De Moribus Brachmanorum [Incertus]

On the Customs of the Brahmins. This treatise is preserved in manuscript in three most celebrated Italian libraries, the Vatican, the Milanese, and the Medicean, under the name of the Blessed Ambrose, Bishop of Milan. Yet that it is not his can be doubted from other reasons, as well as from the difference of style, which seems far removed from Ambrose’s gravity, from his elegance and sharpness of words joined with charm. But since in ancient books it has already, for some reason, obtained his name, it has been added by us in this edition among other uncertain little works, which we leave to the judgment of the sincere reader as to whether they are to be attributed to this holy doctor or not. We confess that the work itself is not very polished. Or perhaps Ambrose (if he is to be called its author), writing to the Greek man Palladius, who was little skilled in the Latin language and still a youth (for he is the one who, it is conjectured, was later ordained bishop of the Irish), used a more open and common style in order to accommodate himself to his capacity.

The desire of your mind, Palladius, which, inflamed with an immense love of wisdom, always wishes to learn new things, compels us to produce a new and even arduous work, namely, to review the country, custom, and life of the Brahmins. For I, since I have seen neither them nor their country (for they are separated from our Europe by a great expanse of land), will attempt to relate to you only those things which I have heard from others and which I have taken from writers. The Brahmins are called by some Gymnosophists, by others philosophers or sages of the Indians (Strabo, Book XV of Geography). They dwell, moreover, near the Ganges, the greatest river of all India (Quintus Curtius, Book VIII). Now this Ganges is that which the Holy Scriptures call Phison, and one of the four which are said to issue from paradise (Genesis 2).

First, then, our brother Musaeus, bishop of the Doleneri, reported to me that he himself, some years before, setting out for the Indies with the purpose of seeing the Brachmans, traversed nearly the whole region of Serica: in which, he says, there are trees that produce not only leaves but also a very fine wool, from which garments are made, which are called silken; and that there a certain notable stone column is seen, inscribed with the name of Alexander with this title: I, Alexander, came this far; and that after traversing many peoples, nations, and regions, he finally arrived in the province of Ariana near the river Indus: which, seeing it surrounded by deserts and scorched by heat, because the sun burned everything (whence there was a great scarcity of water, and if it was brought from elsewhere, it was seen to boil immediately even in their vessels), and since he could not endure the heat of the sun and the burning of the places, he was forced at once to abandon the journey he had begun, to withdraw, and to return to Europe (Pliny, Natural History, Book VI, chapter 23). He affirms, therefore, that he saw some new things, but not a Drachma. Nevertheless, he reports that he heard certain things about the Brachmans from a certain Theban scholar, who, as he says, for this very reason, namely to see and speak with the Brachmans themselves, proposed to travel to the Indies, and that finally the wretch fell into captivity.

He, therefore, as the bishop reported to me, being of a gentler disposition, and wearied by the tedium of the forensic advocacy office, a profession unsuited to him, decided to see India and to learn the homeland and customs of the Brachmans. For this reason, embarking on a ship with certain merchants on the Erythraean, or Red, Sea, he sailed first to the Adulic Gulf and saw the town of the Adulitae, then he penetrated the Aromata Promontory and the emporium of the Troglodytae, and from there he touched the places of the Assumitae, whence, setting sail with favorable winds, although after a voyage of very many days, he finally arrived at Muziris, the emporium of all India on this side of the Ganges: where he asserted that a certain Indian prince held dominion. Having lingered there for some time, and having diligently observed the quality of the air and place, and the custom of the men, after several days it came into his mind to cross over to the island which is called Taprobane: in which those to whom the name of the Blessed Ones is given are said to live a very long life (for they consider a human life of a hundred years to be short) on account of the wonderful temperateness of the air and the incomprehensible disposition of divine judgment (Pliny, Book VI, Chapter 22). This island is ruled by four kings or satraps, among whom one is the greatest, to whom the others are subject and obey, as that scholar reported (Ptolemy, Book VII of Geography, Chapter 4). He also related, if it is easy to believe, that a thousand islands of the Arabian and Persian Sea, and those which they call the Mammolae, are obedient to it.

Here he discovered the stone which is called the magnet, which is said to draw the nature of iron to itself by its own power. Therefore, when any ship having iron nails has put in there, it is immediately held fast, and is not permitted to go anywhere, hindered by some hidden force of the stone; for this reason, he said, ships are built there with wooden nails. That island has five rivers, and indeed very large ones, by which it is entirely irrigated and made more fertile. Hence, also, because of the great mildness of the climate, fruits are never at any time lacking from the trees; indeed, at the same time, on the same tree, while one branch is flowering, another is producing fruit, and the others display ripe fruits. Moreover, this island has dates, nuts which we call Indian, both large and small, yet fragrant, and also nuts which we call hazelnuts. The men of that land are nourished by the food of fruits, rice, and milk; the nobles feed on the flesh of sheep and goats on certain days, and also on feast days. Swine, they say, are not found from the Thebaid as far as the borders of India and Ethiopia, because of the great heats. The people of the island clothe themselves in the skins of sheep, skillfully worked, not to be despised; sheep are covered not with wool, but with a fleece of bristles; there is no use of wool or linen there, as the scholar related, and that merchants gather there from the borders of Ethiopia and Persia, and from the places of the Assumitae, for the sake of buying, selling, and exchanging goods; and that pepper grows there, and is collected in great quantity.

This people, however, is quite small and useless, living within rocky caves, and, taught by their native land, they have grown accustomed to running about over great precipices. Pepper, moreover, is gathered with its twigs; he said that the trees themselves are like low and small shrubs. For he asserts that these men themselves are tiny little creatures, and that they have rather large heads with smooth and shorn hair. The rest of the Ethiopian and Indian race, however, bristles with naturally curly hair. In which place (he added) I was immediately seized and detained by the one who held the most power there, who at once began to revile me harshly, because I had dared to touch their fatherland and soil. And they listened to neither my excuse nor my defense with fair minds, for they could not understand the speech of my tongue, nor did I know the cause of the crime that was charged against me, because I did not know their words; we seemed to understand each other only by nods. Indeed, I could discern the meaning of their words from the fierce look of their eyes and from the savage gnashing of their teeth; they, however, from my pallor and fear, suspected that my feelings were more worthy of pity. And so, thus detained by them, they ordered me to do my former work for six years, with my expenses from the palace of their king being only one modius of grain in any given year.

After six years, however, while I was gradually learning their language, I was able to learn many things about the neighboring nations and places. Finally, with God propitious, I was freed from captivity in this manner: Another king, hostile to the aforementioned king, accused him before the greater emperor of that region, that he had reduced a noble man and Roman citizen to the foulest captivity and extreme servitude. When the emperor heard this, he immediately sent an investigator there, and then, after the truth of the matter was examined, he ordered that the one who was convicted of the said crime be flayed of the entire skin of his body, because he had done injury to a Roman citizen (Pliny, Book VI, Chapter 22). They are said not only to honor the emperor of the Romans more earnestly, but also to fear him incredibly, as one who excels in outstanding intelligence and magnificent virtue, and the Romans because they are so powerful in arms and strength that (if they wished) they could reach the point of destroying their region. Therefore, that same man who was saying these things added that the race of the Brachmans renounces secular affairs not only by their own will, but rather as if depending on the judgment of God and supported by the help of the Divinity. For they live naturally naked in the neighboring regions of the river. Among them there are no four-footed animals, no cultivation of the land, no use of iron, no kind of tool by which any work could be done. They have, however, there delightful and very fine breezes, and most healthfully tempered ones.

Curtius, book 8). They always worship God, professing to have true and distinct knowledge of him, and to discern every principle of his providence and divinity. They pray continually, and when praying they do not look toward the eastern part where the sun rises, but rather gaze at the sky. They eat whatever they can find on the ground in the manner of cattle, that is, the husks of trees and wild vegetables. For among them there is an abundance of a herb which we call inula, as also among the Persians. There is also a tree there called acanthus. They also have certain native trees bearing some fruits, I know not what, which they always eat. The men live across the bank of the river Ganges in the parts of the Ocean into which the said river flows; the women, however, live on this side of the Ganges near the inland regions, to which their husbands are accustomed to cross over in the months of July and August. For these months seem colder to them, because at that time the sun turns toward us and its ray rises above the north wind which we call Boreas, at which time the airs are said to be more temperate and more suitable for intercourse. So when they have spent forty days with their women, they soon return to their own places. But when a man's wife has given birth and produced one or two offspring, her husband no longer crosses over to her, nor does he any longer lie with his own wife.

For each son is substituted in the place of the fathers, and for the rest of their lives, after purification, they abstain from their own wives. But if it happens that someone draws a sterile wife, her husband goes to her for up to five years and renders her marital service. If she has not been made pregnant during that time, he is soon separated from her entirely; for this reason their race does not spread into many peoples, both because of the difficulty of the places and because of the custom of continence. This, then, is the life and conduct of the Brachmans. They say that the river itself is crossed with the greatest difficulty (Curtius, book 8), both because of the tyrant Ondoniton infesting those places, and also from fear of a certain animal dwelling in the aforementioned river, which they say is of such great size that it can devour an entire elephant. At the time, however, when the Brachmans are accustomed to cross the river, they assert that by divine judgment the said animal is not seen in the river. Very large snakes are said to be there, having seventy cubits in length, whence I remember having seen the skin of one having forty-two feet in width. They also speak of ants there the size of a man's palm, and scorpions the measure of a human cubit being present; on account of these monsters, their crossing of the places is dangerous. Yet these animals are not born everywhere, but only in those parts which are not inhabited by men.

Very many herds of elephants are said to exist there. These are the things which Musaeus affirms he heard from the Theban scholasticus about the Brachmans; but what I have read in the histories of Alexander's Life, and what I have taken from very many authors bearing on this matter concerning them, I shall now subjoin. The emperor Alexander, when the rule of Macedonia alone was not sufficient for him, and he could not be content with only his father Philip, used to say that he himself was the son of Jupiter Ammon. And although the truth of the matter itself proved his origin to be base, yet by certain fables and, as it seemed to him, invincible means, he asserted a different nature of his own lineage.

Therefore, rising from the region of Macedonia with the solemn array of wars and with troops of cavalry and infantry prepared, he traversed almost the entire world; and before he approached the province of Babylon, he ran through Europe and Asia as if they were small places. He finally came into parts of our own world as well, to inspect them, and when he found them conforming to his own sensibility, he himself said: "Wisdom, the mother of providence, having a certain communion with virtue itself, which is the head of all virtues, consisting in truth alone, nourishing and making all nature, whose gift is the speech of our words, examining and perceiving common knowledge and understanding, assigning to the unjust what they deserve, but sparing the just: grant me, I pray, your calm, so that I may attain what I desire through these prayers, and see the Brachmans, men endowed with goodness and wisdom, present here. For I have come to learn something from Calanus, an inhabitant of these places, who hastened to me, and at whose urging I now wish to learn and see everything more fully." The Brachmans, on the other hand, said this to Alexander: "You have come to us, they say, desiring to learn wisdom; we Brachmans willingly at once embrace such a desire. For a desire of this kind in our life and customs is considered a kingdom: which you yourself, the emperor, have now wished to learn.

For a philosopher does not obey the authority of another, but rules himself: a man has no power over him. But since you have believed nothing from us up to now (because until the present time certain persons have spoken ill of us to you), now you have come to us, tasting the truth. For Calanus was a very wicked man among us, through whom you Greeks indeed came to know the Brachmans, but were not able to know them well. For he was not one of us, he who fled to riches without any excuse for himself, for whom it was not enough to draw the water of chastity from the river Taberuncus, nor to take the food of pressed milk, by which a mind worthy of God grows—a mind which he always held as an enemy to God, by which he, badly inflamed, blazed up into anger, and which he transferred from the goods of wisdom to the vices of pleasure. But none of us rolls on burning coals, nor do any pains consume our bodies, but our life is a kind of medicine of health. By a natural benefit we are strangers to all riches: an equal end also accompanies our life with death. And if again some mortals, to whom the teaching of false words has come, attempt to strike us with vain arrows, they cannot, however, harm or corrupt our integrity. To lie and to believe the liar are one and the same. For one who falsely persuades another harms him, and also harms himself, because while he believes a lie, he cannot easily arrive at the truth itself.

But false accusation is a kind of mother of enmities and conflicts, which from itself produces anger, from which in turn quarrels and wars are born. Nevertheless, to kill a man is a naked virtue: for that, as we know, is the custom of bandits. But we call true virtue to fight with a naked body against changes of the winds, to cut off the desires of the belly, and to overcome its various struggles by abstinence and patience. Therefore, first conquer these enemies of yours before all else, if you seem strong to yourself, and thereafter you will have no need to undertake external conflicts against anyone. For you stir up wars against those who are thieves, in order to supply nourishment and fuel to those whom you have within; but you see that you indeed conquer those with whom you fight outside, yet you are overcome by those whom you know, who are within you. Consider, therefore, how many tyrants dwell in the hearts of fools: eyes, ears, nostrils, belly, genitals, and the whole human body, and also how many desires arise within, to all of which the mortal race succumbs and serves, and on account of which all are both slaughtered and slaughter.

But we Brahmans, because we overcome all the wars that we have within ourselves, from now on rest unharmed and secure in the highest peace; we see the forests, we look up at the sky, we always hear the most pleasing voices of eagles and various birds; under the open air we cover our bodies with the leaves of trees, we feed on their fruits, we drink water, we sing hymns to God, and we long for the life of the future age, and we hear nothing that cannot benefit us. Therefore, content with these customs, we Brahmans live, and after a few words have been exchanged, we soon fall silent. But you, on the other hand, say what ought to be done, yet you do not do it; you consider no one a philosopher unless he knows how to speak: for all your sense is in your tongue, and all your wisdom is on the lips of your mouth. You gather gold and silver, you need many slaves and large houses; you covet honors and pursue dignities, you eat and drink only as much as it pleases you to be filled, you always use equally delicate and soft garments, and you do things for which you soon feel repentance; you are accustomed to speak against yourselves as if against your enemies, even though you know that you have power over your own tongue. Far better, indeed, are those who have grown accustomed to silence, for they do not refute themselves by speaking.

You receive mutual reward from all, placing, as you think, a glorious ornament on your fingers—gold. We also see you adorned with necklaces, though you know that this very thing in which you so greatly believe, as far as the true matter is concerned, can be of no benefit to you. For souls are not exalted by gold, nor are bodies nourished; on the contrary, through it both of these are corrupted. But we, who know the truth and nature itself, if we begin to thirst, we go to the river, and trampling gold underfoot, we drink water. For hunger cannot be appeased by gold, and thirst knows no quenching by it. From gold does not come the healing of wounds, nor the medicine of ailing limbs, nor any restraint of immense desire, but rather a greater incitement and provocation to some unknown lust for coveting. And indeed, when natural thirst has been satisfied with the water it desired, it soon ceases to thirst; similarly, natural hunger, when it has received the food it seeks, subsides. If, therefore, in the same way and by the same nature, the human mind also desired gold, as soon as it had received what it wished to receive, without doubt that desire itself would cease. But far from ceasing, it always desires anew and without any interruption, because such desire does not proceed from a prompting of nature. Finally, that in which among you men both adorn themselves and take pride, among us is despised. Calanus is your friend, but he is despised and trampled upon by you.

Whoever, therefore, has been the author of many evils among you is honored and worshipped by you; but whoever is useless is cast out by us. And those things which we do not seek at all pleased Calanus, because of the greed for money which he had. But this man of ours was not such a one, who wretchedly harmed and destroyed his own soul, on account of which he seemed worthy to be a friend neither of God nor of us, nor did he deserve to have security in this world among the forests, nor could he hope for that glory which is promised in the future. When the emperor Alexander came to the forests, he was not able to see Dandamis himself in passing (Plutarch, *Life of Alexander*); for he was lying in the forest, reclining on tree leaves in security and peace, near a spring, which, like a breast of the earth, he was accustomed to draw forth, pure and undefiled, into his mouth. But Alexander sent to him a certain friend named Onesicritus (Quintus Curtius, *History of Alexander*, Book IX), saying to him: "Onesicritus, hasten that the aforementioned man Dandamis come to me, or announce the reason why he was unwilling to come, so that I myself may go to see him." To which he replied: "I will do with speed what you command. For just as it is your command, so I recognize it to be mine to obey your orders.

When the aforementioned messenger came to Dandamis, he addressed him with these words: "Alexander the emperor, son of the great god Jupiter, who is lord of the human race, commands that you hasten to come to him, because if you come, he will give you very many gifts; but if you are unwilling to come, he will punish you with death as a despiser." When these words came to Dandamis's ears, he did not rise from the leaves on which he lay reclining, but, laughing, gave this reply while still lying down: "God," he said, "the greatest, knows not how to prepare injury for anyone, but rather restores the light of life to those souls which his own decree has released. Therefore, my sole master is he who forbids murder and who does not stir up wars. But Alexander is not a god, because he himself is going to die. How, then, can he be lord of all, who has not yet crossed the river Tiberoboam, nor placed his seat throughout the whole world, nor crossed the zone of Gades, nor seen the course of the sun in the middle of the earth? For this reason, very many peoples have not yet been able to know even his name. But if the land he possesses does not contain him, let him cross our river, and he will find soil alone that knows how to sustain men. Whatever Alexander promises me, if he should provide it, will be useless to me.

I have a house of leaves; I feed on the herbs that lie near me, and I drink water. I set aside all other things, which are gathered with anxiety and perish, and which offer nothing but sorrow to those who seek and possess them. Therefore, I now rest in security, and with my eyes closed, I guard nothing at all. If I wished to keep gold, I would disturb my sleep. The earth supplies me with everything, as a mother supplies milk to an infant. I go to whatever place I wish to go, and I am compelled by no necessity of anxiety to go where I do not wish to go. And if he wishes to cut off my head, he will not be able to take away my soul; but he will only lift up the head lying there, while the soul, departing, will leave its head behind like a part of some garment, and will return it to the one from whom it received it, namely the earth. But when I have become a spirit, I shall ascend to the God who enclosed it within this flesh. When he did this, he wished to test us, to see how we would live in this world while separated from him. And afterwards, when we have returned to him, he demands from us an account of this life. Standing before him, I will see my injury, and I will behold his judgment upon those who have done me injury; for the sighs and groans of the injured become the punishments of those who injure. Let Alexander threaten those who desire wealth, who fear death, for we despise both. For the Brachmani neither love gold nor fear death.

Go therefore, and report this to Alexander: Dandamis seeks nothing of yours; but if you believe that anything from his possessions is necessary for you, you should not disdain to come to him. When Alexander heard this through the messenger, he began to desire all the more to see such a man, and that he, who had conquered many nations, might be conquered by one naked old man. He therefore proceeds with five or ten friends to the forests we mentioned above, and when he had come near, and had dismounted from the horse on which he was riding, he removed the crown from his head, and leaving behind all the swelling pride that was about him, he entered alone to the aforementioned old man, and prostrated himself at his feet, saying: Hail, Dandamis, I have come to you because you were unwilling to come to me. To which he replied: Why have you come to us? Or what do you desire to take away from our concerns? What you desire, we ourselves cannot possess; what we have, in turn, is not necessary for you. We honor God and love man; we neglect gold, we despise death: but you fear death, honor gold, hate man, and despise God. To whom Alexander said: Teach us, he said, something of wisdom: they say you are full of divinity, and converse often with God himself; but I desire to know in what respect you consider yourselves superior to the Greeks, and in what you either see better than other men, or know more.

He replied: "I," he said, "would wish to convey to you the understanding received from God, but you yourself have no place where you might receive such a gift. For your soul is filled with greedy and immoderate desires, which I now consider to be contending with me, because I am trying to tear you away from them, although today they grieve greatly, since you are polluted by the death of no people or blood, and because they see that men still dwell in cities. You wish to go as far as the Ocean, and beyond that you desire to seize another part of the world: and then you are afflicted with sadness when you cannot have what you want. How, then, will you be able to satisfy your desire, when the whole world serving you cannot fill and sate your mind? You have become far lesser than the world, and if you wish to conquer everything at once, and to possess all that men hold, in the end it is necessary that you have only as much as either you see me lying down holding, or I see you sitting occupying. From which, if we pass to other matters, we are found to be similar to you in other respects as well. For in the same way as you, I use all the elements—air, water, and earth—nor do I desire to have anything beyond, and I justly have all that I possess; and if you alone obtain all the rivers, you will still not be able to draw more water from them than I. Therefore, if you learn this wisdom from me, nothing will be lacking to you: and you will have everything, if you desire nothing.

Covetousness is the mother of poverty, which cannot be cured by any evil remedy, that is, by anxiety: for it always seeks everything, as if it could find nothing, because it does not rest in those things to which it has already been able to attain, but is more and more tormented by those which it sees it does not yet hold. But you will have the greatest riches together with pleasure, if you are willing to live with me in this way: and if you acquiesce in my words, you will possess my wealth. God, the friend of all, is a friend to me, and I speak with him about the same matters; I do not hear the words of evil men. I have the sky for a roof, the whole earth is my bed. Rivers provide me with pure drink, the forest supplies my table. I do not feed on the entrails of animals, like lions, nor do the flesh of quadrupeds or birds rot within my breast, nor am I a tomb for the dead, but natural providence pours forth all fruits for me like a mother’s milk. I myself understand what you seek. You see me wise; such I have become, and I live as I was created, and I recognize what God does, and I know what ought to be done. But you, filled with great vanity, believe that you can foretell, although you do not even know how to understand these very works of God which you see day by day. I know all things, both whence, and when, and how they come to be. I foretell rains, droughts, lightning, and storms: and this is what delights and refreshes me, because God has made me share in a certain communion and counsel with his works.

To me an angel comes, and if ever the emperor fears something, then I beseech God to grant him some good when he comes to me, to free him from the fear with which he labors, and to inspire in him some confidence of mind. What do you say is more right, to harm men or to protect and preserve them, and what is more fitting for the sons of God to do, to overthrow everything by fighting, or to restore what has been attacked and ruined by pacifying? A huge weight of gold will not profit you, emperor, nor the multitude of elephants which you have taken from others, but this voice of mine and this speech of mine. And even if you should wish to kill me, I will not be afraid, for I will go to God more quickly, who knows both my cause and my life. There is nothing that can be hidden from God, whose eyes are all the stars, the sun, and the moon, which you cannot escape, nor evade his judgment in yourself. Do not therefore destroy what he has built: do not desire to scatter what he, who made it, wishes to adorn: do not sacrifice the blood of cities, nor pass over the corpses of dead peoples. For you will act far more rightly if you care for your own life than if you desire another's death: and if, despising those losses which you pursue, you choose true gains. Why, when you pursue one soul, do you wish to extinguish so many nations at once? Why do you delight in the evils of the whole world? Why, when others weep, do you laugh?

Yet by this very fact, that you have wished to be mindful of me, who live in these solitudes, you have gained yourself. And now you neither dread conflicts, nor desire to harm anyone, nor exercise your virtue in the misfortunes of others, as you have always done. Therefore, cast from your body the fleeces of dead sheep, and do not wish to cover yourself with the garments of the deceased; for you will honor yourself more if you have made yourself such, since the soul is tempered by living in deserted places. Therefore, choose rather this purpose of our life, by whose blessedness you will be able to enjoy more than among the Macedonians. They indeed await you day by day, so that they may destroy the remaining cities with you, and plunder whatever they can find in them; and I think they are sad and grieve on this present day, because they still see some nations unharmed, seizing the opportunity for their own desires and plunders through the authority of your name. What a secure life in God, then, will you be able to obtain, and to live for yourself now, who still now think of seizing many things, desire to slaughter many: of which you have already done some, are doing others at present, and promise that you will do still others?

But I, when I have departed from this world, will see you placed in the air; and then indeed you will proclaim my teaching, because no multitude of horsemen or foot soldiers will accompany you, and with the greatest grief of your mind you will weep, saying this: "I have wasted the life of all past time without cause, which I consumed in the honors of this world and in wars." From these things you will understand that nothing else has been left to you except the mere memory of evils. For I know what divinity holds within itself, although I myself am placed among men, and then you will say this to me: "You used to give good counsel, Dandamis, to me at one time." For then before your sight will come all the souls which you have attacked without cause, before whom how will you be able to excuse yourself? Alexander listened to these things willingly and without any anger, for the spirit of God was in Dandamis; but, with the evil demon goading him, Alexander changed at the very beginnings. Hence Dandamis addressed him with these words: "I know that you speak the truth, for you are descended from divine lineage, and you are placed in these places where now it is permitted for you to live without any trouble, but with the greatest pleasure, and where you enjoy natural riches and secure peace.

I, however, live amid various tumults and terrors, and I fear very many of those who guard me; and often greater fear comes to me from friends than from enemies, and I dread the plots of the former more daily than those of my foes. And I can neither live without them, nor can I trust myself to them. Therefore I live in affliction; for I am guarded by the very throng of those whom I fear. By day, indeed, I pursue and exhaust various peoples; by night, sleep disturbs and torments me, lest some unexpected enemy make an attack upon me. And if I kill those whom I dread, I become sad; if, on the other hand, I wish to be gentle and mild, I am despised. And I do not know how I may snatch myself from such great perils of affairs. For even if I wished to live in these deserts in which you dwell, this would not be permitted to me at all, on account of which I can now excuse myself before God, because He Himself placed me in this state of life and in such an order of men. But you, for these complaints which I have poured forth, because you have refreshed me in every way and have freed my senses for a little while from conflicts and battles, accept my gifts, and do not wish to refuse what I offer to you, to my dishonor. For you have profited me not a little when you caused wisdom to be honored. And when these things were finished, Alexander signaled to his servants to bring forth the gifts which he had promised. They immediately offered the finest kinds of gold and silver, various garments, along with oil and bread.

Having seen these things, Dandamis laughed, saying this: Can you persuade those birds that live in wooded places to accept gold and silver, and to sing better than they are accustomed? Since this cannot happen at all, do you think me worse than them? Why should I accept what can neither be eaten nor drunk by me? Why should I accept what is of no use to me at all? Or for what reason should I guard that which I cannot use, unless perhaps to bind my soul, free in all things, with such fetters? Why should I vainly subject its freedom to the most shameful yoke of servitude? This I will never do at all. But I do not wish to buy anything either, since I live in deserts where nothing is sold. God provides me with gifts, that is, the fruits of these places. For God sells nothing to man for gold, but bestows good wisdom upon him who knows how to receive it. I am clothed with the garment with which my mother’s birth brought me forth. I feed on this air as food, and gladly see myself such, while I burden my body with no bonds; and sweeter to me than any honey is the drink of flowing water when natural thirst comes. But if you say that those loaves have some pleasure, why did you burn them with flames? I do not wish to make the remnants of fire my food; nor do I desire to turn into my food what I have taken from another’s mouth. Therefore, let the fire that baked these loaves consume them. But lest you think that any insult is inflicted on you, who honor wisdom, by me, I accept only that oil.

When Dandamis had said these things, he immediately rose up, and, traversing the forest and gathering wood, made a very great pile of it, which he set on fire, and spoke these words: "The Brachman," he said, "has everything, and is abundantly nourished from all things as he desires." And having soon poured oil on it, and the pyre being vehemently kindled, he sang this hymn to God: "Immortal God," he said, "I give thanks to you for all things." When Alexander saw this, he departed, carrying back with him everything except the oil which he had offered, greatly amazed. Dandamis, however, added this also to his words, saying: "We are all such as this. Calanus, however, was judged by us to be a very bad man, because he showed himself to your presence and did not imitate our life; and because, since he could not be a lover of God, he fled from us and migrated to the Greeks, and, having despised our customs, condemned himself to immortal flames. But you, who say you are the master of the evil race of Macedonians, disparage the Brachmans and order all to be killed, believing their lying words, which a good man ought not to do. We, however, know that we shall render an account of our own life to God then, when we have set out to him. For we are all his; we despise vain glory, which fools cannot do. How can you pass over to our custom, who live so badly, and who always consign to oblivion those things which are good?

We Brachmans, however, mindful of how we were once begotten, and seeing for what ends we ought to live, hold to an irreproachable course of life; for God has formed each one according to a fixed purpose, to which he is assigned. We rejoice in desert places, and sitting in the midst of forests, we are occupied only with these senses of ours, lest the words of men ever be able to separate our souls from such established practices. Blessed is he who lacks nothing, and who does not covet another's glory; and he who wishes to please everyone must necessarily be the slave of everyone. Cities, in which a multitude of thieves gathers, are not necessary for us; God has built and provided for us great houses: mountains and forests alike; from them we take simple fruits, and we drink the pure gifts of nature, water; and more freely, after labor, we lie down to rest on leaves. How can you command free men, when you know that you are in the power of many? For you serve your own souls in all things which you desire. For if you desire to have many garments, you need not only a few flocks of sheep to pasture, not only a few men to shear those sheep, and those from whom the wools themselves are woven, but you also need artisans. Why do you make excuses that you do not have soft clothing? For equal servitude is proven to exist in lesser and greater matters.

For whoever marvels at a small amount of gold will also desire a great deal; and whoever has been the ruler of a small city will also wish to rule over a larger one. Moreover, even from a modest portion of the everlasting, which gleams in your garments, you become proud; and when your servants have purple garments, you, deeming yourselves to be something more beautiful, take care that your own attire shines with a different color. If, however, this does not seem good among you, you are judged poor while you marvel at small things. You willingly kill the animals which the earth has produced, though you yourselves recognize that many of them are of great benefit to you; for some of them are shorn, others are milked; with some you till the field, with others you fight; afterward you rejoice in shedding their blood, and you give such a reward in return to those which have been so useful to you; and those whose fleeces cover you outwardly, their flesh burdens you inwardly, and you begin to be living tombs of dead bodies. Can a mind weighed down by so many and such unsuitable and such contrary things receive within itself the sense of God? Put aside for a little while the flesh of the aforementioned animals which you kill, and let it lie thus, and understand what becomes of it. Will you be able to bear its stench without fleeing? How much filth, how much impurity is brought upon human souls and bodies, which, when you yourself cannot tolerate it, is shut up within those who desire such foods, and is brought in by them.

Anger gives birth to the soul; these things together produce vomiting: but the earth yields fruits and flowers, which please by emitting good odors when sent forth. Such feasts God has planted and provided for us: you have utterly lost your human senses. Your bodies stink like wild beasts: for you are receptacles of dead animals: you have begun to be worse than lions and wolves. For wolves, if they could use earthly foods, would certainly never feed on flesh. Bulls, horses, deer live on the just pasturage of herbs, whence they are strengthened with more robust limbs and stronger sinews. Why do you not rather imitate these animals? Why do you not eat wild foods and drink water? But the cause of fire prepares such feasts for you, which, since you see that stronger beasts do not eat them, are therefore not pressed by your snares; for you seek more citizens, you incur very great expenses, and you labor very much over small things for the sake of slight pleasure: where there is nothing but the open ruin of those in whom there has been vain labor. Therefore nothing is more wretched than your life.

We never drink unwillingly, but we fulfill the necessary duty of nature from springs when thirsty; these flow always, even when we are not drinking. You, however, for the pleasure of the belly, seek constant foods even when not hungry, and prepare for yourselves many and diverse feasts by various arts: you scour the entire sea with nets, you delight in hunting birds in the air and beasts on the mountains, and, admiring the speed of your dogs, you reproach the slowness of the wild animals, and call them dwellers of evil deserts. Thus you persist in these pursuits, tracking down these living creatures, and once tracked, you hasten to kill them, or, while alive, you bring them shut up in cages to the spectacles of cities: not to sow crops, from which you might relieve hunger, nor to provide any necessary service to men from them, but to slaughter with the utmost disgrace your neighbor and your own blood, and (what is greater) the work of God, or to violently cast them, bound in chains, to the bites of wild beasts. And you willingly watch this very thing, that beasts fight with men, and that they devour part of nature, your likeness; afterwards, however, you kill those same beasts outright, declaring them cruel because they killed a man: and, what seems even more wicked and worse, sated with human blood, not yet filled with so many and such great evils, you desire to fill the bellies of your fellow citizens.

To these things you live with such shameful and depraved habits that you even build heated houses for yourselves, so that what you have eaten may be forced to be digested more quickly to satisfy your gluttony. Moreover, to have the intestines of your own body distended by excessive repletion of foods, you choose more sumptuous feasts, for which you procure skilled craftsmen to season and arrange the banquets. We, however, pray to God that we may never be thirsty; for we are sometimes drawn away from the rule of truth in this way, that is, when we give necessary drink to our body, on account of which we afterwards raise our eyes and hands, like some sacrifice, to the rays of the sun. But you are even joyful whenever you celebrate your feasts beyond measure, and you do not put an end to your carousings until you begin to rage with excessive drunkenness, and until you lose by drinking that very thing which you seemed to know; and you burden the senses of your heart with an excessive weight of wine. I would indeed believe those who are said to be mad to be more fortunate among you. For they are always drunk, although they have not bought wine; but you bear excessive anxiety for the price of wine: having bought it, you pollute yourselves with drunkenness, and you beat each other, and finally, having returned to sobriety, you can scarcely recognize how you are able to guard your drunkenness.

I also hear that you eat so many things that you cannot digest them, and that when you have at last barely withdrawn from the voracity of a banquet, you vomit up everything that usually fills you; and, perversely changing your very nature, you excrete from the same part by which you take in food: you walk on your head, not on your feet. Most foolish men, you fill and distend your entrails with gluttony, so that afterwards you again empty your bodies by the art of physicians: seeking through these things shame and the greatest sickness for yourselves, and you are so insane that you wish to overturn nature itself by such a cure—nature which feels no pleasure at all—having as the end of immoderate voracity not health, but punishment; for insatiable limbs are usually produced from diseases, torments accompany them, so that in the end you have nothing from such great delights that is conferred upon an honorable and upright life. But I hear you boast that you possess many things: yet, although you give much to others, you provide very little to your own. For that reason we judge you more poor, because you do not even give bread itself to your parents, yet you desire to have countless riches. You are slaves of your belly; therefore the greatest crowd of physicians is among you, who constantly empty you by purgation: and they do this either by fasting or starvation, or by the art of medicines: so that those who used to drink many wines suddenly cannot take even a moderate amount of water, whenever you are afflicted by the necessity of illnesses.

And just as then you drink an excessive amount of undiluted wine beyond what nature requires, so now you desire even a little water, which nature itself demands, only sparingly. We, however, do not seek wine at all; we have water, which alone we want, in which we take the greatest delight, and with which we wisely care for thirst. We do not hasten to rage and go mad; rather, we pray for death more than for drunkenness, through which men must necessarily perish in both body and mind. For a drunkard seems indeed to live, but as far as wisdom is concerned, he is judged dead; he has lost that sublime mind which God gave to man. And what of those who consider themselves great and glorious—how they are deceived by false hope and vain allurements, those who alternately harm, despoil, and slaughter one another with their own hands, while they themselves await the death that is necessarily owed to them? Finally, what shall I say of those men, as if they were some great ones and providers for others, who, in the manner of shameful women, having their limbs anointed with various perfumed oils, are accustomed to go out in public, polluting the very purity of the air with their own corruption? What shall I say of your Stoic philosophers, who, though all are held by love of gold, nevertheless seem to you worthy of admiration or praise?

We also hear that you cut off a certain part of the body from your males and are eager to convert them into the female sex; and that among you there exists such a man, who can neither beget as a man nor give birth as a woman, and who lives only for his own disgrace and only for his own injury. Who would not grieve, even in thought, at such a perversion of the human race and such a pitiable downfall? Moved by compassion for them, we desire to benefit you as much as we can, because we both abhor pride and love and cherish the entire nature of the human race; and, as if seated in a high place of some magnificent house, naked in both mind and body, we know and teach any spectators of truth. And this is in what we consider ourselves richer than other men. Macedonia does violence to all, yet it itself first suffered violence from others. But all who have turned to worse things are judged base slaves. However, of all these evils which we name, the Brachmans seem to have no part. For they cannot be warred against and conquered by anyone, because they are held by no desire or love of any thing. But if you wish to be truly wise, come to India, live naked in the deserts, casting off all the honors which you love and by which you seem to be adorned; for otherwise you will not be received by us.

And then you will love all those things which a little before you saw and wondered at; nor will anyone further contend against you, nor will anyone be able to take away any of your possessions; you will not be fed by others' contribution or by others' sweat, for you will be rich in all things. And since you write that you desire me to be of some use to you, we do not begrudge those who truly imitate a pious God. For we wish the whole human nature everywhere, as far as it is possible for us, to become better. (Some things seem to be missing.)