4. If further the offence of the inhabitants be so great that God stirs up and brings war upon them, then their land is truly iron, bristling with crops of spears, and stripped ofits own fruit, fruitful as regards punishment, barren as regards nourishment. But where is abundance? Exod. xvi. 4. Behold I will rain bread for you, saith the Lord.
Farewell; love me, for I also love you.
LETTER LXIX.
IN this Letter S. Ambrose answers a question propounded to him as to the ground of the severity of the Mosaic Law against those who disguised their sex.
AMBROSE TO IRENÆUS, GREETING.
1. YOU have referred to me, as to a father, the inquiry which has been made of you, why the Law was so severe in pronouncing those unclean who used the garments of the other sex, whether they were men or women, for it is written, Deut. xxii. 5. The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman’s garment; for all that do so are an abomination unto the Lord.
2. Now, if you will consider it well, that which nature herself abhors must be incongruous. For why do you not wish to be thought a man, seeing that you are born such? why do you assume an appearance which is foreign to you? why do you play the woman, or you, O woman, the man? Nature clothes each sex in their proper raiment. Moreover in men and women, habits, complexion, gestures, gait, strength and voice are all different.
3. So also in the rest of the animal creation; the form, the strength, the roar of the lion and lioness, of the bull and heifer are different. Deer also differ as much in form as they do in sex, so that you may distinguish the stag from the hind even at a distance. But in the case of birds the similitude between them and men, as regards covering, is still closer; for in them Nature distinguishes their sex by their very plumage. The peacock is beautiful, but the feathers of its consort are not variegated with equal beauty. Pheasants also have different colours to mark thedifference of the sexes. And so with poultry. How sonorous is the cock’s voice, night by night performing his natural office of calling us from sleep by crowing. They do not change their form; why then do we desire to change ours?
4. A Greek custom has indeed prevailed for women to wear men’s tunics as being shorter. Be it allowed however that they should imitate the nature of the more worthy sex; but why should men choose to assume the appearance of the inferior? A falsehood is base even in word, much more in dress. So in the heathen temples, where there is a false faith, there also is a false nature. It is there considered holy for men to assume women’s garments, and female gestures. And therefore the Law says that every man who puts on a woman’s garment is an abomination unto the Lord.