“The smell of my son is as the smell of a full field which the Lord hath blessed: therefore God give thee of the dew of heaven, and of the fruitfulness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine: let nations serve thee, and princes adore thee: and be lord of thy brethren, and let thy father’s sons adore thee: cursed be he that curseth thee, and blessed be […]
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Augustine: The Trinity and Divine Simplicity
For that which is begotten of the simple Good is simple as itself, and the same as itself. These two we call the Father and the Son; and both together with the Holy Spirit are one God; and to this Spirit the epithet Holy is in Scripture, as it were, appropriated. And He is another than the Father and the Son, for He is neither the Father nor the Son. […]
Read moreAugustine: Original Sin
The first men were indeed so created, that if they had not sinned, they would not have experienced any kind of death; but that, having become sinners, they were so punished with death, that whatsoever sprang from their stock should also be punished with the same death. For nothing else could be born of them than that which they themselves had been. Their nature was deteriorated in proportion to the […]
Read moreTertullian: Freedom Of Religion
Let one man worship God, another Jupiter; let one lift suppliant hands to the heavens, another to the altar of Fides; let one—if you choose to take this view of it—count in prayer the clouds, and another the ceiling panels; let one consecrate his own life to his God, and another that of a goat. For see that you do not give a further ground for the charge of irreligion, by […]
Read moreTertullian: De Corona
Baptism When we are going to enter the water, but a little before, in the presence of the congregation and under the hand of the president, we solemnly profess that we disown the devil, and his pomp, and his angels. Hereupon we are thrice immersed, making a somewhat ampler pledge than the Lord has appointed in the Gospel. Then when we are taken up (as new-born children), we taste first […]
Read moreTertullian: On the Divinity of Christ
God made the world, and all which it contains, by His Word, and Reason, and Power. … The Word, and Reason, and Power, by which God made all, have spirit as their proper and essential substratum, in which the Word has in being to give forth utterances, and reason abides to dispose and arrange, and power is over all to execute. He proceeds forth from God, and in that procession […]
Read moreTertullian: Apology
The Persecution of Christians 1. Christians were deprived of the right to defend themselves before their accusers and the court. They were also denied the due process of law, for they were prosecuted differently from criminals, though condemned likewise, for “the crime of murder, or sacrilege, or incest, or treason”. And then, too, you do not in that case deal with us in the ordinary way of judicial proceedings against offenders; […]
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