God? (1 Peter ii. 5). If we fill their censers, their minds, with strange fire, are we not handing them over to the anger of God? For to a Christian soul all is strange, and should be strange, that has any other source than the Holy Spirit; and of such a kind are the ravings of the heathen philosophers and poets, as the Apostle bears witness (Rom. i. 21, 22; Col. ii. 8, 9). Not without reason did Jerome call poetry the wine of devils; since it intoxicates the incautious and sends them to sleep, and, while they sleep, plies them with monstrous opinions, dangerous temptations, and the foulest desires. We should therefore be on our guard against these philtres of Satan.
15. If we do not obey the wise counsels of God, the Ephesians will stand in judgment against us, for they, as soon as the light of divine wisdom shone upon them, burnt all their curious books, since these were henceforth useless to them as Christians (Acts xix. 19). The modern Greek Church also, although there exist the most excellent philosophical and poetical works, written by the Greeks of old, who were reputed the wisest of men, has forbidden its followers to read them under pain of excommunication. The result of this is that, although with the invasion of barbarism they have fallen into great ignorance and superstition, God has hitherto preserved them from being carried away by anti-Christian error. In this matter, therefore, we ought to imitate them, that (greater stress being laid on the reading of Scripture) the heathen darkness, which still remains, may be removed, and that in the light of God we may see light (Psalm xxxvi. 9). “O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord” (Isaiah ii. 5).
16. Let us now see by what reasonings the mind of man rebels against these injunctions, and winds about like a snake, seeking to avoid the necessity of obeying the Faith and serving God. The arguments used are as follows:
17. (i) Great wisdom is to be found in the philosophers, the orators and the poets. I answer: Those are worthy of darkness who turn away their eyes from the light. Twilight is as mid-day to the owl, but animals, that are
