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If this kingdom was so great and lasting without the aid of the gods,
why is the ample territory and long duration of the Roman empire to be
ascribed to the Roman gods? For whatever is the cause in it, the
same is in the other also. But if they contend that the prosperity of
the other also is to be attributed to the aid of the gods, I ask of
which? For the other nations whom Ninus overcame, did not then
worship other gods. Or if the Assyrians had gods of their own, who,
so to speak, were more skillful workmen in the construction and
preservation of the empire, whether are they dead, since they
themselves have also lost the empire; or, having been defrauded of
their pay, or promised a greater, have they chosen rather to go over
to the Medes, and from them again to the Persians, because Cyrus
invited them, and promised them something still more advantageous?
This nation, indeed, since the time of the kingdom of Alexander the
Macedonian, which was as brief in duration as it was great in extent,
has preserved its own empire, and at this day occupies no small
territories in the East. If this is so, then either the gods are
unfaithful, who desert their own and go over to their enemies, which
Camillus, who was but a man, did not do, when, being victor and
subduer of a most hostile state, although he had felt that Rome, for
whom he had done so much, was ungrateful, yet afterwards, forgetting
the injury and remembering his native land, he freed her again from the
Gauls; or they are not so strong as gods ought to be, since they can
be overcome by human skill or strength. Or if, when they carry on war
among themselves. the gods are not overcome by men, but some gods who
are peculiar to certain cities are perchance overcome by other gods, it
follows that they have quarrels among themselves which they uphold,
each for his own part. Therefore a city ought not to worship its own
gods, but rather others who aid their own worshippers. Finally,
whatever may have been the case as to this change of sides, or flight,
or migration, or failure in battle on the part of the gods, the name
of Christ had not yet been proclaimed in those parts of the earth when
these kingdoms were lost and transferred through great destructions in
war. For if, after more than twelve hundred years, when the kingdom
was taken away from the Assyrians, the Christian religion had there
already preached another eternal kingdom, and put a stop to the
sacrilegious worship of false gods, what else would the foolish men of
that nation have said, but that the kingdom which had been so long
preserved, could be lost for no other cause than the desertion of their
own religions and the reception of Christianity? In which foolish
speech that might have been uttered, let those we speak of observe
their own likeness, and blush, if there is any sense of shame in
them, because they have uttered similar complaints; although the
Roman empire is afflicted rather than changed, a thing which has
befallen it in other times also, before the name of Christ was heard,
and it has been restored after such affliction, a thing which even in
these times is not to be despaired of. For who knows the will of God
concerning this matter?
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