and serve it, but this faculty alone sees sharp and sees what is the
value of each of the rest; will this faculty declare to us that
anything else is the best, or that itself is? And what else does the
do when it is opened than see? But whether we ought to look on the
wife of a certain person, and in what manner, who tells us? The
faculty of the will. And whether we ought to believe what is said or
not to believe it, and if we do believe, whether we ought to be
moved by it or not, who tells us? Is it not the faculty of the will?
But this faculty of speaking and of ornamenting words, if there is
indeed any such peculiar faculty, what else does it do, when there
happens to be discourse about a thing, than to ornament the words
and arrange them as hairdressers do the hair? But whether it is better
to speak or to be silent, and better to speak in this way or that way,
and whether this is becoming or not becoming and the season for each
and the and the use, what else tells us than the faculty of the
will? Would you have it then to come forward and condemn itself?
"What then," it says, "if the fact is so, can that which ministers
be superior to that to which it ministers, can the horse be superior
to the rider, or the do, to the huntsman, or the instrument to the
musician, or the servants to the king?" What is that which makes use
of the rest? The will. What takes care of all? The will. What destroys
the whole man, at one time by hunger, at another time by hanging,
and at another time by a precipice? The will. Then is anything
stronger in men than this? and how is it possible that the things
which are subject to restraint are stronger than that which is not
What things are naturally formed to hinder the faculty of vision? Both
will and things which do not depend on the faculty of the will. It
is the same with the faculty of hearing, with the faculty of
speaking in like manner. But what has a natural power of hindering the
will? Nothing which is independent of the will; but only the will
itself, when it is perverted. Therefore this is alone vice or alone
virtue.
Then being so great a faculty and set over all the rest, let it come
forward and tell us that the most excellent of all things is the
flesh. Not even if the flesh itself declared that it is the most
excellent, would any person bear that it should say this. But what
is it, Epicurus, which pronounces this, which wrote about "The End
of our Being," which wrote on "The Nature of Things," which wrote
about the Canon, which led you to wear a beard, which wrote when it
was dying that it was spending the last and a happy day? Was this
the flesh or the will? Then do you admit that you possess anything
superior to this? and are you not mad? are you in fact so blind and
deaf?
What then? Does any man despise the other faculties I hope not. Does
any man say that there is no use or excellence in the speaking
faculty? I hope not. That would be foolish, impious, ungrateful toward
God. But a man renders to each thing its due value. For there is
some use even in an ass, but not so much as in an ox: there is also
use in a dog, but not so much as in a slave: there is also some use in
a slave, but not so much as in citizens: there is also some use in