If the famous Scipio Nasica were now alive, who was once your pontiff, and was unanimously chosen by the senate, when, in the panic created by the Punic war, they sought for the best citizen to entertain the Phrygian goddess, he would curb this shamelessness of yours, though you would perhaps scarcely dare to look upon the countenance of such a man.For why in your calamities do you complain of Christianity, unless because you desire to enjoy your luxurious license unrestrained, and to lead an abandoned and profligate life without the interruption of any uneasiness or disaster? For certainly your desire for peace, and prosperity, and plenty is not prompted by any purpose of using these blessings honestly, that is to say, with moderation, sobriety, temperance, and piety; for your purpose rather is to run riot in an endless variety of sottish pleasures, and thus to generate from your prosperity a moral pestilence which will prove a thousandfold more disastrous than the fiercest enemies.It was such a calamity as this that Scipio, your chief pontiff, your best man in the judgment of the whole senate, feared when he refused to agree to the destruction of Carthage, Rome's rival and opposed Cato, who advised its destruction.He feared security, that enemy of weak minds, and he perceived that a wholesome fear would be a fit guardian for the citizens.And he was not mistaken; the event proved how wisely he had spoken.For when Carthage was destroyed, and the Korean republic delivered from its great cause of anxiety, a crowd of disastrous evils forthwith resulted from the prosperous condition of things.
First concord was weakened, and destroyed by fierce and bloody seditions;then followed, by a concatenation of baleful causes, civil wars, which brought in their train such massacres, such bloodshed, such lawless and cruel proscription and plunder, that those Romans who, in the days of their virtue, had expected injury only at the hands of their enemies, now that their virtue was lost, suffered greater cruelties at the hands of their fellow-citizens.The lust of rule, which with other vices existed among the Romans in more unmitigated intensity than among any other people, after it had taken possession of the more powerful few, subdued under its yoke the rest, worn and wearied.
CHAP.31.--BY WHAT STEPS THE PASSION FOR GOVERNING INCREASED AMONG THEROMANS.
For at what stage would that passion rest when once it has lodged in a proud spirit, until by a succession of advances it has reached even the throne.And to obtain such advances nothing avails but unscrupulous ambition.But unscrupulous ambition has nothing to work upon, save in a nation corrupted by avarice and luxury.Moreover, a people becomes avaricious and luxurious by prosperity; and it was this which that very prudent man Nasica was endeavouring to avoid when he opposed the destruction of the greatest, strongest, wealthiest city of Rome's enemy.He thought that thus fear would act as a curb on lust, and that lust being curbed would not run riot in luxury, and that luxury being prevented avarice would be at an end; and that these vices being banished, virtue would flourish and increase the great profit of the state; and liberty, the fit companion of virtue, would abide unfettered.For similar reasons, and animated by the same considerate patriotism, that same chief pontiff of yours--I still refer to him who was adjudged Rome's best man without one dissentient voice--threw cold water on the proposal of the senate to build a circle of seats round the theatre, and in a very weighty speech warned them against allowing the luxurious manners of Greece to sap the Roman manliness, and persuaded them not to yield to the enervating and emasculating influence of foreign licentiousness.So authoritative and forcible were his words, that the senate was moved to prohibit the use even of those benches which hitherto had been customarily brought to the theatre for the temporary use of the citizens.(1) How eagerly would such a man as this have banished from Rome the scenic exhibitions themselves, had he dared to oppose the authority of those whom he supposed to be gods ! For he did not know that they were malicious devils; or if he did, he supposed they should rather be propitiated than despised.For there had not yet been revealed to the Gentiles the heavenly doctrine which should purify their hearts by faith, and transform their natural disposition by humble godliness, and turn them from the service of proud devils to seek the things that are in heaven, or even above the heavens.
CHAP.32.--OF THE ESTABLISHMENT OF SCENICENTERTAINMENTS.
Know then, ye who are ignorant of this, and ye who feign ignorance be reminded, while you murmur against Him who has freed you from such rulers, that the scenic games, exhibitions of shameless folly and license, were established at Rome, not by men's vicious cravings, but by the appointment of your gods.Much more pardonably might you have rendered divine honors to Scipio than to such gods as these.The gods were not so moral as their pontiff.But give me now your attention, if your mind, inebriated by its deep potations of error, can take in any sober truth.
