5. But even if the avoidance of such an omen[113] were not sufficient, it would at least have been seemly to abstain from injuring the ornaments of the Senate House. Allow us, we beseech you, as old men to leave to posterity what we received as boys. The love of custom is great. Justly did the act of [pg 341] the divine Constantius last for a short time. All precedents ought to be avoided by you, which you know were soon abolished.[114]
6. Where shall we swear to obey your laws and commands? By what religious sanctions shall the false mind be terrified, so as not to lie in bearing witness? All things are, indeed, filled with God, and no place is safe for the perjured, but to be bound in the very presence of religious forms has great power in producing a fear of sinning. That altar preserves the concord of all; that altar appeals to the good faith of each; and nothing gives more authority to our decrees than that our order issues every decree as if we were under the sanction of an oath. So that a place will be opened to perjury, and my illustrious princes, who are defended by a public oath, will deem this to be such.
7. But the divine Constantius is said to have done the same. Let us rather imitate the other actions of that prince [Valentinian I], who would have undertaken nothing of the kind, if any one else had committed such an error before him. For the fall of the earlier sets his successor right, and amendment results from the censure of a previous example. It was pardonable for your clemency's ancestor in so novel a matter not to guard against blame. Can the same excuse avail us, if we imitate what we know to have been disapproved?
8. Will your majesties listen to other actions of this same prince, which you may more worthily imitate? He diminished none of the privileges of the sacred virgins, he filled the priestly offices with nobles. He did not refuse the cost of the Roman ceremonies, and following the rejoicing Senate through all the streets of the Eternal City, he beheld the shrines with unmoved countenance, he read the names of the gods inscribed on the pediments, he inquired about the origin of the temples, and expressed admiration for their founders. Although he himself followed another religion, he maintained these for the Empire, for every one has his own customs, [pg 342] every one his own rites. The divine Mind has distributed different guardians and different cults to different cities. As souls are separately given to infants as they are born, so to a people is given the genius of its destiny. Here comes in the proof from advantage, which most of all vouches to man for the gods. For, since our reason is wholly clouded, whence does the knowledge of the gods more rightly come to us, than from the memory and records of successful affairs? Now if a long period gives authority to religious customs, faith ought to be kept with so many centuries, and our ancestors ought to be followed by us as they happily followed theirs.
9. Let us now suppose that we are present at Rome and that she addresses you in these words: “Excellent princes, fathers of your country, respect my years to which pious rites have brought me. Let me use the ancestral ceremonies, for I do not repent of them. Let me live after my own fashion, for I am free. This worship subdued the world to my laws, these sacred rites repelled Hannibal from the walls, and the Senones from the capitol. Have I been reserved for this, that when aged I should be blamed? I will consider what it is thought should be set in order, but tardy and discreditable is the reformation of old age.”
10. We ask, therefore, peace for the gods of our fathers and of our country. It is just that what all worship be considered one. We look on the same stars, the sky is common, the same world surrounds us. What difference does it make by what paths each seeks the truth? We cannot attain to so great a secret by one road; but this discussion is rather for persons at ease; we offer now prayers, not conflict.[115]
(e) Ambrose, Epistula 18. (MSL, 16:1013.)
Reply of Ambrose to the Memorial of Symmachus.
Immediately after the receipt of the Memorial of Symmachus by Valentinian II, a copy was sent to Ambrose, who wrote a reply or letter of advice to Valentinian, which might be regarded as a counter-petition. [pg 343] In it he enters upon the arguments of Symmachus. Although he could not present the same pathetic figure of an old man pleading for the religion of his ancestors, his arguments are not unjust, and dispose satisfactorily of the leading points made by Symmachus. The line of reasoning represents the best Christian opinion of the times on the matter of the relation of the State to heathenism.
3. The illustrious prefect of the city has in a memorial set forth three propositions which he considers of force—that Rome, he says, asks for her rites again, that pay be given to her priests and vestal virgins, and that a general famine followed upon the refusal of the priests' stipends.…