Chapter LXI.—The Details of Our Bodily Sex, and of the Functions of Our Various Members. Apology for the Necessity Which Heresy Imposes of Hunting Up All Its Unblushing Cavils.

Now you have received your mouth, O man, for the purpose of devouring your food and imbibing your drink: why not, however, for the higher purpose of uttering speech, so as to distinguish yourself from all other animals? Why not rather for preaching the gospel of God, that so you may become even His priest and advocate before men?  Adam indeed gave their several names to the animals, before he plucked the fruit of the tree; before he ate, he prophesied. Then, again, you received your teeth for the consumption of your meal: why not rather for wreathing your mouth with suitable defence on every opening thereof, small or wide? Why not, too, for moderating the impulses of your tongue, and guarding your articulate speech from failure and violence? Let me tell you, (if you do not know), that there are toothless persons in the world. Look at them, and ask whether even a cage of teeth be not an honour to the mouth.  There are apertures in the lower regions of man and woman, by means of which they gratify no doubt their animal passions; but why are they not rather regarded as outlets for the cleanly discharge of natural fluids? Women, moreover, have within them receptacles where human seed may collect; but are they not designed for the secretion of those sanguineous issues, which their tardier and weaker sex is inadequate to disperse? For even details like these require to be mentioned, seeing that heretics single out what parts of our bodies may suit them, handle them without delicacy, and, as their whim suggests, pour torrents of scorn and contempt upon the natural functions of our members, for the purpose of upsetting the resurrection, and making us blush over their cavils; not reflecting that before the functions cease, the very causes of them will have passed away. There will be no more meat, because no more hunger; no more drink, because no more thirst; no more concubinage, because no more child-bearing; no more eating and drinking, because no more labour and toil. Death, too, will cease; so there will be no more need of the nutriment of food for the defence of life, nor will mothers’ limbs any longer have to be laden for the replenishment of our race. But even in the present life there may be cessations of their office for our stomachs and our generative organs. For forty days Moses465    Ex. xxiv. 8. and Elias466    1 Kings xix. 8. fasted, and lived upon God alone. For even so early was the principle consecrated:  “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”467    Deut. viii. 3; Matt. iv. 4. See here faint outlines of our future strength! We even, as we may be able, excuse our mouths from food, and withdraw our sexes from union. How many voluntary eunuchs are there! How many virgins espoused to Christ! How many, both of men and women, whom nature has made sterile, with a structure which cannot procreate! Now, if even here on earth both the functions and the pleasures of our members may be suspended, with an intermission which, like the dispensation itself, can only be a temporary one, and yet man’s safety is nevertheless unimpaired, how much more, when his salvation is secure, and especially in an eternal dispensation, shall we not cease to desire those things, for which, even here below, we are not unaccustomed to check our longings!

CAPUT LXI.

Sed accepisti, homo, os ad vorandum atque potandum: cur non potius ad eloquendum, ut a caeteris animalibus distes? cur non potius ad praedicandum Deum, ut etiam hominibus antistes? Denique, Adam ante nomina animalibus enuntiavit, quam de arbore decerpsit; ante etiam prophetavit, quam voravit. Sed accepisti dentes ad macellum corrodendum 0883C : cur non potius ad omnem hiatum et rictum tuum coronandum? cur non potius ad pulsus linguae temperandos , ad vocis articulos offensione signandos? Denique et edentulos audi et vide, ut honori 0884A oris, et organum dentium quaeras. Forata sunt inferna in viro et in foemina, nimirum qua libidines fluitent: cur non magis qua potuum defruta colentur ? Est adhuc foeminis intus, quo semina congerantur: an quo sanguinis onera secedant, quem pigrior sexus discutere non sufficit? Dicenda enim et haec, quatenus, quae volunt et quorum volunt, et qualiter volunt , officia membrorum ludibriose, de industria suffundendae resurrectionis, oblatrant; non recogitantes, ipsas prius caussas necessitatis tunc vacaturas, cibi famem, et potus sitim, et concubitus genituram, et operationis victum. Sublata enim morte, neque victus fulcimenta ad praesidia vitae, neque generis supparatura gravis erit membris. Caeterum, et hodie vacare intestinis et pudendis licebit. Quadraginta 0884B diebus Moses et Helias jejunio functi, solo Deo alebantur. Jam tunc enim dedicabatur, Non in pane vivet homo, sed in Dei verbo. Ecce virtutis futurae liniamenta. Nos quoque, ut possumus, os cibo excusamus; etiam sexum a congressione subducimus. Quot spadones voluntarii? quot virgines Christo maritatae? quot steriles utriusquae naturae, infructuosis genitalibus structi? Nam si et hic jam vacare est et officia et emolumenta membrorum temporali vacatione, ut in temporali dispositione, nec homo tamen minus salvus est; proinde homine salvo, et quidem magis tunc, ut in aeterna dispositione, magis non desiderabimus, quae jam hic non desiderare consuevimus.