Learning And Peril

Gentilis quidam est, ad fidem tendit: catechumenus est, majorem vult accipere doctrinae et fidei plenitudinem; caveat ne dum vult discere, male discat, et discat a Photino, discat ab Ario, discat a Sabellio: tradat se hujusmodi magistris quorum quaedam eum teneat auctoritas; et inductus quadam magistrorum praesumptione, teneris sensibus impressa dijudicare non noverit. Prius igitur oculis mentis perspiciat quid sequatur: videat ubi vita sit: tangat denique divinarum vitalia lectionum, ut nullo pravo offendatur interprete. Legit illi Sabellius: Ego in Patre, et Pater in me, et dicit unam esse personam. Legit Photinus: Quia mediator Dei et hominum homo Christus Jesus. Et alibi: Quid me vultis occidere hominem? Legit etiam Arius quia dixit: Quoniam Pater major me est. Legitur quidem manifestum: sed qua ratione dictum sit, debet ante pertractare secum, ut rationem dictorum possit advertere. Ducitur quadam magistrorum auctoritate; et profuisset ei non quaesisse, quam talem invenisse doctorem. Sed etiam gentilis si quis Scripturas accipiat, legit: Oculum pro oculo, dentem pro dente. Legit etiam: Si scandalizaverit te dextera tua, abscinde illam; non intelligit sensum, non advertit divini arcana sermonis, pejus labitur, quam si non legisset. Et ideo docuit quemadmodum Dei Verbum investigare deberent, non perfunctorie, non improvide, sed diligenter atque sollicite: Quod erat, inquit, ab initio, quod audivimus, et quod vidimus, oculis nostris perspeximus, et manus nostrae perscrutatae sunt de Verbo vitae: et vidimus et testamur, et annuntiamus vobis. Vides quod ante velut manibus quibusdam perscrutatus sit Dei verbum, et postea annuntiaverit: et ideo nihil Adae et Evae fortasse nocuisset verbum, si pertractantibus diligenter mentis quibusdam manibus ante tetigissent. Infirmi enim pertractando, et diligentius requirendo, uniuscujusque quam non intelligunt, possunt investigare naturam. Certe illi infirmi id lignum in quo scientiam mali esse cognoverant, ante quemadmodum tangerent, debuerant perscrutari. Nam et mali saepe nobis potest prodesse cognitio. Et ideo diaboli fraudes vel in hac legimus lectione, vel in prophetia, ut discamus quemadmodum artes ejus cavere possimus. Cognoscenda sunt enim tentamenta ejus, non ut sequamur, sed ut docti instructique caveamus. Sanctus Ambrosius Mediolanensis, De Paradiso, Caput XII

Some of the Gentiles, one who inclines to the faith and becomes a catechumen, who wishes to receive a greater fullness of the teachings and the faith, should be wary lest while he wishes to learn, he learns evil, from Photinus and Arius and Sabellius, so that he gives himself over to such teachers and their authority rules over him, and he is beholden to the assumption of these teachers, with tender senses so impressed, because he does not know how to judge. Before such a thing, then, let him discern with the eyes of the mind what he should follow, let him see where life is, then let him touch the vivifying things of Scripture, that he is not corrupted by a depraved interpretation. Sabellius reads to him: 'I am in the Father and the Father is in me' 1 and says that the person is one. Photinus reads, 'Because the mediator of God and of men, the man Jesus Christ,' 2 and elsewhere 'Why do you wish to kill me a man?' 3 And Arius reads: 'Because the Father is greater than me.' 4 The reading is easy, but the reason why it is said, a man should ponder to himself, that he be able to grasp the meaning of the words. He is led by the authority of certain teachers and not what he sought is given him when he has such teachers. But even the Gentile if he read the Scriptures, saying 'An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,' 5 and he reads, 'If your right hand scandalises you, cut it off' 6 he does not understand the meaning, he does not perceive the secrets of the Divine speech, and he falls further than if he had not read at all. And therefore this teaches that we should investigate the word of God, not hastily, nor improvidently, but with love and care, 'What was, 'he says, 'from the beginning, whom we heard, and whom we saw, and gazed upon with our own eyes, and our hands  examined, the word of life, this we saw and give witness, and we announce it to you.' 7 You see that before with the hands, as it were, he examined, if he might be the word of God, and after announced it, and therefore perhaps no harm would have come to Adam and Eve by that speech if, as with the examination with the hands, with the mind they had they examined. Even the weak by pondering, which requires great diligence, that which they are not able to understand, are able to investigate the nature of a thing. Certainly those weak ones should have first thought how they were to touch the tree in which they knew there was knowledge of evil. For even the knowledge of evil is able to profit us. And therefore we have the deceits of the devil which we may read in scripture, or in prophecy, 8 by which we learn what his art is and what we should beware. For let his snares be known, that we not fall into them, but being learned and instructed we be wary of them. Saint Ambrose, On Paradise, Chap 12 1 Jn 1.10 2 1 tim 2.5  3 Jn 8.40  4 Jn 14.28  5 Lev 24.20  6 Mt 5.30  7 1 Jn 1, 1,2  8 Ez 27.18