in the sense in which we do when we call animals void of words, but speaking of himself as one who did not choose to employ words by means of his organs of speech, but who impresses and stamps the principles of true wisdom upon his mind alone, which is the most perfect opposite to false sophis- try. And he will not go to Egypt, nor will he descend into the arena to strive against the sophists who contend in it, till he has thoroughly studied and practised the art of argumen- tative reasoning; God himself showing to him all the ideas which belong to such elocution, and making him perfect in them by the election of Aaron who was the brother of Moses, and whom he was accustomed to call his mouth-piece, and interpreter, and prophet.* For all these attributes belong to speech, which is the brother of the intellect; for the intellect is the fountain of words, and speech is its mouth-piece, because all the conceptions which are entertained in the mind are poured forth by means of speech, like streams of water which flow out of the earth, and come into sight. And speech is an interpreter of the things which the mind has decided upon in its tribunal. Moreover, it is a prophet and a soothsayer of those things which the mind unceasingly pours forth as oracles from its inaccessible and invisible retreats.
XIII. In this manner, then, it is useful to oppose those who are ostentatious about doctrines. For if we have been well exercised in various species of discourses, we shall no longer stumble through inexperience and want of acquaintance with the manoeuvres of sophists. But rising up and making a firm and resolute stand against them, we shall with ease escape from their artificial entanglements. But they, when their tricks have once been found out, will appear to be exhibiting the conduct of sparrers rather than of regular combatants. For they too, in their own opinion, get great credit by their style of beating the air; but when they come to a real contest they meet with no moderate disgrace. And if any one is adorned as to his soul with all imaginable virtues, and yet has paid no attention to the art of speaking and arguing, if he only preserves silence he will obtain safety, a prize won without danger. But if he comes forth like Abel into a contest with sophists, he will be thrown down before he has obtained a firm footing.
* Exodus vii. 1.
252 PHILO JUDiEUS.
For, as in medical science, some practitioners who know how to cure almost every complaint, and disease, and infirmity, can nevertheless give no true or even probable account of any one of them; and on the other hand, others are very clever, as far as giving an account of the diseases goes, and in explaining their symptons and causes, and the modes of cure, and are the most excellent interpreters possible of the principles of which their art is made up, but are utterly useless in the matter of attending the bodies of the sick, to the cure of which they are notable to contribute even the slightest assistance. In the same way, those who have devoted themselves to practical wisdom have often neglected to pay attention to their language; and those who have learnt their professions thoroughly as far as words go, have yet treasured up no good instruction in their soul. It is therefore nothing extraordinary, that these men being in the habit of indulging an unbridled tongue, should be full of self-sufficiency and boldness, displaying all the folly which they have from the first beginning cherished. But it is better to trust to those who, like skilful physicians, have a knowledge of the means of healing the diseases and evil affections of the soul, until God provides an excellent interpreter, and displays to and pours upon him the fountains of his elo- quence.
XIV. It would therefore have been consistent for Abel to practise prudence, a very saving virtue, and to have remained at home, disregarding the invitation to the arena of discus- sion and contest, which was given to him, imitating Rebecca, that is perseverance, who, when Esau, the companion of wickedness, was pouring forth threats, advised the practiser of wisdom, Jacob, to retreat before him who was about to plot against him, until he should have relaxed in his fierce hostility to him, for Esau had been holding out an intolerable threat over Jacob, saying, " The days of mourning for my Father are at hand, that then I may slay my brother Jacob;"* for he is wishing only that that species in the nature of things which is void of passions, namely, Isaac (to whom the oracle had beeu given, that he should not descend into Egypt),t may be the victim of an irrational affection, in order I suppose that he may be wounded by the stings of pleasure or pain, or of any other passion, showing that the man who is not wholly perfect * Genesis xxvii. 41. t Genesis xxvi. 2.
THE WORSE PLOTTING AGAINST THE BETTER. 253 and who makes laborious improvements, will receive not merely a wound, but utter destruction. However, the good God will neither allow that invulnerable species among created things to be subdued by passion, nor will he surrender the practice of virtue to bloody and raging destruction.
On which account we read in a subsequent passage, " Cain rose up against Abel, his brother, and slew him." * For ac- cording to the first imagination, he suggests the idea that Abel has been killed. But if you look at it according to the most accurate investigation, you will see that he intimates that Cain himself was slain by himself, so that we ought to read it thus: " Cain rose up and killed himself," and not the other. And very reasonably may we attribute this to him. For the soul, which destroys out of itself the virtue-loving and God- loving principle, has died as to the life of virtue, so that Abel (which appears a most paradoxical assertion) both is dead and alive. He is dead, indeed, having been slain by the foolish mind, but he lives according to the happy life which is in God. And the holy oracle which has been given will bear witness, which expressly says, that he cried out loudly, and betrayed clearly by his cries t what-lie had aullerfed hum t.hft cnnvretA eviTT^tEat is from the body. For howjould """ ™^n "n ln»^.r existed have conversed?
XV. The wise man, therefore, who appears to have de- parted from this mortal life, lives according to the immortal life; but the wicked man who lives in wickedness has died ac- cording to the happy life. For in the various animals of different kinds, and in general in all bodies, it is both possible and easy to conceive, that the agents are of one kind, and the patients of another. For when a father beats his son, cor- recting him, or when a teacher beats his pupil, he who beats is one, and he who is beaten is another. But in the case of these beings, which are united and made one, only in the part as to which both acting and suffering are found to exist; these two things are there, neither at different times, nor do they affect different people, but they affect the same person in the same manner at the same time.
At all events, when an athlete rubs himself for the sake of taking exercise, he is by all means rubbed also; and, if any one strikes himself, he himself is struck and wounded; and so * Genesis iv. 8. T Genesis m 10.
254 PHILO JUD^EUS.
254 PHILO JUD^EUS.
also he who mutilates or kills himself as the agent, is mutilated or killed as the patient. Why, then, do I say this? Because it appears inevitable that the soul, inasmuch as it consists not of particles which are separated but of those which are united, should suffer what it appears to do, as in real truth it did in this instance; for, when it appeared to be destroying the God- loving doctrine, it destroyed itself. And Lamech is a witness to this, the descendant of the impiety of Cain, who says to his wives, who are the representatives of two inconsiderate opinions, " I have slain a man to my hurt, and a young man to be a scar to me."* For it is evident that if any one slays the prin- ciple of courage, he wounds himself with the opposite disease of cowardice; and if any one in the practice of honourable studies slays his vigorous strength, he is inflicting on himself wounds and great injuries with no moderate degree of disgrace. Therefore, indeed, perseverance says that if practice and im- provement be destroyed she will lose not only one child but also her others also, and be an instance of complete childless- ness.
XVI. But as he who injures a good man is proved to be doing injury to himself, so also does he who thinks his betters worthy of privileges, in word indeed claim advantage for them, but in fact he is procuring it for himself. And nature here bears testimony in support of my argument, and so do all the laws which have been established in consistency with her; for there is a positive and express and intelligible command laid down in these words: " Honour thy father and thy mother, that it may be well with thee;"f not well with those who receive the honour, says the Scripture, but with thee; for if we look upon the intellect as the father of this concrete animal, and if we honour the outward senses as its mother, we ourselves shall be well treated by them. But the proper honour to be paid to the mind is first to be honoured on account of what is useful, and not on account of what is pleasant; but all things proceed- ing from virtue are useful. And the honour proper to be paid to the outward sense is when we do not allow ourselves to be carried away by its impetuosity towards the external objects of the outward senses, but compel it to be curved by the mind, which knows how to govern and guide the irrational powers in us. Jf, therefore, each of these things, the outward sense and * Genesis iv. 23. + Genesis xxvii. 45. J Exodus xx. 12.
THE WORSE PLOTTING AGAINST THE BETTER. 255 the mind, receive the honour which I have been describing, then it follows'of necessity that I, who use them both, must de- rive advantage from them. But if, carrying your language away a long distance from the mind and from the outward sense, you think your father, that is to say, the world which produced you, and your mother, wisdom, by means of which the universe was completed, worthy of honour, you yourself shall be well treated; for neither does God, who is full of everything, nor sublime and perfect knowledge, want anything. So that he who is in- clined to pay proper attention to them, benefits not those who receive his attentions and who are in no need of anything, but himself most exceedingly. For skill in horsemanship and in judging of dogs, being in reality a ministering to horses and dogs, supplies those animals with the useful things of which each species is in need; and if it were not so to supply them it would seem to neglect them. But it is not proper to call piety, which consists in ministering to God, a virtue which is conversant about supplying the things which will be of use to the Deity; for the Deity is not benefited by any one, inas- much as he is not in need of anything, nor is it in the power of any one to benefit a being who is in every particular superior to himself. But, on the contrary, God himself is continually and unceasingly benefiting all things.
So, when we say that piety is a ministering to God, we say that it is in some such a service as slaves discharge to their masters, who are taught to do without, hesitation that which is commanded them; but, again, there will be a difference, because the masters are in need of service, but God has no such want. So that, in the case of the masters, the servants do supply that which will be of use to them, but to God they supply nothing beyond a mind imbued with a spirit of willing obedience; for they will not find anything which they can im- prove, since all things belonging to masters are, from the very beginning, most excellent; but they will benefit themselves very greatly by determining to become friends to God.
XVII. I think, therefore, that enough has been now said with respect to those who appear to think that they do others good or harm. For it has been shown, that that which they think that they are doing to others, they in either case do to themselves. We will now examine the remainder of this event; the question is as follows: — " Where is Abel, thy kbd PHILO JUD.EUS.
kbd PHILO JUD.EUS.
brother?"* To which answer is made, "I do not know; am I my brother's keeper?" It is therefore worth while to con- sider the question whether it can be appropriately said of God that he asks a question. For he who asks a question or puts an inquiry is asking or inquiring about something of which he is ignorant; seeking an answer through which he will know what he as yet does not know. But everything is known to God, not only all that is present, and all that is past, but also all that is to come. What need, then, has he of an answer which cannot give any additional knowledge to the questioner? But we must say that such things cannot properly be uttered by the Cause of all things, but that, as it is possible to say what is not true without lying, so it is possible for one to put a question or an interrogatory without either making inquiry or seeking for information. " Why, then," some one will say, " are such words spoken?" In order that the soul which is about to give the answer may prove by itself what it answers correctly or incorrectly, having no one else either as an accuser or an adversary.
Since, when he asks the wise man, Where is virtue?f that is to say, when he asks Abraham, about Sarah, he asks, not because he is ignorant, but because he thinks that he ought to answer for the sake of eliciting praise from the answer of him who speaks. Accordingly, Moses tells us that Abraham answered, " Behold, she is in the tent;" that is to say, in the soul. What then is there in this answer that contains praise? Behold, says he, I keep virtue in my house as a treasure carefully stored up, and on account of this I am immediately happy. For it is the use and enjoyment of virtue that is happiness, and not the bare possession of it. But I should not be able to use it unless you, by letting down the seeds from heaven, had yourself made virtue pregnant; and unless she had brought forth the germs of happiness, namely, Isaac. And I consider that happiness is the employment of perfect virtue in a perfect life. In reference to which he, approving of his own determination, promises that he will complete perfectly all that he asked.
XVIII. To him therefore the answer brought praise, as he confessed that virtue without the divine favour was not sufficient of itself to help any one; and, in consequence, it * Genesis iv. 9. f Genesis xviii. 9.
THE WORSE PLOTTING AGAINST THE BETTER. 257 also brings blame to Cain, who says tbat he does not know where he is who has been treacherously slain by him. For he appears by this answer to be wishing to deceive his hearer, as one who does not see everything, and who has no previous suspicion of the deceit which he is about to use. But every one is wicked and worthy of proscription who thinks that the eye of God can ever fail to see anything. But Cain here speaks arrogantly, "Am I my brother's keeper?" For we might altogether say he was sure hereafter to lead a miser- able life, if nature made you the guardian and keeper of so good a man. Do you not see that the lawgiver entrusts the keeping and preservation of the holy things not to any chance person, but to the Levites, who were the most holy persons in their opinions? for whom the earth and the air and the water were considered an unworthy inheritance, but the heaven and the whole world were looked upon as their due. And the Creator alone is worthy of these things, to whom they have fled for refuge, becoming his sincere suppliants ancl servants, showing their love for their master in their continued service, and in the unhesitating observance of all the com- mands which are laid upon them, and in the preservation of the things entrusted to them.
XIX. And it has not fallen to the lot of all the suppliants to become guardians of the holy things, but to those only who have arrived at the number fifty, which proclaims remission of offences and perfect liberty, and a return to their ancient pos- sessions. " For this," says the Scripture, "is the law concerning the Levites: from twenty-five years old and upwards, they shall go in to wait upon the service of the tabernacle of the congregation: and from the age of fifty years they shall cease waiting upon the service thereof, and shall serve no more; but shall minister with their brethren in the tabernacle of the con- gregation, and they shall keep what is to be kept, and shall do no service."* Therefore, the Scripture charges him who has half perfection (for the number fifty is perfect, and the number twenty-five is the half of fifty), to work and to do what is holy, approving his ministration by his works. And the beginning, as an old writer has said, is half of the whole. But the perfect man it does not enjoin to labour any longer, but only to preserve what he has acquired by labour and diligence. For * Numbers viii. 24. S 258 PHILO JUD^EOS.
258 PHILO JUD^EOS.
may I never become a practiser of what I ought not to be a preserver; subsequently practice therefore is mediocrity not perfection, for it takes place not in perfect souls, but in such as are seeking after perfection. But it is the perfect duty of guardianship to deliver to memory the well-practised con- templations of holy things, the excellent deposit of knowledge to a faithful guardian, who is the only one who disregards the ingenious and manifold nets of forgetfulness; so that the Scripture, with great propriety and felicity, calls him who is mindful of what he has learnt, the guardian of it. And such an one before he practised was a pupil, having another to teach him; but when he became competent himself to guard what he had learnt, he then received the power and rank of a teacher, having appointed his brother, his own uttered dis- course, to the ministration of teaching.
For it is said that, " His brother shall minister;"* so that the mind of the good man is the guardian and steward of the doctrines of virtue. But his brother, that is to say, uttered discourse, shall minister instead of him, going through all the doctrines and speculations of wisdom to those who are desirous of instruction. On which account Moses, also, in his praises of Levi, having previously said many admirable things, adds subsequently, " He has guarded thy oracles and kept thy cove- nant." f And presently he continues, " They shall show thy justification to Jacob, and thy law to Israel. Therefore, he here clearly asserts that the good man is the guardian of the words and of the covenant of God. And, indeed, in another place he has shown that he is the best interpreter and declarer of his justifications and laws; the faculty of interpretation being displayed through its kindred organ — the voice, and guardianship being exerted through the mind, which having been made by nature as a great storehouse, easily contains the conceptions of all things, whether bodies or things. It would therefore have been worth the while of this self-loving Cain to have been the keeper of Abel; for if he had kept him he would have attained to a compounded and moderate kind of life, *In quoting thia passage above, I used the ~anslation as given in the bible, they " shall mi iister with their brethren in the tabernacle;" but the Greek of the text was the same in that passage as it is here.
+ Deuteronomy xxxiii. 9.
THE WORSE PLOTTING AGAINST THE BETTER. 259 and would not have been filled with unmodified and absolute wickedness.
XX. And God said, " What hast thou done? The voice 01 the blood of thy brother cries out to me from out of the ground."* The expression, " What hast thou done," shows in- dignation at an unhallowed action, and also ridicules the man who thought he had committed the murder secretly. The in- dignation now arises at the intention of the man who has done the deed, because he designed to destroy what was good; but the ridicule is excited by his thinking that he has plotted against one who is better than himself, and at his having plotted not so much against him as against himself. For, as I have said before, he who appears to be dead is alive, inasmuch as he is found to be a suppliant of God and to utter a voice; and he who believes that he is still alive is dead, as to the death of the soul, inasmuch as he is excluded from virtue, according to which alone he is worthy to live. So that the expression, " What hast thou done?" is equivalent to, " Thou hast done nothing; thou hast done no good for thyself."
For neither was the sophist, Balaam, who was an empty mul- titude of contrary and contending doctrines, when he was desirous to imprecate curses upon and to injure the good man, able to do so; since God turned his curses into a blessing, in order to correct the unjust man of wickedness and to display his own love of virtue.
XXI. But it is the nature of sophists to have for enemies the faculties which are in them, while their language is at variance with their thoughts and their thoughts with their lan- guage, and while neither is in the least degree consistent with the other. At all events, they wear out our ears, arguing that justice is a great bond of society, that temperance is a profitable thing, that continence is a virtuous thing, that piety is a most useful thing, and, of each other virtue, that it is a most wholesome and saving quality. And, on the other hand, that injustice is a quality with which we ought to have no truce, that intempe- rance is a diseased habit, that impiety is scandalous, and so going through every kind of wickedness, that each sort is most pernicious. And, nevertheless, they never cease showing by ^e'ir conduct that their real opinion is the reverse of their lau- ^«dge. But, when they extol prudence and temperance and * Numbers xxiii. 8.
260 PHILO JCJDjEUS.
justice and piety, they then show that they are, above all measure, foolish, and intemperate, and unjust, and impious; in short, that they are throwing into confusion and overturning all divine and human regulations and principles. And to them, therefore, one may very properly say what the divine oracle said to Cain, " What is this that thou hast done?" What good have ye done yourselves? What have all these discourses about virtue profited your souls? In what particular of life, whether small or great, have ye done well? What? Have you not, on the contrary, contributed to advancing true charges against yourselves? because, by expressing your ap- proval of what is good, and philosophising as far as words go, you have been excellent interpreters, but are nevertheless dis- covered to be men who both think and practise shameful things. In fact, all good things are dead in your souls, these evils having been there kindled; and, on this account there is no one of you who is really alive.
For as, when some musician or grammarian is dead, the music and grammar which existed in them dies with them, but their ideas survive, and in a manner live as long as the world itself endures; according to which the existing race of men, and those who are to exist hereafter in continual succession, will, to the end of time, become skilful in music and grammar. Thus, also, if the prudence, or the temperance, or the courage, or the justice, or, in short, if the wisdom of any kind existing in any individual be destroyed, nevertheless the prudence existing in the nature of the immortal universe will still be im- mortal; and every virtue is erected like a pillar in imperish- able solidity, in accordance with which there are some good people now, and there will be some hereafter. Unless, indeed, we should say that the death of any individual man is the de- struction of humanity and of the human race, which, whether we ought to call it a genus, or a species, or a conception, or what- ever else you please, those who are anxious about the investiga- tion of proper names may determine. One seal has often stamped thousands upon thousands of impressions in infinite number, and though at times all those impressions have been effaced with the substances on which they were stamped, still the seal itself has remained in its pristine condition without being at all injured in its nature. Again, do we not think that the virtues, even if all the characters which they have impressed THE WORSE PLOTTING AGAINST THE BETTER. 26 J upon the souls of those who have sought them should become effaced by wicked living, or by any other cause, would never- theless preserve their own unadulterated and imperishable nature? Therefore, they who have not been duly initiated in instruction, not knowing anything about the differences between wholes and parts, or between genera and species, or about the homonymies which are incidental to these things, mix up all things together in a confused mass. On which account every one who is a lover of self, by surname Cain, should learn that he has destroyed the namesake of Abel, that is to say species, individuality, the image made according to the model; not the archetypal pattern, nor the genus, nor the idea, which he thinks are destroyed together with animals, though, in fact, they are indestructible.
Let any one then say to him, reproving and ridiculing him, What is this that thou hast done, 0 wretched man? Does not tbe God-loving opinion which you flatter yourself that you have destroyed, live in the presence of God? But it is of yourself that you have become the murderer, by destroying from out of its seat the only quality by which you could live in a blameless manner.