Eusebius of Caesarea · a new plain-English translation from the Greek
1| Of this kingdom the friend of God already partakes even here, adorned with the virtues that are native to God and having received into his soul the emanations that flow from that source. He has become rational through the universal Word, wise by sharing in wisdom, good by communion with the Good, just by participation in justice, temperate through the form of temperance, and brave by partaking of the highest power.
2| Such a man, too, may truly bear the name of emperor, for he has shaped his soul with royal virtues after the likeness of the kingdom beyond. But consider the man who has made himself a stranger to these things and has denied the King of the universe; who has not acknowledged the heavenly Father of souls, nor clothed himself in the adornment that befits an emperor, but has taken deformity and shame into his soul; who has exchanged royal gentleness for the fury of a savage beast, a generous disposition for the hard-to-heal poison of vice, prudence for folly, and reason and wisdom for the most hideous of all things, unreason. From that root, as from a bitter drink, its destructive offshoots spring up together: a dissolute life, greed, murders, war against God, impieties. A man given over to these things, even if he is sometimes thought to rule by tyrannical force, will never in truth bear the name of emperor.
3| How could someone bear the likeness of monarchical authority when he has stamped on his own soul countless falsely painted images of demons? How could he be ruler and lord of all when he has drawn upon himself countless cruel masters, a slave of shameful pleasure, a slave of unbridled lust for women, a slave of wealth gathered by injustice, a slave of anger and rage, a slave of fear and terrors, a slave of murderous demons, a slave of soul-destroying spirits?
4| Let him alone, then, with truth as our witness, be proclaimed emperor who is the friend of God, the universal King: he who alone is free, or rather truly lord; who is above wealth and stronger than desire for women; who is victor over pleasures and over the impulses of nature; who masters anger and rage and is not mastered by them. This man is truly emperor, for he carries a title that his conduct makes true to its name. He is truly a conqueror, for he has won the victory over the passions that wrestle the mortal race to the ground. He has been made an image of the archetypal form of the great King, and his mind has been shaped, as in a mirror, by the rays of the virtues that shine from it; by them he has been made complete: temperate, good, just, brave, pious, a lover of God. Truly this emperor alone is a philosopher, for he knows himself and understands well that the abundance of every good thing is poured upon him from outside, or rather from heaven. He displays the venerable title of sole sovereignty by the distinguished robe he wears, and he alone is worthy to be wrapped in the royal purple that befits him.
5| This is an emperor: he who night and day calls on the heavenly Father, who cries out to him in his prayers, who reaches out for the kingdom on high. For he knows that present things are not worthy of God the King of all, since mortal and perishable things flow by like a river and are lost. He longs for the incorruptible and bodiless kingdom of God and prays to obtain it. Through the greatness of his thinking he has raised his mind above the vault of heaven and has taken into his heart an unspeakable longing for the lights there; set beside them, he judges, the honors of this present life differ in no way from darkness. He sees that rule over human beings is a small and short-lived charge over a mortal and transient life, not much better than the rule of goatherds or shepherds or cowherds; indeed, he thinks it more laborious, and over more troublesome flocks. The acclamations of the people and the voices of flatterers he counts as a nuisance rather than a pleasure, because of his firm character and the genuine training of his soul. 6 Nor, when he sees the guard formed by his subjects, the tens of thousands of his armies, the enslaved and obedient multitudes of armed men on foot and on horseback, is he at all overawed, nor puffed up by his rule over them; for he turns his mind back upon himself and sees in himself the common nature of all. As for the garment woven with gold and embroidered with many-colored flowers, the royal purple and the diadem itself, he laughs when he sees the crowds struck with wonder and, just like little children, treating the spectacle as divine, as though it were some bogey. He himself feels nothing of the kind in his soul. Through his knowledge of the divine he puts on a robe embroidered with temperance and justice, with piety and the other virtues: the adornment that in truth befits an emperor.
7| Beyond this, he knows that the riches the many crave so ardently, gold, I mean, and silver, and every kind of stone that people marvel at, are in truth nothing but stones, useless and worthless matter; they are what they are by nature and are seen as such, and they have no power to help as a defense against evils. For what strength do these things have to drive off disease or to escape death? Yet even so, knowing this, he puts them to skillful use with a mind unmoved by passion, to give fitting splendor to those he governs, while he laughs at those whom childishness of mind has left dazzled by them. From carousing and drunkenness, and from the rich dishes that suit gluttons, he holds himself back, judging that such things may befit others but not himself; for he is convinced that they do great harm and darken the mind's understanding.
8| Above all these things, then, the emperor schooled in divine teaching and great of mind reaches for things better than the present life. He calls on the Father in heaven and longs for his kingdom; he does everything with piety, and to those under his rule, as pupils taught by a good teacher, he holds out the knowledge of God, the great King.
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