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On the Public Shows

Pseudo-Cyprian

Treatises Attributed to Cyprian on Questionable Authority.

About this work

Author: Pseudo-Cyprian

Treatises Attributed to Cyprian on Questionable Authority.

On the Public Shows.

Argument.—The Writer First of All Treats Against Those

Section 1 ›

Who

Endeavoured

to

Defend

the

Public

Exhibitions

of

the

Heathens

by

Scriptural

Authority

;

And

He

Proves

That

,

Although

They

are

Never

Prohibited

by

the

Express

Words

of

Scripture

,

Yet

that

They

are

Condemned

in

the

Scriptural

Prohibition

of

Idolatry

,

from

the

Fact

that

There

is

No

Kind

of

Public

Show

Which

is

Not

Consecrated

to

Idols

.

Notes

2
Obviously imitating Tertullian’s treatise De Spectaculis. [See vol. iii. p. 79.]
3
He then prosecutes the subject, by going through the several kinds of public exhibitions, and sets forth, a little more diffusely than in the Epistle to Donatus, what risks are incurred by the spectators, and especially in respect of those exhibitions wherein, as he says, “representations of lust convey instruction in obscenity.” Finally, he briefly enumerates such exhibitions as are worthy of the interest of a Christian man, and in which he ought rightfully to find pleasure. [For Epistle to Donatus, see p. 275, supra.]