrowful feelings as from an everlasting spring.

These punishments, then, are those which were decided on to be inflicted on the first slayer of his brother. But others were also appointed for households which had entered into any conspiracy to unite in crime. And there were some men appointed to be keepers of the temple and ministers in the sacred offices, classed as a kind of door-keepers. These men, being wholly filled with unreasonable pride, rose up in rebellion against the priests, desiring to appropriate their honours and privileges to themselves.

And, having elected as chief of their conspiracy the eldest of their body, who also, with a few of those who joined in this audacious folly, was the leader of the whole enterprise, they left the outer courts and precincts of the tabernacle and entered into the most holy places, expelling those who, by the oracular commands of God, had been thought worthy of the priesthood.

Therefore, as was natural, a great confusion spread among the whole multitude, in consequence of things being disturbed which never ought to have been moved, and of the laws being openly violated and all the ordinances for the regular service of

at which the governor and president of the nation was indignant. And, at first, displaying a stern disposition, though without any anger (for he was the meekest of men and by nature incapable of anger), he endeavoured by arguments to persuade them to alter their conduct, and not to transgress the bounds laid down for them, nor to seek to overturn the ordinances established with respect to holy and consecrated things on which the hopes of the whole nation depended.

But when he could not succeed in the least, but found that the people were deaf to all his entreaties, since they looked upon him as wholly under the influence of domestic affection and thought that it was on that account that he had made his brother high priest, and had given the inferior priesthood to his nephews, he still was not so much indignant at that, though it was a shocking thing, as at this other all terrible idea that they were imputing to him a contempt for the sacred oracles, in accordance with which the election of priests had taken place. [*]( Numbers xvi. 1.) ... [*]( There appears to be a considerable hiatus in the text here.)

And there is a distinct evidence in confirmation of what I have now said recorded in the sacred scriptures; because, in the first place, the sacred historian records the prayers which he commonly calls blessings. "If," [*]( Deuteronomy xxx. 10.) says he, "you keep the commandments of God and are obedient to his injunctions, and receive what is said to you, not merely so far as to listen to them, but also to fulfil them by the actions of your lives, you shall have as a first reward victory over your enemies;

for the commandments are not burdensome or too weighty for the ability of you who are to live by them to obey, nor is the good which is promised to you removed to any distance, either beyond the sea, or at the furthest extremities of the country, so as to require a long and painful journey to avail yourselves of it." Nor did the lawgiver at once set out on his departure from earth to heaven, so that no one else being raised on high and borne aloft on wings could attain to the obedience which he enjoined; but the obedience remained near and very close to men, being fixed separately in three parts of us, in the mouth, and heart, and hands; that is to say, in the speech, and designs, and actions of every one. [*]( Numbers xvi. 1.) [*]( There appears to be a considerable hiatus in the text here.) [*]( Deuteronomy xxx. 10.)