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Translated by Ch. Browne and J. Swallow.
Gregory Theologian Bilingual Anthology, Resources Online and in Print
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48 Pages
Page 12
20. Such were our feelings for each other, when we had thus supported, as Pindar [4422] has it, our "well-built chamber with pillars of gold," as we advanced under the united influences of God's grace and our own affection. Oh! how can I mention these things without tears.
We were impelled by equal hopes, in a pursuit especially obnoxious to envy, that of letters. Yet envy we knew not, and emulation was of service to us. We struggled, not each to gain the first place for himself, but to yield it to the other; for we made each other's reputation to be our own. We seemed to have one soul, inhabiting two bodies. And if we must not believe those whose doctrine is "All things [4423] are in all;" yet in our case it was worthy of belief, so did we live in and with each other. The sole business of both of us was virtue, and living for the hopes to come, having retired from this world, before our actual departure hence. With a view to this, were directed all our life and actions, under the guidance of the commandment, as we sharpened upon each other our weapons of virtue; and if this is not a great thing for me to say, being a rule and standard to each other, for the distinction between what was right and what was not. Our associates were not the most dissolute, but the most sober of our comrades; not the most pugnacious, but the most peaceable, whose intimacy was most profitable: knowing that it is more easy to be tainted with vice, than to impart virtue; just as we can more readily be infected with a disease, than bestow health. Our most cherished studies were not the most pleasant, but the most excellent; this being one means of forming young minds in a virtuous or vicious mould.
21. Two ways were known to us, the first of greater value, the second of smaller consequence: the one leading to our sacred buildings and the teachers there, the other to secular instructors. All others we left to those who would pursue them—to feasts, theatres, meetings, banquets. For nothing is in my opinion of value, save that which leads to virtue and to the improvement of its devotees. Different men have different names, derived from their fathers, their families, their pursuits, their exploits: we had but one great business and name—to be and to be called Christians of which we thought more than Gyges [4424] of the turning of his ring, if this is not a legend, on which depended his Lydian sovereignty: or than Midas [4425] did of the gold through which he perished, in answer to his prayer that all he had might turn to gold—another Phrygian legend. For why should I speak of the arrow of the Hyperborean Abaris, [4426] or of the Argive Pegasus, [4427] to whom flight through the air was not of such consequence as was to us our rising to God, through the help of, and with each other? Hurtful as Athens was to others in spiritual things, and this is of no slight consequence to the pious, for the city is richer in those evil riches—idols—than the rest of Greece, and it is hard to avoid being carried along with their devotees and adherents, yet we, our minds being closed up and fortified against this, suffered no injury. On the contrary, strange as it may seem, we were thus the more confirmed in the faith, from our perception of their trickery and unreality, which led us to despise these divinities in the very home of their worship. And if there is, or is believed to be, a river [4428] flowing with fresh water through the sea, or an animal [4429] which can dance in fire, the consumer of all things, such were we among all our comrades.
[4422] Olymp. Od. vi. 1.
[4423] All things, etc., i.e. Empedocles and Anaxagoras.
[4424] Gyges is said to have had a ring by means of which he could make himself invisible, and by thus using it was able to seize on the Kingdom of Lydia.
[4425] Midas, said to have had the power granted of turning everything he touched to gold. Accordingly, as this power took effect on his food, he died of hunger.
[4426] Abaris, a Hyperborean priest of Apollo, who was said to have given him an arrow, on which he rode through the air.
[4427] Pegasus, called Argive, because caught near to Argos, the winged horse, by the aid of which Bellerophon was said to have destroyed the Chimaera.
[4428] A river, etc. The Alpheus, a river of Arcadia.
[4429] Animal. The salamander, a lizard said to be impervious to the action of fire. Plin. N. H. x. 67.
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/gregory-nazianzen/funeral-basil.asp?pg=12
