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38. But when all these have been cut away and rooted out of the mind
of the Christian we must then look at human institutions which are not
superstitious, that is, such as are not set up in association with
devils, but by men in association with one another. For all
arrangements that aye in force among men, because they have agreed
among themselves that they should be in force, are human institutions;
and of these, some are matters of superfluity and luxury, some of
convenience and necessity. For if those signs which the actors make in
dancing were of force by nature, and not by the arrangement and
agreement of men, the public crier would not in former times have
announced to the people of Carthage, while the pantomime was dancing,
what it was he meant to express, a thing still remembered by many old
men from whom we have frequently heard it.I And we may well believe
this, because even now, if any one who is unaccustomed to such follies
goes into the theatre, unless some one tells him what these movements
mean, he will give his whole attention to them in vain. Yet all men
aim at a certain degree of likeness in their choice of signs, that the
signs may as far as possible be like the things they signify. But
because one thing may resemble another in many ways, such signs are not
always of the same significance among men, except when they have
mutually agreed upon them.
39. But in regard to pictures and statues, and other works of this
kind, which are intended as representations of things, nobody makes a
mistake, especially if they are executed by skilled artists, but every
one, as soon as he sees the likenesses, recognizes the things they are
likenesses of. And this whole class are to be reckoned among the
superfluous devices of men, unless when it is a matter of importance to
inquire in regard to any of them, for what reason, where, when, and
by whose authority it was made. Finally, the thousands of fables and
fictions, in whose lies men take delight, are human devices, and
nothing is to be considered more peculiarly man's own and derived from
himself than anything that is false and lying. Among the convenient
and necessary arrangements of men with men are to be reckoned whatever
differences they choose to make in bodily dress and ornament for the
purpose of distinguishing sex or rank; and the countless varieties of
signs without which human intercourse either could not be carried on at
all, or would be carried on at great inconvenience; and the
arrangements as to weights and measures, and the stamping and weighing
of coins, which are peculiar to each state and people, and other
things of the same kind. Now these, if they were not devices of men,
would not be different in different nations, and could not be changed
among particular nations at the discretion of their respective
sovereigns.
40. This whole class of human arrangements, which are of
convenience for the necessary intercourse of life, the Christian is
not by any means to neglect, but on the contrary should pay a
sufficient degree of attention to them, and keep them in memory.
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