XXIII. I never observed, that the dogmatic writers, who in various
manners, have conclusively proved the evident credibility of our
holy faith, have introduced as one of their arguments, the consent
of many nations in their belief of those mysteries; but have laid
great stress, upon the consent of men, eminent for their sanctity and
wisdom. The first argument would be favourable to idolatry, and the
Mahomedan Sect; the second cannot be answered, nor can it be used to
militate on the other side; and in case they should oppose to us the
authority of the antient philosophers, who have been the partizans of
idolatry, the objection would be grounded on a false supposition, it
being established by irrefragable testimony, that those philosophers
in matters of religion did not think with the people. Marcus Varus,
one of the wisest of the Romans, distinguished among the Antients
three kinds of Theology; the Natural, the Civil, and the Poetical.
The first existed in the minds of wise men; the second was used to
govern the religion of the people at large; the third was the invention
of the poets; and of all the three, the philosophers held only the
first to be true. The distinction of the two first, had been pointed
out by Aristotle, in the twelfth book of his Metaphysics, cap. 8,
where he says, that from the opinions of preceding ages which have
been communicated to us respecting the Gods, may be inferred, they
held some things to be true, and others false, and that the last were
invented for the use and civil government of the populace: _Cætera
vero fabulosè ad multitudinis persuasionem_. It is true, that although
those philosophers were not of the same sentiment with the people, they
generally talked their language, as an opposite conduct would have been
very hazardous; for whoever denied the plurality of Gods, was looked
upon as impious; as it happened to Socrates. The sum of the whole of
this is, that in the voice of the people was contained all the error;
and that the little or much which existed of truth, was shut up and
imprisoned in the minds of a few wise men.
XXIV. After all that has been said, I shall conclude, by pointing out
two senses, in which only, and in no other whatever, is contained the
truth of the maxim, “that the voice of the people is the voice of
God.” The first is, taking for the voice of the people, the unanimous
consent of all God’s people; that is, of the universal church, which it
is certain cannot err in matters of faith; nor through any antecedent
impossibility which may be inferred from the nature of things, but by
means of the interposition of the holy spirit, with which, according
to the promise made by Christ, it will be constantly assisted. I said
all God’s people, because a large portion of the church may err, and
in fact did err, in the great Western Schism; for the kings of France,
Castile, Arragon, and Scotland, acknowledged Clement the VIIth for
legitimate Pope; the rest of the Christian world, adhered to Urban the
VIth. But it is manifest, that one of the two parties must be wrong,
which may be considered as a conclusive proof; that even within
the pale of the Christian church, not only one, but several nations
collectively, may err in essentials.
XXV. The second sense in which the maxim ought to be held true, is,
by taking for the voice of the people, the universal concurrence of
all mankind; it appearing morally impossible, that all the nations of
the world should agree in adopting any one error. Thus the consent of
the whole earth, in believing the existence of a God, is held by the
learned, as a conclusive proof of this article.
VIRTUE and VICE.
Every mortal (said Philo, as cited by St. Ambrose, Lib. 1. of Cain
and Abel, cap. 4.) has, within the little habitation of the soul, two
females, the one chaste but rigid and unpleasant, the other wanton
but soft and amorous. The first is the type of virtue, the second of
worldly delights.
II. The learned Jew paints virtue and vice according to appearances
at first sight, or according to the opinion of the world, but not
according to the truth; and so it comes to pass, that virtue is
commonly conceived to be all asperity, and vice all deliciousness;
virtue is placed among thorns, and vice reposing on beds of flowers:
but this is an error, and of all the false opinions upheld by the
blindness of the world, the most pernicious one. I shall endeavour in
this discourse to expose its fallacy, by shewing, that even in this
life, abstracted from the rewards and punishments of that to come, by
people’s abandoning themselves to the pursuit of criminal pleasures,
they are liable to more inquietudes, and experience more fatigues,
than they would be exposed to, by the practice of the moral and
Christian virtues. For this purpose, I shall make use of such arguments
as are furnished by natural reason and experience, without having
recourse to the sentences of fathers, or the sayings of philosophers,
the collection of which might be swelled to a vast bulk; but whoever is
not to be persuaded by reason, will never be convinced by authority.
III. Could we but see the hearts of men abandoned to a vicious
course, the doubt would be soon removed; however, we may view them by
reflection in the looking-glasses of their souls, of which their words
and actions are the types. If you observe with attention these unhappy
men, you will find, that no others betray such perturbation in their
countenances, such inquietude in their actions, nor such embarrassment
in their conversation; nor is this to be wondered at, there being many
tormentors, who are continually disturbing them in the enjoyment of
their beloved pleasures. That domestic enemy, that unavoidable, but
unsavoury guest, their own conscience, with the nectar they drink, is
constantly mixing the gall they abominate.
IV. Tully said with energetical propriety, that the crimes of wicked
men, reflected in their own imaginations, are to them continual and
domestic furies? _Hæ sunt impiis assiduæ, domesticæque furiæ._ (Orat.
pro Rosc.) These are the serpents and vulturs, who gnaw in pieces the
entrails of the wicked _Tityus_; these are the eagles, who tear the
heart of the rash Prometheus. Consider the torments of Cain, a fugitive
from the world, and who, if it were possible, would fly from himself
also; wandering through the woods and mountains, without ever having
power to extract the dart which had pierced his breast, that is, the
memory of his crime; or like another wounded hind, under which image
the great poet describes the mortal inquietude of that enamoured queen,
----_Silvas, saltusque peragrat_
_Dictæos; hæret lateri læthalis arundo._
V. Contemplate the anxieties of a Lamech, so violently pressed by the
recollection of the murder, or murders, which he had committed, that,
wanting power to remain the repository of his own secret, he throws
it up like one who has swallowed poison, which excites a coughing or
tickling in the throat, and runs the hazard of infamy and punishment,
for the sake only of enjoying a trivial and temporary relief. Plutarch
relates of one Apollodorus, that the memory of his crimes, haunted him
in his sleep; for he dreamed every night, that after being quartered,
his members were dissolved in boiling water, and that while he suffered
this martyrdom, his heart screamed out, “I am the cause and motive of
these torments.”