Adam S. Rust

Great thread on Ilan Wurman's latest Originalist foray into constitutional naturalization law. Really amazing how I can only slightly alter a passage I wrote on Wurman in 2019 and it still applies in 2026.

Cover of "Religion and the Decline of Magic" by Keith Thomas. The dark orange cover shows a demon getting some voodoo doll type things from people in monk robes while demon dragons fly overhead. No academic cover has a right to go this hard.

Augie's args against pagan gods (some of which come close to being arguments against any divine order at all) reminding me of "Religion and the Decline of Magic" (a book I have only partially read) that argues that the early modern Church's war on magic laid the ground work for secularism.

"Founded as she was under the tutelage of so many gods, Rome surely should not have been assailed and afflicted by such great and horrible calamities, of which I shall mention only a few out of the many. For by the great smoke of her sacrifices, as by a given signal, she summoned to her protection all the many gods for whom she established and provided temples, altars, sacrifices and priests: thereby offending, however, the most high and true God, to Whom alone these rites were justly due. In fact, Rome had lived more happily when she had had fewer gods. But, as she became greater, she considered that she should acquire more gods, just as a bigger ship needs more sailors. She despaired, I believe, of those few gods under whom, in comparison with her worse life to come, she had lived well, deeming them insufficient for the defence of her greatness."

Augustine making the argument "an empire with this many gods should not have had so many problems" is a pretty good arg.

"God moves in mysterious ways" making more sense in the context of Augustine's argument against paganism really illustrates the idea that an arguments persuasiveness is as much a matter of rhetorical context as it is of logic.

One weird consequence of reading Augustine is that I am less annoyed by the proposition "God moves in mysterious ways". It's definitely a step up from the logical mess of pagan transactionalism.

Given who I think is being subskeeted here I do not think this is THAT amazing. Kinda predictable actually.

"Not gonna question this feature of pagan mythology as it is also a feature of Christian mythology" really straddling that line between intellectual consistency and special pleading.

"In order not to be unduly tedious, however, I shall remain silent as to the most grave evils suffered by other nations everywhere."

Bruh, I have over 1,000 pages left, you don't get a special award for keeping your receipts on Persia in the desk drawer.

"Enough has now been said, I suppose, of those moral and spiritual evils which are especially to be shunned, to show that the false gods of the Romans did nothing to help the people who worshipped them to avoid oppression by the weight of such ills. On the contrary, they caused them to be oppressed by them in ever greater measure. Now, I see, I must speak of the only kind of evils which our adversaries are unwilling to endure: that is, famine, disease, war, pillage, captivity, slaughter and the similar things which we have already mentioned in the first book. For evil men regard as evils only those things which do not make men evil. They do not blush to praise good things yet to remain evil themselves even among the good things that they praise. It vexes them more to have a bad house than a bad life, as if the greatest good for a man were to have everything good but himself."

Passages like this (which are frequent) where Augustine disparages the focus on material goods (food, shelter, etc.) over moral goods (faith, humility, etc.) is where the appeal of Augustine for anti-liberals is most obvious.

Again I am wondering about Christian nationalism here — what's the difference? I suspect Augie would say that, unlike paganism, the public facing doctrine of Scripture does not promote vice, whatever a Christian community may do. But this almost seems worse than the pagan situation Augie describes.

"Thus, the mingled infamies and cruelties, the scandals and crimes of the divine beings, whether real or feigned, have, at their own insistence, and to avoid incurring their displeasure, been publicly and openly consecrated and dedicated to them in fixed and established festivals. They have been exhibited to all eyes as objects worthy of imitation and fit to be seen. Clearly, by such spectacles, these demons confess themselves to be unclean spirits. By their own base and vicious deeds, whether actual or pretended, whose celebration they request from the shameless and demand from the modest, they attest themselves to be the teachers of a wicked and impure life. Why, then, are they nonetheless reputed to give certain good moral precepts to some few chosen initiates in their shrines and innermost chambers? If they do indeed do this, then the malice of these harmful spirits must be deemed all the more artful and deserving of condemnation. For so great is the force of probity and chastity that the whole, or nearly the whole, of humankind is moved to praise them; nor is there anyone so ruined by vice as to relinquish all sense of honour. Accordingly, unless they somewhere 'transformed themselves into angels of light', as we find written in our Scriptures, the malice of the demons would not fully achieve its purpose of deception. Out of doors, therefore, foul impiety clam-ours unceasingly around the people on every hand, while, inside, a feigned chastity whispers to the few. Shameful things are furnished with a public stage and the praiseworthy are concealed; honour..."

"... hides and dishonour parades; when evil is on display, all assemble to watch; when good is spoken, scarcely anyone is found to listen. It is as if honourable things deserved to be blushed at and the dishonourable glorified. But where does this happen, save in the temples of the demons? Where, save in the dwelling-place of lies? For the secret teaching is intended to ensnare honest men, who are scarce, and the public exhibition of wickedness to keep the many, who are wholly base, from improvement."

Augustine points out how "secret doctrines" of pagan promoting virtue makes things worse. The decent minority are co-opted to give moral legitimacy to an enterprise whose public facing rituals promote vice.

Augustine's view on pagan ritual is "garbage in, garbage out" — you are what you worship. Contentious and lecherous gods make people in their image.

He also sees pagan gods as a front for demonic machinations, but stripping away the metaphysics the psychological observation seems correct.

I wonder how Augustine would reckon with Christian nationalism. The distortions of Christian thinking he has identified so far are individual, whereas the pagan errors are all systemic. I suspect he would call Christian nationalism paganism with Christian characteristics.

A copy of City of God in your humble posters lap with a scone and cup of coffee from one kf my favorite local bakeries in the background.

And we are back! Disneyland was fun, but experiencing in the context of ICE's second murder of a Minneapolis activist was a bit surreal. What a time to reading a book trying to imagine a world beyond an empire with no moral legitimacy.

Disneyland, one of man's attempts to mimic the glorious City of God.

Will be off the thread for a few days experiencing one of man's many futile attempts to create the City of God on earth.

Doom scroll the fall of the Roman Empire as a treat.

Augustine's concept of God is more able to deal with an unstable and unfair world than the gods of paganism. Though I do think Augustine sometimes slips back into transactionalism when discussing his concept of God.

The idea that "God moves in mysterious ways" is somehow less grating to me in the context of Augustine's polemics against paganism. Pagan gods promise to deliver what you want (and don't deliver) Augustine's God promises you what you need (even if you don't know you need it).

Coming to learn in the next chapter Augustine was quoting Cicero imagining a guy above. The poster lineage is strong.

The above passage is definitely what a Certain Type Of Right Wing Guy latches onto when claiming Augustine for themselves (even as they ally themselves with tech billionaires who pretty clearly meet Augustine's description above).

"But those who worship and love the gods of Rome, whom they rejoice to imitate even in their wickedness and shame, do not at all care that the commonwealth is depraved and wholly vile. 'Only let it stand', they say; only let it flourish with abundant treasures, glorious in victory or - which is better - secure in peace, and what do we care? What is of more concern to us is that a man's wealth should be always increasing for the support of his daily pleasure, and that the stronger may thereby be able to subject weaker men to themselves. Let the poor serve the rich because of their abundance, and let them enjoy under their patronage a senseless idleness; and let the rich abuse the poor as their clients and the appendages of their pride. Let the poor applaud, not those who take counsel for their welfare, but those who are most lavish with pleasures. Let nothing unpleasant be required; let no impurity be forbidden; let kings care not how good their subjects are, but how docile. Let provinces serve their kings not as the rulers of their morals, but as the lords of their property and the procurers of their pleasures; and let them not honour them in sincerity, but fear them in worthlessness and servility. Let the laws take cognisance rather of the harm done by a man to his neighbour's vineyard than of that which he does to his own life. Let no one be brought to judgment unless he harms another's property or house or health or is troublesome or offensive to someone against his will. Otherwise, let everyone do as he wishes with what is his, either with his own cronies or with anyone else who is willing. Let there be plenty of public whores for anyone to enjoy who wishes to do so, and especially for those who cannot afford to keep private ones. Let the most... [It goes on like this]"

Reading long quote passage (which I am truncating here) and went "Wow, who is Augustine quoting?" And, true to my "Augustine is a poster" thesis he just Imagined A Guy To Be Mad At.

"But perhaps the divine beings saw no need to appoint laws for the Roman people because, as Sallust says, 'justice and goodness pre-vailed among them as much by nature as by law'. 19 I take it, then, that the rape of the Sabine women was an instance of this justice and goodness. For what could be more just or good than to use the false promise of an entertainment to carry young women off by force, without the consent of their parents? Even if the Sabines..."

"... were wrong to withhold their daughters when asked, how much more wrong was it to abduct them when they were not given! The Romans might with some justice have waged war against that people when they refused a request to give their daughters in marriage to those who shared the country with them and were their neighbours. But it was certainly not just to wage war against the same people because they sought to rescue their stolen daughters. War should have been declared at the beginning. In that case, Mars might have helped his warlike son to avenge by force of arms the injury done him by the refusal of marriage, and to attain in this way the women whom he desired. For perhaps some right of war might have justified a victor in carrying off the women who had been unjustly refused. No right of peace, however, entitled him to abduct those who were not given to him and then to wage unjust war against their justly angered parents."

Augustine: The rape of the Sabine women was bad!

Me: Yes!

Augustine: Because they took the women without the consent of their families!

Me: .... 🤨

Augustine: And they didn't even declare war before doing it!

Me: .... 🫤

It really is wild reading a one man intellectual demolition of a thousand year old culture.

Augustine sees the Greeks allowing poetic satire of both gods and humans as consistent, but wrong. He sees the Romans as half right in protecting humans from poetic satire, but not gods. He adds that gods who are praised through satire (and in fact encourage it) are no gods at all.

Augustine making a larger point about how satire can function as a permission structure for immorality ("everyone else, even the gods, are doing it, why not me?") which *looks around* is at least worth considering.

"Although our Twelve Tables sanctioned the death penalty only for a very few crimes, among those deemed worthy of such punishment was anyone who brought infamy or disgrace upon another by singing or composing verses against him. Splendid! For how we lead our lives should be a matter for the judgment of magistrates interpreting the law rather than for the ingenuity of poets; nor ought we to have to listen to insults without being allowed by law to reply and to defend ourselves before a tri-bunal."

Augustine approvingly citing Cicero praising Roman Law for sanctioning the death penalty for poetic satire, as it bypasses the proper venue for punishment — the courts. (Though he thinks the Greeks are more consistent in allowing the satire of all, including the gods).

"For those who cannot understand what is said to them, or those whose minds are so hardened to contradiction that they will not concur even when they do understand: these answer us and, as is written, 'speak hard things' and are tirelessly vain. If we resolved to refute their contrary arguments as often as they resolve obstinately to contradict our reasoning in whatever way they can, without considering the truth of what they say, you see what an infinite and toilsome and fruitless task we should have."

Augustine anticipates reply guys.

Posting is not merely a due process right, it is a substantive due process right. We all know this. This was the original public meaning. The Founders were the OG posters.

"Which way Western Man?" image showing a book cover of Augustine's "City of God" at a crossroads. One path leading to an ominous storm cloud region with a picture of J.D. Vance and another leading to a bright and sunny place with a picture of Pope Francis (in an AI doctored image of him in a puffer jacket).

This came to me in a vision.

The French love committing to a bit.