It is hard to give you credit for not being artful and chameleon-like here. The man who labours in the Scriptures with the wiliness and hypocrisy which you employ over them, may safely enough profess that he is not yet taught by the Scriptures, but that he wishes to be taught.
On the contrary, he wishes nothing less, and only chatters in this way, so that he may disparage that most clear light which is in the Scriptures, and may give a blessing to his own obstinacy. Thus the Jews maintain to this day, that what Christ, and the Apostles, and the Church have taught, is not proved by the Scriptures. Heretics cannot be taught anything by the Scriptures. The Papists have not yet been taught by the Scriptures, though even the stones cry out the truth. Perhaps you are waiting for a passage to be produced from the Scriptures, which will consist of these letters and syllables: ‘The principal part in man is flesh;’ or ‘that which is most excellent in man is flesh.’ And till then, you mean to march off as an invincible conqueror. This is as if the Jews demanded that a sentence be produced from the Prophets consisting of these words: ‘Jesus, the son of a carpenter, born of the Virgin Mary at Bethlehem, is the Messiah, and the Son of God.’
Here, where you are compelled to admit our conclusion by this manifest sentiment, you instead prescribe the letters and syllables which we are to produce for you. Elsewhere, when you are conquered both by the letters and the sentiment, you have your tropes; your knots to untie, and your “sober explanation.” Everywhere you find something to oppose to the divine Scriptures. And this is no wonder, when you do nothing but search for something to oppose to them. One time you run to the interpretations of the ancients; another time to the absurdities of reason. And when neither of these serve your purpose, you talk about things that are afar off, and things that are nearby, to avoid being confined to the text immediately before you. What shall I say? Proteus is no Proteus, compared with you. But you cannot slip out of our hands even by these artifices.
What victories did the Arians boast, because those letters and syllables omowsiov (homoousios) 619 were not contained in the Scriptures: considering it nothing, that the reality affirmed by that word is most decisively proved by other words. But let even impiety and iniquity herself judge whether this is the acting of a good mind — I will not say of a pious one — which desires to be instructed.
Take your victory, then — I confess myself conquered — these letters and syllables, ‘the most excellent thing in man is but flesh,’ are not found in the Scriptures. But do you see what sort of a victory you have, when I prove that testimonies are found in the greatest abundance to the fact that not one portion, or the most excellent thing in man— or the principal part of man — is flesh; but that the whole man is flesh. And not only so, but that the whole people is flesh. And as though this were not enough, that the whole human race is flesh. For Christ says, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh.” Untie your knots, imagine your tropes, follow the interpretation of the ancients, or turn elsewhere and discourse about the Trojan war, so that you may not see or hear the text which is before you. It is not matter of faith with us, but we both see and feel that the whole human race is born of the flesh. We are therefore compelled to believe what we do not see: namely, that the whole human race is flesh, on the authority of Christ’s teaching. Now, therefore, we leave it to the Sophists to doubt and dispute whether the hegemonikon, or leading part in man, is comprehended in the whole man, the whole people, the whole race of man. We know that in the subject, ‘whole human race,’ is comprehended the body and the soul, with all their powers and operations, with all their vices and virtues, with all their folly and wisdom, with all their justice and injustice.
All things are flesh because all things mind the flesh (i.e., the things which are their own), and are destitute of the glory of God and of the Spirit of God, as Paul says in Rom. 3. 620
SECT. 43. Heathen virtue is God’s abhorrence.
As to what you say, therefore, that:
‘Every affection 621 of man is not flesh, but there is affection which is called soul, there is affection which is called spirit. By the latter, we strive after whatever things are honourable 622 — just as the philosophers strove, who taught that death should be encountered a thousand times sooner than allow ourselves in any base act, even if we knew that men would be ignorant of it, and God would forgive it.’
I reply, it is easy for a man who believes nothing, to assuredly believe anything, and say anything. Let your friend Lucian ask you, 623 not I, whether you can show us a single individual out of the whole human race (you will be twice or seven times a Socrates if you please) who has exhibited what you mention here, and what you say that they taught. Why do you tell stories, then, in vain words? Could someone strive after honourable things if he did not even know what honourable is? You call it honourable, perhaps (to hunt out the most eminent example), that they died for their country, for their wives and children, and for their parents; or that, to avoid belying themselves or betraying these relations, they endured exquisite torments. Such were C. Scaevola, M. Regulus, and others. 624 But what can you display in all these, save an outside show of good works? Have you looked into their hearts?
No, it appeared at the same time, on the surface of their performance, that they were doing all these things for their own glory, for they were not ashamed to confess, and to make it their boast, that they were seeking their own glory. For it was glory burning them through and through, which led even these Romans, according to their own testimony, to do whatever they did that was virtuous. This same thing is true both of the Greeks and the Jews, and also of the whole human race.
Now, although this is honourable among men, still nothing can be more dishonourable in the sight of God; indeed, it was the most impious and consummate sacrilege in his sight, that they did not act for the glory of God, nor did they glorify him as God, but by the most impious sort of robbery, they stole the glory from God and ascribed it to themselves. So that, they were never less honourable and more vile, than while shining forth in their most exalted virtues. But now, how could they act for the glory of God, when they knew nothing of God and of his glory? Not because these did not appear, but because the flesh did not allow them to see the glory of God, through the rage and madness with which they were raving after their own glory. Here then, you have the chieftain spirit (hegemonikon), that principal part of man striving after honourable things— i.e., exhibiting itself as the robber of God’s glory, and affecters of his Majesty — in the case of those men most of all, those who are the most honourable and most illustrious for their consummate virtues. Deny now, if you can, that these men are flesh, and in a lost state through ungodly affection.
Indeed, I imagine that Diatribe was not so much offended with its being said that man is flesh or spirit, when she read it according to the Latin translation, ‘man is carnal or spiritual.’
For we must grant this peculiarity among many others with the Hebrew tongue, that when it says, ‘Man is flesh or spirit,’ it means the same as we do when we say, ‘Man is carnal or spiritual;’ just as the Latins say, ‘The wolf is a sad thing for the folds.’ ‘Moisture is a sweet thing to the sown corn;’ or when they say that, ‘man is wickedness and malice itself.’ Thus holy Scripture, too, by an expression of intensity, calls man flesh as though he were carnality itself. This is because he has an excessive relish for the things of the flesh, and none for anything else — just as it also calls him spirit, because he relishes, seeks, does, and endures only the things of the Spirit.
She may ask this question, indeed, which still remains: ‘Even if the whole man, and that which is most excellent in man, is called flesh, does it follow that whatever is flesh must immediately be called ungodly?’ Whoever does not have the Spirit of God, I call ungodly: for the Scripture declares that the Spirit is given for this very purpose, that he may justify the ungodly. 625 Again, 626 when Christ distinguishes the Spirit from the flesh by saying “That which is born of the flesh is flesh;” and adds that one who is born
