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454 Credibilitij of the Gospel History.
pie. For he fomul himself obliged frequently to caution
his own people and hearers against being** seduced ' by
' their fastings, abstinence from certain meats, mean dress,
' pale countenances,' and other marks of a sober and abstemious
course of life. Which is agreeable to Augustine, who
says, that ' by' an appearance of chastity and temperance
' they ensnared many people.' Sixthly, pope Leo's abusive
manner of speaking of the Manichees invalidates all his accusations
against them. For he says, ' they"^ were the worst
* of all heretics, Avho had nothing- in them that was tolerable :
' whose law is a lie, whose religion is the devil, and whose
' sacrifice is filthiness and the like.' Is any regard to be
had to a man who talks at that rate ? He who should take his
notion of the Manichoean worship from pope Leo, I believe,
would suffer himself to be grossly imposed upon. It might
be better to take it from Faustus, one of their own bishops,
as cited in° Augustine, and also in this volume, at p. 386.
I must now return to the note before cited at p. 23.
' The great and chief mystery of their sect was the eucharist.
* And it was in celebrating the eucharist that they com-
* mitted the abominations Avith which the fathers have re-
' proached them. We might indeed suspect the testimony
* of the fathers, it being well known that in declaiming'
' against heretics they are apt to exag'gerate, and did not
' always scrupulously adhere to truth. But that the Mani-
' chees abandoned themselves, in the celebration of their
* eucharist, to the most impure and infamous practices, is
' not only attested by them, but has been often proved by
* unexceptionable witnesses, nay, and owned by themselves,
' before the civil magistrates, in Italy, in Gaul, in Paphla-
' gonia, and Africa.'
'' Neminem fallant discrctionibus ciborura, sordibus vestium, vultuuraque
palloribus. Non sunt casta jejunia, quae non de ratione veniunt continenfiae,
sed de arte fallaciae. Serm. 33. c. v. p. 93.
Non vos seducant deceptoriis artibus ficta et simnlata jejunia, quse non ad
purificationem proficiunt animarum. Speciem quidem sibi pietatis et castitatis
assumunt, sed hoc dolo actuum suorum obsccEna circumtegunt, &c. Serm. 23.
c. 6. p. 76. ' Duae maxime sunt illecebrae Manichseorum, quibus
decipiuntur incauti altera, cum vitae castae, et meniorabilis continentiae,
imaginera praeferunt. De Mor. Cath. Ec. 1. 1. c. 1. T. 1.
"" quibus plenissime docetur, nullam in hac secta pudicitiam, nullatn
honestatem, nuilam penitus repeiiri castitatem : in qua lex est mendacium,
diabolus reiigio, sacrificium turpitude. Serm. 15. c. 4. p. 64.
Aliae haereses, dilectissimi, licet merito omnes in sua perversitate damnandae
sint, habeiit tamen singulae in aliqua sui parte quod verum est, In
Manichseorum autem scelestissimo dogmafe prorsus nihil est, quod ex ulla
parte possit tolerabile judicari. Serm. 23. c. 5. p. 76. al. de Nativitate
Domini, iv. " Contr. Faust. 1. 20. c. 3. T. 8.