Sanctified snark

"Farewell, my very dear friend, my son in years, my father in dignity, and please note this request:  that, whatever you write to me, you see that it comes to me first."

"uale, mi amice carissime, aetate fili, dignitate parens, et hoc a me rogatus obserua, ut, quicquid mihi scripseris, ad me primum facias peruenire."

     St. Jerome to St. Augustine, Saint Augustine:  Letters, trans. Sister Wilfrid Parsons, vol. 1 (1-81) =FC 12 (1951), no. 72 (403/404), p. 332 =CSEL 34 (1885), p. 262.
     St. Jerome wasn't just irritated by the theological criticism; he was pissed that he was the last to hear of it.  And though St. Augustine got the better of St. Jerome theologically in Letter 82 (404/405), he promised to "take greater care, as far as the Lord helps me, to see that the letters which I write to you reach you before they get into any other hands to be scattered abroad" (420).

The infant learns to speak in its mother's lap

"what can one imagine more contrary to all the known facts than this primitive state dreamed up by philosophy [(e.g. Rousseau)], in which a troop of human orangutans, weary of devouring one another, improvise finally society, language, intelligence; animal creators who invent humankind?"

     Philippe Gerbet, Considerations sur le dogme générateur de la piété catholique, 5th ed. (Paris:  Librairie de Piété et d’Éducation d’Auguste Vaton, Éditeur, 1853 [1829]), 9, as quoted in François Laplanche, "La notion de«science catholique»:  ses origins audébut du XIXe siècle," Revue d’histoire de l’Église de France 74, no. 192(1988):  75 (63-90), translation mine.

For us, in order that it might be our own

"All that can be said of us is that without this perfect action of God we would be lost; that apart from it we can have no refuge or counsel or consolation or help. But of God we have to say that this perfect action which He Himself did not need has in His merciful good pleasure taken place for us; that He willed to make it and did make it a need of His, a matter of His own glory, to do this for us, that is, to accept the perfect sacrifice, the righteousness of Jesus Christ as our righteousness, our sacrifice, and therefore as the finished work of our reconciliation. Not only as though we had brought this sacrifice, but as the sacrifice which we have brought. Not only as though the righteousness of Jesus Christ were ours, but as the righteousness which we have achieved. Not only as though the work of reconciliation finished in Him were our work, but really as the work which we have done. We remember that in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ we no longer have a substitute for that which we cannot do. It is no longer a question of a Quidproquo, an 'as if,' beyond which we still need something more perfect, a real reconciliation which has still to come. In the doctrine of the justification of man, of the reach of that which has taken place in Jesus Christ, we have to see that we are saying far too little when we use a favourite expression of the Reformers and call it an imputation of the alien righteousness of Jesus Christ. It cannot in any sense be an improper justification of man which has its basis in this happening. Otherwise how could it be a perfect happening, and how could the love of God for man realised in it be a perfect love? Rather, the alien righteousness which has been effected not in and by us but in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ does become and is always ours, so that in Him we are no longer unrighteous but righteous before God, we are the children of God, we have the forgiveness of our sins, peace with God, access to Him and freedom for Him. That this is the case is the righteousness which Jesus Christ has accomplished for us, the perfection of His sacrifice which cannot be added to by anyone or anything. He has sacrificed in our name with a validity which cannot be limited and a force which cannot be diminished. What He has done He has done in order that being done by Him it may be done by us; not only acceptable to God, but already accepted; our work which is pleasing to Him; our own being as those who are dead to sin and can live to righteousness. He alone has done this, but because He has done it, in a decision which cannot be reversed, with a truth which is absolute, He has done it for us."

     Karl Barth, CD IV/1, 282-283, underscoring mine.  Very subtle!

Pro nobis, sed etiam propria nostra

"All that can be said of us is that without this perfect action of God we would be lost; that apart from it we can have no refuge or counsel or consolation or help. But of God we have to say that this perfect action which He Himself did not need has in His merciful good pleasure taken place for us; that He willed to make it and did make it a need of His, a matter of His own glory, to do this for us, that is, to accept the perfect sacrifice, the righteousness of Jesus Christ as our righteousness, our sacrifice, and therefore as the finished work of our reconciliation. Not only as though we had brought this sacrifice, but as the sacrifice which we have brought. Not only as though the righteousness of Jesus Christ were ours, but as the righteousness which we have achieved. Not only as though the work of reconciliation finished in Him were our work, but really as the work which we have done. We remember that in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ we no longer have a substitute for that which we cannot do. It is no longer a question of a Quidproquo, an 'as if,' beyond which we still need something more perfect, a real reconciliation which has still to come. In the doctrine of the justification of man, of the reach of that which has taken place in Jesus Christ, we have to see that we are saying far too little when we use a favourite expression of the Reformers and call it an imputation of the alien righteousness of Jesus Christ. It cannot in any sense be an improper justification of man which has its basis in this happening. Otherwise how could it be a perfect happening, and how could the love of God for man realised in it be a perfect love? Rather, the alien righteousness which has been effected not in and by us but in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ does become and is always ours, so that in Him we are no longer unrighteous but righteous before God, we are the children of God, we have the forgiveness of our sins, peace with God, access to Him and freedom for Him. That this is the case is the righteousness which Jesus Christ has accomplished for us, the perfection of His sacrifice which cannot be added to by anyone or anything. He has sacrificed in our name with a validity which cannot be limited and a force which cannot be diminished. What He has done He has done in order that being done by Him it may be done by us; not only acceptable to God, but already accepted; our work which is pleasing to Him; our own being as those who are dead to sin and can live to righteousness. He alone has done this, but because He has done it, in a decision which cannot be reversed, with a truth which is absolute, He has done it for us."

     Karl Barth, CD IV/1, 282-283.

"How is it that You have come into my presence, and what will become of me in Yours?"

"Wie kommst du in meine Umgebung und was wird aus mir in der deinigen?"

     Karl Barth, CD IV/1, 290 =KD IV/1, 319.  According to Barth, this is the real question that "Lessing's [famous] question concerning the relationship between the contingent truths of history and the necessary truths of reason", or "the gaping and wide chasm which I cannot cross" (287), only culpably avoids (since the difficulty "has in fact been removed"):

     And now we have to ask whether our whole concern about our temporal distance from Jesus Christ, our indirect relationship to Him, is not a genuine problem only in the sense that it represents a genuine movement of flight from this encounter.  Are we not putting up a technical difficulty, knowing all the time that this difficulty is not so great that it cannot be removed, that it has in fact been removed?

(290-291).  Etc.

Blessed are the cheesemakers

     "The raising and habitual using of Tobacco is contrary to the spirit of the Gospel.  The weed is a narcotic poison; so virulent that a drop of its oil is a fatal dose.  A wilted leaf placed on the breast of a child will soon be followed by death.  Its use is an exceedingly filthy and loathsome practice in all its parts and phases.  Its nauseous and unsightly pools of disgusting slime are almost unendurable; defiling every thing with which they come in contact.  It unnerves the system, injures the health, produces irritability of temper, and creates an appetite for strong drink.  The raising and using of it involve an inexcusable waste of time, a perversion of valuable lands, and a misapplication of millions of money.
     "The raising of the wine-plant and hops for the market we regard as little better than the rum traffic generally.
     "We place the making of cheese, and the selling or delivery of milk to the factory on the Sabbath, in the category with Sabbath-breaking generally.
     "Adopted by the Conference."

     Committee on Raising and Using Tobacco, Raising Hops, Raising the Wine Plant, and Making Cheese on the Sabbath, Minutes of the [Fifth] Genesee Annual Conference [of the Free Methodist Church], Akron, New York, Sept[ember] 29, 1864.
     This seems to have been an ad hoc committee, as it does not appear either before or after this point in the Minutes of the Genesee Annual Conference.
     Are all of the claims about tobacco accurate?  The statement on the making of cheese makes, of course, perfect sense, especially if meant to be closely associated with (as seems undeniable) the phrase "on the Sabbath".  And, of course, Genesee County, New York, would have been a dairy region.  Still, it strikes the funny bone for some reason today.
     At the Third Genesee Annual Conference of 1862, by contrast, a powerful resolution on slavery had been adopted.

give simplicity "side of" complexity

I would not give a fig for the simplicity this side of complexity, but I would give my life for the simplicity on the other side of complexity.

And variants (care not a bit; nickel | right arm, anything I have, everything I have | far side; etc., etc.).

     Oliver Wendell Holmes (Jr.)?  I have my doubts.  I wasn't able to turn up so much as a promising initial clue via a Google Books search stripped down to the following:  give simplicity "side of" complexity.  Indeed, it raised suspicions the moment I first encountered it.  Published attributions I've seen alternative to Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. and Jr. (cumulative):  Albert Einstein and George Bernard Shaw.

     Update, 20 May 2020:  the only hit on the phrase "other side of complexity" in the Hathi Trust Digital Library prior to and including 1935 (the year Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. died) is this one, on Benjamin Jowett, in the words of C. G. Montefiore.  And in the earliest viewable Hathi Trust hit on that same phrase after 1935, dated 1976, it (or something very like it) is attributed to George Bernard Shaw.  Nor did I have any luck before 1935 with just "side of complexity", though I checked, of the 90 or so hits on that, only those that actually looked promising.  I'm starting a timeline that could be supplemented with a search of, say, 19th-century full-text:

• 1900:  "it was a simple Theism.  But it was simplicity with a difference.  It was the simplicity which, so to speak, lies on the other side of complexity" (C. G. Montefiore on Benjamin Jowett, Jewish quarterly review 12 (1900):  301).
• 1968 March & November:  "Again we borrow, this time more directly, from [Stanford religious (i.e Hebrew) studies] Professor [Edwin] Good['s Founder’s Day Address of March of 1968]:  'I have not been able to ascertain the source of a remark that I believe is a profound one:  "I do not care a fig for the simplicity that lies on this side of complexity; but I would put my life at the service of the simplicity that lies on the other side of complexity."  That, I suggest, is the long-range goal of the enterprise in which we are all engaged.'  We agree" (The study and its purposes, The Study of Education at Stanford.  Report to the University, November 1968, p. 11).  This was the earliest version of the full quote (with that "do not care a fig for"-"would put my life at the service of" element) that I was seeing via Google Books Advanced Search on 20 May 2020.
• 1976, at the link above.