On Drunkenness (71-75)

Why, then, are we not also to repel this being, too, who is a sophist and a polluted person, condemning him to the death which is suited to him, namely, silence (for silence is the death of speech), in order that the mind may be no longer led away by its sophisms, but being completely emancipated from all the pleasures which are according to the body, "the brother," and being alienated from, and having shaken off the yoke of, all the trickeries according to "the neighbour," and the neighbouring outward senses, and from the sophistries in accordance with the "nearest" nearest " speech, may be able, in all purity, to apply itself to all the proper objects of the intellect.

This is he "who says to his father and to his mother," his mortal parents, "I have not seen you," ever since I have beheld the things of God, who "does not recognize his sons," ever since he has become an acquaintance of wisdom, who "disowns his brethren," [*] ever since he has ceased to be disowned by God, and has been thought worthy of perfect salvation.

This is he who "took as coadjutor," that is to say, who searched for and sought out the things of corruptible creation, of which the chief happiness is laid up in eating and drinking, and who went, Moses says, "to the chimney," [*]

Will not this person be justly looked upon as a murderer, by many who are influenced by the customs which have so much weight among women? But with God, the ruler and father of the universe, he will be thought worthy of infinite praises and panegyrics, and of rewards which can never be taken away; and the rewards are great, and akin to one another, being peace and the priesthood:

for it was an illustrious achievement, after having put to flight the almost invincible troops of men who live according to the common fashion, and having put down the civil war of the appetites in the soul, to establish a peace firmly; and for this great exploit to receive nothing else, not riches, not glory, not honour, not authority, not beauty, not strength, not any of the advantages of the body, nor, on the other hand, earth or heaven, or all the world, but that most important and valuable of all things, the rank of the priesthood, the office of serving and paying honour to Him who is in truth the only being worthy of honour and service; this is an admirable thing, an object worthy of contention.