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METHODIUS

THE BANQUET OF THE TEN VIRGINS;(1) OR, CONCERNING CHASTITY.

[Translated by the Rev. William R. Clark, M.A., Vicar of St. Mary Magdalen,
Taunton.]

PERSONS OF THE DIALOGUE: EUBOULIOS,(2) GREGORION, ARETE; MARCELLA,
THEOPHILA, THALEIA, THEOPATRA, THALLOUSA, AGATHE, PROCILLA, THEKLA,
TUSIANE, DOMNINA.

INTRODUCTION.

PLAN OF THE WORK; WAY TO PARADISE; DESCRIPTION AND PERSONIFICATION OF
VIRTUE; THE AGNOS A SYMBOL OF CHASTITY; MARCELLA, THE ELDEST AND FOREMOST
AMONG THE VIRGINS OF CHRIST.

   EUBOULIOS. You have arrived most seasonably, Gregorion, for I have just
been looking for you, wanting to hear of the meeting of Marcella and
Theopatra, and of the other virgins who were present at the banquet, and of
the nature of their  discourses on the subject of chastity; for it is said
that they argued with such ability and power that there was nothing lacking
to the full consideration of the subject. If, therefore, you have  come
here for any other purpose, put that off to  another time, and do not delay
to give us a complete and connected account of the matter of which we are
inquiring.

   GREGORION.(3) I seem to be disappointed of my hope, as some one else
has given you intelligence beforehand on the subject respecting which you
ask me. For I thought that you had heard nothing of what had happened, and
I was flattering myself greatly with the idea that I should be the first to
tell you of it. And for this reason I made all haste to come here to you,
fearing the very thing which has happened, that some one might anticipate
me.

   EUBOULIOS. Be comforted, my excellent friend, for we have had no
precise information respecting anything which happened; since the person
who brought us the intelligence had nothing to tell us, except that there
had been dialogues; but when he was asked what they were, and to what
purpose, he did not know.

   GREGORION. Well then, as I came here for this reason, do you want to
hear all that was said from the beginning; or shall I pass by parts of it,
and recall only those points which I consider worthy of mention?

   EUBOULIOS. By no means the latter; but first, Gregorion, relate to us
from the very beginning where the meeting was, and about the setting forth
of the viands, and about yourself, how you poured out the wine

                                                   "They in golden cups
   Each other pledged, while towards broad heaven they looked."(4)

   GREGORION. You are always skilful in discussions, and excessively
powerful in argument--thoroughly confuting all your adversaries.

   EUBOULIOS. It is not worth while, Gregorion, to contend about these
things at present; but do oblige us by simply telling us what happened from
the beginning.

   GREGORION. Well, I will try. But first answer me this: You know, I
presume, Arete,(5) the daughter of Philosophia?

   EUBOULIOS. Why do you ask?

   GREGORION. "We went by invitation to a garden of hers with an eastern
aspect, to enjoy the fruits of the season, myself, and Procilla, and
Tusiane." I am repeating the words of Theopatra, for it was of her I
obtained the information. "We went, Gregorion, by a very rough, steep, and
arduous path: when we drew near to the place," said Theopatra, "we were met
by a tall and beautiful woman walking along quietly and gracefully, clothed
in a shining robe as white as snow. Her beauty was something altogether
inconceivable and divine. Modesty, blended with majesty, bloomed on her
countenance. It was a face," she said, "such as I know not that I had ever
seen, awe-inspiring, yet tempered with gentleness and mirth; for it was
wholly unadorned by art, and had nothing counterfeit. She came up to us,
and, like a mother who sees her daughters after a long separation, she
embraced and kissed each one of us with great joy, saying, 'O, my daughters
you have come with toil and pain to me who am earnestly longing to conduct
you to the pasture of immortality; toilsomely have you come by a way
abounding with many frightful reptiles; for, as I looked, I saw you often
stepping aside, and I was fearing lest you should turn back and slip over
the precipices. But thanks to the Bridegroom to whom I have espoused(1)
you, my children, for having granted an effectual answer to all our
prayers.' And, while she is thus speaking," said Theopatra, "we arrive at
the enclosure, the doors not being shut as yet, and as we enter we come
upon Thekla and Agathe and Marcella preparing to sup. And Arete immediately
said, 'Do you also come hither, and sit down here in your place along with
these your fellows.' Now," said she to me, "we who were there as guests
were altogether, I think, ten in  number; and the place was marvellously
beautiful, and abounding in the means of recreation. The air was diffused
in soft and regular currents,  mingled with pure beams of light, and a
stream  flowing as gently as oil through the very middle of the garden,
threw up a most delicious drink; and the water flowing from it, transparent
and pure, formed itself into fountains, and these, overflowing like rivers,
watered all the garden with their abundant streams; and there were
different kinds of trees there, full of fresh fruits, and the fruits that
hung joyfully from their branches were of equal beauty; and there were
ever-blooming meadows strewn with variegated and sweet-scented flowers,
from which came a gentle breeze laden with sweetest odour. And the agnos(2)
grew near, a lofty tree, under which we reposed, from its being exceedingly
wide-spreading and shady."

   EUBOULIOS. You seem to me, my good friend, to be making a revelation of
a second paradise.(3)

   GREGORION. You speak truly and wisely. "When there," she said, "we had
all kinds of food and a variety of festivities, so that no delight was
wanting. After this Arete,(4) entering, gave utterance to these words:--

   "'Young maidens, the glory of my greatness, beautiful virgins, who tend
the undefiled meadows  of Christ with unwedded hands, we have now had
enough of food and feasting, for all things are abundant and plentiful with
us.(5) What is there, then, besides which I wish and expect? That each of
you shall pronounce a discourse in praise of virginity. Let Marcella begin,
since she sits in the highest place, and is at the same time the eldest. I
shall be ashamed of myself if I do not make the successful disputant an
object of envy, binding her with the unfading flowers of wisdom.'

   "And then," I think she said, "Marcella immediately began to speak as
follows." DISCOURSE I.--MARCELLA.

CHAP. I.--THE DIFFICULTY AND EXCELLENCE OF VIRGINITY; THE STUDY OF DOCTRINE
NECESSARY FOR VIRGINS.

   Virginity is something supernaturally great, wonderful, and glorious;
and, to speak plainly and in accordance with the Holy Scriptures, this best
and noblest manner of life alone is the root(6) of immortality, and also
its flower and first-fruits; and for this reason the Lord promises that
those shall enter into the kingdom of heaven who have made themselves
eunuchs, in that passage(7) of the Gospels in which He lays down the
various reasons for which men have made themselves eunuchs. Chastity with
men is a very rare thing, and difficult of attainment, and in proportion to
its supreme excellence and magnificence is the greatness of its dangers.(8)

   For this reason, it requires strong and generous natures, such as,
vaulting over the stream of pleasure, direct the chariot of the soul
upwards from the earth, not turning aside from their aim, until having, by
swiftness of thought, lightly bounded above the world, and taken their
stand truly upon the vault of heaven, they purely contemplate immortality
itself as it springs forth(9) from the undefiled bosom of the Almighty.

   Earth could not bring forth this draught; heaven alone knew the
fountain from whence it flows; for we must think of virginity as walking
indeed upon the earth, but as also reaching up to heaven. And hence some
who have longed for it, and considering only the end of it, have come, by
reason of coarseness of mind, ineffectually with unwashed feet, and have
gone aside out of the way, from having conceived no worthy idea of the
virginal manner of life. For it is not enough to keep the body only
undefiled, just as we should not show that we think more of the temple than
of the image of the god; but we should care for the souls of men as being
the divinities of their bodies, and adorn them with righteousness. And then
do they most care for them and tend them when, striving untiringly to hear
divine discourses, they do not desist until, wearing the doors of the
wise,(1) they attain to the knowledge of the truth.

   For as the putrid humours and matter of flesh, and all those things
which corrupt it, are driven out by salt, in the same manner all the
irrational appetites of a virgin are banished from the body by divine
teaching. For it must needs be that the soul which is not sprinkled with
the words of Christ, as with salt, should stink and breed worms, as King
David, openly confessing with tears in the mountains, cried out, "My wounds
stink and are corrupt,"(2) because he had not salted himself with the
exercises of self-control, and so subdued his carnal appetites, but self-
indulgently had yielded to them, and became corrupted in adultery. And
hence, in Leviticus,(3) every gift, unless it be seasoned with salt, is
forbidden to be offered as an oblation to the Lord God. Now the whole
spiritual meditation of the Scriptures is given to us as salt which stings
in order to benefit, and which disinfects, without which it is impossible
for a soul, by means of reason, to be brought to the Almighty; for "ye are
the salt of the earth,"(4) said the Lord to the apostles. It is fitting,
then, that a virgin should always love things which are honourable, and be
distinguished among the foremost for wisdom and addicted to nothing
slothful or luxurious, but should excel, and set her mind upon things
worthy of the state of virginity, always putting away, by the word, the
foulness of luxury, lest in any way some slight hidden corruption should
breed the worm of incontinence; for "the unmarried woman careth for the
things of the Lord," how she may please the Lord, "that she may be holy
both in body and in spirit,"(5) says  the blessed Paul. But many of them
who consider the hearing of the word quite a secondary matter, think they
do great things if they give their attention to it for a little while. But
discrimination must be exercised with respect to these; for it is not
fitting to impart divine instruction to a nature which is careful about
trifles, and low, and which counterfeits wisdom. For would it not be
laughable to go on talking to those who direct all their energy towards
things of little value, in order that they may complete most accurately
those things which they want to bring to perfection, but do not think that
the greatest pains are to be taken with those necessary things by which
most of all the love of chastity would be increased in them?

CHAP. II. -- VIRGINITY A PLANT FROM HEAVEN, INTRODUCED LATE; THE
ADVANCEMENT OF MANKIND TO PERFECTION, HOW ARRANGED.

   For truly by a great stretch of power the plant of virginity was sent
down to men from heaven, and for this reason it was not revealed to the
first generations. For the race of mankind was still very small in number;
and it was necessary that it should first be increased in number, and then
brought to perfection. Therefore the men of old times thought it nothing
unseemly to take their own sisters for wives, until the law coming
separated them, and by forbidding that which  at first had seemed to be
right, declared it to be a sin, calling him cursed who should "uncover the
nakedness" of his sister; (6) God thus mercifully bringing to our race the
needful help in due  season, as parents do to their children. For they do
not at once set masters over them, but allow them, during the period of
childhood, to amuse themselves like young animals, and first send them to
teachers stammering like themselves, until they cast off the youthful wool
of the mind, and go onwards to the practice of greater things, and from
thence again to that of greater still. And thus we must consider that the
God and Father of all acted towards our forefathers. For the world, while
still unfilled with men, was like a child, and it was necessary that it
should first be filled with these, and so grow to manhood. But when
hereafter it was colonized from end to end, the race of man spreading to a
boundless extent, God no longer allowed man to remain in the same ways,
considering how they might now proceed from one point to another, and
advance nearer to heaven, until, having attained to the very greatest and
most exalted lesson of virginity, they should reach to perfection; that
first they should abandon the intermarriage of brothers and sisters, and
marry wives from other families; and then that they should no longer have
many wives, like brute beasts, as though born for the mere propagation of
the species; and then that they should not be adulterers; and then again
that they should go on to continence, and from continence to virginity,
when, having trained themselves to despise the flesh, they sail fearlessly
into the peaceful haven of immortality.(1)

CHAP. III.--BY THE CIRCUMCISION OF ABRAHAM, MARRIAGE WITH SISTERS
FORBIDDEN; IN THE TIMES OF THE PROPHETS POLYGAMY PUT A STOP TO; CONJUGAL
PURITY ITSELF BY DEGREES ENFORCED.

   If, however, any one should venture to find fault with our argument as
destitute of Scripture proof, we will bring forward the writings of the
prophets, and more fully demonstrate the truth of the statements already
made. Now Abraham, when he first received the covenant of circumcision,
seems to signify, by receiving circumcision in a member of his own body,
nothing else than this, that one should no longer beget children with one
born of the same parent; showing that every one should abstain from
intercourse with his own sister, as his own flesh. And thus, from the time
of Abraham, the custom of marrying with sisters has ceased; and from the
times of the prophets the contracting of marriage with several wives has
been done away with; for we read, "Go not after thy lusts, but refrain
thyself front thine appetites;"(2) for "wine and women will make men of
understanding to fall away;"(3) and in another place, "Let thy fountain be
blessed; and rejoice with the wife of thy youth,"(4) manifestly forbidding
a plurality of wives. And Jeremiah clearly gives the name of "fed
horses"(5) to those who lust after other women; and we read, "The
multiplying brood of the ungodly shall not thrive, nor take deep rooting
from bastard slips, nor lay any fast foundation."(6)

   Lest, however, we should seem prolix in collecting the testimonies of
the prophets, let us again point out how chastity succeeded to marriage
with one wife, taking away by degrees the lusts of the flesh, until it
removed entirely the inclination for sexual intercourse engendered by
habit. For presently one is introduced earnestly deprecating, from
henceforth, this seduction, saying, "O Lord, Father, and Governor of my
life, leave me not to their counsels; give me not a proud look; let not the
greediness of the belly, nor lust of the flesh, take hold of me."(7) And in
the Book of Wisdom, a book full of all virtue, the Holy Spirit, now openly
drawing His hearers to continence and chastity, sings on this wise, "Better
it is to have no children, and to have virtue, for the memorial thereof is
immortal; because it is known with God and with men. When it is present men
take example at it; and when it is gone they desire it: it weareth a crown
and triumpheth for ever, having gotten the victory, striving for undefiled
rewards."(8)

CHAP. IV.--CHRIST ALONE TAUGHT VIRGINITY, OPENLY PREACHING THE KINGDOM OF
HEAVEN; THE LIKENESS OF GOD TO BE ATTAINED IN THE LIGHT OF THE DIVINE
VIRTUES.

   We have already spoken of the periods of the human race, and how,
beginning with the intermarriage of brothers and sisters, it went on to
continence; and we have now left for us the subject of virginity. Let us
then endeavour to speak of this as well as we can. And first let us inquire
for what reason it was that no one of the many patriarchs and prophets and
righteous men, who taught and did many noble things, either praised or
chose the state of virginity. Because it was reserved for the Lord alone to
he the first to teach this doctrine, since He alone, coming down to us,
taught man to draw near to God; for it was fitting that He who was first
and chief of priests, of prophets, and of angels, should also be saluted as
first and chief of virgins.(9) For in old times man was not yet perfect,
and for this reason was unable to receive perfection, which is virginity.
For, being made in the Image of God, he needed to receive that which was
according to His Likeness;(10) which the Word being sent down into the
world to perfect. He first took upon Him our form, disfigured as it was by
many sins, in order that we, for whose sake He bore it, might be able again
to receive the divine form. For it is then that we are truly fashioned in
the likeness of God, when we represent His features in a human life, like
skilful painters, stamping them upon ourselves as upon tablets, learning
the path which He showed us. And for this reason He, being God, was pleased
to put on human flesh, so that we, beholding as on a tablet the divine
Pattern of our life, should also be able to imitate Him who painted it. For
He was not one who, thinking one thing, did another; nor, while He
considered one thing to be right, taught another. But whatever things were
truly useful and right, these He both taught and did.

CHAP. V.--CHRIST, BY PRESERVING HIS FLESH IN-CORRUPT IN VIRGINITY, DRAWS TO
THE EXERCISE OF VIRGINITY; THE SMALL NUMBER OF VIRGINS  IN  PROPORTION TO
THE NUMBER OF SAINTS.

   What then did the Lord, who is the Truth and the Light, take in hand
when He came down  from heaven? He preserved the flesh which He had taken
upon Him incorrupt in virginity, so that we also, if we world come to the
likeness of God and Christ, should endeavour to honour virginity. For the
likeness of God is the avoiding of corruption. And that the Word, when He
was incarnate, became chief Virgin, in the same way as He was chief
Shepherd and chief Prophet of the Church, the Christ-possessed John shows
us, saying, in the Book of the Revelation, "And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb
stood on the mount Sion, and with Him an hundred forty and four thousand,
having His name and  His Father's name written in their foreheads. And I
heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of
a great thunder; and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps:
And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four
beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred
and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth. These are
they which were not defiled with women; for they are virgins. These are
they who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth;"(1) showing that the Lord
is leader of the choir of virgins. And remark, in addition to this, how
very great in the sight of God is the dignity of virginity: "These were
redeemed from among men, being the first-fruits unto God and to the Lamb.
And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault,"(2) he
says, "and they follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth." And he clearly
intends by this to teach us that the number of virgins was, from the
beginning, restricted to so many, namely, a hundred and forty and four
thousand, while the multitude of the other saints is innumerable. For let
us consider what he means when discoursing of the rest. "I beheld a great
multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and
people, and tongues."(3) It is plain, therefore, as I said, that in the
case of the other saints he introduces an unspeakable multitude, while in
the case of those who are in a state of virginity he mentions only a very
small number, so as to make a strong contrast with those who make up the
innumerable number.(4)

   This, O Arete, is my discourse to you on the subject of virginity. But,
if I have omitted anything, let Theophila, who succeeds me, supply the
omission.

DISCOURSE II.--THEOPHILA.

CHAP. I.--MARRIAGE NOT ABOLISHED BY THE COMMENDATION OF VIRGINITY.

   And then, she said, Theophila spoke:--Since Marcella has excellently
begun this discussion without sufficiently completing it, it is necessary
that I should endeavour to put a finish to it. Now, the fact that man has
advanced by degrees to virginity, God urging him on from time to time,
seems to me to have been admirably proved; but I cannot say the same as to
the assertion that from henceforth they should no longer beget children.
For I think I have perceived clearly from the Scriptures that, after He had
brought in virginity, the Word did not altogether abolish the generation of
children; for although the moon may be greater than the stars, the light of
the other stars is not destroyed by the moonlight.

   Let us begin with Genesis, that we may give its place of antiquity and
supremacy to this scripture. Now the sentence and ordinance of God
respecting the begetting of children(5) is confessedly being fulfilled to
this day, the Creator still fashioning man. For this is quite manifest,
that God, like a painter, is at this very time working at the world, as the
Lord also taught, "My Father worketh hitherto."(6) But when the rivers
shall cease to flow and fall into the reservoir of the sea, and the light
shall be perfectly separated from the darkness,--for the separation is
still going on,--and the dry laud shall henceforth cease to bring forth its
fruits with creeping things and four-footed beasts, and the predestined
number of men shall be fulfilled; then from henceforth shall men abstain
from the generation of children. But at present man must cooperate in the
forming of the image of God, while the world exists and is still being
formed; for it is said, "Increase and multiply."(5) And we must not be
offended at the ordinance of the Creator, from which, moreover, we
ourselves have our being. For the casting of seed into the furrows of the
matrix is the beginning of the generation of men, so that bone taken from
bone, and flesh from flesh, by an invisible power, are fashioned into
another man. And in this way we must consider that the saying is fulfilled,
"This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh."(7)

CHAP. II.--GENERATION SOMETHING AKIN TO THE FIRST FORMATION OF EVE FROM THE
SIDE AND NATURE OF ADAM; GOD THE CREATOR OF MEN IN ORDINARY GENERATION.

   And this perhaps is what was shadowed forth by the sleep and trance of
the first man, which prefigured the embraces of connubial love. When
thirsting for children a man falls into a kind of trance,(1) softened and
subdued by the pleasures of generation as by sleep, so that again something
drawn from his flesh and from his bones is, as I said, fashioned into
another man. For the harmony of the bodies being disturbed in the embraces
of love, as those tell us who have experience of the marriage state, all
the marrow-like and generative part of the blood, like a kind of liquid
bone, coming together from all the members, worked into foam and curdled,
is projected through the organs of generation into the living body of the
female. And probably it is for this reason that a man is said to leave his
father and his mother, since he is then suddenly unmindful of all things
when united to his wife in the embraces of love, he is overcome by the
desire of generation, offering his side to the divine Creator to take away
from it, so that the father may again appear in the son.

   Wherefore, if God still forms man, shall we not be guilty of audacity
if we think of the generation of children as something offensive, which the
Almighty Himself is not ashamed to make  use of in working with His
undefiled hands;  for He says to Jeremiah, "Before I formed thee in the
belly I knew thee;"(2) and to Job, "Didst  thou take clay and form a living
creature, and  make it speak upon the earth?"(3) and Job draws near to Him
in supplication, saying, "Thine hands have marie me and fashioned me."(4)
Would it not, then, be absurd to forbid marriage  unions, seeing that we
expect that after us there  will be martyrs, and those who shall oppose the
evil one, for whose sake also the Word promised that He would shorten those
days?(5) For if the generation of children henceforth had seemed evil to
God, as you said, for what reason will those who have come into existence
in opposition to the divine decree and will be able to appear well-pleasing
to God? And must not that which is begotten be something spurious, and not
a creature of God, if, like a counterfeit coin, it is moulded apart from
the intention and ordinance of the lawful authority? And so we concede to
men the power of forming men.

CHAP. III.--AN AMBIGUOUS  PASSAGE OF SCRIPTURE; NOT ONLY THE FAITHFUL BUT
EVEN PRELATES SOMETIMES ILLEGITIMATE.

   But Marcella, interrupting, said, "O Theophila, there appears here a
great mistake, and something contrary to what you have said; and do you
think to escape under cover of the cloud which you have thrown around you?
For there comes that argument, which perhaps any one who addresses you as a
very wise person will bring forward: What do you say of those who are
begotten unlawfully in adultery? For you laid it down that it was
inconceivable and impossible for any one to enter into the world unless he
was introduced by the will of the divine Ruler, his frame being prepared
for him by God. And that you may not take refuge behind a safe wall,
bringing forward the Scripture which says, 'As for the children of the
adulterers, they shall not come to their perfection,'(6) he will answer you
easily, that we often see those who are unlawfully begotten coming to
perfection like ripe fruit.

   And if, again, you answer sophistically, 'O, my friend, by those who
come not to perfection I understand being perfected in Christ-taught
righteousness;' he will say, 'But, indeed, my worthy friend, very many who
are begotten of unrighteous seed are not only numbered among those who are
gathered into the flock of the brethren, but are often called even to
preside over them.(7) Since, then, it is clear, and all testify, that those
who are born of adultery do come to perfection, we must not imagine that
the Spirit was teaching respecting conceptions and births, but rather
perhaps concerning those who adulterate the truth, who, corrupting the
Scriptures by false doctrines, bring forth an imperfect and immature
wisdom, mixing their error with piety.' And, therefore, this plea being
taken away from you, come now and tell us if those who are born of adultery
are begotten by the will of God; for you said that it was impossible that
the offspring of a man should be brought to perfection unless the Lord
formed it and gave it life."

CHAP. IV.--HUMAN GENERATION, AND THE WORK OF GOD THEREIN SET FORTH.

   Theophila, as though caught round the middle by a strong antagonist,
grew giddy, and with difficulty recovering herself, replied, "You ask a
question, my worthy friend, which needs to be solved by an example, that
you may still better understand how the creative power of God, pervading
all things, is more especially the real cause in the generation of men,
making those things to grow which are planted in the productive earth. For
that which is sown is not to be blamed, but he who sows in a strange soil
by unlawful embraces, as though purchasing a slight pleasure by shamefully
selling his own seed. For imagine our birth into the world to be like some
such thing as a house having its entrance lying close to lofty mountains;
and that the house extends a great way down, far from the entrance, and
that it has many holes behind, and that in this part it has circular." "I
imagine it," said Marcella. "Well, then, suppose that a modeller seated
within is fashioning many statues; imagine, again, that the substance of
clay is incessantly brought to him from without, through the holes, by many
men who do not any of them see the artist himself. Now suppose the house to
be covered with mist and clouds, and nothing visible to those who are
outside but only the holes." "Let this also be supposed," she said. "And
that each one of those who are labouring together to provide the clay has
one hole allotted to himself, into which he alone has to bring and deposit
his own clay, not touching any other hole. And if, again, he shall
officiously endeavour to open that which is allotted to another, let him be
threatened with fire and scourges.

   "Well, now, consider further what comes after this: the modeller within
going round to the holes and taking privately for his modelling the clay
which he finds at each hole, and having in a certain number of months made
his model, giving it back through the same hole; having this for his rule,
that every lump of clay which is capable of being moulded shall be worked
up indifferently, even if it be unlawfully thrown by any one through
another's hole, for the clay has done no wrong, and, therefore, as being
blameless, should be moulded and formed; but that he who, in opposition to
the ordinance and law, deposited it in another's hole, should be punished
as a criminal and transgressor. For the clay should not be blamed, but he
who did this in violation of what is right; for, through incontinence,
having carried it away, he secretly, by violence, deposited it in another's
hole." "You say most truly."

CHAP. V.--THE HOLY FATHER FOLLOWS UP THE SAME ARGUMENT.

   And now that these things are completed, it remains for you to apply
this picture, my wisest of friends, to the things which have been already
spoken of; comparing the house to the invisible nature of our generation,
and the entrance adjacent to the mountains to the sending down of our souls
from heaven, and their descent into the bodies; the holes to the female
sex, and the modeller to the creative power of God, which, under the cover
of generation, making use of our nature, invisibly forms us men within,
working the garments for the souls. Those who carry the clay represent the
male sex in the comparison; when thirsting for children, they bring and
east in seed into the natural channels of the female, as those in the
comparison cast clay into the holes. For the seed, which, so to speak,
partakes of a divine creative power, is not to be thought guilty of the
incentives to incontinence; and art always works up the matter submitted to
it; and nothing is to be considered as evil in itself, but becomes so by
the act of those who used it in such a way; for when properly and purely
made use of, it comes out pure, but if disgracefully and improperly, then
it becomes disgraceful. For how did iron, which was discovered for the
benefit of agriculture and the arts, injure those who sharpened it for
murderous battles? Or how did gold, or silver, or brass, and, to take it
collectively, the whole of the workable earth, injure those who,
ungratefully towards their Creator, make a wrong use of them by turning
parts of them into various kinds of idols? And if any one should supply
wool from that which had been stolen to the weaving art, that art,
regarding this one thing only, manufactures the material submitted to it,
if it will receive the preparation, rejecting nothing of that which is
serviceable to itself, since that which is stolen is here not to be blamed,
being lifeless.  And, therefore, the material itself is to be wrought and
adorned, but he who is discovered to have abstracted it unjustly should be
punished. So,  in like manner, the violators of marriage, and  those who
break the strings of the harmony of life, as of a harp, raging with lust,
and letting loose their desires in adultery, should themselves be tortured
and punished, for they do a great wrong stealing from the gardens of others
the embraces of generation; but the seed itself, as in the case of the
wool, should be formed and endowed with life.

CHAP. VI.--GOD CARES EVEN FOR ADULTEROUS BIRTHS; ANGELS GIVEN TO THEM AS
GUARDIANS.

   But what need is there to protract the argument by using such examples?
for nature could not thus, in a little time, accomplish so great a work
without divine help. For who gave to the bones their fixed nature? and who
bound the yielding members with nerves, to be extended and relaxed at the
joints? or who prepared channels for the blood, and a soft windpipe for the
breath? or what god caused the humours to ferment, mixing them with blood
and forming the soft flesh out of the earth, but only the Supreme Artist
making us to be man, the rational and living image of Himself, and forming
it like  wax, in the womb, from moist slight seed? or by whose providence
was it that the foetus was not suffocated by damp when shut up within, in
the connexion of the vessels? or who, after it was brought forth and had
come into the light, changed it from weakness and smallness to size, and
beauty, and strength, unless God Himself, the Supreme Artist, as I said,
making by His creative power copies of Christ, and living pictures? Whence,
also, we have received from the inspired writings, that those who are
begotten, even though it be in adultery, are committed to guardian angels.
But if they came into being in opposition to the will and the decree of the
blessed nature of God, how should they be delivered over to angels, to be
nourished with much gentleness and indulgence? and how, if they had to
accuse their own parents, could they confidently, before the judgment seat
of Christ, invoke Him and say, "Thou didst not, O Lord, grudge us this
common light; but these appointed us to death, despising Thy command?"
"For," He says, "children begotten of unlawful beds are witnesses of
wickedness against their parents at their trial."(1)

CHAP. VII.--THE RATIONAL SOUL FROM GOD HIMSELF; CHASTITY NOT THE ONLY GOOD,
ALTHOUGH THE BEST AND MOST HONOURED.

   And perhaps there will be room for some to argue plausibly among those
who are wanting in discrimination and judgment, that this fleshly garment
of the soul, being planted by men, is shaped spontaneously apart from the
sentence of God. If, however, he should teach that the immortal being of
the soul also is sown along with the mortal body, he will not be believed;
for the Almighty alone breathes into man the undying and undecaying part,
as also it is He alone who is Creator of the invisible and indestructible.
For, He says, He "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man
became a living soul."(2) And those artificers who, to the destruction of
men, make images in human form, not perceiving and knowing their own Maker,
are blamed by the Word, which says, in the Book of Wisdom, a book full of
all virtue,(3) "his heart is ashes, his hope is more vile than earth, and
his life of less value than clay; forasmuch as he  knew not his Maker, and
Him that inspired into  him an active soul, and breathed in a living
spirit;"(4) that is, God, the Maker of all men; therefore, also, according
to the apostle, He "will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the
knowledge of the truth."(5) And now,  although this subject be scarcely
completed, yet there are others which remain to be discussed. For when one
thoroughly examines and understands those things which happen to man
according to his nature, he will know not to despise the procreation of
children, although he applauds chastity, and prefers it in honour. For
although honey be sweeter and more pleasant than other things, we are not
for that reason to consider other things bitter which are mixed up in the
natural sweetness of fruits. And, in support of these statements, I will
bring forward a trustworthy witness, namely, Paul, who says, "So then he
that giveth her(6) in marriage doeth well; but he that giveth her not in
marriage doeth bet ter."(7) Now the word, in setting forth that which   is
better and sweeter, did not intend to take away the inferior, but arranges
so as to assign to each its own proper use and advantage. For there are
some to whom it is not given to attain virginity; and there are others whom
He no longer wills to be excited by procreations to lust,   and to be
defiled, but henceforth to meditate and to keep the mind upon the
transformation of the body to the likeness of angels, when they "neither
marry nor are given in marriage,"(8) according to the infallible words of
the Lord; since  it is not given to all to attain that undefiled state of
being a eunuch for the sake of the kingdom  of heaven,(9) but manifestly to
those only who are able to preserve the ever-blooming and unfading flower
of virginity. For it is the custom of the prophetic Word to compare the
Church to a flower covered and variegated meadow, adorned and crowned not
only with the flowers of virginity, but also with those of child-bearing
and of continence; for it is written, "Upon thy(10) right hand did stand
the queen in a vesture of gold, wrought about with divers colours."(11)
These words, O Arete, I bring according to my ability to this discussion in
behalf of the truth.    And when TheophiIa had thus spoken, Theopatra said
that applause arose from all the virgins approving of her discourse; and
that when they became silent, after a long pause, Thaleia arose, for to her
had been assigned the third place in the contest, that which came after
Theophila. And she then, as I think, followed, and spoke.

DISCOURSE III.--THALEIA.

CHAP. I.--PASSAGES OF HOLY SCRIPTURE(12) COMPARED.

   You seem to me, O Theophila, to excel all in action and in speech, and
to be second to none m wisdom. For there is no one who will find fault with
your discourse, however contentious and contradictory he may be. Yet, while
everything else seems rightly spoken, one thing, my friend, distresses and
troubles me, considering that that wise and most spiritual man--I mean
Paul--would not vainly refer to Christ and the Church the union of the
first man and woman,(1) if the Scripture meant nothing higher than what is
conveyed by the mere words and the history; for if we are to take the
Scripture as a bare representation wholly referring to the union of man and
woman, for what reason should the apostle, calling these things to
remembrance, and guiding us, as I opine, into the way of the Spirit,
allegorize the history of Adam and Eve as having a reference to Christ and
the Church? For the passage in Genesis reads thus: "And Adam said, This is
now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman,
because she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a man leave his father
and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one
flesh."(2) But the apostle considering this passage, by no means, as I
said, intends to take it according to its mere natural sense, as referring
to the union of man and woman, as you do; for you, explaining the passage
in too natural a sense, laid down that the Spirit is speaking only of
conception and births; that the bone taken from the bones was made another
man, and that living creatures coming together swell like trees at the time
of conception. But he, more spiritually referring the passage to Christ,
thus teaches: "He that loveth his wife loveth himself. For no man ever yet
hated his own flesh, but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the
Church: for we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. For
this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined
unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery:
but I speak concerning Christ and the Church."(3)

CHAP.II.--THE DIGRESSIONS OF THE APOSTLE  PAUL; THE CHARACTER OF HIS
DOCTRINE:  NOTHING IN IT CONTRADICTORY; CONDEMNATION OF ORIGEN, WHOWRONGLY
TURNS EVERYTHINGINTO ALLEGORY.

Let it not disturb you, if, in discussing one class of subjects, he, i.e.,
Paul, should pass over into another, so as to appear to mix them up, and to
import matters foreign to the subject under consideration, departing from
the question, as now for instance. For wishing, as it seems, to strengthen
most carefully the argument on behalf of chastity, he prepares the mode of
argument beforehand, beginning with the more persuasive mode of speech. For
the character of his speech being very various, and arranged for the
purpose of progressive proof, begins gently, but flows forward into a style
which is loftier and more magnificent. And then, again changing to what is
deep, he sometimes finishes with what is simple and easy, and sometimes
with what is more difficult and delicate; and yet introducing nothing which
is foreign to the subject by these changes, but, bringing them all together
according to a certain marvellous relationship, he works into one the
question which is set forth as his subject. It is needful, then, that I
should more accurately unfold the meaning of the apostle's arguments, yet
rejecting nothing of what has been said before. For you seem to me, O
Theophila, to have discussed those words of the Scripture amply and
clearly, and to have set them forth as they are without mistake. For it is
a dangerous thing wholly to despise the literal meaning,(4) as has been
said, and especially of Genesis, where the unchangeable decrees of God for
the constitution of the universe are set forth, in agreement with which,
even until now, the world is perfectly ordered, most beautifully in
accordance with a perfect rule, until the Lawgiver Himself having re-
arranged it, wishing to order it anew, shall break up the first laws of
nature by a fresh disposition. But, since it is not fitting to leave the
demonstration of the argument unexamined--and, so to speak, half-lame--come
let us, as it were completing our pair, bring forth the analogical sense,
looking more deeply into the Scripture; for Paul is not to be despised when
he passes over the literal meaning, and shows that the words extend to
Christ and the Church.

CHAP. III.--COMPARISON INSTITUTED BETWEEN THE FIRST AND SECOND ADAM.

   And, first, we must inquire if Adam can be likened to the Son of God,
when he was found in the transgression of the Fall, and heard the sentence,
"Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."(5) For how shall he be
considered "the first-born of every creature,"(6) who, after the creation
of the earth and the firmament, was formed out of clay? And how shall he be
admitted to be "the tree of life" who was cast out for his
transgression,(7) lest "he should again stretch forth his hand and eat of
it, and live for  ever?"(8) For it is necessary that a thing which is
likened unto anything else, should in many respects be similar and
analogous to that of which it is the similitude, and not have its
constitution opposite and dissimilar. For one who should venture to compare
the uneven to the even, or harmony to discord, would not be considered
rational. But the even should be compared to that which in its nature is
even, although it should be even only in a small measure; and the white to
that which in its nature is white, even although it should be very small,
and should show but moderately the whiteness by reason of which it is
called white. Now, it is beyond all doubt clear to every one, that that
which is sinless and incorrupt is even, and harmonious, and bright as
wisdom; but that that which is mortal and sinful is uneven and discordant,
and cast out as guilty and subject to condemnation.

CHAP. IV.--SOME THINGS HERE HARD AND TOO SLIGHTLY TREATED, AND APPARENTLY
NOT SUFFICIENTLY BROUGHTOUT ACCORDING TO THE RULE OF THEOLOGY.

   Such, then, I consider to be the objections urged by many who,
despising, as it seems, the wisdom of Paul, dislike the comparing of the
first man to Christ. For come, let us consider how rightly Paul compared
Adam to Christ, not only considering him to be the type and image, but also
that Christ Himself became the very same thing,(1) because the Eternal Word
fell upon Him. For it was fitting that the first-born of God, the first
shoot, the only--begotten, even the  wisdom of God, should be joined to the
first-formed man, and first and first-born of mankind, and should become
incarnate. And this was Christ, a man filled with the pure and perfect
Godhead, and God received into man. For it  was most suitable that the
oldest of the AEons and the first of the Archangels, when about to hold
communion with men, should dwell in the  oldest and the first of men, even
Adam. And thus, when renovating those things which were  from the
beginning, and forming them again of the Virgin by the Spirit, He frames
the same(2) just as at the beginning. When the earth was still virgin and
untilled, God, taking mould, formed the reasonable creature from it without
seed.(3)

CHAP. V.--A PASSAGE OF JEREMIAH EXAMINED.

   And here I may adduce the prophet Jeremiah as a trustworthy and lucid
witness, who speaks thus: "Then I went down to the potter's house; and,
behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of
clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another
vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it."(4) For when Adam, having
been formed out of clay, was still soft and moist, and not yet, like a
tile, made hard and incorruptible, sin ruined him, flowing and dropping
down upon him like water. And therefore God, moistening him afresh and
forming anew the same clay to His honour, having first hardened and fixed
it in the Virgin's womb, and united and mixed it with the Word, brought it
forth into life no longer soft and broken; lest, being overflowed again by
streams of corruption from without, it should become soft, and perish as
the Lord in His teaching shows in the parable of the finding of the sheep;
where my Lord says to those standing by, "What man of you, having an
hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine
in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost until he find it? and
when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders rejoicing; and when he
cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto
them, Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost."

CHAP. VI.--THE WHOLE NUMBER OF SPIRITUAL SHEEP; MAN A SECOND CHOIR, AFTER
THE ANGELS, TO THE PRAISE OF GOD; THE PARABLE OF THE LOST SHEEP EXPLAINED.

   Now, since He truly was and is, being in the beginning with God, and
being God,(5) He is the chief Commander and Shepherd of the heavenly ones,
whom all reasonable creatures obey and attend, who tends in order and
numbers the multitudes of the blessed angels. For this is the equal and
perfect number of immortal creatures, divided according to their races and
tribes, man also being here taken into the flock. For be also was created
without corruption, that he might honour the king and maker of all things,
responding to the shouts of the melodious angels which came from heaven.
But when it came to pass that, by transgressing the commandment (of God),
he suffered a terrible and destructive fall, being thus reduced to a state
of death, for this reason the Lord says that He came from heaven into (a
human) life, leaving the ranks and the armies of angels. For the mountains
are to be explained by the heavens, and the ninety and nine sheep by the
principalities and powers(6) which the Captain and Shepherd left when He
went down to seek the lost one. For it remained that man should be included
in this catalogue and number, the Lord lifting him up and wrapping him
round, that he might not again, as I said, be overflowed and swallowed up
by the waves of deceit. For with this purpose the Word assumed the nature
of man, that, having overcome the serpent, He might by Himself destroy the
condemnation which had come into being along with man's ruin. For it was
fitting that the Evil One should be overcome by no other, but by him whom
he had deceived, and whom he was boasting that he held in subjection,
because no otherwise was it possible that sin and condemnation should be
destroyed, unless that same man on whose account it had been said, "Dust
thou art, and unto dust thou shall return,"(1) should be created anew, and
undo the sentence which for his sake had gone forth on all, that "as in
Adam" at first "all die, even so" again "in Christ," who assumed the nature
and position of Adam, should "all be made alive."(2)

CHAP. VII.--THE WORKS OF CHRIST, PROPER TO GOD AND TO MAN, THE WORKS OF HIM
WHO IS ONE.

   And now we seem to have said almost enough on the fact that man has
become the organ and clothing of the Only-begotten, and what He was who
came to dwell in him. But the fact that there is no moral inequality or
discord(3) may again be considered briefly from the beginning. For he
speaks well who says that that is in its own nature good and righteous and
holy, by participation of which other things become good, and that wisdom
is in connection with(4) God, and that, on the other hand, sin is unholy
and unrighteous and evil. For life and death, corruption and incorruption,
are two things in the highest degree opposed to each other. For life is a
moral equality, but corruption an inequality; and righteousness and
prudence a harmony, but unrighteousness and folly a discord. Now, man being
between these is neither righteousness itself, nor unrighteousness; but
being placed midway between incorruption and corruption, to whichever of
these he may incline is said to partake of the nature of that which has
laid hold of him. Now, when he inclines to corruption, he becomes corrupt
and mortal, and when to incorruption, he becomes incorrupt and immortal.
For, being placed midway between the tree of life and the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, of the Fruit of which he tasted,(5) he was
changed into the nature of the latter, himself being neither the tree of
life nor that of corruption; but having been shown forth as mortal, from
his participation in and presence with corruption, and, again, as incorrupt
and immortal by connection with and participation in life; as Paul also
taught, saying, "Corruption shall not inherit incorruption, nor death
life,"(6) rightly defining corruption and death to be that which corrupts
and kills, and not that which is corrupted and dies; and incorruption and
life that which gives life and immortality, and not that which receives
life and immortality. And thus man is neither a discord and an inequality,
nor an equality and a harmony. But when he received discord, which is
transgression and sin, he became discordant and unseemly; but when he
received harmony, that is righteousness, he became a harmonious and seemly
organ, in order that the Lord, the Incorruption which conquered death,
might harmonize the resurrection with the flesh, not suffering it again to
be inherited by corruption. And on this point also let these statements
suffice.

CHAP. VIII.--THE BONES AND FLESH OF WISDOM; THE SIDE OUT OF WHICH THE
SPIRITUAL EVE IS FORMED, THE HOLY SPIRIT; THE WOMAN' THE HELP-MEET OF ADAM;
VIRGINS BETROTHED TO CHRIST.

   For it has been already established by no contemptible arguments from
Scripture, that the first man may be properly referred to Christ Himself,
and is no longer a type and representation and image of the Only-begotten,
but has become actually Wisdom and the Word.

   For man, having been composed, like water, of wisdom and life, has
become identical with the very same untainted light which poured into him.
Whence it was that the apostle directly referred to Christ the words which
had been spoken of Adam. For thus will it be most certainly agreed that the
Church is formed out of His bones and flesh; and it was for this cause that
the Word, leaving His Father in heaven, came down to be "joined to His
wife;"(7) and slept in the trance of His passion, and willingly suffered
death for her, that He might present the Church to Himself glorious and
blameless, having cleansed her by the laver,(8) for the receiving of the
spiritual and blessed seed, which is sown by Him who with whispers implants
it in the depths of the mind; and is conceived and formed by the Church, as
by a woman. so as to give birth and nourishment to virtue. For in this way,
too, the command, "Increase and multiply,"(9) is duly fulfilled, the Church
increasing daily in greatness and beauty and multitude, by the union and
communion of the Word who now still comes down to us and falls into a
trance by the memorial of His passion; for otherwise the Church could not
conceive believers, and give them new birth by the , layer of regeneration,
unless Christ, emptying Himself for their sake, that He might be contained
by them, as I said, through the recapitulation of His passion, should die
again, coming down from heaven, and being "joined to His wife," the Church,
should provide for a certain  power being taken from His own side, so that
all who are built up in Him should grow up, even  those who are born again
by the laver, receiving of His bones and of His flesh, that is, of His
holiness and of His glory. For he who says that the bones and flesh of
Wisdom are understanding and virtue, says most rightly; and that the
side(1) is the Spirit of truth, the Paraclete, of whom the illuminated (2)
receiving are fitly born again to incorruption. For it is impossible for
any one to be a partaker of the Holy Spirit, and to be chosen a member of
Christ, unless the Word first came down upon him and fell into a trance, in
order that he, being filled(3) with the Spirit, and rising again from sleep
with Him who was laid to sleep for his sake, should be able to receive
renewal and restoration. For He may fitly be called the side(1) of the
Word, even the  sevenfold Spirit of truth, according to the prophet;(4) of
whom God taking, in the trance of Christ, that is, after His incarnation
and passion, prepares a help-meet for Him(5)--I mean  the souls which are
betrothed and given in marriage to Him. For it is frequently the case that
the Scriptures thus call the assembly and mass of believers by the name of
the Church, the more perfect in their progress being led up to be the one
person and body of the Church. For those who are the better, and who
embrace the truth more clearly, being delivered from the evils of the
flesh, become, on account of their perfect purification and faith, a church
and help-meet of Christ, betrothed and given in marriage to Him as a
virgin, according to the apostle,(6) so that receiving the pure and genuine
seed of His doctrine, they may co-operate with Him, helping in preaching
for the salvation of others. And those who are still imperfect and
beginning their lessons, are born to salvation, and shaped, as by mothers,
by those who are more perfect, until they are brought forth and regenerated
unto the greatness and beauty of virtue; and so these, in their turn making
progress, having become a church, assist in labouring for the birth and
nurture of other children, accomplishing in the receptacle of the soul, as
in a womb, the blameless will of the Word.

CHAP. IX.--THE DISPENSATION OF GRACE IN PAUL THE APOSTLE.

   Now we should consider the case of the renowned Paul, that when he was
not yet perfect in Christ, he was first born and suckled, Ananias preaching
to him, and renewing him in baptism, as the history in the Acts relates.
But when he was grown to a man, and was built up, then being moulded to
spiritual perfection, he was made the help-meet and bride of the Word; and
receiving and conceiving the seeds of life, he who was before a child,
becomes a church and a mother, himself labouring in birth of those who,
through him, believed in the Lord, until Christ was formed and born in them
also. For he says, "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again
until Christ be formed in you; "(7) and again, "In Christ Jesus I have
begotten you through the Gospel."(8)

   It is evident, then, that the statement respecting Eve and Adam is to
be referred to the Church and Christ. For this is truly a great mystery and
a supernatural, of which I, from my weakness and dulness, am unable to
speak, according to its worth and greatness. Nevertheless, let us attempt
it. It remains that I speak to you on what follows, and of its
signification.

CHAP. X.--THE DOCTRINE OF THE SAME APOSTLE CONCERNING PURITY.

   Now Paul, when summoning all persons to sanctification and purity, in
this way referred that which had been spoken concerning the first man and
Eve in a secondary sense to Christ and the Church, in order to silence the
ignorant, now deprived of all excuse. For men who are incontinent in
consequence of the uncontrolled impulses of sensuality in them, dare to
force the Scriptures beyond their true meaning, so as to twist into a
defence of their incontinence the saying, "Increase and multiply; "(9) and
the other, "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother;"(10) and
they are not ashamed to run counter to the Spirit, but, as though born for
this purpose, they kindle up the smouldering and lurking passion, fanning
and provoking it; and therefore he, cutting off very sharply these
dishonest follies and invented excuses, and having arrived at the subject
of instructing them how men should behave to their wives, showing that it
should be as Christ did to the Church, "who gave Himself for it, that He
might sanctify and cleanse it by the washing(11) of water by the Word,"
(12) he referred back to Genesis, mentioning the things spoken concerning
the first man, and explaining these things as bearing on the subject before
him, that he might take away occasion for the abuse of these passages from
those who taught the sensual gratification of the body, under the pretext
of begetting children.

CHAP. XI.--THE SAME ARGUMENT.

   For consider, O virgins, how he,(1) desiring with all his might that
believers in Christ should be chaste, endeavours by many arguments to show
them the dignity of chastity, as when he says,(2)

   Now, concerning the things whereof ye wrote  unto me: It is good for a
man not to touch a woman," thence showing already very clearly that it is
good not to touch(3) a woman, laying it down. and setting it forth
unconditionally. But afterwards, being aware of the weakness of the less
continent, and their passion for intercourse, he permitted those who are
unable to govern the flesh to use their own wives, rather than, shamefully
transgressing, to give themselves tip to fornication. Then, after having
given this permission, he immediately added these words,(4) "that Satan
tempt you not for your incontinency;" which means, "if you, such as you
are, cannot, on account of the incontinence and softness of your bodies, be
perfectly continent, I will rather permit you to have intercourse with your
own wives, lest, professing perfect continence, ye be constantly tempted by
the evil one, and be inflamed with lust after other men's wives."

CHAP. XII.--PAUL AN EXAMPLE TO WIDOWS, AND TO THOSE WHO DO NOT LIVE WITH
THEIR WIVES.

   Come, now, and let us examine more carefully the very words which are
before us, and observe that the apostle did not grant these things
unconditionaIly to all, but first laid down the reason on account of which
he was led to this. For, having set forth that "it is good for a man not to
touch a woman,"(2) he added immediately,(7) "Nevertheless, to avoid
fornication, let every man have his own wife"(5)--that is, "on account of
the fornication which would arise from your being unable to restrain your
voluptuousness "-- and let every woman have her own husband. Let the
husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife
unto the husband. The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband:
and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife.
Defraud ye not one the other, except it tie with consent for a time, that
ye may give yourselves to prayer;(6) and come together again, that Satan
tempt you not for your incontinency. But I speak this by permission, and
not of commandment."(7) And this is very carefully considered. "By
permission" he says, showing  that he was  giving counsel, "not of command;
" for he receives command  respecting chastity and the not touching of a
woman, but permission respecting those who are unable, as I said, to
chasten their  appetites. These things, then, he lays down concerning men
and women who are married to one spouse, or who shall hereafter be so; but
we must now examine carefully the apostle's language respecting men who
have lost their wives, and women who have lost their husbands, and what he
declares on this subject.

   "I say therefore," he goes on,(8) "to the unmarried and widows, It is
good for them if they abide even as I. But if they cannot contain, let them
marry: for it is better to marry than to burn." Here also he persisted in
giving the preference to continence. For, taking himself as a notable
example, in order to stir them up to emulation, he challenged his hearers
to this state of life, teaching that it was better that a man who had been
bound to one wife should henceforth remain single, as lie also did.(9) But
if, on the other hand, this should be a matter of difficulty to any one, on
account of the strength of animal passion, he allows that one who is in
such a condition may, "by permission," contract a second marriage; not as
though he expressed the opinion that a second marriage was in itself
flood,(10) but judging it better than burning. Just as though, in the fast
which prepares for the Easter celebration, one should offer food to an
other who was dangerously ill, and say," In truth, my friend, it were
fitting and good that you should bravely hold out like us, and partake of
the same things,(11) for it is forbidden even to think of food to-day; but
since you are held down and weakened by disease, and cannot bear it,
therefore, 'by permission,' we advise you to eat food, lest, being quite
unable, from sickness, to hold up against the desire for food, you perish."
Thus also the apostle speaks here, first saying that he wished all were
healthy and continent, as he also was, but afterwards allowing a second
marriage to those who are burdened with the disease of the passions, lest
they should be wholly defiled by fornication, goaded on by the itchings of
the organs of generation to promiscuous intercourse, considering such a
second marriage far preferable to burning and indecency.

CHAP. XIII.--THE DOCTRINE OF PAUL CONCERNING VIRGINITY EXPLAINED.

   I have now brought to an end what I have to say respecting continence
and marriage and chastity, and intercourse with men, and in which of these
there is help towards progress in righteousness; but it still remains to
speak concerning virginity--if, indeed, anything be prescribed on this
subject. Let us then treat this subject also; for it stands thus: "Now
concerning virgins, I have no commandment of the Lord: yet I give my
judgment, as one that hath obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful. I
suppose therefore that this is good for the present distress; I say, that
it is good for a man so to be. Art thou bound unto a wife? seek not to be
loosed. Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not a wife. But and if thou
marry, thou hast not sinned; and if a virgin marry, she has not sinned.
Nevertheless such shall have trouble in the flesh: but I spare you." Having
given his opinion with great caution respecting virginity, and being about
to advise him who wished it to give his virgin in marriage, so that none of
those things which conduce to sanctification should be of necessity and by
compulsion, but according to the free purpose of the soul. for this is
acceptable to God, he does not wish these things to be said as by
authority, and as the mind of the Lord, with reference to the giving of a
virgin in marriage; for after he had said,(2) "if a virgin marry, she hath
not sinned," directly afterwards, with the greatest caution, he modified
his statement, showing that he had advised these things by human
permission, and not by divine. So, immediately after he had said, "if a
virgin marry, she hath not sinned," he added, "such shall have trouble in
the flesh: but I spare you."(2) By which he means: "I sparing you, such as
you are, consented to these things, because yon have chosen to think thus
of them, that I may not seem to hurry you on by violence, anti compel any
one to this.(3) But yet if it shall please you who find chastity hard to
bear, rather to turn to marriage; I consider it to be profitable for you to
restrain yourselves in the gratification of the flesh, not making your
marriage an occasion for abusing your own vessels to uncleanness." Then he
adds,(4) "But this I say, brethren, the time is short: it remaineth, that
both they that have wives be as though they had none." And again, going on
and challenging them to the same things, he confirmed his statement,
powerfully supporting the state of virginity, and adding expressly the
following words to those which he had spoken before, he exclaimed,(5) "I
would have you without carefulness. He that is unmarried careth for the
things that belong to the Lord:(6) but he that is married careth for f the
things that are of the world, how he may please his wife. There is a
difference also between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman careth for
the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit:
but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may
please her husband." Now it is clear to all, without any doubt, that to
care for the things of the Lord and to please God, is much better than to
care for the things of the world and to please one's wife. For who is there
so foolish and blind. as not to perceive in this statement the higher
praise which Paul accords to chastity? "And this," he says,(7) "I  speak
for your own profit, not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that
which is comely."

CHAP. XIV.--VIRGINITY A GIFT OF GOD: THE PURPOSE OF VIRGINITY NOT RASHLY
TO BE ADOPTED BY ANY ONE.

   Consider besides how, in addition to the words already quoted, he
commends the state of virginity as a gift of God. Wherefore he rejects
those of the more incontinent, who, under the influence of vain-glory,
would advance to this state, advising them to marry, lest in their time of
manly strength, the flesh stirring up the desires and passions, they should
be goaded on to defile the soul. For let us consider what he lays down:(8)
" But if any man think that he behaveth himself uncomely towards his
virgin," he says," if she pass the flower of her age, and need so require,
let him do what he will, he sinneth not: let him marry;" properly here
preferring marriage to "uncomeliness," in the case of those who had chosen
the state of virginity, but afterwards finding it intolerable and grievous,
and in word boasting of their perseverance before men, out of shame, but
indeed no longer having the power to persevere in the life of a eunuch. But
for him who of his own free will and purpose decides to preserve his flesh
in virgin purity, "having no necessity,"(9) that is, passion calling forth
his loins to intercourse, for there are, as it seems, differences in men's
bodies; such a one contending and struggling, and zealously abiding by his
profession. and admirably fulfilling it, he exhorts to abide and to
preserve it, according the highest prize to virginity. For he that is able,
he says, and ambitious to preserve his flesh pure, does better; but he that
is unable, and enters into marriage lawfully, and does not indulge in
secret corruption, does well. And now enough has been said on these
subjects.

   Let any one who will, take in his hand the Epistle to the Corinthians,
and, examining all its passages one by one, then consider what we have
said, comparing them together, as to whether there is not a perfect harmony
and agreement between them. These things, according to my power, O Arete, I
offer to thee as my contribution on the subject of chastity.

   EUBOULIOS. Through many things, O Gregorion, she has scarcely come to
the subject, having measured and crossed a mighty sea of words.

   GREGORION. So it seems; but come, I must mention the rest of what was
said in order, going through it and repeating it, while I seem to have the
sound of it dwelling in my ears, before it flies away and escapes; for the
remembrance of things lately heard is easily effaced from the aged.

   EUBOULIOS. Say on, then; for we have come to have the pleasure of
hearing these discourses.

   GREGORION. And then after, as you observed, Thaleia had descended from
her smooth and unbroken course to the earth, Theopatra, she said, followed
her in order, and spoke as follows.

DISCOURSE IV.--THEOPATRA.

CHAP. I.--THE NECESSITY OF PRAISING VIRTUE, FOR THOSE WHO HAVE THE POWER.

   If the art of speaking, O virgins, always went by the same ways, and
passed along the same path, there would be no way to avoid wearying you for
one who persisted in the arguments which had already been urged. But since
there are of arguments myriads of currents and ways, God inspiring us "at
sundry times and in divers manners,"(1) who can have the choice of holding
back or of being afraid? For he would not be free from blame to whom the
gift has been given, if he failed to adorn that which is honourable with
words of praise. Come then, we also, according to our gifts, will sing the
brightest and most glorious star of Christ, which is chastity. For this way
of the Spirit is very wide and large. Beginning, therefore, at the point
from which we may say those things which are suitable and fitting to the
subject before us, I let us from thence consider it.

CHAP. II.--THE PROTECTION OF CHASTITY AND VIRGINITY DIVINELY GIVEN TO MEN,
THAT THEY MAY EMERGE FROM THE MIRE OF VICES.

   Now I at least seem to perceive that nothing has been such a means of
restoring men to paradise, and of the change to incorruption, and of
reconciliation to God, and such a means of salvation to men, by guiding us
to life, as chastity. And I will now endeavour to show why I think so
concerning these things, that having heard distinctly the power of the
grace already spoken of, you may know of how great blessings it has become
the giver to us. Anciently, then, after the fall of man, when he was cast
out by reason of his transgression, the stream of corruption poured forth
abundantly, and running along in violent currents, not only fiercely swept
along whatever touched it from without, but also rushing within it,
overwhelmed the souls of men. And they,(2) continuously exposed to this,
were carried along dumb and stupid, neglecting to pilot their vessels,(3)
from having nothing firm to lay hold of. For the senses of the soul, as
those have said who are learned in these things, when, being overcome by
the excitements to passion which fall upon them from without, they receive
the sudden bursts of the waves of folly which rush into them, being
darkened turn aside from the divine course its whole vessel, which is by
nature easily guided. Wherefore God, pitying us who were in such a
condition, and were able neither to stand nor to rise, sent down from
heaven the best and most glorious help, virginity, that by it we might tie
our bodies fast, like ships, and have a calm, coming to an anchorage
without damage, as also the Holy Spirit witnesses. For this is said in the
hundred and thirty-sixth(4) psalm, where the souls send joyfully up to God
a hymn of thanksgiving,(5) as many as have been taken hold of and raised up
to walk with Christ in heaven, that they might not be overwhelmed by the
streams of the world and the flesh. Whence, also, they say that Pharaoh was
a type of the devil in Egypt, since he mercilessly commanded the males to
be cast into the river,(6) but the females to be preserved alive. For the
devil, ruling(7) from Adam to Moses over this great Egypt, the world, took
care to have the male and rational offspring of the soul carried away and
destroyed by the streams of passions, but he longs for the carnal and
irrational offspring to increase and multiply.

CHAP. IlI.--THAT PASSAGE OF DAVID EXPLAINED;(8) WHAT THE HARPS HUNG UPON
THE WILLOWS SIGNIFY; THE WILLOW A SYMBOL OF CHASTITY; THE WILLOWS WATERED
BY STREAMS.

   But not to pass away from our subject, come, let us take in our hands
and examine this psalm, which the pure and stainless souls sing to God,
saying:(1) "By the rivers of Babylon there we sat down; yea, we wept, when
we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst
thereof," clearly giving the name of harps to their bodies which they hung
upon the branches of chastity, fastening them to the wood that they might
not be snatched away and dragged along again by the stream of incontinence.
For Babylon, which is interpreted "disturbance "or" confusion," signifies
this life around which the water flows, while we sit in the midst of which
the water flows round us, as long as we are in the world, the rivers of
evil always beating upon us. Wherefore, also, we are always fearful, and we
groan and cry with weeping to God, that our harps may not be snatched off
by the waves of pleasure, and slip down from the tree of chastity. For
everywhere the divine writings take the willow as the type of chastity,
because, when its flower is steeped in water, if it be drunk, it
extinguishes whatever kindles sensual desires and passions within us, until
it entirely renders barren, and makes every inclination to the begetting of
children without effect, as also Homer indicated, for this reason calling
the willows destructive of fruit.(2) And in Isaiah the righteous are said
to "spring up as willows by the water courses."(3) Surely, then, the shoot
of virginity is raised to a great and glorious height, when the righteous,
and he to whom it is  given to preserve it and to cultivate it, bedewing it
with wisdom, is watered by the gentlest streams of Christ. For as it is the
nature of this tree to bud and grow through water, so it is the nature of
virginity to blossom and grow to maturity when enriched by words, so that
one can hang his body(4) upon it.

CHAP. IV.--THE AUTHOR GOES ON WITH THE INTERPRETATION OF THE SAME PASSAGE.

   If, then, the rivers of Babylon are the streams of voluptuousness, as
wise men say, which confuse and disturb the soul, then the willows must be
chastity, to which we may suspend and draw up the organs of lust which
overbalance and weigh down the mind, so that they may not be borne down by
the torrents of incontinence, and be drawn like worms to impurity and
corruption. For God has bestowed upon us virginity as a most useful and a
serviceable help towards incorruption, sending it as an ally to those who
are contending for and longing after Zion, as the psalm shows, which is
resplendent charity and the commandment respecting it, for Zion is
interpreted "The commandment of the watchtower."(5) Now, let us here
enumerate the points which follow. For why do the souls declare that they
were asked by those who led them captive to sing the Lord's song in a
strange land? Surely because the Gospel teaches a holy and secret song,
which sinners and adulterers sing to the Evil One. For they insult the
commandments, accomplishing the will of the spirits of evil, and cast holy
things to dogs, and pearls before swine,(6) in the same manner as those of
whom the prophet says with indignation, "They read the law(7) without; "(8)
for the Jews were not to read the law going forth out of the gates of
Jerusalem or out of their houses; and for this reason the prophet blames
them strongly, and cries that they were liable to condemnation, because,
while they were transgressing the commandments, and acting impiously
towards God, they were pretentiously reading the law, as if, forsooth, they
were piously observing its precepts; but they did not receive it in their
souls, holding it firmly with faith, but rejected it, denying it by their
works. And hence they sing the Lord's song in a strange land, explaining
the law by distorting and degrading it, expecting a sensual kingdom, and
setting their hopes on this alien world, which the Word says will pass
away,(9) where those who carry them captive entice them with pleasures,
lying in wait to deceive them.

CHAP. V.--THE GIFTS OF VIRGINS, ADORNED WITH WHICH THEY ARE PRESENTED TO
ONE HUSBAND, CHRIST.

   Now, those who sing the Gospel to senseless people seem to sing the
Lord's song in a strange land, of which Christ is not the husbandman; but
those who have put on and shone in the most pure and bright, and unmingled
and pious and becoming, ornament of virginity, and are found barren and
unproductive of unsettled and grievous passions, do not sing the song in a
strange land; because they are not borne thither by their hopes, nor do
they stick fast in the lusts of their mortal bodies, nor do they take a low
view of the meaning of the commandments, but well and nobly, with a lofty
disposition, they have regard to the promises which are above, thirsting
for heaven as a congenial abode, whence God, approving their dispositions,
promises with an oath to give them choice honours, appointing and
establishing them "above His chief joy;" for He says thus:(10) "If I forget
thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not
remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer
not Jerusalem above my chief joy;" meaning by Jerusalem, as I said, these
very undefiled and incorrupt souls, which, having with self-denial drawn in
the pure draught of virginity with unpolluted lips, are "espoused to one
husband," to be presented "as a chaste virgin to Christ"(1) in heaven,
"having gotten the victory, striving for undefiled rewards."(2) Hence also
the prophet Isaiah proclaims, saying,(3) "Arise, shine,(4) for thy light is
come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." Now these promises, it
is evident to every one, will be fulfilled after the resurrection.(5) For
the Holy Spirit does not speak of that well-known town in Judea; but truly
of that heavenly city, the blessed Jerusalem, which He declares to be the
assembly of the souls which God plainly promises to place first, "above His
chief joy," in the new dispensation, settling those who are clothed in the
most white robe of virginity in the pure dwelling of unapproachable light;
because they had it not in mind to put off their wedding garment--that is,
to relax their minds by wandering thoughts.

CHAP. VI.--VIRGINITY TOBE CULTIVATED AND COMMENDED IN EVERYPLACE AND TIME.

   Further, the expression in Jeremiah,(6) "That a maid should not forget
her ornaments, nor a bride her attire,"(7) shows that she should not give
up or loosen the band of chastity through wiles and distractions. For by
the heart are properly denoted our heart and mind. Now the breastband, the
girdle which gathers together and keeps firm the purpose of the soul to
chastity, is love to God, which our Captain and Shepherd, Jesus, who is
also our Ruler and Bridegroom, O illustrious virgins, commands both you and
me to hold fast unbroken and sealed up  even to the end; for one will not
easily find  anything else a greater help to men than this  possession,
pleasing and grateful to God. There-fore, I say, that we should all
exercise and honour chastity, and always cultivate and commend it.

   Let these first-fruits of my discourse suffice for thee, O Arete, in
proof of my education and my zeal. "And I receive the gift," she said that
Arete replied, "and bid Thallousa speak after  thee; for I must have a
discourse from each one of you." And she said that Thallousa, pausing a
little, as though considering somewhat with  herself, thus spoke.

DISCOURSE V.--THALLOUSA.

CHAP. I.--THE OFFERING OF CHASTITY A GREAT GIFT.(8)

   I pray you, Arete, that you will give your assistance now too, that I
may seem to speak something worthy in the first place of yourself, and then
of those who are present. For I am persuaded, having thoroughly learnt it
from the sacred writings, that the greatest and most glorious offering and
gift, to which there is nothing comparable, which men can offer to God, is
the life(9) of virginity. For although many accomplished many admirable
things, according to their vows, in the law, they alone were said to fulfil
a great vow who were willing to offer themselves of their free-will. For
the passage runs thus: "And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto
the children of Israel, and say unto  them, when either man or woman shall
separate themselves . . . unto the Lord."(10) One vows to offer gold and
silver vessels for the sanctuary when he comes, another to offer the tithe
of his fruits, another of his property, another the best of his flocks,
another consecrates his being; and no one is able to vow a great vow to the
Lord, but he who has offered himself entirely to God.

CHAPTER II. ABRAHAM'S SACRIFICE OF A HEIFER THREE YEARS OLD, OF A GOAT, AND
OF A RAM ALSO THREE YEARS OLD: ITS MEANING; EVERY AGE TO BE CONSECRATED TO
GOD; THE THREEFOLD WATCH AND OUR AGE.

   I must endeavour, O virgins, by a true exposition, to explain to you
the mind of the Scripture according to its meaning.(11) Now, he who watches
over and restrains himself in part, and in part is distracted and
wandering, is not wholly given up to God. Hence it is necessary that the
perfect man offer up all, both the things of the soul and those of the
flesh, so that he may be complete and not lacking. Therefore also God
commands Abraham,(12) "Take Me an heifer of three years old, and a she goat
of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtle dove, and a
young pigeon;" which is admirably said; for remark, that concerning those
things, He also gives this command, Bring them Me and keep them free from
the yoke, even thy soul uninjured, like a heifer, and your flesh, and your
reason; the last like a goat, since he traverses lofty and precipitous
places, and the other like a ram, that he may in nowise skip away, and fall
and slip off from the right way. For thus shalt thou be perfect and
blameless, O Abraham, when thou hast offered to Me thy soul, and thy sense,
and thy mind, which He mentioned under the symbol of the heifer, the goat,
and the ram of three years old, as though they represented the pure
knowledge of the Trinity.

   And perhaps He also symbolizes the beginning, the middle, and the end
of our life and of our age, wishing as far as possible that men should
spend their boyhood, their manhood, and their more advanced life purely,
and offer them up to Him. Just as our Lord Jesus Christ commands in the
Gospels, thus directing: "Let not your lights be extinguished, and let not
your loins be loosed. Therefore also be ye like men who wait for their
lord, when he will return from the wedding; that, when he cometh and
knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. Blessed are ye, when he shall
make you sit down, and shall come and serve you. And if he come in the
second, or in the third watch, ye are blessed."(1) For consider, O virgins,
when He mentions three watches of the night, and His three comings, He
shadows forth in symbol our three periods of life, that of the boy, of the
full-grown man, and of the old man; so that if He should come and remove us
from the world while spending our first period, that is, while we are boys,
He may receive us ready and pure, having nothing amiss; and the second and
the third in like manner. For the evening watch is the time of the budding
and youth of man, when the reason begins to be disturbed and to be clouded
by the changes of life, his flesh gaining strength and urging him to lust.
The second is the time when, afterwards advancing to a full-grown man, he
begins to acquire stability, and to make a stand against the turbulence of
passion and self-conceit. And the third, when most of the imaginations and
desires fade away, the flesh now withering and declining to old age.

CHAP. III.--FAR BEST TO CULTIVATE VIRTUE FROM BOYHOOD.

   Therefore, it is becoming that we should kindle the unquenchable light
of faith in the heart,  and gird our loins with purity, and watch and  ever
wait for the Lord so that, if He should  will to come and take any of us
away in the first period of life, or in the second, or in the third, and
should find us most ready, and working what He appointed, He may make us to
lie down in the bosom of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. Now Jeremiah
says, "It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth;"(2) and
"that his soul should not depart from the Lord." It is good, indeed, from
boyhood, to submit the neck to the divine Hand, and not to shake off, even
to old age, the Rider who guides with pure mind, when the Evil One is ever
dragging down the mind to that which is worse. For who is there that does
not receive through the eyes, through the ears, through the taste and smell
and touch, pleasures and delights, so as to become impatient of the control
of continence as a driver, who checks and vehemently restrains the horse
from evil? Another who turns his thoughts to other things will think
differently; but we say that he offers himself perfectly to God who strives
to keep the flesh undefiled from childhood, practising virginity; for it
speedily brings great and much-desired gifts of hopes to those who strive
for it, drying up the corrupting lusts and passions of the soul. But come,
let us explain how we give ourselves up to the Lord.

CHAP. IV.--PERFECT CONSECRATION AND DEVOTION TO GOD: WHAT IT IS.

   That which is laid down in the Book of Numbers,(3) "greatly to vow a
vow," serves to show, as, with a litle more explanation, I proceed to
prove, that chastity is the great vow above all vows. For then am I plainly
consecrated altogether to the Lord, when I not only strive to keep the
flesh untouched by intercourse, but also unspotted by other kinds of
unseemliness. For "the unmarried woman," it is said,(4) "careth for the
things of the Lord, how she may please the Lord.;" not merely that she may
bear away the glory in part of not being maimed in her virtue, but in both
parts, according to the apostle, that she may be sanctified in body and
spirit, offering up, her members to the Lord. For let us say what it is to
offer up oneself perfectly to the Lord. If, for instance, I open my mouth
on some subjects, and close it upon others; thus, if I open it for the
explanation of the Scriptures, for the praise of God, according to my
power, in a true faith and with all due honour, and if I close it, putting
a door and a watch upon it s against foolish discourse, my mouth is kept
pure, and is offered up to God. "My tongue is a pen."(6) an organ of
wisdom; for the Word of the Spirit writes by it in clearest letters, from
the depth and power of the Scriptures, even the Lord, the swift Writer of
the ages, that He quickly and swiftly registers and fulfils the counsel of
the Father, hearing the words, "quickly words may be applied, "My tongue is
a pen;" for a beautiful pen is sanctified and offered to Him, writing
things more lovely than the poets  and orators who confirm the doctrines of
men.  If, too, I accustom my eyes not to lust after the charms of the body,
nor to take delight in unseemly sights, but to look up to the things which
are above, then my eyes are kept pure, and are offered to the Lord. If I
shut my ears against detraction and slanders, and open them to the word of
God, having intercourse with wise men,(2) then have I offered up my ears to
the Lord. If I keep my hands from dishonourable dealing, from acts of
covetousness and of licentiousness, then are my hands kept pure to God. If
I withhold my steps from going(3) in perverse ways, then have I offered up
my feet, not going to the places of public resort and banquets, where
wicked men are found, but into the right way, fulfilling something of
the(4) commands. What, then, remains to me, if I also keep the heart pure,
offering up all its thoughts to God; if I think no evil, if anger and wrath
gain no rule over me, if  I meditate in the law of the Lord day and night?
And this is to preserve a great chastity, and to vow a great vow.

CHAP. V.--THE VOW OF CHASTITY, AND ITS RITES IN THE LAW; VINES, CHRIST, AND
THE DEVIL.

   I will now endeavour to explain to you, O virgins, the rest of that
which is prescribed; for this is attached to your duties, consisting of
laws concerning virginity, which are useful as teaching how we should
abstain, and how advance to virginity. For it is written thus:(5) "And the
Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say
unto them, When either man or woman shall separate themselves to vow a vow
of a Nazarite, to separate themselves unto the Lord; he shall separate
himself from wine and strong drink, and shall drink no vinegar of wine, or
vinegar of strong drink, neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor
eat moist grapes, or dried, all the days of his separation." And this
means, that he who has devoted and offered himself to the Lord shall not
take of the fruits of the plant of evil, because of its natural tendency to
produce intoxication and distraction of mind. For we perceive from the
Scriptures two kinds of vines which were separate from each other, and were
unlike. For the one is productive of immortality and righteousness; but the
other of madness and insanity. The sober and joy-producing vine, from whose
instructions, as from branches, there joyfully hang down clusters of
graces, distilling love, is our Lord Jesus, who says expressly to the
apostles,(6) "I am the true vine, ye are the branches; and my Father is the
husbandman." But the wild and death-bearing vine is the devil, who drops
down fury and poison and wrath, as Moses relates, writing concerning
him,(7) "For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of
Gomorrah: their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter: their
wine is the poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps." The
inhabitants of Sodom having gathered grapes from this, were goaded on to an
unnatural and fruitless desire for males. Hence, also, in the time of Noah,
men having given themselves tip to drunkenness, sank down into unbelief,
and, being overwhelmed by the deluge, were drowned. And Cain, too, having
drawn from this, stained his fratricidal hands, and defiled the earth with
the blood of his own family. Hence, too, the heathen, becoming intoxicated,
sharpen their passions for murderous battles; for man is not so much
excited, nor goes so far astray through wine, as from anger and wrath. A
man does not become intoxicated and go astray through wine, in the same way
as he does from sorrow, or from love, or from incontinence. And therefore
it is ordered that a virgin shall not taste of this vine, so that she may
be sober and watchful from the cares of life, and may kindle the shining
torch of the light of righteousness for the Word. "Take heed to
yourselves," says the Lord,(8) "lest at any time your hearts be overcharged
with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day
come upon yon unawares, as a snare."

CHAP. VI.--SIKERA, A MANUFACTURED AND SPURIOUS WINE, YET INTOXICATING;
THINGS WHICH ARE AKIN TO SINS ARE TO BE AVOIDED BY A VIRGIN; THE ALTAR OF
INCENSE (A SYMBOL OF) VIRGINS.

   Moreover, it is not only forbidden to virgins in any way to touch those
things which are made from that vine, but even such things as resemble them
and are akin to them. For Sikera, which is manufactured, is called a
spurious kind of wine, whether made of palms or of other fruit-trees. For
in the same way that draughts of wine overthrow man's reason, so do these
exceedingly; and to speak the plain truth, the wise are accustomed to call
by the name of Sikera all that produces drunkenness and distraction of
mind, besides wine. In order, therefore, that the virgin may not, when
guarding against those sins which are in their own nature evil, be defiled
by those which are like them and akin to them, conquering the one and being
conquered by the other, that is, decorating herself with textures of
different cloths, or with stones and gold, and other decorations of the
body, things which intoxicate the soul; on this account it is ordered that
she do not give herself up to womanish weaknesses and laughter, exciting
herself to wiles and foolish talking, which whirl the mind around and
confuse it; as it is indicated in another place,(1) "Ye shall not eat the
hyaena and animals like it; nor the weasel and creatures of that kind." For
this is the straight and direct way to heaven, not merely not to avoid any
stumbling-block which would trip up and destroy men who are agitated by a
desire for luxuries and pleasures, but also from such things as resemble
them.

   Moreover, it has been handed down that the unbloody altar of God
signifies the assembly of the chaste; thus virginity appears to be
something great and glorious. Therefore it ought to be preserved undefiled
and altogether pure, having no participation in the impurities of the
flesh; but it should be set up before the presence of the testimony, gilded
with wisdom, for  the Holy of holies, sending forth a sweet savour of love
to the Lord; for He says,(2) "Thou shalt make an altar to burn incense
upon: of shittim-wood shalt thou make it. And thou shall make the staves of
shittim-wood, and overlay them with gold. And thou shalt put it before the
veil that is by the ark of the testimony, before the mercy-seat that is
over the testimony, where I will meet with thee. And Aaron shall burn
thereon sweet incense every morning: when he dresseth the lamps, he shall
burn incense upon it. And when Aaron lighteth the lamps at even, he shall
burn incense upon it; a perpetual incense before the Lord throughout your
generations. Ye shall offer no strange incense thereon, nor burnt-
sacrifices nor meat-offering; neither shall ye pour drink-offering
thereon."

CHAP. VII.--THE CHURCH INTERMEDIATE BETWEEN THE SHADOWS OF THE LAW AND THE
REALITIES OF HEAVEN.

   If the law, according to the apostle, is spiritual, containing the
images "of future good things,"(3) come then, let us strip off the veil of
the letter which is spread over it, and consider its naked and true
meaning. The Hebrews were commanded to ornament the Tabernacle as a type of
the Church, that they might be able, by means of sensible things, to
announce beforehand the image of divine things. For the pattern which was
shown to Moses(4) in the mount, to which he was to have regard in
fashioning the Tabernacle, was a kind of accurate representation of the
heavenly dwelling, which we now perceive more clearly than through types,
yet more darkly than  if we saw the reality. For not yet, in our present
condition, has the truth come unmingled to men, who are here unable to bear
the sight of pure immortality, just as we cannot bear to look upon the rays
of the sun. And the Jews declared that the shadow of the image (of the
heavenly things which was afforded to them), was the third from the
reality; but we clearly behold the image of the heavenly order; for the
truth will be accurately made manifest after the resurrection, when we
shall see the heavenly tabernacle (the city in heaven "whose builder and
maker is God"(5) "face to face," and not "darkly" and "in part."(6)

CHAP. VIII.--THE DOUBLE ALTAR, WIDOWS AND VIRGINS; GOLD THE SYMBOL OF
VIRGINITY.

   Now the Jews prophesied our state, but we foretell the heavenly; since
the Tabernacle was a symbol of the Church, and the Church of heaven.
Therefore, these things being so, and the Tabernacle being taken for a type
of the Church, as I said, it is fitting that the altars should signify some
of the things in the Church. And we have already compared the brazen altar
to the company and circuit of widows; for they are a living altar of God,
to which they bring calves and tithes, and free-will offerings, as a
sacrifice to the Lord; but the golden altar within the(7) Holy of holies,
before the presence of the testimony, on which it is forbidden to offer
sacrifice and libation, has reference to those in a state of virginity, as
those who have their bodies preserved pure, like unalloyed gold, from
carnal intercourse. Now gold is commended for two reasons: the first, that
it does not rust, and the second, that in its colour it seems in a measure
to resemble the rays of the sun; and thus it is suitably a symbol of
virginity, which does not admit any stain or spot, but ever shines forth
with the light of the Word. Therefore, also, it stands nearer to God within
the Holy of holies, and before the veil, with undefiled hands, like
incense, offering up prayers to the Lord, acceptable as a sweet savour; as
also John indicated, saying that the incense in the vials of the four-and-
twenty elders were the prayers of the saints. This, then, I offer to thee,
O Arete, on the spur of the moment, according to my ability, on the subject
of chastity.

   And when Thallousa had said this, Theopatra said that Arete touched
Agathe with her sceptre, and that she, perceiving it, immediately arose and
answered.

DISCOURSE VI.--AGATHE.

CHAP. I.--THE EXCELLENCE OF THE ABIDING GLORY OF VIRGINITY; THE SOUL MADE
IN THE IMAGE OF THE IMAGE OF GOD, THAT IS OF HIS SON; THEDEVIL A SUITOR FOR
THE SOUL.

   With great confidence of being able to persuade, and to carry on this
admirable discourse,  O Arete, if thou go with me, will I also endeavour,
according to my ability, to contribute something to the discussion of the
subject before us;  something commensurate to my own power, and not to be
compared with that which has already been spoken. For I should be unable to
put forth in philosophizing anything that could compete with those things
which have already been so variously and brilliantly worked out. For I
shall seem to bear away the reproach of silliness,  if I make an effort to
match myself with my superiors in wisdom. If, however, you will bear even
with those who speak as they can, I will endeavour to speak, not lacking at
least in good will. And here let me begin.

   We have all come into this world, O virgins, endowed with singular
beauty, which has a relationship and affinity to divine wisdom. For the
souls of men do then most accurately resemble Him who begat and formed
them, when, reflecting the unsullied representation of His likeness, and
the features of that countenance, to which God looking formed them to have
an immortal and indestructible shape, they remain such. For the unbegotten
and incorporeal beauty, which neither begins nor is corruptible, but is
unchangeable, and grows not old and has need of nothing,  He resting in
Himself, and in the very light which  is in unspeakable and inapproachable
places,(1) embracing all things in the circumference of His power, creating
and arranging, made the soul after the image of His image. Therefore, also,
it is reasonable and immortal. For being made after the image of the Only-
begotten, as I said, it has an unsurpassable beauty, and therefore evil
spirits(2) love it, and plot and strive to defile its godlike and lovely
image, as the prophet Jeremiah shows, reproaching Jerusalem, "Thou hadst a
whore's forehead, thou refusedst to be ashamed;"(3) speaking of her who
prostituted herself to the powers which came against her to pollute her.
For her lovers are the devil and his angels, who plan to defile and pollute
our reasonable and clear-sighted beauty of mind by intercourse with
themselves, and desire to cohabit with every soul which is betrothed to the
Lord.

CHAP. II.--THE PARABLE OF THE TEN VIRGINS.(4)

   If, then, any one will keep this beauty inviolate and unharmed, and
such as He who constructed it formed and fashioned it, imitating the
eternal and intelligible nature of which man is the representation and
likeness, and will become like a glorious and holy image, he will be
transferred thence to heaven, the city of the blessed, and will dwell there
as in a sanctuary. Now our beauty is then best preserved undefiled and
perfect when, protected by virginity, it is not darkened by the heat of
corruption from without; but, remaining in itself, it is adorned with
righteousness, being brought as a bride to the Son of God; as He also
Himself suggests, exhorting that the light of chastity should be kindled in
their flesh, as in lamps; since the number of the ten virgins s signifies
the souls that have believed in Jesus Christ, symbolizing by the ten the
only right way to heaven. Now five of them were prudent and wise; and five
were foolish and unwise, for they had not the forethought to fill their
vessels with oil, remaining destitute of righteousness. Now by these He
signifies those who strive to come to the boundaries of virginity, and who
strain every nerve to fulfil this love, acting virtuously and temperately,
and who profess and boast that this is their aim; but who, making light of
it, and being subdued by the changes of the world, come rather to be
sketches of the shadowy image of virtue, than workers who represent the
living truth itself.

CHAP. III.--THE SAME ENDEAVOUR AND EFFORT AFTER VIRGINITY, WITH A DIFFERENT
RESULT.

   Now when it is said(5) that "the kingdom of heaven is likened unto ten
virgins, which took their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom,"
this means that the same way towards the goal had been entered upon, as is
shown by the mark X.(6) By profession they had equally proposed the same
end, and therefore they are called ten, since, as I have said, they chose
the same profession; but they did not, for all that, go forth in the same
way to meet the bridegroom. For some provided abundant future nourishment
for their lamps which were fed with oil, but others were careless, thinking
only of the present. And, therefore, they are divided into two equal
numbers of five, inasmuch as the one class preserved the five senses, which
most people consider the gates of wisdom, pure and undefiled by sins; but
the others, on the contrary, corrupted them by multitudes of sins, defiling
themselves with evil. For having restrained them, and kept them free from
righteousness, they bore a more abundant crop of transgressions, in
consequence of which it came to pass that they were forbidden, and shut out
from the divine courts. For whether, on the one hand, we do right, or, on
the other, do wrong through these  senses, our habits of good and evil are
confirmed. And as Thallousa said that there is a chastity of the eyes, and
of the ears, and of the tongue, and so on of the other senses; so here she
who keeps inviolate the faith of the five pathways of virtue--sight, taste,
smell, touch, and hearing--is called by the name of the five virgins,
because she has kept the five forms of the sense pure to Christ, as a lamp,
causing the light of holiness to shine forth clearly from each of them. For
the flesh is truly, as it were, our five-lighted lamp, which the soul will
bear like a torch, when it stands before Christ the Bridegroom, on the day
of the resurrection, showing her faith springing out clear and bright
through all the senses, as He Himself taught, saying,(1) "I am come to send
fire on the earth; and what will I if it be already kindled?" meaning by
the earth our bodies, in which He wished the swift-moving and fiery
operation of His doctrine to be kindled. Now the oil represents wisdom and
righteousness; for while the soul rains down unsparingly, and pours forth
these things upon the body, the light of virtue is kindled unquenchably,
making its good actions to shine before men, so that our Father which is in
heaven may be glorified.(2)

CHAP.IV.--WHAT THE OIL IN THE LAMPS MEANS.

   Now they offered, in Leviticus,(3) oil of this kind, "pure oil olive,
beaten for the light, to cause the lamps to burn continually, without the
veil . . . before the Lord." But they were commanded to have a feeble light
from the evening to the morning. For their light seemed to resemble the
prophetic word, which gives encouragement to temperance, being nourished by
the acts and the faith of the people. But the temple (in which the light
was kept burning) refers to "the lot of their inheritance,"(4) inasmuch as
a light can shine in only one house. Therefore it was necessary that it
should be lighted before day. For he says,(5) "they shall burn it until the
morning," that is, until the coming of Christ. But the Sun of chastity and
of righteousness having arisen, there is no need of other light.

   So long, then, as this people treasured up nourishment for the light,
supplying oil by their works, the light of continence was not extinguished
among them, but was ever shining and giving light in the "lot of their
inheritance." But when the oil failed, by their turning away from the faith
to incontinence, the light was entirely extinguished, so that the virgins
have again to kindle their lamps by light transmitted from one to another,
bringing the light of incorruption to the world from above. Let us then
supply now the oil of good works abundantly, and of prudence, being purged
from all corruption which would weigh us down; lest, while the Bridegroom
tarries, our lamps may also in like manner be extinguished. For the delay
is the interval which precedes the appearing of Christ. Now the slumbering
and sleeping of the virgins signifies the departure from life; and the
midnight is the kingdom of Antichrist, during which the destroying angel
passes over the houses.(6) But the cry which was made when it was said,(7)
"Behold the bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him," is the voice which
shall be heard from heaven, and the trumpet, when the saints, all their
bodies being raised, shall be caught up, and shall go on the clouds to meet
the Lord.(8)

   For it is to be observed that the word of God says, that after the cry
all the virgins arose, that is, that the dead shall be raised after the
voice which comes from heaven, as also Paul intimates,(9) that "the Lord
Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise
first;" that is the tabernacles,(10) for they died, being put off by their
souls. "Then we which are alive shall be caught up together with them,"
meaning our souls.(11) For we truly who are alive are the souls which, with
the bodies, having put them on again, shall go to meet Him in the clouds,
bearing our lamps trimmed, not with anything alien and worldly, but like
stars radiating the light of prudence and continence, full of ethereal
splendour.

CHAP. V.--THE REWARD OF VIRGINITY.

   These, O fair virgins, are the orgies of our mysteries; these the
mystic rites of those who are initiated in virginity; these the "undefiled
rewards"(12) of the conflict of virginity. I am betrothed to the Word, and
receive as a reward the eternal crown of immortality and riches from the
Father; and I triumph in eternity, crowned with the bright and unfading
flowers of wisdom. I am one in the choir with Christ dispensing His rewards
in heaven, around the unbeginning and never-ending King. I have become the
torch-bearer of the unapproachable lights, (1) and I join with their
company in the new song of the archangels, showing forth the new grace of
the Church; for the Word says that the company of virgins always follow the
Lord, and have fellowship with Him wherever He is. And this is what John
signifies in the commemoration of the hundred and forty-four thousand.(2)

   Go then, ye virgin band of the new ages. Go, fill your vessels with
righteousness, for the hour is coming when ye must rise and meet the
bridegroom. Go, lightly leaving on one side the fascinations and the
pleasures of life, which confuse and bewitch the soul; and thus shall ye
attain the promises, "This I swear by Him who has shown me the way of
life." This crown, woven by the prophets, I have taken from the prophetic
meadows, and offer to thee, O Arete.

   Agathe having thus admirably brought her discourse to an end, she said,
and having been applauded for what she had uttered, Arete again commanded
Procilla to speak. And she, rising and passing before the entrance, spoke
thus.

DISCOURSE VII.--PROCILLA.

CHAP. I.--WHAT THE TRUE AND SEEMLY MANNER OF PRAISING; THE FATHER GREATER
THAN THE SON, NOT IN SUBSTANCE, BUT IN ORDER; VIRGINITY THE LILY; FAITHFUL
SOULS AND VIRGINS, THE ONE BRIDE OF THE ONE CHRIST.

   It is not lawful for me to delay, O Arete, after such discourses,
seeing that I confide undoubtingly in the manifold wisdom of God, which
gives richly and widely to whomsoever it wills. For sailors who have
experience of the sea declare that the same wind blows on all who sail; and
that different persons, managing their course differently, strive to reach
different ports. Some have a fair wind; to others it blows across their
course; and yet both easily accomplish their voyage. Now, in the same way,
the "understanding Spirit,(3) holy, one only,"(4) gently breathing down
from the treasures of the Father above, giving us all the clear fair wind
of knowledge, will suffice to guide the course of our words without
offence. And now it is time for me to speak. This, O virgins, is the one
true and seemly mode of praising, when he who praises brings forward a
witness better than all those who are praised. For thence one may learn
with certainty that the commendation is given not from favour, nor of
necessity, nor from repute, but in accordance with truth and an
unflattering judgment. And so the prophets and apostles, who spoke more
fully concerning the Son of God, and assigned to Him a divinity above other
men, did not refer their praises of Him to the teaching of angels, but to
Him upon whom all authority and power depend. For it was fitting that He
who was greater than all things after the Father, should have the Father,
who alone is greater than Himself,(5) as His witness. And so I will not
bring forward the praises of virginity from mere human report, but from Him
who cares for us, and who has taken up the whole matter, showing that He is
the husbandman of this grace, and a lover of its beauty, and a fitting
witness. And this is quite clear, in the Song of Songs,(6) to any one who
is willing to see it, where Christ Himself, praising those who are firmly
established in virginity, says,(7) "As the lily among thorns, so is my love
among the daughters;" comparing the grace of chastity to the lily, on
account of its purity and fragrance, and sweetness and joyousness. For
chastity is like a spring flower, always softly exhaling immortality from
its white petals. Therefore He is not ashamed to confess that He loves the
beauty of its prime, in the following words:(8) "Thou hast ravished my
heart, my sister, my spouse; thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine
eyes, with one chain of thy neck. How fair is thy love, my sister, my
spouse! how much better is thy love than wine! and the smell of thine
ointments than all spices! Thy lips, O my spouse, drop as the honeycomb;
honey and milk are under thy tongue; and the smell of thy garments is like
the smell of Lebanon. A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring
shut up, a fountain sealed."

   These praises does Christ proclaim to those who have come to the
boundaries of virginity, describing them all under the one name of His
spouse; for the spouse must be betrothed to the Bridegroom, and called by
His name. And, moreover, she must be undefiled and unpolluted, as a garden
sealed, in which all the odours of the fragrance of heaven are grown, that
Christ alone may come and gather them, blooming with incorporeal seeds. For
the Word loves none of the things of the flesh, because He is not of such a
nature as to be contented with any of the things which are corruptible, as
hands, or face, or feet; but He looks upon and delights in the beauty which
is immaterial and spiritual, not touching the beauty of the body.

CHAP. II.--THE INTERPRETATION OF THAT PASSAGE OF THE CANTICLES.(1)

   Consider now, O virgins, that, in saying to the bride, "Thou hast
ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse," He shows the clear eye of the
understanding, when the inner man has cleansed it and looks more clearly
upon the truth. For it is clear to every one that there is a twofold power
of sight, the one of the soul, and the other of the body. But the Word does
not profess a love for that of the body, but only that of the
understanding, saying, "Thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes,
with one chain of thy neck;" which means, By the most lovely sight of thy
mind, thou hast urged my heart to love, radiating forth from within the
glorious beauty of chastity. Now the chains of the neck are necklaces which
are composed of various precious stones; and the souls which take care of
the body, place around the outward neck of the flesh this visible ornament
to deceive those  who behold; but those who live chastely, on the other
hand, adorn themselves within with ornaments truly composed of various
precious stones, namely, of freedom, of magnanimity, of wisdom, and of
love, caring little for those temporal decorations which, like leaves
blossoming  for an hour, dry up with the changes of the body. For there is
seen in man a twofold beauty, of which the Lord accepts that which is
within and is immortal, saying, "Thou hast ravished my heart with one chain
of thy neck;" meaning to show that He had been drawn to love by the
splendour of the inner man shining forth in its glory, even as the Psalmist
also testifies, saying, "The King's daughter is all glorious within."(2)

CHAP. III.--VIRGINS BEING MARTYRS FIRST AMONG THE COMPANIONS OF CHRIST.

   Let no one suppose that all the remaining company of those who have
believed are condemned, thinking that we who are virgins alone shall be led
on to attain the promises, not understanding that there shall be tribes and
families and orders, according to the analogy of the faith of each. And
this Paul, too, sets forth, saying,(3) "There is one glory of the sun, and
another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star
differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the
dead." And the Lord does not profess to give the same honours to all; but
to some He promises that they shall be numbered in the kingdom of heaven,
to others the inheritance of the earth, and to others to see the Father.(4)
And here, also, He announces that the order and holy choir of the virgins
shall first enter in company with Him into the rest of the new
dispensation, as into a bridal chamber. For they were martyrs, not as
bearing the pains of the body for a little moment of time, but as enduring
them through all their life, not shrinking from truly wrestling in an
Olympian contest for the prize of chastity; but resisting the fierce
torments of pleasures and fears and griefs, and the other evils of the
iniquity of men, they first of all carry off the prize, taking their place
in the higher rank of those who receive the promise. Undoubtedly these are
the souls whom the Word calls alone His chosen spouse and His sister, but
the rest concubines and virgins and daughters, speaking thus:(5) "There are
threescore queens and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number. My
dove, my undefiled, is but one; she is the only one of her mother, she is
the choice one of her that bare her: the daughters saw her and blessed her:
yea, the queens and the concubines, and they praised her." For there being
plainly many daughters of the Church, one alone is the chosen and most
precious in her eyes above all, namely, the order of virgins.

CHAP. IV.--THE PASSAGE(5) EXPLAINED; THE QUEENS, THE HOLY SOULS BEFORE THE
DELUGE; THE CONCUBINES, THE SOULS OF THE PROPHETS; THE DIVINE SEED FOR
SPIRITUAL OFFSPRING IN THE BOOKS OF THE PROPHETS; THE NUPTIALS OF THE WORD
IN THE PROPHETS AS THOUGH CLANDESTINE.

   Now if any one should have a doubt about  these things, inasmuch as the
points are nowhere fully wrought out, and should still wish more fully to
perceive their spiritual significance, namely, what the queens and the
concubines and the virgins are, we will say that these may have been spoken
concerning those who have been conspicuous for their righteousness from the
beginning throughout the progress of time; as of those before the flood,
and those after the flood, and so on of those after Christ. The Church,
then, is the spouse. The queens are those royal souls before the deluge,
who became well-pleasing to God, that is, those about Abel and Seth and
Enoch. The concubines(6) those after the flood, namely, those of the
prophets, in whom, before the Church was betrothed to the Lord, being
united to them after the manner of concubines, He sowed true words in an
incorrupt and pure philosophy, so that, conceiving faith, they might bring
forth to Him the Spirit of salvation. For such fruits do the souls bring
forth with whom Christ has had intercourse,  fruits which bear an ever-
memorable renown. For if you will look at the books of Moses, or David, or
Solomon, or Isaiah, or of the prophets who follow, O virgins, you will see
what offspring they have left, for the saving of life, from their
intercourse with the Son of God. Hence the Word has with deep perception
called the souls of the prophets concubines, because He did not espouse
them openly, as He did the Church, having killed for her the fatted
calf.(1)

CHAP. V.--THE SIXTY QUEENS: WHY SIXTY, AND WHY QUEENS; THE EXCELLENCE OF
THE SAINTS OF THE FIRST AGE.

   In addition to these matters, there is this also to be considered, so
that nothing may escape us of things which are necessary, why He said that
the queens were sixty, and the concubines eighty, and the virgins so
numerous as not to be counted from their multitude, but the spouse one. And
first let us speak of the sixty. I imagine that He named under the sixty
queens, those who had pleased God from the first-made man in succession to
Noah, for this reason, since these had no need of precepts and laws for
their salvation, the creation of the world in six days being still recent.
For they remembered that in six days God formed the creation, and those
things which were made in paradise; and how man, receiving a command not to
touch(2) the tree of knowledge, ran aground, the author of evil having led
him astray.(3) Thence he gave the symbolical name of sixty queens to those
souls who, from the creation of the world, in succession chose God as the
object of their love, and were almost, so to speak, the offspring of the
first age, and neighbours of the great six days' work, from their having
been born, as I said, immediately after the six days. For these had great
honour, being associated with the angels, and often seeing God manifested
visibly, and not in a dream. For consider what confidence Seth had towards
God, and Abel, and Enos, and Enoch, and Methuselah, and Noah, the first
lovers of righteousness, and the first of the first-born children who are
written in heaven,(4) being thought worthy of the kingdom, as a kind of
first-fruits of the plants for salvation, coming out as early fruit to God.
And so much may suffice concerning these.

CHAP. VI.--THE EIGHTY CONCUBINES, WHAT; THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE INCARNATION
COMMUNICATED TO THE PROPHETS.

   It still remains to speak concerning the concubines. To those who lived
after the deluge the knowledge of God was henceforth more remote, and they
needed other instruction to ward off the evil, and to be their helper,
since idolatry was already creeping in. Therefore God, that the race of man
might not be wholly destroyed, through forgetfulness of the things which
were good, commanded His own Son to reveal  to the prophets His own future
appearance in the world by the flesh, in which the joy and knowledge of the
spiritual eighth day s shall be proclaimed, which would bring the remission
of sins and the resurrection, and that thereby the passions and corruptions
of men would be circumcised. And, therefore, He called by the name of the
eighty virgins the list of the prophets from Abraham, on account of the
dignity of circumcision, which embraces the number eight, in accordance
with which also the law is framed; because they first, before the Church
was espoused to the Word, received the divine seed, and foretold the
circumcision of the spiritual eighth day.

CHAP. VII.--THE VIRGINS,(6) THE RIGHTEOUS ANCIENTS; THE CHURCH, THE ONE
ONLY SPOUSE, MORE EXCELLENT THAN THE OTHERS.

   Now he calls by the name of virgins, who belong to a countless
assembly, those who, being inferior to the better ones, have practised
righteousness, and have striven against sin with youthful and noble energy.
But of these, neither the queens, nor the concubines, nor the virgins, are
compared to the Church. For she is reckoned the perfect and chosen one
beyond all these, consisting and composed of all the apostles, the Bride
who surpasses all in the beauty of youth and virginity. Therefore, also,
she is blessed and praised by all, because she saw and heard freely what
those desired to see, even for a little time, and saw not, and to hear, but
heard not. For "blessed," said our Lord to His disciples,(7) "are your
eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear. For verily I say unto
you, That many prophets have desired to see those things which ye see, and
have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not
heard them." For this reason, then, the prophets count them blessed, and
admire them, because the Church was thought worthy to participate in those
things which they did not attain to hear or see. For "there are threescore
queens, and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number. My dove, my
undefiled, is but one."(1)

CHAP. VIII.--THE HUMAN NATURE OF CHRIST HIS ONE DOVE.

   Can any one now say otherwise than that the Bride is the undefiled
flesh of the Lord, for the sake of which He left the Father and came down
here, and was joined to it, and, being incarnate, dwelt in it? Therefore He
called it figuratively a dove, because that creature is tame and domestic,
and readily adapts itself to man's mode of life. For she alone, so to
speak, was found spotless and undefiled, and excelling all in the glory and
beauty of righteousness, so that none of those who had pleased God most
perfectly could stand near to her in a comparison of virtue. And for this
reason she was thought worthy to become a partaker of the kingdom of the
Only-begotten, being betrothed and united to Him. And in the forty-fourth
psalm,(2) the queen who, chosen out of many, stands at the right hand of
God, clothed in the golden ornament of virtue, whose beauty the King
desired,(3) is, as I said, the undefiled and blessed flesh, which the Word
Himself carried into the heavens, and presented at the right hand of God,
"wrought about with divers colours," that is, in the pursuits of
immortality, which he calls symbolically golden fringes. For since this
garment is variegated and woven of various virtues, as chastity, prudence,
faith, love, patience, and other good things, which, covering, as they do,
the unseemliness of the flesh, adorn man with a golden ornament.

CHAP. IX.--THE VIRGINS IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE QUEEN AND SPOUSE.

   Moreover, we must further consider what the Spirit delivers to us in
the rest of the psalm, after the enthronization of the manhood assumed by
the Word at the right hand of the Father. "The virgins," He says,(4) "that
be her fellows shall bear her company, and shall be brought unto thee. With
joy and gladness shall they be brought, and shall enter into the King's
palace." Now, here the Spirit seems quite plainly to praise virginity,
next, as we have explained, to the Bride of the Lord, who promises that the
virgins shall approach second to the Almighty with joy and gladness,
guarded and escorted by angels. For so lovely and desirable is in truth the
glory of virginity, that, next to the Queen, whom the Lord exalts, and
presents in sinless glory to the Father, the choir and order of virgins
bear her company, assigned to a place second to that of the Bride. Let
these efforts of mine to speak to thee, O Arete, concerning chastity, be
engraven on a monument.

   And Procilla having thus spoken, Thekla said, It is my turn after her
to continue the contest; and I rejoice, since I too have the favouring
wisdom of words, perceiving that I am, like a harp, inwardly attuned, and
prepared to speak with elegance and propriety.

   ARETE. I most willingly hail thy readiness, O Thekla, in which I
confide to give me fitting discourse, in accordance with thy powers; since
thou wilt yield to none in universal philosophy and instruction, instructed
by Paul in what is fitting to say of evangelical and divine doctrine.

DISCOURSE VIII.--THEKLA.

CHAP. I.--METHODIUS' DERIVATION OF THE WORD VIRGINITY:(5) WHOLLY DIVINE;
VIRTUE, IN GREEK areth', WHENCE SO CALLED.

   Well, then, let us first say, beginning from the origin of the name,
for what cause this supreme and blessed pursuit was called partheni'a, what
it aims at, what power it has, and afterwards, what fruits it gives forth.
For almost all have been ignorant of this virtue as being superior to ten
thousand other advantages of virtue which we cultivate for the purification
and adornment of the soul. For virginity s is divine by the change of one
letter,k(6) as she alone makes him who has her, and is initiated by her
incorruptible rites like unto God, than which it is impossible to find a
greater good, removed, as it is, from pleasure and grief; and the wing of
the soul sprinkled by it becomes stronger and lighter, accustomed daily to
fly from human desires.

   For since the children of the wise have said that our life is a
festival, and that we have come to exhibit in the theatre the drama of
truth, that is, righteousness, the devil and the demons plotting and
striving against us, it is necessary for us to look upwards and to take our
flight aloft, and to flee from the blandishments of their tongues, and from
their forms tinged with the outward appearance of temperance, more than
from the Sirens of Homer. For many, bewitched by the pleasures of error,
take their flight downwards, and are weighed down when they come into this
life, their nerves being relaxed and unstrung, by means of which the power
of the wings of temperance is strengthened, lightening the downward
tendency of the corruption of the body. Whence, O Arete, whether thou hast
thy name, signifying, virtue, because thou art worthy of being chosen(1)
for thyself, or because thou raisest(2) and liftest up to heaven, ever
going in the purest minds, come,  give me thy help in my discourse, which
thou  hast thyself appointed me to speak.

CHAP. II.--THE LOFTY MIND AND CONSTANCY OF  THE SACRED VIRGINS; THE
INTRODUCTION OF  VIRGINS INTO THE BLESSED ABODES BEFORE OTHERS.

   Those who take a downward flight, and fall into pleasures, do not
desist from grief and labours until, through their passionate desires, they
fulfil the want of their intemperance, and,  being degraded and shut out
from the sanctuary, they are removed from the scene of truth,  and, instead
of procreating children with modesty and temperance, they rave in the wild
pleasures of unlawful amours. But those who, on light wing, ascend into the
supramundane life, and see from afar what other men do not see, the very
pastures of immortality, bearing in abundance flowers of inconceivable
beauty, are ever turning themselves again to the spectacles there; and, for
this reason, those things are thought small which are here considered noble
--such as wealth, and glory, and birth, and marriage; and they think no
more of those things.(3) But yet if any of them should choose to give up
their bodies to wild beasts or to fire, and be punished, they are ready to
have no care for pains, for the desire of them or the fear of them; so that
they seem, while in the world, not to be in the world, but to have already
reached, in thought and in the tendency of their desires, the assembly of
those who are in heaven.

   Now it is not right that the wing of virginity should, by its own
nature, be weighed down upon the earth, but that it should soar upwards to
heaven, to a pure atmosphere, and to the life which is akin to that of
angels. Whence also they, first of all, after their call and departure
hence, who have rightly and faithfully contended as virgins for Christ,
bear away the prize of victory, being crowned by Him with the flowers of
immortality. For, as soon as their souls have left the world, it is said
that the angels meet them with much rejoicing, and conduct them to the very
pastures already spoken of, to which also they were longing to come,
contemplating them in imagination from afar, when, while they were vet
dwelling in their bodies, they appeared to them divine.

CHAP. III.--THE LOT AND INHERITANCE OF VIRGINITY.

   Furthermore, when they have come hither, they see wonderful and
glorious and blessed things of beauty, and such as cannot be spoken to men.
They see there righteousness itself and prudence, and love itself, and
truth and temperance, and other flowers and plants of wisdom, equally
splendid, of which we here behold only the shadows(4) and apparitions, as
in dreams, and think that they consist of the actions of men, because there
is no clear image of them here, but only dim copies, which themselves we
see often when making dark copies of them. For never has any one seen with
his eyes the greatness or the form or the beauty of righteousness itself,
or of understanding, or of peace; but there, in Him whose name is I AM,(5)
they are seen perfect and clear, as they are. For there is a tree of
temperance itself, and of love, and of understanding, as there are plants
of the fruits  which grow here--as of grapes, the pomegranate, and of
apples; and so, too, the fruits of those trees are gathered and eaten, and
do not perish and wither, but those who gather them grow to immortality and
a likeness to God. Just as he from whom all are descended, before the fall
and the blinding of his eyes, being in paradise, enjoyed its fruits, God
appointing man to dress and to keep the plants of wisdom. For it was
entrusted to the first Adam to cultivate those fruits. Now Jeremiah saw
that these things exist specially in a certain place, removed to a great
distance from our world, where, compassionating those who have fallen from
that good state, he says:(6) "Learn where is wisdom, where is strength,
where is understanding; that thou mayest know also where is length of days,
and life, where is the light of the eyes, and peace. Who hath found out her
place? or who hath come into her treasures?" The virgins having entered
into the treasures of these things, gather the reasonable fruits of the
virtues, sprinkled with manifold and well-ordered lights, which, like a
fountain, God throws up over them, irradiating that state with unquenchable
lights. And they sing harmoniously, giving glory to God. For a pure
atmosphere is shed over them, and one which is not oppressed by the sun.

CHAP. IV.--EXHORTATION TO THE CULTIVATION OF VIRGINITY; A PASSAGE FROM THE
APOCALYPSE(7) IS PROPOSED TO BE EXAMINED.

   Now, then, O Virgins, daughters of undefiled temperance, let us strive
for a life of blessedness and the kingdom of heaven. And do ye unite with
those before you in an earnest desire for the same glory of chastity,
caring little for the things of this life. For immortality and chastity do
not contribute a little to happiness, raising up the flesh aloft, and
drying up its moisture and its clay-like weight, by a greater force of
attraction. And let not the uncleanness which you hear creep in and weigh
you down to the earth;  nor let sorrow transform your joy, melting away
your hopes in better things; but shake off incessantly the calamities which
come upon you, not defiling your mind with lamentations. Let faith conquer
wholly, and let its light drive away the visions of evil which crowd around
the heart. For, as when the moon brightly shining fills the heaven with its
light, and all the air becomes clear, but suddenly the clouds from the
west, enviously rushing in, for a little while overshadow its light, but do
not destroy it, since they are immediately driven away by a blast of the
wind; so ye also, when causing the light of chastity to shine in the world,
although pressed upon by afflictions and labours, do not grow weary and
abandon your hopes. For the clouds which come from the Evil One are driven
away by the Spirit,(1) if ye, like your Mother, who gives birth to the male
Virgin in heaven, fear nothing the serpent that lies in wait and plots
against you; concerning whom I intend to discourse to you more plainly; for
it is now time.

   John, in the course of the Apocalypse, says:(2) "And there appeared a
great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under
her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars: and she, being with
child, cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered. And there
appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having
seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads. And his tail
drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth:
and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for
to devour her child as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man-
child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was
caught up unto God, and to His throne. And the woman fled into the
wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed
her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days." So far we have
given, in brief, the history of the woman and the dragon. But to search out
and explain the solution of them is beyond my powers. Nevertheless, let me
venture, trusting in Him who commanded to search the Scriptures.(3) If,
then, you agree with this, it will not be difficult to undertake it; for
you will quite pardon me, if I am unable sufficiently to explain the exact
meaning of the Scripture.

CHAP. V.--THE WOMAN WHO BRINGS FORTH, TO WHOM THE DRAGON IS OPPOSED, THE
CHURCH;  HER ADORNMENT AND GRACE.

   The woman who appeared in heaven clothed with the sun, and crowned with
twelve stars, and having the moon for her footstool, and being with child,
and travailing in birth, is certainly, according to the accurate
interpretation, our mother,(4) O virgins, being a power by herself distinct
from her children; whom the prophets, according to the aspect of their
subjects, have called sometimes Jerusalem, sometimes a Bride, sometimes
Mount Zion, and sometimes the Temple and Tabernacle of God. For she is the
power which is desired to give light in the prophet, the Spirit crying to
her:(5) "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is
risen upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shalI cover the earth, and gross
darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and  His glory
shall be seen upon thee. And the  Gentiles shall come to thy light, and
kings to the brightness of thy rising. Lift up thine eyes  round about, and
see; all they gather themselves together, they come to thee: thy sons shall
come from far, and thy daughters shall be nursed at thy side." It is the
Church whose children shall come to her with all speed after the
resurrection, running to her from all quarters. She rejoices receiving the
light which never goes down, and clothed with the brightness of the Word as
with a robe. For with what other more precious or honourable ornament was
it becoming that the queen should be adorned, to be led as a Bride to the
Lord, when she had received a garment of light, and therefore was called by
the Father? Come, then, let us go forward in our discourse, and look upon
this marvelous woman as upon virgins prepared for a marriage, pure and
undefiled, perfect and radiating a permanent beauty, wanting nothing of the
brightness of light; and instead of a dress, clothed with light itself; and
instead of precious stones, her head adorned with shining stars. For
instead of the clothing which we have, she had light; and for gold and
brilliant stones, she had stars; but stars not such as those which are set
in the invisible heaven, but better and more resplendent, so that those may
rather be considered as their images and likenesses.

CHAP. VI.--THE WORKS OF THE CHURCH, THE BRINGING FORTH OF CHILDREN IN
BAPTISM; THE MOON IN BAPTISM, THE FULL MOON OF CHRIST'S PASSION.

   Now the statement that she stands upon the moon, as I consider, denotes
the faith of those who are cleansed from corruption in the laver of
regeneration, because the light of the moon has more resemblance to tepid
water, and all moist substance is dependent upon her. The Church, then,
stands upon our faith and adoption, under the figure of the moon, until the
fulness of the nations come in, labouring and bringing forth natural men as
spiritual men; for which reason too she is a mother. For just as a woman
receiving tim unformed seed of a man, within a certain time brings forth a
perfect man,  in the same way, one should say, does the Church  conceive
those who flee to the Word, and, forming them according to the likeness and
form of Christ, after a certain time produce them as citizens of that
blessed state. Whence it is necessary that she should stand upon the layer,
bringing forth those who are washed in it. And in this way the power which
she has in connection with the layer is called the moon,(1) because the
regenerate shine being renewed with a new ray,(2) that is, a new light.
Whence, also, they are by a descriptive term called newly-enlightened;(3)
the moon ever showing forth anew to them the spiritual full moon, namely,
the period and the memorial of the passion, until the  glory and the
perfect light of the great day arise.

CHAP. VII.--THE CHILD OF THE WOMAN IN THE APOCALYPSE NOT CHRIST, BUT THE
FAITHFUL WHO ARE BORN IN THE LAVER.

   If any one, for there is no difficulty in speaking distinctly, should
be vexed, and reply to what we have said: "But how, O virgins, can this
explanation seem to you to be according to the mind of Scripture, when the
Apocalypse plainly defines that the Church brings forth a male, while you
teach that her labour-pains have their fulfilment in those who are washed
in the layer?" We will answer, But, O faultfinder, not even to you will it
be possible to show that Christ Himself(4) is the one who is born. For long
before the Apocalypse, the mystery of the Incarnation of the Word was
fulfilled. And John speaks concerning things present and things to come.
But Christ, long ago conceived, was not caught up to the throne of God when
He was brought forth, from fear of the serpent injuring Him. But for this
was He begotten, and Himself came down from the throne of the Father, that
He should remain and subdue the dragon who made an assault upon the flesh.
So that you also must confess that the Church labours and gives birth to
those who are baptized. As the spirit says somewhere in Isaiah:(5) "Before
she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered
of a man-child. Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things?
Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be
born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her
children."(6) From whom did he flee? Surely from the dragon, that the
spiritual Zion might bear a masculine people, who should come back from the
passions and weakness of women to the unity of the Lord, and grow strong in
manly virtue.

CHAP. VIII.--THE FAITHFUL IN BAPTISM MALES, CONFIGURED TO CHRIST; THE
SAINTS THEMSELVES CHRISTS.

   Let us then go over the ground again from the beginning, until we come
in course to the end, explaining what we have said. Consider if the passage
seems to you to be explained to your mind. For I think that the Church is
here said to give birth to a male; since the enlightened(7) receive the
features, and the image, and the manliness of Christ, the likeness of the
form of the Word being stamped upon them, and begotten in them by a true
knowledge and faith, so that in each one Christ is spiritually born. And,
therefore, the Church swells and travails in birth until Christ is formed
in us,(8) so that each of the saints, by partaking of Christ, has been born
a Christ. According to which meaning it is said in a certain scripture,(9)
"Touch not mine anointed,(10) and do my prophets no harm," as though those
who were baptized into Christ had been made Christs(11) by communication of
the Spirit, the Church contributing here their clearness and transformation
into the image of the  Word. And Paul confirms this, teaching it plainly,
where he says:(12) "For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,
that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be
strengthened I with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that  Christ may
dwell in your hearts by faith." For it is necessary that the word of truth
should be imprinted and stamped upon the souls of the regenerate.

CHAP. IX.--THE SON OF GOD, WHO EVER IS, IS TO-DAY BEGOTTEN IN THE MINDS AND
SENSE OF THE FAITHFUL.

   Now, in perfect agreement and correspondence with what has been said,
seems to be this which was spoken by the Father from above to Christ when
He came to be baptized in the water of the Jordan, "Thou art my son: this
day have I begotten thee;"(1) for it is to be remarked that He was declared
to be His Son unconditionally, and without regard to time; for He says
"Thou art," and not "Thou hast become," showing that He had neither
recently attained to the relation of Son, nor again, having begun before,
after this had an end, but having been previously begotten,(2) that He was
to be, and was the same. But the expression, "This day have I begotten
thee," signifies that He willed that He who existed before the ages in
heaven should be begotten on the earth--that is, that He who was before
unknown should be made known. Now, certainly, Christ has never yet been
born in those men who have never perceived the manifold wisdom of God--that
is, has never been known, has never been manifested, has never appeared to
them. But if these also should perceive the mystery of grace, then in them
too, when they were converted and believed, He would be born in knowledge
and understanding. Therefore from hence the Church is fitly said to form
and beget the male Word in those who are cleansed.(3) So far I have spoken
according to my ability concerning the travail of the Church; and here we
must change to the subject of the dragon and the other matters. Let us
endeavour, then, to explain it in some measure, not deterred by the
greatness of the obscurity of the Scripture; and if anything difficult
comes to be considered, I will again help you to cross it like a river.

CHAP. X.--THE DRAGON, THE DEVIL; THE STARS STRUCK FROM HEAVEN BY THE TAIL
OF THE DRAGON, HERETICS; THE NUMBERS OF THE TRINITY, THAT IS, THE PERSONS
NUMBERED; ERRORS CONCERNING THEM.

   The dragon, which is great, and red, and cunning, and manifold, and
seven-headed, and horned, and draws down the third part of the stars, and
stands ready to devour the child of the woman who is travailing, is the
devil, who lies in wait to destroy the Christ-accepted mind  of the
baptized, and the image and clear features of the Word which had been
brought forth in them. But he misses and fails of his prey, the, regenerate
being caught up on high to the throne of God--that is, the mind of those
who  are renovated is lifted up around the divine seat and the basis of
truth against which there is no stumbling, being taught to look upon and
regard the things which are there, so that it may not be deceived by the
dragon weighing them down. For it is not allowed to him to destroy those
whose thoughts and looks are upwards. And the stars, which the dragon
touched with the end of his tail, and drew them down to earth, are the
bodies of heresies; for we must say that the stars, which are dark,
obscure, and falling, are the assemblies of the heterodox; since they, too,
wish to be acquainted with the heavenly ones, and to have believed in
Christ, and to have the seat of their soul in heaven, and to come near to
the stars as children of light. But they are dragged down, being shaken out
by the folds of the dragon, because they did not remain within the
triangular forms of godliness, falling away from it with respect to an
orthodox service. Whence also they are called the third part of the stars,
as having gone astray with regard to one of the three Persons of the
Trinity. As when they say, like Sabellios, that the Almighty Person of the
Father Himself suffered;(4) or as when they say, like Artemas, that the
Person of the Son was born and manifested only in appearance;(5) or when
they contend, like the Ebionites, that the prophets spoke of the Person of
the Spirit, of their own motion. For of Marcion and Valentinus, and those
about Elkesaios and others, it is better not even to make mention.

CHAP. XI.--THE WOMAN WITH THE MALE CHILD IN THE WILDERNESS THE CHURCH; THE
WILDERNESS BELONGS TO VIRGINS AND SAINTS; THE PERFECTION OF NUMBERS AND
MYSTERIES; THE EQUALITY AND PERFECTION OF THE NUMBER SIX; THE NUMBER SIX
RELATED TO CHRIST; FROM THIS NUMBER, TOO, THE CREATION AND HARMONY OF THE
WORLD COMPLETED.

   Now she who brings forth, and has brought  forth, the masculine Word in
the hearts of the faithful, and who passed, undefiled and uninjured by the
wrath of the beast, into the wilderness, is, as we have explained, our
mother the Church. And the wilderness into which she comes, and is
nourished for a thousand two hundred and  sixty days, which is truly waste
and unfruitful of evils, and barren of corruption, and difficult of access
and of transit to the multitude; but fruitful and abounding in pasture, and
blooming and easy of access to the holy, and full of wisdom, and productive
of life, is this most lovely, and beautifully wooded and well-watered abode
of Arete.(6) Here the south wind awakes, and the north wind blows, and the
spices flow out,(7) and all things are filled with refreshing dews, and
crowned with the unfading plants of immortal life; in which we now gather
flowers, and weave with sacred fingers the purple and glorious crown of
virginity for the queen. For the Bride of the Word is adorned with the
fruits of virtue. And the thousand two hundred and sixty days that we are
staying here, O virgins, is the accurate and perfect understanding
concerning the Father, and the Son, and the Spirit, in which our mother
increases, and rejoices, and exults throughout this time, until the
restitution of the new dispensation, when, coming into the assembly in the
heavens, she will no longer contemplate the I AM through the means of human
knowledge, but will clearly behold entering in together with Christ. For a
thousand,(1) consisting of a hundred multiplied by ten, embraces a full and
perfect number, and is a symbol of the Father Himself, who made the
universe by Himself, and rules all things for Himself. Two hundred embraces
two perfect numbers united together, and is the symbol of the Holy Spirit,
since He is the Author of our knowledge of the Son and the Father. But
sixty has the number six multiplied by ten, and is a symbol of Christ,
because the number six proceeding(2) from unity is composed of its proper
parts, so that nothing in it is wanting or redundant, and is complete when
resolved into its parts. Thus it is necessary that the number six, when it
is divided into even parts by even parts, should again make up the same
quantity from its separated segment.(3) For, first, if divided equally, it
makes three; then, if divided into three parts, it makes two; and again, if
divided by six, it makes one, and is again collected into itself. For when
divided into twice  three, and three times two, and six times one, when the
three and the two and the one are put together, they complete the six
again. But everything is of necessity perfect which neither  needs anything
else in order to its completion, nor has anything over. Of the other
numbers,  some are more than perfect, as twelve. For the half of it is six,
and the third four, and the fourth three, and the sixth two, and the
twelfth one. The numbers into which it can be divided, when put together,
exceed twelve, this number not having preserved itself equal to its parts,
like the number six. And those which are imperfect, are numbers like eight.
For the half of it is four,  and the fourth two, and the eighth one. Now
the numbers into which it is divided, when put together, make seven, and
one is wanting to its completion, not being in all points harmonious with
itself, like six, which has reference to the Son of God, who came from tile
fulness of the Godhead into a human life. For having emptied Himself,(4)
and taken upon Him the form of a slave, He was restored again to His former
perfection and dignity. For He being humbled, and apparently degraded, was
restored again from His humiliation and degradation to His  former
completeness and greatness, having never been diminished from His essential
perfection.

   Moreover, it is evident that the creation of the world was accomplished
in harmony with this number, God having made heaven and earth, and the
things which are in them, in six days; the word of creative power
containing the number six, in accordance with which the Trinity is the
maker of bodies. For length, and breadth, and depth make up a body. And the
number six is composed of triangles. On these subjects, however, there is
not sufficient time at present to enlarge with accuracy, for fear of
letting the main subject slip, in considering that which is secondary.

CHAP. XII.--VIRGINS ARE CALLED TO THE IMITATION OF THE CHURCH IN THE
WILDERNESS OVERCOMING THE DRAGON.

   The Church, then, coming hither into this wilderness, a place
unproductive of evils, is nourished, flying on the heavenward wings of
virginity, which the Word called the "wings of great eagle,"(5) having
conquered the serpent, and driven away from her full moon the wintry
clouds. It is for the sake of these things, meanwhile, that all these
discourses are held, teaching us, O fair virgins, to imitate according to
our strength our mother, and not to be troubled by the pains and changes
and afflictions of life, that you may enter in exulting with her into the
bride-chamber, showing your lamps. Do not, therefore, lose courage on
account of the schemes and slanders of the beast, but bravely prepare for
the battle, armed with the helmet of salvation,(6) and the breastplate, and
the greaves. For you will bring upon him an immense consternation when you
attack him with great advantage and courage; nor will he at all resist,
seeing his adversaries set in array by One more powerful; but the many-
headed and many-faced beast will immediately allow you to carry off the
spoils of the seven contests:--

   "Lion in front, but dragon all behind,
   And in the midst a she-goat breathing forth
   Profuse the violence of flaming fire.
   Her slew Bellerophon in truth. And this
   Slew Christ the King; for many she destroyed,
   Nor could they bear the fetid foam which burst
   From out the fountain of her horrid jaws;"(7)

unless Christ had first weakened and overcome her, making her powerless and
contemptible before us.

CHAP. XIII.--THE SEVEN CROWNS OF THE BEAST TO BE TAKEN AWAY BY VICTORIOUS
CHASTITY; THE TEN CROWNS OF THE DRAGON, THE VICES OPPOSED TO THE DECALOGUE;
THE OPINION OF FATE THE GREATEST EVIL.

   Therefore, taking to you a masculine and sober mind, oppose your armour
to the swelling beast, and do not at all give way, nor be troubled because
of his fury. For you will have immense glory if you overcome him, and take
away the seven crowns which are upon him, on account of which we have to
struggle and wrestle, according to our teacher Paul. For she who having
first overcome the devil, and destroyed his seven heads, becomes possessed
of the seven crowns of virtue, having gone through the seven great
struggles of chastity. For incontinence and luxury is a head of the dragon;
and whoever bruises this is wreathed with the crown of temperance.
Cowardice and weakness is also a head; and he who treads upon this carries
off the crown of martyrdom. Unbelief and folly, and other similar fruits of
wickedness, is another head; and he who has overcome these and destroyed
them carries off the honours connected with them, the power of the dragon
being in many ways rooted up. Moreover, the ten borns and stings which he
was said to have upon his heads are the ten opposites, O virgins, to the
Decalogue, by which he was accustomed to gore and cast down the souls of
many imagining and contriving things in opposition to the law, "Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God,"(1) and to the other precepts which follow. Consider
now the fiery and bitter horn of fornication, by which he casts down the
incontinent; consider adultery, consider falsehood, covetousness, theft,
and the other sister and related vices, which flourish by nature around his
murderous heads, which if you root out with the aid of Christ, you will
receive, as it were, divine heads, and will bloom with the crowns gained
from the dragon. For it is our duty to prefer and to set forward the best
things, who have received, above the earth-born, a commanding and voluntary
mind, and one free from all necessity, so as to make choice like masters of
the things which please us, not being in bondage to fate or fortune. And so
no man would be master of himself and good, unless selecting the human
example of Christ, and bringing himself to the likeness of Him, he should
imitate Him in his manner of life. For of all evils the greatest which is
implanted in many is that which  refers the causes of sins to the motions
of the stars, and says that our life is guided by the necessities of fate,
as those say who study the stars, with much insolence. For they, trusting
more in guessing than in prudence, that is, in something between truth and
falsehood, go far astray from the sight of things as they are. Whence, if
you permit me, O Arete, now that I have completed the discourse which you,
my mistress, appointed to be spoken, I will endeavour, with your assistance
and favour, to examine  carefully the position of those who are offended,
and deny that we speak the truth, when we say that man is possessed of
free-will, and prove that

                          "They perish self-destroyed,
   By their own fault,"(2)

choosing the pleasant in preference to the expedient.

   ARETE. I do permit you and assist you; for your discourse will be
perfectly adorned when you have added this to it.

CHAP. XIV.--THE DOCTRINE OF MATHEMATICIANS NOT WHOLLY TO BE DESPISED, WHEN
THEY ARE CONCERNED ABOUT THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE STARS; THE TWELVE SIGNS OF
THE ZODIAC MYTHICAL NAMES.

   THEKLA. Resuming then, let us first lay bare, in speaking of those
things according to our power, the imposture of those who boast as though
they alone had comprehended from what forms the heaven is arranged, in
accordance with the hypothesis of the Chaldeans and Egyptians. For they say
that the circumference of the world is likened to the turnings of a well-
rounded globe, the earth having a central point. For its outline being
spherical, it is necessary, they say, since there are the same distances of
the parts, that the earth should be the centre of the universe, around
which, as being older, the heaven is whirling. For if a circumference is
described from the central point, which seems to be a circle,--for it is
impossible for a circle to be described without a point, and it is
impossible for a circle to be without a point,--surely the earth consisted
before all, they say, in a state of chaos and disorganization. Now
certainly the wretched ones were overwhelmed in the chaos of error,
"because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither
were thankful; but  became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish
heart was darkened;"(3) and their wise men said that nothing earth-born was
more honourable or more ancient than the Olympians. Whence they are not
mere children who know Christ, like the Greeks, who, burying the truth in
fairies and fictions, rather than in artistic words, ascribing human
calamities to the heavens, are not ashamed to describe the circumference of
the world by geometrical theorems and figures, and explain that the heaven
is adorned with the images of birds and of animals that live in water and
on dry land, and that the qualities of the stars were made from the
calamities of the men of old, so that the movements of the planets, in
their opinion, depended upon the same kind of bodies. And they say that the
stars revolve around the nature of the twelve signs of the Zodiac, being
drawn along by the passage of the circle of the Zodiac, so that through
their intermingling they see the things which happen to many, according to
their conjunctions and departures, their rising and setting.

   For the whole heaven being spherical, and having the earth for its
central point, as they think,(1) because all the straight lines from the
circumference falling upon the earth are equal to one another, holds back
from the circles which surround it, of which the meridian is the greatest;
and the second, which divides it into two equal parts, is the horizon; and
the third, which separates these, the equinoctial; and on each side of this
the two tropics, the summer and the winter--the one on the north, and the
other on the south. Beyond is that which is called the axis, around which
are the greater and lesser Bears, and beyond them is the tropic. And the
Bears, turning about themselves, and weighing upon the axis, which passes
through the poles, produce the motion of the whole world, having their
heads against each other's loins, and being untouched by our horizon.

   Then they say that the Zodiac touches all the circles, making its
movements diagonally, and that there are in it a number of signs, which are
called the twelve signs of the Zodiac, beginning with the Ram, and going on
to the Fishes, which, they say, were so determined from mythical causes;
saying that it was the Ram that conveyed Helle, the daughter of Athamas,
and her brother Phryxos into Scythia; and that the head of the Ox is in
honour of Zeus, who, in the form of a Bull, carried over Europe into Crete;
and they say the circle called the Galaxy, or milky way, which reaches from
the Fishes to the Ram, was poured forth for Herakles from the breasts of
Hera, by the commands of Zeus. And thus, according to them, there was no
natal destiny before Europe or Phryxos, and the Dioscuroi, (2) and the
other signs of the Zodiac, which were placed among the constellations, from
men and beasts. But our ancestors lived without destiny. Let us endeavour
now to crush falsehood, like physicians, taking its edge off, and quenching
it with the healing medicine of words, here considering the truth.

CHAP. XV.--ARGUMENTS FROM THE NOVELTY OF FATE AND GENERATION; THAT
GOLDEN AGE, EARLY MEN; SOLID ARGUMENTS AGAINST THE MATHEMATICIANS.

   If it were better, O wretched ones, that man should be subject to the
star of his birth,than that he should not, why was not his generation and
birth from the very time when the race of man began to be? And if it was,
what is the need of those which had lately been placed  among the stars, of
the Lion, the Crab, the Twins, the Virgin, the Bull, the Balance, the
Scorpion, the Ram, the Archer, the Fishes, the Goat, the Watercarrier,
Perseus, Cassiopeia, Cepheus, Pegasus, Hydra, the Raven, the Cup, the Lyre,
the Dragon, and others, from which you introduce, by your instructions,
many to the knowledge of mathematics, or, rather, to a knowledge which is
anathema?(3) Well, then, either there was generation among those before,
and the removal of these creatures above was absurd; or else there was not,
and God changed human life into a better state and government than that of
those who before that lived an inferior life. But the ancients were better
than those of the present time; whence theirs was called the golden age.
There was then no natal destiny.

   If the sun, driving through the circles and passing along the signs of
the Zodiac in his annual periods, accomplishes the changes and turnings of
the seasons, how did those who were born before the signs of the Zodiac
were placed among the stars, and the heaven was adorned with them, continue
to exist, when summer, autumn, winter, and spring, were not as yet
separated from each other, by means of which the body is increased and
strengthened? But they did exist, and were longer lived and stronger than
those who live now, since God then disposed the seasons in the same manner.
The heaven was not then diversified by such shapes.

   If the sun and the moon and the other stars were made for the division
and protection of the members of the time,(4) and for the adornment of the
heaven, and the changes of the seasons, they are divine, and better than
men; for these must needs pass a better life, and a blessed and peaceful
one, and one which far exceeds our own life in righteousness and virtue,
observing a motion which is well-ordered and happy. But if they are the
causes of the calamities and mischief of mortals, and busy themselves in
working the lasciviousness, and the changes and vicissitudes of life, then
they are more miserable than men, looking upon the earth, and their weak
and lawless actions, and doing nothing better than men, if at least our
life depends upon their revolutions and movements.

CHAP. XVI.--SEVERAL OTHER THINGS TURNED AGAINST THE SAME MATHEMATICIANS.

   If no action is performed without a previous desire, and there is no
desire without a want, yet the Divine Being has no wants, and therefore has
no conception of evil. And if the nature of the stars be nearer in order to
that of God, being better than the virtue of the best men, then the stars
also are neither productive of evil, nor in want.

   And besides, every one of those who are persuaded that the sun and moon
and stars are  divine, will allow that they are far removed from evil, and
incapable of human actions which spring from the sense of pleasure and
pain; for such abominable desires are unsuitable to heavenly beings. But if
they are by nature exempt from these, and in no want of anything, how
should they be the causes to men of those things which they do not will
themselves, and from which they are exempt?

   Now those who decide that man is not possessed of free-will, and affirm
that he is governed by the unavoidable necessities of fate, and her
unwritten commands, are guilty of impiety towards God Himself, making Him
out to be the cause and author of human evils. For if He harmoniously
orders the whole circular motion of the stars, with a wisdom which man can
neither express nor comprehend, directing the course of the universe; and
the stars produce the qualities of virtue and vice in human life, dragging
men to these things by the chains of necessity; then they declare God to be
the Cause and Giver of evils. But God is the cause of injury to no one;
therefore fate(1) is not the cause of all things.

   Whoever has the least intelligence will confess that God is good,
righteous, wise, true, helpful, not the cause of evils, free from passion,
and everything of that kind. And if the righteous be better than the
unrighteous, and unrighteousness be abominable to them, God, being
righteous, rejoices in righteousness, and unrighteousness is hateful to
Him, being opposed and hostile to righteousness. Therefore God is not the
author of unrighteousness.

   If that which profits is altogether good, and temperance is profitable
to one's house and life and friends, then temperance is good. And if
temperance be in its nature good, and licentiousness be opposed to
temperance, and that which is opposed to good be evil, then licentiousness
is evil. And if licentiousness be in its nature evil, and out of
licentiousness come adulteries, thefts, quarrels, and murders, then a
licentious life is in its nature evil. But the Divine Being is not by
nature implicated in evils. Therefore  our birth is not the cause of these
things.

   If the temperate are better than the incontinent, and incontinence is
abominable to them, and God rejoices in temperance, being free from the
knowledge of passions, then incontinence is hateful also to God. Moreover,
that the action which is in accordance with temperance, being a virtue, is
better than that which is in accordance with incontinence, which is a vice,
we may learn from kings and rulers, and commanders,  and women, and
children, and citizens, and masters, and servants, and pedagogues, and
teachers; for each of these is useful to himself and to the public when he
is temperate; but when he is licentious he is injurious to himself and to
the public. And if there be any difference between a filthy man and a noble
man, a licentious  and a temperate; and if the character of the noble and
the temperate be the better, and that of the opposite the worse; and if
those of the better character be near to God and His friends, and those of
the worse be far from Him and His enemies, those who believe in fate make
no i distinction between righteousness and unrighteousness, between
filthiness and nobility, between licentiousness and temperance, which is a
contradiction. For if good be opposed to evil, and  unrighteousness be
evil, and this be opposed to righteousness and righteousness be good, and
good be hostile to evil, and evil be unlike to good, then righteousness is
different from un-righteousness. And therefore God is not the cause of
evils, nor does He rejoice in evils. Nor does reason commend them, being
good. If, then, any are evil, they are evil in accordance with the wants
and desires of their minds, and not by necessity.

                          "They perish self-destroyed,
   By their own fault."(2)

   If destiny(3) leads one on to kill a man, and to stain his hands with
murder, and the law forbids this, punishing criminals, and by threats
restrains the decrees of destiny, such as committing injustice, adultery,
theft, poisoning, then the law is in opposition to destiny; for those
things which destiny appointed the law prohibits, and those things which
the law prohibits destiny compels men to do. Hence law is hostile to
destiny. But if it be hostile, then lawgivers do not act in accordance with
destiny; for by passing decrees in opposition to destiny they destroy
destiny. Either, then, there is destiny and there was no need of laws; or
there are laws and they are not in accordance with destiny. But it is
impossible that anyone should be born or anything done apart from destiny;
for they say it is not lawful for anyone even to move a finger apart from
fate. And therefore it was in accordance with destiny that Minos and
Dracon, and Lycurgus, and Solon, and Zaleukos were law-givers and appointed
laws, prohibiting adulteries, murders, violence, rape, thefts, as things
which neither existed nor took place in accordance with destiny. But if
these things were in accordance with destiny, then the laws were not in
accordance with destiny. For destiny itself would not be destroyed by
itself, cancelling itself, and contending against itself; here appointing
laws forbidding adultery and murders, and taking vengeance upon and
punishing the wicked, and there producing murders and adulteries. But this
is impossible: for nothing is alien and abhorrent to itself, and self-
destructive, and at variance with itself. And, therefore, there is no
destiny.

   If everything in the world falls out in accordance with destiny, and
nothing without it, then the law must needs be produced by destiny. But the
law destroys destiny, teaching that virtue should be learnt, and diligently
performed; and that vice should be avoided, and that it is produced by want
of discipline. Therefore there is no destiny.

   If destiny makes men to injure one another,  and to be injured by one
another, what need is there of laws? But if laws are made that they  may
check the sinful, God having a care for those  who are injured, it were
better that the evil should not act in accordance with Fate, than that they
should be set right, after having acted. But God is good and wise, and does
what is best. Therefore there is no fixed destiny. Either education and
habit are the cause of sins, or the passions of the soul, and those desires
which arise through the body. But whichever of these be the cause, God is
not the cause. If it is better to be righteous than to be unrighteous, why
is not man made so at once from his birth? But if afterwards he is tempered
by instruction and laws, that he may become better, he is so tempered as
possessing free-will, and not by nature evil. If the evil are evil in
accordance with destiny, by the decrees of Providence, they are not
blameworthy and deserving of the punishment which is inflicted by the laws,
since they live according to their own nature, and are not capable of being
changed.

   And, again, if the good, living according to their own proper nature,
are praiseworthy, their natal destiny being the cause of their goodness;
yet the wicked, living according to their own proper nature, are not
blamable in the eye of a righteous judge. For, if we must speak plainly, he
who lives according to the nature which belongs to him, in no way sins. For
he did not make himself thus, but Fate; and he lives according to its
motion, being urged on by unavoidable necessity. Then no one is bad. But
some men are bad: and vice is blameworthy, and hostile to God, as reason
has shown. But virtue is lovable and praiseworthy, God having appointed a
law for the punishment of the wicked. Therefore there is no Fate.

CHAP, XVII.--THE LUST OF THE FLESH AND SPIRIT: VICE AND VIRTUE.

   But why do I draw out my discourse to such length, spending the time
with arguments, having set forth the things which are most necessary for
persuasion, and to gain approval for that which is expedient; and having
made manifest to all, by a few words, the inconsistency of their trick, so
that it is now possible even for a child to see and perceive their error;
and that to do good or evil is in our own power, and not decided by the
stars. For there are two motions in us, the lust of the flesh and that of
the soul, differing from each other,(1) whence they have received two
names, that of virtue and that of vice. And we ought to obey the most noble
and most useful leading of virtue, choosing the best in preference to the
base. But enough on these points. I must come to the end of my discourse;
for I fear, and am ashamed, after these discourses on chastity, that I
should be obliged to introduce the opinions of men who study the heavens,
or rather who study nonsense, who waste their life with mere conceits,
passing it in nothing but fabulous figments. And now may these offerings of
ours, composed from the words which are spoken by God, be acceptable to
thee, O Arete, my mistress.

   EUBOULIOS. How bravely and magnificently, O Gregorion, has Thekla
debated!

   GREGORION. What, then, would you have said, if you had listened to
herself, speaking fluently, and with easy expression, with much grace and
pleasure? So that she was admired by every one who attended, her language
blossoming with words, as she set forth intelligently, and in fact
picturesquely, the subjects on which she spoke, her countenance suffused
with the blush of modesty; for she is altogether brilliant in body and
soul.

   EUBOULIOS. Rightly do you say this, Gregorion, and none of these things
is false; for I knew her wisdom also from other noble actions, and what
sort of things she succeeded in speaking, giving proof of supreme love to
Christ; and how glorious she often appeared in meeting the chief conflicts
of the martyrs, procuring for herself a zeal equal to her courage, and a
strength of body equal to the wisdom of her counsels.

   GREGORION. Most truly do you also speak. But let us not waste time; for
we shall often be able to discuss these and other subjects. But I must now
first relate to you the discourses of the other virgins which followed, as
I promised; and chiefly those of Tusiane and Domnina; for these still
remain. When, then, Thekla ceased speaking these things, Theopatra said
that Arete directed Tusiane to speak; and that she, smiling, passed before
her and said.

DISCOURSE IX.--TUSIANE.

CHAP. I.--CHASTITY THE CHIEF ORNAMENT OF THE TRUE TABERNACLE; SEVEN DAYS
APPOINTED TO THE JEWS FOR CELEBRATING THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES: WHAT THEY
SIGNIFY; THE SUM OF THIS SEPTENARY UNCERTAIN; NOT CLEAR TO ANY ONE WHEN THE
CONSUMMATION OF THE WORLD WILL BE; EVEN NOW THE FABRIC OF THE WORLD
COMPLETED.

   O Arete, thou dearest boast to the lovers of virginity, I also implore
thee to afford me thine aid, lest I should be wanting in words, the subject
having been so largely and variously handled. Wherefore I ask to be excused
exordium and introductions, lest, whilst I delay in embellishments suitable
to them, I depart from the subject: so glorious, and honourable, and
renowned a thing is virginity.

   God, when He appointed to the true Israelites  the legal rite of the
true feast of the tabernacles,  directed, in Leviticus, how they should
keep and do honour to the feast; above all things, saying that each one
should adorn his tabernacle with chastity. I will add the words themselves
of Scripture, from which, without any doubt, it will  be shown how
agreeable to God, and acceptable  to Him, is this ordinance of virginity:
"In the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye have gathered in the
fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto the Lord seven days: on the
first day shall be a Sabbath, and on the eighth day shall be a Sabbath. And
ye shall take you on the  first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of
palm-trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows(1) of the brook; and
ye shall rejoice before  the Lord your God seven days. And ye shall  keep
it a feast unto the Lord seven days in the year. It shall be a statute for
ever in your generations; ye shall celebrate it in the seventh month. Ye
shall dwell in booths seven days; all that are Israelites born shall dwell
in booths; that your generations may know that I made the children of
Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought them out of Egypt: I am the Lord
your God."(2)

   Here the Jews, fluttering about the bare letter  of Scripture, like
drones about the leaves of herbs, but not about flowers and fruits as the
bee, fully believe that these words and ordinances were spoken concerning
such a tabernacle as they erect; as if God delighted in those trivial
adornments which they, preparing, fabricate from trees, not perceiving the
wealth of good things to come; whereas these things, being like air and
phantom shadows, foretell the resurrection and the putting up of our
tabernacle that had fallen upon the earth, which at length, in the seventh
thousand of years, resuming again immortal, we shall celebrate the great
feast of true tabernacles in the new and indissoluble creation, the fruits
of the earth having been gathered in, and men no longer begetting and
begotten, but God resting from the works of creation.(3)

   For since in six days God made the heaven and the earth, and finished
the whole world, and rested on the seventh day from all His works which He
had made, and blessed the seventh day and sanctified it,(4) so by a figure
in the seventh month, when the fruits of the earth have been gathered in,
we are commanded to keep the feast to the Lord, which signifies that, when
this world shall be terminated at the seventh thousand years, when God
shall have completed the world, He shall rejoice in us.(5) For now to this
time all things are created by His all-sufficient will and inconceivable
power; the earth still yielding its fruits, and the waters being gathered
together in their receptacles; and the light still severed from darkness,
and the allotted number of men not yet being complete; and the sun arising
to rule the day, and the moon the night; and four-footed creatures, and
beasts, and creeping things arising from the earth, and winged creatures,
and creatures that swim, from the water. Then, when the appointed times
shall have been accomplished, and God shall have ceased to form this
creation, in the seventh month, the great resurrection-day, it is commanded
that the Feast of our Tabernacles shall be celebrated to the Lord, of which
the things said in Leviticus are symbols and figures, which things,
carefully investigating, we should consider the naked truth itself, for He
saith, "A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of
understanding shall attain unto wise counsels: to understand a proverb, and
the interpretation; the words Of the wise, and their dark sayings."(1)

   Wherefore let it shame the Jews that they do not perceive the deep
things of the Scriptures, thinking that nothing else than outward things
are contained in the law and the prophets; for they, intent upon things
earthly, have in greater esteem the riches of the world than the wealth
which is of the soul. For since the Scriptures are in this way divided that
some of them give the likeness of past events, some of them a type of the
future, the miserable men, going back, deal with the figures of the future
as if they were already things of the past. As in the instance of the
immolation of the Lamb, the mystery of which they regard as solely in
remembrance of the deliverance of their fathers from Egypt, when, although
the first-born of Egypt were smitten, they themselves were preserved by
marking the door-posts of their houses with blood. Nor do they understand
that by it also the death of Christ is personified, by whose blood souls
made safe and sealed shall be preserved from wrath in the burning of the
world; whilst the first-born, the sons of Satan, shall be destroyed with an
utter destruction by the avenging angels, who shall reverence the seal of
the Blood impressed upon the former.

CHAP. II.--FIGURE, IMAGE, TRUTH: LAW GRACE, GLORY; MAN CREATED IMMORTAL:
DEATH BROUGHT IN BY DESTRUCTIVE SIN.

   And let these things be said for the sake of example, showing that the
Jews have wonderfully fallen from the hope of future good, because they
consider things present to be only signs of things already accomplished;
whilst they do not perceive that the figures represent images, and images
are the representatives of truth. For the law is indeed the figure and the
shadow of an image, that is, of the Gospel; but the image, namely, the
Gospel, is the representative of truth itself. For the men of olden time
and the law foretold to us the characteristics of the Church, and the
Church represents those of the new dispensation which is to come. Whence
we, having received Christ, saying, "I am the truth,"(2) know that shadows
and figures have ceased; and we hasten on to the truth, proclaiming its
glorious images. For now we know "in part," and as it were "through a
glass,"(3) since that which is perfect has not yet come to us; namely, the
kingdom of heaven and the resurrection, when "that which is in part shall
be done away."(4) For then will all our tabernacles be firmly set up, when
again the body shall rise, with bones again joined and compacted with
flesh. Then shall we celebrate truly to the Lord a glad festal-day, when we
shall receive eternal tabernacles, no snore to perish or be dissolved into
the dust of the tomb. Now, our tabernacle was at first fixed in an
immoveable state, but was moved by transgression and bent to the earth, God
putting an end to sin by means of death, lest man immortal,,living a
sinner, and sin living in him, should be liable to eternal curse. Wherefore
he died, although he had not been created liable to death or corruption,
and the soul was separated from the flesh, that sin might perish by death,
not being able to live longer in one dead. Whence sin being dead and
destroyed, again I shall rise immortal; and I praise God who by means of
death frees His sons from death, and I celebrate lawfully to His honour a
festal-day, adorning my tabernacle, that is my flesh, with good works, as
there did the five virgins with the five-lighted lamps.

CHAP. III.--HOW EACH ONE OUGHT TO PREPARE HIMSELF FOR THE FUTURE
RESURRECTION.

   In the first day of the resurrection I am examined whether I bring
these things which are commanded, whether I am adorned with virtuous works,
whether I am overshadowed by the boughs of chastity. For account the
resurrection to be the erection of the tabernacle. Account that the things
which are taken for the putting together  of the tabernacle are the works
of righteousness.  I take, therefore, on the first day the things which are
set down, that is, on the day in which I stand to be judged, whether I have
adorned my tabernacle with the things commanded; if those things are found
on that day which here in time we are commanded to prepare, and there to
offer to God. But come, let us consider what follows.

   "And ye shall take yon," He says, "on the first day the boughs of
goodly trees, branches of palm-trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and
willows (and the tree of chastity) of the brook; and ye shall rejoice
before the Lord your God."(5) The Jews, uncircumcised in heart, think that
the most beautiful fruit of wood is the citron wood, on account of its
size; nor are they ashamed to say that God is worshipped with cedar, to
whom not all the quadrupeds of the earth would suffice as a burnt-offering
or as incense for burning. And moreover, O hard breasts, if the citron
appear beautiful to you, why not the pomegranate, and other fruits of
trees, and amongst them apples, which much surpass the citron? Indeed, in
the Song of Songs,(1) Solomon having made mention of all these fruits,
passes over in silence the citron only. But this deceives the unwary, for
they have not understood that the tree of life(2) which Paradise once bore,
now again the Church has produced for all, even the ripe and comely fruit
of faith.

   Such fruit it is necessary that we bring when we come to the judgment-
seat of Christ, on the first day of the feast; for if we are without it we
shall not be able to feast with God, nor to have part, according to
John,(3) in the first resurrection. For the tree of life is wisdom first
begotten of all. "She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her,"
says the prophet; (4) "and happy is every one that retaineth her." "A tree
planted by the waterside, that will bring forth his fruit in due
season;"(5) that is, learning and charity and discretion are imparted in
due time to those who come to the waters of redemption.

   He that hath not believed in Christ, nor hath understood that He is the
first principle and the tree of life, since he cannot show to God his
tabernacle adorned with the most goodly of fruits, how shall he celebrate
the feast? How shall he rejoice? Desirest thou to know the goodly fruit of
the tree? Consider the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, how pleasant they
are beyond the children of men. Good fruit came by Moses, that is the Law,
but not so goodly as the Gospel. For the Law is a kind of figure and shadow
of things to come, but the Gospel is truth and the grace of life. Pleasant
was the fruit of the prophets, but not so pleasant as the fruit of
immortality which is plucked from the Gospel.

CHAP. IV.--THE MIND CLEARER WHEN CLEANSED FROM SIN; THE ORNAMENTS OF THE
MIND AND THE ORDER OF VIRTUE; CHARITY DEEP AND FULL; CHASTITY THE LAST
ORNAMENT OF ALL; THE VERY USE OF MATRIMONY TO BE RESTRAINED.

   "And ye shall take you on the first day the boughs of goodly trees,
branches of palm-trees."(6) This signifies the exercise of divine
discipline, by which the mind that subdues the passions is cleansed and
adorned by the sweeping out and ejection from it of sins. For it is
necessary to come cleansed and adorned to the feast, arrayed, as by a
decorator, in the discipline and exercise of virtue. For the mind being
cleansed by laborious exercises from the distracting thoughts which darken
it, quickly perceives the truth; as the widow in the Gospels(7) found the
piece of money after she had swept the house and cast out the dirt, that
is, the passions which obscure  and cloud the mind, which increase in us
from  our luxuriousness and carelessness.

   Whoso, therefore, desires to come to that Feast of Tabernacles, to be
numbered with the saints, let him first procure the goodly fruit of faith,
then palm branches, that is, attentive meditation upon and study of the
Scriptures, afterwards the far-spreading and thickly-leaved branches of
charity, which He commands us to take after the palm branches; most fitly
calling  charity dense boughs, because it is all thick and  close and very
fruitful, not having anything hare or empty, but all full, both branches
and trunks. Such is charity, having no part void or unfruitful. For "though
I sell all my goods and give to the poor, and though I yield up my body to
the fire, and though I have so great faith that I can remove mountains, and
have not charity, I am nothing."(8) Charity, therefore, is a tree the
thickest and most fruitful of all, full and abounding copiously abounding
in graces.

   After this, what else does He will that we should take? Willow
branches; by that figure indicating righteousness, because "the just,"
according to the prophet, shall spring up "as grass in the midst of the
waters, as willows by the watercourses,"(9) flourishing in the word.
Lastly, to crown all, it is commanded that the bough of the Agnos tree be
brought to decorate the Tabernacle, because it is by its very name the tree
of chastity, by which those already named are adorned. Let the wanton now
be gone. who, through their love of pleasure, reject chastity. How shall
they enter into the feast with Christ who have not adorned their tabernacle
with boughs of chastity, that God-making and blessed tree with which all
who are hastening to that assembly and nuptial banquet ought to be begirt,
and to cover their loins? For come, fair virgins, consider the Scripture
itself, and its commands, how the Divine word has assumed chastity to be
the crown of those virtues and duties that have been mentioned, showing how
becoming and desirable it is for the resurrection, and that without it no
one will obtain the promises which we who profess viginity supremely
cultivate and offer to the Lord. They also possess it who live chastely
with their wives, and do, as it were about the trunk, yield its lowly
branches bearing chastity, not being able like us to reach its lofty and
mighty boughs, or even to touch them; yet they, too, offer no less truly,
although in a less degree, the branches of chastity.(1) But those who are
goaded on by their lusts, although they do not commit fornication, yet who,
even in the things which are permitted with a lawful wife, through the heat
of unsubdued concupiscence are excessive in embraces, how shall they
celebrate the feast? how shall they rejoice, who have not adorned their
tabernacle, that is their flesh, with the boughs of the Agnos, nor have
listened to that which has been said; that "they that have wives be as
though they had none?"(2)

CHAP. V.--THE MYSTERY OF THE TABERNACLES.

   Wherefore, above all other things, I say to those who love contests,
and who are strong-minded, that without delay they should honour chastity,
as a thing the most useful and glorious. For in the new and indissoluble
creation, whoever shall not be found decorated with the boughs of chastity,
shall neither obtain rest, because he has not fulfilled the command of God
according to the law, nor shall he enter into the land of promise, because
he has not previously celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles. For they only
who have celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles come to the Holy Land, setting
out from those dwellings which are called tabernacles, until they come to
enter into the temple and city of God, advancing to a greater and more
glorious joy, as the Jewish types indicate. For like as the Israelites,
having left the borders of Egypt, first came to the Tabernacles,(3) and
from hence, having again set forth, came into the land of promise, so also
do we. For I also, taking my journey, and going forth from the Egypt of
this life, came first to the resurrection, which is the true Feast of the
Tabernacles, and there having set up my tabernacle, adorned with the fruits
of virtue, on the first day of the resurrection, which is the day of
judgment, celebrate with Christ the millennium of rest, which is called the
seventh day, even the true Sabbath. Then again from thence I, a follower of
Jesus, "who hath entered into the heavens,"(3) as they also, after the rest
of the Feast of Tabernacles, came into the laud of promise, come into the
heavens, not continuing to remain in tabernacles--that is, my body not
remaining as it was before, but, after the space of a thousand years,
changed from a human and corruptible form into angelic size and beauty,
where at last we virgins, when the festival of the resurrection is
consummated, shall pass froth the wonderful place of the tabernacle to
greater and better things, ascending into the very house of God above the
heavens, as, says the Psalmist, "in the voice of praise and thanksgiving,
among such as keep holy day."(5) I, O Arete, my mistress, offer as a gift
to thee this robe, adorned according to my ability.

   EUBOULIOS. I am much moved, O Gregorion, considering within myself in
how great anxiety of mind Domnina must be from the character of the
discourses, perplexed in heart as she is, and with good cause, fearing lest
she should be at a loss for words, and should speak more feebly than the
rest of the virgins, since they have spoken on the subject with such
ability and variety. If, therefore, she was evidently moved, come and
complete this too; for I wonder if she had anything to say, being the last
speaker.

   GREGORION. Theopatra told me, Euboulios, that she was greatly moved,
but she was not perplexed from want of words. After, therefore, Tusiane had
ceased, Arete looked at her and said, Come, my daughter, do thou also
deliver a discourse, that our banquet may be quite complete. At this
Domnina, blushing, and after a long delay, scarcely looking up, rose to
pray, and turning round, invoked Wisdom to be her present helper. And when
she had prayed, Theopatra said that suddenly courage came to her, and a
certain divine confidence possessed her, and she said:--

DISCOURSE X.--DOMNINA.

CHAP. I.--CHASTITY ALONE AIDS AND EFFECTS THE MOST PRAISEWORTHY GOVERNMENT
OF THE SOUL.

   O Arete, I also, omitting the long preludes of exordiums, will
endeavour according to my ability to enter upon the subject, lest, by
delaying upon those matters which are outside the subject in hand, I should
speak of them at greater length than their importance would warrant. For I
account it a very great part of prudence not to make long speeches, which
merely charm the ears, before coming to the main question, but to begin
forthwith at the point in debate. So I will begin from thence, for it is
time.

   Nothing can so much profit a man, O fair virgins, with respect to moral
excellence, as chastity; for chastity alone accomplishes and brings it
about that the soul should be governed in the noblest and best way, and
should be set free, pure from the stains and pollutions of the world. For
which reason, when Christ taught us to cultivate it, and showed its
unsurpassable beauty, the kingdom of the Evil One was destroyed, who
aforetime led captive and enslaved the whole race of men, so that none of
the more ancient people pleased the Lord, but all were overcome by errors,
since the law was not of itself sufficient to free the human race from
corruption, until virginity, succeeding the law, governed men by the
precepts of Christ. Nor truly had the first men so often rim headlong into
combats and slaughter, into lust and idolatry, if the righteousness that is
by the law had been to them sufficient for salvation. Now truly they were
then confused by great and frequent calamities; but from the time when
Christ was incarnate, and armed and adorned His flesh with virginity, the
savage tyrant who was master of incontinence was taken away, and peace and
faith have dominion, men no longer turning so much as before to idolatry.

CHAP. II.--THE ALLEGORY OF THE TREES DEMANDING A KING, IN THE BOOK OF
JUDGES,(1) EXPLAINED.

   But lest I should appear to some to be sophistical, and to conjecture
these things from mere probabilities, and to babble, I will bring forward
to you, O virgins, from the Old Testament, written prophecy from the Book
of Judges, to show that I speak the truth, where the future reign of
chastity was already clearly foretold. For we read: "The trees went forth
on a time to anoint  a king over them; and they said unto the olive-tree,
Reign thou over us. But the olive-tree said unto them, Should I leave my
fatness, wherewith by the they honour God and man, and go to be promoted
over the trees? And the trees said to the fig-tree, Come thou, and reign
over us. But the fig-tree said unto them, Should I forsake my sweetness,
and my good fruit, and go to be promoted over the trees? Then said the
trees unto the vine, Come thou, and reign over us. And the vine said unto
them, Should I leave my wine, which cheereth God and man, and go to be
promoted over the trees? Then said all the trees unto the bramble, Come
thou, and reign over us. And the bramble said unto the trees, If in truth
ye anoint me king over you, then come and put your trust in my shadow; and
if not, let fire come out of the bramble, and devour the cedars of
Lebanon."

   Now, that these things are not said of trees growing out of the earth,
is clear. For inanimate trees cannot be assembled in council to choose a
king, inasmuch as they firmly fixed by deep roots to the earth. But
altogether are  these things narrated concerning souls which,  before the
incarnation of Christ, too deeply luxuriating in transgressions, approach
to God as suppliants, and ask His mercy, and that they may be governed by
His pity and compassion, which Scripture expresses under the figure of the
olive, because oil is of great advantage to our bodies, and takes away our
fatigues and ailments, and affords light. For all lamp-light increases when
nourished by oil. So also the mercies of God entirely dissolve death, and
assist the human race, and nourish the light of the heart.(2) And consider
whether the laws, from the first created man until Christ in succession,
were not set forth in these words by the Scripture by figments, in
opposition to which the devil has deceived the human race. And it has
likened the fig-tree to the command given to man in paradise, because, when
he was deceived, he covered his nakedness with the leaves of a fig-tree;(3)
and the vine to the precept given to Noah at the time of the deluge,
because, when overpowered by wine, he was mocked.(4) The olive signifies
the law given to Moses in the desert, because the prophetic grace, the holy
oil, had failed from their inheritance when they broke the law. Lastly, the
bramble not inaptly refers to the law which was given to the apostles for
the salvation of the world; because by their instruction we have been
taught virginity, of which alone the devil has not been able to make a
deceptive image. For which cause, also, four Gospels have been given,
because God has four times given the Gospel(5) to the human race, and has
instructed them by four laws, the times of which are clearly known by the
diversity of the fruits. For the fig-tree, on account of its sweetness and
richness, represents the delights of man, which he had in paradise before
the fall. Indeed, not rarely, as we shall afterwards show, the Holy
Spirit(6) takes the fruit of the fig-tree as an emblem of goodness. But the
vine, on account of the gladness produced by wine, and the joy of those who
were saved from wrath and from the deluge, signifies the change produced
from fear and anxiety into joy.(7) Moreover, the olive, on account of the
oil which it produces, indicates the compassion of God, who again, after
the deluge, bore patiently when men turned aside to ungodliness, so that He
gave them the law and manifested Himself to some, and nourished by oil the
light of virtue, now almost extinguished.

CHAP. III.--THE BRAMBLE AND THE AGNOS THE SYMBOL OF CHASTITY; THE FOUR
GOSPELS, THAT IS, TEACHINGS OR LAWS, INSTRUCTING TO SALVATION.

   Now the bramble commends chastity, for the bramble and the agnos is the
same tree: by some it is called bramble, by others agnos.(8)  Perhaps it is
because the plant is akin to virginity that it is called bramble and agnos;
bramble, because of its strength and firmness against pleasures; agnos,
because it always continues chaste. Hence the Scripture relates that
Elijah, fleeing from the face of the woman Jezebel,(1) at first came under
a bramble, and there, having been heard, received strength and took food;
signifying that to him who flies from the incitements of lust, and from a
woman--that is, from pleasure--the tree of chastity is a refuge and a
shade, ruling men from the coming of Christ, the chief of virgins. For when
the first laws, which were published in the times of Adam and Noah and
Moses, were unable to give salvation to man, the evangelical law alone has
saved all.

   And this is the cause why the fig-tree may be said not to have obtained
the kingdom over trees, which, in a spiritual sense, mean men; and the fig-
tree the command, because man desired, even after the fall, again to be
subject to the dominion of virtue, and not to be deprived of the
immortality of the paradise of pleasure. But, having transgressed, he was
rejected and cast far away, as one who could no longer be governed by
immortality, nor was capable of receiving it. And the first message to him
after the transgression was preached by Noah,(2) to which, if he had
applied his mind, he might have been saved from sin; for in it he promised
both happiness and rest from evils, if he gave heed to it with all his
might, just as the vine promises to yield wine to those who cultivate it
with care and labour. But neither did this law rule mankind, for men did
not obey it, although zealously preached by Noah. But, after they began to
be surrounded and drowning by the waters, they began to repent, and to
promise that they would obey the commandments. Wherefore with scorn they
are rejected as subjects; that is, they are contemptuously told that they
cannot be helped by the law; the Spirit answering them back and reproaching
them because they had deserted those men whom God had commanded to help
them, and to save them, and make them glad; such as Noah and those with
him. "Even to you, O rebellious," said he, "I come, to bring help to you
who are destitute of prudence, and who differ in nothing from dry trees,
and who formerly did not believe me when I preached that you ought to flee
from present things."

CHAP. IV.--THE LAW USELESS FOR SALVATION; THE LAST LAW OF CHASTITY UNDER
THE FIGURE OF THE BRAMBLE.

   And so those men, having been thus rejected from the divine care, and
the human race having again given themselves up to error, again God sent
forth, by Moses, a law to rule them and recall them to righteousness. But
these, thinking fit to bid a long farewell to this law, turned to idolatry.
Hence God gave them up to mutual slaughters, to exiles, and captivities,
the law it self confessing, as it were, that it could not save them.
Therefore, worn out with ills and afflicted, they again promised that they
would obey the commandments; until God, pitying man the  fourth time, sent
chastity to rule over them, which  Scripture consequently called the
bramble. And she consuming pleasures threatens besides, that unless all
undoubtingly obey her, and truly come to her, she will destroy all with
fire, since there will be hereafter no other law or doctrine but judgment
and fire. For this reason, man henceforth began to do righteousness, and
firmly to believe in God, and to separate himself from the devil. Thus
chastity was sent down, as being most useful and helpful to men. For of her
alone was the devil unable to forge an imitation  to lead men astray, as is
the case with the other precepts.

CHAP. V.--THE MALIGNITY OF THE DEVIL AS AN IMITATOR IN ALL THINGS; TWO
KINDS OF FIG-TREES AND VINES.

   The fig-tree, as I said, from the sweetness and excellence of its
fruit, being taken as a type of the delights of paradise, the devil, having
beguiled the man by its imitations, led him captive, persuading him to
conceal the nakedness of his body by fig-leaves; that is, by their friction
he excited him to sexual pleasure. Again, those that had been saved from
the deluge, he intoxicated with a drink which was an imitation of the vine
of spiritual joy; and again he mocked them, having stripped them of virtue.
And what I say will hereafter be more clear.

   The enemy, by his power, always imitates(3) the forms of virtue and
righteousness, not for the purpose of truly promoting its exercise, but for
deception and hypocrisy. For in order that those who fly from death he may
entice to death, he is outwardly dyed with the colours of immortality. And
hence he wishes to seem a fig-tree or vine, and to produce sweetness and
joy, and is "transformed into an angel of light,"(4) ensnaring many by the
appearance of piety.

   For we find in the Sacred Writings that there are two kinds of fig-
trees and vines, "the good  figs, very good; and the evil, very evil;"(5)
"wine that maketh glad the heart of man."(6) and wine which is the poison
of dragons, and the incurable venom of asps.(1) But from the time when
chastity began to rule over men, the fraud was detected and overcome,
Christ, the chief of virgins, overturning it. So both the true fig-tree and
the true vine yield fruit after that the power of chastity has laid hold
upon all men, as Joel the prophet preaches, saying: "Fear not, O land; be
glad and rejoice, for the Lord will do great things. Be not afraid, ye
beasts of the field; for the pastures of the wilderness do spring, for the
tree beareth her fruit, the fig-tree and the vine do yield their strength.
Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, for He
hath given you food unto righteousness;"(2) calling the former laws the
vine and the fig, trees bearing fruit unto righteousness for the children
of the spiritual Zion, which bore fruit after the incarnation of the Word,
when chastity ruled over us, when formerly, on account of sin and much
error, they had checked and destroyed their buds. For the true vine and the
true fig-tree were not able to yield such nourishment to us as would be
profitable for life, whilst as yet the false fig-tree, variously adorned
for the purpose of fraud, flourished. But when the Lord dried up the false
branches, the imitations of the true branches, uttering the sentence
against the bitter fig-tree, "Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for
ever,"(3) then those which were truly fruit-bearing trees flourished and
yielded food unto righteousness.

   The vine, and that not in a few places, refers to the Lord Himself,(4)
and the fig-tree to the Holy Spirit, as the Lord "maketh glad the hearts of
men," and the Spirit healeth them. And therefore Hezekiah is commanded(5)
first to make a plaster with a lump of figs--that is, the fruit of the
Spirit--that he may be healed--that is, according to the apostle--by love;
for he says, "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance;"(6) which, on account of
their great pleasantness, the prophet calls figs. Micah also says, "They
shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig-tree; and none shall
make them afraid."(7) Now it is certain that those who have taken refuge
and rested under the Spirit, and under the shadow of the Word, shall not be
alarmed, nor frightened by him who troubles the hearts of men.

CHAP. VI.--THE MYSTERY OF THE VISION OF ZECHARIAH.

   Moreover, Zechariah shows that the olive shadows forth the law of
Moses, speaking thus: "And the angel that talked with me came again and
waked me, as a man that is wakened out of his sleep, and said unto me, What
seest thou? And I said, I have looked, and behold a candlestick all of
gold, with a bowl upon the top of it . . . And two olive-trees by it, one
upon the right side of the bowl, and the other upon the left side
thereof."(8) And after a few words, the prophet, asking what are the olives
on the right and left of the candlestick, and what the two olive-boughs in
the hands of the two pipes, the angel answered and said: "These are the two
sons of fruitfulness(9) which stand by the Lord of the whole earth,"
signifying the two first-born virtues that are waiting upon God, which, in
His dwelling, supply around the wick, through the boughs, the spiritual oil
of God, that man may have the light of divine knowledge. But the two boughs
of the two olives are the law and the prophets, around, as it were, the
lot(10) of the inheritance, of which Christ and the Holy Spirit are the
authors, we ourselves meanwhile not being able to take the whole fruit and
the greatness of these plants, before chastity began to rule the world, but
only their boughs--to wit, the law and the prophets--did we formerly
cultivate, and those moderately, often letting them slip. For who was ever
able to receive Christ or the Spirit, unless he first purified himself? For
the exercise which prepares the soul from childhood for desirable and
delectable glory, and carries this grace safely thither with ease, and from
small toils raises up mighty hopes, is chastity, which gives immortality to
our bodies; which it becomes all men willingly to prefer in honour and to
praise above all things; some, that by its means they may be betrothed to
the Word, practising virginity; and others, that by it they may be freed
from the curse, "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."(11)

   This, O Arete, is the discourse on virginity which you required of me,
accomplished according to my ability; which I pray, O mistress, although it
is mediocre and short, that thou wilt receive with kindness from me who was
chosen to speak last.

DISCOURSE XI.--ARETE.

CHAP. I.--THE TRUE AND CHASTE VIRGINS FEW; CHASTITY A CONTEST; THEKLA CHIEF
OF VIRGINS,

   I do accept it, Theopatra related that Arete said, and approve of it
all. For it is an excellent thing, even although you had not spoken so
clearly, to take up and go through with earnestness those things which have
been said, not to prepare a sweet entertainment for those who listen, but
for correction, recollection, and abstinence. For whoever teaches that
chastity is to be preferred and embraced first of all among my pursuits,
rightly advises; which many think that they honour and cultivate, but which
few, so to speak, really honour. For it is not one who has studied to
restrain his flesh from the pleasure of  carnal delight that cultivates
chastity, if he do  not keep in check the rest of the desires; but rather
he dishonours it, and that in no small degree, by base lusts, exchanging
pleasures for pleasures. Nor if he have strongly resisted the desires of
the senses, but is lifted up with vainglory, and from this cause is able to
repress the heats of burning lust, and reckon them all as nothing, can he
be thought to honour chastity; for he dishonours it in that he is lifted up
with pride, cleansing the outside of the cup and platter, that is, the
flesh and the body, but injuring the heart by conceit and ambition. Nor
when any one is conceited of riches is he desirous of honouring chastity;
he dishonours it more than all, preferring a little gain to that to which
nothing is comparable of those things that are in this life esteemed. For
all riches and gold "in respect of it are as a little sand."(1) And neither
does he who loves himself above measure, and eagerly considers that which
is expedient for himself alone, regardless of the necessities of his
neighbour, honour chastity, but he also dishonours it. For he who has
repelled from himself charity, mercy, and humanity, is much inferior to
those who honourably exercise chastity. Nor is it right, on the one hand,
by the use of chastity to keep virginity, and, on the other hand, to
pollute the soul by evil deeds and lust; nor here to profess purity and
continence, and there to pollute it by indulgence in vices. Nor, again,
here to declare that the things of this world bring no care to himself;
there to be eager in procuring them, and in concern about them. But all the
members are to be preserved intact and free from corruption; not only those
which are sexual, but those members also which minister to the service of
lusts. For it would be ridiculous to preserve the organs of generation
pure, but not the tongue; or to preserve the tongue, but neither the
eyesight, the ears, nor the hands; or lastly, to preserve these pure, but
not the mind, defiling it with pride and anger.

   It is altogether necessary for him who has resolved that he will not
err from the practice of chastity, to keep all his members and senses clean
and under restraint, as is customary with the planks of ships, whose
fastenings the ship-masters diligently join together, lest by any means the
way and access may lie open for sin to pour itself into the mind. For great
pursuits are liable to great falls, and evil is more opposed to that which
is really good than to that which is not good. For many who thought that to
repress vehement lascivious desires constituted chastity, neglecting other
duties connected with it, failed also in this, and have brought blame(2)
upon those endeavouring after it by the fight way, as you have proved who
are a model in everything, leading a virgin life in deed and word. And now
what that is which becomes a virgin state has been described.

   And you all in my hearing having sufficiently contended in speaking, I
pronounce victors and crown; but Thekla with a larger and thicker chaplet,
as the chief of you, and as having shone with greater lustre than the rest.

CHAP. II.--THEKLA SINGING DECOROUSLY A HYMN, THE REST OF THE VIRGINS SING
WITH HER; JOHN THE BAPTIST A MARTYR TO CHASTITY; THE CHURCH THE SPOUSE OF
GOD,PURE AND VIRGIN.

   Theopatra said that Arete having said these things, commanded them all
to rise, and, standing under the Agnos, to send up to the Lord in a
becoming manner a hymn of thanksgiving; and that Thekla should begin and
should lead the rest. And when they had stood up, she said that Thekla,
standing in the midst of the virgins on the right of Arete, decorously
sang; but the rest, standing together in a circle after the manner of a
chorus, responded to her: "I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and
holding a lighted torch I go to meet Thee."(3)

   THEKLA. I. From above, O virgins, the sound of a noise that wakes the
dead has come, bidding us all to meet the Bridegroom in white robes, and
with torches towards the cast.Arise, before the King enters within the
gates.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 2. Fleeing from the sorrowful happiness of mortals, and having
despised the luxuriant delights of life and its love, I desire to be
protected under Thy life-giving arms, and to behold Thy beauty for ever, O
blessed One.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 3. Leaving marriage and the beds of mortals and my golden home
for Thee, O King, I have come in undefiled robes, in order that I might
enter with Thee within Thy happy bridal chamber.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 4. Having escaped, O blessed One, from the innumerable
enchanting wiles of the serpent, and, moreover, from the flame of fire, and
from the mortal-destroying assaults of wild beasts, I await Thee from
heaven.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 5. I forget my own country, O Lord, through desire of Thy
grace.(1) I forget, also, the company of virgins, my fellows, the desire
even of mother and of kindred, for Thou, O Christ, art all things to me.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 6. Giver of life art Thou, O Christ. Hail, light that never
sets, receive this praise. The company of virgins call upon Thee, Perfect
Flower, Love, Joy, Prudence, Wisdom, Word.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 7. With open gates, O beauteously adorned Queen, admit us
within thy chambers. O spotless, gloriously triumphant Bride, breathing
beauty, we stand by Christ, robed as He is, celebrating thy happy nuptials,
O youthful maiden.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 8. The virgins standing without the chamber,(2) with bitter
tears and deep moans, wail and mournfully lament that their lamps are gone
out, having failed to enter in due time the chamber of joy.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 9. For turning from the sacred way of life, unhappy ones, they
have neglected to prepare sufficiency of oil for the path of life; bearing
lamps whose bright light is dead, they groan from the inward recesses of
their mind.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 10. Here are cups full of sweet nectar; let us drink, O
virgins, for it is celestial drink, which the Bridegroom hath placed for
those duly called to the wedding.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 11. Abel, clearly prefiguring Thy death,(3) O blessed One, with
flowing blood, and eyes lifted up to heaven, said, Cruelly slain by a
brother's hand, O Word, I pray Thee to receive me.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 12. Thy valiant son Joseph,(4) O Word, won the greatest prize
of virginity, when I a woman heated with desire forcibly drew him to an
unlawful bed; but he giving no heed to her fled stripped, and crying
aloud:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 13. Jephthah offered his fresh slaughtered virgin daughter a
sacrifice to God, like a lamb; and she, nobly fulfilling the type of Thy
body, O blessed One, bravely cried:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 14. Daring Judith,(5) by clever wiles having cut off the head
of the leader of the foreign hosts, whom previously she had allured by her
beautiful form, without polluting the limbs of her body, with a victor's
shout said:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 15. Seeing the great beauty of Susanna, the two Judges,
maddened with desire, said, O dear lady, we have come desiring secret
intercourse with thee; but she with tremulous cries said:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 16. It is far better for me to die than to betray my nuptials
to you, O mad for women, and so to suffer the eternal justice of God in
fiery vengeance. Save me now, O Christ, from these evils.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 17. Thy Precursor, washing multitudes of men in flowing lustral
water, unjustly by a wicked man, on account of his chastity, was led to
slaughter; but as he stained the dust with his life-blood, he cried to
Thee, O blessed One:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 18. The parent of Thy life, that unspotted Grace(1) and
undefiled Virgin, bearing in her womb without the ministry of man, by an
immaculate conception,(2) and who thus became suspected of having betrayed
the marriage-bed, she, O blessed One, when pregnant, thus spoke:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 19. Wishing to see Thy nuptial day, O blessed One, as many
angels as Thou, O King, calledst from above, bearing the best gifts to
Thee, came in unsullied robes:--

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 20. In hymns, O blessed spouse of God, we attendants of the
Bride honour Thee, O undefiled virgin Church of snow-white form, dark
haired, chaste, spotless, beloved.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 21. Corruption has fled, and the tearful pains of diseases;
death has been taken away, all folly has perished, consuming mental grief
is no more; for again the grace of the God-Christ has suddenly shone upon
mortals.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 22. Paradise is no longer bereft of mortals, for by divine
decree he no longer dwells there as formerly, thrust out from thence when
he was free from corruption, and from fear by the various wiles of the
serpents, O blessed One.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 23. Singing the new song, now the company of virgins attends
thee towards the heavens, O Queen, all manifestly crowned with white
lilies, and bearing in their hands bright lights.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

   THEKLA. 24. O blessed One, who inhabited the undefiled seats of heaven
without beginning, who governed all things by everlasting power, O Father,
with Thy Son, we are here, receive us also within the gates of life.

   CHORUS. I keep myself pure for Thee, O Bridegroom, and holding a
lighted torch I go to meet Thee.

CHAP. III.--WHICH ARE THE BETTER, THE CONTINENT, OR THOSE WHO DELIGHT IN
TRANQUILLITY OF LIFE? CONTESTS THE PERIL OF CHASTITY: THE FELICITY OF
TRANQUILLITY; PURIFIED AND TRANQUIL MINDS GODS: THEY WHO SHALL SEE GOD;
VIRTUE DISCIPLINED BY TEMPTATIONS.

   EUBOULIOS. Deservedly, O Gregorion, has Thekla borne off the chief
prize.

   GREGORION. Deservedly indeed.

   EUBOULIOS. But what about the stranger Telmisiake?(3) Tell me, was she
not listening from without? I wonder if she could keep silence on hearing
of this banquet, and would not forthwith, as a bird flies to its food,
listen to the things which were spoken.

   GREGORION. The report is that she was present with Methodios(4) when he
inquired respecting these things of Arete. But it is a good as well as a
happy thing to have such a mistress and guide as Arete, that is virtue.

   EUBOULIOS. But, Gregorion, which shall we say are the better, those who
without lust govern concupiscence, or those who under the assaults of
concupiscence continue pure?

   GREGORION. For my part, I think those who are free from lust, for they
have their mined undefiled, and are altogether uncorrupted, sinning in no
respect.

   EUBOULIOS. Well, I swear by chastity, and wisely, O Gregorion. But lest
in any wise I hinder you, if I gainsay your words, it is that I may the
better learn, and that no one hereafter may refute me.

   GREGORION. Gainsay me as you will, you have my permission. For,
Euboulios, I think  that I know sufficient to teach you that he who  is not
concupiscent is better than he who is. If I cannot, then there is no one
who can convince you.

   EUBOULIOS. Bless me! I am glad that you answer me so magnanimously, and
show how wealthy you are as regards wisdom.

   GREGORION. A mere chatterer, so you seem to be, O Euboulios.

   EUBOULIOS. Why so?

   GREGORION. Because you ask rather for the sake of amusement than of
truth.

   EUBOULIOS. Speak fair, I pray you, my good friend; for I greatly admire
your wisdom and renown. I say this because, with reference to the things
that many wise men often dispute among themselves, you say that you not
only understand them, but also vaunt that you can teach another.

   GREGORION. Now tell me truly whether it is a difficulty with you to
receive the opinion, that they who are not concupiscent excel those who are
concupiscent, and yet restrain themselves? or are you joking?

   EUBOULIOS. How so, when I tell you that I do not know? But, come, tell
me, O wisest lady, in what do the non-concupiscent and chaste excel the
concupiscent who live chastely?

   GREGORION. Because, in the first place, they have the soul itself pure,
and the Holy Spirit always dwells in it, seeing that it is not distracted
and disturbed by fancies and unrestrained thoughts, so as to pollute the
mind. But they are in every way inaccessible to lust, both as to their
flesh and to their heart, enjoying tranquillity from passions. But they who
are allured from without, through the sense of sight, with fancies, and
receiving lust flowing like a stream into the heart, are often not less
polluted, even when they think that they contend and fight against
pleasures, being vanquished in their mind.

   EUBOULIOS. Shall we then say that they who serenely live and are not
disturbed by lusts are pure?

   GREGORION. Certainly, For these(1) are they whom God makes gods in the
beatitudes; they I who believe in Him without doubt. And He says that they
shall look upon God with confidence, because they bring in nothing that
darkens or confuses the eye of the soul for the beholding of God; but all
desire of things secular being eliminated, they not only, as I said,
preserve the flesh pure from carnal connection, but even the heart, in
which, especially, as in a temple, the Holy Spirit rests and dwells, is
open to no unclean thoughts.

   EUBOULIOS. Stay now; for I think that from hence we shall the better go
on to the discovery of what things are truly the best; and, tell me, do you
call anyone a good pilot?

   GREGORION. I certainly do.

   EUBOULIOS. Whether is it he that saves his vessel in great and
perplexing storms, or is it he who does so in a breathless calm?

   GREGORION. He that does so in a great and perplexing storm.

   EUBOULIOS. Shall we not then say that the soul, which is deluged with
the surging waves of the passions, and yet does not, on that account, weary
or grow faint, but direct her vessel--that is, the flesh --nobly into the
port of chastity, is better and more estimable than he that navigates in
calm weather?

   GREGORION. We will say so.

   EUBOULIOS. For to be prepared against the entrance of the gales of the
Evil Spirit, and not to be cast away or overcome, but to refer all to
Christ, and strongly to contend against pleasures, brings greater praise
than he wins who lives a virgin life calmly and with ease.

   GREGORION. It appears so.

   EUBOULIOS. And what saith the Lord? Does He not seem to show that he
who retains continence, though concupiscent, excels him who, having no
concupiscence, leads a virgin life?

   GREGORION. Where does He say so?

   EUBOULIOS. Where, comparing a wise man to a house well founded, He
declares him immoveable because he cannot be overthrown by rains, and
floods, and winds; likening, as it would seem, these storms to lusts, but
the immoveable and unshaken firmness of the soul in chastity to the rock.

   GREGORION. You appear to speak what is true.

   EUBOULIOS. And what say you of the physician? Do you not call him the
best who has been proved in great diseases, and has healed many patients?

   GREGORION. I do.

   EUBOULIOS. But the one who has never at any time practised, nor ever
had the sick in  his hands, is he not still in all respects the inferior?

   GREGORION. Yes.

   EUBOULIOS. Then we may certainly say that a soul which is contained by
a concupiscent body, and which appeases with the medicaments of temperance
the disorders arising from the heat of lusts, carries off the palm for
healing, over one to whose lot it has fallen to govern aright a body which
is free from lust.(2)

   GREGORION. It must be allowed.

   EUBOULIOS. And how is it in wrestling? Whether is the better wrestler
he who has many and strong antagonists, and continually is contending
without being worsted, or he who has no opponents?

   GREGORION. Manifestly he who wrestles.

   EUBOULIOS. And, in wrestling, is not the athlete who contends the more
experienced?

   GREGORION. It must be granted.

   EUBOULIOS. Therefore it is clear that he whose soul contends against
the impulses of lust, and is not borne down by it, but draws back and sets
himself in array against it, appears stronger than he who does not lust.(2)

   GREGORION. True.

   EUBOULIOS. What then? Does it not appear to you, Gregorion, that there
is more courage in being valiant against the assaults of base desires?

   GREGORION. Yes, indeed.

   EUBOULIOS. Is not this courage the strength of virtue?

   GREGORION. Plainly so.

   EUBOULIOS. Therefore, if endurance be the strength of virtue, is not
the soul, which is troubled by lusts, and yet perseveres against them,
stronger than that which is not so troubled?

   GREGORION.Yes.

   EUBOULIOS.And if stronger, then better?

   GREGORION.Truly.

   EUBOULIOS.Therefore the soul which is concupiscent, and exercises self-
control, as appears from what has been said, is better than that which is
not concupiscent, and exercises serf-control.(1)

   GREGORION. You speak truly, and I shall desire still more fully to
discourse with you concerning these things. If, therefore, it pleases you,
tomorrow I will come again to hear respecting them. Now, however, as you
see, it is time to betake ourselves to the care of the outward man.


Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland beginning in
1867. (ANF 6, Roberts and Donaldson). The digital version is by The
Electronic Bible Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.

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