Teaching Christianity (continued)
Book II
What signs are, and how many kinds there are
1, 1. While I was writing about things, I put in a warning at the beginning that one should only consider in them that they are, and what they are, and not also whether they signify anything besides themselves. So now, being about to treat of signs, I have this to say, that we are not particularly interested in the fact that they are, but rather that they are precisely signs, that is that they signify. A sign, after all, is a thing, which besides the impression it conveys to the senses, also has the effect of making something else come to mind; as when we see a spoor, we think of the animal whose spoor it is; or when we see smoke, we know there is fire underneath; and when we hear the cry of a living creature, we can tell what its mood is; and when the trumpet sounds, soldiers know that they must advance or retreat, or whatever else the battle requires.
2. Among signs, then, some are natural, some conventional. Natural ones are those which have the effect of making something else known, without there being any desire or intention of signifying, as for example smoke signifying fire. It does not do this, after all, because it wishes to signify; but through our experience of things and our observation and memory, we know that fire is there, even if only smoke can be seen. And again, the spoor of a passing animal is this kind of sign; and the expression of an angry or sad person signifies his mood, even without the angry or sad person wishing it to do so. And any other stirring of the spirit can be betrayed by our expressions, even if we are not deliberately revealing it.
But it is not now my purpose to discuss this whole subcategory of signs. Still, as it falls within the division of our subject, it could not be passed over completely; but let it suffice to have taken note of it to this extent.
2, 3. Conventional or given signs, on the other hand, are those which living creatures give one another in order to show, as far as they can, their moods and feelings, or to indicate whatever it may be they have sensed or understood. Nor have we any purpose in signifying, that is in giving a sign, other than to bring out and transfer to someone else's mind what we, the givers of the sign, have in mind ourselves. It is this category of signs, therefore, insofar as it concerns human beings, that we have undertaken to consider and treat of, because even the signs given by God, which are contained in the holy scriptures, have been indicated to us through the human beings who wrote them down.
Animals too have signs for each other, by which they express their desires and intentions. Thus when the farmyard cock finds some food it gives the sign of its crowing to the hen to come running up; and by its cooing the male dove calls the female or is in his turn called by her; and there are many other such instances commonly noticed. Whether, however, like the expression or cry of someone in pain, they just follow the mood of the spirit, without any intention of signifying, or are really and truly given in order to signify, is another question, and does not concern the business we have in hand; so let us eliminate it from this work, as not being at all needed or relevant.
3, 4. Of the signs, therefore, with which human beings communicate their thoughts among themselves, some are directed to the sense of sight, most of them to the sense of hearing, very few to the other senses. Thus when we beckon, we are only giving a sign to the eyes of the person whom we are wishing by this sign to acquaint with our will. And some people do indeed signify a great many things with the gestures they make with their hands. And vaudeville artists are able to give signs to the cognoscenti by the movements of every part of their bodies, and to carry on a kind of conversation with the eyes of their audiences. And military flags and banners signal the will of commanders to the eyes of their men; and all these things are rather like visible words.
But as I said, there are many more signs that are directed to the ears, above all with words. Trumpets, of course, and flutes and guitars also frequently give out tunes that have a significant meaning as well as a pleasant sound. But compared with words, all such signs are few indeed. Words, after all, are far and away the principal means used by human beings to signify the thoughts they have in their minds, whenever anyone wishes to express them. Yes, it is true that the Lord gave some sign through the odor of the ointment which was poured over his feet.[1] And in the sacrament of his body and blood the Lord signified what he wished to through the sense of taste.[2] And when the woman was healed by touching the hem of his cloak, it certainly signified something.[3] But the verbal signs with which human beings express their thoughts are almost infinite in number. Because of all these other kinds of sign which I have touched on briefly, I have been able to give an account in words, while in no way at all could I give an account of words with these other kinds of sign.
4, 5. But because words immediately pass away once they have agitated the air waves, and last no longer than the sound they make, letters were invented as signs of words. Thus spoken utterances can be shown to the eyes, not in themselves, but through what are signs of them. It has not been possible, therefore, for these signs to be common to all nations, as a result of a kind of sin of human dissension, when everyone grabbed at the first place for himself. A sign of this pride was the building of that tower to reach heaven, when humanity was rewarded for its impiety by discord in its speech as well as in its thoughts and its ambitions.[4]
5, 6. As a result of this it came about that divine scripture too, which provides treatment for so many diseases of the human will, starting out from language, was able when the time came to be disseminated throughout the world, spreading far and wide through translation into a variety of other languages, and thus came to the knowledge of the nations for their salvation. In reading it their one intention is to discover the thoughts and will of the authors it was written by, and through them to discover the will of God, which we believe directed what such human writers had to say.
What the scriptures are; in what way they are written; what is required in order to understand them
6, 7. But those who read them in a light-minded spirit are liable to be misled by innumerable obscurities and ambiguities, and to mistake the meaning entirely, while in some places they cannot even guess at a wrong meaning, so dense and dark is the fog that some passages are wrapped in. This is all due, I have no doubt at all, to divine providence, in order to break in pride with hard labor, and to save the intelligence from boredom, since it readily forms a low opinion of things that are too easy to work out.
I mean, why is it, I would like to know, that if anybody says that there are holy and perfect people, by the example of whose life and behavior the Church of Christ cuts off from all kinds of superstition those who come to her, and in some way or other incorporates them into herself by their imitating her good members; and that these faithful and true servants of God, on laying aside the burdens of the world,[5] came to the holy bath of baptism, and stepping up from it, conceived by the Holy Spirit and gave birth to the twin fruit of charity, that is to love of God and neighbor—why is it that if anybody says that, it gives less pleasure to the hearer than if he expounds in that sense the passage from the Song of Songs, where the Church is told, when she is being praised as a beautiful woman, Your teeth are like a flock of shorn