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--- crates_of_thebes:jerome_against_jovinianus_book_2 [2012/05/26 11:41] – created frank
+++ crates_of_thebes:jerome_against_jovinianus_book_2 [2014/01/14 23:19] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1
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-====== Crates of Thebes ======
+====== Crates of Thebes | Jerome, Against Jovinianus Book 2 ======
-===== Jerome, Against Jovinianus Book 2 =====
 <blockquote>That there is no difference (morally) between one who fasts and one who takes food with thanksgiving. Jovinian has quoted many texts of Scripture to show that God has made animals for men's food. But there are many other uses of animals besides food. And there are many warnings like 1 Cor. vi. 13, as to the danger arising from food. There are among the heathen many instances of abstinence. They recognize the evil of sensual allurements, and often, like **Crates the Theban**, have cast away what would tempt them; the senses, they teach, should be subject to reason; and, that except for athletes (Christians do not want to be like Milo of Crotona) bread and water suffice. Horace, Xenophon and other eminent Greeks, the Essenes and the Brahmans, as well as philosophers like Diogenes, testify to the value of abstinence. The Old Testament stories of Esau's pottage, of the lusting of Israel for the flesh-pots of Egypt, and those in the New Testament of Anna, Cornelius, etc., commend abstinence. If some heretics inculcate fasting in such a way as to despise the gifts of God, and weak Christians are not to be judged for their use of flesh, those who seek the higher life will find a help in abstinence.
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 [[http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/30092.htm|Source]]</blockquote>
-<blockquote>At the call of reasoning such as this, many philosophers have forsaken the crowded cities, and their pleasure gardens in the suburbs with well-watered grounds, shady trees, twittering birds, crystal fountains, murmuring brooks, and many charms for eye and ear, lest through luxury and abundance of riches, the firmness of the mind should be enfeebled, and its purity debauched. For there is no good in frequently seeing objects which may one day lead to your captivity, or in making trial of things which you would find it hard to do without. Even the Pythagoreans shunned company of this kind and were wont to dwell in solitary places in the desert. The Platonists also and Stoics lived in the groves and porticos of temples, that, admonished by the sanctity of their restricted abode, they might think of nothing but virtue. Plato, moreover, himself, when Diogenes trampled on his couches with muddy feet (he being a rich man), chose a house called Academia at some distance from the city, in a spot not only lonely but unhealthy, so that he might have leisure for philosophy. His object was that by constant anxiety about sickness the assaults of lust might be defeated, and that his disciples might experience no pleasure but that afforded by the things they learned. We have read of some who took out their own eyes lest through sight they might lose the contemplation of philosophy. Hence it was that **Crates the famous Theban**, after throwing into the sea a considerable weight of gold, exclaimed, "Go to the bottom, you evil lusts: I will drown you that you may not drown me." But if anyone thinks to enjoy keenly meat and drink in excess, and at the same time to devote himself to philosophy, that is to say, to live in luxury and yet not to be hampered by the vices attendant on luxury, he deceives himself. For if it be the case that even when far distant from them we are frequently caught in the snares of nature, and are compelled to desire those things of which we have a scant supply: what folly it is to think we are free when we are surrounded by the nets of pleasure! We think of what we see, hear, smell, taste, handle, and are led to desire the thing which affords us pleasure. That the mind sees and hears, and that we can neither hear nor see anything unless our senses are fixed upon the objects of sight and hearing, is an old saw. It is difficult, or rather impossible, when we are swimming in luxury and pleasure not to think of what we are doing: and it is an idle pretence which some men put forward that they can take their fill of pleasure with their faith and purity and mental uprightness unimpaired. It is a violation of nature to revel in pleasure, and the Apostle gives a caution against this very thing when he says, 1 Timothy 5:6 "She that gives herself to pleasure is dead while she lives."
+<blockquote>Hence it was that **Crates the famous Theban**, after throwing into the sea a considerable weight of gold, exclaimed, "Go to the bottom, you evil lusts: I will drown you that you may not drown me." But if anyone thinks to enjoy keenly meat and drink in excess, and at the same time to devote himself to philosophy, that is to say, to live in luxury and yet not to be hampered by the vices attendant on luxury, he deceives himself. For if it be the case that even when far distant from them we are frequently caught in the snares of nature, and are compelled to desire those things of which we have a scant supply: what folly it is to think we are free when we are surrounded by the nets of pleasure! We think of what we see, hear, smell, taste, handle, and are led to desire the thing which affords us pleasure. That the mind sees and hears, and that we can neither hear nor see anything unless our senses are fixed upon the objects of sight and hearing, is an old saw. It is difficult, or rather impossible, when we are swimming in luxury and pleasure not to think of what we are doing: and it is an idle pretence which some men put forward that they can take their fill of pleasure with their faith and purity and mental uprightness unimpaired. It is a violation of nature to revel in pleasure, and the Apostle gives a caution against this very thing when he says, 1 Timothy 5:6 "She that gives herself to pleasure is dead while she lives."
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 [[http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/30092.htm|Source]]</blockquote>
+Translated by W.H. Fremantle, G. Lewis and W.G. Martley. From Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 6. Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1893.) \\