Laudator Temporis Acti

Mankato, Minn. (Associated Press):

A jail guard has been suspended after allegedly thumping an inmate with a Bible.

James Lee Sheppard, 56, has been charged with two gross misdemeanors for allegedly swatting a Blue Earth County Jail inmate with the book, grabbing him by the throat and slamming him against steel bars on Feb. 8, according to the criminal complaint.

A video shows a guard entering the cell of inmate Jeremy Hansen, 26. The guard then takes Hansen's Bible and strikes him in the side of the face with the book.

Compare this passage from one of Erasmus' Colloquies (Cyclops, or The Gospel Bearer, tr. Craig R. Thompson):

Cannius. Then why do you insist you love the Gospel?

Polyphemus. I'll tell you. A certain Franciscan in our neighborhood kept babbling from the pulpit against Erasmus' New Testament. I met the man privately, grabbed him by the hair with my left hand, and punched him with my right. I gave him a hell of a beating; made his whole face swell. What do you say to that? Isn't that promoting the Gospel? Next I gave him absolution by banging him on the head three times with this very same book, raising three lumps, in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Cannius. The evangelical spirit, all right! This is certainly defending the Gospel with the Gospel.

---

Ca. Unde igitur declaras te amare Evangelium?

Po. Dicam. Franciscanus quidam apud nos non desinebat e suggesto deblaterare in Novum Testamentum Erasmi: conveni hominem privatim, laevam inieci capillis, dextra pugilem egi, suggillavi illum magnifice, totamque faciem tuber reddidi. Quid ais? non est hoc favere evangelio? Deinde absolvi illum a commissis, hoc ipso codice ter in verticem impacto, fecique tria tubera, in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti.

Ca. Satis quidem evangelice. Istuc nimirum est Evangelium Evangelio defendere.