would be destroying its soul. Neither are Christians allowed to eat meat that still has blood. Of the charges of incest and adultery, Tertullian says that Christians are not guilty of them, for they refrain from adultery and from fornicating before marriage, thus ensuring that they are safe from incest. Such behavior is different from that of the Romans, who through their immoral acts commit incest. This comes about simply through the case of mistaken identity: men go off and commit adultery, begetting children all throughout the empire who later unknowingly have intercourse with their own kin by mistake. In his attempt to make the Romans acknowledge their engagement in these acts, Tertullian hopes to demonstrate that Christians behave much differently from what they are accused of and that the charges should not hold. Charges of more "manifest crimes" answered (Chapters 10–45) Of the more "manifest crimes", as Tertullian refers to them, he first addresses the charges of sacrilege and says that Christians do not worship the pagan gods because the gods are not real, do not exist and thus hold no power or control over anything. Saturn, he claims, was once a mere man, as Roman lore and history will demonstrate. He then refutes further claims that the gods received their divinity through death, and wonders what business would the gods have with wanting ministers and assistants that are already dead. Such powerless beings cannot even be responsible for the rise and success of the Roman Empire. Furthermore, the character and nature of the gods themselves leave much to be desired; they are filled with rage, incestuous thoughts, envy, and jealousy. Why then should such imperfect and wicked beings be worthy of praise? He makes an even greater argument in referring to the pagan gods as demons, whose sole purpose is the subversion and destruction of mankind. They corrupt the souls of men by passions and lusts and rather successfully procuring "for themselves a proper diet of fumes and blood offered to their statues' images." In this way they draw attention to themselves and prevent people from turning to the true God. But even the demons acknowledge the power of God, and acknowledging this should be enough to clear the Christians of charges of sacrilege. For Tertullian, the Romans are at fault here for worshipping the wrong religion, not that of the one true God. But if the gods