De Ebrietate

Philo Judaeus

The works of Philo Judaeus, the contemporary of Josephus, volume 1. Yonge, C. D., translator. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1854.

But great numbers of persons who, because they never touch unmixed wine, look upon themselves as sober, are them involved in the same accusation. And one may see some of acting in a foolish and senseless manner, and others possessed by complete insensibility; and others again who are never satisfied, but are always thirsting for what cannot be obtained, because of their want of knowledge; others, on the other hand rejoicing and exulting; and others in good truth naked.

The cause now of behaving foolishly is a mischievous ignorance; I mean by this expression, not an ignorance of such things

v.1.p.454
as are matters of instruction but an alienation from, and dislike of knowledge. The cause again of insensibility is a treacherous and mutilated ignorance. The cause of insatiability is a most grievous appetite for the indulgence of the passions of the soul. The cause of cheerfulness is at once the acquisition and the employment of virtue. Of nakedness there are many causes—an ignorance of such things as are opposite to one another; complete innocence and simplicity of manners; truth, which strips off all the coverings of such things as are concealed, on the one side revealing virtue to our eyes, and on the other side, in its turn, uncovering vice;

for no one can possibly put off both these things at one time, nor can he either strip them both off together. But when any one discards the one, he must of necessity take up and clothe himself with the other.

For as the old story tells us, God, when he had combined pleasure and pain, two things naturally at variance, under one head, gave to us an outward sense capable of appreciating them both, not at the same moment, but at different times, fixing the period of the return of one to be simultaneous with the moment of the flight of the other. Thus from one root of the dominant principle, the two shoots of virtue and vice sprang up, neither blossoming nor bearing fruit at the same time;