{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/002/0020329.htm","path":"chr/ecf/002/0020329.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/002/0020329.htm","text":"Accordingly all those above-mentioned dogmas appear to have been transmitted from Moses the great to the Greeks. That all things belong to the wise man, is taught in these words: \u201cAnd because God hath showed me mercy, I have all things.\u201d 2190 And that he is beloved of God, God intimates when He says, \u201cThe God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.\u201d 2191 For the first is found to have been expressly called \u201cfriend;\u201d 2192 and the second is shown to have received a new name, signifying \u201che that sees God;\u201d 2193 while Isaac, God in a figure selected for Himself as a consecrated sacrifice, to be a type to us of the economy of salvation.\nNow among the Greeks, Minos the king of nine years\u2019 reign, and familiar friend of Zeus, is celebrated in song; they having heard how once God conversed with Moses, \u201cas one speaking with his friend.\u201d 2194 Moses, then, was a sage, king, legislator. But our Saviour surpasses all human nature. 2195 He is so lovely, as to be alone loved by us, whose hearts are set on the true beauty, for \u201cHe was the true light.\u201d 2196 He is shown to be a King, as such hailed by unsophisticated children and by the unbelieving and ignorant Jews, and heralded by the prophets. So rich is He, that He despised the whole earth, and the gold above and beneath it, with all glory, when given to Him by the adversary. What need is there to say that He is the only High Priest, who alone possesses p. 352 the knowledge of the worship of God? 2197 He is Melchizedek, \u201cKing of peace,\u201d 2198 the most fit of all to head the race of men. A legislator too, inasmuch as He gave the law by the mouth of the prophets, enjoining and teaching most distinctly what things are to be done, and what not. Who of nobler lineage than He whose only Father is God? Come, then, let us produce Plato assenting to those very dogmas. The wise man he calls rich in the Ph\u0153drus, when he says, \u201cO dear Pan, and whatever other gods are here, grant me to become fair within; and whatever external things I have, let them be agreeable to what is within. I would reckon the wise man rich.\u201d 2199 And the Athenian stranger, 2200 finding fault with those who think that those who have many possessions are rich, speaks thus: \u201cFor the very rich to be also good is impossible\u2014those, I mean, whom the multitude count rich. Those they call rich, who, among a few men, are owners of the possessions worth most money; which any bad man may possess.\u201d \u201cThe whole world of wealth belongs to the believer,\u201d 2201 Solomon says, \u201cbut not a penny to the unbeliever.\u201d Much more, then, is the Scripture to be believed which says, \u201cIt is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man\u201d 2202 to lead a philosophic life. But, on the other hand, it blesses \u201cthe poor;\u201d 2203 as Plato understood when he said, \u201cIt is not the diminishing of one\u2019s resources, but the augmenting of insatiableness, that is to be considered poverty; for it is not slender means that ever constitutes poverty, but insatiableness, from which the good man being free, will also be rich.\u201d And in Alcibiades he calls vice a servile thing, and virtue the attribute of freemen. \u201cTake away from you the heavy yoke, and take up the easy one,\u201d 2204 says the Scripture; as also the poets call [vice] a slavish yoke. And the expression, \u201cYe have sold yourselves to your sins,\u201d agrees with what is said above: \u201cEvery one, then, who committeth sin is a slave; and the slave abideth not in the house for ever. But if the Son shall make you free, then shall ye be free, and the truth shall make you free.\u201d 2205\nAnd again, that the wise man is beautiful, the Athenian stranger asserts, in the same way as if one were to affirm that certain persons were just, even should they happen to be ugly in their persons. And in speaking thus with respect to eminent rectitude of character, no one who should assert them to be on this account beautiful would be thought to speak extravagantly. And \u201cHis appearance was inferior to all the Sons of men,\u201d 2206 prophecy predicted.\nPlato, moreover, has called the wise man a king, in The Statesman. The remark is quoted above.\nThese points being demonstrated, let us recur again to our discourse on faith. Well, with the fullest demonstration, Plato proves, that there is need of faith everywhere, celebrating peace at the same time: \u201cFor no man will ever be trusty and sound in seditions without entire virtue. There are numbers of mercenaries full of fight, and willing to die in war; but, with a very few exceptions, the most of them are desperadoes and villains, insolent and senseless.\u201d If these observations are right, \u201cevery legislator who is even of slight use, will, in making his laws, have an eye to the greatest virtue. Such is fidelity,\u201d 2207 which we need at all times, both in peace and in war, and in all the rest of our life, for it appears to embrace the other virtues. \u201cBut the best thing is neither war nor sedition, for the necessity of these is to be deprecated. But peace with one another and kindly feeling are what is best.\u201d From these remarks the greatest prayer evidently is to have peace, according to Plato. And faith is the greatest mother of the virtues. Accordingly it is rightly said in Solomon, \u201cWisdom is in the mouth of the faithful. 2208 Since also Xenocrates, in his book on \u201cIntelligence,\u201d says \u201cthat wisdom is the knowledge of first causes and of intellectual essence.\u201d He considers intelligence as twofold, practical and theoretical, which latter is human wisdom. Consequently wisdom is intelligence, but all intelligence is not wisdom. And it has been shown, that the knowledge of the first cause of the universe is of faith, but is not demonstration. For it were strange that the followers of the Samian Pythagoras, rejecting demonstrations of subjects of question, should regard the bare ipse dixit 2209 as ground of belief; and that this expression alone sufficed for the confirmation of what they heard, while those devoted to the contemplation of the truth, presuming to disbelieve the trustworthy Teacher, God the only Saviour, should demand of Him tests of His utterances. But He says, \u201cHe that hath ears to hear, let him hear.\u201d And who is he? Let Epicharmus say:\u2014\n \u201cMind sees, mind hears; all besides is deaf and blind.\u201d\u00a02210\n \nRating some as unbelievers, Heraclitus says, p. 353 \u201cNot knowing how to hear or to speak;\u201d aided doubtless by Solomon, who says, \u201cIf thou lovest to hear, thou shalt comprehend; and if thou incline thine ear, thou shalt be wise.\u201d 2211\nThe words of Jacob to Esau slightly changed from the Septuagint: \u201cFor God hath shown mercy to me, and I have all things\u201d\u2014\u03bf\u03c4\u03b9 \u1f20\u03bb\u03ad\u03b7\u03c3\u03ad \u03bc\u03b5 \u1f41 \u0398\u03b5\u1f78\u03c2 \u03ba\u03b1\u1f76 \u1f14\u03c3\u03c4\u03b9 \u03bc\u03bf\u03b9 \u03c0\u03ac\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1 (Gen. xxxiii. 11).\n351:2191 351:2192 351:2193\nSo the name Israel is explained, Stromata, i. p. 334, Potter; [see p. 300, supra.]\n351:2194 351:2195\n[This passage, down to the reference to Plato, is unspeakably sublime. One loves Clement for this exclusive loyalty to the Saviour.]\n351:2196 352:2197\nThe Stoics defined piety as \u201c the knowledge of the worship of God.\u201d\n352:2198 352:2199\nSocrates in the Ph\u0153drus, near the end, [p. 279.]\n352:2200\nIntroduced by Plato in The Laws, conversing with Socrates.\n352:2201\nTaken likely from some apocryphal writing.\n352:2202 352:2203 352:2204 352:2205 352:2206\nIsa. liii. 3. [That is after he became the Man of Sorrows; not originally.]\n352:2207 352:2208 352:2209\nLaertius, in opposition to the general account, ascribes the celebrated \u03b1\u1f50\u03c4\u1f78\u03c2 \u03b5\u03c6\u03b1 to Pythagoras Zacynthus. Suidas, who with the most ascribes it to the Samian Pythagoras, says that it meant \u201cGod has said,\u201d as he professed to have received his doctrines from God.\n352:2210\nThis famous line of Epicharmus the comic poet is quoted by Tertullian (de Anima), by Plutarch, by Jamblichus, and Porphyry.\n353:2211","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol II: CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA: Chapter V.\u2014He Proves by Several Examples that the Greeks Drew from the Sacred Writers.","type":"page"}