על השכר והעונש ט״זOn Rewards and Punishments 16
א׳
1[91] Thus the age-long and natural and therefore primary war will be brought to an end through the change which makes the wild beasts tame and amenable. And then its later successor whose source is selfishness and its method deliberate will be easily settled, because men, I believe, will take shame to think that they should prove to be more savage than the irrational animals, when they have escaped all danger of injury or mischief from them.
ב׳
2[92] For surely it will seem a deep disgrace that while venomous and man-eating brutes and creatures without a sense of fellowship or companionship have become placable and have been won over to a peaceful disposition, man, a creature naturally gentle and kindly, in whom the sense of fellowship and amity is ingrained, should implacably seek the life of his own kind.
ג׳
3[93] Either, then, as he says, the war will not pass through the land of the godly at all, but will dissolve and fall to pieces of itself when the enemy perceives the nature of their opponents, that they have in justice an irresistible ally. For virtue is majestic and august and can unaided and silently allay the onsets of evils however great.
ד׳
4[94] Or if some fanatics whose lust for war defies restraint or remonstrance come careering to attack, till they are actually engaged, they will be full of arrogance and bluster, but when they have come to a trial of blows they will find that their talk has been an idle boast. Win they cannot. Forced back by your superior strength, they will fly headlong, companies of hundreds before handfuls of five, ten thousands before hundreds by many ways for the one by which they came.
ה׳
5[95] Some, without even any pursuer save fear, will turn their backs and present admirable targets to their enemies so that it would be an easy matter for all to fall slaughtered to a man. For “there shall come forth a man,” says the oracle, and leading his host to war he will subdue great and populous nations, because God has sent to his aid the reinforcement which befits the godly, and that is dauntless courage of soul and all-powerful strength of body, either of which strikes fear into the enemy and the two if united are quite irresistible.
ו׳
6[96] Some of the enemy, he says, will be unworthy to be defeated by men. He promises to marshal against them to their shame and perdition, swarms of wasps to fight in the van of the godly,
ז׳
7[97] who will win not only a permanent and bloodless victory in the war but also a sovereignty which none can contest, bringing to its subjects the benefit which will accrue from the affection or fear or respect which they feel. For the conduct of their rulers shows three high qualities which contribute to make a government secure from subversion, namely dignity, strictness, benevolence, which produce the feelings mentioned above. For respect is created by dignity, fear by strictness, affection by benevolence, and these when blended harmoniously in the soul render subjects obedient to their rulers.
