Chapter VII.—Of Elaborate Dressing of the Hair in Other Ways, and Its Bearing Upon Salvation.

What service, again, does all the labour spent in arranging the hair render to salvation?  Why is no rest allowed to your hair, which must now be bound, now loosed, now cultivated, now thinned out?  Some are anxious to force their hair into curls, some to let it hang loose and flying; not with good simplicity:  beside which, you affix I know not what enormities of subtle and textile perukes; now, after the manner of a helmet of undressed hide, as it were a sheath for the head and a covering for the crown; now, a mass (drawn) backward toward the neck.  The wonder is, that there is no (open) contending against the Lord’s prescripts!  It has been pronounced that no one can add to his own stature.115    Mensuram.  See Matt. vi. 27.  You, however, do add to your weight some kind of rolls, or shield-bosses, to be piled upon your necks!  If you feel no shame at the enormity, feel some at the pollution; for fear you may be fitting on a holy and Christian head the slough116    Exuvias.of some one else’s117    “Alieni:”  perhaps here ="alien,” i.e., “heathen,” as in other places. head, unclean perchance, guilty perchance and destined to hell.118    Gehennæ.  Nay, rather banish quite away from your “free”119    Comp. Gal. iv. 31; v. 13. head all this slavery of ornamentation.  In vain do you labour to seem adorned:  in vain do you call in the aid of all the most skilful manufacturers of false hair.  God bids you “be veiled.”120    See 1 Cor. xi. 2–16; and comp. de Or., c. xxii., and the treatise de Virg. Vel.  I believe (He does so) for fear the heads of some should be seen!  And oh that in “that day”121    Comp. ad Ux., b. ii. c. iii. of Christian exultation, I, most miserable (as I am), may elevate my head, even though below (the level of) your heels!  I shall (then) see whether you will rise with (your) ceruse and rouge and saffron, and in all that parade of headgear:122    Ambitu (habitu is a conjectural emendation noticed by Oehler) capitis.  whether it will be women thus tricked out whom the angels carry up to meet Christ in the air!123    See 1 Thess. iv. 13–17.  If these (decorations) are now good, and of God, they will then also present themselves to the rising bodies, and will recognise their several places.  But nothing can rise except flesh and spirit sole and pure.124    Comp. 1 Cor. xv. 50 with 1 Thess. v. 23.  Whatever, therefore, does not rise in (the form of)125    Or, “within the limits of the flesh and the spirit.” spirit and flesh is condemned, because it is not of God.  From things which are condemned abstain, even at the present day.  At the present day let God see you such as He will see you then.

CAPUT VII.

Quid enim tanta ornandi capitis operositas ad salutem subministrat? Quid crinibus vestris quiescere non licet, modo substrictis, modo relaxatis, modo suscitatis, modo elisis? Aliae gestiunt in cincinnis coërcere, aliae, ut vagi et volucres elabantur, non bona simplicitate. Affigitis praeterea nescio quas enormitates sutilium atque textilium capillamentorum, nunc in galeri modum quasi vaginam capiti et operculum verticis, nunc in cervicem retro suggestum. Mirum, quod non contra Domini praecepta 1323B contenditur. Ad mensuram neminem sibi adjicere posse pronuntiatum est. Vos plane adjicitis ad pondus collyrias quasdam vel scutorum umbilicos cervicibus adstruendo. Si non pudet enormitatis, pudeat 1324A inquinamenti, ne exuvias alieni capitis, forsitan immundi, forsitan nocentis et gehennae destinati, sancto et christiano capiti supparetis. Imo omnem hanc ornatus servitutem a libero capite propellite. Frustra laboratis ornatae videri, frustra peritissimos quosque structores capillaturae adhibetis . Deus vos velari jubet, credo, ne quarumdam capita videantur. Atque [utinam miserrimus ego] in illo die christianae exsultationis [vel inter calcanea vestra caput elevem !] videbo, an cum cerussa et purpurisso et croco et in illo ambitu capitis resurgatis, an taliter expictas angeli in nebula sublevent obviam Christo. Si nunc bona et Dei sunt, tunc quoque occurrent resurgentibus corporibus et sua loca agnoscent. Sed non potest resurgere, nisi caro et spiritus 1324B solus ac purus; damnata sunt igitur, quae in carne et spiritu non resurgunt, quia Dei non sunt. Damnatis hodie abstinete. Hodie vos Deus tales videat, quales tunc videbit.