8

Gospel, in the profusion of pearls those receiving the benefit become worse. Therefore it seems good to me, as the divine word has said, to separate the worthless from the precious in the giving, so that he who has trampled the pearl and by his insensibility to good things has insulted the benefaction may not grieve the goodness of the generous giver. 1.1.3 It came to me to say these things when I thought of the man of God who shares his own good things unsparingly with all, I mean Basil the mouth of piety, who in the abundance of his spiritual treasures often poured out the grace of wisdom indiscriminately even on malicious souls, and of Eunomius, who was ungrateful to those who were eager 1.1.4 to do him some good. For this man, because of the exceeding sickness of his soul, in which he was weak concerning the faith, seemed indeed pitiful to all who belong to the church (for who is so unsympathetic as not to pity one who is perishing?), but he moved that man alone to the undertaking of a cure, the only one who in his abounding love for humanity dares to attempt the healing even of the incurable; who, grieving at the man's destruction, through his natural sympathy for those in distress, labored on the "Refutation of the heresy" as an antidote for wicked poisons, with the goal of saving the man again through these writings and restoring him to the church. 1.1.5 But he, as if struck in his mind by a frenzy, rages against the one who heals him, and wars and fights, and considers an enemy the one who is trying to lift him up from the pit of impiety. And he does not rave these things just simply, as it happens, to anyone he meets, but he has set up against himself a written monument of this melancholy. 1.1.6 and having obtained for a long time as much leisure as he wanted, he was in labor with a treatise for all the intervening time, more than the great and fleshy beasts, and was heavy with threats while still fashioning the embryo in secret, and at last and with difficulty he brought forth to the light a kind of abortion and an unformed 1.1.7 offspring. which all those who have partaken of the same corruption nurse and cherish, but we, because of the blessing from the prophecy ("Blessed," it says, "is he who will take and dash your infants against the rock"), since it also came into our hands, were eager to seize this infant treatise and dash it against the rock as one of the children of Babylon; and the rock was Christ, that is, the word of truth. May the power that strengthens the weak come upon us too, through the prayers of him who in the weakness 1.1.8 of the body perfected his own power. If, then, even now that godlike and holy soul were still observing human life through the flesh, and his lofty mouth, according to the grace allotted to him from the beginning, were uttering that invincible voice, who would have come to such confidence as to dare even to utter anything concerning this subject, when that divine trumpet out-sounded 1.1.9 every word and every echo? But since he flew up whole to God, previously touching the earth with some small and shadowy remnant of his body, but for the greater part soaring with God, and now having also put off that shadow of a body and left it to this life, and the drones buzz around the honeycombs of the word and spoil the honey, let no one accuse me of boldness for having risen up in defense 1.1.10 of the silent mouth. For I did not undertake the labor because I was conscious of possessing any power of words beyond others; but knowing precisely, if anyone else does, that thousands abound in the church of the Lord according to the gift of wisdom, yet since I say that the inheritance of the departed belongs to me most of all, both because of the written laws and the laws of nature, for this reason I myself before others appropriate the inheritance of his teaching, being numbered among the least of those who contribute to the church of God, but of him who is torn from the church

8

εὐαγγέλιον, ἐν τῇ τῶν μαργαριτῶν ἀφειδίᾳ χείρους εὐερ γετούμενοι γίνονται. διό μοι δοκεῖ καλῶς ἔχειν, καθὼς ὁ θεῖος προείρηκε λόγος, ἀποκρίνειν ἐν τῇ παροχῇ τῶν τιμίων τὰ ἄτιμα, ὡς ἂν μὴ λυποίη τοῦ φιλοτιμουμένου τὴν ἀγαθό τητα ὁ καταπατήσας τὸν μαργαρίτην καὶ τῇ τῶν καλῶν ἀναισθησίᾳ τὴν εὐεργεσίαν ὑβρίσας. 1.1.3 Ταῦτα δέ μοι λέγειν ἐπῆλθεν ἐνθυμηθέντι τόν τε πᾶσιν ἀφειδῶς κοινωνοῦντα τῶν ἰδίων καλῶν, τὸν τοῦ θεοῦ ἄνθρωπον λέγω, τὸ τῆς εὐσεβείας στόμα Βασίλειον, τὸν ἐν τῇ περιουσίᾳ τῶν πνευματικῶν θησαυρῶν καὶ εἰς κακοτέχνους ψυχὰς ἀνεξετάστως πολλάκις τὴν χάριν τῆς σοφίας ἐκχέοντα, καὶ τὸν ἀγνώμονα πρὸς τοὺς ἀγαθόν τι ποιεῖν αὐτὸν ἐσπου 1.1.4 δακότας Εὐνόμιον. οὗτος γὰρ τῷ ὑπερβάλλοντι τῆς κατὰ ψυχὴν ἀρρωστίας, ἣν περὶ τὴν πίστιν ἠσθένησεν, ἐλεεινὸς μὲν ἅπασιν ἔδοξε τοῖς τῆς ἐκκλησίας μετέχουσι (τίς γὰρ οὕτως ἀσυμπαθής, ὡς μὴ οἰκτεῖραι τὸν ἀπολλύμενον;) ἐκεῖνον δὲ μόνον πρὸς τὴν ἐγχείρησιν τῆς θεραπείας ἐκίνησε τὸν μόνον ἐν τῷ περιττεύοντι τῆς φιλανθρωπίας καὶ τοῖς ἀμη χάνοις ἐπιτολμῶντα πρὸς ἴασιν, ὃς τῇ ἀπωλείᾳ τοῦ ἀνδρὸς περιαλγήσας διὰ τὴν φυσικὴν αὐτοῦ πρὸς τοὺς ταλαιπωροῦντας συμπάθειαν οἷόν τι πονηρῶν δηλητηρίων ἀλεξιφάρμακον τὸν Ἀνατρεπτικὸν τῆς αἱρέσεως λόγον ἐπόνησε, σκοπὸν ἔχων ἀνα σῶσαι πάλιν διὰ τούτων καὶ ἀποκαταστῆσαι τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ τὸν ἄνθρωπον. 1.1.5 Ὁ δὲ καθάπερ ὑπὸ φρενίτιδος παραπληγεὶς τὴν διά νοιαν ἀγριαίνει τῷ θεραπεύοντι καὶ πολεμεῖ καὶ μάχεται καὶ ἐχθρὸν νομίζει τὸν ἐκ τοῦ βαράθρου τῆς ἀσεβείας ἀναλα βεῖν βιαζόμενον. καὶ ταῦτα οὐχ ἁπλῶς οὑτωσὶ κατὰ τὸ συμβὰν ἐπὶ τῶν προστυχόντων παραληρεῖ, ἀλλ' ἔγγραφον στήλην τῆς μελαγχολίας ταύτης καθ' ἑαυτοῦ ἀνεστήσατο. 1.1.6 καὶ ἐν μακρῷ τῷ χρόνῳ σχολῆς ἐπιτυχὼν ὁπόσης ἐβούλετο, ὑπὲρ τὰ μεγάλα καὶ πολύσαρκα τῶν θηρίων ὤδινε λόγον ἐν παντὶ τῷ διὰ μέσου χρόνῳ καὶ βαρὺς ἦν ταῖς ἀπειλαῖς ἐν ἀπορρήτοις ἔτι διαπλάσσων τὸ κύημα, ὀψὲ δέ ποτε καὶ μόγις εἰς φῶς προήγαγεν ἀμβλωθρίδιόν τι καὶ ἀτελεσφόρητον γέν 1.1.7 νημα. ὃ πάντες μὲν οἱ τῆς αὐτῆς συμμετασχόντες δια φθορᾶς τιθηνοῦνται καὶ θάλπουσιν, ἡμεῖς δὲ διὰ τὸν ἐκ τῆς προφητείας μακαρισμόν (Μακάριος γάρ, φησίν, ὃς κρατήσει καὶ ἐδαφιεῖ τὰ νήπιά σου πρὸς τὴν πέτραν) ἐπειδὴ καὶ εἰς ἡμετέρας ἀφίκετο χεῖρας, κρατῆσαι τὸ νήπιον τοῦτο λόγιον καὶ ἐδαφίσαι πρὸς τὴν πέτραν ὡς ἕν τι τῶν Βαβυλωνίων τέκνων προεθυμήθημεν· ἡ πέτρα δὲ ἦν ὁ Χριστός, τουτέστι τῆς ἀληθείας ὁ λόγος. μόνον ἔλθοι καὶ ἐφ' ἡμᾶς ἡ τὸ ἀσθενὲς ἐνισχύουσα δύναμις διὰ τῶν εὐχῶν τοῦ ἐν ἀσθενείᾳ 1.1.8 τοῦ σώματος τὴν δύναμιν ἑαυτοῦ τελειώσαντος. εἰ μὲν οὖν ἔτι καὶ νῦν ἡ θεοειδὴς ἐκείνη καὶ ἁγία ψυχὴ διὰ σαρκὸς ἐφεώρα τὸν ἀνθρώπινον βίον, καὶ τὸ ὑψηλὸν στόμα κατὰ τὴν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἀποκληρωθεῖσαν χάριν αὐτῷ τὴν ἄμαχον ἐκείνην ἠφίει φωνήν, τίς ἂν εἰς τοσοῦτον πεποιθήσεως ἦλθεν, ὥστε τι περὶ τῆς ὑποθέσεως ταύτης τολμῆσαι καὶ φθέγξασθαι, πάντα λόγον καὶ πᾶσαν ἠχὴν τῆς θείας ἐκείνης σάλπιγγος 1.1.9 ὑπερηχούσης; ἐπεὶ δὲ ὁ μὲν πρὸς θεὸν ὅλος ἀνέπτατο, πρότερον μὲν ἐν ὀλίγῳ τινὶ καὶ σκιοειδεῖ τῷ λειψάνῳ τοῦ σώματος τῆς γῆς ἐφαπτόμενος, τῷ δὲ πλείονι συμμετεωρο πορῶν τῷ θεῷ, νυνὶ δὲ καὶ τὴν σκιὰν ἐκείνην τοῦ σώματος προσαφεὶς καὶ καταλιπὼν τῷδε τῷ βίῳ, οἱ δὲ κηφῆνες περι βομβοῦσι τὰ κηρία τοῦ λόγου καὶ τὸ μέλι διαλυμαίνονται, μηδεὶς ἐγκαλείτω τόλμαν ἐμοὶ ὑπὲρ τοῦ σιγῶντος στόματος 1.1.10 διαναστάντι πρὸς ἄμυναν. οὐδὲ γὰρ ὑπὲρ τοὺς ἄλλους ἰσχύν τινα λόγων ἐμαυτῷ συνεγνωκὼς κατεδεξάμην τὸν πόνον· ἀλλ' ἀκριβῶς εἰδὼς εἴπερ τις ἕτερος, ὅτι χιλιάδες εὐθηνούντων κατὰ τὸ χάρισμα τῆς σοφίας ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ τοῦ κυρίου πληθύνουσιν, ὅμως ἐπειδὴ πάντων μάλιστα προσήκειν ἐμοί φημι τοῦ μεταστάντος τὸν κλῆρον διά τε τοὺς γεγραμμένους καὶ τοὺς τῆς φύσεως νόμους, τούτου χάριν αὐτὸς πρὸ τῶν ἄλλων οἰκειοῦμαι τὴν κληρονομίαν τοῦ λόγου, τῶν μὲν εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ θεοῦ συντελούντων τοῖς ἐσχάτοις συναριθ μούμενος, τοῦ δὲ ἀπερρωγότος τῆς ἐκκλησίας