Chapter XXXIV.—These Vagaries Stimulated Some Profane Corruptions of Christianity. The Profanity of Simon Magus Condemned.

No tenet, indeed, under cover of any heresy has as yet burst upon us, embodying any such extravagant fiction as that the souls of human beings pass into the bodies of wild beasts; but yet we have deemed it necessary to attack and refute this conceit, as a consistent sequel to the preceding opinions, in order that Homer in the peacock might be got rid of as effectually as Pythagoras in Euphorbus; and in order that, by the demolition of the metempsychosis and metensomatosis by the same blow, the ground might be cut away which has furnished no inconsiderable support to our heretics. There is the (infamous) Simon of Samaria in the Acts of the Apostles, who chaffered for the Holy Ghost: after his condemnation by Him, and a vain remorse that he and his money must perish together,238    Acts viii. 18–21. [Vol. I. pp. 171, 182, 193, 347.] he applied his energies to the destruction of the truth, as if to console himself with revenge. Besides the support with which his own magic arts furnished him, he had recourse to imposture, and purchased a Tyrian woman of the name of Helen out of a brothel, with the same money which he had offered for the Holy Spirit,—a traffic worthy of the wretched man. He actually feigned himself to be the Supreme Father, and further pretended that the woman was his own primary conception, wherewith he had purposed the creation of the angels and the archangels; that after she was possessed of this purpose she sprang forth from the Father and descended to the lower spaces, and there anticipating the Father’s design had produced the angelic powers, which knew nothing of the Father, the Creator of this world; that she was detained a prisoner by these from a (rebellious) motive very like her own, lest after her departure from them they should appear to be the offspring of another being; and that, after being on this account exposed to every insult, to prevent her leaving them anywhere after her dishonour, she was degraded even to the form of man, to be confined, as it were, in the bonds of the flesh. Having during many ages wallowed about in one female shape and another, she became the notorious Helen who was so ruinous to Priam, and afterwards to the eyes of Stesichorus, whom, she blinded in revenge for his lampoons, and then restored to sight to reward him for his eulogies. After wandering about in this way from body to body, she, in her final disgrace, turned out a viler Helen still as a professional prostitute. This wench, therefore, was the lost sheep, upon whom the Supreme Father, even Simon, descended, who, after he had recovered her and brought her back—whether on his shoulders or loins I cannot tell—cast an eye on the salvation of man, in order to gratify his spleen by liberating them from the angelic powers. Moreover, to deceive these he also himself assumed a visible shape; and feigning the appearance of a man amongst men, he acted the part of the Son in Judea, and of the Father in Samaria. O hapless Helen, what a hard fate is yours between the poets and the heretics, who have blackened your fame sometimes with adultery, sometimes with prostitution!  Only her rescue from Troy is a more glorious affair than her extrication from the brothel. There were a thousand ships to remove her from Troy; a thousand pence were probably more than enough to withdraw her from the stews. Fie on you, Simon, to be so tardy in seeking her out, and so inconstant in ransoming her! How different from Menelaus! As soon as he has lost her, he goes in pursuit of her; she is no sooner ravished than he begins his search; after a ten years’ conflict he boldly rescues her:  there is no lurking, no deceiving, no cavilling. I am really afraid that he was a much better “Father,” who laboured so much more vigilantly, bravely, and perseveringly, about the recovery of his Helen.

CAPUT XXXIV.

Nulla quidem in hodiernum dementiae hujusmodi sententia erupit sub nomine haeretico, quae humanas animas refingat in bestias. Sed necessarie 0708B hanc quoque speciem intulimus et exclusimus, ut superioribus cohaerentem, quo perinde in pavo retunderetur Homerus, sicut in Pythagora Euphorbus; atque ita hac etiam metempsychosi sive metensomatosi repercussa, illa rursus caederetur quae aliquid haereticis subministravit. Nam et Simon samarites in Actis Apostolorum redemptor Spiritus Sancti, posteaquam damnatus ab ipso cum pecunia sua in interitum, frustra flevit conversus ad veritatis expugnationem, quasi pro solatio ultionis, fultus etiam artis suae viribus, ad praestigias virtutis alicujus Helenam quamdam tyriam de loco libidinis publicae eadem pecunia redemit, dignam sibi mercedem pro Spiritu Sancto . Et se quidem finxit summum patrem, illam vero injectionem suam primam , qua injecerat angelos et archangelos condere: hujus eam propositi 0709A compotem exilisse de patre, et in inferiora desultasse; atque illic praevento patris proposito, angelicas potestates genuisse, ignaras patris, artificis mundi hujus; ab his vero per invidiam retentam , ne digressa ea alterius genimina viderentur; et idcirco omni contumeliae addictam, ut nusquam discedere depretiatam liberet, humanae quoque formae succidisse, velut vinculis carnis coercendam; ita multis aevis per alios atque alios habitus foemininos volutatam, etiam illam Helenam fuisse, exitiosissimam Priamo, et Stesichori postea oculis , quem et excaecasset ob convicium carminis, dehinc reluminasset ob satisfactionem laudis; proinde migrantem eam de corporibus in corpora, postrema dedecoratione , sub titulo prostitisse Helenam viliorem: 0709B hanc igitur esse ovem perditam, ad quam descenderit pater summus, Simon scilicet, et primum recuperata ea et revecta, nescio humeris an foeminibus , exinde ad hominum respexerit salutem, quasi per vindictam liberandorum ex illis angelicis potestatibus; quibus fallendis, et ipse configuratus aeque, et hominibus hominem ementitus, in Judaea quidem filium, in Samaria vero patrem gesserit. O Helenam inter poetas et haereticos laborantem! tunc adulterio, nunc stupro infamem! nisi quod de Troja gloriosius eruitur, quam de lupanari: mille navibus de Troja, nec mille denariis forsitan de lupanari. Erubesce, Simon, tardior in requirendo, inconstantior in retrahendo. At Menelaus statim insequitur amissam, statim repetit ereptam, decenni 0709C praelio extorquet, non latens, non fallens, non cavillabundus. Vereor ne ille magis pater fuerit, qui circa Helenae recuperationem et vigilantius et audentius et diutius laboraverit.