Lactantius,
Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol. VII, The Divine Institutes…
(1885)
“ If, therefore, mercy is a distinguished and excellent gift in man, and that is judged to be very good by the consent both of the good and the evil, it appears that philosophers were far distant from the good of man, who neither enjoined nor practised anything of this kind, but always esteemed as a vice that virtue which almost holds the first place in man. ”
Lactantius,
Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol. VII, The Divine Institutes…
(1885)
“ Freedom of speech also, if it attack others rather than oppose those who attack it, is obstinacy. Severity also, unless it restrain itself within the befitting punishments of the guilty, becomes savage cruelty. ”
Lactantius,
Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol. VII, The Divine Institutes…
(1885)
“ For to be frugal, or constant, or cautious, or calm, or grave, or severe, are virtues indeed, but virtues which relate to this short [2] life. But we who despise this life have other virtues set before us, respecting which philosophers could not by any means even conjecture. Therefore they regarded certain virtues as vices, and certain vices as virtues. For the Stoics take away from man all the affections, by the impulse of which the soul is moved—desire, joy, fear, sorrow: the two former of which arise from good things, either future or present; the latter from evil things. ”
