The body's excellence and corruption as a curb on evil

But if you want to learn the body's excellence, examine the formation of all its members, their shape, their functions, their harmony with one another. You will see that the constitution of these members toward one another is more precise than any well-governed city whose citizens are all philosophers. And if you pass over all this and bring forward only its corruptible and mortal aspect, we will not lack a defense even from that. For it is clear from this that not only has no harm come from it, but great gain has come to the human race. All the saints who lived with this body displayed that angelic way of life, and it caused them no harm in their course toward virtue. And those who looked toward impiety had no small hindrance in the corruption of the body, keeping them from advancing further in their own lawlessness. For if many people, while clothed in this corruptible and passible body, imagined equality with God and worked hard to wrap such glory around themselves, then if they had not had a passible and corruptible body to expose their weakness, whom would they not have deceived among the more foolish? So when corruption appears as a hindrance even to impiety—which is the furthest limit of wickedness—and provides the saints an opportunity to display the courage of their soul, what pardon could those deserve who slander and abuse it? Nor is this all we can say about it. It has also become for us a cause of the knowledge of God. For since his invisible attributes are perceived through the things he has made, from the creation of the world (Romans 1:20), and faith comes from hearing (Romans 10:17), it is clear that the soul, led by the hand through eyes and ears, came to know the God who made it. This is why Paul loves it and cries out, saying, "We do not want to be unclothed, but to put on over it immortality" (2 Corinthians 5:4). And do not tell me, "How can the body rise again and become incorruptible?" When God's power is at work, do not ask how. And why do I speak only of God? He made you yourself to become a craftsman of resurrection—in seeds, in crafts, and in metallic materials. For seeds, unless they first die and rot and decay, do not produce the ear of grain. So when you see the grain rotting and dissolving, you do not doubt the resurrection; you make it a very clear proof for yourself. For unless it remains rotting and decaying, it would never rise. Think the same way about your own body: when you see corruption, then especially reflect on the resurrection. For death is nothing other than the removal of corruption. Death does not consume the body itself, but its corruption. You can see this happening with metallic materials as well. Those experienced in these things take gold-bearing earth, hand it over to the furnace, and produce gold. They mix sand and other material and make pure glass. Tell me then: what the power of fire does, will the grace of God not be able to do? Who among those with any sense at all would say that? Consider how he made you in the beginning, and no longer doubt the resurrection.