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nor for the birds his liver being torn, never diminishing, but always being replenished; whether these things are truth, or a myth, showing the truth in fictions; but we shall see by what and by what sort of things 35.716 he is then punished, and by things much more harsh than these, if indeed the punishments and retributions are in proportion to the sins committed.

39. This is for you a guest-gift in return for your foot, O most excellent and most wise one, that I may address you with your own words; these things from us who have been shut out from rhetoric, according to your great and admirable legislation. You see how we were not going to be silent forever, nor to be condemned to speechlessness by your decrees, but to break forth with a free voice, and one that refutes your irrationality? Neither is there any device to hold back the cataracts of the Nile, which fall from Ethiopia for the sake of Egypt, nor the ray of the sun, even if for a little while it is hidden by a cloud; nor to fetter the tongue of Christians, which denounces your ways. These things to you from Basil and Gregory, the opponents and rivals of your undertaking, as you yourself supposed, and persuaded others, making us venerable by the things you threatened, and sharpening us more toward piety, whom, knowing to be conspicuous and well-known still from Greece, for our life, and speech, and harmony with one another, you honored with the Cyclopean honor, and kept us for last for the persecution, and perhaps you intended a great and magnificent victory-gift for your demons, if we should receive you on your return from Persia, or you hoped even to snatch us away with you to your abyss, thinking wrongly.

40. For we are not more ignoble than those young men, who were refreshed in the fire and conquered wild beasts by faith, and who readily shared danger with a noble mother, and a nobler priest, and who showed that faith alone of all things is unconquerable; or than those young men in your time, one of whom, having insulted the mother of your gods, and scattered an altar, was brought forward as one condemned, 35.717 but entered as a victor, and having mocked much at your purple robe and your arguments, as being mere calculations and ridiculous, he went out with greater boldness, as if someone returning from a dinner and a splendid feast; while the other, having his whole body deeply torn by gazelle-hides, and still breathing faintly from his wounds, was so far from yielding to the tortures, or from considering his present state as something terrible, that, when he saw some part of his body untouched by the blows, he even accused the torturers, as insolent men, and for not having honored his whole body, but having left some part untorn and unhallowed; at the same time pointing out his shin, as being the only part that had escaped the claws, and urging them not to spare even this.

41. This speech is for you better than the falsehoods and triflings of Porphyry, in which you exult as if they were divine utterances, or than your Misopogon, or Antiochene oration (for you give both titles to the speech), than which nothing is more dishonorable to Christians; which at that time the purple made great, and the flatterers who admired all your doings; but now it is a beard carried about and dragged around, and mocked along with its fellow-laborers, in which you, because of a superfluity of the body, and because you never happened to have spit from greed, puff yourself up, as if saying something wonderful; but that you persecuted Christians so bitterly, and consumed such a nation and one so holy, you willingly pass over. And yet, if one man spat, or let out a natural belch, what harm is there in this to the common good? But when such a great persecution was set in motion, and such a new confusion was introduced, how is it not entirely necessary for the affairs of the Romans to be in a bad state, as indeed they appear to have been? 35.720

42. This is a monument for you from us, loftier and more conspicuous than the pillars of Hercules; for those are fixed in one place, and are seen only by those who arrive there; but it is not possible for this one not to be known everywhere and to all

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οὐδὲ ὄρνισι τὸ ἧπαρ κειρόμε νος, οὔποτε λεῖπον, ἀεὶ δὲ πληρούμενον· εἴτε ἀλή θεια ταῦτά ἐστιν, εἴτε μῦθος, παραδεικνὺς τὴν ἀλή θειαν ἐν τοῖς πλάσμασιν· ἀλλ' ὀψόμεθα τίσι καὶ οἵοις 35.716 τηνικαῦτα κολαζόμενος, καὶ ὡς πολὺ τούτων χαλε πωτέροις, εἴπερ πρὸς μέτρον τῶν ἁμαρτανομένων αἱ τίσεις καὶ ἀντιδόσεις.

ΛΘʹ. Τοῦτό τοι ἀντὶ ποδὸς ξεινήϊον, ὦ λῷστε καὶ συνετώτατε, ἵνα σε προσείπω τοῖς σοῖς· ταῦτα οἱ τῶν λόγων ἀποκλεισθέντες ἡμεῖς, κατὰ τὴν μεγάλην καὶ θαυμαστήν σου νομοθεσίαν. Ὁρᾷς, ὡς οὐκ εἰς τέλος ἐμέλλομεν σιωπήσεσθαι, οὐδὲ ἀλογίαν κα τακριθήσεσθαι τοῖς σοῖς δόγμασιν, ἀλλὰ ῥήξειν φωνὴν ἐλευθέραν, καὶ τῆς σῆς ἐλεγκτικὴν ἀλο γίας; Οὔτε τοὺς Νειλῴους καταῤῥάκτας ἐπισχεῖν μηχανή τις, τοὺς ἀπ' Αἰθιοπίας ὑπὲρ Αἰγύπτου πίπτοντας, οὔτε ἡλιακὴν ἀκτῖνα, κἂν πρὸς ὀλίγον νέ φει καλύπτηται· οὔτε Χριστιανῶν γλῶσσαν πεδῆσαι, τὰ ὑμέτερα στηλιτεύουσαν. Ταῦτά σοι Βασίλειος καὶ Γρηγόριος, οἱ τῆς σῆς ἐγχειρήσεως ἀντίθετοι καὶ ἀν τίτεχνοι, ὡς αὐτός τε ᾤου, καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους ἔπειθες, ἀποσεμνύνων ἡμᾶς οἷς ἠπείλεις, καὶ θήγων πλέον πρὸς τὴν εὐσέβειαν, οὓς καὶ βίῳ, καὶ λόγῳ, καὶ τῇ πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὁμονοίᾳ περιφανεῖς, καὶ γνωρίμους ἔτ' ἀπὸ τῆς Ἑλλάδος εἰδὼς, τὴν Κυκλώπειον ἐτίμας τι μὴν, καὶ τελευταίους ἐταμιεύου τῷ διωγμῷ, καὶ δῶρον ἐπινίκιον ἴσως ἐπενόεις τοῖς δαίμοσι μέγα τι καὶ μεγαλοπρεπὲς, εἴ σε ἀπὸ τῆς Περσίδος ὑποδεξώμεθα ἐπανήκοντα, ἢ καὶ συναρπάσειν πρὸς τὸ σὸν βάραθρον ἤλπισας, κακῶς οἰόμενος.

Μʹ. Οὐ γὰρ ἀγεννέστεροι τῶν νεανίσκων ἐκείνων ἡμεῖς, τῶν ἐν πυρὶ δροσισθέντων καὶ θῆρας νικησάντων ἐκ πίστεως, καὶ μητρὶ γενναίᾳ, καὶ ἱερεῖ γενναιοτέρῳ προθύμως συγκινδυνευσάντων, καὶ δειξάντων, ὅτι μόνον τῶν ἁπάντων πίστις ἀνάλωτον· ἢ τούτων δὴ τῶν ἐπὶ σοῦ νεανίσκων, ὧν ὁ μὲν τὴν μητέρα τῶν σῶν θεῶν καθυβρίσας, καὶ βωμὸν διασπείρας, προσήχθη μὲν ὡς κατάκριτος, 35.717 εἰσῆλθε δὲ ὡς νικηφόρος, καὶ πολλά σου τῆς ἁλουργίδος καὶ τῶν λόγων καταγελάσας, ὡς ψηφολογικῶν καὶ γελοίων, μετὰ πλείονος ἐξῆλθε τῆς παῤῥησίας, ὡς εἴ τις ἀπὸ δείπνου ἐπαναστρέφων καὶ λαμπρᾶς ἑστιάσεως· ὁ δὲ πᾶν τὸ σῶμα δορκαλίσι καταξανθεὶς εἰς βάθος, καὶ μικρὰ πνέων ἔτι τοῖς τραύμασι, τοσοῦτον ἀπεῖχεν ἐνδιδόναι πρὸς τὰς βασάνους, ἢ δεινόν τι τῶν παρόντων νομίζειν, ὥστε, ἐπειδή τι τοῦ σώματος εἶδεν ἀνεπηρέαστον ταῖς πληγαῖς, καὶ προσῃτιᾶτο τοὺς βασανιστὰς, ὡς ὑβριστὰς, καὶ οὐ πᾶν τὸ σῶμα τιμήσαντας, ἀλλά τι παρέντας ἄξαντον καὶ ἀνίερον· παραδεικνὺς ἅμα τὴν κνήμην, ὡς μόνην διαφυγοῦσαν τοὺς ὄνυχας, καὶ μηδὲ ταύτης φείδεσθαι διακελευόμενος.

ΜΑʹ. Οὗτος ὁ λόγος σοι τῶν Πορφυρίου ψευσμάτων καὶ ληρημάτων, οἷς ὑμεῖς ὡς θείαις φωναῖς ἀγάλλεσθε, ἢ τοῦ σοῦ Μισοπώγωνος, εἴτ' οὖν Ἀντιοχικοῦ (ἀμφότερα γὰρ ἐπιγράφεις τῷ λόγῳ), οὗ τι Χριστιανοῖς ἀτιμότερον· ὃν τότε μὲν ἡ πορφυρὶς μέγαν ἐποίει, καὶ οἱ πάντα τὰ σὰ θαυμάζοντες κόλακες· νῦν δὲ πώγων ἐστὶ περιφερόμενος καὶ περισυρόμενος, καὶ τοῖς συμπεπονηκόσιν ὁμοῦ γελώμενος, ἐν ᾧ σὺ μὲν ἀπερίττῳ τοῦ σώματος, καὶ τῷ μηδεπώποτε τυχεῖν ἀπεπτήσας ἐξ ἀπληστίας, μέγα φυσᾷς, ὡς δή τι θαυμάσιον λέγων· ὅτι δὲ Χριστιανοὺς ἤλασας οὕτω πικρῶς, καὶ τοσοῦτον ἔθνος καὶ οὕτως ἱερὸν παρανάλωσας, ἑκὼν παρατρέχεις. Καίτοι γε ἑνὸς μὲν ἀνδρὸς ἀπεπτήσαντος, ἢ ἐρυγὰς φυσικὰς ἀφέντος, τί παρὰ τοῦτο τῷ κοινῷ βλάβος; τοσούτου δὲ διωγμοῦ κινηθέντος, καὶ τοσαύτης καινοτομηθείσης συγχύσεως, πῶς οὐκ ἀνάγκη πᾶσα τὰ Ῥωμαίων ἔχειν κακῶς, ὥσπερ οὖν καὶ ἐσχηκότα φαίνεται; 35.720

ΜΒʹ. Αὕτη σοι παρ' ἡμῶν στήλη, τῶν Ἡρακλείων στηλῶν ὑψηλοτέρα τε καὶ περιφανεστέρα· αἱ μὲν γὰρ ἐφ' ἑνὸς τόπου πεπήγασι, καὶ μόνοις εἰσὶ θεαταὶ τοῖς ἐκεῖσε ἀφικνουμένοις· τὴν δὲ οὐκ ἔστι μὴ πανταχοῦ καὶ πᾶσι γνωρίζεσθαι