De peste quaestiones duae explicatae

The true and primary cause of them, I say, is our sins, by which God, being provoked, stirs up and excites all those inferior causes against us, so that He may avenge mortality with just punishments. I say, therefore, that it is absurd to confuse those things which are so far separated and distinct by their own very different ends, though not conflicting ones, but only ὑπαλλήλοις subordinate or ordered. Furthermore, since by this argument they contend that the plague is therefore not contagious, because it is called the hand, and sword, and arrow of the Lord, I ask: was leprosy not the hand of the Lord, and was it not for that reason contagious, or rather, were not the lepers ordered to withdraw precisely because it was contagious? I ask also this: if there is no evil in a city that the Lord does not do, is elephantiasis a form of leprosy or severe chronic infection not today considered contagious? And I would gladly ask those who blame all withdrawal during the plague whether they themselves believe that those with elephantiasis should be tolerated in the common society of men. And if they think they should be tolerated, why do they not also declaim against those by whom they are excluded? If not, if they believe they should be avoided because of contagion, why do they, without exception, reproach those who avoid the contagion of the plague, as if they were the most harmful of all men? But perhaps they will deny that elephantiasis is the hand of God. Let us speak, therefore, of scabies, whether French or Spanish, and I wish it were not also German. I do not think anyone would dare deny that it is a punishment divinely inflicted upon fornication, which in this century is treated as a game, and that it is truly the hand, sword, and arrow of God striking fornicators.