Tertullian, On the Apparel of Women Book II
I address you as servants of the living God, my fellow servants and sisters, though I claim no higher right among you than my own lowly standing in servitude and brotherhood; I dare this appeal not from vanity, but from genuine care for your salvation. That salvation, established for men no less than women, rests especially on the display of chastity. Since we all are the temple of God, with the Holy Spirit brought in and consecrated within us, chastity stands as the guardian and priest of this temple, refusing admission to anything unclean or profane, lest the God who dwells there, offended, abandon his defiled seat. My present subject is not chastity itself — divine precepts everywhere suffice to urge and demand that — but the things that belong to it: how you ought to conduct yourselves. Most women, whom God permits me to rebuke in every respect, either through simple ignorance or bold pretense behave as if chastity consisted only in bodily integrity and the avoidance of sexual violation, as though nothing internal were required concerning the arrangement of dress and adornment. Yet they persist in their old pursuit of beauty and splendor, parading the same appearance as the women of the nations, who lack the consciousness of true chastity because nothing true exists in those who do not know God as the guardian and master of truth. Even if some chastity can be credited among the gentiles, it remains imperfect and unformed, so that however tenacious it may be in the mind, it dissolves in the license of habits, chasing the perversity of the gentiles whose very effect it shuns. How many women, finally, do not even desire to please outsiders? Who does not wish to adorn herself in order to deny desire? Although this, too, is characteristic of gentile chastity — not to sin, yet to will it; or even not to will it, yet not to refuse it. What is surprising? All things are perverse that are not from God. Let them see, then, how they fail to obtain the whole good easily, and whatever they do obtain they mix with evil. You must turn away from them, as in all other matters, so also in your gait, because you ought to be perfect, just as your Father who is in heaven.
Latin
Ancillae Dei vivi, conservae et sorores meae, quo jure deputor vobiscum, postremissimus equidem meo jure conservitii et fraternitatis, audeo ad vos facere sermonem, non utique affectationis, sed affectioni procurans in caussa vestrae salutis. Ea salus nec foeminarum modo, sed etiam virorum, in exhibitione praecipue pudicitiae statuta est. Nam cum omnes templum Dei simus, illato in nos et consecrato Spiritu Sancto, ejus templi aedituus et antistes pudicitia est, quae nihil immundum nec profanum inferri sinat, ne Deus ille, qui inhabitat, inquinatam sedem offensus derelinquat. Sed modo nos non de pudicitia, cui indicendae et exigendae sufficiunt instantia ubique divina praecepta, verum de pertinentibus ad eam, id est qualiter vos incedere oporteat. Pleraeque enim, quod ipsum mihi utique [reprehendendo in omnibus] reprehendere Deus permittat, aut ignorantes simpliciter aut dissimulantes audacter ita ingrediuntur, quasi pudicitia in sola carnis integritate et stupri aversione consistat, nec quicquam intrinsecus opus sit, de cultus et ornatus dispositione. Sed enim perseverant in pristinis studiis formae et nitoris, eamdem sui speciem circumferentes, quam foeminae nationum, a quibus abest conscientia verae pudicitiae, quia nihil verum in his, qui Deum nesciunt praesidem et magistrum veritatis. Nam etsi qua in gentilibus pudicitia credi potest, usque adeo eam imperfectam et inconditam constat, ut licet in animo aliquatenus tenax sui agat, in habitus tamen licentia sese dissolvat, pro perversitate gentilium appetendo, cujus rei devitat effectum. Quota denique est, quae nec placere quidem extraneis concupiscat? quae non velit idcirco se expingere, ut neget appetitum? Quanquam et hoc gentili pudicitiae familiare sit, non delinquere, attamen velle; vel etiam nolle, attamen non denegare. Quid mirum? perversa sunt omnia, quae a Deo non sunt. Videant igitur, quae non totum bonum obtinendo facile et quod obtinent malo commiscent. Vos ab illis, ut in caeteris, incessu quoque devertere necessarium est, quoniam perfectae esse debetis, sicut Pater vester qui est in coelis.