18
And indeed, were our law (as you suppose) not truly divine, and if we wrongly think it divine, we should have no right even in that case to destroy our sense of religion.
19
think not eating the unclean, then, a trifling offense.
20
For transgression of the law, whether in small or great matters, is of equal moment;
21
for in either case the law is equally slighted.
22
But thou deridest our philosophy, as though we lived irrationally in it.
23
Yet it instructs us in temperance, so that we are superior to all pleasures and lusts; and it exercises us in manliness, so that we cheerfully undergo every grievance.
24
And it instructs us in justice, so that in all our dealings we render what is due; and it teaches us piety, so that we worship the one only God becomingly.
25
Wherefore it is that we eat not the unclean; for believing that the law was established by God, we are convinced that the Creator of the world, in giving his laws, sympathises with our nature.
26
Those things which are convenient to our souls, he has directed us to eat; but those which are repugnant to them, he has interdicted.
27
But, tyrant-like, thou not only forcest us to break the law, but also to eat, that thou mayest ridicule us as we thus profanely eat:
28
but thou shalt not have this cause of laughter against me;