Tertullian · a new plain-English translation from the original language
[1] Furthermore, we noted above concerning the character of these places, that it is not by themselves that they defile us, but through what is carried on there — through which, once they have soaked up the defilement, they then spit it back out onto everyone else. Let the primary charge, then, as we said, be idolatry; but let us bear all the remaining qualities of the things themselves as likewise opposed to God. [2] God has commanded that the Holy Spirit — being, in keeping with the goodness of its nature, tender and delicate — be treated with tranquility and gentleness and quiet and peace, not disturbed with rage, with bile, with anger, with grief. [3] How, then, will this square with the spectacles? For no spectacle exists without some shaking of the spirit. Where there is pleasure, there is also eager partisanship, through which, precisely, the pleasure gets its savor; where there is partisanship, there is also rivalry, through which the partisanship gets its savor. [4] And further, where there is rivalry, there too are rage and bile and anger and grief, and all the rest that go with these — none of which fits our discipline. [5] For even the man who enjoys the spectacles with restraint and decency, in keeping with his rank or age or even his own natural temperament, is nonetheless not left unmoved in spirit, nor free of some silent passion. [6] No one comes to pleasure without feeling; no one undergoes feeling without being affected by its ups and downs. Those very ups and downs are what fuel the feeling. But if the feeling ceases, there is no pleasure left, and the man who goes on attending, gaining nothing from it, already stands convicted of vanity. [7] I take it, though, that vanity too is foreign to us. And what of the fact that such a man judges himself, standing among people whose likeness, precisely by not wanting it, he confesses himself to detest? [8] It is not enough for us that we ourselves do none of this, unless we also refuse to keep company with those who do. "If you saw a thief," Scripture says, "you ran along with him." If only we did not so much as share this world with such people! But as it is, we are set apart within worldly things, because the world is God's, but worldly indulgences are the devil's.