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Title: Leaves from St. John Chrysostom
Author: Chrysostom, St John
Language: English
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LEAVES
FROM
ST. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM.
SELECTED AND TRANSLATED BY
MARY H. ALLIES.
Edited with a Preface by T. W. ALLIES, K.C.S.G.
Μεγάλης δυνάµεως ἀπόδειξις τὸ διὰ τῶν ἐναντίων πείθειν.
_Hom. iv. on 1st Epistle to Corinthians._
LONDON: BURNS & OATES, Limited.
NEW YORK: CATHOLIC PUBLICATION SOCIETY CO.
1889.
_Imprimatur._
Henricus Eduardus,
_Cardinalis Archiepiscopus_.
Westmonasterii,
_Die 28 Novembris, 1888_.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Preface.—St. John Chrysostom. i
Birth and Parentage, 1
Named Preacher at Antioch, 3
Archbishop of Constantinople, 5
State of Constantinople, 7
Enmity of Eudoxia, 9
Synod of the Oak, 10
Exile at Kucusus, 11
Judgment of Pope Innocent I., 12
Comana, 13
His Death, 14
Translation of his Body, 15
Final Burial at St. Peter’s, 16
Summary of his Works, 17
PART I.
THE KING’S HIGHWAY.
1. The Way, the Truth, and the Life, 23
2. Who is the Greater? 26
3. The First are Last and the Last First, 29
4. Variety of Human Lot, 34
5. Whence the Rich? 38
6. The Rich Young Man, 41
7. Different Kinds of Friendship, 46
8. The Buyers and Sellers in the Temple, 49
9. The Voice of Good Deeds, 51
10. The Best Controversy, 55
11. The Tongue a Royal Power, 63
12. Golden Vessels and Golden Hearts, 66
13. True Almsgiving, 70
14. I was hungry and you gave Me to eat, 73
15. The Archetype and the Type, 77
16. The Weak Things of God, 83
17. The Secret of our Faith, 94
18. The Victory of our Faith, 100
19. Marriages as they were and as they are, 105
20. ‘Use a little Wine,’ 109
21. Possessing the Land, 118
22. The Word of Praise, 125
23. Sufferings of the Just, 130
24. The Folly of the Cross, 141
25. The Abode of the Humble, 148
26. The Prisoner of Jesus Christ, 152
27. The Seed not vivified unless it dies, 157
28. The Resurrection in Creation, 163
29. Resurrection confirmed by Signs which followed, 169
PART II.
THE KING’S HOUSE.
1. ‘Thou art Peter,’ 183
2. ‘Peter rose up,’ 188
3. Built upon the Rock, 189
4. The Priest a Man, not an Angel, 193
5. The Authority of the Priest, 198
6. The Priest a Shepherd of Souls, 204
7. One Sacrifice, 212
8. The New Pasch, 217
9. The ‘Eyes of Rome,’ 221
10. ‘This is My Body,’ 228
11. The Union of the Holy Eucharist, 237
12. Bone of our Bone, Flesh of our Flesh, 241
13. Remembrance of the Dead, 248
14. The Departed at the Sacred Mysteries, 252
15. The Tombs of the Martyrs, 256
16. The Bodies of the Martyrs, 259
17. The Tombs of the Servants, 266
PART III.
PERSONAL.
1. Letter to Pope Innocent, A.D. 404, 272
2. Letter to some Imprisoned Bishops and Priests (404), 282
3. To the Priests and Monks Nicholas, Theodotus, &c. (405), 283
4. To some Priests and Monks in Phœnicia (405), 284
5. To Studius the Prefect of the City, on the Death of his Brother
(404), 286
6. To Malchus on the Death of his Daughter, 288
7. To Olympias. The Virginal Life, 288
8. To Olympias. The Blessedness of Suffering, 290
9. To Olympias (406), 293
10. To Pœanius. ‘Glory be to God in all things,’ 295
11. Vanity of Vanities 296
ERRATA.
Page 16, _for_ “surrounded” _read_ surrounds.
Page 21, _for_ “Nirockl” _read_ Nirschl.
{_These are corrected in this electronic edition._}
ST. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM.
Birth and Parentage
John of Antioch was born about the year 347, of a noble family. His
father, Secundus, held a high rank in the imperial army; he died early,
and left a very young widow, in the bloom of age and beauty, and amply
endowed with wealth. Many suitors sought to obtain the hand of St.
Anthusa. She remained faithful to the memory of her husband, and devoted
to the education of her only son. She brought him up in all the
knowledge of the age and in strict piety, which she enforced by her
example. St. Anthusa, amid all the perils of Antioch, guarded her son
John with the same care which her contemporary, St. Monica, bestowed in
the small circle of an African town on her Augustine. She was happier in
one thing. The heathen charms of Antioch exerted no such power over her
son John as the like seductive beauty of Carthage exerted over the young
Augustine. The prayers and the care of St. Monica and St. Anthusa were
equally zealous. In the one case, after the most terrible fall, lasting
over a period of at least fourteen years, the African mother had the
unspeakable joy of seeing her son’s mind delivered from the most
dangerous heresy of the day, and was allowed to die in the arms of the
new-born Christian, who could share all her hopes of eternal life, which
are recorded in the beautiful dialogue between mother and son preserved
for us by that son, who was to be the greatest doctor of the Church. In
the other case, the Antiochene parent to whom was applied that
expression of the admiring heathen, ‘See what mothers these Christians
have,’ had the still rarer gift of rearing a son who never fell, who
pursued from beginning to end a holy life, who was crowned with a
confessorship exceeding the glory of many martyrs, and whose least merit
is that he was the greatest preacher of the Eastern Church, and gave to
the language of Plato, eight hundred years after him, in its decline, a
glory equal to that which the Athenian gave to it in its prime.
Two men—I know not if there be any others in all history—have had their
personal name merged by posterity in the name which expressed their
special qualities. As the son of Pepin is for ever Charlemagne, so John,
the son of St. Anthusa, is for ever Chrysostom, the Golden Mouth. It is
thus the world calls the one great and the other eloquent.
To return to the facts of John of Antioch’s life. As he grew up he had
lessons from the renowned heathen rhetorician Libanius. He studied
philosophy, and distinguished himself, at twenty years of age, in
preparation for the bar. Libanius considered him the best scholar he
had, and even wished to be succeeded by him in his office.
Named Preacher at Antioch
But John speedily renounced this and all worldly renown. He practised a
most strictly ascetic life, and gave himself up to the study of the
Christian religion. He was a pupil of that Diodorus, afterwards bishop
of Tarsus, who was then held in high repute as a Scripture commentator.
He was also under St. Meletius, patriarch of Antioch. From him he
received baptism in 369, at the age, therefore, of twenty-two years; and
the minor order of Lector three years later. The bishops who met at
Antioch in 373 designated him, with his friend Basil, for the episcopal
dignity. In his humility he took flight to the anchorets who dwelt in
the mountains near Antioch. With them he spent four years, and two years
after that in a cavern, until his health failed, and he was obliged to
return to Antioch. Here the patriarch Meletius made him a deacon in 380;
and his successor Flavian gave him the priesthood in 386, in his
fortieth year, and named him to be preacher in the cathedral.
Then during ten years the great see of the East wondered at the
eloquence, the teaching, and the zeal of the greatest preacher it had
known. In her sorest time of need he was at hand to comfort and support
the city of his birth. When a great riot broke out, and led the citizens
in their haste and anger to insult the statues of the emperor Theodosius
and his wife, the most pious Flaccilla, and Antioch trembled lest this
act of treason should be followed by summary destruction; when her
patriarch Flavian hurried across the five hundred miles to
Constantinople, that if possible he might soften the wrath of the
emperor before the bolt was launched, St. Chrysostom preached some of
his most famous sermons, those entitled, ‘On the Statues’. He kept up
the courage of the fainting people, and when Flavian returned with a
pardon which left untouched the privileges of the city, the preacher
shared with the patriarch the gratitude of those who were saved.
After ten years of incessant labours by the preacher, which form a large
part of the writings preserved to us, the see of Constantinople fell
vacant by the death of the patriarch Nectarius. Theodosius had died in
395, leaving the great eastern empire in the hands of his elder son
Arcadius, scarcely out of his boyhood. The young emperor was unwilling
to trust the see of his capital to any one of his clergy, and he
listened to the advice given to him to call from Antioch the man whose
genius was as great as his character was stainless. The great officer
who carried out the imperial invitation, or command, at Antioch, was
obliged to use artifice for the purpose of securing the preacher. His
people would not knowingly have suffered him to leave them. He was taken
out of the city under a plausible pretence. ‘Asterius, count of the
East, had orders to send for him and ask his company to a church without
the city. Having got him into his carriage, he drove off with him to the
first station on the high road to Constantinople, where imperial
officers were in readiness to convey him thither.’[1] Thus he was
carried across Asia with all possible speed. Upon his arrival at
Constantinople he was chosen bishop with one voice, and consecrated on
the 26th February, 398. His consecrator was Theophilus, patriarch of
Alexandria, who very unwillingly performed this office. He had striven
to get a certain priest who was devoted to himself appointed. His
subsequent enmity to St. Chrysostom was a main cause of the banishment
and death which befel the man whom he had consecrated.
Archbishop of Constantinople
Thus, at fifty years of age, St. Chrysostom was placed, not only without
seeking for it, but against his wishes, upon that see which, through the
residence of the emperor, was already become the most conspicuous of
episcopal thrones in the East. From the moment that Constantine,
sixty-seven years before, had made Byzantium Nova Roma, and founded, in
fact, a new empire, all the ambitious spirits among the prelates of the
East sought to seat themselves on that perilous height. This new centre
of temporal power was from that time forth the centre of trouble,
heresy, and disaster to the Church. Eusebius left his former see,
Nicomedia, to possess it, and to be the emperor’s bishop. One after
another Arian heretics succeeded. In 379, when the small number of
Catholics remaining in the new capital invited St. Gregory Nazienzen to
come to their aid, he could only open in a private room a small church,
which he called by the significant name of Anastasia, the Resurrection.
In that year Theodosius was promoted by the young Gratian to share his
throne, upon the destruction of his uncle Valens by the Goths. Valens
had all but destroyed both empire and Church in the East. It was the
great effort of Theodosius to restore both. In fifteen years of
unexampled energy, terrible trials, and almost miraculous success, he
did what valour, piety, and prudence could do. These years were all that
the Divine Providence had allowed him for a work almost transcending
human power; and when he died, not yet fifty years old, in 395, the
great empire of Rome, both in East and West, may be said to have fallen
into orphanage. His two sons, Arcadius and Honorius, one a youth of
nineteen and the other a boy of eleven, proved to be utterly
incompetent. Even Theodosius had failed to overcome the deep degeneracy
and rooted party spirit to which the Arian heresy had reduced the
eastern episcopate when St. Athanasius and St. Basil had been freshly
laid in their tombs. The council called by Theodosius at Constantinople
in 381 suffered St. Gregory to give up the see, which was surrounded by
envious rivals. For when Meletius, the patriarch of Antioch, died, in
presiding over that council, instead of extinguishing the Antiochene
schism by the election of Paulinus, the bishop who was already in
communion with Rome and Alexandria, according to an actual agreement,
they suffered the schism to be prolonged by the election of Flavian.
Nectarius took the place which St. Gregory had vacated, and St.
Chrysostom was called after about fifteen years to succeed to his
patriarchate.
State of Constantinople
Such was the state of things when, in 398, he began the charge of a city
which, in corruption, party spirit, and unquenched enmities of
long-standing, surpassed, if it were possible, his own native Antioch.
It is true, that instead of the small remnant who listened to St.
Gregory eighteen years before in the Church of the Resurrection, the
whole city was, in name at least, Catholic. Its bishop was seated in a
magnificent church, with a clergy more numerous, perhaps, than in any
episcopal see in the world: with vast revenues, and a position second
only to that of the emperor. But the court of the East was the focus of
endless rivalries: of eunuchs who were ministers of state exercising the
terrible autocratic powers of an emperor scarcely of age, and dominated
by an imperious empress, whose splendid beauty held him in thraldom,
while her lust of power was endless and her vanity excessive. And then
there were foreign and barbarian generals, whose struggle with each
other for mastery was always keeping the empire in disquietude. And
lastly, the rivalry of the Gallic Rufinus, whom Theodosius had left to
advise his son in the East with the semi-barbarian Stilicho, to whom he
had given both his favourite niece Serena for wife, and his younger son
Honorius for pupil in the West, was preparing the ruin of Constantine’s
empire by its own hands.
In such an atmosphere the preacher and the saint was placed to struggle
as he might against court intrigues, and to correct and purify a clergy
whose conduct left much to be desired. He showed himself throughout an
admirable bishop. Pursuing himself the most simple and ascetic life, he
bestowed his whole great income as patriarch on the poor. He founded
hospitals and homes. He celebrated the divine service with the utmost
care and splendour. He watched over discipline among his clergy. He was
unwearied in preaching. Nor did his vigilance end with the limits of his
own see. He sent missionaries to Phœnicia and Palestine; to the
Scythians, also, and the Goths. For the latter he established a special
service of their own—he did all he could to deliver them from the fatal
error which the deceit of the emperor Valens had infected them with, in
presenting them with Arianism instead of the Christian faith. He exerted
also the very questionable claim of his see—which the council of 381 had
attempted to exalt to the utmost—by judging the case of the Exarch of
Ephesus, and removing several faulty bishops from their seats in that
exarchate.
Enmity of Eudoxia
But the ‘Court’s stern martyr-guest,’ who was also ‘the glorious
preacher with soul of zeal and lips of flame,’ could not go on long
practising the life of a saint with the power of a patriarch under such
sovereigns as the weak Arcadius and the imperious Eudoxia. His virtues
offended many in a city of intense worldliness. His censures, delivered
with his wonted eloquence from the pulpit of the cathedral, roused great
enmities. In Theophilus, patriarch of Alexandria, he had a watchful
enemy, eager to punish, in the person of Chrysostom, the new rank which
his see arrogated of being the second in the Church, as the see of Nova
Roma. By that arrogation, the see of St. Mark at Alexandria was degraded
from a rank which it had held since the beginning of the Christian
hierarchy. Not only among the magnates of the court, but among his
brother bishops, Chrysostom found much opposition: and at last the
empress set herself at the head of his opponents. While he was absent in
Asia Minor, restoring to order the exarchate of Ephesus, Severian,
bishop of Gabala in Syria, sought, by sermons delivered in the cathedral
itself, to take from him the favour of the people. But it received him
with acclamation on his return, and drove Severian out of the city.
Synod of the Oak
But certain disturbances about the doctrine of Origen which had broken
out among the monks in Egypt involved him in unfortunate difficulties.
Among many monks who fled to Constantinople from the desert of Nitria in
Egypt, under excommunication from Theophilus, were the ‘four tall
brothers’. They came to accuse their patriarch before the emperor and
Chrysostom. He took them up, showing kindness and sympathy, though he
did not admit them to communion. Theophilus was summoned to
Constantinople by the emperor, to answer for his conduct before a synod.
To escape this humiliation he used every effort to ruin Chrysostom, whom
he took to be his own opponent. He accused Chrysostom himself of
Origenism. This scheme of the Egyptian patriarch brought over to his
side all the opponents of Chrysostom at the court. Theophilus even
ventured to appear as the accuser and judge of the patriarch in the
capital itself. He was able to draw together a synod of thirty-six
bishops at the Oak, a country-house near Chalcedon, and to summon the
bishop of Constantinople to appear before it. Chrysostom, on the double
ground of his own rank and his innocence, refused to appear. The
unlawful synod ‘of the Oak’ condemned him, supported by the influence of
the empress. Forty bishops around him in Constantinople attested his
innocence, and objected to a proceeding utterly unlawful and, until
then, unknown. Chrysostom was willing to obey a command of the emperor
that he should cross the Bosphorus and attend; but the people threatened
insurrection if the command were not withdrawn. Chrysostom had to
return, and was reseated in his church with the joyful acclamation of
his people.
Exile at Kucusus
Not long did the peace last. A statue of the empress had been
inaugurated before the cathedral. The crowd indulged in most intemperate
rejoicings, and paid almost idolatrous homage to the statue. This
Chrysostom, in preaching, censured. The empress took the blame to
herself: it kindled her wrath afresh. It was whispered to her that the
great preacher had alluded to her under the name of Herodias. A new
synod of the patriarch’s opponents was convoked. It issued, in the year
404, a second sentence of deposition against him. It alleged that
Chrysostom, after being deposed by a synod, had, contrary to the law of
the Church, resumed his see without being restored by another synod. The
emperor Arcadius confirmed the decision, and subscribed a decree of
banishment. This time Chrysostom waited for force to be used. Soldiers
were sent into the church: they pushed aside the people who were
protecting their bishop. Blood flowed, and the church was desecrated.
Chrysostom was carried away to Nicæa in Bithynia, and was ordered, in
the midst of the summer heats, to go thence on foot, amid the greatest
privations and hardships, to Kucusus in Armenia. The journey brought on
him a grievous illness. Thus he was detained for some time at Cæsarea in
Cappadocia. He was scarcely recovered when he was driven further on. In
406, he reached Kucusus. But he kept up intercourse by letter with his
friends in the capital. Arsacius, in the meantime, had been intruded by
the emperor’s power into his see; and a grievous persecution was
instituted against those who would not recognise the intruder.
Chrysostom consoled them in many letters. Banished as he was, he
concerned himself for the spread of the faith among Persians and Goths.
His sufferings, and the magnanimity with which he bore them, won for him
sympathy far and wide. But his enemies remained unmoved. He besought the
intercession of Pope Innocent I., describing to him, in a letter which
is translated in this volume, the utter illegality of the violence which
he was suffering. The Pope applied to the emperor Honorius for succour,
and was supported by him in sending a solemn deputation to the emperor
Arcadius; but he was under the dominion of the offended Eudoxia, and
refused to listen either to his brother emperor or the Pope.
Judgment of Pope Innocent I.
The Pope withdrew his communion from the intruder Arsacius, who had been
put unlawfully in the see of Chrysostom, and from his successor Atticus;
and for many years this mark of reprobation was all that the Pope could
do in the difficult circumstances of the times. It lasted until the name
of Chrysostom was replaced in the diptychs of the Church at
Constantinople.
Comana
But Arcadius went further, and condemned Chrysostom to a more distant
and ruder exile at Pityus, a seaport on the most desolate eastern coast
of the Euxine. In the utmost summer heat, with exhausted strength, the
deposed patriarch had to undertake this journey. He never reached the
end. His merciless guards pressed his weakness to the utmost. When at
Comana he thought his end was near; but the guards urged him on. For an
hour he could drag himself along; then his strength utterly failed. He
was taken into the small church of the Martyr Basiliscus, which was
near. His friend and biographer, the Bishop Palladius, thus describes
the last scene:
His Death
‘In that very night (that is, at Comana) the martyr of the place stood
before him, Basiliscus by name, who had been bishop of Comana, and died
by martyrdom in Nicomedia in the reign of Maximinus, together with
Lucian of Bithynia, who had been a priest of Antioch. And he said, “Be
of good heart, brother John, for to-morrow we shall be together”. It is
said that the martyr had already made the same announcement to the
priest of the place: “Prepare the place for brother John, for he is
coming”. And John, believing the divine oracle, upon the morrow besought
his guards to remain there until the fifth hour. They refused, and set
forward; but, when they had proceeded about thirty stadia, he was so ill
that they returned back to the martyr’s shrine whence they had started.
‘When he got there, he asked for white vestments suitable to the tenor
of his past life; and taking off his clothes of travel, he clad himself
in them from head to foot, being still fasting, and then gave away his
old ones to them about him. Then, having communicated in the symbols of
the Lord, he made the closing prayer “on present needs”. He said his
customary words, “Glory be to God for all things,” and having concluded
it with his last Amen, he stretched forth those feet of his which had
been so beautiful in their running, whether to convey salvation to the
penitent or reproof to the hardened in sin. And being gathered to his
fathers, and shaking off this mortal dust, he passed to Christ, as it is
written, “Thou shalt come to thy burial like full wheat that is
harvested in season, but the souls of transgressors shall die
prematurely”. But so great a crowd of virgins, ascetics, and those who
had the witness of sanctity in their life were present from Syria,
Cilicia, Pontus, and Armenia, that many thought they had come by
agreement. With these solemn rites, like a victorious athlete, he was
buried in the same shrine with Basiliscus.’[2]
In the meantime, the empress Eudoxia had passed away in child-bed before
her victim. In the undimmed lustre of her beauty, and the undiminished
power of her will over her husband, she had been called to her account.
Her husband, the emperor Arcadius, died not long after. He finished an
utterly inglorious reign of twelve years at the age of thirty-one. His
miserable government had gone near to destroy the empire which his
father saved, and had actually thrown Alaric with his Goths upon Rome
and Italy. He was succeeded by Theodosius II., a boy eight years old.
Translation of his Body
Thirty years after, a disciple and friend of Chrysostom sat in the see
of Nova Roma, the orthodox Proclus, who was a theologian and a saint. He
moved the emperor Theodosius II. to bring back the body of Chrysostom to
its place among the bishops in the Church of the Apostles, where only
the bishops and the emperors were buried—the former in the church, the
latter in the vestibule. Theodoret, bishop of Cyrus at the time, says:
‘A great multitude of the faithful crowded the sea in vessels, and
lighted up a part of the Bosphorus near the mouth of the Propontis with
torches. These sacred treasures were brought to the city by the present
emperor. He laid his face upon the coffin, and entreated that his
parents might be forgiven for having so unadvisedly persecuted the
bishop.’
Final Burial at St. Peter’s
Those remains now rest in a fitter place. St. Chrysostom, in words
quoted further on, when dilating as a fervent lover of St. Paul upon his
praise, cried out: ‘Rome, for this do I love, although having reason
otherwise to praise her, both for her size, and her antiquity, and her
beauty, and her multitude, and her power, and her wealth, and her
victories in war. But passing by all these things, for this I count her
blessed: because, when alive, Paul wrote to them, and loved them so
much, and went and conversed with them, and there finished his life.
Wherefore the city is on that account more remarkable than for all other
things together, and like a great and strong body, it has two shining
eyes—the bodies of these saints. Not so bright is the heaven when the
sun sends forth his beams, as is the city of the Romans sending forth
everywhere over the world these two lights. Thence shall Paul, thence
shall Peter, be caught up. Think, and tremble, what a sight shall Rome
behold, when Paul suddenly rises from that resting-place with Peter, and
is carried up to meet the Lord. What a rose doth Rome offer to Christ!
with what two garlands is that city crowned! with what golden fetters is
she girdled! what fountains does she possess! Therefore do I admire that
city, not for the multitude of its gold, nor for its columns, nor for
its other splendours, but for these, the pillars of the Church.’
The body, therefore, of him who spoke these words, while a preacher at
Antioch, rests more fitly than in any other place amid that matchless
group of apostles, saints, and martyrs which surrounds the body of the
Fisherman, in the central shrine of Christendom. There he awaits the
sight which he anticipated with so much joy.
I must notice one more fact of the eight great brethren, the chief
doctors of the East and West. St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Augustine,
St. Gregory the Great, St. Athanasius, St. Basil, St. Gregory Nazianzen,
and himself, all suffered persecution; the life of St. Athanasius was
for years in danger from the bitter hatred of the emperor Constantius,
and the emperor Valens would have destroyed St. Basil, had he dared. But
to Chrysostom alone was given actually to lay down his life itself for
justice’ sake, and to follow St. John the Baptist not only in sanctity
of life and preaching the cross of Christ, but in his death through the
persecution of a woman, and the blinded tyranny of a king devoted to her
will.
Summary of his Works
It may be well to give here a summary of St. Chrysostom’s works. Very
much of his labour he spent in commenting upon Scripture. This took the
form of homilies, of which the larger part was delivered before the
people in Antioch. He belongs to the Antiochene school of literal
explanation. He was a fellow-pupil under Diodorus of Tarsus, with that
Theodorus, afterwards bishop of Mopsuestia, whose writings were the
fountain-head of what was afterwards called Nestorianism. They were
composed exactly at the same time as those of St. Augustine, and were as
prolific for evil as those of St. Augustine for good. But the piety and
accurate doctrine of St. Chrysostom preserved him from the errors of his
early comrade and friend. His homilies in their structure may be divided
into the careful expounding of the text, even to its particles, and then
the moral application, both in popular yet scientific form, finished
with such skill that the art of eloquence seems blended with that of
exposition in the fairest union.
He thus expounded the whole of Genesis in sixty-seven homilies; the
Psalms in sixty homilies; the prophet Isaias, but only to the middle of
the 8th chapter, according to both the historical and the mystical
sense. There are five discourses on St. Anne, the mother of Samuel;
three on David and Saul; two on the obscurity of the prophets; six upon
the seraphim, in which he speaks on the incomprehensibility of the
Divine Being. To the gospel of St. Matthew he has given ninety homilies,
so skilfully interweaving Christian doctrine with literal exposition
that, in Montfaucon’s opinion, no such work exists elsewhere; and St.
Thomas Aquinas is reported to have said that he would rather have it
than the city of Paris. He has given seven homilies to the history of
Lazarus and Dives in St. Luke; and eighty-eight homilies to the gospel
of St. John, shorter, however, than those on St. Matthew. To the Acts of
the Apostles he has given fifty-five homilies, delivered at
Constantinople, and written down by shorthand. To the epistles of St.
Paul he has given two hundred and forty-six homilies; which make up the
number of four hundred and eighty-six on the whole New Testament.
All these are counted among his best works: but the best of all, those
on the Pauline epistles, particularly that to the Romans. St. Isidore of
Pelusium says: ‘I believe if Paul had interpreted himself in Attic
phrase, he would have done it no otherwise than this distinguished holy
teacher. So admirable is his exposition in meaning, elegance, and choice
of words.’
Besides biblical exposition, St. Chrysostom has left a great number of
other discourses on various occasions.
Such are eight homilies against the Jews; twelve against the Anomæans,
the worst branch of the Arians. Discourses on the great festivals;
panegyrics on saints, among them on bishops of Antioch, Ignatius,
Babylas, Philogonius, Eustathius, and Meletius. Seven on the Apostle
Paul, held at Antioch, whom he seems to have chosen for his model: to
have read perpetually, and, as it were, to have seen at his side.
Of occasional discourses, there are twenty-one ‘On the Statues’ held at
Antioch in the Lent of 387, full of tenderness and the most stirring
eloquence. Of moral discourses, there are two to ‘those about to be
illuminated,’ that is, baptised: nine upon penance. Eleven at
Constantinople in 398 and 399, one of these in praise of the empress
Eudoxia when she came at night to Sancta Sophia to venerate the relics
of the martyrs; nine others on various subjects.
Among his dogmatic works are the demonstration against the Jews that
Christ is God, proving the divine dignity of the Messias from the
fulfilment of Old Testament prophecies, from the wonderful spread of the
Christian faith, from the fulfilment of the prophecies of Christ,
especially on the temple and the Jewish people: the writing on St.
Babylas, and against Julian and the heathen. He points out how the
miracles worked at Antioch in Julian’s attack on Daphne were a warning
to the restorer of heathenism, disregarding which, he was punished by an
early death. A treatise on two books to Theodorus, when he lapsed, the
Theodorus mentioned above: on compunction, two books: on Providence,
three books, to a friend grievously troubled. To the opposers of the
monastic life, three books: the comparison between a monk and a king: on
the priesthood, six books, written in solitude, in 376. It dwells on the
holiness and exalted character of the New Testament priesthood: on its
divine powers in offering the sacrifice and forgiving sins; on the
difficulty and the dangers of preaching; on the great qualities required
by a priest and a bishop. So he excuses himself to his friend Basil for
recommending him to an office which he fled from himself. A treatise on
the virginal life, which he gives only as a counsel, not as a precept,
recognising the honour due to marriage. Two books to a young widow,
advising her not to remarry. Against the prohibited dwelling of
unmarried women in the same house with priests, and a most beautiful
treatise upon ‘No one can be hurt except by himself,’ written in the
last moments of his own banishment, of which his own life and death is
the best assurance; and a like one ‘on those who are scandalised at
misfortunes’.
Lastly, we possess 238 letters, all but one called forth by the
incidents of his own banishment. These show the holy confessor in the
whole beauty of his magnanimous life. They are instinct throughout with
trust in the Divine Providence, like the last words which he uttered
when he lay down to die.
Out of this vast mass of works, the largest left to us by any Greek
Father, the Translator has ventured to make a small selection, which,
together with the translation itself, is entirely her own; and for which
her excuse is the desire to bring in the easiest form specimens of so
great a writer, and of one greater yet in deed than in writing, greatest
of all in his death, before some who know him rather by the reputation
he has left in the Church than by his actual words.[3]
THOS. W. ALLIES.
_11th July, 1888._
PART I.
THE KING’S HIGHWAY.
The Way, the Truth, and the Life.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_,[4] lxxvi., vol. ii., p. 395.)
· · · · · · ·
Is not it with justice, then, that He turns away from us and chastises
us, since in everything He is offering us Himself, and we are resisting
Him? This is clear to all. ‘For,’ He says, ‘if you wish to adorn
yourself you have My adornment, or to arm yourself you have My arms, or
to dress yourself you have My clothing, or to eat you have My table, or
to walk you have My road, or to inherit you have My inheritance, or to
go into your own country you have that city of which I am the Builder
and the Architect, or to build a house you have My tents. I do not
demand of you a reward for the things which I give, but I owe interest
to you besides for that reward if you are willing to make use of all
that is Mine.’ What could equal this munificence? ‘I am father, I am
brother, I am bridegroom, I am dwelling-place; I am food, I am clothing,
I am root and foundation; I am all things whatsoever you desire: stand
in need of no man. I will also be a slave, for I came to minister, not
to be ministered to. I am a friend too; I am member and head, and
brother, and sister, and mother; I am all things; only hold Me for your
own. I am poor for you, and a wanderer for you; I was on the cross for
you, and in the tomb for you; I intercede with the Father for you up
above, and I came down to earth as a messenger to you from the Father.
You are all things to Me—brother and co-heir, and friend and member.’
What more do you ask? Why do you turn away from Him, your Lover? Why do
you labour for the world? Why do you pour water into a broken pitcher?
For this is to toil for the life which now is. Why do you spin a web for
burning? Why beat the air? Why run at random? Has not every art an
object? This is clear to everyone. Show me, then, you also, the object
of your labour in life. You have none.
_Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity._ Let us go into a churchyard;
show me now your father, show me your wife. Where is he who was clothed
in gold? Where is he who rode in his chariot? Where is he who had an
army at his command, he who had a treasury, and he who held a public
office? Where is he who killed some and cast others into prison, who
slew whom he pleased and acquitted whom he pleased? I see nothing except
bones, and the moth and the cobweb; all those things were dust and
fable, and dream and shadow, and idle talk and an epitaph—indeed, not
even an epitaph, for we see an epitaph on a figure, but in this place
not even a figure. And would that evils ended here! Now, that which
pertains to honour and feasting and great name is like a shadow and idle
talk, but that which they produce is by no means a shadow or idle talk.
Their effects remain, and will abide with us there and be evident to
all—rapacity and selfishness, fornication, adultery, and a thousand
vices of the same kind. These are not in the image nor in the ashes, but
both words and deeds are written above. With what eyes, then, shall we
look upon Christ? For if a man would not venture to see his father if he
were conscious in his own mind of sinning against him, how shall we in
that hour confront Him Who is infinitely gentler than a father? How
shall we bear Him? For we shall stand before the tribunal of Christ, and
there will be a strict scrutiny of all things. But if anyone disbelieve
in that future judgment, let him consider things as they are on
earth—those in prisons, for instance, those in mines and on dung-hills,
possessed men, madmen, those who are fighting with incurable disease,
those who are pinched by persistent poverty, those who are mated with
hunger, those who are given over to unhealable sorrow, those who are in
captivity. Men, indeed, would not now suffer these things if He did not
ordain that reward and punishment should await all those who have been
guilty of the like transgressions. And if these men incur no penalty in
this world, you must take this to yourself as a sign that there is to be
something in the next after our departure hence. For He Who is the Lord
of all would not chastise some and leave others, who had been guilty of
the same or of worse things, unchastised, if He did not reserve a
punishment for them in the next world.
· · · · · · ·
Who is the Greater?
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lviii., vol. ii., p. 167.)
· · · · · · ·
_At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying: Who, then, is the
greater in the kingdom of heaven?_ The disciples had a human feeling,
this is why the Evangelist lays special stress upon it, saying, _at that
time_—that is, when He had singled out Peter for special honour. For in
the case of James and John one was the first-born, but He did nothing of
the kind for them. As, then, they are ashamed to own to their annoyance,
they do not say openly: ‘Why hast Thou honoured Peter more than us?’ or,
‘Is he greater than we?’ they would not say this, but ask indefinitely:
_Who is the greater?_ When they saw the three singled out for special
honour, they had felt nothing of the kind; they _were_ grieved, however,
when so great a distinction was conferred upon one. This was not all,
for their feeling was intensified by putting many other favours
together. For Our Lord said to him: _I will give thee the keys, and,
Blessed art thou, Simon Bar Jona_, and again, _Give it to them for Me
and thee_; and, seeing Peter’s great fearlessness, they were irritated.
And if Mark says that they did not put their question, but thought it in
their own minds, this is not in any way contrary to Matthew’s account.
For it is probable that they did both one and the other, both that they
felt this at one time, and that at another they spoke out, and also had
their own thoughts about it. Now, do not look merely at the accusation,
but consider further, first, that they are not seeking earthly things,
and secondly, that they afterwards overcame this feeling, and ceded the
first places to each other. We, on the contrary, are neither able to
reach their defects, nor do we seek who is the greater in the kingdom of
heaven, but who is the greater in the kingdom of the world, who is the
richer and the more powerful.
Now, what does Christ say? He reveals their conscience to them, and
answers this feeling rather than their mere words. _Calling unto Him a
little child, He said: Unless you be converted and become as little
children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven._ ‘You, indeed,
enquire who is the greater, and dispute about the first places; _I_ tell
you that he who has not become meeker than all the rest is not worthy
even to enter into that kingdom.’ And He brings the example before them
in a beautiful way; and not only does He bring it before them, but He
sets the child in the midst of them, admonishing them by the sight, and
urging them to be both humble and unaffected. For a child is free from
envy and from vainglory, and from the love of the first places, and he
possesses the greatest virtue—simplicity, and unaffectedness and
humility. It is not sufficient to have courage and prudence, but this
virtue also: I mean humility and simplicity. For with the greatest, our
salvation will be at fault, if we have not these. Contempt, blows,
honour, or praise cause a child neither annoyance nor envy, nor is he
thereby inflated. Do you see again how He excites us to natural
qualities, showing us that these may be rightly directed by a free
choice, and how He thus condemns the wretched fury of the Manicheans?
For if nature be bad, why does He take from nature illustrations in
favour of asceticism? The child seems to me most truly a child standing
in the midst of them, free from all these passions. Such a child,
indeed, is without folly, and the love of reputation, without jealousy
and envy, and every affection of the kind; and having many
virtues—simplicity, humility, unmeddlesomeness—he is not puffed up by
any one of them; it is doubly wise to possess these things and not to be
vain of them. This is why Our Lord called the child and set him in the
midst of them; nor did He close His argument here, but He adds this
further exhortation, saying: _He who shall receive one of these children
in My name receives Me_. ‘Not only if you have become like to them shall
you have a great reward, but also if you honour those like them for My
sake, I will give you a kingdom as a reward for your honour of them.’ He
says, indeed, more than this in the words _receives Me_. Thus, ardently
am I to desire meekness and unaffectedness. Hence He calls men who ate
thus simple and humble, and cast off by the multitude, and despised,
children.
· · · · · · ·
The First are Last and the Last First.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxvii., vol. ii., p. 285.)
· · · · · · ·
Let no sinner despair: let no just man give way to sloth. Neither let
the just be presumptuous, for it often happens that the harlot outstrips
him; nor let the sinner be downcast, for he may overtake those who are
first.
Listen to what God says to Jerusalem: _I said all these things after her
adultery, Turn to Me, and she did not turn_. As often as we return to
the burning charity of God, He no longer remembers our former sins. God
is not as man: He does not reproach those who come to Him, or say, if we
be really changed, ‘Why hast thou wasted so much time?’ but He loves us
whenever we go to Him. Let us only go to Him in the right way. Let us
cling fast to Him, and nail our hearts to His fear. These things have
taken place not only recently, but they happened also of old. What was
worse than Manasses? Yet he was able to appease God. Who was more
blessed than Solomon? But torpor made him fall. Indeed, I can show the
two things happening in one man; in Solomon’s father, for he himself was
just and became wicked. Who was more blessed than Judas? Yet Judas
became a traitor. What could be more miserable than Matthew? But he
became an evangelist. What was worse than Paul? Still, Paul became an
apostle. Who was more zealous than Simon? And yet Simon himself became
the most wretched of all. How many more of the same vicissitudes would
you contemplate—those both of the past and those which are taking place
every day? So I say, neither let the man who is on the stage despair,
nor let the man who is in the Church make too bold. To the latter it was
said: _He who seems to stand, let him be careful lest he fall_, and to
the former: _Does the fallen man not rise up again?_ and, _Restore
languid hands and disabled knees_. Again, to the just it was said:
_Watch_, but to sinners: _Arise, thou who sleepest, and rise from the
dead_. The former have need to watch over what they possess, and the
latter to become that which they are not as yet: the just to preserve
their health, sinners to put off their sickness. For they _are_ sick,
but many of the sick are sound, and some of the sound, by their
carelessness, become sick. For it was to these that Our Lord said, _Go,
thou art sound: sin no more, lest something worse should befal thee_;
but to sinners, _Wilt thou be made sound? Take up thy bed and walk, and
go into thy house._ Sin is indeed a dire paralysis, or, rather, it is
not only a paralysis, but something more fearful. For a paralysed man is
not only lacking good things, but is also a prey to bad ones. Still, if
you are even in this state, and are willing to make a small effort to
rise, all sins are remitted. Even if your sickness has lasted
thirty-eight years, yet you strive to become sound: there is no one to
prevent you. Christ is at hand now as then, and He says, _Take up thy
bed_. Only be willing to rise; do not lose heart. Have you no man? You
have God. Have you no one to put you into the pool? But you have One Who
will not allow you to require the pool in vain. Have you no one to hold
you in it? You have One Who commands you to take up your bed. You have
not to say, _When I come, another gets down before me_. For if you wish
to go down to the fountain no man hinders you. Charity is not spent nor
consumed: it is a source which is always flowing upwards: out of His
fulness we are all cured as to our soul and as to our body. Now,
therefore, also, let us approach Him. Rahab was a harlot, yet she was
saved; and the thief was a murderer, but he became a citizen of
paradise; and Judas, being in the society of the Master, was lost,
whilst the thief on the cross became a disciple. These are God’s
paradoxes. Thus it was that the Magi found favour, that a publican
became an evangelist, and a blasphemer an apostle.
Consider these things, and never despair, but be of good heart always,
and raise yourself up. Keep to that path alone which leads above, and
you will make rapid progress. Close not the doors nor block up the
entrance. This time is short and the labour small. And if it were heavy,
even then we should not refuse it. For if you are not weary with this
most delicious weariness of wisdom and virtue, you will be weary with
the weariness of the world, and will be worn out in another way. But if
there be weariness here too, why do we not choose for ourselves that
other which is so productive of fruit and has so great a reward? And yet
this last weariness is not as the former. For in worldly things there
are always risks and continuous penalties: hope is uncertain, much
slavery of spirit is required, and there is expenditure of money, and of
strength of body and of mind, and even then the compensation of results
is far below the expectation, if there be any results at all. The sweat
and toil of worldly business do not, indeed, in all cases produce fruit.
Even in those instances in which they are not fruitless, but rich in
results, these are short-lived. For it is when you grow old, and have no
longer an acute sense of enjoyment that your labour yields its fruit.
The hard work falls to the lot of the body at its prime, whereas the
fruit and its enjoyment come when it is worn and aged, and time has
dulled its perceptions, or, if it has not dulled them, the prospect of
an approaching end forbids enjoyment. It is not so in the other case,
but labour is the part of a mortal and corruptible body, and the crown
belongs to a glorified and immortal one which is eternal. The labour
comes first and is slight, but the reward comes last and is infinite, so
that you may rest with security and be untroubled as to the future.
There is no fear of change or of misfortune as there is here on earth.
What goods, then, are these—insecure, slight, and earthly, which
disappear before they appear, and are possessed with so much toil? How
are they equal to those immutable, undecaying good things which are free
from all hardships, and crown you in the time of warfare? The man who
despises money receives his reward even on earth: he is free from care
and envy, slander, treachery, and heart-burnings. The wise man, he who
lives decorously, is crowned and in luxury before his flight hence, in
his freedom from unseemliness and senseless laughter, and dangers and
accusations, and all evils. In the same way, virtue, of whatever other
kind, puts us already in possession of our reward. Let us then, fly from
evil and choose the good, so that we may arrive at both present and
future rewards. Thus we shall both enjoy our lives here and possess our
crowns in heaven, which may it be given to us all to do through the love
and mercy of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory and power for ever
and ever. Amen.
Variety of Human Lot.
(_Homilies on the First Epistle to the Corinthians_,[5] xxix., vol. ii.,
p. 359.)
· · · · · · ·
_One and the same Spirit worketh all things, distributing to each his
own gifts according to His pleasure._ Therefore he says, let us not be
troubled or grieved, thinking to ourselves, ‘Why have I received this
and not received that?’ Neither must we scrutinise the doings of the
Holy Spirit. For if you know that He has shown you favour out of
kindness, considering that out of the same kindness He has also put a
limit to His gift, acquiesce and rejoice in what you have received, and
be not down-hearted about what you have not received, but rather give
thanks that your gift is not beyond your power. If it behoves us not to
be over-eager in spiritual things, how much less in those of the flesh;
but we should be at ease, and not be disturbed because one man is rich
and another poor. In the first place, not every rich man gets his wealth
from God, but many become rich through injustice and avarice and
graspingness. For how could He, Who commands us not to lay up riches,
have given that which He prohibited our taking? Now, in order that I may
silence those who differ from us in this with the more authority, let us
go deeper into the argument. Tell me why were riches given by God? Why
was it that Abraham was rich, and that Jacob even wanted bread? Were not
both righteous men? Had not God said equally of the three, _I am the God
of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob_? Why then was the one rich and
the other in poverty? Or, rather, why was Esau, the unjust and
fratricidal man, rich, and Jacob in servitude for so long? Again, why
did Isaac pass his whole life in ease, and Jacob in toils and hardships,
so that he said, _My days are short and miserable_? Why did David, too,
being both prophet and king, as he was, live his life in labour, whilst
his son Solomon was, during forty years, the richest of men, in the
enjoyment of enduring peace, glory, and honour, and every possible
luxury? Why, in short, amongst the prophets was one tried more and
another less? Because thus it was profitable to each. Therefore, every
man should say, _Thy judgments are a deep abyss_. For if God exercised
those great and admirable men in different ways—one through poverty,
another through riches; one by a life of ease, another by tribulation—it
behoves us all the more to take the same lesson now to heart. Together
with these considerations, we must admit that many things happen to us,
which are not according to His judgment, but the result of our own
wickedness. Say not, then, ‘Why is it that a man is rich, being bad, and
another man is poor, being just?’ We may easily explain this, and say
that neither does the just man suffer any harm from his poverty, which
is a source of greater merit to him, and that the unjust man, unless he
be converted, possesses in his riches a store of wrath, and that, in
place of chastisement, the riches of many men have often been the cause
of evil to them, and led them into a thousand abysses. But God leaves
them these riches, showing everywhere the free action of divine choice,
everywhere teaching other men not to fight nor to strive for money.
‘What, then,’ you say, ‘if a bad man becomes rich, and suffers no harm?
If a righteous man were to become rich, it would be just, but what are
we to say when a bad man does?’ That on this account he is to be pitied.
For wealth added to wickedness increases the intensity of passions. But
a man is just, and he is starving. Well, it does him no harm. But he is
bad, and starving. Well, he has his just deserts, or, rather, what is
for his good. ‘But so and so,’ you say, ‘received his wealth from
ancestors, and has squandered it on bad women and parasites, and he is
none the worse.’ How is this? Will you call him a dissolute man, and say
he is none the worse? He is a drunkard, and do you call it enjoyment? He
wastes for no good purpose, and do you look upon him as enviable? What
could a man do worse than to be making his soul an ignominy? If a body
were to be distorted or maimed, you would think it the saddest matter in
the world; yet, contemplating that man’s soul wholly maimed, do you
consider him a happy man? ‘But,’ you say, ‘he does not feel it.’ And for
this very reason he is the more to be pitied, just as men who lose their
wits are. For he who knows that he is ill will seek the physician
honestly and apply remedies; whereas he who does not know it will be
beyond cure. Tell me, then, is this the man you consider happy? But this
is not astonishing, for the majority of men are devoid of a right
estimate of things. So it is that, when chastised, we pay the extreme
penalty, and are not freed from wrath; hence come desires and
despondencies and perpetual anxieties, since, when God shows us a
painless life, that of goodness, by removing ourselves from it, we
choose another road, the way of riches and money, which is productive of
a thousand evils. We act as a man would act, who, not being able to
judge of physical beauty, but, ascribing everything to clothes and
adornment, should pass over a young woman, possessing comeliness of
body, and take to himself an ugly one, deformed and crippled, merely for
her fine dress. The great mass of men now do something of this kind in
the matter of goodness and badness, by following their bad nature on
account of its outward attraction, and by turning away from the good
nature, which is blooming and beautiful, on account of its unadorned
comeliness, the very reason why they should have chosen it.
· · · · · · ·
Whence the Rich?
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xxxiv., vol. ii., p. 430.)
· · · · · · ·
You ask, ‘Whence come the rich?’ for it is written, _Riches and poverty
are from the Lord_. Now let us ask those who urge this upon us, ‘Then is
all wealth and all poverty from the Lord?’ Who would say as much? For we
see many laying up riches for themselves through rapacity, through the
spoliation of tombs, through sorcery, and other means of the same kind,
and that those who possess these riches are unworthy even of living.
Now, tell me, is this the wealth we recognise as from God? No, far from
it. Whence, then, does it come? From sin. For a bad woman grows rich by
misusing her body, and the handsome youth often bartering the flower of
his years possesses his money in ignominy, and the invader of graves who
unearths tombs amasses the wealth of unrighteousness, just as the thief
does by breaking down walls. Therefore not all wealth is from God. How
then, you ask, shall we answer this argument? In the first place,
understand that poverty was not made by God either, and then we will
examine our argument. When a licentious youth either spends his riches
upon bad women, or upon magical arts, or upon any other lusts of the
same nature, and thus becomes poor, is it not evident that it is brought
about not by God, but by his own riotousness? Again, if a man were to
become poor through sloth, or to fall into poverty because of his want
of sense, or to engage in perilous and unlawful pursuits, is it not
evident once more that no one of these or those like them would be
thrust into this want by God? Then, is the Scripture false? God forbid,
but those who lay down the law on all the Scripture with insufficient
discernment are wanting in sense. For if it be asserted that the
Scripture is trustworthy, and it be proved that not all wealth is from
God, then the difficulty lies in the weakness of those who put an
inconsiderate construction upon such things. I ought indeed to have let
you alone on this point, having first cleared the Scripture of blame, in
order to make you pay a penalty for your carelessness concerning it; yet
since I have great pity on you, and cannot bear to see you more troubled
and confounded, let me add the explanation, considering in the first
place who said it, then when it was said, and to whom.
For God does not speak in the same way to all, just as we ourselves do
not use children as we use men. Now, when is it said, and by whom, and
to whom? By Solomon of old to the Jews, who were familiar with sensible
things only, and measured God’s power by these. It is they who say, _Is
He not able to give us bread_? and, _What sign dost Thou show us? Our
fathers ate manna in the desert, whose belly is their God_. Since they
estimated Him by these things, he tells them that God is also able to
make men rich and poor, not that He Himself does it altogether, but that
He can do it if He choose, as when He says, _He rebuketh the sea, and
drieth it up, and bringeth all the rivers to be a desert_, although this
never happened at all. How, then, does the prophet say that it did? Not
as really taking place, but implying His power to do it. Now, what sort
of poverty does He give and what sort of wealth? Call to mind the
patriarch, and you will see what the riches are which God bestows. For
it was He Who made Abraham rich, and Job after him, as Job admitted in
the words: _If we have received good things from the Lord, shall we not
endure the bad things as well?_ And later on their twofold increase was
His gift. And Jacob’s riches began from the same source. There is a
poverty which is praised by Him, that which He proposed to that rich
young man, saying, _If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and
give to the poor, and come and follow Me_; and again, when legislating
for the disciples, He said, _Ye shall not possess gold nor silver nor
two cloaks_. Therefore, do not say that He gives wealth to all without
exception, for I have shown you that it is put together by murders and
covetousness and a thousand other like causes.
· · · · · · ·
The Rich Young Man.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxiii., vol. ii., p. 227.)
_And behold one came and said to Him: Good Master, what shall I do that
I may inherit eternal life?_ Some reject this young man as insidious and
bad. I, however, would not deny that he was a lover of money, and unable
to resist it, since Christ convicted him of this; but I should not admit
that he was insidious, because it is not safe to make a venture upon
what is unknown, especially in accusations, and because St. Mark has
removed this doubt. For he says _that running up and kneeling before_
Him, he asked Him a question, and again, that _Jesus, looking upon him,
loved him_. But great is the tyranny of money as we gather from this;
for even if we be quite faultless as to other things, it alone spoils
everything else. St. Paul too justly called it the root of all evils.
_The love of money_, he says, _is the root of all evils_. Now, why did
Our Lord answer him by saying, _No man is good_. Because the youth
approached Him as a mere man, as one of many, and a Jewish teacher: on
this account Our Lord spoke as man to man with him. For He frequently
answers according to the secret mind of those who come to Him, as, for
instance, when He says, _We adore what we know_, and, _If I bear witness
to Myself, My witness is not true_. When, then, He says, _No man is
good_, He does not say it to repudiate His own goodness—far from it; for
He does not say, ‘Why do you call _Me_ good? I am not good,’ but, _No
man is good_, that is, no man at all.
When He speaks in this way, He is not defrauding men of all goodness,
but making a distinction as to God’s goodness. So He added: _Only God is
good_. And He did not say, ‘Only my Father,’ that you may know that He
did not disclose Himself to the youth. Thus, higher up, He called all
men bad, saying, _But if you who are bad know how to give good gifts to
your children_. And if He called them wicked in this place, He did not
condemn human nature as altogether bad (for He says _you_, not ‘you, the
human race’). He so called them, because He was putting the goodness of
man by the side of the goodness of God, and therefore He added, _How
much more will your Father give good gifts to those who ask Him_. And,
you may say, what necessity or advantage was there that He should answer
the young man in this way? He leads him up by degrees, teaches him to
put off all deception, withdraws him from the things of earth, nailing
him to God, inducing him to seek the things to come, to know the good,
the root and foundation of all things, and to refer honour back to Him.
And thus when He says, _You shall call no man master upon earth_, He
said it to make a distinction as to Himself, that they might learn Who
was the first Beginning of all things. For, so far, the young man had
shown no slight willingness by rushing eagerly to embrace this love; and
whilst others had come, some to tempt, others for the curing of disease,
whether it was their own or their neighbours’, he had come and had
spoken for the sake of eternal life. The soil indeed was rich and moist,
but the brambles overpowered and stifled the seed. For consider how far
up to this point he is disposed to obey commands. _What shall I do_, he
says, _that I may inherit eternal life?_ Thus ready was he to accomplish
what he should be told. But if he had come to Our Lord to tempt Him, the
Evangelist would have told us so, as he does in other instances, and in
that of the advocate. But if the young man was silent, Christ would not
have allowed him to escape unknown, but would have convicted him wisely,
or have hinted at his meaning, so that the youth should not think he had
deceived and escaped without recognition, and so have been misled. If he
had come to tempt, he would not have gone away sad, because of what he
heard. This, at least, was not what any one of the Pharisees of the day
did; but when they were silenced, they were angry. It was not so with
the young man: _he_ went away cast-down, which was no small proof that
he had come with a weak rather than a bad intention, with the desire of
life, but weighed down by another and a stronger passion.
Therefore, when Our Lord said, _If thou wilt enter into life, keep the
commandments_, he asks, _Which commandments?_ This was not said
tempting—far from it—but thinking that he was to know of other
commandments besides those of the Law, which would help him to life.
This showed a great desire on his part. Then, when Jesus enumerated
those of the Law, he said, _All these have I kept from my youth_. And he
did not stop his enquiry here, but asked further, _What is yet wanting
to me?_ which in itself was a proof of his eagerness. His thinking
himself to be still wanting in something, and his deeming that the
things already specified were not sufficient, was no small step towards
gaining what he desired. What does Christ say? As He was about to
accomplish a great work, He put the prize before the youth and said, _If
thou wouldst be perfect, go, sell what thou hast and give to the poor,
and thou shalt have a treasure in heaven, and come and follow Me_. Do
you see what rewards and crowns He sets for this career? If the young
man had been tempting, he would not have spoken these things to Him. But
now He does speak, and, as it were, draws him to Himself, shows him the
reward to be exceedingly great, and unfolds the whole before his mind,
hiding throughout the semblance of irksomeness in the advice. Therefore,
before speaking of the combat and the labour, He shows him the reward,
saying, _If thou wilt be perfect_; then He adds, _Go, sell what thou
hast and give to the poor, and_, again returning to the rewards, _thou
shalt have a treasure in heaven, and come and follow Me_. For the
following Him is a great compensation. _And thou shalt have a treasure
in heaven._ Hence, as the matter turned on money, and He was exhorting
the young man to strip himself of everything, He points out that He does
not take away possessions, but adds to them, and that He gives more
things than those of which He commanded the sacrifice; and not merely
are they more, but they are as much greater as heaven is than earth, and
even more. He spoke of a treasure which is double the thing given,
showing it to be abiding and secure, intimating thus through human
things what His listener was to understand. Indeed, it is not enough to
despise money, but a man must also feed the poor and follow Christ above
all things; that is, he must carry out all His commandments, hold
himself in readiness to be slaughtered and to suffer death any day. _If
any man wish to come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his
cross and follow Me._ As this command was a much higher one than the
giving up of money—even the shedding of blood—so the giving up of money
is no slight help towards its fulfilment. And when the young man had
heard this word, _he went away sad_. Then, as if to show that he had
felt nothing unreasonable, the Evangelist said, _for he was very rich_.
Those who possess a little and those who are steeped in abundance are
not equally restrained; then it is that love becomes more tyrannical. So
I will not cease to say that the addition of superfluities is fuel to
the fire, that it makes their possessors poorer, that it increases,
indeed, their desires, and makes them conscious of greater needs. See
how, in this case, passion showed its strength. For when Our Lord
commanded the man, who came to him with joyful readiness, to renounce
his money, he was so cast down and perturbed as to go away without
giving any answer at all; and having become silent and sad and gloomy,
he thus departed.
· · · · · · ·
Different Kinds of Friendship.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lx., vol. ii., p. 199.)
· · · · · · ·
Let us now consider the various forms which friendship takes with the
majority of men. One man loves because he is loved; another because he
has been honoured; another shows a liking for a man who has been of use
to him in some practical matter or other; another, again, for some such
similar reason; but it is difficult, indeed, to find a man who loves his
neighbour thoroughly and as he ought for Christ’s sake. For in most
cases it is temporal business which brings men together. St. Paul did
not love in this way: he loved for Christ’s sake, so that he loved
others whether he was loved by them or not, and did not break charity,
since he had laid a strong foundation for his love-charm. It is not so
now; indeed, if we search diligently, we shall find in most men a
fictitious friendship rather than this. And if anyone gave me power to
enquire into the matter in so great a multitude, I could show that the
majority are bound to each other for worldly reasons. This is apparent
from the causes which produce enmity. Since, then, men are bound to each
other for motives so paltry, there is neither warmth nor fidelity in
their mutual dealings; but contempt, and money losses, and jealousy, the
love of honour, or any similar thing showing itself, destroys the
love-charm. It rests not upon a spiritual foundation. If it were so,
worldly things would never break up spiritual things. The love, indeed,
which is born of Christ is strong and enduring and invincible, and
nothing has power to dissolve it—neither calumnies, nor dangers, nor
death, nor any other of these things whatsoever. If a man who thus loves
should suffer in a thousand ways, contemplating that on which love
rests, he stands unmoved. But the man who loves because he is loved, if
he should suffer some foolish thing or other, breaks up his friendship,
whilst the former is firm to the end. This is why St. Paul said,
_Charity never falleth away_. What answer would you make? That the man
whom you have honoured is a reviler? or that the one whom you have
benefited would wish to put you to death? But if you love for Our Lord’s
sake, this encourages you to love all the more. For those things which
are destructive to love in other cases become productive of it in this
particular one. How so? In the first place, because the man so loved is
the cause of your reward; secondly, because one thus situated requires
special help and much care. On this account a man who loves for Our
Lord’s sake does not enquire about family, or country, or riches, or
demand love in return: he concerns himself about none of these things,
but even if he be hated, or despised, or destroyed, he still loves,
because his affection is built on a strong foundation—Christ. Hence he
stands firm, steadfast, immutable, with his eyes on Our Lord. So it was
that Christ loved His enemies—harsh men, scoffers, blasphemers, haters,
those who wished not even to see Him, those who preferred stones and
wood to His love, and He loved them with the charity from above, in
comparison with which there is no other charity to be found. _For_, He
says, _no man hath greater charity than this, that he giveth his life
for his friends_. See how loving He ceases not to be towards the very
men who crucified Him and reviled Him. He even spoke for them to His
Father, saying, _Forgive them, for they know not what they do_. And,
later on, He charged His disciples with those same men. Let us, then, be
zealous for this same charity, and strive to possess it, that, being
made the imitators of Christ, we may enjoy both present and future good
things by the grace and tenderness of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be
honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen.
The Buyers and Sellers in the Temple.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxvii., vol. ii., p. 277.)
_And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold
and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the
money-changers, and the chairs of them that sold doves. And He saith to
them: It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but
you have made it a den of thieves._ John says the same thing, but he
says it in the beginning of his gospel, whereas Matthew says it towards
the end. Hence it is evident that the thing recounted took place twice
and at different times. This is clear from the time and from the answer.
In St. Matthew it happened at the very time of the Pasch; in St. John a
good deal before it. In the latter the Jews say, _What sign dost Thou
show us?_ but in the former they are silent as if rebuked, because He
was an object of wonder to all men. His doing the same action twice, and
this in an authoritative way, strengthens the charge against the Jews,
for they remained at their traffic, and called Him God’s enemy, when
they should have learnt from this His action how much He honoured His
Father and what His own power was. For He was working wonders, and they
saw a correspondence between His words and His deeds. Still they were
unmoved and discontented, and this in the face of the loud testimony of
the Prophet and of children witnessing to Him, with a wisdom beyond
their years. This is why He Himself uses as an arm against them the
accusing words of Isaias: _My house shall be called the house of
prayer_. He shows His power not only in this way, but in the curing of
many kinds of diseases; for the lame and the blind came to Him and He
cured them, and He shows forth His power and His authority. They,
however, were not persuaded in this way; but after seeing these wonders,
and listening to children bearing witness to Him, they say, _Dost Thou
not hear what these say?_ This was what Christ might have said to
_them_: ‘Do you not hear what these say?’ for they sang to Him as to
God. What does He do? Since they spoke against visible signs, He makes
use of a stronger correction, saying, _Have you never read, Out of the
mouths of infants and of sucklings Thou hast perfected praise?_ He said
well, _out of the mouths_. For that which they said did not come from
themselves, but from that power of His which controlled the words of
their tongues. This indeed was a type amongst the nations of those who
faltered and cried out confusedly, speaking great things with
discernment and faith. Hence it was no small encouragement to the
Apostles also. In order that they should not be perplexed as to how
they, being unlearned, are to announce the Gospel tidings, these
children by anticipation have cast out their fear, because He who has
caused the children to sing will give them also reasoning powers. This
was not all that the wonder made manifest: it showed Him to be the Lord
of creation. These children of unripe age, on the one hand, gave voice
to words of good omen which were in harmony with the things above; but
men, on the contrary, to outbursts of folly and madness. Such was their
badness. Whilst then, they had many incitements to anger, the attitude
of the crowd, the throwing over of the tables of the buyers, the voice
of His wonders, that of the children, He again leaves them, allowing
their passion to cool, and not wishing to begin His teaching lest,
boiling over with jealousy, they should be still more angered at what
had been said.
· · · · · · ·
The Voice of Good Deeds.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, xlvi., vol. ii., p. 14.)
· · · · · · ·
If twelve men leavened the whole world, consider what _our_ wickedness
must be, inasmuch as we, being so many, are unable to convert the
remainder, when we ought to suffice for the leavening of a thousand
worlds. ‘But,’ some one says, ‘they were apostles.’ What does this
matter? Had not they the same surroundings as you? Were they not reared
in cities? Did they not lead the same sort of life? Did they not follow
a trade? Were they angels? Did they come down from heaven? ‘But,’ you
say, ‘they worked wonders.’ It was not the wonders which made them
famous. How long shall we use our own softness as a pretext for not
considering those wonders? For many who cast out devils, since they
afterwards worked iniquity, did not become renowned, but were even
chastised. And what is it, you ask, which pointed them out as great? The
despising of money and of reputation, and the withdrawal from worldly
business. If they had been without these things, and had been slaves to
their passions, even if they had raised up a thousand dead men, not only
they would have done no good, but they would have been looked upon as
deceivers. Thus, it is the life in every case which is resplendent, and
which draws upon itself the unction of the Spirit. Did not John work a
sign when he made so many cities hang upon his words? Yet listen to the
Evangelist saying that he worked no wonder: _John did no wonder_. How
did Elias become renowned? Was it not by his outspokenness with the
king—by his zeal for God’s service—by his possessing nothing—by his
sheep-skin, and his cavern, and his mountains? For he worked his wonders
after all these things. What sign did the devil see Job doing when he
was struck with amazement? Not any at all, but he found him leading a
resplendent life, which showed forth an endurance firmer than adamant.
What sign had David accomplished for God to say of him, when still a
youth, _I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart_?
What dead man did Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob raise to life? What leper
did they cleanse? Do you not know that, if we are not watchful,
wonder-working is often harmful? Thus it was that many of the
Corinthians fell into schism and many Romans lost their right mind.
Thus, too, that Simon was cast out, and that the man who desired to
follow Christ refused the call when he heard that _foxes have holes, and
birds of the air have nests_. Each of these, the one seeking money, and
the other glory from the working of signs, fell away and were lost. But
purity of life and the love of goodness not only do not produce this
desire, but they take it away where it exists. And what did He Himself
say when He was laying down the law to His disciples? Did He say, ‘You
shall do signs in order that men may see’? Not at all, but, rather, _Let
your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and
glorify your Father Who is in heaven_. Nor did He say to Peter, ‘If thou
lovest Me, work wonders,’ but, _Feed My sheep_. And, honouring Peter,
with James and John, in every instance more than the rest, how does He
show this honour, tell me? Is it in the doing of wonders? No; for they
all cleansed lepers, and raised the dead to life, and to all He gave
authority in equal measure. How then were those three distinguished? By
interior virtue. Do you see that, everywhere, life is the need, and the
manifestation of works? _By their fruits_, He said, _you shall know
them_. What is it which approves our life? Is it the manifestation of
wonders or an irreproachable conduct? Clearly it is the latter; for the
reason which calls forth signs belongs to this world, and they cease in
the next. The man who gives an example of a good life draws this charity
upon himself; and he who shines by charity shines in this way, in order
that he may correct the life of others. Since Christ also worked those
wonders in order that He might appear worthy of confidence in this
world, and, drawing men to Himself, might introduce virtue into life;
therefore, more stress is laid upon this point. For He is not contented
with signs alone, but He threatens hell, and He preaches the kingdom,
and He enacts those marvellous laws, and everything is done with a view
to His making men like to angels. But why do I say that Christ does
everything unto this end? Tell me, if anyone gave _you_ your choice
either to raise up the dead in His name or to die for His name’s sake,
which would you choose? The latter surely; for the one is a sign and the
other is a deed. Again, if anyone offered you the power of turning grass
into gold, or that of looking down upon all gold as if it were grass,
would you not rather choose the latter, and with good reason? It would
be this which would attract men. For if they were to see food turned
into gold, and were even desirous of taking the same power into their
own hands, as Simon was, the love of money would be increased in them;
but if they were to see all men looking down upon money as upon grass,
and making little of it, they would be cured of this disease.
· · · · · · ·
The Best Controversy.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, xv., vol. i., p. 201.)
· · · · · · ·
Then He goes on to a higher example—_You are the light of the world_. It
is again _of the world_; not of one people, nor of twenty cities, but of
the whole world; and it is a reasonable light, far superior to this
physical light, just as spiritual salt is to material salt. And first
they are salt, and afterwards light, in order that you may learn the
force of strong words and the advantage of this holy teaching. For it is
urgent and will not be diverted from its aim, and, leading us by the
hand, makes us look towards goodness. _A city seated on a mountain
cannot be hidden. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a
bushel._ He leads them once more through these things to purity of life,
teaching them to be soldiers, as if before the eyes of all men and
wrestling in the midst of the arena of the whole world. ‘Look not,’ He
said, ‘to rest now whilst you are in a small corner; for you are to be
visible to all men, like a city seated on a mountain, and like a candle
shining upon all those in the house.’ Where, now, are they who have
distrusted the power of Christ? Let them listen to these things, and,
being frightened by the might of the prophecy, let them fall down and
adore His almightiness. Think what great things He promised to those who
were not known even in their native place: that they are to go over land
and sea, and to lift up their voice against the temptations of the
world, or rather not their voice, but the force of their goodness. For
it was not their universal fame which made them conspicuous: it was the
manifestation of works. As if they had had wings, they spread over the
whole earth quicker than light, sowing the light of piety. Hence, it
seems to me that He stimulates them unto fearlessness, for His saying,
_A city seated on the mountain cannot be hidden_, was the manifestation
of His own power; for, if it were useless to hide that, so neither could
the Gospel tidings be hushed or concealed. And to prevent them from
thinking that persecutions, and accusations, and plots, and wars, since
He spoke of these things, would have power to check them, He encourages
them by saying that not only these persecutions will not pass unnoticed,
but that they will shine forth to the whole world, and that through this
very fact they themselves were to be renowned and famous. In this, then,
His own power is manifested; but He furthermore requires fortitude from
each one of them, saying, _Men do not light a candle and put it under a
bushel, but upon a candlestick, and it gives light to all in the house.
So may your light shine before men, that they may see your good works
and glorify your Father Who is in heaven._ ‘For it is I Who have
enkindled the light,’ He says. Whether, however, it remains lighted or
not must depend upon your zeal, not on your own account alone, but for
the sake of those who are to enjoy this beacon, and whom it is to lead
to the truth. For the slanderings of men will not be able to veil your
brightness if you yourselves are leading strict lives, and thus are
preparing to convert the whole world. Show forth, therefore, a life
worthy of grace, that, as the truth is preached everywhere, so your life
may harmonise with it. And, again, He holds out another advantage
besides the salvation of men, which is capable of firing them with
courage and making all zealous. Not only will you reform the world, He
says, by living upright lives, but you will also prepare the glory of
God; just as by the contrary course you destroy men, and cause the name
of God to be blasphemed. ‘And how,’ you ask, ‘is God to be glorified
through us if men are to slander us?’ Not all men are to do this; but
those who do so hypocritically will wonder and admire you in secret,
just as outward flatterers of those who are living in wickedness despise
them in their own minds. ‘How, then, would you have us live for show and
vainglory? No, indeed, I said nothing of the kind. I did not say, Make
haste to bring forth your good deeds before men; nor did I say, Point
them out; but, _Let your light shine_; that is, let your virtue be
solid, and the fire plentiful, and the light undimmed.’ Whenever virtue
is thus great, it cannot possibly be hidden, even if he who pursues it
conceal it in a thousand ways. Show forth a spotless life and let them
have no real ground of accusation, and then, even if accusers be
numbered by hundreds, no man shall have power to overcloud you. And His
expression, _the light_, was pertinent. For nothing distinguishes a man
so much, even if he wish to be hidden a thousand times over, as an
example of goodness. Just as physical light envelops a man, so does he
shine forth with greater brightness, not letting his rays sink into the
earth, but directing them beyond heaven itself. So He encourages them
the more. ‘If,’ He says, ‘you are grieved at being reviled, many men
through you will be in admiration of God.’ He lays both wages to your
account—God’s glorification through you, and your being blasphemed for
God’s sake. In order, therefore, that we should not give heed to evil
speaking, knowing that it procures us a reward, He did not simply
mention the thing itself, but made two distinctions—that of calumny and
that of calumny for God’s sake; and He shows, moreover, that patience
under it bears much fruit, by referring the glory back to God; and He
holds out pleasant hopes to them. The accusation of the wicked, He says,
is in nothing so powerful as in helping others to see your light. When
you act foolishly, then only it is that they will trample you down, not
when, doing what is right, you are cast aside. Then many will be in
astonishment, not at you alone, but, through you, at our common Father.
He said the Father, not God, laying already the seeds of the spiritual
birth which He was to give them. Then, showing His equality with the
Father, He said higher up, ‘Grieve not for evil report; for it is
sufficient for you that it is on My account’. Thereupon He speaks of the
Father, manifesting their equality everywhere.
Recognising, therefore, our gain from this zeal and the danger of our
negligence (for it is much worse that our Master should be blasphemed
because of us than that we should be lost), _Let us not give offence to
the Jews, or to heathens, or to the Church of God_; and, showing forth a
life more shining than the sun, even if anyone should wish to accuse us,
not grieving at evil report, but at hearing a just report unworthily.
For if we are living in wickedness and there be no accuser, we are the
most miserable of men, but if we are practising virtue, even if the
whole world should speak ill of us, we shall be the most enviable of
all, and we shall draw all those who are called to be saved to
ourselves; for it is not by the accusation of the wicked but by a good
life that they will cleave to us. And a good example speaks louder than
any trumpet, and a pure life is more resplendent than the very light,
even if there be a thousand adversaries. If we are all that I have
specified—if we are meek and humble and merciful, and clean of heart and
lovers of peace, and when we are slandered do not repine but rejoice—we
shall draw those who look upon us to ourselves no less than by signs,
and every man will deal kindly with us, whether he be a wild beast or a
demon, or anything else whatsoever. Still, if there should be
calumniators, do not be troubled at this, nor at seeing yourself
publicly accused, but examine their inmost heart, and you will find that
they applaud and admire you, and are loud in your praises. Just consider
how Nabuchodonosor praised the children in the furnace, although he was
their declared enemy; and when he saw their brave endurance, he
acclaimed and acknowledged them for nothing else whatever than for
turning away from his commands to listen to those of God. For when the
devil sees that he is accomplishing nothing, he desists, fearing lest he
should be the means of increasing our crowns; and when he is gone,
however bad and depraved a man may be, he recognises virtue, that mist
being removed from before his eyes. And if men should form a wrong
judgment, you will have greater praise and admiration from God.
Therefore, be not sorrowful or wavering, since the Apostles themselves
were an odour of death to some and of life to others. If you have
offered no offence to any man, and have kept free from all reproach, you
are blessed indeed. Shine, then, by your life, and make no account of
slandering words. For it is quite impossible that a man who cultivates
goodness should not have many enemies; but this is nothing to him, for
through these very enemies his life will shine the more. Taking these
things to heart, let us seek for one thing—to order our own life with
purity, for in this way we shall lead those who sit in darkness to that
future life. Such, indeed, is the power of this light, that it not only
shines here, but it escorts those who follow it to that heavenly
country. Whenever men see you looking down upon all present things, and
holding yourselves in readiness for eternal ones, your works will
convince them better than any argument. Who so foolish as not to deduce
a clear proof of the future life when he sees a man, thinking yesterday
only of luxury and money-making, giving up everything, freeing himself
from all cares, and stretching out his hand towards hunger, and poverty,
and hardship, and dangers, and blood-shedding, and a violent death,
towards everything which seems an evil? But if we are wholly engrossed
with present things, and plunge into them deeper and deeper, how are men
to be persuaded that we are looking for another home? What excuse shall
we have if the fear of God cannot do among us that which human fame did
amongst Greek philosophers? Some of them also gave up money and despised
death, in order to be a spectacle to men, and so their hopes were vain.
What can be said for us with these things before us, and so great a
philosophy being unfolded, that we cannot do even what they did, but are
destroying ourselves and others too? For a heathen who acts against his
conscience does not do the same harm as a Christian who thus acts, and
most justly. Their reputation is corrupt, whereas ours, through God’s
goodness, is sacred and manifest even amongst impious men. Consequently,
whenever they want particularly to reproach us, and to make their
accusation more telling, they bring this additional charge against us:
‘So and so is a Christian,’ which they would not do if they had not a
great opinion of Christian teaching. Have you not heard how many and
what great things Christ enjoined? Now, how can you observe one of those
commandments when, forgetting the rest, you go about investing your
money, looking greedily after interest, involving yourself in lawsuits,
buying herds of slaves, preparing silver plate, laying up stores of
fields and houses, and quantities of furniture? And would that this were
all! When you add iniquity to these inopportune pursuits—encroaching
upon the land of others, pulling down houses, aggravating poverty,
increasing hunger—how will you be able to mount up to those gates? But
supposing that you are merciful to the poor, I know what this means, and
it again will call for a great expiation hereafter. For if you are
merciful through conceit or vainglory, so that you gain no merit even
from good works, what could be more wretched than to be shipwrecked in
harbour? In order to prevent this from happening, seek not a reward from
me when you have done a good action, so that God may be your debtor.
_Lend_, He says, _to him from whom you expect no return_.
· · · · · · ·
The Tongue a Royal Power.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, li., p. 76.)
· · · · · · ·
Let us understand what those things are which sully a man, and when we
have understood let us shun them. In the church we see a certain habit
prevailing amongst the majority of men—how they are eager to come in
with spotless clothes and clean hands, whilst they do not trouble
themselves about how they are to offer up a pure heart to God. I say
this, not forbidding men to wash their hands or their mouths; my wish,
however, is that they should wash them in the right way, not with water
alone, but rather with virtues. For slandering, blasphemy, foul
language, bad words, laughter at low jokes, are the mouth’s defilement.
If, then, you perceive that you are not dwelling on any of these things,
nor guilty of this uncleanness, approach with good heart; if, on the
contrary, you have laid yourself open to these numerous stains, why are
you so foolish as to rinse your tongue with water whilst you carry in it
this pernicious and destructive impurity? Tell me, now, if you had dirt
or dung in your hands, would you dare to utter a prayer? Certainly not.
Yet one is not at all harmful, and the other is perdition. How comes it
that you are particular in things of no consequence, and negligent about
the prohibited ones? ‘What, then,’ you ask, ‘are we not to go on
praying?’ Certainly you are, but not in this filthy condition, nor with
this dirt upon you. ‘What am I to do,’ you ask, ‘if I fall by accident?’
Then, purify yourself. How, and in what manner? Be in mourning and
groaning, give alms, apologise to the man you have insulted, and
reconcile him to yourself by these things; purify your tongue in order
that you may incite the less the anger of God. For if anyone with his
hands full of mud were to grasp your feet in supplication, not only
would you not listen to him, but you would kick him away; how, then, are
you so bold as to approach God in this way? The tongue of those who pray
is a hand, and through it we touch the knees of God.[6] Therefore do not
defile that tongue, lest He should say to you, _And when you multiply
your prayer I will not hear_. For, _in the hand of the tongue are life
and death_; and, again, _By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by
thy words thou shalt be condemned_. Therefore guard the tongue more
carefully than the pupil of the eye. The tongue is the horse of a king.
If you put a bridle upon him and teach him to walk at a measured pace,
the king will rest and lean upon him; but if you allow him to be at
large unbridled, and to be unmanageable, he becomes the vehicle of the
devil and his angels.... Dishonour not the tongue, for how will it pray
for you when it has lost its proper confidence? Adorn it rather with
mildness and humility; make it worthy of the God Whom you are invoking;
fill it with words of kindness and much almsgiving. For there is an alms
which is to be given by words: _The good word is better than the gift_;
and, again, _Answer the poor man in mildness and gentleness_. And make
the rest of your time profitable by dwelling on the divine laws._ Let
all thy conversation be on the law of the Most High._ Thus adorning
ourselves, let us go forth to the King and fall at His feet, not with
the body only, but with our mind. Let us consider Whom we go to, for
what purpose, and what it is we wish to accomplish. We go to that God
from Whom the seraphim turned away their gaze, unable to bear His
splendour, on Whom the earth trembles to look. We go to God, Who is in
the region of light inaccessible. And we are going to Him in order to
escape hell, for the remission of our sins, to deliver ourselves from
those overwhelming penalties, for the winning of heaven and the goods
which are there.
· · · · · · ·
Golden Vessels and Golden Hearts.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, l., p. 62.)
· · · · · · ·
Let us then, too, touch the hem of His garment, or rather, if we please,
we have Himself whole and entire. For His body too is now put before us,
not His garment only, but His very body, not to be merely touched, but
to be eaten and taken away. Let us therefore approach with faith, each
one with his own infirmity. For if those who touched the hem of His
garment drew forth so much strength, how much more those who possess the
whole of Him? Approaching with faith is not only taking what is there
before us, but touching with a pure heart, and being so disposed as if
we were going to meet Christ Himself. What matters it if you hear no
voice? You see Him before you, or rather you _do_ hear a voice, that of
Himself speaking through the Evangelists. Believe, therefore, that even
now there is that banquet at which He Himself sat. Nor is this banquet
different from that; nor is ours the work of a man, and that the work of
God, but God is the worker now as He was then. When, then, you see the
priest offering it to you, think that it is not the priest who is doing
this, but that it is the hand of Christ which is presenting it. Just as,
when he baptises, it is not he who is baptising you, but it is God Who
is holding your head with an invisible power, and neither angel nor
archangel nor anyone else whatsoever presumes to approach and touch you;
so it is now. For whenever God generates, it is His gift alone. Do you
not know how those who adopt sons in this world do not entrust their
adoption to servants, but appear themselves in the court? In like manner
God has not entrusted His gift to angels, but He is Himself present,
commanding, and saying, _You shall call no man your father upon earth_,
not wishing you to dishonour your natural parents, but that before all
the rest you may prefer Him Who created you, and Who wrote your name
amongst His children. For He Who gives more, that is, Who gives Himself,
will all the more certainly not disdain to make over His body to you.
Let us then, both priests and laity, consider what that is of which we
have been made worthy; let us consider and be in awe. He gave us to be
filled with His sacred flesh, and placed before us Himself offered up in
sacrifice. Now, what will our excuse be, if feeding on such food we
commit such sins; when we eat the Lamb and are become wolves; when we
eat the sheep and ravage like lions? For this mystery obliges us to
purify ourselves not only from robbery but from the merest enmity. This
mystery is indeed a mystery of peace; it cannot be conciliated with a
struggle for money. For if He did not spare Himself for our sakes, what
should we deserve for hoarding up money and neglecting our soul, on
which account He did not spare _Himself_? God indeed bound the Jews to a
remembrance of their domestic blessings every year at the feasts, but
you He has bound to a daily remembrance, so to say, through these
mysteries. Be not, then, ashamed of the cross, for these are our august
things, these are _our_ mysteries, we are adorned with this gift, and it
is our beauty. Even when I say that He stretched the firmament overhead,
and unfolded earth and sea, that He sent forth prophets and angels, I
speak of nothing equal to this. This is the fountain-head of all good,
that He did not spare His only Son in order to save alienated servants.
Therefore, let neither Judas nor Simon approach this table, for avarice
destroyed both one and the other. Let us avoid this abyss, and think not
that it is sufficient for our salvation, if, after stripping widows and
orphans, we offer a cup of gold and precious stones for this table. If
you wish to show honour to the sacrifice, offer your soul for whose sake
it was sacrificed. Make this golden, for if _it_ should be inferior to
lead and potsherd, what is the gain of the vessel being of gold? Then,
do not let us be concerned only about how we are to offer a vessel of
gold, but let it be also a vessel of honest labours, for that which is
without avarice is more precious than gold. The church is neither a gold
nor a silver-smith’s shop, but an assembly of angels, therefore souls
are what we want, and these things are acceptable to God through souls.
The table which He then used was not of silver, nor was the chalice a
golden one out of which Christ gave His own blood to His disciples; but
all those things were sacred and terrible, since He filled them with the
Spirit. Would you honour the body of Christ? Leave Him not naked, nor
honour Him _there_ with silk coverings, passing Him by outside in cold
and nakedness. He who said, _This is My body_, ratifying the deed by His
word, said likewise, _You saw Me in want and did not feed Me_, and,
again, _Inasmuch as you did not do it for one of the least of these, you
did it not for Me_. For the former does not require the giving of
garments but a pure heart, whereas the latter demands great attention.
Let us, then, learn to be wise and to honour Christ as He Himself
wishes, for to Him Who is honoured, that honour is the sweetest which He
chooses for Himself, not that which may be according to our judgment.
Since Peter, too, thought to honour Him by forbidding Him to wash his
feet, he was not showing honour, but the reverse. So in your case do you
honour Him with the honour which He Himself laid down, by giving your
riches to the poor. God has no need of golden vessels, but of golden
hearts.
True Almsgiving.
(_Homilies on St. Paul’s Second Epistle to the Corinthians_, xvi., vol.
iii., p. 182.)
· · · · · · ·
Charity is, indeed, a great thing, and a gift of God, and when it is
rightly ordered, likens us to God Himself as far as that is possible;
for it is charity which makes the man. Some one, at least, wishing to
characterise man, did it in these words: _Man is great, and the merciful
man is honourable_. Kindness is better than raising up the dead. For it
is a much greater thing to feed Christ in His hunger than to raise the
dead in the name of Jesus. By feeding Christ you confer a benefit upon
Him; in the other case He is benefiting you. And the reward is for
doing, not for receiving. As to the signs, you are under an obligation
to God, but with regard to the almsgiving, you put God under an
obligation to you. It is an alms when you give willingly, generously,
thinking that you are rather taking than giving; when you give as if you
were receiving something, as gaining rather than losing, otherwise there
would be no thanks in it. He who helps his neighbour should be in
gladness, not in gloom. In truth, is it not foolish that in removing the
despondency of another you yourself should be despondent? You will not
suffer it to be a real alms. If you are sad because you are taking away
another man’s sadness, you are giving a proof of extreme unkindness and
inhumanity; it is better to leave it undone than to do it in this way.
Why are you sad at all? Is it for fear of diminishing your money? If
this is your motive, then do not give; if you are not encouraged by the
thought that it will be made up to you over and above in heaven, do not
put out your hand in alms-giving. Perhaps you look for a compensation in
this world. What is the good of this? Let your alms be alms and not
traffic. Now, many have received their due here on earth, yet not so
that they will be on this account much better than those who have not;
these have been a few of the weaker, since they did not go vigorously
after the things above. And like greedy and common people, slaves of
their belly, who, called to a royal table, and not waiting for the right
time, do as children do, spoil their own mirth by snatching up and
satiating themselves with inferior food: so, indeed, is it that they who
seek and receive temporal good things lessen the reward above. Again, in
lending your money, you become desirous of securing the capital after a
time, or, perhaps, of not spending it, so that you may lay up more for
the future, whereas in this case you demand it at once, although you are
not always to be here, but for ever there. Nor are you to be judged
here, but to give an account there. Supposing that a man prepared houses
for you where you did not mean to stay, you would view his act as a
penalty; and would you wish to grow rich in a place from which you may
be called away before the evening? Know you not that we are spending our
time in a foreign land, like sojourners and strangers, and that
sojourners may be cast out when they are not thinking of it or expecting
it. And this is our case. So it is that we leave behind us whatever we
may have busied ourselves with on earth. Our Master does not allow us to
take our labours with us, whether it is that we build houses, or buy
estates, or slaves, or furniture, or anything else of the kind. Not only
He does not allow us to go away with them, but He refuses you a reward
for them. He told you beforehand that you should not build or spend with
the property of others, but with your own. Why, then, leaving your own,
do you labour with what is not yours, and squander it so that you will
lose both your labour and your reward, and endure the extremity of
punishment? Do not so act, I beseech you; but, as we are sojourners by
nature, let us become so by choice, so that we may not be aliens there,
rejected without honour. If we wish to be citizens in this world we
shall be so neither here nor there, but if we remain sojourners, and
spend our time after the fashion of sojourners, we shall receive the
assurance of being citizens both here and there. For the just man, even
with nothing, will be as free on earth with the common property of all
as if it were his own, and when he departs hence to heaven he will look
upon the eternal dwelling-places; he will neither suffer any
unpleasantness in this world, nor will any man be able to make him a
sojourner, who has the whole world for his city; and in taking
possession of his country, he will, moreover, receive true riches. In
order, then, that we may gain both the things of time and the things of
eternity, let us use present goods in the right way. Thus we shall
become citizens of heaven, and enjoy much consolation. May this be the
portion of us all, through the love and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ,
to Whom, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, be glory and power for
ever. Amen.
I was hungry and you gave Me to eat.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, xlv., vol. ii., p. 5.)
· · · · · · ·
Are you unable to practise the virginal life? Then make a prudent
marriage. Are you unable to do without possessions? Give, then, of what
you possess. Is such a burden too heavy for you? Divide your goods with
Christ. Are you not willing to cede Him everything? Make over to Him at
least the half or the third part. He is your brother and co-heir; make
Him your co-heir even on earth. How much soever you give to Him you give
that to yourself. Do you not listen to the Prophet’s words, _Despise not
thy own flesh_? But if we may not despise relations, how much less the
Master, Who, besides His superiority, has the rights of relationship on
His side, and many other stronger claims? He has made you a partaker of
His own possessions, taking nothing from you, but being the first to
give to you out of His unspeakable mercy. Then, is not it extreme folly
neither to grow kind by this gift, nor to return a reward for a favour,
and to give less instead of more? For He has made you heir to the
kingdom of heaven, but you have not even given Him a share of the things
of earth. You He reconciled without any merit of your own, when you were
even His enemy; will you not make any return to your lover and
benefactor, although, over and above the kingdom and all His other
gifts, it was just that you should feel grateful to Him for the giving
itself? Servants, indeed, when they call their masters to dinner, deem
not that they are offering, but receiving; here, however, it was just
the contrary. It was not the servant who first called the Lord, but the
Lord Who first called the servant to His own table; and will you not
call Him even after this? He was the first to bring you under His own
roof; can you not even follow His example? He covered you in your
nakedness, and in the face of this do you refuse to bring in a stranger?
It was He Who first gave you to drink of His own cup, and will you not
offer Him even cold water? He gave you the Holy Spirit to drink, and
will you not relieve bodily thirst? He gave you the Spirit to drink, who
were worthy of chastisement, but do you disregard a thirsty man whilst
you are about to do all this out of what is His? Do you not consider it
a great honour to hold the cup out of which Christ is about to drink,
and to approach it to His mouth? Do you not see that the priest alone
may give the chalice with the Blood? ‘I go into none of these
particulars.’ Our Lord says: ‘If you yourself give it I receive it; even
if you are a layman I do not refuse it. I do not require what I have
given, for I seek not blood but cold water.’ Consider, then, _Whose_
thirst you are relieving, and be in awe. Consider that _you_ have become
Christ’s priest, giving with your own hands not flesh but bread, not
blood but a drink of cold water. He has put on you the robe of
salvation, and has clothed you through Himself; do you also clothe _Him_
in the person of a child. He has made you a name in heaven; do you drive
away cold, and nakedness, and unseemliness. He has made you a citizen of
the angels; if you can bear it, give Him a portion only, give Him
house-room as you would your servant. He says, ‘I will not turn away
from this refuge, and that when I have opened all heaven to you. I have
delivered you,’ He says, ‘from the bitterest captivity: _I_ do not
require this, nor do I say, Deliver Me; but if you only see Me in
chains, this is sufficient to console Me. I raised you from the dead:
this I do not require from you; but I say, only visit Me when I am
sick.’ Since, then, the gifts given to us are thus great, and the things
demanded of us so very small, and we do not offer even these, what sort
of hell should we not deserve? It is just that we should go down into
the fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, since we are
harder than a rock. For, tell me, what insensibility is this, receiving
gifts so great with the prospect of the same hereafter, to be the slaves
of money, which in a little while we shall have to give up, and to give
up unwillingly? Others have laid down their lives and shed their blood,
but you have not hazarded the smallest thing for heaven or for those
unfading crowns. What sort of excuse or pardon would you deserve for
enjoying all things with the fat of the earth, neglecting nothing for
putting your money out to interest, and yet being cruel and inhuman in
feeding your Lord in the person of the indigent? Pondering all this in
our minds, and considering what we have received, and what we are going
to receive, and what we are asking for, let us show forth all our zeal
in spiritual things. Let us, then, become gentle and kind, so that we
may escape the weight of that tremendous judgment. What is there which
is not sufficient to condemn us?—the enjoyment of things so wonderful,
the being asked for nothing great, the fact that we shall have to give
up what we are asked for in spite of ourselves when we leave this world,
the ostentation of great ambition in worldly things. Each one of these
is by itself sufficient to condemn us, but when they are all combined,
what hope will there be of salvation? In order, then, that we may escape
this great condemnation, let us show ourselves kind towards the poor.
· · · · · · ·
The Archetype and the Type.
(_Homilies on the Epistle to the Philippians_, xiii., vol. v., p. 136.)
· · · · · · ·
The Apostles presented a type, maintaining in their own persons a
certain archetype. Consider how austere their life was, as if offering
an archetype, and example, and living laws. For they set forth to all,
through their deeds, that which the Scripture said. This is the best
teaching, which has power to lead the disciple. You may talk and use
fine words, but if your actions do the contrary you are no teacher. The
disciple thinks very little of fine words; they should be accompanied by
the teaching and leading of works: this makes both the master venerable,
and disposes the disciple to agree with him. How so? When he hears a man
making a display of words, he says that he has enjoined what is
impossible, and that he who is not a doer is the first to prove their
impracticability. Now, if he saw a man practising goodness in deed, he
would not be able to say this. Moreover, supposing the master’s life be
careless, let us rouse ourselves, and listen to the Prophet, saying,
_All shall be taught by God_, and again, _They shall teach_ _no more
every man his brother, saying: Know the Lord; for all shall know Me,
from the least of them even to the greatest_. Have you no righteous
teacher? You have the real Master, Him Whom alone you may call Master,
learn of Him. _He_ said, _Learn of Me, for I am meek_. Cleave, then, to
no teacher, but to Him and to His teaching. Take your model from Him;
you have a most excellent one; fashion yourself after it. The Scripture
offers us numberless examples of a holy life; choose which you will, and
follow the Master with His disciples. One shone by poverty, another
through riches; for instance, Elias by poverty, Abraham by his wealth;
choose whichever you think the easier and securer. Again, the one was
holy through marriage, the other through virginity, as Abraham and
Elias: choose your road, for each leads to heaven. John was holy by
fasting, and Job without it. Job, moreover, was what he was by despising
wife, and sons, and daughters, and house, having great wealth, whilst
John possessed nothing except his sheep-skin. And why do I speak of
house and abundance and money, since a king has it in his power to win
goodness for himself. A royal palace would be found to be far more
troublesome than any private house. David, then, shone in his royalty,
and his purple and his crown impeded him in nothing: another was
entrusted with the leadership of a whole people—I mean Moses—which is a
more difficult thing. In the latter, power was greater, therefore the
difficulty was greater. Do you see men who gained a good name both in
riches and in poverty, in marriage and in continency? Now look, on the
other hand, at those who were lost both in marriage and in continency,
in riches and in poverty. For instance, many men, living in the married
state, have been lost, like Samson, not because of marriage, but through
their own will; in virginity, too, as the five virgins; in abundance, as
the rich man who despised Lazarus; in poverty, for thousands of poor are
lost every day. I can show you many men lost in monarchy, many in
leading the people. Would you like to know of some in armies who have
been saved? There is Cornelius. And of some in stewardships? There is
the eunuch of the Ethiopian. Thus, if everywhere we use wealth as we
should, it does us no harm; if we do not, everything harms us—royalty
and poverty and riches. Nothing can hurt the man who is watching. Tell
me, has captivity ever harmed anyone? No, never. Think of Joseph in
servitude, bearing goodness in his mind; think of Daniel and the three
children taken captive, how they shone the more. Everywhere goodness is
resplendent and invulnerable, and nothing can master it. Why do I speak
of poverty and captivity and slavery? I may add hunger and ulceration
and a painful illness, for this is worse than slavery. Lazarus suffered
this, and Job, and Timothy with his frequent infirmities. Do you see how
nothing can overcome goodness? Neither wealth, nor poverty, nor power,
nor leadership, nor being at the head of affairs, nor illness, nor being
unknown, nor cast aside: disregarding all these things on the earth, it
makes its way to heaven. Only have a brave spirit, and there is no
obstacle against goodness. When the labourer is strong, no external
thing hinders him. And so, in the case of handicrafts, when a mechanic
is experienced and steadfast, and possesses all his art, even if illness
should come, he has it still; or if he should be in poverty, he has it;
and whether he has the instrument in his hands or not, whether he works
or not, it is not diminished, because the science is in himself. So is
it with God’s servant: even if you throw him into riches, his art is
shown forth; or into poverty, or disease, or health, or contempt, or
fame, it is all the same. Did not the Apostles work through everything?
_Through honour and dishonour, and evil report and good report._ This
shows the soldier, the being invulnerable against everything. For this
is the nature of virtue. If you say, ‘I am unable to be set over many, I
do best alone,’ you insult virtue, for it can benefit all, and show
itself, let it only be in the mind. Has hunger to be endured? or is
there abundance? Virtue, again, shows its own strength; as Paul said: _I
know both how to be brought low, and I know how to abound_. Was it
necessary to work? He was not ashamed, but laboured for two years. Was
hunger to be borne? He neither pined nor doubted. Had he to die? He did
not lose heart, but showed in all things a brave soul and his skill. Now
let us emulate him, and we shall have no cause for sorrow. For, tell me,
what is capable of grieving such a man? Nothing. As long as no one robs
us of virtue, the man who possesses it is the happiest of creatures even
here—not only there. Supposing there is a holy man, with wife and
children, and money, and a great name, and he still remains holy in
spite of them: take them away, and he will still be holy: neither
dejected by tribulation, nor elated by his righteousness, but like a
rock which stands immovable whether the sea rages or whether it is calm,
not troubled by the waves nor affected by the calm, so does the
steadfast soul stand bravely both with calm, and with foaming waves.
And, as children sailing on the sea are frightened whilst the pilot sits
still and laughs at them, sees their trouble and is of good cheer, so
does the mortified soul recline as if on some land or oasis of
contentment, whilst all men are troubled, and laughing in an untimely
way at the vicissitudes of things. For what can disturb the soul of a
peaceful man? Death? But this is the beginning of a better life. Or
poverty? This helps that soul on to virtue. Or illness? It accounts both
refreshment and suffering as nothing, for it punished itself beforehand.
Or being defamed? But the world is crucified to it. Or the loss of
children? It had no fear if fully convinced of the resurrection. What,
then, can make it miserable? Nothing whatever. If this man be rich, is
he puffed up? By no means, for he knows that money is nothing. What of
fame, then? He has been taught that _all human glory is like the flower
of the field_. Or luxury, again? He has listened to Paul’s words: _She
that liveth in pleasure is dead while she is living_. Now, since this
soul is neither lifted up nor dejected, what could come up to this
well-being? Not all souls are so disposed, but they are more changeable
than wind or weather, so that it is most ludicrous to see the same man
now laughing, now weeping, now buried in thought, now loquacious beyond
measure. Therefore he said: _Be not conformed to this world_: our
citizenship is in heaven, where there is no change. Immutable rewards
are offered to us: let us show forth that citizenship whence we have
already received good things. But what if we cast ourselves into
uncertainty and a surging sea, into a storm or a hurricane? Let us be at
peace. The point lies not in riches or poverty, or glory or dishonour,
or sickness or health, or weakness, but in our own soul. If this be
steadfast and well-grounded in goodness, all things will be easy to it,
and even here it will behold its rest, and the peaceful harbour, and
departing hence it will gain endless goods. May it be granted to us all
through the love and kindness of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom, with
the Father and the Holy Spirit, be glory, power, and praise now and for
ever. Amen.
The Weak Things of God.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, vi., vol. ii., p. 59.)
· · · · · · ·
_And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling._
Here, again, is another point. Not only are those who believe
illiterate, not only is the teacher illiterate, not only is the mode of
teaching replete with illiterateness, not only is the teaching itself
qualified to terrify—for it was the Cross and death—but together with
these there were other obstacles: dangers and plottings, and daily
anguish, and harassing pursuit. For he often calls persecution weakness,
as he does in another place: _Ye have not spurned the weakness in my
flesh_; and again: _If it behoves me to glory, I will glory in my
weakness_. What weaknesses are these? _The governor of king Areta was
keeping the city of Damascus, wishing to take me._ And again: _Therefore
I rejoice in my infirmities_. Then, going on to distinguish what
infirmities, he added: _In contumely, in want, in persecutions_. So here
he speaks in the same way; for, saying, _And I was in weakness_, he
added, _and I was with you in fear and in much trembling_. What is this?
Did Paul himself fear dangers? He did indeed, and greatly too; for, if
he was Paul, he was also a man. This is no accusation against Paul, but
a weakness of nature, and an encomium of his choice, that whereas he
_did_ fear stripes and death, this fear did not lead him to do any
unworthy action; so that those who say he did _not_ fear stripes not
only do not exalt him, but take much away from his praises. If, indeed,
he did _not_ fear, where is the fortitude and where is the merit of
braving dangers? For my own part, this is what I admire in him, that,
fearful as he was, and not only fearful, but trembling at dangers, he
came out victorious through everything, and in no case surrendered,
cleansing the world, and sowing the Gospel all over the earth and sea.
_And my speech and my preaching was not in the persuasive words of human
wisdom_—that is, it has not outward wisdom. If, therefore, his preaching
had no subtlety about it, and those who were called were uncultured as
well as the preacher, and there was, besides, persecution, and fear, and
trembling, tell me, how did they gain the mastery without divine power?
So, in saying, _That which I say and preach does not consist in the
persuasive words of wisdom_, he added, _but in the manifestation of the
Spirit and of power_. Do you see how the folly of God is wiser than man,
and how the weakness is stronger? Illiterate as they were who preached
these things, in chains and imprisoned, they overcame those who bound
them. How? Was it not through showing the faith which is of the Spirit?
This, indeed, was an irrefutable argument. For, tell me, what man,
seeing the dead arise and devils put forth, would not have received
their teaching? Since, however, there are powers of deception, such as
those of magicians, he removed this ambiguity. He did not speak of power
only, but first of the Spirit and then of power, thus showing that what
had taken place was spiritual. Consequently, there having been no
learning about the preaching of the Gospel is no lessening of its value,
but its greatest glory. This, at least, shows it to be divine, and to
have had its root above, in heaven. On this account he continued: _That
your faith may not be in the wisdom of man, but in the power of God_. Do
you see how clearly in everything he pointed out the gain of
illiterateness and the harm of culture? While human wisdom made the
Cross vain, ignorance proclaimed the power of God: the one disposed men
not to find the necessaries of life, and so to glory in themselves; the
other, to receive the truth and to glory in God. Again, wisdom persuaded
many men to regard dogma suspiciously as human; ignorance pointed it out
clearly as divine, and coming down from heaven. Now, whenever a proof is
arrived at by word-wisdom, it is very often the bad men who get the
better of the more moderate, being the more skilful in their arguments,
and falsehood outwits the truth. It is not so here: for neither does the
Holy Spirit take possession of an unclean soul, nor when He has taken
possession can He be ever lessened, even if all the clever words in the
world be used. A manifestation through works and signs is much clearer
than that of words.
But some one might reasonably say that, if the Gospel is bound to
conquer, and the Cross needs no eloquence, that it may not be proved
vain, why is it that miracles have now ceased? Why is it? Do you speak
as an unbeliever, and not receive those which took place in the case of
the Apostles, or do you honestly seek to learn? If as an unbeliever,
then I will first direct myself to this. Now, if miracles did _not_ take
place then, how did they make themselves heard, standing up against
whole peoples and speaking such things, driven about as they were,
pursued, in fear, in chains; one and all an object of hatred to the
world; at the mercy of everyone’s ill-treatment; having nothing
attractive of their own—neither eloquence, nor fame, nor riches, nor
city, nor nationality, nor family, nor career, nor reputation, nor any
one of these things, but just the reverse of them all, an illiterate and
sorry condition, poverty, hatred, and enmity? Their injunctions also
entailed much hardship and their teaching many dangers, and the hearers
too who were to be persuaded were given up to much feasting and
drunkenness and vice. Now, tell me, whence their power of persuasion,
whence their titles of credence? As I was saying, if they _did_ gain men
without miracles, the wonder appears very much greater. Therefore do not
conclude that because there are no miracles now there were none then. It
was to the point, both that they took place then and that they do not
take place now. Persuasion by word alone now is no security that the
Gospel lies in the possession of wisdom. For they who in the beginning
were sowers of the Word were uncultured and ignorant, and they spoke
nothing of themselves, but they gave to the world that which they had
received from God; now, we also spread abroad not our own inventions,
but we speak to all what we have received from them. We do not persuade
by arguments now but by Holy Scripture, and the signs which then took
place inspire us with confidence in what we say. Neither did they
persuade by signs alone, but also by discoursing, whilst the signs made
their words appear the more powerful together with the testimony of the
Old Testament, not the cleverness of what was said. ‘Why,’ you ask,
‘were miracles good then and not now?’ Let us suppose a case, for so far
my contest has been directed against a heathen, and therefore I will
suppose something that must undoubtedly happen; let us then suppose a
case, and let the unbeliever submit to believe, for instance, that
Christ will come, even if he take my word for it; well, then, when
Christ shall come and all the angels with Him, and He is shown to be
God, and all things are under His dominion, will not the heathen too
believe? It is evident that he will fall down in adoration and confess
Him to be God, however stubborn he may be. Who, indeed, seeing the
heavens opened and Christ Himself seated on the clouds, with all the
heavenly host surrounding Him, the rivers running fire, all men standing
by in great fear, would not worship Him and acknowledge Him as God? Tell
me now, shall that worship and knowledge be accounted to the heathen as
faith? By no means. For it is _not_ faith; sheer force produces it, and
the manifestation of visible things. It is not a matter of choice, but
reason is constrained by the greatness of the vision. Therefore, the
more evident and undeniable that which happens is, by so much is faith
diminished, and this is why miracles are not worked now. And that it is
so, listen to Our Lord’s words to St. Thomas: _Blessed are they who have
not seen yet have believed_. Therefore the reward of faith is diminished
just in proportion to the greater evidence of the sign, so that if signs
took place now the same would follow. In the words, _Now we walk through
faith, not through sight_, Paul made it clear that then we shall no
longer know Him by faith. Thus, if you believe then, you will not be
convinced by the wonder of the thing, so neither would you be now if the
same signs took place as of old. Whenever we receive things which are in
no sort of way discoverable to anyone by reasoning, that is faith. On
this account, too, hell is threatened, but is not apparent, for if it
were, the same would be the case here also. Still, if you seek for
miracles, you will see them even now, though they are not the same kind
of miracles. You will see a thousand prophecies concerning a thousand
things, the conversion of the world, the holy life of barbarians, the
change of cruel habits, the increase of piety.
‘What prophecies are these?’ you ask. ‘For all that was foretold was
written down after the event.’ Tell me when, and where, and by whom, and
how long ago? Shall we say it was fifty years ago or a hundred?
Therefore a hundred years ago there was nothing at all written down.
Then how did the world receive the teaching and all other things, as
memory did not suffice? How did they know that Peter was crucified? How
after this did it occur to men to foretell such things, for instance, as
that the Gospel should be preached in the whole world, that the Jewish
dispensation should stop and not come back again? How would those who
had staked their lives for the Gospel have borne to see it
counterfeited? How were the writers trusted when there were no more
miracles? How did those writings penetrate into uncivilised lands, and
into India, and even unto the farthest extremities of the ocean, if the
speakers were not worthy of faith? Now, who were the writers? When and
where did they write? Why did they write? Was it to make themselves
famous? Why did they ascribe the Scriptures to others? Were they
desirous of embodying a system of doctrine? Then was it true or false?
For if they looked upon it as false, there was no pretext for their
coming forward at all; but if as true, there was no need of
counterfeits, as you truly say. Moreover, the prophecies are such that
up to the present day what has been said cannot be restricted by time.
If, on the one hand, the destruction of Jerusalem took place many years
ago, there are other prophecies dating from the same time which reach up
to His coming. Examine these, if you like—as, for instance, _I am with
you always, even unto the consummation of time_, and, _Upon this rock I
will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against
it_; again, _This Gospel shall be preached to all nations_, and the deed
of the woman who was a sinner, and many more than these. Now, whence
comes the truth of this prophecy if it was an invention? How have the
gates of hell not prevailed against the Church? How is Christ always
with us? If He were not with us, the Church would not have conquered.
How has the Gospel been spread about the whole world? Our adversaries
are able to bear witness to the antiquity of our Scriptures—I mean
Celsus and his party, and the man of Batavia after him—for they did not
contradict what those who came after them put together; moreover, the
whole world with one voice has received it. For if it was not the grace
of the Spirit, there could not have been so great an unity from end to
end of the earth, but the inventors would speedily have been convicted,
nor would successes so great have been produced by forgeries and
falsehood. Do you not see the whole world coming to meet it, and error
extinguished?—the mortification of monks shining brighter than the sun?
Do you not see bands of virgins, the piety of barbarians, men all
serving under one yoke? Nor are these things foretold by us alone, but
first by the prophets. You must not overlook those prophecies of theirs
either, for our Scriptures are present to our enemies, and Greeks have
set themselves eagerly to translate them into the language of Greece.
These prophecies foretell many things, and show that He Who was to come
is God.
Now, why do not all men now believe? Because things have been going to
the bad, and it is we who are the cause of it. The rest of my discourse
is for your benefit. It was not, indeed, through signs only that they
then believed, but many were led on by an example of life. _Let your
light shine before men_, Our Lord says, _that they may see your good
works and glorify your Father Who is in heaven_. And, again, _They all
had one heart and one mind, and no man among them called anything his
own, but they had all things in common, and to each man was given
according to his need_, and their life was an angelical one. And if this
were to take place now, we should convert the whole world even without
wonder-working. In the meantime, let those who wish to be saved follow
the Scriptures: there they will find both these successes and many more
besides. For the teachers themselves surpassed those deeds, living their
lives in hunger and thirst and nakedness; we, on the contrary, wish to
enjoy much feasting, and refreshment, and security. Not so those men who
cried out: _Up to the present hour we are in hunger and thirst and
nakedness, and are homeless and beaten about_. Some went out from
Jerusalem as far as Illyria, one to the Indies, one to the Moors,
another to all parts of the earth; we, on the other hand, have not
courage to leave even our own country, but seek for luxury, and splendid
households, and abundance of every kind. Which of us ever suffered
hunger for God’s Word, or went into the desert, or took a long journey
for it? What teacher living by his hands has come to the help of others?
Who has encountered death day after day? Hence our people are growing
softer. For if anyone were to see soldiers and generals wrestling with
hunger and thirst, and death, and every possible evil, and bearing cold
and dangers with the fortitude of lions, and conquering; and if, after
this, he were to see them giving up their life of heroism, becoming
faint-hearted, loving money, absorbed in their own affairs and business,
and then defeated by their enemies, it would be extreme folly to seek
for the reason. Let us apply this to ourselves and our forefathers, for
we have grown weaker than anyone else, and we are nailed to this present
life. Even if a man be found with a trace of the old mortification, who
leaves the city and the market-place, and the thick of the fray, and the
ordering of others, and flies to the mountain, and if anyone ask why he
retires, he will discover no sound reason for it. He says: ‘I withdraw
that I may not perish, and that I may not become weak in goodness’. How
much better it would be that you _should_ grow weaker and gain others,
than remain on the heights and see your brethren perishing. Now, when
some neglect goodness, and others who _do_ care for it are withdrawn
from their rank in the fight, how shall we gain our enemies? If signs
took place now, who would be convinced? Or who of those without would
attach himself to us whilst vice is so apparent? An upright life on our
part seems to the multitude more convincing. For signs from shameless
and bad men arouse a suspicion of evil, but a pure life is able to shut
the devil’s mouth with great force. These things I say both to rulers
and ruled, and to myself, before all, in order that we may show forth an
admirable life, and, forming ourselves into battle array, may disregard
all present things. Let us despise money, and not despise hell; think
little of fame, but not little of our salvation; let us endure struggles
and labours here, that there we may not encounter chastisement. Thus let
us fight the heathen, thus let us take them prisoners in a captivity
which is better than freedom. But we talk persistently and often about
these things, and scarcely ever do them. However, whether we do them or
not, it is right always to insist upon them. For if some cheat through
fine words, how much more should those who are leading others to the
truth not weary of speaking what is due. For if cheaters make use of
these tactics—for they lay up money, and bring arguments to bear, and
encounter dangers, and make their power felt—how much more should we,
who lead men away from deceit, endure dangers, and death, and all
things, so that, gaining ourselves and others, and standing invincibly
against our adversaries, we may arrive at the promised goods in Christ
Jesus our Lord, to Whom be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen.
The Secret of our Faith.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, iii., vol. ii., p. 27.)
· · · · · · ·
Show me, if you can, whether Peter and Paul were scholars. But you
cannot; for they were ordinary men and unlettered.[7] Just as Christ,
when He sent His disciples out into the world, showed His power first to
them in Palestine, saying, _When I sent you without purse, and scrip,
and shoes, did you want anything?_ Afterwards He charged them to have a
scrip and a purse, and so He did in this case. For that which was aimed
at was to show the power of Christ, not that the lack of external
accomplishments should cause those who approached to be rejected from
the faith. Now, whenever heathens accuse the disciples of being
unlearned, let us be even louder than they in our accusations. Let no
one say that Paul was skilful, but praising great men amongst them for
their skill, and those remarkable for their clever speeches, let us say
that all of ours are unlearned. We shall not a little overthrow them on
this side too, so brilliant will be the victory. I have said these
things because I once heard a Christian making himself ridiculous in
discussion with a heathen, and each in their fight against the other
destroying his own side. That which the Christian should have said the
heathen said, and that which it would have been natural for the heathen
to say the Christian put forward. For, Paul and Plato forming the
subject of dispute, the heathen, on the one hand, tried to show that
Paul was uneducated and unlearned, and, on the other, the Christian, out
of simplicity, was all eager to prove that Paul was a better reasoner
than Plato. Thus the heathen gained the victory, as this consideration
prevailed. For, if Paul _had_ been a better dialectician than Plato,
many would naturally have used the argument that he succeeded through
his skilful speech rather than by grace. So the Christian’s argument
told for the heathen, and the heathen’s for the Christian. For if Paul
was untaught and still conquered Plato, as I have said, it was a
triumphant victory. The unlearned Paul, taking Plato’s disciples,
convinced them and drew them to himself. Hence, it is evident that the
Gospel was not preached by human wisdom, but by the grace of God. In
order, then, that we may not encounter the same defeat, nor make
ourselves ridiculous when we are thus in discussion with heathens, let
us condemn the Apostles as unlearned: this very condemnation is praise.
And when they tell us that the Apostles were rustic, let us admit and
confess that they were untaught, and unlearned, and poor, and needy, and
unintelligent, and obscure. This is no blasphemy of the Apostles, but
their glory, that, being what they were, they appeared more famous than
the whole world. Those very unlearned, rustic, untaught men beat down
men wise in their conceits, powerful men, tyrants, men who were enjoying
riches and glory and all outward goods, as if they had not been men at
all. Whence it is clear that the power of the Cross was great, and that
it was not through human strength that these things took place. They do
not, indeed, come from nature at all, but that which was accomplished
was above nature. Whenever something takes place which is above nature,
and very much above it, and is also opportune and good, it is evident
that it happens by a certain divine power and co-operation. For,
consider—a fisherman, a tent-maker, a publican, an unlearned man, and an
untaught man, coming from their outlandish province of Palestine, drove
out from their own stronghold philosophers, and orators, and
rhetoricians, and overcame them in a short time in the midst of many
dangers, peoples and kings resisting them, nature itself being adverse:
inveterate custom, force of habit, fighting them to the teeth: evil
spirits armed against them: the devil in agitation setting all things in
motion—monarchies, and rulers, and democracies, and nations, and cities,
barbarians, heathens, philosophers, orators, sophists, lawmakers, laws,
tribunals, every sort of chastisement, and manifold deaths. And yet all
these things were overcome, and gave way at the voice of fishermen, just
as a little dust which is unable to resist the force of strong winds.
Let us learn, therefore, so to speak with the heathens as not to be like
a herd of sheep or cattle, but let us be prepared to prove the hope
which is in us. And, meanwhile, let us insist on the chief point, which
is no small one, and say to them, How was it that the weak circumvented
the strong, that twelve men conquered the world, not in the strength of
their own weapons, but in their nakedness fighting armed men? For, say,
if twelve men, inexperienced in war, breaking in upon a huge array of
armed warriors, not only weaponless themselves, but feeble in body, were
to suffer nothing at their hands, and were to escape scatheless from a
thousand missiles, and, standing in their midst with unprotected bodies,
were to put them all to flight, not using weapons, but fighting with
their hands, slaying some and taking others into captivity, and not
receiving a scratch themselves, nor reached by a thousand blows aimed at
them—who would ascribe this to man alone? Yet the victory of the
Apostles was far more wonderful than this. For it is much more
stupendous that an unlearned man, an untaught man, and a fisherman
should circumvent so much cleverness, than that an unarmed man should
come scatheless out of the fight: that they should be held back neither
by their small numbers nor their poverty, nor by dangers, nor by force
of habit, nor by the difficulty of the enterprise which they had
undertaken, nor by death looking them daily in the face, nor by the
multitude of those deceived, nor by the fame of deceivers.
In like manner, then, let us overthrow them, and fight against them, and
let us strike them down rather by our life than by arguments. For this
is the great strife, and the most unanswerable argument is that of
works, since we may philosophise with our tongues in a thousand ways,
and yet if we show not forth a better life than theirs, we gain nothing
whatever. They do not give heed to our reasonings, but take note of what
we do, and they say, ‘First yield obedience to your own words, and then
advise others. If you speak of the innumerable goods of the next world,
and yet seem to be given up to present ones, as if those others did not
exist, your deeds are more convincing to me than your words. For when I
see you seizing others’ property, grieving inordinately over the dead,
committing many other sins, how can I believe you when you tell me that
there is a resurrection?’ Even if they do not put this into words, they
think it, and bear it in their minds. And this it is which prevents
infidels from becoming Christians. Let us, then, lead them by our life.
Many illiterate men have thus struck down the mind of philosophers, by
showing them the philosophy of works, sending forth a voice louder than
a trumpet through their own manner of life and conduct: this voice is
indeed much more powerful than the tongue. Whenever I say that it is not
lawful to bear malice to anyone, and then injure a heathen in a thousand
ways, how shall I be able to persuade him by my words since I frighten
him away by my deeds? Let us, therefore, catch them by our daily life,
and build up the Church through these souls, and collect this wealth.
Nothing whatsoever is of so much worth as a soul, not even the whole
world. If you should give thousands of pounds to the poor, you do
nothing in comparison to the one who converts a soul. _He who makes an
honourable man out of a worthless one shall be as My mouth_, God says.
Compassion for the poor is also a great good, but it is nothing compared
to withdrawing a soul from error; the man who does this becomes like
Peter and Paul. For we may point out the Gospel which they preached; not
that we be imperilled as they were, and have hunger and pestilence and
other evils to endure, for this is a time of peace, but so that we may
show forth the zeal of a willing spirit. _This_ fishing may, indeed, be
carried out by those who sit at home. If any man have a friend, or
relation, or servant, this let him do and say, and he will become like
Peter and Paul. And why do I say Peter and Paul? He will be the mouth of
Christ. For _he who makes an honourable_ _man out of a worthless one
shall be as My mouth_, He says. If you should not persuade to-day, you
will to-morrow, and, even if you never persuade at all, you will have
the full reward. And if you cannot persuade all, you can persuade a few
out of many, since the Apostles themselves did not convince all the men
of their day; but still they conversed with them all, and have the
reward for all. For God is wont to bestow His crowns, not according to
what is accomplished by good deeds, but according to the intention of
those who do them. If you put down only two mites He receives them, and
He will do for those who teach what He did for the widow. Therefore,
because you are not able to save the world, do not despise the few, nor
turn away from small things in your desire for great things. If you
cannot give a hundred, look after the ten; and if you cannot give ten,
do not despise the five; and if five are beyond you, do not overlook the
one; and if you cannot even give the one, do not lose courage, and do
not neglect your part.
· · · · · · ·
The Victory of Our Faith.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxv., vol. ii., p. 376.)
· · · · · · ·
We may wonder the more at the power of Christ, and at the courage of the
Apostles, because they were announcing the Gospel at the very time when
everything Jewish was particularly attacked, and the Jews were
proscribed as seditious, and the Roman emperor commanded their total
dispersion. And this happened in a state of things which we may describe
in this way. There is a great tempest at sea, the whole atmosphere is
wrapped in darkness, wreck follows upon wreck, on board all the sailors
are in open rebellion, and from below monsters are darting up, and
together with the waves are destroying the men; thunderbolts are
falling, pirates attacking, and on board all is mutiny. Suppose that in
this extremity anyone should order men who were ignorant of nautical
matters, nor even knew the sea, to sit at the rudder, to guide the helm,
and to fight their way. And then, in the face of an experienced crew
equipped with much labour suppose that these men should use a light
boat, in the state of tumult which I have described, and overcome and
master it. For as Jews they were hated by the Gentile world, and as the
enemies of their own laws they were stoned by the Jews; nowhere was
there any standing-ground. Thus, on all sides there were precipices,
chasms, and rocks; cities, country-places, dwelling-houses, offered them
nothing else; one and all opposed them—commander, and magistrate, and
the man in private life, all races and all peoples—and there was a
disturbance with which men could not reason. For, indeed, the Jewish
race was exceedingly hateful to the Roman rulers, inasmuch as it had
caused them trouble in a thousand ways, and yet the Gospel tidings were
not prejudiced thereby, but the city itself was ravaged and set on fire,
and numberless ills fell upon its inhabitants. Nevertheless the
Apostles, going forth from that city, bringing in new laws, mastered
even the Romans. Oh, what new and wonderful deeds are these! The Romans
at that time subdued countless thousands of Jews, and they did _not_
circumvent twelve poor unarmed men. What words can adequately express
this wonder? For there are two things which teachers should possess—the
being worthy of confidence and the love of their disciples; and over and
above these, that what they say should be well received, and the time in
which they say it free from agitation and fear. But then everything was
just the reverse. For neither did they appear to be worthy of
confidence, and yet they were to detach those whom men, apparently thus
worthy, had deceived. They were not loved, but even hated, and they drew
men off from those things which they clung to, from habits of life, and
from country, and from laws. Moreover, their injunctions were
exceedingly hard, but those from which they took men were most pleasant.
Many were the dangers and the deaths to be encountered both by them
themselves and by those who listened to them; and with all this, the
time itself was a time of great trouble, fruitful in wars, tumults, and
agitation, so that if there had been no one of the things which we have
enumerated, it alone might have upset everything. We may say,
pertinently: _Who shall declare the powers of the Lord? who shall set
forth all His praises?_ For if the friends of Moses did not listen to
him when he spoke with miraculous signs simply because of bricks and
clay, who was able to withdraw from an idle life men who day after day
are killed and slaughtered, and are suffering intolerable evils? Who was
able to make them prefer this insecure life of blood-shedding and death
even to the other, the heralds of these tidings being of another race,
and on all accounts most hostile? Let a man bring in, not to a race, or
city, or people, but into one small household, one who is hated by
everybody in it, and let him try hard through that person to withdraw
men from those he loves, from father and wife and children, will he not
be seen torn to pieces before he opens his mouth? And if he bring to the
house contention and strife between husband and wife, will they not take
and stone him before he again crosses the threshold? If besides he is
contemptible, and yet enjoins disagreeable things, ordering luxurious
men to practise an ascetic life; and with all this, if the combat be
against men much more numerous and powerful than himself, is it not
evident that he is wholly undone? And yet this very thing which it was
impossible to do in one household is what Christ has done in the whole
world, through precipice and fire, and chasm and rock, with earth and
sea fighting against Him, by introducing the healers of the world. And
if you wish to learn these things more accurately,—I mean famines, and
plagues, and earthquakes, and other visitations,—go over the history of
these things as it is contained in Josephus, and you will see it all
most clearly. This is why He Himself said: _Be not disturbed, for all
things must come about_; and _He who perseveres unto the end shall be
saved_; and again, _This Gospel shall be preached throughout the whole
world_. For He revives those who are discouraged and drooping for fear
at what He has told them, by saying, that whatever happens, the Gospel
must be preached in every part of the world, and that then the end will
come. Do you see what a state things were in at that time, and how war
was everywhere? And this at the outset, when that which is established
most especially requires much peace. Now, what was this state? There is
no reason why we should not recapitulate the same things. The first war
was that of deceivers, for He said: _There shall arise false Christs and
false prophets_; the second, that of the Romans: _You are about to hear
wars_; the third was that which was to bring in famine; the fourth, that
of plagues and earthquakes; the fifth, _They shall give you up to fear_;
the sixth, _You shall be hated by all_; the seventh, _They shall traduce
and hate each other_; hence clearly civil war; hence false Christs and
false brethren; hence _Charity shall grow cold_, which is the cause of
all evils without exception. Do you see how war was there in every
shape, both novel and marvellous? Still, with all this and much more
(for war amongst kindred was added to civil discord), the Gospel tidings
took possession of the whole world. _For_, He said, _the Gospel shall be
preached in the whole world_.
· · · · · · ·
Marriages as they were and as they are.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxiii., vol. ii., p. 355.)
· · · · · · ·
Have you not heard that men and women were assembled together in the
upper room, and that that gathering was worthy of heaven? And with
reason. The women of those days put in practice a high ascetic life, and
men were grave and wise. Listen at least to the seller of purple saying:
_If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come unto my house
and abide there_. Listen to the women who followed the Apostles about
from place to place with the spirit of true men—a Priscilla, and a
Persis, and the others—from whom the women of to-day are as far removed
as the men are from the men. For then even when going about they gave no
scandal, but now, delicately nurtured in their houses, they hardly avoid
this suspicion. These scandals arise from people decking themselves out
and from luxury. Those women of old made it their business to spread
abroad the Gospel tidings: _now_ women’s anxiety is to have fine figures
and comely faces. They care no more for their good name than for their
salvation; and as to high and great deeds of goodness, they do not even
dream of them. What woman shows eagerness to make her husband better?
What man is anxious to bring his wife to amendment? Not one; but the
wife’s whole anxiety is about jewels and clothes, and the other
adornments of the body, and how she may increase her substance; and the
husband’s is the same, except that he has many more cares, and they are
all worldly cares. Who that is about to marry would inquire into the
girl’s manners and education? No one; but he would be particular enough
about money and land, and the accurate estimate of her fortune, as if he
were going to buy something, or to carry out some low contract. This is
why they speak of marriage as a contract. For I have heard many say,
‘Such a man has made a contract with such a girl; that is, he has
married’. They trample upon the very gifts of God, and marry and are
married, as if they were buyers and sellers. Indeed, deeds require more
accuracy than the business of buying and selling. Consider how men
married of old, and emulate their example. Now, _how_ did they marry?
They enquired about the ways and habits of their bride, and about her
goodness of heart. Therefore they had no need of contracts, nor of
pen-and-ink settlements; the bride’s character was everything to them.
So I admonish you, too, not to look for money and wealth, but for
disposition and goodness. Seek out a virtuous and earnest girl, and she
will be of more worth to you than thousands of pounds. If you look for
the things of God, the other things will come of themselves; but if you
pass over the former and insist on the latter, you will not gain even
these. But you will say, ‘Such a man became rich through his wife’. Are
you not ashamed to bring forward such instances? I have heard many say,
‘I would rather be poor a thousand times over than grow wealthy through
my wife’. For what is more unacceptable than that wealth? What is more
pungent than that abundance? What is more humiliating than to be the man
thus noted and pointed at by everyone as the ‘man who became rich
through his wife’. I would set forth the domestic vexations which would
of necessity befal this man from his act, viz., his wife’s temper, his
state of slavery, their contentions, the scoffs of servants who call him
‘a poor beggar, a nobody sprung from nowhere, for what had he to offer?
Did not everything belong to the lady?’ But these words make no
impression on you, for you have not an independent spirit. Since
toad-eaters, too, have to hear what is still more outrageous, and do not
care, so neither are these men troubled, but they glory in their
shamelessness, and when we talk to them about it, one of them answers,
‘Let me alone, it is very pleasant; and it can put an end to me for all
I care’. Oh! the malice of the devil for making certain sayings
commonplaces in life, which are capable of poisoning the whole existence
of such men. See, at least, what deadly havoc this one diabolical phrase
works; for it says in so many words, ‘Have no care for sobriety or for
justice: let everything of the kind be thrown aside, and look only for
one thing—pleasure’. Even if this pursuit oppress you, choose it; even
if all who meet you spit upon you, and throw mud in your eyes, and drive
you about like a dog, bear it. What else could swine say if they had a
voice? or unclean dogs? Indeed, often _they_ would not give voice to
those things which the devil has induced men to rave about. Therefore I
strongly advise those who know the heartlessness of these words to fly
from such proverbial sayings, and to confute them by the contrary ones
of Holy Scripture. Which are they? _Go not after thy lusts, and turn
away from thy own will._ And, again, concerning the harlot, its words
are opposed to that other phrase: _Mind not the deceit of a woman. For
the lips of a harlot are like a honeycomb dropping, and her throat is
smoother than oil. But her end is bitter as wormwood, and sharp as a
two-edged sword._ Let us listen to these, and not to those words. For on
the latter base-minded and servile men ground their sophistry; hence, in
this, men become unreasoning things, in that they elect to seek pleasure
everywhere according to the world’s standard, which is despicable even
apart from our showing. For after the surfeiting, what is the gain of a
sweet taste? Cease, then, from this mirth, and from committing
yourselves to hell and the unquenchable fire, and let us look forward as
we ought to the things to come, putting off the scales from our eyes, so
that we may reach that future life in due time in great piety and
contentment, and may gain its good things through the love and kindness
of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be power for ever and ever. Amen.
“Use a Little Wine.”
(_Homilies de Statuis_,[8] xxi., _preached at Antioch_, tom. ii., p. 2.)
· · · · · · ·
Since, therefore, we melt down the gold of the Apostle’s mines, not
throwing it into the furnace, but putting it by in the understanding of
our soul, not enkindling a flame, but the fire of the Spirit, let us
pick up diligently even the tiny shavings. For if the word is brief, its
power is great. If the special worth of pearls lies not in their bulk
but in their beauty, so is it in the reading of the Divine Scriptures.
On the one hand, secular education has a care for much that is trifling,
is full of silly talk to its pupils, and sends them away empty-handed,
without gain small or great. It is not so with the grace of the Spirit,
but just the contrary. By a few words it brings asceticism before all,
and often one word is sufficient for the provision of a whole lifetime.
Since we have this wealth before us, let us rouse ourselves, and receive
these words with a pure mind. And I am prepared to show that this word
(of St. Paul to St. Timothy) contains a great deal. This advice has
seemed to many superfluous and trifling, and they make some such remark
as, ‘Might not Timothy have known himself how much wine he was to take,
without waiting to be told it by his master?’ Now, as the master not
only gave the order, but enforced it by letter, as on a metal slab, in
the epistle which he wrote to him, was he not ashamed to establish a
rule for such things in writing to his disciple? Learn, then, that this
advice, far from being superfluous, was necessary and most useful. It is
not Paul’s doing, but the grace of the Spirit. I am speaking not only of
its having been said, but also of its having been made emphatic in
writing, and published by this same epistle to all future generations. I
shall come presently to this proof. Together with the remarks I have
noted, some people question another and a not less important point,
asking themselves why God allowed a man of so great courage, whose bones
and body put forth devils, to fall into this great bodily weakness; for
he was not merely ill, he was always and persistently ill with illnesses
following close upon each other, so as to leave him no breathing time.
How do we know this? From Paul’s own words; for he did not say, _because
of thy infirmity_, nor thy infirmities alone, but to show that they were
constant he said, _thy frequent infirmities_. Let as many as are given
up to a long sickness, and are in great distress and weariness, listen
to this. Our enquiry does not concern itself only with the fact that,
being a holy man, he was sick, or that he was so thus constantly, but
that he was entrusted with the concerns of the world. If he had been one
of those dwellers on the mountain heights, or bound fast to a tent in
the desert, and thus leading a life without business, the question would
be less puzzling; but exposed to view as he was, with the cares of
churches so great upon him, traversing entire cities and countries, and
the whole world itself, with so much readiness, that _he_ should have
been given up to the powerlessness of illness, this it is which is the
most perplexing of all to a man without reflection; for if not for
himself, he wanted his health for others. He was an excellent general:
he had waged war, he said, not against unbelievers only, but against
demons and the devil himself. All his enemies were fiercely assailing
him, dispersing his army, and taking it captive. This man could lead
thousands to the truth, and he was sick. If no further harm than this
had been done to our work by that illness, a man says, that alone was
sufficient to make believers grow more careless and negligent. If
soldiers see their general confined to bed, they grow careless and less
eager for battle; so it was much more natural that the faithful of those
days, seeing the master who worked signs so great constantly ill and
weak in his body, should suffer, humanly speaking, at the sight. This is
not all; but enquiries go on to something else, and ask again why
neither he cured himself, nor his master, who saw him thus prostrated,
cured him either; whereas they were raising the dead, and casting out
demons, and conquering death with authority, they did _not_ cure this
one sick body; and whilst in life and in death they were showing forth a
wonderful power in other bodies, they did _not_ restore this ailing
stomach. And, what is more, Paul was not ashamed, after wonders so great
as he had shown forth, by a mere word writing to Timothy, of advising
him to try the remedy of wine-drinking. Not that drinking wine is bad.
Far from it. This is what heretics assert; but that he deemed it not
beneath him that the cure of one sick member could not be affected
without this help. He was so far from being ashamed of this that he made
it clear to all succeeding generations. Do you see how deeply we have
gone into the matter: how that which appears a small thing gives rise to
endless questions? Let us, then, add the explanation, for we _have_ gone
into it thus deeply in order to rouse your minds and establish them in
security.
You must allow me, before coming to the explanation in question, to say
something about Timothy’s goodness and Paul’s care for him. What was
kinder than he, who at so great a distance, and in a round of so much
business, made the well-being of his disciple’s stomach his care, and
told him clearly what to do for his restoration to health? And what
could equal Timothy’s virtue? He so looked down on luxury and scorned a
rich table as to grow weak from his extreme severity and excessive
fasting. Listen to Paul’s words plainly showing that he was not this by
nature, but that he had lost his strength of stomach through fasting and
water drinking; for he did not merely say, _Use a little wine_, but
saying in the first place, _Do not still drink water_, he added his
counsel about drinking wine. The _still_ was a proof that until then he
had drunk water, and had so become weak. Who would not be struck with
his mortification and severity of life? Timothy was taking heaven itself
by storm, and pressing on to the height of virtue, and to this his
master bears witness in the words: _I have sent you Timothy, who is my
beloved child and faithful in the Lord_. Now, when Paul calls him his
child, and his faithful and beloved child, these words sufficiently show
all his worth; for the judgments of the saints are not given either out
of love or hatred, but are free from all prejudice. If Timothy had been
Paul’s child according to nature, he would not have been as enviable as
he is now renowned, for whereas Timothy was nothing to him according to
the flesh, through the attraction of piety he drew him into his sonship,
preserving carefully in all things the characteristics of Timothy’s
asceticism. Just as a calf yoked with a bull, so did Timothy bear the
yoke with him all over the world, and made no difference as he grew
older, but his ardour induced him to vie with the labours of his master.
Paul, again, witnesses to this, saying: _Let no one set him at nought,
for he is doing the Lord’s work as I am myself_. Do you see how he
proclaims Timothy’s zeal as equal to his own? And that you may not think
that favouring prompted him so to speak, he makes his listeners
themselves witnesses of his child’s goodness, saying: _You know what his
test has been; how he has served with me in the Gospel as a child his
father. You have had a proof by this of his virtue and of his tried
spirit._ Yet whilst Timothy was rising to these great heights of
goodness, he did not presume of himself. On the contrary, he was in
wrestling and fear. On this account he was diligent in fasting, and did
not act as the majority of men do, who, having given themselves up to
fasting, some for ten months only, others for twenty, suddenly break up
everything. He did not suffer this, nor did he say anything of this kind
within himself: ‘Why should I go on fasting? I have got the better of
myself: I have conquered my desires, I have mortified my body, I have
terrified demons, I have cast out the devil, I have raised the dead, I
have cleansed lepers, the opposing powers hold me in fear, what further
need have I of fasting and of the weakness which it brings?’ He said
none of these things, nor were they in his mind; but the greater his
abundance of good deeds, the more he feared and trembled, and this
asceticism he had learnt from his master; for he who had been rapt into
the third heaven and taken into paradise, who had heard ineffable words
and had participated in mysteries so high, who had traversed the whole
world as if with wings, said, in writing to the Corinthians: _I fear
lest, having preached to others, I myself should be cast out_. Now, if
Paul, who was able to say, _The world is crucified to me and I to the
world_, is in fear after all these his wonderful deeds, how much more
should _we_ fear, and this should increase in proportion to the number
of our good actions. For the devil storms and rages the more when he
sees us ordering our lives with care. When he sees much goodness pressed
together and an accumulation of merits, then it is that he sets himself
to bring about a completer shipwreck. For a poor and abject man, even if
he be supplanted and fall, does not so injure the common good. Now, when
he who stands, as it were, gloriously on the heights of virtue, seen and
known to all, the object of general admiration, falls into temptation,
he effects great ruin and havoc, not only because he fell from a high
place, but also because he made those who looked up to him more
slothful. Just as in the body, when a member withers up, the harm is not
great, yet, if the eyes fail or the head is injured, the whole body
becomes useless, so is it with the saints and with those who do great
things. When these are extinguished, when they admit any stain, they
work immense harm to the whole body.
Now, Timothy had all this before him, and he fortified himself on all
sides; for he knew that youth is hard to manage: unstable, easily
deceived, unsteady, and that it needs a strong bridle; for it is a pyre
which embraces all external things and is easily ignited. Therefore, he
was careful to put a check upon it on all sides, and he tried in every
way to quench this fire, and he drove the horse, which was unruly and
refractory, with much spirit, until he had broken him in and made him
obedient, and brought a strong hand to bear upon him, so that he
listened to reason’s word of command: ‘Let my body be weak but not my
soul,’ he said. ‘Let the flesh be bridled, and my soul in its course
heavenwards not be impeded.’ Together with this, what we should
especially wonder at in him was, that weakened down as he thus was, and
fighting with weakness, he did not neglect God’s work, but was more
active than those in full and robust health. He was seen with his
master, now at Ephesus, now at Corinth, often in Macedonia, in Italy,
everywhere by land and by sea, ever taking part in his toils and in his
continual dangers, nor did his weakness of body get the better of his
asceticism of spirit. This is zeal according to God, which makes
high-soaring easy. Thus, they who are in good case and sound in body
will gain nothing by it if their soul be cast down, and soft, and
slothful; so the weak will not be harmed by their want of health if
their soul be strong and alert. Now, this advice and counsel seem to
some to warrant unlimited wine-drinking, which is by no means the case.
If anyone would weigh the word carefully, he would find it is rather an
exhortation to fasting. For consider, this advice of Paul’s was given
not from the first and at the outset. It was given when he knew that
Timothy’s whole strength was broken, and even then not unrestrictedly,
but with a condition. He did not merely say, _Use wine_, but, _a little
wine_, and this not because Timothy required the advice, but because
_we_ do. Therefore, in writing to him, he limits and restricts
wine-drinking, telling him to drink as much as would overcome weakness,
and restore health to the body; not what would encourage another
complaint. Immoderate wine-drinking breeds complaints no less than
excessive water-drinking, or rather much worse ones, both in soul and
body. It incites the war of passions, and leads a tempest of foolish
fancies into the mind, weakens and enervates strength of body. An
abundance of water falling on the earth does not more persistently break
up the soil than constant wine-drinking does bodily strength by
weakening and wasting it. Let us, therefore, avoid both extremes, and
take care of our health, whilst we keep it within due bounds. For wine
was given us by God, not that we should be drunk with it, but that we
should be temperate, that we should be made glad and not sorry. _Wine
rejoices the heart of man_, the Scripture says. Now, you turn it into a
course for despondency. Those who drink too much are sullen, and their
reason is overclouded. Used with moderation, it is the best medicine.
This will be a useful argument against heretics who attack what God has
made. If it had been forbidden, Paul would not have counselled it, nor
have said, _Use wine_. And not against heretics only is it good, but
against our own simpler brethren, who, when they see certain men
degrading themselves by drink, instead of blaming _them_, attack God’s
gift, saying, _Let there be no wine_. Then we may answer them: ‘Let
there be no drunkenness’. For wine is God’s, whilst drunkenness is the
devil’s. It is not wine which makes inebriety, but intemperance. Do not
slander God’s creature, but the madness of your fellow-man. Will you
neglect to punish and correct the sinner whilst you despise the
Benefactor?
· · · · · · ·
Possessing the Land.
(_Homilies on Second Epistle to Corinthians_, ix., vol. iii., p. 110.)
· · · · · · ·
Since, then, the things which we see are temporary, but the things which
we do not see eternal, let us turn our minds to these. For what excuse
should we have for choosing passing things instead of eternal ones? If
the present time be indeed pleasant, it does not last, whilst the pain
which it produces endures relentlessly.
How will those who have been made worthy of the Spirit be justified,
enjoying so great a gift, if they remain crawling upon the earth and
clinging to it? For I hear many men making use of foolish speeches, such
as: ‘Give me to-day and take to-morrow; for, if things are what you
pretend hereafter, it is one thing against another; but, supposing there
is no hereafter at all, it is two things instead of nothing’. What is
more senseless or more idle than such words? We are talking about heaven
and the ineffable goods of eternity, and you bring before us the
arguments of a racing-course, and are not ashamed to speak words worthy
of madmen. Do you not blush so to cleave to present things? Will you not
desist from madness and foolishness, and from wasting your youth? That
heathens should speak in this way is not astonishing, but what will
believing men who so rave have to say for themselves? Would you call in
question those immortal hopes or doubt them altogether?
And what is your excuse? ‘Who has ever come,’ you say, ‘and told us
about the next world?’ No man ever did; but God, Who is the most worthy
of belief, has revealed these things. ‘But we cannot see them.’ Neither
can you see God; and do you doubt His existence because you cannot see
Him?’ ‘I believe in it most thoroughly,’ you say. Now, then, if an
unbeliever ask you, ‘Who has ever come from heaven and told us these
things?’ what will you answer? How do you know that there is a God?
‘From visible things,’ you reply; ‘from the order which is in the whole
creation; from the fact that this is evident to all.’ Therefore, apply
the same argument to that which concerns judgment. ‘How am I to do
this?’ you ask. I will tell you, and you will say if I am right. Is God
just, and does He give to each one according to his works, or, on the
contrary, is it His wish that the wicked should do well and feast, and
the good be in trouble and want? ‘Certainly not,’ you say; ‘for not even
a man would suffer this.’ Then where are those who are upright here to
enjoy good things? Where are the wicked to suffer, if there is to be no
future life and no retribution after this world? Do you see that so far
it is one against one, and not two things instead of one? I am showing
you that the just will have not one thing rather than another, but two
things rather than nothing, and that with sinners and those who feast
here just the reverse is the case. For those who feast in this world
have not even one thing against another, but those who persevere in
virtue have two things instead of nothing. Who will be in
refreshment—those who misuse this present life or those who lead an
ascetic one? You say the former, but I point out the latter, and call in
as witnesses those very people who have enjoyed present things, and they
will not be ashamed of what I am going to say. For they have often
cursed match-makers and the day on which the marriage-tie was completed,
and have envied the unmarried. Many young men, who could easily have
married, have desisted for no other reason except its irksomeness. I say
this, not in disparagement of marriage—for it is honourable—but against
those who misuse it. For if married people have often called their life
insupportable, what shall we say of those who have fallen into the
abysses of lust, and who have led a life more slavish and miserable than
any captivity?—of those who have rotted in luxury, and drawn down a
hundred disorders upon their body? ‘Still,’ you answer, ‘it is pleasant
to be somebody.’ Nothing in the world is bitterer than this servitude.
The vain man and he who wishes to please all-comers is more servile than
any slave; whereas he who looks down upon vainglory is exalted above
all, and troubles himself not with what others say. ‘But having money is
delightful.’ We have often shown you that those are in greater plenty
and refreshment who have given up these things and are rather possessors
of nothing. ‘But drunkenness is pleasant.’ Who would say so? Therefore,
if poverty is pleasanter than riches, the unmarried rather than the
married life, obscurity rather than reputation, fasting than feasting,
it follows that those have the most who do not cleave to present things.
I mean that the one, although he may be torn with numberless cares,
rests on a good hope; whereas the other, even if he enjoy luxury a
thousand times over, has fear of the future to spoil and mar his
pleasure. And this is indeed not a slight punishment, as it is
destructive to feasting and enjoyment. Together with these there is a
third sort of punishment. What is this? That earthly feasting is seen to
have no real existence, since nature and the action of time disprove it;
whereas eternal things not only do exist, but remain unchanged. Do you
see that it is not only two things against nothing, but three, five,
ten, twenty, or a thousand against nothing. In order to teach you this
from an example, take the case of Dives and Lazarus: the one enjoyed the
present life and the other eternal life. Now, does it seem to you that
you can set the one thing against the other: to be chastised for ever
and to suffer hunger for a short time; to be sick in a perishing body,
and to be burnt in a fierce fire with an immortal body; to be crowned,
and to feed on eternal goods after short suffering, and to be tortured
endlessly after a brief enjoyment of temporal things? Who would say so?
What would you have me reckon? Quantity, quality, order, God’s
determination respecting each of us? How long will you speak as an
insect might who is always wallowing in the mire?
It does not belong to consistent men to throw away so precious a soul
for anything whatsoever, when a little labour is required to conquer
heaven. Shall I show you by another example that a formidable tribunal
is awaiting us there? Open the door of your conscience and see the judge
who is sitting in your mind. If you exercise judgment upon yourself,
selfish as you are, and could not bear the judgment not to be just, how
much more will God have a care for the righteous, and judge every man
impartially rather than allow all things to be carried out for nothing
and in vain! Who, indeed, would say this? No man whatsoever, but
heathens, barbarians, poets, philosophers, and all the human race will
agree with us in these matters, if not in the same way, and will admit
that there is some kind of tribunal in hell, because the thing is so
clear and evident.
‘And why,’ you ask, ‘does He not chastise in this world?’ In order that
He may show forth His own long-suffering, and give us an opportunity of
salvation by contrition; that He may not use harshness with our race,
nor deprive of salvation those who may be saved by a perfect conversion.
If He immediately chastised sins and destroyed sinners, how would Paul
have been saved or Peter, the chief teachers of the world (οἱ κορυφαῖοι
τῆς οἰκουµένης διδάσκαλοι)? How would David have reaped salvation from
his repentance? or the Galatians? or many others? This is why He does
not demand the payment of every penalty here, but some of the whole
number, nor all there, but one man pays in this world and another in the
next, in order that He may arouse the most insensible through those whom
He chastises, and prove the future state through those whom He does not
chastise. See you not how many men have received their punishment
here—those, for instance, who were buried by the tower, those whose
blood Pilate used for the sacrifices, those amongst the Corinthians who
died a premature death for partaking unworthily of the mysteries; or
again, Pharaoh, or those amongst the Jews who were slaughtered by the
Gentiles, or so many others then, and now, and at all times? And, again,
many great sinners have departed hence without paying any penalty here,
like the rich man in Lazarus’ case, and numerous others. This he does,
and so leads unbelievers to future things, and makes believers more
fervent. _For God is a just, and a strong, and a long-suffering judge,
and remembers not His anger day by day._ Yet, if we misuse His
long-suffering, a time will come when He will be patient no more, and
will instantly apply the penalty. Let us not then encounter chastisement
during endless ages for the enjoyment of one moment, which is our
present life, but let us labour during this critical moment that we may
be crowned for ever. Do you not see that this is how the majority of men
act in worldly things? And they choose a short labour in preference to a
long rest, even if the issue be unfavourable to them. Here there is
equality of labour and gain, or, on the other hand, there is often
endless labour and a small harvest, or none at all; whereas in the case
of the kingdom the travail is little, and the pleasure great and
never-ending. For consider, the husbandman toils all the year round, and
towards the end of it he is often defrauded of the fruits of his many
labours. Again, the sailor and the soldier are in wars and toils till
extreme old age, and it often chances that each dies, the one without
his wealth of cargoes, the other losing his life as well as victory on
the battlefield. Now, tell me what excuse shall we have if we choose
labours in worldly things, that we may rest for a while, or not even
that, because hope is uncertain, whereas in spiritual things we do the
very contrary, and draw down upon us an unspeakable chastisement for the
sake of short ease?
· · · · · · ·
The Word of Praise.
(_Homilies on Second Epistle to Corinthians_, i., vol. iii., p. 8.)
· · · · · · ·
Let us not lose heart in temptation. For no man that feasts, and
slumbers, and flags, is united to Christ, nor any of those who lead this
soft and dissolute life; but the man in tribulation and temptation, he
who walks on the narrow path, is near to Christ. For this was His path,
and so He said: _The Son of man hath not whereon to lay His Head_.
Therefore do not grieve that you are tried, seeing Whom you are like in
this, how you are purified by temptations, and what great things you
gain. Nothing is grievous except falling out with God. Short of this
neither tribulation, nor snares, nor anything else, has power to afflict
the wisely-tempered soul; but just as a small spark falling into a deep
abyss goes out at once, so the force of despondency sinking into a good
conscience is destroyed and quickly disappears. Thus it was that Paul
always rejoiced, since he drew his courage from the things of God, and
did not even perceive human evils: he was grieved as a man, but did not
fall. Thus, too, that patriarch of old was in gladness whilst suffering
many painful things. For consider: he was exiled from his country, he
went through long and grievous journeys, and coming to a foreign land,
he had not a place for the sole of his foot. After that he was a prey to
hunger, and it made him a wanderer, and his hunger was followed by the
taking of his wife, by the fear of death, by childlessness, and war, and
dangers, and plottings, and at last by the crowning and most bitter
grief of all, the slaughtering of his only son, the heir.
Do not think that, because he had so much endurance, he went through
these things without suffering. For if he was just a thousand times
over, as indeed he was, he was still a man, and he had the feelings of a
man. Yet no one of these things overthrew him, but he stood like a
valiant combatant with the laurel wreath, acclaimed with applause in
each race. Thus, too, blessed Paul, exposed day by day to the snowstorms
of temptation, as if feasting in the midst of paradise, rejoiced and
exulted. Now, just as a man who is glad with this gladness does not fall
a prey to despondency, so one who is not glad in this way is easily
overcome by everything, and he suffers as a man would, who having
insufficient armour should be wounded by a chance shot. Not so the man
who is safely armed from head to foot: he wards off every assailing
dart. For, indeed, joy, according to God, is stronger than any armour,
and nothing can make such a man downcast or sad, but he bears all things
with fortitude. What is more destructive than fire, or more painful than
constant tortures? Even if a man lose a hundred possessions and
children, and anything else, this is the sharpest suffering: _Skin for
skin, and all that a man hath he will give for his life_. Nothing could
be harder to bear than pain. Still, that which men deem unbearable
becomes tolerable and desirable through the gladness coming from God. If
you lead the martyr whilst still alive away from the cross or the
cauldron you will find this same joy within his breast, which is not
even to be described.
‘And why should I suffer,’ you ask, ‘since this is no age for
martyrdom?’ What are you saying, ‘This is no age for martyrdom’? It has
never ceased, but is always before our eyes if we will be on the
look-out. It is not only hanging on the wood which makes a martyr, for
if this were the case, Job would be deprived of this particular crown.
He neither appeared at a judgment-seat, nor heard the voice of a judge,
nor saw an executioner, nor raised in the air and disjointed on the
cross, were his ribs worn away. Yet he bore stripes harder than many
martyrs did, and the voices of ceaseless messengers urged and tormented
him more sharply than any stripes, and those worms devoured his flesh
more rapidly than countless executioners. Was he then not fully equal to
a martyr? He _was_ a thousand times a martyr. He wrestled in every
single way, and was crowned; he was tried by money losses, and by
children, and bodily sickness, and wife, and friends, and enemies, and
servants, for they also insulted him to his face; by hunger, and curses,
and pains, and stench. On this account I should say that he would equal
not one, or two, or three, but many martyrs. Besides all this, the time
added greatly to his crowns: for instance, it was before the law and the
dispensation of grace, and he suffered during many months and with
intensity, and all his misfortunes were laid upon him at once, although
each was in itself overwhelming, and that which seemed the most grievous
of all, the loss of his wealth. Many at least have borne stripes but
have not borne the loss of property, and have chosen to be scourged for
it, and would rather have endured a thousand other evils than any
diminution of it, as the loss of money appeared to them the greater
stripe. So this constitutes another kind of martyrdom for the man who
bears its loss with endurance. And how shall we be sure of the
endurance, you ask? By understanding that you gain more than you have
lost by a single word, that of thanksgiving. If, when we hear of our
loss, we are not agitated, but say, ‘Praised be God,’ we have found
something of much greater worth. Indeed, you could not gain rewards so
high by distributing your riches to the poor, nor by going about to seek
out the needy, and by lavishing your good things upon them, as you gain
by this one word. Hence, I admire Job not so much when he opens his
house to the poor, as I proclaim and wonder at him for bearing the loss
of his wealth with thanksgiving. The same is evident in the case of his
children’s death. You will receive a reward not less than his was who
led out his son to sacrifice him, if seeing _yours_ dead, you give
thanks to the God of mercy. How is such a man less than Abraham? He did
not see _his_ son lying dead, but only expected it; so that if he
carries off the palm for his readiness to sacrifice, and for putting out
his hand to seize the knife, he is surpassed by the fact of _your_ son
being actually a corpse before your eyes. And, besides, the inward
consciousness of his good deed bore him up with consolation, that heroic
action being produced by his own fortitude, and the listening to the
voice from above increased his readiness; in this case there is nothing
of this kind. Thus it requires a most steadfast soul in the man who
looks upon his only son, brought up in wealth and giving much promise,
lying stretched across the threshold, in order to bear it meekly. He who
can do this has overcome the tempest of natural emotion, and is able to
speak tearlessly those words of Job: _The Lord has given, the Lord has
taken away_; he will take his place even with Abraham, and be proclaimed
with Job for this one word alone. And if you put a stop to the wailing
of women and break up the bands of weepers, and lead them to the voice
of praise, numberless rewards will follow both from above and below; men
will be in admiration, angels will applaud, God will be your crown.
· · · · · · ·
Sufferings of the Just.
(_Homilies de Statuis_, xxi., _preached at Antioch_, t. ii., p. 13,
_Benedictine Edition_.)
· · · · · · ·
_Blessed are ye when men reproach you, and pursue you, and say every
evil thing against you, lying. Rejoice and be glad, because your reward
is very great in heaven; for this is what their fathers did to the
prophets._ And again, Paul, wishing to encourage the Macedonians, said:
_You, brethren, are become the imitators of the churches of God in
Judea, because you have suffered from your own countrymen the same
things as they suffered from the Jews._ And again, exhorting the Hebrews
in the same way, he enumerates all the just; those who were in furnaces,
in water, in deserts, in mountains, in caves, in hunger, those living in
anguish; as a community of suffering is in itself some consolation to
its victims. And listen again to Paul urging the same thing when
speaking of the resurrection: _If as a man I fought with the wild beasts
at Ephesus, what do I gain by it if the dead are not to rise again?_ And
again: If we hope in Christ in this life only, we are more miserable
than all men. We suffer a thousand evils according to this world, he
says; if then we may hope for no other life, what can be more wretched
than we? Whence it is clear that our lives do not end here, and this is
evident from temptations, for God would never allow those who have
suffered so much and so greatly, and have passed their whole lives in
temptations and numberless dangers, not to be rewarded with gifts much
greater. And if this be the case, it is evident that He has prepared
another life which is happier and more glorious, in which He means to
crown and to proclaim the champions of piety in the face of the whole
world. Therefore, when you see a just man spending this present life in
great trouble, when you see him ill-treated, in sickness, poverty, and
enduring all sorts of misfortunes, say to yourself, that if there were
no resurrection and no judgment, God would not allow him to leave this
world after suffering so many evils and enjoying no good. Hence it is
evident that He holds in reserve for them another life far pleasanter
and higher than this. If this were not the case He would not allow so
many sinners to feast in this life, nor so many just to be in a sea of
troubles. But since there _is_ another life, in which He designs to give
to every man according to his deserts, whether they be those of
wickedness or those of goodness, He suffers the one to be persecuted and
the other to enjoy himself. I will endeavour to prove another reason
(why suffering is tolerated) from the Scriptures. And what is it? That
we who are called to the same virtue may not say that _they_ had a
different nature to ours and were not men. So in speaking of the great
Elias it is said that Elias was a man of like feelings to ourselves. Do
you see that he is shown to be a man like to us from similarity of
feelings? And again: _For I am a man of like nature to yourselves_. This
is a pledge of similarity. Clearly He is teaching you here the lesson
that He makes us happy in the right way. When you hear Paul saying, _Up
to the present time we are in hunger, and thirst, and nakedness, and we
are chastised, and homeless, and weary_; and again: _that the Lord
chastises the one He loves, and scourges every son He receives_, it is
evident that we should exalt not those who are enjoying rest, but those
who are tried and afflicted for God, and that we should emulate those
who live holily, and care for piety. So spoke the prophet: _Their right
hand is the right hand of iniquity. Their daughters decked out, adorned
round about after the similitude of a temple. Their store-houses full,
flowing out of this into that. Their sheep fruitful in young, abounding
in their goings forth; their oxen fat. There is no breach of wall, nor
passage, nor crying out in their streets. They have called the people
happy that hath these things._ What do you say, O prophet? _Happy_, he
says, _is that people whose God is the Lord_. I call blessed, not the
man who abounds in money, but him who lives for piety, even if he suffer
a thousand evils. And if we ought to speak of another[9] reason, I
should say that tribulation increases the worth of the tried.
_Tribulation worketh patience, and patience probation, probation hope,
and hope is not shamed_: see you how the probation produced by
tribulation makes us hopeful concerning the future, and how remaining in
temptations puts us in good hope of what is to come? Therefore, I said,
not unadvisedly, that tribulations themselves strengthen the
resurrection in our hearts, and make those who are tried better. For as,
he says, gold is tried in the fire, so is an acceptable man in the fire
of humiliation. There is yet another[10] reason. What is this? One which
I have often spoken of already: that, if we have any stains, we may put
them off in this world. The Patriarch clearly said to the rich man that
Lazarus had received his bad things, and was therefore consoled. And,
added to this, we may find another reason. What is it? The strengthening
of our crowns and rewards, for the more searching the tribulation, the
greater will be the rewards, or, rather, they will far surpass the
comparison. _The sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared
to the glory to come, which shall be revealed in us._ Having, then, all
these reasons to give for the affliction of the saints, let us not be
cast down in temptations, nor distressed, nor harassed, but let us
instruct our own souls, and teach these things to others. Even if you
see a man leading a good life, practising asceticism, pleasing God, and
he be suffering a thousand evils, be not scandalised, O beloved. Again,
if you see some one overthrown who is engaged in spiritual works and
about to complete something useful, be not troubled. For I have often
heard many men remark upon it in this way: ‘So and so,’ they say, ‘went
to a shrine, taking all his money to the poor, and he was shipwrecked,
and lost everything; another, again, did the same and fell among
thieves, and barely escaping with his life, he got away in nakedness’.
What should we say? That none of these things need trouble us. For if he
_did_ perish by shipwreck, the fruit of justice is perfect above: he had
done his part, he had put together his possessions, given them up, and
taking them, had set out. He had begun his journey, but the shipwreck
was not of his own making. Why, then, did God allow it? That it might
prove him. Still the poor were deprived of their money, you say: you do
not care for the poor as God their maker does. If they were indeed
deprived of this money, He is able to offer them an opportunity of a
much greater treasure.
Therefore, do not let us call Him to account for what has happened, but
glorify Him in all things. For not by chance, or in vain, does He allow
such things often to come about, nor does He despise those who are to
enjoy solace from money, but instead of this He puts another means of
support in their way, and, besides the trial, gives the shipwrecked man
a greater reward. Indeed, giving thanks to God in trials of this kind is
much higher than alms, for we do not give by alms alone, but if we bear
bravely the losses inflicted by others, we shall gain immense fruit from
it. In order to prove this to you I will make it clear to you from what
happened to Job that patience is better than alms-giving. When Job was
rich, he opened his house to the poor and gave away all that he
possessed, but he was not so magnificent at the time he was opening his
house to the needy, as when he heard unmoved that it had fallen to the
ground: he was not so renowned when he covered the naked with the fleece
of his sheep as when, hearing that fire had broken out and consumed all
his cattle, he gave thanks. _Then_ he was kind, now he became mortified:
_then_ he had compassion on the poor, now he gave thanks to his Lord.
Nor did he say to himself: ‘What is the meaning of this? The sheep, from
which thousands of poor were fed, are destroyed: for if _I_ was unworthy
to enjoy this abundance, I should have been spared, at least, for the
sake of those who shared it.’ He neither said nor thought anything of
the sort, but he knew that God was ordering it all for the best. And to
show you that he beat the devil more effectually by giving thanks when
despoiled than by showing mercy when rich, consider that, at the time of
his wealth, the devil had some reason, even if falsely, for saying,
_Does Job worship Thee for nothing?_ Now when God took away everything,
and stripped him completely, and Job kept his good-will towards God,
then was that shameless mouth stopped, and he had nothing more to say:
that just man was more glorious than before. To bear with fortitude and
thanksgiving the being despoiled is a much greater thing than for a rich
man to give alms, as has been shown in the case of this just man. Then
his kindness to his fellow-man was overflowing, now he proved his
exceeding love for God. I insist on this, not without reason, but
because many men by frequent alms have supported widows, and then been
deprived of their substance. Others have lost everything through a fire
breaking out; others have encountered shipwreck; others through
slanderings and abuse have, after generous alms-giving, fallen into the
extreme of poverty, and into weakness and disease, and have been helped
by no one in any way. In order, therefore, that we should not say, as
many often do, ‘No man knows anything,’ what I have said will suffice to
put an end to this difficulty. ‘So and so, who gave so much in alms,’
you say, ‘lost everything.’ And what if he did? For, if he give thanks
for this great loss of his, he will propitiate God’s good-will the more,
and reap not double riches, as Job did, but the hundred-fold in eternal
life. If he _does_ suffer here, the very fact of his bearing it all
bravely will increase his reward. God, in calling him to greater trials
and struggles, allowed him to fall from abundance into poverty. Has fire
perchance often broken out in your house and destroyed your substance?
Remember what happened to Job, give thanks to the Lord, Who was able to
stop it and did not stop it, and you will receive a reward as great as
if you had poured forth all those things into the hands of the poor. Or,
are you living in poverty and hunger, and a thousand dangers? Call to
mind Lazarus, who was hard pressed by sickness, and poverty, and
solitude, and numberless things of the kind, and all this after so much
goodness; call to mind the Apostles, who passed their lives in hunger
and thirst and nakedness; and the prophets, and patriarchs, and just,
and you will find them one and all, not amongst the rich, not amongst
those who feast, but amongst those suffering hunger and affliction and
anguish.
Pondering on these things, give thanks to God for the share He has
allotted to you, not in hatred, but in tender love, since He would not
have allowed those men to suffer evils so great, if He had not loved
them dearly, because He made them more illustrious through these evils.
No good is so great as thanksgiving, as nothing is worse than blasphemy.
Let us not be astonished that, when we are paying much attention to
spiritual things, we suffer a great deal. It is as with thieves, who do
not break into places where mud and chaff and reeds are, but where gold
and silver are, and are ever on the watch. Thus the devil gives his
special attention to those who are taken up with spiritual things.
Snares are numerous where goodness exists, and envy is to be found where
there is alms-giving. But we have one great weapon by which we may
resist all these machinations, the giving thanks to God in all things.
Tell me, did not Abel, who reserved the first-fruits for God, fall by
his brother’s hand? Yet God allowed it, not hating the man who had
honoured him, but loving him much, and adding to the crown of Abel’s
beautiful sacrifice the further crown of martyrdom. Moses wished to
succour some one who had been wronged, and he confronted the greatest
dangers on this account, and fled from his country, and God allowed it,
to teach you what the patience of the saints is. If, knowing beforehand
that we should suffer no evil, we were thus to give ourselves up to
spiritual things, we should not appear to be doing a great thing,
possessing this pledge of security. Now, it so happens that those who do
this are chiefly admirable because, foreseeing dangers, and penalties,
and deaths, and a thousand evils, they have still neither desisted from
their good deeds nor grown faint-hearted through fear of the terrors to
come. As the three children said, _There is a God in heaven Who can
deliver us, and even if He do not, know, O king, that we do not worship
thy gods, and do not adore the golden statue which thou hast set up_, so
when you are about to do something for God, expect many dangers, many
penalties, many deaths, and wonder not nor fear at them. _Son_, he says,
_when thou comest to serve_ _God, prepare thy soul for temptation_. For
no one who has chosen a hand-to-hand fight may expect to bear off the
crown without wounds. And you who are to wrestle with the devil in every
possible way, live not a life of ease and luxury. Your rewards and
promises are not here, but God promises you all glory in the world to
come. When, therefore, either you yourself do a good action and reap
contrary effects, or you see another enduring them, rejoice and be glad,
for the deed becomes a source of greater reward to you; only be not cast
down, do not lose your fervour, grow not faint-hearted, but rather go on
your way with greater readiness. Since the Apostles, also, were scourged
and stoned and perpetually in prison for what they preached, not only
after their liberation from dangers, but in the very midst of them, they
announced the tidings with all the more willingness. We may see Paul
catechising and instructing even in prison, even in his chains, and
again before the tribunal, and in the shipwreck, and the storm, and in a
thousand dangers. Do you also emulate these saints, and, as long as you
can, hold to good works. Even if you see the devil assailing you on a
thousand sides, never turn away. In distributing your money, you may
perhaps have suffered shipwreck, yet Paul, who was more precious than
any money, in preaching the word, went to Rome, suffered shipwreck, and
endured numberless evils. And this he clearly says in the words: _We
have often wished to come to you, but Satan has prevented us_. And God
allowed it by an abundant manifestation of His power, showing that, in
spite of the devil’s making and unmaking in a thousand ways, the Gospel
was by no means lessened or impeded thereby. So Paul gave thanks to God
in everything, knowing that God was proving him by these things; and he
showed his burning zeal everywhere by allowing no obstacle to stand in
his way. Now, the more we meet with failure, the greater will be our
hold of spiritual works; and do not let us say, ‘Why did God allow there
to be impediments?’ He allowed them that He may prove your zeal the more
to the multitude, and your true love. For lovers are remarkable for
never departing from the good pleasure of the beloved one. He who is
remiss and luxurious is prostrated by the first touch of tribulation;
but the fervent and watchful man, even if he be impeded in a thousand
ways, sets himself the more to work at God’s business, doing his part
perfectly, and giving thanks in every thing. This let us also do.
Thanksgiving is an immense treasure, great riches, an inexhaustible
good, a strong weapon. Blasphemy has a present penalty, and causes our
destruction over and above what we have suffered. Have you lost money?
If you have given thanks, you have gained your soul and won greater
riches for yourself, and propitiated God the more; but, if you have
blasphemed, you have destroyed your own salvation without gaining any of
those things, and have slain your own soul.
The Folly of the Cross.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xiv., vol. ii., p. 36.)
· · · · · · ·
Showing the power of the Cross, St. Paul says: _The Jews too ask for
signs, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: but we preach Christ crucified,
a scandal to the Jews, a folly to the Gentiles, but to those who are
called, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ the power of God and the wisdom
of God_. There is a deep meaning in these words. For he wishes to say
how God conquered by contraries, and that the promulgation of the Gospel
does not come from man. What he says amounts to this. When we say to the
Jews, ‘Believe,’ they reply, ‘Raise up the dead, cure those who are
possessed, show us signs’. How do we answer these things? By saying,
that He Whom we preach was crucified and died. This was sufficient not
only not to move those who did not wish to be moved, but also to repulse
those who had the will; yet still He is not repulsed, but draws men
after Him, and conquers and gets the better of them. Again, the Gentiles
demand of us eloquent discourses and elaborate reasonings, and we reply
to them also by preaching the Cross, and that which seems to be weakness
to the Jews, the Gentiles consider folly. Now, when we not only do not
offer them what they ask for, but the very contrary, for the Cross not
only does not seem to be a sign tested, according to human reason, but
the destruction of signs: not only not a manifestation of power, but a
proof of weakness: not only not an embodiment of wisdom, but a
personification of folly; when, then, those who look for signs and
wisdom not only do not receive what they seek, but listen to things
which are the exact contrary of their desires, and, furthermore, are
persuaded by them, is not the power of Him Who is preached beyond words?
It is as if some one were to show those who are tossed on the waves and
longing for harbour, not the land, but a more angry sea, would he induce
them to follow him? Or if a physician were to tell a man broken by pain
and desiring remedies that he will restore health, not by medicine but
by again using the knife, would his patient yield himself to his
guidance? This implies very great power. So the Apostles made their way
not only by signs, but by a line of action seemingly in opposition with
signs, as Christ had done in the case of the blind man. For wishing to
cure him, He used a course which increased the affliction, as He put
clay upon his eyes. Just, then, as He cured the blind man by putting
clay upon him, so he drew the world to Himself through the Cross, which
indeed was an increase, not a removal of scandal. So He acted in the
Creation, preparing contraries by contraries. He built up with sand the
limits of the sea, curbing the strong with the weak; He placed the earth
upon the water, causing that which was hard and firm to be upborne by
flowing and liquid matter. Again, through the prophets He made iron
float with a little wood. Thus He drew the world after Himself through
His Cross. For as water supports the earth, so the Cross supports the
world. Therefore it is a great proof of power and wisdom to persuade by
contraries. And if the Cross seems to be a subject of scandal, still not
only it does _not_ scandalise, but it draws to itself. St. Paul had all
these things in his mind and was struck with astonishment when he said
that _the folly of God is wiser than man, and the weakness of God is
stronger than man_, applying this folly and this weakness to the Cross,
not that it was really foolish and weak but that it seemed so: for he
answers them according to _their_ estimate. That, in fact, which
philosophers had been unable to do by their reasonings was effected by
this apparent folly. Now who was the wiser? He Who persuaded many, or he
who persuaded a few—or rather no one? He Who convinced man of the
greatest things, or he who used his powers of persuasion about things
which do not exist at all? How Plato and his school laboured about the
line, the angle, and the point, and about even numbers and odd numbers,
and about their being equal and unequal, discoursing to us about such
like cobwebs, for such things are less profitable to our life than even
cobwebs, and so helping us neither much nor little, he came to the end
of his life.
How he wearied himself to show that the spirit is immortal, and did he
not die without making any clear statement or convincing a single man
amongst his disciples? But it was through unlearned men that the Cross
brought conviction, and drew the world to itself. It spoke to men, not
of chance things, but of God, and of piety in the truth, of the Gospel
polity, of future judgment, and it made uncouth men and unlearned men
philosophers.
This is how the folly of God is wiser than man, and His weakness
stronger. How is it stronger? It is stronger in that it spread over the
whole earth and seized all men by force, and whereas thousands and
thousands did their utmost to stamp out the name of the Crucified One,
just the contrary came to pass. For this name took root and was
propagated all the more, whereas _they_ were destroyed and consumed, and
living men fighting a dead One, gained not a stroke. Consequently when a
heathen tells me that I am a fool, he proves that he himself is doubly
one; inasmuch as considered by him to be a fool, I appear wiser than the
wise; and when he calls me weak, he shows himself to be weaker. For
publicans and fishermen set up those very things by the goodness of God
which philosophers, and orators, and despots, and the whole world vainly
striving with all its might could not even devise.
What, indeed, has the Cross not introduced? The belief concerning the
immortality of the soul, and the resurrection of the body, the despising
of present things, the desire of eternal. And it made angels out of men,
who practise everywhere the philosophy of all endurance. But amongst
heathens, too, you say, ‘There have been many who have despised death’.
Tell me who they are. Do you allude perchance to the drinker of hemlock?
But, if you like, I will show you thousands of such men in the Church.
For if, when a persecution came, all men could get off by taking
hemlock, they would all have been more illustrious than he was. Besides,
he drained the cup, not being free to drink or not to drink: willing or
unwilling, he had to suffer, which was not courage, but necessity.
Thieves and murderers under sentence of their judges have suffered
harder things. It is just the very contrary amongst us; for the martyrs
endured, not in spite of themselves, but willingly, and having it in
their power not to suffer, showed forth a fortitude beyond all proof.
Therefore it is not surprising if Socrates drank hemlock, both because
he could not do otherwise, and because he had reached extreme old age,
for he said that he was seventy years old when he despised life, if this
be indeed despising it; _I_ should not say so, nor would anyone else.
But show me a man rejoicing in torments for his belief, as I can show
_you_ thousands all over the world. Who bore bravely the tearing out of
his nails, the racking of his joints, the hacking asunder of his
members, one after the other, the stretching upon a gridiron, or
plunging into a caldron? Show me this. For death by hemlock is
equivalent to slumbering quietly away, as it is said to be an end which
is sweeter than sleep. And if certain men have even endured torments,
they have forfeited the praise due to them by dying for criminal causes:
some for betraying secret things, others for aiming at domination,
others for being taken in the most shameful deeds; others, again, either
vainly or foolishly, without any cause, have destroyed themselves. But
it is not so with us. And this is why their deeds have been hushed in
silence, whilst ours are flowering and increasing day by day. This was
in Paul’s mind when he said: ‘The weakness of God is stronger than all
men put together’. For the divinity that was in the tidings is clear
from this. How, indeed, was it that twelve unlettered men attempted
things of this importance, twelve men, whose life was spent on seas and
rivers and in deserts, who scarcely entered city or marketplace? How did
they manage to set themselves in battle array over the whole world? The
recorder of their deeds shows them to have been faint-hearted and
unmanly, and himself to have no desire to conceal their shortcomings,
which were themselves the greatest proof of the truth. Now, what does he
say about them? That when Christ was taken, after seeing Him work
countless wonders, some fled, and the one who remained, the chief of
all, denied Him. How was it, then, that those who, whilst Christ lived,
could not endure Jewish anger, should have been able to range themselves
against the whole earth after He was dead and buried, if, as heathens
say, He did not rise from the dead, nor have any communication with
them, nor infuse courage into them? Would they not have said to
themselves, ‘How is this? He was not powerful enough to save Himself,
and will He help us? He did not help Himself whilst alive, and will He,
now that He is dead, put out His hand to us? In life He did not gain
over even one people, and shall we persuade the whole world by speaking
His name?’ And, indeed, how would it be reasonable not only to do these
things, but even to conceive the doing? Whence it is evident that if
they had not seen His resurrection, and had not witnessed a very great
proof of His power, they would not have made such a venture. For if they
had, indeed, numberless friends, would they not have made enemies of
them all by disturbing ancient customs and removing ancestral landmarks?
Now, they had all for enemies both at home and abroad. But if they had
been in universal veneration on account of outward gifts, would not all
men have detested them for introducing a new manner of life? Seeing,
however, that they were without all these things, this in itself would
have been enough to make them hated and despised by all.
· · · · · · ·
The Abode of the Humble.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxii., vol. ii., p. 344.)
· · · · · · ·
_He who humbleth himself shall be exalted._ Where shall we find this
humility? Would you like to go once more to the abode of goodness, to
the tents of the blessed, I mean, to the mountains and forests? For it
is there that we shall see this perfection of humility. They are men,
some famous for outward position, some for wealth, who humble themselves
in every particular, in their food, in their dwelling, in their
servants, and so in all their life they are writing the word _humility_
as if with pen and ink. Just as smart dressing and a fine house and a
large establishment are incentives to vainglory, which thrust men into
it, often in spite of themselves, all these things are cut off in the
desert. Those men light their own fire, hew their wood, do their own
cooking, and themselves wait upon guests. Insult is neither given nor
taken, no man is ruled, no man rules, but all are ministering. Each man
washes the stranger’s feet, and there is much contention as to who shall
do it. This he does, not seeking to find out who the stranger is,
whether a slave or a free man; in each case he carries out this service.
No man is either great or small. Is there confusion then? God forbid, it
is rather the perfection of harmony. If, indeed, a man there be of small
account, he who is great does not regard it, but deems himself inferior,
and so becomes greater.
Both servers and served eat at one and the same table, have the same
food, the same clothes, the same lodging, the same rule of life. He is
great there who is eager over a lowly task. Mine and thine do not exist,
and the thing itself, the cause of endless strife, has been banished.
And why do you wonder that there is one rule, one table, and one dress
for all, where there is one spirit in all, not according to the body
only (for this is the case with all men), but according to charity? For
how could charity ever be set against itself? Neither poverty nor riches
are to be found there, neither fame nor disgrace. How, then, could folly
or vainglory creep in? Some are great, some are little amongst the
number according to a moral reckoning, but as I was saying, no one takes
note of it. The weak man does not grieve as being despised, for there is
no one to despise him. Even should anyone insult another, this is their
principal training, bearing contempt and contumely and shabby treatment
both in word and act; they live with the lowly and the maimed, for these
are the guests of their repasts, and thus they are worthy of heaven. One
dresses sores, another leads the blind, another supports the lame. There
are neither flatterers nor parasites, or rather they do not even
apprehend what flattery is. How, then, could they ever be puffed up? For
a great equality reigns among them, consequently the contentedness
produced by goodness. In this way the most wretched are better taught
than by being obliged to give them the first places. Just as a meek man
schools an impetuous man to lowliness, so does a man who makes no
account of reputation, but despises it, teach the ambitious. This they
do lavishly, for, in proportion as we fight over the first places, do
they wrestle not to have them, but to be hindered; and their burning
zeal is, not who shall be honoured, but who shall not be honoured.
Moreover, their very works incline them to moderation, and do not
tolerate vanity. For, tell me, how can a man who is tilling and watering
and planting the earth, or plaiting baskets, or weaving a sack, or doing
any other manual labour, ever think great things of himself? Who, that
is living in poverty, and struggling with hunger, will be sick with this
complaint? No man. Therefore their lowliness is well contented. And just
as moderation is difficult here, through the crowd of flatterers and
admirers, so is it perfectly easy _there_. They have only the desert
before them: they see birds flying, and the breeze through the trees,
and the soft wind blowing, and streams flowing through ravines. How,
then, could a man living in so great a solitude be puffed up? Neither
can _we_ find any excuse, that, being in the thick of the fight, we
think great things of ourselves. For Abraham, when in company of the
Chananæns, said, _I am dust and ashes_, and David, in the din of arms,
_I am a worm and no man_, and the Apostle in the midst of the world, _I
am not_ _worthy to be called an apostle_. Therefore, what shall we have
to say for ourselves, if, even with these great examples before us, we
are not sober? As _they_ are worthy of a thousand crowns for being the
first to walk upon the path of goodness, so do we deserve as many
chastisements for not arriving at a like zeal, neither for the example
of those who have departed hence and lie in their sepulchres, nor for
the living who are wonderful through their deeds. What could you allege
for not being converted? Are you unlettered, and have you not read the
epitaphs so as to know the goodness of those men of old? This is indeed
the chief point of accusation, the church being ever open, not to go in
and partake of those pure waters. Besides, if you did not know the dead
through their epitaphs, you should have had these living men before your
eyes. ‘But if there was no one to point them out to us?’ Come with me
and I will show you the dwelling-places of these holy ones: come and
learn a useful lesson from them. They are shining lights throughout the
world, they surround cities like strong walls. They have taken
possession of deserts in order to teach you to look down upon worldly
agitations. They, then, in this strength of theirs, are able to enjoy
peace in the midst of the tempest: you, who are tossed about on all
sides, should be at rest, and have a short breathing time from the ever
rolling waves.
· · · · · · ·
The Prisoner of Jesus Christ.
(_Homilies on Epistle to the Ephesians_, viii., vol. iv., p. 175.)
It is the virtue of teachers to seek not honour nor glory from their
disciples, but their salvation, and to do all things unto that end; for
he who seeks the former would be a tyrant, not a teacher. It was not for
your greater personal glorification that God set you over them, but that
your business should be forgotten whilst theirs is strengthened. This is
a teacher’s part; this was what blessed Paul did, who was removed from
vanity and considered himself as one of the multitude, or rather as the
least of all. Thus he calls himself their slave, and generally speaks in
the attitude of a suppliant. Look at him, at least in this instance,
writing nothing imperiously, nothing authoritatively, but mild,
conciliating words. _I, a prisoner in the Lord, beseech you that you
walk worthy of the vocation in which you are called_, he says. Tell me,
what do you beseech, O Paul? That you may get something for yourself?
‘Certainly not,’ he answers, ‘but that I may save others.’ Yet they who
beseech do it for what concerns themselves. ‘And this does concern me,’
he says, ‘as I have written distinctly in another place: _Now we live,
if you stand in the Lord_.’ He was always most eager for the salvation
of his disciples. _I, the prisoner in the Lord._ Great and wonderful
dignity, surpassing consulships, and kingdoms, and all things else. This
he wrote also to Philemon, saying: _As Paul, an old man, and_ _now a
prisoner also of Jesus Christ_. Nothing is so glorious as a chain for
Christ’s sake, as the fetters which hang round those hallowed hands.
Better than being an apostle, or a teacher, or an evangelist, is it to
be a prisoner for Christ’s sake. If there be a lover of Christ, he will
know what I say;[11] if any man be foolish and on fire for his Lord, he
understands the power of chains, he would choose to be a prisoner for
Christ rather than to dwell in paradise. Paul has shown us those hands
of his more glittering than gold or than any royal crown. A band of
precious stones does not ennoble a head as iron chains for Christ’s
sake. _His_ prison was more glorious than kingly palaces, or than heaven
itself. Why do I say ‘than palaces’? That place contained Christ’s
prisoner. A lover of Christ knows what this privilege is, he is
acquainted with this virtue, he knows what a gain the being in chains
for His sake has been to the human race. More glorious far than sitting
on His right hand, more solemn than sitting on one of the twelve
thrones, is the being imprisoned for His sake. And why do I speak of
human things? I shame to put riches and golden ornament in comparison
with those chains, but with regard to those great ones, if their deed
had no reward, this alone is a great reward and a powerful antidote, the
suffering these evils on account of the Beloved. Lovers, I say not of
God but of man, know the proverb which speaks of those who take pleasure
rather in suffering evils from the loved ones than in being honoured by
them. This is seen only in the case of the holy band: I mean the
Apostles. Listen to what blessed Luke says: _They went from the council
rejoicing that they were accounted worthy to suffer reproach for His
Name_. Now to others it seems ridiculous that dishonour should be
accounted honour and a joy, but to those who follow Christ this desire
is held to be most blessed of all. If anyone would give me all heaven or
those chains, I would choose the chains. If anyone were to place me with
the angels above or with Paul in chains, I would choose his prison. If
anyone were to make me one of those heavenly Powers or Thrones, or a
prisoner as Paul was, I would choose to be a prisoner. Nothing is more
blessed than those chains. Would that I could now be in those regions;
for it is said that the chains are preserved, as well they may be, and I
am in admiration of those men full of desire for Christ; would that I
could see those chains, which devils have feared and trembled at, which
angels reverence. Nothing is better than suffering some adversity for
the sake of Christ. I deem Paul blessed not so much because he was
ravished into paradise as for being thrown into prison. I call him
blessed not so much because he heard ineffable words as for enduring
chains. I hold him blessed not so much for being carried into the third
heaven as for his chains. That these were greater than those things,
understand what he himself thought of them. He did not say, ‘I, who have
heard mysterious words, beseech you,’ but what? _I, the prisoner in the
Lord, beseech you._ And if he did not use the expression in all his
epistles, it is not astonishing, for he was not always in chains, only
at certain times. I would choose rather to suffer adversity for Christ
than to be honoured by Christ. This is true honour and glory, higher
than any other. If he became a servant for my sake and divested Himself
of His praise, nor deemed that He was glorified except in being
crucified for me, what ought I not to suffer? Listen to Him as He says,
_Glorify Me, O Father_. What sayest Thou, Lord? Thou art led to the
cross between thieves and malefactors, to suffer the most shameful
death; Thou art to be spit upon and struck, and this Thou callest glory?
‘Yea,’ He answers, ‘I suffer these things for those whom I love, and
account them a glory indeed.’ If He Who loves the wretched and miserable
calls this glory, if He finds His glory, not in being on His Father’s
throne, nor in honour, but in being dishonoured, and prefers it, how
much more am _I_ bound to hold these things a glory! O happy chains, O
blessed hands which those chains adorned! Those hands of Paul’s which
raised up the lame man in Lystra and made him walk were less honourable
than when covered with chains. If I had been living in those days, it is
then that I would have embraced them and placed them on my eyes; I would
not have ceased caressing the hands which had been found worthy to wear
chains for my Lord’s sake. Do you wonder at Paul because the serpent
fastened upon his hand and did no harm? Wonder not: the serpent
reverenced the chains, and so did the ocean, for then he was in fetters.
If anyone were to give me now the power of raising the dead I would not
have it, but I would have those chains. If I were free from the cares of
the Church, and were sound in body, I would go that long journey only to
look at those chains, to see the prison in which he was bound. Although
amongst his wonderful deeds there are many signs everywhere, they are
not so enviable as the marks of Christ. And in the Scripture he does not
encourage me so much by wonder-working as he does when he is suffering
persecution, being scourged, and dragged away. _So that_, he says, _they
brought handkerchiefs and aprons from his body to the sick_. These were
truly wonders, but not so great as those others: _They scourged him and
laid many stripes upon him, they cast them into prison_; and again:
_They gave praise to God in their chains_; and again: _They stoned him
and drew him out of the city, thinking him to be dead_. Would you know
what a privilege it is for the body of a servant to wear an iron chain
for Christ’s sake? Then listen to Christ’s words: _Blessed are ye_. Why
blessed, O Lord? When you raise the dead? No, not for this. When you
cure the blind? Not at all. Then why? _When they shall reproach you, and
pursue you, and say every evil against you, lying, for My sake._ And if
evil report makes men so blessed, what will suffering evil not do for
them? Listen to that holy one who says this in another place: _For the
rest a crown of justice awaits me_. Yet the chains are brighter than
this crown; they will make me worthy of it, he says, and I value nothing
so much. Suffering for Christ’s sake is a perpetual remedy to me. May it
be given to me to utter those words, _I make up in my flesh what is
wanting to the sufferings of Christ_: and I shall want nothing more.
· · · · · · ·
The Seed not vivified unless it dies.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xli., vol. ii., p. 517.)
· · · · · · ·
_But some one asks, how are the dead to be raised to life? With what
sort of body will they come? Senseless man, that which thou sowest is
not quickened, except it die first._ Whereas the Apostle is everywhere
so gentle and humble, he makes use of stronger language in this place on
account of the adversaries’ unreasonableness. Nor is this enough but he
adds arguments and examples, and in this way gets the better even of the
most contentious. He had already said: _Whereas by man came death, by
man came also the resurrection from the dead_; and now he dissipates an
opinion prevalent amongst heathens. And consider again how he cuts away
that which is most plausible about it. He did not say, ‘_you_ ask,’ but
made the adversary indefinite, that, using strong language with effect,
he might not unduly crush his hearers. He stated two difficulties: the
manner of the resurrection and the quality of bodies. And indeed they
were in doubt concerning both points by their words: ‘How can that which
is dissolved rise again?’ and, ‘With what sort of body will they come?’
How, _with what sort of body_? Will it be like this corruptible mortal
body, or like some other? Then, to show that they are not seeking to
clear up doubtful points but to dispute what is indisputable, he uses
still stronger language, saying, _Foolish man, that which thou sowest is
not vivified unless it dieth_.
This is also our way of answering those who call in question what is
indisputable. Why, for instance, does he not at once take refuge in the
power of God? Because he is talking to unbelievers. Whenever he has to
deal with believers he is in no great need of arguments. For instance,
saying in another place that _He shall transform the body of your
humility into becoming conformed to the body of His glory_, and showing
forth something further than the resurrection, he made use of no
examples, but, instead of any proof, brought forward the power of God,
adding, _according to the efficacy of His power and to bring all things
into subjection to Him_. Here, however, he sets arguments in motion. For
since he provided this one from Scripture, he used the same with
authority against those who did not believe in the Scriptures, and said:
_Foolish man, that which thou sowest_; that is, you see from what you
yourself do day after day the proof of these things, and do you still
doubt? This is why I call you foolish, that you ignore what happens
every day to yourself, and that whereas _you_ can work a resurrection,
you doubt concerning God; therefore he said most emphatically: _That
which thou sowest_; you, that is, who are a mortal and corruptible man.
And see how the words he uses bring home the point in question. _It is
not vivified_, he says, _unless it dieth_. Passing over the terms which
are proper to seeds, such as the sprouting and growth and rotting and
withering, he takes those points which correspond to our flesh, the
‘vivifying’ and ‘death,’ which belong properly not to seeds but to
bodies. And he does not say that it is vivified after dying, but what is
more, that it is quickened _because_ it has died. You see how, as I am
always saying, he brings his argument as a proof against itself. That
which they made out as conclusive against the resurrection _he_ makes an
earnest of it, for they said, ‘He will not rise because he is dead’.
Now, how can you meet this? If, indeed, he had not died, neither would
he rise again, and _because_ he has died, therefore he rises again. In
the same way Christ points this out still more clearly, saying: _If the
grain of wheat, falling into the earth, doth not die, it remaineth
alone, but if it dieth, it beareth much fruit_; so here, in illustrating
this example, Paul does not say that it does not live, but that it is
not ‘quickened,’ making again the power of God his theme, and showing
that it is He Who does all, not the properties of the soil. And why did
he not at once speak of something more personal—I mean of human seed?
For our coming into the world also begins in corruption just as that of
the corn does. It was because it was still stronger in our case than in
the latter. What he wants is something quite perishable: the corn was
partially so, and that is why he introduced it. Besides, the human seed
proceeds from a living person, and falls into a living womb, but here
the seed is cast into the earth, not into a living body, and becomes
dissolved in it, just as in the case of the mortal body. Thus the
example was the more pertinent.
_And the sower does not sow the body which shall be._ That which has
been said so far is to answer the objection, ‘How shall they rise
again?’ this is directed to the question, ‘What sort of body will they
have?’ Now what is, _Thou sowest not the body which shall be_?—not a
full ear of corn, nor new grain. For here they were not disputing the
resurrection, but the manner of the resurrection, what sort of body the
risen one should be, whether like our present one, or more perfect and
splendid, and he embraces both points in the same example, and shows
that it is a much more perfect one. But heretics, admitting none of
these things, retort by saying that it is one body which is sown and
another which is risen. How, then, could it be a resurrection since a
resurrection refers to something sown? What is there wonderful or awful
about the victory over death, if one thing is sown and another thing
rises again? Death would not seem to be giving back the trophy which he
took. How would the illustration be carried out in what they say? Not
one substance is sown and another raised up, but the same substance in
an improved condition. Supposing that Christ did not resume the same
body when He became the first fruits of the risen; but according to you
He cast off His former body although it was without sin, and took
another. Whence, then, did this other come from? The first was from the
Virgin. Whence the second? Do you see what an unnatural argument it is?
Why did He show the marks of the nails? Was it not because He wished to
prove that the same body which was crucified had also risen again? How
does the sign of Jonas affect him? I presume that it was not one Jonas
who was swallowed up, and another who was washed to land again? And what
were His words? _Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it
up again._ It is plain that He _did_ raise up this temple when
destroyed. Therefore, the Evangelist went on to say that _He was
speaking of the temple of His body_. Now, what does St. Paul say? _Thou
sowest not the body which shall be_; that is, not the ear of corn, which
is the same and not the same: the same as being the same substance, and
not the same inasmuch as it is perfected, and whereas the same substance
remains, it rises in renewed vigour. If this were not the case, He would
not have required a resurrection at all, unless He had meant to raise up
something better. Why, indeed, should He dissolve the house if He did
not intend to make it a more striking dwelling-place? This, therefore,
St. Paul said in answer to those who look upon it as corruptible.
Moreover, lest any man should imagine that he means another body, he
softens the difficulty, and himself interprets it so that his hearer
should not in any way bring the wisdom of the world to bear upon the
point. What need is there, then, of our arguments? Listen to his
interpretation of the words, _Thou sowest not the body which shall be_,
to which he added pertinently, _but bare grain, as of wheat, or of some
of the rest_. That is to say, _thou sowest not the body which shall be_:
the corn, for instance, as we look upon it, with stalk and ear, _but
bare grain, as of wheat, or of some of the rest. And God giveth it a
body as He wills._ ‘Granted,’ you say, ‘but in that case the work of
nature comes in.’ Tell me, what sort of nature? Here it is God Who works
everything, not nature, nor soil, nor rain. Hence He makes this clear,
and leaving earth, rain, air, sun, and the labour of the agriculturist
out of the question, adds: _God giveth it a body as He willeth_. Seek
not, therefore, to understand or to scrutinise the why and the how, when
you hear that God’s power and good pleasure come into play. _And to each
of the seeds its own body._ Why then another? He gives each his own. So
that when St. Paul says, _Thou sowest not the body which shall be_, he
does not mean that He raises up something else of a different substance,
but something better and more splendid: _To each one of the seeds its
own substance_.
· · · · · · ·
The Resurrection in Creation.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xvii., vol. ii., p. 199.)
· · · · · · ·
Let no man disbelieve in the Resurrection, but if any man be in doubt,
let him consider what great and wondrous things God made out of nothing,
and receive _them_ as a pledge of _it_. That, indeed, which has already
taken place is much more marvellous and awe-inspiring. For, consider, He
took the earth and moulded it, and made man and earth which was not
before. How, then, did earth become man? How did the earth come out of
nothing? How all those things proceeding from the earth, the endless
families of unreasoning animals, of seeds and plants, which came forth
without travail, without rains falling upon them, with no apparent
cultivation, neither oxen nor plough nor anything else contributing
towards their production. On this account He brought forth in the
beginning, from that which was without life and without substance, such
great things, both of the physical and animal creation, in order that He
might teach you from the first the doctrine of the Resurrection. For
this is far more difficult than the Resurrection. It is not indeed an
equivalent proof of power to rekindle a smouldering flame and to light a
fire by invisible means; it is not the same thing to restore a
dilapidated house and to build one from the foundations. In the one
case, if there was nothing else, there was material to work from; but in
the other not even that. Consequently, He began by the more difficult
thing, in order that you might receive that which was easier. I say
_more difficult_, not that it was so to God, but according to our manner
of reasoning. For nothing is hard to God; and just as the sculptor who
makes one statue can as easily produce a thousand, so it is as easy to
God to create a thousand endless worlds, or, rather, as easy as it is to
you to _think_ of a city or countless worlds, and indeed much more so.
_You_ spend a little time upon the thought, but it is not so with God.
In the same proportion as stones are heavier than the swiftest birds, or
rather than this mind of ours, so much is our mind removed from God’s
swiftness of action. Have you wondered at His power with regard to the
earth? Consider again how the heavens were made from nothing, the
countless stars, the sun and moon: none of these things were previously
in being. Again, tell me how, after they were made, they remained in
place, and on what they rested? What was their basis, and what is the
earth’s basis? And what comes after the earth? What is that something?
Do you see to what a giddy height the light of your reason leads you if
you do not hold eagerly to the faith and to the inscrutable power of the
Creator? If you will make a guess from human things, you will shortly be
able to give wings to your reason. ‘What human things?’ you ask. See you
not what potters do? How they remould a broken and shapeless thing into
a vessel; how melters make gold and iron and brass out of earth? Again,
how others who manipulate glass transform sand into one compact and
transparent body? Let me mention dyers of leather, who dress garments:
they produce one piece after the other, which they have received, with
the dye. Again, as to our own generation: is not the seed, formless and
shapeless at first, implanted in the mother’s womb? Whence, then, comes
so wonderful a formation of the living man? And what about wheat? Is not
a mere seed put into the ground? And does it not rot after it has been
put there? Whence come the ear of corn and the stalk and all the rest?
Does not a small grain of fig, which is often scattered into the earth,
take root and put forth branches and fruit? You receive each one of
these things, and do not trouble yourself about them, but would subject
God alone, Who disposes of our bodies, to scrutiny! What can justify
such a demand?
These and such like things are what we say to heathens, for I need no
argument with those who are convinced of the Scriptures. For if you were
able to understand all that He does, how would God be more than a man?
Indeed there are many men whom we fail to understand. But if this
happens to us in the case of men, and we do not grasp them, how much
more are we to abstain from scrutinising the wisdom of God and from
fathoming His reasons—the former, because He Who acts is worthy of
confidence; the latter, because the acts themselves are above
reasonings. God is not so abject as to do only those things which _you_,
in the weakness of your reasonings, are able to encompass. For, if you
cannot grasp a mechanic’s work, how much less that of God the Sovereign
Architect! Therefore, do not disbelieve the Resurrection, for you will
be so much the further away from the future hope. But what clever thing
do opponents say, or rather what exceedingly foolish thing? ‘How,’ they
ask, ‘when the body has been mixed with earth, and become earth, and it
again has been changed into something else, can it rise again?’ This
seems to _you_ to be impracticable, but not so to the Eye which never
sleeps, for to It all things are laid bare. In that corruption _you_ see
no distinction, but He knows everything; you, again, are ignorant
concerning your neighbour’s heart: He is familiar with all. Since, then,
you do not know how God raises from the dead, you doubt that He _does_
raise, and will doubt that He knows what is in the human mind; for
neither are these things apparent to our bodily eyes. If, indeed, in the
case of the body, matter is visible even if it be dissolved—but those
conceptions are invisible—therefore, shall He Who is perfectly cognisant
of invisible things not see the visible ones and not easily raise up the
body? No one will say so! Do not disbelieve in the Resurrection, for
this disbelief is in truth a diabolical temptation, and the devil urges
it, not only that the Resurrection may be doubted, but also that he may
dissolve and destroy virtuous actions. For if a man imagines that he is
not to rise again, and not to give an account of his works, he will not
easily be righteous, and not being righteous, he will thoroughly
mistrust the Resurrection. Each paves the way for the other: wickedness
comes from want of faith, and want of faith from wickedness. For when a
conscience has burdened itself with much wickedness, and since it is not
willing to provide itself with consolation by change to a better course,
in fear and anguish at the future punishment, it seeks to ease itself in
unbelief. If you say there is neither Resurrection nor Judgment, another
man’s comment is: ‘Then I shall give no account of my actions’. But what
are Christ’s words? _You err, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power
of God._ In truth, God would not have worked things so great if He had
intended not to raise us up again, but to dissolve and annihilate us: He
would not have stretched the heavens above our heads, nor the earth
under our feet, nor have made all other things for this brief period of
life only. But if He has done this for the life which now is, what will
He not do for the life to come? If there is to be no future life, then
are we far less considered, according to our present condition, than
those things which were called into existence for our sakes. For
heavens, and earth, and ocean, and rivers are more abiding than we, as
also some unreasoning animals: the crow, the elephant, and many others
are much longer lived than we. _Our_ life is short and full of labour:
it is not so with them, but they have a long life free from despondency
and care. Tell me, how is this?—has He made the servants happier than
their masters? I repeat it, do not reason in this way, nor humble your
intellect, nor disregard the riches of God, having so great a Master. It
was God’s design from the beginning to make you immortal, but you were
not willing. The being with God, the living a life without suffering, or
grief, or care, or labour, or any other anxiety,—all this pointed to
immortality. Adam had no need of clothes, nor of shelter, nor of any
other protection, but he was more like an angel, and he had a
fore-knowledge of many things to come, and was endued with much wisdom.
He knew what God had done in secret, as to the creation of woman, and so
he said, _This is bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh_. Afterwards
came labour, and sweat, and shame, and cowardice, and bondage: _then_
there was neither grief nor pain, nor effort. But he did not remain in
this high state.
· · · · · · ·
Resurrection confirmed by Signs which followed.
(_Homilies on the New Testament_,[12] viii., t. iii., p. 89.)
· · · · · · ·
The reason, beloved brethren, why we read immediately after the
Crucifixion and the Resurrection of the wonders worked by the Apostles
is that we may have a clear and unambiguous proof of the Resurrection.
You did not look upon Him rising from the dead with your bodily eyes,
but you see Him rising with the eyes of faith. You did not look upon Him
rising with this physical eyesight of yours, but you will see Him rising
through those signs. For their manifestation will lead you to faith’s
contemplation. Hence the working of signs in His name was a much greater
and stronger testimony than seeing Him as He rose from the dead. Would
you know how this establishes the Resurrection more firmly than if it
had been seen by all men with their bodily eyes? Listen with attention,
for many men make this objection and say, ‘Why, when rising from the
dead, did He not show Himself immediately to the Jews?’ But this
argument is trifling and vain. If He had meant to enforce faith upon
them, He would not have omitted to appear to all men after the
Resurrection. Now He showed that He did _not_ mean to put force upon
them by appearing after the Resurrection: in the case of Lazarus, He
raised up this man, who had been four days dead, and was corrupt and
stinking, and He made him, who was bound, come forth before all; and not
only He did not induce them to believe, but He provoked them to anger.
When they came they wished to put Him to death on this account. Now, if
they were faithless when He raised up another, would they not also have
been mad with Him if He had shown them Himself risen from the dead? If
they had not been able to accomplish anything, they would still have
been guilty of impiety. Thus, wishing to save them from a useless
madness, He concealed Himself. For He would have made them deserving of
chastisement if He had appeared to them after the Cross. Consequently,
to spare them, He hid Himself from their eyes, but manifested Himself
through signs. Hearing Peter say, _In the Name of Jesus Christ arise and
walk_, was not a less thing than seeing Him rise again. And that this
_was_ a great proof of the Resurrection, and more conducive to faith
than the first, that seeing signs taking place in His Name was better
able to persuade the minds of men than the sight of Him risen is evident
from what I am going to say. Christ rose and showed Himself to the
disciples. Yet one of their number, Thomas, who was called Didymus, was
unbelieving, and he demanded to put his hands into the marks of the
nails. Now, if that disciple, who had spent three years with Him, who
had partaken of his Lord’s table, witnessed great signs and wonders, and
heard his Lord’s words, did not at first believe when he even beheld Him
risen, until he felt the marks of the nails and of the wounds, tell me
how would the whole world have believed it if it had seen Him risen? Who
would say as much? But I will give you further proof than this that
signs were more persuasive than the physical sight of the risen Lord.
The crowd hearing Peter’s words to the lame man, _In the Name of Jesus
Christ arise and walk_, three thousand, and five thousand believed in
Christ; on the other hand, the single disciple seeing Christ risen was
unbelieving. Do you see that the signs much more furthered faith in the
Resurrection? In presence of the one His own disciple doubted, whereas
in contemplating the signs even enemies were persuaded. Hence they were
more powerful and clearer; they attracted men and won them over to the
Resurrection. And why do I speak of Thomas? For understand fully that
neither were the other disciples persuaded by their first sight of Jesus
risen; but condemn them not, dear brethren. If Christ did not reproach
them, neither should you, for the disciples saw a strange and wonderful
thing; they saw Him rising the First-Born from the dead. Signs so great
as this are wont at first to stupify, until in process of time they take
root in the souls of the faithful. Now, this is what happened to the
disciples. Whilst Christ risen from the dead spoke to them the words,
_Peace be to you_, the Evangelist says they were troubled and
frightened, imagining they saw a spirit, and Jesus said to them, _Why
are ye fearful?_ And after that He showed them His Hands and Feet, and
He said to them, whom joy and wonder made unbelieving, _Have you
anything to eat?_ wishing to convince them through these material things
of the Resurrection. ‘Do neither My Side nor My Wounds persuade you,
then let even food persuade you.’ That you may clearly understand that
He said, _Have you anything to eat here?_ in order to show them they
beheld not a vision, nor a spirit, nor a phantom, but a true and
substantial resurrection, consider how Peter is convinced of it in this
very way. For in saying that _God had raised Him from the dead and had
given Him to appear in a glorious form to us His preordained witnesses_,
he added, as a proof of the Resurrection: _we who ate and drank with
Him_. This was why whenever Christ raised anyone from the dead, in order
to prove the Resurrection, He said: _Give him to eat_. When, therefore,
you hear that He offered Himself to them in the body during forty days,
appearing to them and living with them, understand His reason for eating
with them. It was not that He required food, but He wished to strengthen
the weakness of the disciples; whence it is plain that the signs and
wonders of the Apostles were the greatest proof of the Resurrection.
Therefore, His own words were: _Amen, Amen, I say to you, he who
believeth in Me shall do the works which I do, and greater works than I
do_. For since the Cross coming between had scandalised many, He
required even greater signs after it. If, indeed, Christ in ending His
life had remained in death and the tomb, and had not risen, as the Jews
pretend, nor ascended into heaven, not only were greater signs not
required to come after the cross, but even the former ones should have
been blotted out. Follow my argument attentively, as what I have said is
an irrefutable proof of the Resurrection, and therefore I repeat it.
First, Christ did wonders, He raised the dead and cleansed lepers, and
cast out devils: after this He was crucified, and, as the lawless Jews
assert, He did not rise from the dead. Now, how are we to answer them?
That if He did _not_ rise, how after this did greater signs take place
in His Name? No living man at his death ever worked greater wonders
after it, but in this case they _were_ greater after it, both in manner
and in matter. They were greater in matter, for never had the shadow of
Christ raised from the dead, yet the shadows of the Apostles did many
things of this kind. And they were greater in manner when at His command
signs took place; but after the crucifixion His servants, using His
awful and all-holy Name, did greater and more wonderful things, so that
their power shone forth more conspicuously than His. For it was much
more striking that another should do these things by invoking His Name
than that He should command them to be done. See you, dear brethren, how
the signs of the Apostles after Christ’s Resurrection were greater both
in manner and in matter? Therefore, the proof of the Resurrection is
irrefutable. As I was saying, and now repeat, if Christ had died and not
risen again, wonders also should have ceased and been extinguished: now,
not only were they not quenched, but they became more evident and more
glorious after these things. And if Christ had not risen, others would
not have worked signs so great in His Name. One and the same power did
wonders both before and after the Cross, first through Himself and
afterwards through His disciples; but the greater and more wonderful
signs took place after the Cross in order that the proof of the
Resurrection might be the clearer and more renowned. ‘And how,’ the
unbeliever asks, ‘is it certain that signs _did_ take place?’ ‘How is it
certain that Christ was crucified?’ ‘From Holy Scripture,’ you answer.
And it is also evident from Holy Scripture both that signs took place
then and that Christ was crucified, for they say one and the other. And
if the adversary assert that the Apostles did no signs, he shows their
power and divine grace to have been the greater, inasmuch as without
wonders they were able to win such a world to the service of God.[13]
For this is the greatest sign and the crowning wonder of all, that the
lowly, and poor, and despised, and ignorant, and unlearned, and needy,
twelve men in number, seem without signs to drag in their train cities
so great, and races and peoples, kings, tyrants, philosophers, and
orators, and, so to speak, the whole world. Would you like to see signs
taking place now? Then I will show you signs more striking than the
former ones—not one dead man raised to life, not one blind man restored
to sight, but the whole world freed from the darkness of error; not one
leper cleansed, but entire nations washed from the leprosy of sin and
purified through baptism to regeneration. What greater signs than these
would you have, O man, contemplating so radical a change over the face
of the earth?
Would you know how Christ restored sight to the world? Men began by
looking at wood and stone, not as wood and stone, but were so blinded as
to invoke material things as gods: now, however, that they have seen
what wood is and what stone is, they believe what God is, for that high
and blessed nature is contemplated by faith alone. Would you have
another sign of the Resurrection? You will find it in the knowledge of
the disciples, which was increased after the Resurrection. For it is
admitted by all that one who is well-disposed towards a living man
thinks no more of him when he is dead, but if he dislikes the living
man, and if he deserts him whilst present, much more will he forget him
when dead. Hence, no one who neglected a friend and counsellor when
living will make much of him when dead, especially when he finds a
thousand dangers threatening himself if he should be so minded. Yet,
what took place in the case of no other man _did_ take place with Christ
and His Apostles and those who had denied and forsaken Him during His
life, who had left Him when apprehended, and turned their backs upon Him
after numberless reproaches, made so much of the Cross, as to give up
their own lives for their testimony and for their faith in Him. If
Christ did not die and did not rise again, what reason was there that
those who had fled from Him when living, on account of impending danger,
should have encountered a thousand dangers for Him when dead? Now they
all fled from Him, and Peter, besides, denied Him thrice with an oath,
and he who denied Him thrice with an oath, and was frightened at a poor
maid-servant, after His death, wishing to persuade us through their acts
that he had seen Him risen, became so thoroughly changed that he defied
all the people, and went out into the midst of the Jews and proclaimed
that He Who was crucified and buried had risen from the dead on the
third day, and had ascended into heaven, and that he himself feared no
evil. Whence came this courage of his? Whence, if not from his
conviction of the Resurrection? For since he had seen Christ, and spoken
with Him, and had heard future things foretold, risking the rest of his
life as if for a living man, he so confronted all adverse things that he
took fresh strength and courage, so as to die for Him, and to be
crucified with his head downwards. Therefore when you see greater signs
taking place, and the disciples showing more feeling for Him Whom they
at first deserted, and a bolder fearlessness, and the change in morals
becoming everywhere more marked, and bringing everything into a secure
and happy state, learn through practical experience that the personal
history of Christ did not stop at the death of Christ, but a
Resurrection received Him, and He lives and remains immutably the
crucified God for ever. If He had not risen and were not living, the
disciples would not have worked greater wonders than had taken place
before the Cross. _Then_ the disciples even had left Him: _now_ the
whole world seeks Him out, and not Peter alone, but thousands of others;
and after Peter many more, who never saw Him, have given up their lives
for Him. They have lost their heads and suffered numberless evils in
order to maintain a pure and entire belief in Him until their death. How
then could a dead man lying in his tomb, as you say, O Jew, have shown
forth so great a strength and power even in those coming after Him,
persuading them to adore Him alone, and to be willing to endure and
suffer anything rather than to give up their faith in Him? Do you not
see this clear proof of the Resurrection in every particular? Through
the signs then and now, through the affection of the disciples then and
now, through the perils in which believers passed their lives? Would you
see His enemies too fearing His strength and His power, and in much
greater straits after His crucifixion? Give your minds, then, to this
also. The Jews seeing the courage of Peter and John, the Scripture says,
and considering that they were ignorant and untaught men, wondered and
were dismayed, not that they were illiterate, but that, being
illiterate, they got the better of all the wise, and seeing the man who
had been healed standing with them, they could say nothing against it,
although before this they _had_ had something to say against it when
they saw signs taking place. Now, why had they nothing to say then? The
invisible power of the Crucified had sealed their tongues. He it was Who
had silenced their mouths and put down their boldness, so that they
stood there, and could not gainsay them. And when they _did_ speak, see
how they admit their own cowardice. _Would you draw down upon us the
blood of this man?_ For if He be a mere man, why fear His blood? How
many prophets have you removed, O Jew, how many just have you slain, and
have you feared the blood of any one of them? Why, then, did you fear in
this case? The Crucified awed their conscience; and not being able to
conceal their struggle, they reveal their own weakness towards their
enemies in spite of themselves. And when they crucified Him, they cried
out, saying, _His blood be upon us and upon our children_. Thus did they
despise His blood. But after the Cross, seeing His power shine forth,
they are afraid and distressed, and say, _Would you draw down_ _the
blood of this man upon us?_ If indeed he was a deceiver, and impious, as
you false Jews say, why did you fear His blood? If He were this you
should have prided yourselves on putting Him to death, but because He
was not this, therefore, are you in fear.
Do you see how everywhere His enemies are distressed and afraid? Do you
see their anguish? Learn, too, the kindness of the Crucified. They said,
_His blood be upon us and upon our children_. Not so Christ, but,
supplicating the Father, He said, _Father, forgive them, for they know
not what they do_. For, if His blood had indeed fallen upon them and
upon their children, the Apostles would not have been made out of their
children; neither three thousand nor five thousand would have believed
on the spot. See you how barbarous and cruel as they were towards their
descendants, they ignored even nature itself, whilst God was more loving
than all fathers put together and tenderer than any mother? Still His
blood _was_ upon them and upon their children, though not upon all their
children, but on those alone who emulated the impiety and
unrighteousness of their fathers. Those alone were liable to the evils
who were sons, not according to nature, but through their own foolish
choice. Look with me at another side of the goodness and lovingness of
God. He did not at once let the chastisement and penalty fall upon them,
but He allowed forty years and more to pass after the Cross. Our Lord
Himself was crucified under Tiberius, and their city was destroyed under
Vespasian and Titus. Now, why did He allow so long a time to elapse
after these things? Because He wished to give them time for repentance,
so that they might put off their iniquities and be quit of their crimes.
As, having a respite for conversion, they remained in their impenitence,
He at last inflicted punishment upon them, and, destroying their city,
sent them out wanderers over the face of the earth. And this He did
through love. He dispersed them that they might everywhere see that
Christ Whom they had crucified adored, and that, seeing Him adored by
all, they might learn His power and acknowledge their own exceeding
wickedness, and in acknowledging it might come to the truth. And indeed
their humiliation became a teaching to them and their chastisement a
remedy, for, if they had remained in the country of the Jews, they would
not have recognised the truth of the prophets. What had the prophets
said? _Ask of me and I will give you the gentiles for your inheritance
and the ends of the earth as your possession._ Thus it behoved them to
go out to the ends of the earth that they might see with their own eyes
that Christ reigns even there. Again, another prophet says, _Each one
shall adore Him from his own place_. Therefore it was necessary that
they should be dispersed into every corner of the earth, that with their
very eyes they might see every man adoring Him from his own place.
Again, another says, _The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of
the Lord as the waters cover the sea_. Therefore, it was fitting that
they should go forth unto all the earth, that they might see it all
filled with the knowledge of God, and _seas_, that is, these spiritual
churches, with His fear. On this account God dispersed them throughout
the earth. If they had established themselves in Judæa, they would not
have known these things. He wishes too that they should experience with
their eyes both the truth of the prophets and His own power, so that, if
they be right-minded, they may be thus led to the truth, whilst, if they
follow impiety, they may have no excuse in the terrible day of judgment.
Therefore, God dispersed them over the earth that we too may draw profit
hence, that, seeing the prophecies concerning their dispersion and the
destruction of Jerusalem, which Daniel, in recalling the abomination of
desolation, and Malachias, in saying, _The gates shall be shut in you_,
and David and Isaias and many other prophets have foretold, and how
those are chastised who did not receive their Lord, cut off from their
national liberty, from all their domestic ties and hereditary customs,
may understand the power which accomplishes and works these things, and
that enemies may see His strength through our gain. May we indeed learn
through their chastisement His infinite kindness and power, and may we
be constant in giving Him praise, so that we may arrive at eternal and
unspeakable goods by the grace and goodness of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to
Whom, with the Father and the Son, be honour and power, now and for
ever. Amen.
PART II.
THE KING’S HOUSE.
“Thou art Peter.”
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, liv., vol. ii., p. 108.)
· · · · · · ·
... _Thou art Simon the son of Jona: thou shalt be called Cephas._ Since
thou hast proclaimed _My_ Father, He says, so will I name _thy_ father
to thee: which was almost saying, ‘As thou art the son of Jona, so am I
the Son of My Father’. For it was superfluous to say, ‘Thou art the son
of Jona’; but as He had spoken of the Son of God, in order to show that
as Peter is the son of Jona so He is the Son of God, of the same
substance as the Begetter, He added further: _And I say to thee thou art
Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church_—that is, on the faith
of this confession. Then He shows him many men who are ready to believe,
and He strengthens Peter’s will and makes him pastor. _And the gates of
hell shall not prevail against it._ ‘If they shall not prevail against
_it_, how much less against Me. So be not troubled, for thou art soon to
hear that I am to be betrayed and crucified.’ He goes on to speak of
another honour: _And I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of
heaven_. What does _And I will give thee_ signify? As the Father gave
thee to know Me, so do _I_ also give it to thee. He did not say: ‘I will
invoke the Father,’ although the power shown forth was so great and the
gift was so unutterably magnificent, but _I will give thee_. Tell me
what hast Thou given? The keys of the kingdom of heaven, that whatsoever
thou dost bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever thou
dost loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. How, then, was it not His
to give to sit on His right and on His left Who said, _I will give_? Do
you see how He leads Peter up to the most ineffable knowledge, how He
reveals Himself, and shows Himself to be the Son of God, through that
double promise? For that which belongs only to God, namely, the
remission of sins, the setting up of an immutable Church in the midst of
waves, and making a fisherman more enduring than the hardest rock, with
the whole world against him, these are the things which He promises to
give, as the Father said to Jeremias: _I have made thee a pillar of iron
and a wall of brass_; but Jeremias was commissioned for one people,
whilst Peter is charged with the whole universe. I would ask those who
wish to depreciate the dignity of the Son, which were the greater gifts
to Peter, those of the Father or those of the Son? The Father vouchsafed
to Peter the manifestation of the Son, but the Son’s gift it was to make
known that manifestation of the Father and of Himself throughout all the
world, and He entrusted to a mortal man authority over the whole kingdom
of heaven, giving those keys to him who propagated the Church in all
parts of the earth and showed it forth more powerful than heaven. _For
heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away._
How, then, was the Giver of such gifts, the Worker of such triumphs, in
any way less than the Father? I speak of them, not separating the works
of the Father from the Son, _for all things were made through Him, and
without Him nothing was made_, but in order to silence the shameless
tongue of those who would so venture. Consider the authority which He
manifests here throughout all He says. _I say to thee, thou art Peter: I
will build My Church: I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of
heaven._ And at the time when He said these things, He charged them to
tell no man that He was the Christ. Why did He thus charge them? That
when those who took scandal were removed, the work of the Cross over,
and all His other sufferings completed, when there was no man left to
disturb or trouble the faith of the multitude in Him, His worship,
undefiled and immutable, might be grafted on the minds of those who
listened. For it was clear that His power had not yet shone forth. On
this account He willed to be preached by them at a time when the
unerring truth of deeds and the strength of things accomplished should
support the testimony of the Apostles. For there was a difference
between seeing Him, now working wonders in Palestine, now despised, now
driven about (more especially at the time when the Cross was about to
follow the wonders accomplished), and seeing Him adored and trusted by
the whole world, His former suffering no more. This is why He enjoined
them to tell no man. For that which has once been rooted and is then
torn up, would with difficulty, if planted again, be received by the
many, but that which has once been secured, and which remains immutable,
and is not threatened from any quarter, is in easy progress and gives
good promise of growth. If, indeed, those who enjoyed many signs, and
who took part in these ineffable mysteries, were scandalised by merely
being told of the Cross, and not those only, but Peter too, the head of
all,[14] consider what the multitude were likely to suffer when they
learnt that He was the Son of God, and saw Him spit upon and crucified,
and yet did not know the sacred nature of these high mysteries, and had
not received the Holy Ghost. If He said even to the disciples, _I have
many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now_, how much more
would the rest of the people have fallen if He had revealed to them the
secret of these hidden things before the due time. On this account,
then, He orders them to be silent. And that you may see how much there
was to be learnt after these things to complete the teaching, when those
who offered scandal were removed, consider the behaviour of Peter, the
chief of all. For this very Peter, after wonders so great, showed
himself weak enough to deny Our Lord and to fear a poor maid-servant.
Then, when the crucifixion was accomplished, and he had received clear
proof of the resurrection, and there remained nothing to scandalise or
terrify him, he embraced the unspeakable teaching of the Spirit in order
to leap with greater eagerness than a lion upon the Jewish people,
although he was threatened by a thousand dangers and deaths. It was
reasonable, therefore, that He bade them not to tell the multitude
before the Cross, since He did not venture to impart everything before
the Cross even to those who were to teach. _I have many things to say,
but you cannot bear them now._ And they were ignorant concerning many
things spoken by Him which He did not clearly explain before the Cross.
But when He rose from the dead, then they came to a knowledge of some of
the things which He had said.
· · · · · · ·
“Peter Rose Up.”
(_Homilies on Acts of Apostles_, _Benedictine Edition_, iii., tom. ix.,
p. 23.)
· · · · · · ·
_And in those days Peter rose up in the midst of the disciples and
said._ As one eager and as entrusted by Christ with the flock, and as
the first of the choir, he ever first begins to speak. _And the number
of names together was_, he says, _about a hundred and twenty_. _Men and
brethren, this Scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy
Ghost spake before._ Why then did he not singly ask of Christ to give
him some one in the place of Judas? And why do they not make the
election of themselves? Peter had now become better than his old self.
This is what we may say on the subject. We will give two reasons why
their asking for one to fill up their band was no chance but a matter of
revelation: the first, that they were engaged about other things; the
second, that this was the greatest proof of Christ’s presence with them.
For being absent He made the election as He would have done if present.
And this was no small matter of consolation. But observe Peter doing
this with common consent; nothing authoritatively, nothing arbitrarily.
And he did not say simply thus: ‘Instead of Judas we elect this man,’
but consoling them about what had passed, see how he manages his
discourse. For what had happened had caused no small distress. And do
not wonder at this. For if many at present twist about this fact, what
may we expect that they said? _Men and brethren_, he says: if the Lord
called them brethren, how much more he?... This is why he began by
saying, _Men and brethren, we must choose one of us_. He commits the
judgment to the multitude, both to invest with respect those who were
chosen, and to escape himself odium from the rest.... What, then, might
not Peter himself have elected? Certainly. But he does not do so, that
he might not seem partial. Moreover, he had not as yet received the
Spirit. _And they appointed two, Joseph that is called Barsabas and
Matthias._ He did not appoint them, but all. He introduced the matter,
showing that it was not even his own, but from above, according to
prophecy. So that he was an interpreter, not a master.
· · · · · · ·
Built upon the Rock.
(_Homily before he went into exile_,[15] tom. iii., p. 415.)
Numerous are the waves, and great the tossing of the sea, but we have no
fear of going down, for we stand upon the rock. Let the ocean rage as it
will, it is powerless to break the rock. Let the waves roll, they cannot
sink the bark of Jesus. Tell me, what should we fear? Death? _To me to
live is Christ and to die gain._ Is it exile perchance? _The earth is
the Lord’s, and the fulness of it._ Is it confiscation of property? We
brought nothing with us into the world, and it is clear that we can take
nothing away with us. I despise what the world fears, and hold its good
things in derision. I do not fear poverty, nor do I desire riches. I am
not afraid of death; I do not pray to live, if it be not for your good.
This is why I speak of what is now taking place, and exhort your charity
to be of good cheer. For no man shall be able to separate us. No man can
part that which God has joined together. If, speaking of man and wife,
He says: _On this account a man shall leave his father and his mother
and shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh; for that
which God has joined together man shall not separate_; if you cannot
dissolve marriage, how much less shall you be able to break up the
Church of God. You may fight her, you will not be able to harm the
object of your attack. ‘But whilst you make me more illustrious, you are
undermining your own strength by fighting against me.’ It is hard for
you to kick against a sharp goad. You do not take the edge off it, but
you make your own feet bloody; and the waves do not break through the
rock, but are dissolved in foam. There is nothing more powerful than the
Church, O man; give up fighting her, lest she overpower your strength.
Wage not war against heaven. If you fight a man, you conquer or are
conquered. But if you fight the Church, you cannot conquer. For God is
stronger than all. _Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy?_ Are we stronger
than He? Who will venture to subvert the order which God has
established? You know not His power. He looks down upon the earth and
causes it to tremble. He commands, and that which was shaken becomes
firm. If He can establish in peace a city torn by factions, how much
more is He able to establish the Church! The Church is stronger than
heaven. _Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass
away._ What words? _Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My
Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it._
If you distrust words, believe in facts. How many tyrants have wished to
get the better of the Church! How many frying-pans, and furnaces, and
fangs of wild animals, and sharp swords have there not been! Yet they
have not succeeded. Where are the oppressors? Silence and oblivion have
passed over them. But where is the Church? It is more dazzling than the
sun. _Their_ deeds are no more, hers are immortal. Now, if being few
they were not conquered, how will you get the better of them, now that
the world is filled with the service of God? _Heaven and earth shall
pass away, but My word shall not pass_; and with good reason. The Church
is more pleasing to God than heaven; He did not take a body from heaven,
but He _did_ take flesh of the Church.[16] Heaven is made for the
Church, not the Church for heaven. Be not disturbed by anything which
has taken place. Gain me the grace of an immutable faith. See you not
Peter walking upon the waters, beginning to doubt and being on the point
of drowning, not through the surging waves, but through the weakness of
his faith? Did we come here by vote of man? Did a man bring us in, that
a man might displace us? I say this, not out of pride, nor to boast—God
forbid!—but wishing to give courage to what is faint in you. Since the
city has become quiet, the devil aimed at disturbing the Church.
Wretched and most wicked demon, you could not master walls, and do you
think to shake the Church? Is the Church made up of walls? The Church is
in the multitude of the faithful. What an array of immutable pillars,
not clasped by iron, but bound by faith! I say not that so vast a
multitude is more ardent than fire, but if it consisted of one, you
would not overcome that one. You know what wounds the martyrs inflicted
on you. Many a time a tender maiden has been brought into court; she was
softer than wax, and she became harder than a rock. You tore her sides,
yet you took not her faith. The flesh languished whilst the strength of
faith was not weakened: the body was being spent, the spirit was
renewed: the physical frame was perishing, yet piety endured. You have
not conquered a single woman, and do you hope to conquer so numerous a
people? _Do you not hear the Lord saying, Wherever two or three are
gathered together in My name, there I am in the midst of them_. Where is
_not_ this people whom charity binds? I have a proof of it. Am I in good
heart by my own strength? I hold His written word. This is my staff,
this is my courage, this is to me a calm harbour. Even if the world be
troubled, I hold that written word; I look up to those words, they are a
wall of strength to me. What are they? _I am with you always until the
consummation of the world._ Christ is with me, what shall I fear? If
waves are raging against me, and the fountains of the deep and the
passions of princes, all these things are more insignificant than a
cobweb. And if it were not for your charity, I would not refuse to
depart to-morrow, for I always say, ‘Lord, may Thy will be done’; not
what this man or that man wishes, but as Thou wilt. This is my tower of
defence, this is my immutable rock, this is my sure staff. If this be
God’s will, so be it. If He wish me to remain here, I am grateful to
Him. Wherever it may be, I give Him thanks.
· · · · · · ·
The Priest a Man, not an Angel.
(_Homily on Peter and Elias_, _Benedictine Edition_, tom. ii., p. 730.)
Why is it that so few are here to day? We commemorate the martyrs, and
no one comes; the distance has made man soft, or rather not the
distance, but their softness has been the impediment. Just as nothing
can hinder readiness and alertness of will, so everything serves as a
hindrance to an irresolute and desponding man. The martyrs shed their
blood for the truth: can _you_ not make light even of a long way? They
laid down their head for Christ: will _you_ not even come out of the
city for your Lord? He died for you, and are you lukewarm in His
service? You are commemorating the martyrs, and are you discouraged and
remiss? You should come and see the devil humbled, and the martyr
triumphing, God glorified, and the Church crowned. What is your excuse?
‘I am a sinner and I cannot come.’ That is the very reason why you
should come so that you may not be quite lost. Tell me what man is
without sin? This is why there is a sacrifice, and a Church, and prayer,
and fasting. Because the soul has many wounds, therefore remedies have
been devised for them, and for every single wound of the soul a
corresponding medicine has been prepared. You have the Church offering
sacrifices, the prayers of the fathers, the administration of the Holy
Spirit, the memory of the martyrs, the assembly of the faithful, and
many things of the kind which have power to recall you from iniquity
unto justice. If you do not come to invoke the martyrs, what excuse have
you got?... You say, ‘I am a sinner and cannot come’. _Because_ you are
a sinner, come. Or do you not know that those very men who stand before
the altar have contracted sins? They are clothed in flesh and blood, yet
we do not refuse to teach when we cast our eyes on the ocean of God’s
goodness. If you enter in, you have not this against you, for you are
subject to teaching. As for us, the higher our dignity, the greater is
our guilt. It is one thing for the man, who is subject to teaching, to
sin, and another for the teacher. Nevertheless, we do not refuse to
impart discipline, or fall into negligence under pretext of humility. It
was a divine ordering that priests themselves should fall into sin. Now
listen to what I mean. If the teachers themselves, if priests had not
sinned and been subjected to the ordinary passions of life, they would
have become inhuman and relentless towards others. Therefore, He
designed that priests, too, and rulers should be under the dominion of
their feelings, so that from what they themselves experience they should
extend pardon to others. God has always pursued this course, not only
now but of old: He allowed those to whom He was going to entrust His
Church and His people to fall into sin, so that on account of their own
shortcomings they might become merciful to others. If they had _not_
sinned, they would not have made a single excuse for sinners, but,
wholly merciless, would have excluded all from the Church. Let me show
you by an example that it _is_ so, and that I do not speak from
conjecture. Peter was to be entrusted with the keys of heaven and with
the multitude of the people. For what were the Lord’s words to him?
_Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall_ _be bound in heaven, and
whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven._ For
Peter was somewhat severe, and if he had been faultless how would he
have excused his disciples? This was why the Divine Goodness brought
about a certain fall on his part, that from what he himself experienced,
he might become kind to others. And consider the man who is allowed to
fall into sin,—Peter, the chief of the Apostles, the irremovable
foundation, the immutable rock, the leader of the Church, the sure
harbour, the invincible pillar. Peter it was who had said to Christ,
_Even if I should die with Thee I will not desert Thee_; Peter who had
confessed the truth by divine revelation: _Thou art Christ the Son of
the living God_: this Peter going in on the night of Christ’s betrayal
and standing by the fire to warm himself, a certain maid-servant went up
to him and said, _Yesterday thou wert with this man_, and Peter
answered, _I know not the man_. Just before he had said, _Even if I
should die with Thee_; now he denies Him and says, _I know not the man_.
O Peter! is this thy promise? Thou hast not endured torments nor
stripes, but at a single word from a maid-servant—thou hast denied. Wilt
thou deny, Peter? As yet there are neither torments, nor stripes, nor
blows, nor angry passions, nor princes, nor outstretched swords, neither
edicts, nor threatening emperors, nor sentence to death, neither
prisons, nor precipices, nor seas. There are none of these things, yet
thou hast already denied Him: _I know not the man_. Again the maid said
to him, _Yesterday thou wert with this man._ And he answered her: _I
know not the man_. Who is making thee deny? No one in authority, but a
woman, and she a poor doorkeeper, a captive unworthy of an answer: at
_her_ word thou deniest! This is wonderful indeed! A maid-servant, a
harlot going up to Peter disturbed his faith. Peter, the pillar,
suffered no temptation: she only opened her mouth and that pillar was
shaken, that bulwark was moved. What seest thou before thee, Peter,
whilst thou deniest? A miserable maid-servant, a wretched doorkeeper.
This is what thou seest, and dost thou deny? Now for the third time she
says: _Yesterday thou too wert with this man_, and he denied for the
third time. And Jesus looking at him, recalled his own words to his
mind, and he began to weep tears of contrition for his sin. Still Jesus
pardoned him, knowing that as a man he had had a human weakness. But as
I have said, on this account He was about to entrust him with a whole
people, so that, not being hard or without sin, he might not be without
mercy for his own brethren. He fell into sin, that, considering his own
fault and his Lord’s pardon, he also might extend a merciful forgiveness
to others, which, according to divine dispensation should reconcile them
to God. He who was to be entrusted with the Church was allowed to sin;
the pillar of the churches, the harbour of faith, Peter the teacher of
the world, was allowed to sin in order that his forgiveness might become
the basis of mercy for others. Why do I say these things? Because we
priests who sit upon a throne and teach are fettered by sins. This is
why neither angel nor archangel has been entrusted with the priesthood,
for _they_ are without sin, in order that they should not through
severity at once strike down sinners amongst the people. A man born of
man was entrusted with this throne, a man held subject himself to
pleasure and to sin, so that in receiving a sinner, mindful of his own
failings, he might be gentler to that sinner. For if the priest were an
angel and were to receive a dissolute man, he would kill him on the
spot, not being acquainted with this passion. On this account if an
angel had the sacerdotal authority, he would not teach, but he would
kill the man in anger through his not being an angel: for this reason it
was a man with the knowledge and experience of his own faults, that he
might pardon sinners, and not be moved by anger, that the Church might
not be vacant through the Synagogue.
· · · · · · ·
The Authority of the Priest.
(_On the Priesthood_,[17] b. iii., c. iv., p. 24.)
The priesthood performs its functions on earth but ranks with heavenly
things. And indeed most rightly, for neither man, nor angel, nor
archangel, nor any other created power has ordained this series of
actions, but the Paraclete Himself, and He it is Who has inspired those
still in the flesh to represent visibly the ministry of angels.
Therefore, since the priest stands in the very heavens in the midst of
those powers, he should be as pure as they. The ordinances before the
law of grace, such as bells and fringes, and precious stones on the
breast, those on the shoulders, the mitre, the girdle, the long garment,
the gold plate, the holy of holies, the intense quiet of the holy place,
were awful and sacred, but if anyone would examine those of the law of
grace, he would find the former terrible ordinances were as nothing, and
that what was then said concerning the law was in this also true, that
_even that which was glorious in this part was not glorified by reason
of the glory that excelleth_. For when you see the Lord sacrificed and
lying before you, and the priest standing over the sacrifice making
supplication, and all present dyed in the precious Blood, do you feel as
if you were still amongst men and on earth, and not rather transported
straight into heaven? Casting aside from your mind every carnal thought,
do you not consider the things of heaven with a naked soul and a pure
heart? Oh, what a wonder this is! What man-loving kindness of God! He
Who is sitting with the Father above is received in that hour into the
hands of all men. And He gives Himself to those who wish to hold Him to
their hearts in close embrace, and all do this through their eyes. Now
would these things appear to you worthy of contempt, as if a man could
possibly feel anger against them? Would you like to realise the
surpassing sacredness of this holy place through another wonder? Picture
Elias to yourselves, an immense crowd surrounding him, the sacrifice
lying upon stones, all men holding their breath, and the prophet alone
in prayer, then fire coming swiftly from heaven upon the offering. This
is a marvel which is most awe-inspiring. Pass on from this to the rites
which are now being carried out, and you will see not marvels alone but
things beyond awe itself. For the priest is standing there, not bringing
down fire but the Holy Spirit: and he makes a long prayer of
supplication, not that fire from above may consume the offering, but in
order that grace, coming down upon the sacrifice, may through it
enkindle all souls, and make them purer than silver purified in the
fire. Now, such being this most tremendous rite, who that is not utterly
mad and out of his mind will be able to show contempt for it? Do you not
know that never could soul of man have borne that fire of the sacrifice,
but all would have been consumed if it had not been for an abundant
assistance of God’s grace? If, indeed, anyone would consider what a
great thing it is for a man still clothed in flesh and blood to be able
to approach nearer to that high and perfect nature, he would then
clearly see what honour the grace of the Spirit has vouchsafed to confer
upon the priest. For through his ministry both these things are
accomplished and other things which, in regard to our dignity and
salvation, are in no way inferior. Dwellers on the earth, sojourners
here, are entrusted with the things of heaven, and have received an
authority which God has given neither to angels nor to archangels. Not
to them are those words said: _Whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall
be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you shall loose shall be loosed_. It
is true that those in power on earth have authority to bind, but in the
case of bodies only: now _that_ chain affects the soul, and penetrates
into heaven, so that whatsoever the priest does here below, God ratifies
it above; the Lord of all sanctions the action of His servants. What
indeed did He give to them if not all authority in heaven? _Whose sins_,
He says, _you shall forgive they are forgiven, and whose sins you shall
retain they are retained_. What could be greater than this authority?
The Father has given all judgment to the Son: now I see them set over
all judgment by the Son as if they were already in heaven, and had
passed beyond nature, and had thrown off our passions also, to so great
an authority have they been raised. Thus, if a king entrusts to one of
his subjects power to throw into prison those whom he chooses, and to
release them, that man will be an object of singular distinction to all.
He who receives from God an authority greater in proportion as heaven
surpasses earth and souls bodies, has seemed to some to be favoured with
an honour so small as to make it credible that some one might look down
upon the gift of men so trusted. God forbid such unreason, for it _is_ a
consummate unreason to despise so exalted an authority, without which we
can arrive neither at salvation nor at the promised goods. If a man
cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven unless he be born again of water
and the Spirit, and if he who does not eat the Flesh of Christ and does
not drink His Blood shall have no part in eternal life, and all these
things are brought about by no one else, but only by those sacred hands,
those of the priest, I mean, how without them will it be possible for a
man either to escape hell-fire or to reach the crowns which are laid up
for us? For priests are those who have been trusted with throes of the
Spirit, and they generate through baptism: through them we put on Christ
and unite ourselves to the Son of God, and become members of that august
Head. Hence they might justly be held by us in greater veneration than
not rulers and kings only, but than our own fathers. These have
generated us by ties of the flesh and of inclination: priests are the
authors of our birth from God, of that blessed regeneration of our true
liberty, and of our adoption according to grace. Priests amongst the
Jews had power to cleanse the leprosy of the body, or rather not at all
to cleanse it, but only to proclaim who _were_ cleansed, and you know
how sought after the priestly office then was. Now these have received
power with regard to, not the leprosy of the body, but impurity of the
soul, not to examine it when cleansed but to entirely effect the
cleansing. Hence, those who hold them in contempt would be under a worse
curse and would deserve a greater chastisement than Dathan and his
companions. The latter, indeed, even if they claimed an authority which
did not belong to them, were still impressed with its being something
extraordinary, and showed this by desiring it with great warmth; but the
former, since a better order has been brought about and divine worship
has received so wonderful an increase, have ventured on a deed the
opposite to that of the others, of much greater audacity. To desire
undue honour and to disregard it are not forms of showing contempt; but
the one is as far removed from the other as is the measure of contempt
from admiration. What soul so unhappy as to disregard goods so great? I
cannot say, unless anyone should be goaded on to it by a demon. Now I
will go back to my starting-point. God has given greater power to
priests than to parents, according to nature, not only for chastising
but also for conferring benefits, and there is as great a difference
between the two as between this present life and the life to come.
Earthly parents generate for this present life, priests for the life to
come: the former are unable to preserve their children from death even
of the body or to ward off illness from them; but the latter have often
saved a soul which was sick and about to be lost, procuring for some a
milder chastisement, and keeping others out of trouble from the first,
not only by teaching and advising, but also by helping them with prayer.
Not only do they generate us anew, but after this they have authority to
remit sins. _Is any man sick among you_, the Apostle says, _let him call
in the elders of the Church, and let them pray over him, anointing him
with oil in the Name of the Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save the
sick man, and the Lord shall raise him up, and whatever sins he may have
committed shall be forgiven him_. So parents in the order of nature can
do nothing to help their children if these should chance to offend
people in high places; but priests have reconciled them not to rulers or
kings only, but to God Himself, Who was angered against them. After this
will anyone venture to accuse us of folly? For my part I conceive that
what has been said will inspire the souls of hearers with such respect
that they will no longer charge with folly and audacity those who shrink
from acquiring this honour for themselves, but those who seek and pursue
it.
· · · · · · ·
The Priest a Shepherd of Souls.
(_On the Priesthood_, b. vi., c. i.)
You have heard what is to be expected here on earth, but how shall we
bear what is to come hereafter, when we shall be compelled to answer for
everyone who has been entrusted to us? The punishment there does not
stop with shame, but is a chastisement which never ends. If I began by
quoting the words, _Render obedience and submission to those who are
over you, and who are responsible for your souls, as giving an account
for them_, I will not now withhold them. Fear of this judgment keeps me
in a state of perpetual trembling. If, indeed, for scandalising one, and
that one the least of all, it is better for a man to have a millstone
about his neck and to be cast into the sea; and if all who inflict a
blow upon the conscience of their brethren sin against Christ Himself,
what will be the suffering on their account of those who destroy not
one, or two, or three, but so great a multitude? It will not do to throw
the blame on want of practice or to take refuge in ignorance, or to
allege necessity or main force: it would be easier for a subject, if he
required it, to make use of this excuse for his own sins than for rulers
in those of others. What is meant by this? That he whose part it is to
correct the ignorance of others, and to guard against the devil’s coming
attack, may not allege his own ignorance, or say, ‘I did not hear the
trumpet,’ or ‘I did not foresee war’. As Ezechiel said, this is the very
reason why he is seated in his place, that he may sound the trumpet to
others and warn them of coming troubles. On this account the
chastisement is inexorable, even if only one be lost. For if, when the
sword is brandished, the watchman does not sound the trumpet to the
people, nor signal to them (he says), and the sword appearing destroys a
life, that life has been lost through the man’s own lawlessness, but I
will require his blood at the watchman’s hand.[18] Cease, then, to push
us into that inevitable judgment. _We_ have to do, not with armies and
kingdoms, but with an action which requires angelical goodness. The soul
of a priest should be purer than the very rays of the sun, so that the
Holy Spirit may never leave him to himself, that he may be able to say:
_I live, not I, but Christ liveth in me_. If dwellers in the desert, who
are removed from the cares of city, market-place, and all that these
entail, and are ever in rest and peace, are unwilling to presume of
their security in such a life, but add numberless cautions, fortifying
themselves on all sides, ardent to do and to speak with much care, so
that they may approach God as fearlessly and purely as it lies in human
capacity to do, what think you the power and strength of the priest
should be, to enable him to put off all defilement from his soul and to
preserve spiritual beauty undamaged? For he ought to be much purer than
they, and the more so as he incurs greater necessities than they, which
may sully his purity, unless by constant watchfulness and strenuous
effort he makes his soul inaccessible to their influence. Thus, there
are fair faces, and luxurious movements, and a studied walk, and a
mincing tone of voice, and painted eyes, and rouged cheeks, beautiful
plaits, dyed hair, rich clothes, variegated golden ornaments, fine
precious stones, the perfume of scents, and all other things of the
kind, dear to the female sex, which are calculated to upset a soul that
is not armed in the austerity of wisdom. It is no wonder if a man be
troubled by _these_ things; but that the devil should be able by the
contrary things to wage war against the souls of men and to wound
them,—_this_ is most surprising and embarrassing. Already some who have
escaped the former snares have allowed themselves to be taken by that
which was so different. For an unstudied address, neglected hair, a
dirty garment, a disordered appearance, a careless demeanour, a natural
manner, frank language, an unartificial gait, an artless voice, a life
of poverty, the being despised, and unprotected, and in solitude, have
inspired a man at first with pity, and from that have led him to utter
destruction. And many who have escaped the former snares, the snares of
gold, and perfume, and clothes, and the rest which go with them, as I
said, have fallen into these so far removed from those, and have been
lost. Now, when the battle strikes on the spectator’s soul, and weapons
of war surround him on all sides, whether by poverty or by riches, by
adornment or by simplicity, by a studied manner or by unaffectedness, or
in any other of the ways which I have enumerated, whence is refreshment
to come to him who is thus hemmed in? How are we to meet the case, not
of being taken by force, for this is not so very difficult, but of
keeping our mind in tranquillity from impure thoughts? I pass over
honours, which are the causes of a thousand evils. Those which come from
women lower the tone of the tempered mind, and often work ruin whenever
a man is not wholly on his guard against such plottings. And as to
honours coming from men; if they be not received with much
high-mindedness, they involve a man in two opposite sufferings—the
slavishness of flattery and the foolishness of boasting. On the one
hand, he is forced to stoop to those who serve him; on the other, he is
puffed up against his inferiors through these honours of theirs, and
thrust into an abyss of folly. _We_ say this, but the harm of it can
only be properly ascertained by experience. And, necessarily, things
much worse and more dangerous than these would happen to those who are
in the midst of the fight. The lover of the desert is exempted from all
this, for if a foolish thought _did_ suggest something of the kind to
him, this imagination is weak and easily overcome, because the flame of
the eyes is not fed by outward things. Now the monk fears for himself
alone: even if he were obliged to think of others, these would be very
few. Or if they were many, they would be fewer than those in churches,
and give their superior little anxiety, not through their small numbers
alone, but because they are removed from worldly business, and have
neither children, nor wife, nor anything else of the kind to trouble
about. It is this and the common life which have made them disposed to
obey their rulers. Thus they are able to see and to correct their
faults, for the constant watchfulness of the teacher is no slight thing
towards increase of virtue. Now, the majority of men under the priest’s
charge are taken up with worldly cares, and this makes them slack in the
fulfilment of their spiritual duties. Hence the teacher should scatter
the seed, so to speak, day by day, in order that the teaching by
constantly falling should take root in the listener’s mind. For
superfluous wealth, and great power, and the softness arising from
luxury, and many other things joined to these, suffocate the seeds, and
often the density of thorns does not allow the seed to shoot forth so as
to be seen. Moreover, excessive tribulation, the necessities of poverty,
constant reproaches, and everything else of the kind which is opposed to
the former things, lead a man away from a holy zeal. Not even the
smallest part of sins incurred can become manifest to them. How should
it not be so when they know not the greater number even by sight? Thus
onerous are a priest’s duties towards the people. But if anyone would
consider duties towards God, he will find the others nothing at all, so
much more careful and diligent a zeal do these require. For what sort of
man should he be who rules an entire city—and why do I say a city?—the
whole world rather—and has to propitiate God for the sins of all—not the
sins of the living only, but those of the dead also. I hold that the
courage of Moses and Elias is all insufficient for this ministry.
Entrusted as if with the world itself, and the father of all, the priest
thus approaches God in order to extinguish wars in every place and to
appease strife, to bring about peace and plenty, and to ask both
privately and publicly a speedy deliverance from the evils which are
pressing upon every man. He himself ought to be as much above what he
asks for as the ruler should be in everything above the ruled. Now, what
place are we to assign to him when he calls down the Holy Spirit, and
offers up the most tremendous Sacrifice, and continually holds in his
grasp the common Lord of all? What purity shall we not expect him to
have, what piety? Think what the hands should be which thus minister!
What the tongue which utters those words! What should be purer or holier
than the soul which receives so great a Spirit? Then angels surround the
priest, and the sanctuary and all the place about the Sacrifice are
filled with heavenly powers in honour of Him Who is lying there. And
this can be sufficiently believed from the rites. But I once heard some
one say that an old man, who was held in veneration and accustomed to
revelations, told him he himself had been made worthy of this vision. At
the time of the sacrifice he had suddenly seen a multitude of angels, as
many as his eye could grasp, in shining garments surrounding the altar,
bending low, as a man might see soldiers in the presence of the king,
and this I believe. And another man told me, not what he had learnt from
a third person, but what he himself had been allowed to see and to hear.
This was it. When the departing, who have chanced to partake of the
mysteries with a pure conscience, draw their last breath, angels,
serving them as a body-guard for the sake of what they have received,
lead them out of this world. Do you not tremble to come with this soul
to this holy sacrifice, and to be at these solemn rites the man in
soiled garments whom Christ cast out from the rest of the guests? The
soul of the priest should be a light of justice to the world, but ours
is so surrounded with the darkness of an evil conscience as to be always
overclouded and unable to look fearlessly at its Lord. Priests are the
salt of the earth; who could bear easily with our folly and our
ignorance in everything if you were not accustomed to give us an
exaggerated love? And it is not enough that he who has been entrusted
with so wonderful a ministry should be pure; he should also be wise and
experienced in many things; he should know worldly business not less
than those engaged in the midst of it, and still be further removed from
all things than monks in their desert. As he must come into contact with
men who are married and have children to bring up, and keep servants and
have much wealth, who are engaged in public business, who are in power,
he should be many-sided. I say many-sided, not a schemer, neither a
flatterer nor a hypocrite, but made up of much liberality and fortitude,
knowing how to lend a useful hand whenever circumstances demand it, at
once kind and austere. All subjects are not to be used in the same way,
since the children of physicians deem it not good to apply one treatment
to all the sick, nor has the pilot only one course at his command
against the wind. Storms are ever hanging over _this_ bark, and these
storms assail not only from without, but arise also within, and we need
to have much condescension and much care. All these things which are
different in themselves have one end in view—the glory of God and the
strengthening of the Church.
· · · · · · ·
One Sacrifice.
(_Homilies on Epistle to the Hebrews_,[19] xvii.)
· · · · · · ·
Tell me what need was there of having many sacrifices when one is
sufficient? That there being many which were constantly offered might
show their inefficacy for purification. Just as a powerful remedy, which
is productive of health and able to remove all the malady, does
everything by one application, and when this one application does
everything, it shows its strength in not being applied again; and this
is also its work, for if it be always used it is a sign that it has no
efficacy. The merit of a remedy consists in being applied once and not
often. And so it is here. Why, then, are they always cured by the same
sacrifices? If they had been free from all sin, sacrifices would not
have been offered up every day. Therefore, they were fixed things, so as
to be invariably offered up for all the people both in the evening and
in the morning. Thus, it was a confession of sins, not a remission of
sins; a confession of weakness, not a manifestation of strength. Since
the first sacrifice availed nothing the second was offered up, and that
also proving ineffectual another followed, so that it was an
acknowledgment of guilt. On the one hand, the act of offering was a
confession of sin, and the ever-recurring offering was a confession of
weakness. Now, with Christ it was the contrary. He was once offered up,
and His one oblation sufficed for all time. He expressed it well by
calling them images, for they present the figure only and not the
strength of the reality. Just as an image represents the likeness of a
man but not his power, so the truth and the figure have something in
common with each other. The likeness is the same but not the living
power. So it was in the matter of heaven and the tabernacle. The figure
was equal, for it was holy; but the power and the other qualities were
not the same. What is the meaning of _He hath appeared for the putting
away of sin by the sacrifice of Himself_? What is the _putting away_?
Contempt; for sin has no longer any assurance. It has been put away.
How? Whereas it should have paid a penalty it did not, that is, force
was put upon it; for just when it was likely to destroy all men it was
itself taken away. _He hath been made manifest_, he says, _by the
sacrifice of Himself_; that is, He was manifested to God and went to
God. Now, because the priest did this many times in the year, do not
think that this has taken place by chance and not through weakness. If
not through weakness, why then did it take place? If there are no
wounds, then neither are remedies necessary. Therefore, He enjoined that
the sacrifice should be always offered up on account of weakness, and
that it should take place as a commemoration of sins. What then? Do we
not offer up sacrifice day by day? We do indeed, but we commemorate His
death. This sacrifice is one, not many. How one and not many? Because it
was once offered up, just as that one sacrifice in the holy of holies.
This is a type of that, and that of the other. We are ever offering up
the same Person. Not one sheep to-day and another to-morrow, but ever
the same sheep, so that the sacrifice is one. Now, in virtue of this
argument, since the sacrifice is offered up in many places, are there
many Christs? By no means, but there is everywhere one Christ, as
perfect in one place as in another, one body. Therefore, as He Who is
offered up in many places is one Body and not many bodies, so is it one
Sacrifice. He is our High Priest Who offered up the sacrifice which
purifies us. This is that which now also we offer up; the One then
offered up, the Inconsumable. This is done in commemoration of what was
then done, for He says, _This do in commemoration of Me_. We are ever
offering not another sacrifice, as the high priest then did, but always
the same; or rather we make a commemoration of a sacrifice. And since I
have spoken of this sacrifice, I would say a few things to you who are
initiated, a few things in volume though possessing great power and
help. What we speak is not ours but the Divine Spirit’s. What, then, is
it? Many partake of this sacrifice once in the whole year, some twice,
some often. Now, we speak to all, not only to those who are here, but to
those who dwell in the desert. For they receive once a year, often,
indeed, once in two years. Well, then, whom shall we prefer? Those who
receive once, or those who receive twice, or those who receive often?
Neither those who receive once, nor those who receive often, nor those
who receive seldom, but those who receive with a pure conscience, and an
undefiled heart, and an irreproachable life. Let such as these ever
approach, and those who are not so not even once. Why? Because they take
judgment to themselves, and condemnation, and chastisement, and penalty.
Wonder not at this. For just as food, which by its nature is nourishing,
if taken by a diseased stomach, destroys and withers up everything and
prepares disease, so is it with this case of the tremendous mysteries.
You are partaking of a spiritual table, of a royal table, and do you
again fill your mouth with mud? You use perfumes, and do you again fill
yourself with ill odours? Tell me, I beseech you, if you receive
communion once a year, will forty days suffice you for the atonement of
your sins during all that time? Again, at the end of a week perhaps, you
return to your former ways. Now, tell me, if you were to enjoy good
health for forty days after a long illness, and then were to go back to
unwholesome food productive of disease, would you not waste your
trouble? Evidently you would. If physical things are so changed, how
much more those which belong to the will. Thus for instance, we see by
nature, and we have naturally a healthy sight. But often our eyes fail
from disease. If, therefore, natural things are so mutable, how much
more that which is a matter of free-will! You give up forty days to the
care of your soul’s health, often not even that, and you think to have
appeased God? You are trifling, man! I say this, not forbidding you the
one communion in the year, but wishing rather that you should always
approach the holy things. So it is that the deacon raises his voice to
call the holy, and, in doing this, scrutinises all, so that no one
should approach unprepared. As with a flock of sheep, where many of them
are sound and many are diseased, these latter have to be separated from
the sound ones, so is it in the Church. Since here, too, some sheep are
sound and some diseased, through this cry which is everywhere heard,
this most awful voice, the priest separates the one from the other,
invites and urges the holy to approach. As, however, man cannot know his
fellow-man—for _what man has known that which is in man, if not the
spirit of man that is in him_?—this cry he raises after the sacrifice is
completed, so that no one should approach the spiritual fountain
negligently or as if by chance. In the case of the flock—for there is no
reason why we should not again make use of the same illustration—we shut
up the sick ones within the fold, and keep them in a dark place, and
give them different food. We allow them neither fresh air, nor pure
grass, nor water in the open. Hence that voice is instead of a chain.
You will not be able to say, ‘I was in ignorance of any danger following
upon this act’. We have, too, the special witness of Paul in the matter.
But you say, perhaps, ‘I have not read about it’. This is an accusation
rather than an excuse. You are coming into the church every day and
still do not know these things.
· · · · · · ·
The new Pasch.
(_31st Homily on St. Matthew_, lxxxi., vol. ii., p. 459.)
· · · · · · ·
_And whilst they were at supper, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and
broke, and gave to His disciples, and said: Take ye and eat: this is My
Body. And taking the chalice, He gave thanks, and gave to them, saying:
Drink_ _ye all of this; for this is my Blood of the new testament, which
shall be shed for many unto remission of sins._ Consider what great
hardness of heart the traitor showed. Partaking of the mysteries, he
remained the same, and enjoying that most tremendous Banquet, he was not
converted. This Luke plainly intimates when he says that after these
things the devil entered into him, not despising the Lord’s Body, but
scorning the traitor’s shamelessness. For his sin was the greater for
two reasons: that he approached the mysteries with such a mind, and
that, approaching them, he grew no better. Neither fear, nor gratitude,
nor the honour received, had any influence over him. And although Christ
knew all things, He did not forbid his approach in order to show you
that He leaves no means of conversion untried. Therefore, both before
this and after this, He continued to exhort and to check Judas both by
actions and words, by fear and by kindness, by threat and by benefit.
But nothing availed against that grievous sickness of his. Hence,
leaving Judas to himself, He again reminds the disciples through the
mysteries of His death as victim, and during the progress of the table
discourses about the Cross, seeking, by His insistence in foretelling
His passion, to find an entrance for it in their minds. If, with all
that was done and foretold, they were troubled, what would they have
suffered if they had heard none of these things? _Whilst they were
eating, He took bread and broke it._ Why did he carry out this mystery
at the time of the Pasch? In order to teach you everywhere that He is
Himself the Lawgiver of the old dispensation, also, and that its
ordinances were made to foreshadow these things. On this account He adds
the reality to the type. The evening signified the fulness of time, and
the end itself to which things were coming. He gives thanks, teaching us
how we are to carry out this mystery, and showing us that He goes not
unwillingly to the Cross. And He instructs us that, whatever we may
suffer, we should bear it with thanksgiving, and opens out from this
good hopes for us. For if the type released men from so grievous a
slavery, how much more will the reality set the world free, and be
bestowed for the blessing of our nature. For this reason He did not
institute this mystery until the enactments of the Law were to cease,
and He brings to a conclusion the chief of their feasts by translating
them to another and a most awful Table, and says: _Take and eat, this is
My Body which is broken for many_. How should they not have feared when
they heard this? He had spoken to them often and much before on the same
subject. Therefore, He no longer prepares them for it, for they had
heard of it sufficiently; but He tells them the reason why He
suffers—the remission of sins. He calls His Blood the Blood of the new
Testament, that is, of the promise, of the gospel, and of the new law.
For this both had been promised of old, and is the bond of the new
Covenant. And as the old Covenant had sheep and heifers, so the new
Covenant had the Lord’s Blood. Then He goes on to show them that He is
about to die, and therefore He commemorates the Covenant, and recalls
the old Covenant to their minds, for that too was consecrated through
blood! And again He tells them why He is to die, _which is shed for many
unto the remission of sins_, and He says: _Do this for a commemoration
of Me_. Do you see how He leads them away and withdraws them from Jewish
customs. ‘As you did that,’ He says, ‘for a commemoration of the wonders
in Egypt, so do this for a commemoration of Me.’ That blood was shed to
save the first-born sons: _this_ Blood for the remission of the sins of
the whole world. _This is My Blood_, He says, _which is shed for the
remission of sins_. He said this to show by this also that His
sufferings and His cross are a mystery, and again, to comfort His
disciples through it. And as Moses had said: _Let this be to you a
perpetual memorial_, so _He_ said, _For a commemoration of Me_, until I
come. And again, _With desire I have desired to eat this Pasch_, that
is, ‘to give you the new gifts, that Pasch by which I intend to make you
spiritual’. And He Himself drank of it. In order that men, hearing this,
might not say: ‘How is this? Are we drinking blood and eating flesh?’
and then be troubled (for words of His on this subject had already
disturbed them, and many had been scandalised by them); to remove, I
say, their trouble, then also He did it first Himself, and led them
gently to a participation of the mysteries. Therefore, He drank His own
Blood. ‘How is this?’ you ask. ‘Did men of old do it?’ Certainly not.
Therefore, He says: _Do this_, that He may draw them away from the
other. For if this work the remission of sins, as indeed it does, the
other is superfluous for the future. Now, as in the case of the Jews, so
was it here. He bound up the commemoration of the benefit with the
mystery, thereby stopping the mouths of heretics. For when they say,
‘How do we know that Christ suffered?’ amongst other arguments, we
silence them also with the mysteries. If, indeed, Jesus did not die,
what do the things involved in the rites symbolise?
· · · · · · ·
The ‘Eyes of Rome’.
(_Homilies on Epistle to the Romans_,[20] xxxiii., vol. i., p. 489.)
· · · · · · ·
A good teacher makes it his special duty to help those he is teaching,
not by word only, but by prayer also. Hence Paul’s words: _Let us give
ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word_. Who
will pray for us now that Paul has departed? Those who emulate Paul: let
us only show ourselves worthy of so great an advocacy, that we may not
alone hear Paul’s voice in this world, but when we depart hence may
deserve to look upon that soldier of Christ. Or rather, if we listen to
him here we are sure to see him there, and if we are not near to him we
shall undoubtedly see him resplendent in glory close to the King’s
throne, where the cherubim give praise, where the seraphim unfold their
wings. There with Peter we shall see Paul, the head and leader of the
choir of the saints, and we shall be in possession of true charity. For
if in this world he so loved men as when he might have been dissolved
and with Christ he chose to be here, how much more potently will he show
forth the love-charm in that place. This is why I cherish Rome, although
I have other grounds for my admiration in its size, and age, and beauty,
and population, and power, and wealth, and its successes in wars; apart
from all these things, I hold it blessed because Paul wrote to the
Romans in his lifetime and loved them so much, because he spoke to them
in person, and there finished his life. This is why that city is famous
rather than for all other reasons put together: it is like a strong and
beautiful human body with two shining eyes, which are the bodies of
these two saints. The heavens are not so splendid when the sun is
sending forth its rays as the city of Rome transmitting these two lights
of hers to the whole world. Rome will yield up Paul; Rome will yield up
Peter. Consider in awe what a sight Rome will witness when Paul rises in
a moment from that tomb, together with Peter, and is borne away to meet
Christ. Think what roses Rome presents to Christ, what a double crown
surrounds the city, how it is girt with golden chains, and what the
fountains of its being are. This is why I am in admiration at that city,
not for its abundance of gold, not for its columns, nor for any other
beauty it has, but for these pillars of the Church.
Who could now give me to embrace Paul’s body, to be nailed to his tomb,
and to see the dust of him who completed what was wanting to the
sufferings of Christ, who bore His marks, and sowed the earth with the
Gospel? Who could give me to see the dust of that body in which he went
over the world, through which Christ spoke, through which a light shone
forth brighter than any lightning, and a voice arose more terrible to
the devils than loudest thunder, through which he gave utterance to
those blessed words: _Would that I could be anathema for my brethren_,
which he used before kings and was not ashamed, through which we have
known Paul and Paul’s Lord? We do not dread the thunderbolt as devils
dread that voice. For if they trembled at his garments, how much more at
his voice. This voice led them in chains, purified the world, cured
diseases, put forth evil, set up truth, had the indwelling Christ, and
with Him made itself everywhere heard. That voice of Paul’s was like the
cherubim. As God took up His seat on those powers, so did He on the
tongue of Paul. It became worthy to receive Christ, speaking those
things which were dear to Christ, and soaring to an unspeakable height
like the seraphim. For what is beyond those words of his: _I am sure
that neither angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor present, nor
future, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to
separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus_? How many wings does
that voice seem to you to have? How many eyes? Therefore he said: _We
are not ignorant of his devices_; and so the devils fled, not merely
when they heard his voice, but when they saw his cloak from a distance.
Would that I could see the dust of this mouth in which Christ did great
and unspeakable things, and even greater things than by Himself—for that
He _did_ work greater things by His disciples was what He said—through
which the Spirit gave those wonderful oracles to the world. For what
good thing did that mouth not accomplish? It put forth demons, remitted
sins, curbed tyrants, silenced the tongues of philosophers, led the
world to God, induced barbarians to be ascetic, and changed all things
on earth; nay, in heaven too he did his will, binding and loosing those
whom he chose to bind and to loose there, according to the power which
was given to him. Would that I could look upon not only the dust of his
mouth, but of that heart, which we might not wrongly call the heart of
the world, the source of endless good, the beginning, fountainhead of
our own life. From thence the spirit of life was poured out upon all,
and was diffused amongst the members of Christ. It was sent forth, not
through arteries, but through the free choice of good. That heart was so
broad that it could embrace whole cities, and peoples, and nations. _My
heart is enlarged_, he says. Yet, large as it was, his all-embracing
love often urged and troubled it. _For out of much affliction and
anguish of heart I wrote to you_, he says. This heart, even dissolved in
dust, is what I long to see—the heart which was consumed for each
individual sinner, suffering afresh the agony of child-birth over every
abortive child, the heart which sees God: _For the clean of heart shall
see God_: the heart which has become a sacrifice: _An afflicted spirit
is a sacrifice to God_: that heart higher than the firmament, wider than
the universe, brighter than sunshine, hotter than fire, stronger than
adamant, giving forth fruitful streams: _For_, he says, _out of his
belly shall flow rivers of living water_: hence arose the fresh spring
which watered not the face of the earth, but the souls of men; hence
sprung forth not rivers alone, but fountains of tears by day and by
night: that heart which lived a new life, not this physical life of
ours: _I live_, he says, _not I, but Christ liveth in me_. So that
Paul’s heart was His heart—a tablet of the Holy Spirit, a book of
charity, a heart in anguish over the sins of men: _I am afraid of you_,
he says, _lest perhaps I have laboured in vain among you, and as the
serpent seduced Eve, lest coming I should not find you as I wish_: a
heart fearful about itself whilst full of courage: _I am afraid_, he
says, _that after preaching to others I myself shall be cast out_; and,
again: _I am sure that neither angels nor archangels shall_ _be able to
separate us_: the heart which was made worthy to love Christ as no one
else has loved Him, despising death and hell, and torn by the tears of
his brethren. _What are you doing_, he says, _weeping and filling my
heart with anguish_?—that strongest of hearts, which could not endure
for a moment to be away from the Thessalonians. Would that I could see
the dust of those fettered hands through which the imposition of the
Spirit was given and the divine words were written: _See what a letter I
have written to you with my own hand_; and, again: _A greeting from the
hand of Paul_, of those hands at sight of which the viper fell into the
fire. Would that I could look upon the dust of those gloriously-blinded
eyes which saw the light again for the world’s salvation and were made
worthy in the body to behold Christ, and saw earthly things without
seeing them, those eyes which looked upon unseen things, which knew not
sleep, which were watching in the midst of night, and which did not
suffer what other eyes suffer. Would that I could see the dust of those
feet which toiled over the world and wearied not, which were chained to
a pillory when he was imprisoned, of those feet which traversed known
and unknown regions and were often on the way. And why should I speak of
each member separately? Would that I could see that tomb in which the
armour of justice is stored up, the armour of light, those members which
are now in life, which were dead whilst living, in all of which Christ
lived, which were crucified to the world, those members of Christ which
had put on Christ, the temple of the Spirit, the dwelling-place of
holiness, which were chained to the Spirit and nailed to the fear of
God, bearing the marks of Christ. This is the body which protects that
city and is stronger than any tower of defence or any number of
fortifications, and with it is that of Peter, whom he honoured in life,
_for he went up to consult Peter_. In death, therefore, charity made him
worthy to be Peter’s companion. Would that I could see this lion
according to the Spirit. For like a lion breathing fire on troops of
foxes so did he spring upon the tribe of devils and philosophers and
fall like a heavy thunderbolt upon the devil’s ranks. Nor did the devil
stand against Paul in battle, but so great was his fear and trembling
that he retreated from his shadow or his voice. So it was that, being
far off, Paul gave the fornicator up to him and again snatched him from
his hands, and so he did others too, that they might be taught not to
blaspheme. Consider how he ranges against the foe those who are under
his own command, rousing and spurring them on. Thus, when he said to the
Ephesians, _Our warfare is not against flesh and blood, but against
principalities and powers_, he added the reward also, by the words _in
heavenly things_. _For_, he said, _our warfare is not for earthly
things, but for heaven and heavenly things_. And to others his words
were: _Know you not that we shall judge angels, how much more things of
this world?_ Taking all this to heart, let us stand bravely. For Paul
was also a man and of the same nature as we are, having everything else
in common with us; but because he showed a great love for Christ he
scaled the heavens and found his place with the angels. If, then, we
wish to rouse ourselves a little and to kindle that fire within us, we
should emulate that holy one. He tells us himself that this is not
impossible: _Be imitators of me as I am of Christ_. Therefore let us not
only admire him and wonder at him, let us also imitate him, that at our
departure hence we may be made worthy to see him and to share that
unspeakable glory. May this be granted to all of us through the grace
and love of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom, with the Father and the Holy
Ghost, be praise for ever and ever. Amen.
· · · · · · ·
‘This is My Body.’
(_1st Homily on the Betrayal of Judas_, _Benedictine Edition_, t. ii.,
p. 381.)
· · · · · · ·
Then the disciples came to Him. _Then._ When? When these things were
taking place, and the betrayal was effected, and Judas destroyed
himself, the disciples came to Him, saying, _Where wilt Thou that we
prepare to eat the Pasch_? Mark you the difference between disciple and
disciples? The one betrays his Lord, the others busy themselves with
preparing the Pasch; the one makes a bargain, the others minister for
His table: both the one and the others had enjoyed the same miracles,
the same teaching, the same authority. Now, how do they differ? In the
will: this is everywhere the cause, both of all good and all evil.
_Where wilt Thou that we prepare to eat the Pasch?_ _Then_ was that same
evening. As Our Lord had no house of His own, they said to Him, _Where
wilt Thou that we prepare to eat the Pasch?_ We have no settled
dwelling-place, neither tent nor house. Let those who dwell in splendid
houses, and spacious courts, and large precincts be taught that Christ
had not where to lay His head. Therefore they asked, _Where wilt Thou
that we prepare to eat the Pasch?_ What Pasch? This was not our Pasch,
but still the Jews’ Pasch; it was this Jewish Pasch which _they_
prepared; Our Lord Himself prepared ours. Not only did He prepare it
Himself, but He became our Pasch. _Where wilt Thou that we prepare for
Thee to eat the Pasch?_ This was the Jewish Pasch which had begun in
Egypt. Now, why did Christ partake of it? Because He accomplished all
the observances of the law. At His baptism He said: _Thus it becomes us
to fulfil all justice_. I came to redeem man from the malediction of the
law. For God sent His own Son, made of woman, made under the law, that
He might redeem those who were bound by it, and might put an end to the
law. Now, to prevent anyone from saying that He abolished the law
because He was unable to fulfil it, as being burdensome, and hard, and
oppressive, having first Himself carried it out, He then dissolved it.
On this account He held the Pasch also, for the Pasch was an ordinance
of the law. And why did the law order the eating of the Pasch? The Jews
were ungrateful towards their benefactor, and so immediately after the
benefits they forgot God’s precepts. When they came out of Egypt, and
saw the waters parted, and again closed, and a thousand other wonders,
they said, _Let us make to ourselves gods who may go before us_. What
say you? You still touch the wonders with your hands, and have you
forgotten the benefactor? Since, therefore, they were thus without
feeling or understanding, God kept alive the memory of His gifts by the
ordinance of feasts, and He commanded the Pasch to be sacrificed, so
that if your son ask you, ‘What is this Pasch?’ you may answer, ‘Our
forefathers in Egypt sprinkled their doors with the blood of the lamb,
lest the angel of destruction, when he came, should enter in and smite
with the plague’. Thus the feast was a perpetual memorial of salvation.
Moreover, not only did these feasts benefit them by keeping fresh the
memory of graces in the past, but something much more, for they
foreshadowed what was to come. That lamb, indeed, was the figure of
another Lamb, a spiritual Lamb, and that sheep of another Sheep. The one
was a shadow, the other the reality. When the Sun of Justice appeared,
the shadow forthwith ceased, for at sunrise the shadows depart.
Consequently, at that table itself, each Pasch takes place—the Pasch of
the figure and the Pasch of the reality. Just as painters use one and
the same canvas for outlining their subject and depicting shadow, and
then add colouring to make it life-like, so did Christ act. At one and
the same table He showed forth the typical Pasch, and set up the true
Pasch. _Where wilt Thou that we prepare for Thee to eat the Pasch?_ It
was then the Jewish Pasch, but when the sun appears let the lamp be
extinguished; with the advent of truth let the shadow languish.
I say these things to the Jews since they seem to celebrate a Pasch,
since the uncircumcised in heart put forward their unleavened bread with
a gross mind. Tell me, O Jew, how do you sacrifice the Pasch? The temple
is destroyed, the altar has been taken away, the holy of holies has been
trampled under foot, all show of sacrifice has ceased. Wherefore, then,
do you venture to carry out practices so illegal? You went out once into
Babylon, and there those who had taken you captive said, _Sing us a song
of Sion_, and you would not. And David spoke with the same intent: _We
sat beside the waters of Babylon and wept; we hung up our organs on the
willows in the midst of it_, that is, our instruments, harps, lyres, and
the rest. Men of old used these things, and thus sung hymns, and when
they went into captivity took them so as to have a reminder of their
life in their own country, not to use them. _For there_, he says, _they
who held us captive asked us for words of songs, and we said, How shall
we sing the song of the Lord in a strange land?_ What! you will not sing
the song of the Lord in a strange land, and yet will you celebrate the
Pasch of the Lord in a strange land! What ingratitude and iniquity!
Because those who constrained them were enemies, they dared not even
sing a psalm in a strange land. And now of themselves, whereas no man
puts force upon them, they wage war against God. Do you see how their
unleavened bread is unclean and their feast illegal? Now there is no
Jewish Pasch. There was one then, but it is dissolved now, and the
spiritual Pasch came, which was given then by Christ. For as they were
eating and drinking, the Evangelist says, taking bread, He broke and
said: _This is My body, which is broken for you unto the remission of
sins_. The initiated understand these words. Then, taking the chalice,
He said: _This is My Blood, which is shed for many unto the remission of
sins_. And Judas was present as Christ spoke thus. This is the very Body
which you have sold for thirty pieces of silver, O Judas; this is the
very Blood which you have just shamefully bartered to the unfeeling
Pharisees. O loving kindness of Christ! O foolish madness of Judas! On
the one hand Judas sold Him for thirty pieces of silver, whilst Christ
even after this did not refuse to give that Blood, which had been
betrayed, to the traitor for the remission of his sins, if he had so
willed. And Judas was there, and he partook of the sacred table. For, as
Our Lord had washed his feet, together with the other disciples’, so did
he eat with them of the sacred table, in order that he might have no
excuse for remaining obdurate. Our Lord did everything in His power, yet
Judas persisted in his wickedness.
But it is now time for us to approach that tremendous table. Let us,
therefore, all go to it with becoming sobriety and watchfulness. Let
there be no Judas here, no guilty man, no one infected with poison, no
man with one thing in his mouth and another in his mind. The same Christ
is now here Who prepared that table. And He it is Who is now preparing
it. For it is not a man who makes the offerings become the Body and
Blood of Christ, but the very Christ for us crucified.[21] Fulfilling
what he represents, the priest stands there, speaking those words; the
power and grace of them are God’s. _This is My Body_, he says, and this
word transforms what lies before him;[22] and just as the words,
_Increase and multiply and fill the earth_, were once spoken and endue
our nature through all time with fruitfulness, so those other words once
spoken from that time till to-day and until His coming, make the
sacrifice over each table in the churches complete. Therefore, let no
hypocrite approach, no one filled with sin, no one with poison in his
mind, that he may not receive judgment to himself, for then, too, Judas
had partaken of the oblation when the devil leapt into him; not that the
devil despised the Lord’s Body, but Judas for his shameful conduct. This
was to teach you that the devil continually attacks and assails those
who unworthily partake of the divine mysteries, as he did Judas. For
honourable things profit the good, but inflict a greater punishment on
those who abuse the use of them. I say this not to terrify but to
fortify you. Let there be no Judas, then; let no one enter in poisoned
with evil. For the sacrifice is spiritual food; and just as bodily food,
when received by a stomach which has bad humours, strengthens disease,
not from its own nature but because of that stomach’s weakness, so does
it usually happen with the spiritual mysteries. They, too, when received
by a soul full of wickedness, wither it up and corrupt it the more, not
by their own nature, but through the weakness of the participating soul.
Let no one, therefore, indulge in bad thoughts; let us rather cleanse
our mind, for we are approaching an immaculate sacrifice; let us make
our souls holy. This may be done even in one day. How? If you have
anything against an enemy cast out your anger, cure your wound, give up
your enmity, in order that you may receive a healing from that table,
for you are approaching a tremendous and all-holy sacrifice. Reverence
the reason which prompts this offering. Christ lies slain before you.
Why was He slain, and on what account? That He might bring about peace
between the things of heaven and the things of earth; that He might make
you the friend of angels, and reconcile you to the God of all; and that,
whereas you were a foe and an enemy, He might transform you into His
friend. _He_ gave up His own life for those who hated Him. _You_
continue in enmity with your fellow-servant, and how will you be able to
approach the table of peace? He did not refuse even to die for you. Will
you not put away for your own sake your anger against your
fellow-servant? What excuse has this conduct? ‘He has treated me badly,’
you say, ‘and has been most grasping.’ What is this? It was a sheer
money loss, but he was far from wounding you as Judas did Our Lord. Yet
_He_ gave that very blood which poured from Him for the salvation of
those who shed it. What have you to put against this? If you do not
forgive your enemy you have wounded not him but yourself. You have often
done him some harm in this life, but you have prepared for yourself a
relentless sentence in the enduring day of eternity. For nothing is so
hateful to God as a revengeful man, an unforgiving heart, and an angered
mind. Listen to what He says: _When thou offerest thy gift at the altar,
and as thou standest there, rememberest that thy brother hath anything
against thee, take thy gift from the altar, and going away, be
reconciled to thy brother, and then offer thy gift_. What? Do you tell
me that I must forgive? ‘I do, indeed,’ He says; ‘this sacrifice was
instituted in order that you and your brother should be at peace.’ If,
therefore, it was instituted that you might be at peace with your
brother, and you do not enjoy peace, it is idle for you to take part in
the sacrifice, and it has been instituted in vain as far as you are
concerned. Do, then, in the first place, that for which the sacrifice is
offered, and then you will enjoy its full benefit. The Son of God came
down from heaven that He might reconcile our nature to its Lord, and on
this account not only did He come, but wished also to make us who should
do the same things participators of His Name. _Blessed are the
peacemakers_, He says, _for they shall be called the sons of God_. That
which the only begotten Son of God did, do you also according to your
human power, by becoming a bond of peace to yourself and to others. This
is why He calls you who are a peacemaker a son of God; this is why, in
the time of sacrifice, He is mindful of no other commandment than that
of reconciliation with a brother, showing that it is the greatest of
all. Would that I could go on with the argument, but what I have said is
sufficient for those who are here present, if they will lay it to heart.
Let us always be mindful of these words, beloved brethren, and of the
holy kiss of peace, and of the most sacred embrace which we give to each
other. For this it is which holds our minds together, and makes us all
one body, since we all partake of one Body. Let us then blend ourselves
into one body, not mixing our bodies, but uniting our souls in the bond
of charity; thus we shall be able to enjoy the table set before us with
confidence. For even if we should be righteous a thousand times over,
and yet have revengeful spirits, all is vanity and deception, and we
shall be powerless to gain fruits of salvation here. Recognising this,
let us put off all anger, and, purifying our conscience, let us with all
meekness and humility approach the table of Christ, to Whom, with the
Father and the Holy Ghost, be all glory, honour, and power, now and for
ever! Amen.
The Union of the Holy Eucharist.
(_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxxii., vol. ii., p. 468.)
· · · · · · ·
Let us then trust in God under all circumstances, and never gainsay Him,
even when what He says seems contrary to our reasonings and to our
sight; but let His word be more powerful than our reasoning and our
sight. So let us act in regard to the mysteries, not seeing only that
which is before us, but also embracing His words. _His_ word is not to
be set aside, whereas our senses are easily deceived. _It_ has never
failed, but our senses have erred over and over again. Since, then, the
word is, _This is My Body_, let us trust and believe in it, and gaze at
it with our mind’s eyes. For Christ delivered to us nothing that is the
object of sense, but objects all of the mind, yet dealing with sensible
things. Thus, too, in baptism, the gift is made through an object of
sense—the water, and that which is accomplished, is an object of mind,
viz., birth and renewal. For, if you were bodiless, He would have given
you bodiless gifts in their nakedness; but, since the soul is
encompassed by the body, He gives you objects of mind, under the
appearance of sensible things. How many men say, ‘I should like to see
His form and features, His garments and His shoes? Well, you see Him,
and touch Him, and eat Him. You desire to see what He wore, and He gives
you Himself, not to see only, but to touch, and to eat, and to receive
within you. Therefore, let no man approach with disgust or carelessness,
but all with fire, and zeal, and watchfulness. For, if the Jews ate
their Pasch in haste, standing, and holding their sandals and staffs in
their hands, how much more should you be wary. _They_ were about to go
out to Palestine, and so they had the outward signs of travellers, and
_you_ are going forth to heaven. Hence we must be ever on the watch, for
not a small punishment is reserved to those who eat unworthily. Think
what your anger is against the traitor, and those who crucified Him, and
see if you are not yourself guilty of the Body and Blood of Christ. They
slaughtered the all-holy Body, and you receive it with a foul soul after
so many loving benefits. He deemed it not sufficient to become man, to
be scourged, and put to death, He also blends Himself with us, not by
faith only, but in very deed makes us His Body. What, then, should be
the purity of him who partakes of this sacrifice? How spotlessly white
should not the hand be which divides this Flesh, or the mouth which is
filled with spiritual fire, or the tongue which is purpled with that
tremendous Blood? Consider what honour has been shown to you, and what
that feast is which you enjoy. The angels gaze and tremble, and dare not
look back again, because of the lightning which flashes from it; and
this is what we feed upon, this is blended with us, and we ourselves
become one body and one flesh with Christ. _Who shall declare the powers
of the Lord? Who shall set forth all His praises?_ Where is the shepherd
who feeds his sheep with his own members? And why do I talk of a
shepherd? There are many mothers who, after the pains of childbirth,
give up their children to be nursed by others. This He would not suffer,
but He Himself feeds us with His own Blood, and in everything unites us
to Himself. For consider: He was born of our substance. ‘Not for all
men,’ you say. Yes, for all. For, if He came to our nature, it is
evident that He came to all, and if He came to all, then He came to each
one of us. And why is it, you ask, that all men have not profited by
this gift? This was not the fault of Him Who took that nature for all,
but of those who had not the will. He unites Himself to each one of the
faithful, through the mysteries, and those whom He brought forth He
rears through Himself, and gives Himself to no other, persuading you
again thereby that it was that very flesh of yours which He took.
Therefore, let us not grow negligent who have been made worthy of so
great charity and honour. Do you not see how eagerly babies grasp their
mother’s breast, and how they press their lips upon it. Just so let _us_
approach this table and the breast of spiritual drink; or rather, with
much more impatience, let us draw near to the kindness of the Spirit, as
children to their mother’s breast, and let us know one only pain, that
of not participating in this food. That which lies before us is no work
of human power. He Who did these things at that supper is He Who is now
doing them. Our part is to furnish the ranks of servers. He Who
sanctifies and prepares these gifts is Himself. Therefore let there be
no Judas, no money-lover. If a man be not a disciple, let him withdraw:
this table is not prepared for such as he. _I will eat the Pasch_, He
says, _with My disciples_. This is that same table, and it offers no
less. It was not that Christ instituted the one and a man the other, but
He instituted both one and the other. This is that upper chamber in
which they were assembled; thence they went forth into the Garden of
Olives. Let us also go forth to minister to the poor, for this is our
mountain of olives. The multitude of the poor, who are planted in God’s
house, are olives, dropping upon us the oil that is to be useful to us,
which the five virgins had, and the five who did not take it perished
for want of it. Possessing it, let us go in, that we may all meet the
Bridegroom, with bright lamps: with it, let us go forth from this world.
Bone of our Bone, Flesh of our Flesh.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xxiv., vol. ii., pp. 287,
295.)
· · · · · · ·
_The chalice of benediction which we bless, is it not the communion of
the Blood of Christ?_ What do you say, blessed Paul? Wishing to engage
your hearers’ attention and commemorating the tremendous mysteries, do
you call that awful and most tremendous chalice a chalice of
benediction? ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘since what I have said is no slight thing.
For when I speak of benediction I speak of the Eucharist, and when I
speak of the Eucharist I unfold all the treasure of God’s munificence
and commemorate His greatest gifts.’ And we, recounting over the chalice
the unspeakable benefits of God and what mercies we have enjoyed, thus
worship Him and hold communion with Him, giving thanks that He has freed
the human race from error, that whereas we were far off from Him He drew
us near, that when we were without hope and without God in the world He
made us His brethren and co-heirs. Thus, in thanking Him for these and
all His gifts, we approach Him. How, then, O Corinthians, are you not
doing the opposite to this when praising God for turning you away from
idols you hasten back to their tables? _Is not the chalice of
benediction which we bless the communion of the Blood of Christ?_ He
spoke these words with an awful assurance. For this is what he says:
that which is in the chalice is what flowed from His side, and of that
we partake. But He called it a chalice of thanksgiving, since we,
holding it in our hands, thus praise Him, wondering and being
overwhelmed with this ineffable gift, magnifying Him for pouring out
this very Blood of His that we might not remain in error, and not only
that He poured it out, but that He has given to each one of us to
partake of it. So, He says, if you desire blood, do not dye the altar of
idols with the slaughter of unreasoning animals, but dye My altar with
_My_ Blood.[23] Tell me what is more tremendous, what is tenderer than
this? For this is what lovers do: when they see the loved ones longing
for what others have and despising what they themselves have, they give
their own gifts, and so induce the beloved to turn away from the things
of others. But lovers show this affection of theirs by money, and
clothes, and chattels, no one of them ever by his blood; yet Christ gave
us even this proof of His solicitude and His burning love for us. Thus,
in the old Law, as men were in an imperfect state and offered blood to
idols, it remained for Him to receive this (the chalice of the Pasch)
that He might turn them away from idols, which, again, was an ineffable
tenderness. But here He led them up to a far more awful and magnificent
worship of God, and changed the sacrifice itself, and instead of the
slaughtering of unreasoning animals, He commanded them to offer up
Himself. _Is not the bread which we break the communion of the Body of
Christ?_ Why did he not say a participation? Because he wished to set
forth something more and to show the closeness of that union. For we
communicate not only by receiving and participating, but by being made
one with Him. For just as that body is united to Christ, so are we made
one with Him through this bread. Why did he add, _which we break_? This
is seen to take place in the case of the Eucharist, though not at the
Cross, but the contrary. _Not a bone of Him shall be broken_, the
Scripture says. That which He did not suffer on the cross He suffers in
the Eucharist for your sake, and He endures being broken that He may
fill all.
Then after saying _the communion of the body_—for that which
communicates is something distinct from the thing communicated—he
removed even this seemingly slight difference. For in the words
_communion of the body_ he sought to say something closer, and therefore
added, _That we, being many, are one bread and one body_. ‘Why do I
speak of communion?’ he says; ‘we are that very Body itself. For what is
the bread? The Body of Christ. What do partakers of it become? The Body
of Christ: not many bodies, but one body.’ Just as bread is composed of
many grains of wheat which are nowhere apparent in it, but still there,
presenting no difference by reason of the kneading, so are we joined
together with each other and with Christ. You are not nourished by one
body and another man by another, but all by the same; therefore he
added, ‘We are all participators of the same bread’. But if we _are_ of
the same, and become the same, why do we not all show forth the same
charity and become one in this respect also? For this was so formerly in
our progenitors. _There was one heart and one mind in the gathering of
the faithful._ This is not the case now, but very much the reverse.
Dissensions are many and various and well-nigh everywhere, and we show
ourselves fiercer than wild beasts towards our members. Christ united
you to Himself when you were so distant, and you will not deign to be
united with your brother as you ought to be, but thrust yourself away
from him, whilst enjoying so great a love and life from your Master. It
was not for no purpose that He gave His Body, but as the first human
nature, which was made from the earth, became by sin subject to death
and to be deprived of life, He introduced, as we might say, another
bread and leaven—His own Flesh—in nature, indeed the same, but free from
sin and full of life; and He gave to all men to eat of it, that,
nourished by it and putting off the old dead nature, we may at this
table be blended with the living and immortal nature.
· · · · · · ·
This Body He gave to us to take and eat, which was an act of exceeding
love.[24] For it often happens that we bite those whom we love. Thus,
when Job pointed out the affection of his household for himself, he
quoted those who loved him specially as often saying, _Who will give us
to be filled with his flesh?_ So it is that Christ has given us to be
filled with His Flesh, drawing us to greater love. Let us, therefore,
approach Him with fervour and burning love, that we may not encounter
the harder chastisement. For the more we are benefitted, the greater
will be our punishment whenever we show ourselves unworthy of His
generosity. This Body, even lying in the manger, the Magi reverenced:
untutored and uncivilised men, leaving their country and their home,
undertook a long journey, they came and adored, full of awe and fear.
Let us, citizens of heaven, emulate even uncivilised men, if necessary.
_They_, seeing Him in a manger, and in a hut, and not seeing Him as you
see Him, approached Him with deep reverence: you see Him not in the
crib, but on the altar: you see Him not held by a woman, but the priest
standing there, and the Spirit hovering with abundant blessings over
what is lying there. Nor do you merely see this Body as they did: _you_
know His power and all the economy of His providence, nor are you
ignorant of anything accomplished through Him, initiated as you are into
all His mysteries. Let us therefore rouse ourselves, and tremble, and
show forth so much the greater reverence than those men from afar, in
order that we may not approach Him heedlessly or casually, and so heap
coals of fire upon our heads. This I say, not that we may not approach
Him, but that we may not approach Him carelessly. For just as going to
Him in a chance way is a danger, so the non-participation in that
mystical Banquet is hunger and death. This Feast is the sinew of our
soul, the bond of intellect, the basis of fortitude; it is hope,
salvation, light, life. With this sacrifice, at our departure from this
world to the next, we shall pass through those sacred portals in great
fearlessness, as if encompassed with an armour of gold. And why do I
speak of the future? Even here this mystery makes the earth a heaven for
you. At least unfold the gates of heaven and look through them, or
rather not only the gates of heaven, but of the heaven of heavens, and
then you will see what I say. For that which is the most precious of all
things there, is what I will show you lying on earth. Just as in royal
palaces it is not the walls which strike men with the most awe, nor the
golden ceilings, but the person of the king sitting on his throne, so in
heaven is it the King’s Body. Yet this is what you may now see on earth.
I am showing you not angels, nor archangels, nor the heavens, nor the
heaven of heavens, but the Lord of all these Himself. Do you understand
how it is that you see the most precious thing of all upon earth? And
not only do you see it, but you also touch it? And not only touch it,
but you eat it, and, receiving it, you take it away with you? Cleanse,
therefore, your soul; prepare your mind for the reception of these
mysteries. If, now, you were judged worthy to carry a royal child in
state, with his kingly robes and his diadem, you would give up
everything on earth for it. And, here, receiving not a royal child of
man, but the very only begotten Son of God, tell me, do you not tremble,
and renounce the love of all earthly things, and adorn yourself only for
that world to come, or have you still your eyes fixed on the earth, do
you still love money, and anxiously crave for gold? What pardon could
you look for, or what excuse would you have? Know you not how Our Lord
turns His back upon all worldly luxury? Was not this His reason for
being born and laid in a manger, and for choosing a mother who was poor?
Was it not for this that He said to the man who looked to worldly
traffic: _The Son of man has not whereon to lay His head_? And what of
His disciples? Did not they carry out the same law, lodging at the
houses of the poor, one going to a tanner’s, another to a tent-maker’s,
another to the woman selling purple? They did not seek for illustrious
houses, but for upright minds. Let us then emulate their example;
looking beyond the beauty of pillars and marbles, seeking only for the
mansions above, let us trample under foot all vanities here below,
together with the lust for money, and take up a lofty mind. For if we be
sober and watchful, the world itself will not be worthy of us, much less
the Stoic portico or the Peripatetic walk. Therefore, I repeat, let us
adorn our souls, let us prepare this dwelling-place, which we shall take
with us when we depart, so that we may possess the eternal tents through
the grace and love of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory for ever
and ever. Amen.
Remembrance of the Dead.
(_Homilies on Epistle to the Philippians_, iv., vol. v., p. 36.)
· · · · · · ·
Let us, then, not simply grieve for the dead, nor simply rejoice in the
living. Then what shall we do? Let us grieve for sinners not when dead
alone, but when living also; and let us be glad over the just not in
their lifetime only, but when they have departed hence. Sinners even
living are dead, whilst the just, who are dead, live: sinners are an
object of pity to all men even here because they have quarrelled with
God, so are the just blessed in that place, since they have gone to
Christ. Sinners, wherever they are, are far from the King, and therefore
deserve tears, but the just, whether here or there, are with the King;
_there_ they are more with Him and nearer to Him, not by their going in,
nor by faith, but face to face. Let us, then, not weep simply for the
dead but for those in sin: these call for tears, for lamentation and
weeping. For, tell me, what hope is there of those who depart in sins to
that place where sins are not put off? As long as they were here, the
probability was great that they might be converted and become better.
But if they go to the other world, there is nothing to be gained from
contrition. _In hell_, he says, _who shall give praise to Thee_? Let us
weep for those who thus depart. I do not forbid it, only not in an
unseemly fashion, not plucking out our hair, nor baring our arms, nor
tearing our face, nor wearing black, but only in shedding a bitter tear
according to the spirit in secret. Without these accompaniments we may
weep bitterly, and not be contented with a show, for what some people
have done differs in nothing from a show. For instance, those who beat
themselves at the market-place do it not from sympathy, but for display
and for self-seeking and vainglory, and many women so treat themselves
as a business speculation. Weep bitterly, groan at home when no one is
looking: this is sympathy, and this will be helpful to you also. For, in
grieving for another, you will be all the more zealous never to fall in
the same way, and you will tremble at sin ever afterwards. Weep for
unbelievers, for those who are not different from unbelievers, who
depart hence without baptism, without being signed with the seal: these
should have tears and wailings, they are outside the royal palace with
those awaiting judgment and with the condemned. _Amen, I say to you,
unless a man be born of water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into
the kingdom of heaven._ Weep for those who have died in riches, and have
devised no comfort for their own souls out of their wealth, who have
received power to wash away their sins, and have not willed to do it.
Weep all of you for these both in secret and in public, but with decorum
and reverence, not making a show of yourselves. Let us shed tears over
these not for one day, nor two, but during our whole life. This is no
foolish weeping, but the weeping of affection; the other is senseless,
and therefore it soon spends itself. Grief which is born of the fear of
God endures for ever. Let us weep for these and help them as much as we
can. Let us devise some succour for them; it may be a slight thing, but
let us somehow do it. How and in what manner? By praying and inviting
others to pray for them, by constantly giving alms to the poor for them.
This deed has its consolation. Listen to God’s words: _I will protect
this city for Myself and for David, My servant_. If the mere remembrance
of a just man could do so much, what will works done for him not be able
to accomplish? Not in vain was it ordained by the Apostles that the dead
should be commemorated at the tremendous mysteries: they knew what a
great gain and benefit it would be to the dead. For when a whole people
stands with uplifted hands in full and sacred assembly, and the awful
sacrifice is lying before us, how shall we not reach God in our prayer
for them? But this applies to those who have died in the faith. With
regard to catechumens they are not deemed worthy of this consolation;
they lack all such succour, save in one particular. What is this? We may
give alms for them to the poor, and the action brings them a certain
refreshment, because God wills us to be of use to each other. For why
did He command us to pray for the peace and well-being of the world, or,
again, for all men? Although there are thieves, and tomb-despoilers, and
plunderers, and men full of every sort of evil amongst the whole number,
yet we still pray for them all. Perhaps there may be a conversion of
some. Now, as we pray for the living who do not differ from the dead, so
we may pray for the departed. Job offered sacrifices for his children,
and freed them from their sins. _Lest perhaps_, he said, _they have
sinned in their hearts_. Thus is a man provident for his children. He
did not say, as the multitude of men _do_ say, ‘I will leave them
possessions,’ nor a fine name, nor, ‘I will buy an office,’ nor fields,
but what, _Lest perhaps they have sinned in their hearts_. For what is
the profit of those things? None, of things that remain here below. _I
will make_, he says, _the King of all propitious to them: and then
nothing is wanting to them_. _The Lord is my Shepherd, and I shall lack
for nothing._ Here are great riches, here are treasures. If we have the
fear of God we want nothing, but without it, even if we have a kingdom,
we are the poorest of men. A God-fearing man has no equal. The fear of
the Lord exceeds all things. This let us possess, and let us do all
things unto this end: even if we have to give up our life, or our body
to be cut in pieces, let us not fear: let us do all our actions in order
to gain this fear. Thus shall we become richer than all, and arrive at
the goods to come in Christ Jesus Our Lord, to Whom, with the Father and
the Holy Spirit, be honour, power, and glory, now and for ever. Amen.
The Departed at the Sacred Mysteries.
(_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xli., vol. ii., p. 524.)
· · · · · · ·
Since, then, we are to enjoy goods so great, let us join ourselves to
that company which is as bright as the sun, and let us not weep for
those who depart hence, but for those who make a bad end. For, as the
husbandman does not grieve over his seed dissolved, but is in fear and
anxiety as long as it remains solid, so he rejoices when he sees that it
_is_ dissolved. For dissolution is the beginning of the future
generating. So let us also rejoice when the corruptible habitation
perishes, and man is generated. And wonder not if Paul called the
burying a generating, for this is the better generating of the two.
Death, labours, dangers, cares, succeed the one; whilst for the other,
if we have lived righteously, we receive crowns and rewards: corruption
and death succeed the one; incorruption, immortality, and a thousand
goods succeed the other. In the one generating there is embracing,
pleasure, sleep; in the other there is only the voice coming down from
heaven, and all things accomplished in the twinkling of an eye. And he
who rises is no more driven to a laborious life, but he will be where
pain and sorrow and lamentation have fled away. If, however, you are
seeking for a protector, and weep over the man on this account, fly for
refuge to God, the common Protector, and Saviour, and Benefactor of all:
to the almighty Friend, to the never-failing Succour, to the lasting
Shelter, Who is everywhere and always holding us up. ‘But,’ you say,
‘the intercourse was pleasant and fascinating.’ I know it was. Still, if
you meet your suffering with your reason, and consider in yourself who
it is that has taken him, and that if you bear it bravely, you offer up
your wish as a sacrifice to God, you will be borne aloft even over this
wave, and Christian principle will effect what the action of time does;
but if you are pusillanimous, time will weaken your passion without
bringing you a reward. Together with these recollections, ponder on the
examples offered both in this present life and in Holy Scripture.
Consider how Abraham slaughtered his own son, neither shedding tears nor
uttering a bitter word. ‘But _he_ was Abraham,’ you say. Yet you are
called to greater conflicts. Job, indeed, showed sorrow as a loving
father would who mourns over those departing from him. Now _we_ show the
grief of foes and enemies. For if a man were summoned to a palace and
crowned, and you were to beat your breast and be in sorrow at it, I
should say you were not a friend to the man crowned, but a determined
adversary and hater. ‘I am not weeping for him,’ you say, ‘but for
myself.’ Neither is this the part of a lover—the wishing him to be still
in conflict on your account, to be left in uncertainty as to the future,
instead of being crowned, or to be tossing on the sea when he might be
resting in harbour. ‘But,’ you say, ‘I know not where he has gone.’ How
is it that you do not know? This will be evident from the fact of his
having lived righteously or the reverse. ‘And as he departed in sin,
this is the very reason why I am tormented.’ What you say is a mere
pretext. If this is why you mourn over a dead man, you should have taken
pains with the living one and set him right. You are throughout thinking
of your own interests, not of his. If, indeed, he departed hence in sin,
you should rejoice that his sins were stopped and that he did not
continue in evil, and you should help him by those means which are in
your power: not by tears, but by prayers, and supplications, and
alms-giving, and offerings. It is not by chance that these things have
been ordered, nor is it due to haphazard that we commemorate the dead at
the sacred mysteries, and that we succour them by supplication to the
Lamb, Who is lying there, Who takes away the sins of the world, but that
they may derive hence some consolation. Nor is it without reason that he
who is standing by the altar, as the sacred mysteries are performed,
utters this cry: for all those who have fallen asleep in Christ, and for
those who make commemoration in their behalf. For if commemoration were
not made for them, this would not be said. Our mysteries are no
theatrical display. God forbid! These things take place by the
disposition of the Spirit. Therefore, let us help them, and make
commemoration in their behalf. For if Job’s sacrifice purified his
children, why do you doubt that the departed receive comfort when we too
offer sacrifice for them? God is wont to give graces to some on behalf
of others. And this Paul also showed, saying _that for this gift
obtained for us, by the means of many persons, thanks may be given by
many in our behalf_. Let us not weary of helping the departed, both by
offering sacrifice and claiming intercession for them. For the sacrifice
which saves the whole world is before us. Therefore we pray confidently
at it for what concerns the world, and we name them with martyrs, and
confessors, and pontiffs. For we are all one body, even if certain
members be more resplendent than others; and everywhere we may be
gaining forgiveness for them, by prayers, by offerings made for them, by
those who are named with them. Why, then, do you grieve and weep, when
you are able to apply so great a forgiveness to him who has departed? Is
it because you have become lonely, and have lost your protector? But you
ought never to say this, because you have not lost God. As long as you
possess Him, He will be more to you than any man, be he father, child,
or near relation; for even when these were living, it was He in reality
Who did everything.
The Tombs of the Martyrs.
(_Homily on the Martyrs, Benedictine Edition_, t. ii., p. 667.)
The feasts of the martyrs are not according to the course of days only,
but they are reckoned also by the disposition of those who celebrate
them. For instance, have you imitated a martyr, have you emulated his
goodness, have you pressed on in the footsteps of his ascetic life?
Then, though it is not a martyr’s day, you have celebrated a martyr’s
feast. For to honour a martyr is to imitate him. Just as evil-doers are
feastless in the midst of feasts, so the righteous, even if there be no
solemnity, have carried out one. The feast is characterised by purity of
conscience. This Paul expressed clearly: _Therefore, let us keep the
feast not in the old leaven of evil and wickedness, but in the
unleavened bread of purity and truth_. There is, then, unleavened bread
amongst the Jews, and so there is amongst us; but with them it consists
of wheaten flour, with us in a pure life and in remaining spotless.
Thus, he who wards off every stain keeps a feast every day, is ever
celebrating a solemnity not only on the feast of the martyr or at his
shrine, but also sitting at home. Every man can keep the martyr’s feast
by himself. In saying this I do not mean that we should _not_ go to the
tombs of the martyrs. I mean that, being there, we should frequent these
places with befitting devotion, not only on their days, but that we
should show the same piety out of their days. Who would not revere this
gathering of ours to-day, this splendid sight, the fervent charity and
glowing spirit, the boundless love, which are here manifested? Nearly
all the city has been eager to come; fear of his master has not withheld
the servant; no straits of poverty, no feebleness of age, have kept the
poor or the old away; no tenderness of sex in women, no extreme of
luxury has hindered the rich, no folly of power the ruler. But a longing
for the martyrs vanquishing all such disparity, both the weakness of
nature and the stress of poverty hold together by one bond the vast
multitude gathered here, who are moved by the wings of this desire to
live the life of the heavenly citizens. For, treading under foot all
allurements to excess and wickedness, you are consumed with longing for
the martyrs. As with the dawn of day wild animals flee away and take
shelter in their own holes, so when the light of the martyrs bursts upon
our minds all diseases are put to flight and the bright flame of
mortification is enkindled. And let us keep this fire alive not now
only, but always, when this spiritual spectacle has been broken up; let
us retire to our own homes with the same fervour, not giving ourselves
up to taverns, or dissoluteness, or drunkenness, or feastings. You have
made night into day through these sacred vigils: do not again make day
into night through inebriation, and gluttony, and meretricious songs.
You have honoured the martyrs by your presence, your attention, and your
fervour: honour them by going modestly home, lest anyone seeing you
taking your ease in a low place should say that you came not on account
of the martyrs, but to increase your passion and to incite your bad
desires. This I say, prohibiting not feasting but sin, prohibiting not
wine but drunkenness. It is not the wine which is evil, it is
intemperance. Wine is the gift of God, intemperance is the devil’s
invention.... Intemperance is ever an evil, beloved brethren, and most
of all on the feast day of the martyrs. Together with the sin, it is a
most open contempt and folly and putting aside of the divine words;
hence the chastisement would be double. If, therefore, you have come to
the martyrs and mean afterwards to drink, you had better remain at home
and not shame nor insult the martyrs’ feast, nor scandalise your
neighbour, nor distort your understanding, nor add to your sins. You
came to look upon men who were racked with torments, covered with blood,
and adorned with wounds, who gave up this present life and took their
flight to the life above. Show yourself worthy of those wrestlers.
_They_ despised life, do _you_ despise luxury; they renounced their life
in this world, do you renounce the craving for drink. Do you wish for
feasting? Remain by the martyr’s tomb, weep there a fountain of tears,
grieve in your mind, take a blessing from that tomb. Let it assist you
in your prayers; make the account of his fight your constant reading;
embrace the coffin; nail yourself to the shrine. Not only the bones of
the martyrs, but their tombs also and their coffins, produce an abundant
blessing. Take holy oil and sign your whole body with it, your tongue,
your lips, your throat and eyes, and you will avoid the abyss of
drunkenness.
· · · · · · ·
The Bodies of the Martyrs.
(_Homily on the Martyrs, Benedictine Edition_, t. ii., p. 650.)
· · · · · · ·
Yesterday was the martyrs’ feast, and so is to-day. Would that we could
be always keeping the feast of the martyrs! For if those who are mad
after theatres, and who gape open-mouthed at horses racing, cannot have
enough of those foolish spectacles, how much more should we be
insatiable for the feasts of the saints. In the one place there is a
diabolical pomp, in the other a Christian feast: in the one place devils
are revelling, in the other angelic choirs are singing: in the one place
souls are lost, in the other there is salvation for all who are gathered
together. Do not theatres offer any pleasure at all? If they do, not
such as the other. What pleasure, indeed, is there in seeing horses
running senselessly to and fro? In the other case, you see, not brute
animals yoked together, but countless chariots of martyrs, and God as
charioteer in the midst of them, leading the way to heaven. Listen to
the prophet saying that the souls of the saints are God’s chariot:
_God’s chariots are ten thousand fold, and thousands those who rejoice_.
That which He has made a gift to the powers above, He has granted to our
nature also. He sits upon the cherubim, as the psalm says: _He ascended
upon the cherubim, and He flew_; and again: _He who sitteth upon the
cherubim and looketh into the abysses_. This He has given to us also. He
sits on them, He dwells in us. _I will abide in you and will walk in
you_, He says. They have become His chariot, let us become His temple.
See you how these honours are akin? See you how He has reconciled the
things above and the things below? Therefore, if we choose, we are in
nothing removed from the angels! As I began by saying, yesterday was the
martyrs’ feast, and to-day is the martyrs’ feast: not the martyrs who
are amongst us here, but those who are in the country, or rather, they
also are with us. Town and country, in the business of this life, are
distinct from each other, but as far as piety is concerned, they meet on
the same ground. Tell me not, then, that they have the tongue of
barbarians: look rather at their mortified minds. How does unity of
language serve me where the spirit is not one? How does a different
speech hurt me where there is harmony in the things of faith? According
to this reasoning, the country is in no sort of way worse off than the
town: they enjoy equality of privileges in the head and chief of good
things. So it was that Our Lord Jesus Christ did not confine Himself to
cities, and leave country places empty and deserted, but He went about
through cities and villages, preaching the Gospel, and curing every
sickness and disease.... This is why God sowed martyrs not in cities
alone, but in the country too, so that we may use their feasts as a
necessary opportunity of meeting each other, and oftener in the country
than in the city. For God gave the greater honour to the inferior, as
this member is weaker, and therefore enjoyed more attention. Dwellers in
towns always have the benefit of teaching at their command, but not so
those who live in remote places. God, therefore, comforting the poverty
of the teachers in the fruitfulness of the martyrs, has ordained that
the greater number should be buried in the country. They have not always
the voice of teachers, but the voice of the martyr speaking to them from
his tomb, and with more force. And that you may know that the martyrs
speak more powerfully in their silence than we by our voice, it has
often happened that many have discoursed to multitudes concerning
goodness, and have effected nothing; whilst others, who said no word,
have done wonders through the shining example of their life. Much more
have the martyrs effected this, not raising the voice of their body, but
the voice of their deeds, which is far louder than the voice of the
mouth. Through this voice they speak to everyone of the human race in
these words: ‘Look at us, and see what evils we have endured. What have
we suffered in being condemned to death, and finding eternal life? We
have been made worthy to lay down our bodies for Christ. If we had not
offered them up then for Christ, in a little while we should have been
obliged to put off this temporary life of theirs in spite of
ourselves.[25] If martyrdom had not come upon us, the common death of
nature would have dissolved our bodies. On this account we give thanks
to God without ceasing for making us worthy to use inevitable death for
the salvation of our souls, and for receiving as a gift from us, and
with the greatest honour, that which was a matter of necessity. Are the
torments oppressive and painful? If they are, they pass away in a moment
of time, whilst the refreshment lasts during eternal ages. Nor are the
torments painful even for one moment to those who have their eyes on
what is to come, and who gaze intently upon the Judge. Because blessed
Stephen saw Christ with the eyes of faith, he was not conscious of the
volley of stones, but instead of the stones he was counting the rewards
and crowns. So do you rise above present things to the contemplation of
the future, and you will be insensible to even a brief consciousness of
pain. This and much more is what the martyrs say, and they are far more
persuasive than we are. For if I tell you that torment is not torment,
my words are not to be trusted, for there is no difficulty about talking
wisely. But the martyr, who speaks by his deeds, cannot be gainsaid.
And, as with ordinary baths, when they are bubbling over with hot water,
no one has the courage to jump in, as long as those who are sitting by
the bath invite each other to enter by word only, they induce nobody to
try. But as soon as one of them puts in either his hand or his foot,
and, encouraged by the attempt, plunges in his whole body, by his
silence he persuades those outside, more than the others by all they
say, to try the bath; and so it is with the martyrs. In their case we
have the stake instead of the bath. Those outside, by all their talk, do
not carry much weight; yet, if a single martyr plunge in, not his foot
nor his hand alone, but his whole body, he offers by his action
something more forcible than any advice or preaching, and he stops the
anxiety of those standing round. See you how the voice of the martyr is
more powerful even in its silence? This is why God has left us their
bodies. This is why, victorious of old, they have not yet risen.
Combats, indeed, they endured not long ago, but they have not yet
enjoyed the resurrection, and this for your greater benefit, that you,
pondering that fight of theirs, may be incited to carry out your own
race. They do not suffer in the least from the delay, whilst _your_
profit is immense. After these things they will receive their reward,
even if they do not now. If God were to take them away from us at this
present time, He would cut off much strength and consolation; because
true strength and consolation come to all men from the tombs of the
saints, and you are witnesses of what I say. For often when we have used
threats, kindness, tears, and exhortations, you were not moved to
fervour in prayer, but going to the shrine, without any sermon, and
merely seeing the tombs of the saints, you shed a fountain of tears, and
warmed to your prayer although the martyr is lying there voiceless in a
deep silence. Whence, then, comes the good to the conscience, which
opens, as it were, the floodgates of tears? It is the sight of the
martyr and the remembrance of all his good deeds. Just as when the poor
see other men who are rich and in high offices attended by body-guards,
and enjoying great honour from the king, learn to feel their poverty
more keenly in the prosperity of others, so is it with us when we call
to mind the fortitude which the martyrs showed towards God, the King of
all their shining example and their glory, and remember our own sins.
Their abundance makes our grief and sorrow at our poverty more poignant,
and this consciousness shows us how far we are left behind them: hence
come our tears. Again, God left us their bodies, so that whenever the
pressure of earthly business and cares should shroud our minds in
darkness,—for private and public affairs are full of this,—we should
leave our house, go out of the city, bid farewell to these harassing
thoughts, and seek out the shrine. We may enjoy the spiritual atmosphere
there, forget our business, feed on peace, have the companionship of the
saints, pray to Him Who is their judge for our own salvation, pour forth
many supplications, and through all these means, lightening our
conscience, may return home in much sweetness of spirit. The biers of
the martyrs are nothing else than secure harbours, the sources of
spiritual streams, inexhaustible treasures of wealth which are never
consumed. And just as harbours receive vessels which have been much
tossed by the waves, and place them in safety, so the biers of the
martyrs receiving these spirits of ours, which are absorbed by the cares
of life, establish them in great peace and security. Just as streams of
cold water revive failing and scorched bodies, so do those
resting-places calm souls which are burnt up with foul passions. The
mere sight of them quenches evil cupidity, and wasting envy, and burning
desires, and any other trouble of the same kind, and they are superior
to treasures of great wealth. For treasures of money present many
dangers to those who find them, and when divided into many parts become
less in the distribution. Here there is nothing of this sort, for the
attainment is without dangers. Contrary to what happens in material
treasures, this division does not diminish _this_ treasure. The former,
as I said, are lessened by being divided. Now, when these are
distributed amongst many, then it is that they most of all show what
their riches are. For such is the nature of spiritual things that they
are increased by distribution, and become greater by division. Meadows
with their sight of roses and violets are not so delightful as the tombs
of the martyrs which offer to souls who gaze upon them an indestructible
and undying delight.
· · · · · · ·
The Tombs of the Servants.
(Οἱ τάφοι τῶν δοὺλων.)
(_Homilies on Second Epistle to Corinthians_, xxvi., vol. iii., p. 273.)
· · · · · · ·
Thus God has led all the saints through tribulation and distress,
helping them on the one hand whilst securing the rest against conceiving
an unduly high opinion of their merits. Thus it was in the beginning
that idolatries prevailed by the excessive admiration lavished upon men,
and in this way the Roman Senate decreed Alexander to be the thirteenth
god. For it had this authority of electing and making gods. When the
whole work of Christ became known the provincial ruler sent to enquire
whether they thought He too should be a god. They would not agree to
that, and were impatient and angry that the power of the Crucified,
bursting forth before their vote and decree, had attracted the whole
world to its own majesty. This was ordained even against their will, so
that the divinity of Christ might not be preached by vote of man, and
that He should not be looked upon as one of the many decreed by them to
be divine. For they made pugilists gods, and the creatures of Hadrian’s
infamous lust, whence, too, the city of Antinoos derives its name. For,
since death bears witness against mortal nature, the devil lighted upon
another way—the immortality of the soul, to which he joined gross
flattery, and led many into impiety. What malice! Whenever _we_ bring
forward this argument in its proper place, he destroys it; but when he
wishes to make an injurious use of it himself, he sets it up most
zealously. If anyone should ask, ‘How is Alexander a god? Did he not die
and die miserably?’ He answers, ‘But his spirit is immortal’. Then you
think over in your mind the argument for immortality, and play the
philosopher in order that you may turn men away from the God of all; but
when _we_ say that this is the greatest gift of God, you persuade those
whom you cheat that we are low-minded and cringing, and nothing better
than unreasoning animals. And if we were to say that the Crucified
lives, they would indulge in great laughter at us, although the whole
universe is crying out that He does live, and did cry out of old, then
by signs, now by converts, for these successes do not belong to a dead
man; but if some one declares that Alexander lives, you believe him,
although he has no wonder whatever to bring forward in proof of it.
‘Yes, he has,’ you reply; ‘in his lifetime Alexander did many and great
deeds, for he subdued peoples and cities, and made many victorious wars,
and set up trophies.’ Now, if I am able to show you things which neither
Alexander nor any other man of his day contemplated in his lifetime,
what further proof of the resurrection do you require? That a living
man, being a king, and having an army, should carry out wars and
victories is neither astonishing nor wonderful; but to do things so
great after crucifixion and the tomb, to do them over land and sea, this
is truly awe-inspiring, and proclaims divine and infinite power. After
his death Alexander did not hinder his empire from dissolution, and when
it had disappeared did not bring it back again. How should a dead man do
this? Now, Christ set up His kingdom in dying. And why do I speak of
Christ, since He gave to His disciples also to become famous after
death? Tell me, where is Alexander’s tomb? Show it to me and say what
day he died. But the tombs of Christ’s servants are famous; they have
taken possession of the most royal city, and their days are solemnly
kept as a feast for the world. Whilst the one is unknown amongst his own
countrymen, even barbarians are familiar with the other. And the tombs
of the servants of the Crucified are more splendid than the courts of
kings, not in the greatness and beauty of the monument, though in this,
too, they are remarkable, but, what is far more, through the devotion of
those who frequent them. And he who is clothed in the royal purple
leaves his throne to embrace those tombs, and, putting off the garb of
vanity, stands as a suppliant of the saints in order to make them his
intercessors with God, and the crowned king has need of a dead
tent-maker and a fisherman as patrons. I ask you, would you dare to call
the Lord of these a dead man, Whose servants, though no longer here, are
the protectors of the kings of the earth? And you may see this happening
not in Rome alone, but also in Constantinople. For here, too, the son
thought his father, Constantine the Great, most highly honoured if he
might be buried in the vestibule of the Fisherman. What door-keepers in
palaces are to kings, this kings are at the tombs of fishermen. The
fishermen, like lords of the spot, have taken possession of what is
within; the kings, like sojourners and neighbours, have been contented
to have a separate place in the doorway, thus proving to unbelievers
that pre-eminence in the resurrection will belong to fishermen. For if
it be so here in the matter of tombs, how much more in the resurrection.
And the order is reversed: kings become servants and subjects, whilst
subjects are invested with regal dignity, or rather with something even
greater. The truth itself shows that there is no flattery in the matter,
for kings have become famous through these subjects of theirs. Their
tombs are far more awe-inspiring than those of all kings put together;
there is great solitude in the one and a great crowd at the other. If
you wish to compare these tombs with royal courts, here again they carry
off the palm. Many are the bustling people at the court, but at the tomb
many are they who call and attract rich and poor, men and women, slaves
and freemen. There is great fear at the one, and an unspeakable delight
at the other. But it is a pleasant sight to look upon the king with his
golden sceptre and his crown on his head, his guards standing near, and
princes, and generals, and commanders, and officers high and low. Yet
the spectacle presented by the other is so much more magnificent and
ineffable, that, compared to it, the court would seem to be a puppet
show and child’s play. You have hardly crossed the threshold when the
place carries your mind up to heaven, to the King above, to the army of
the angels, to the throne of the Most High, to glory unspeakable. At
court it falls to the ruler’s part to release one man and to put another
in chains; now, the bones of the saints have not this poor and miserable
authority, but a power far greater. For they call forth demons and
torture them, and release from their sharpest chains those who are
bound. What is more awful than this tribunal? Whilst no one is seen and
no one appears by the devil’s side, there are voices and convulsions,
and blows and torments, and angry tongues, the devil not bearing that
wonderful power. And they who carry those bodies have dominion over
bodiless spirits: dust, and bones, and ashes, tear those invisible
beings into pieces. So it is that no man would ever go a long journey to
see royal palaces, whilst many kings have often travelled far for this
spectacle. For the testimony of the saints furnishes a likeness and a
symbol of the judgment to come, devils are punished, men are chastised
and set free. See you the power of the saints even when they are dead,
and the weakness of sinners even whilst living? Fly therefore from evil,
that you may have dominion over these, and pursue goodness with all
zeal. For, if things so wonderful take place here, judge what it will be
like hereafter.
· · · · · · ·
PART III.
PERSONAL.
To Innocent, Bishop of Rome.[26]
To my most reverend Lord, and the most religious Bishop Innocent, John
sends greeting in the Lord.
I think that before the reception of our letters your Piety will have
heard of the iniquitous deed which has been attempted here; for the
enormity of the evil has allowed scarcely a part of the world to be in
ignorance of this direful tragedy. Report, carrying news of what has
taken place to the farthest extremities of the earth, has everywhere
called forth much wailing and lamentation. Since, however, it is not a
question of tears alone, but of setting things straight and trying to
find out how this most cruel tempest inflicted on the Church is to be
stayed, I deem it necessary to urge my most honoured and reverend lords
and bishops Demetrius, Pansophius, Pappo, and Eugenius to give up their
own affairs, to brave the seas, and to set out on a long journey, and to
hasten to your Charity, so that, when you have been clearly informed of
all things, a remedy may be more speedily applied. With these we shall
send the most esteemed and beloved of the deacons, Paul and Cyriacus.
And I myself in the shape of a letter will inform your Charity briefly
of what has taken place. Theophilus, being bishop of Alexandria, and
certain men setting our most religious emperor against him, he was
ordered to come here alone. Accompanied by not a few Egyptian bishops,
he makes his appearance, as if wishing from the first to show that he
comes to war and to fight us. Then, when he had arrived at great and
heaven-favoured Constantinople, he did not come to the cathedral
according to custom and old-established usage, nor did he visit us, nor
did he take part in sermon, prayer, or communion, but on disembarking he
passed by the vestibule of the church and established himself at a
distance from the city, although we repeatedly invited him and those
with him to stay with us, for lodgings and everything else needful for
him were in readiness; neither they nor he would hear of it. Seeing
this, I was much perplexed, not being able to imagine the cause of this
unjust enmity. Still, we did our part and what was incumbent on us for
them, and continually invited him to meet us and to say why he had thus
made a quarrel with us from the very first and brought discord into so
great a city. As he would not explain the reason, and as his accusers
were urgent, our most religious emperor summoned us. He ordered me
forthwith to go to the place where Theophilus was, and to hear the case
against him. His accusers were urging assaults, and slaughterings, and
numberless other things. We, however, who know the laws of our fathers,
and reverence and honour the man, and having his own letters, too, to
show that causes should not be carried out of their proper jurisdiction,
but that matters concerning the province should be concluded in the
province, did not accept the task of judging him, but declined with much
firmness. He, on the contrary, adding to his previous conduct, summoned
our archdeacon most peremptorily, as if the church were already widowed
and without a bishop, and through him gained all the clergy to his side.
So the churches became deserted, abandoned in each case by the clergy,
who were preparing to take action against us and to accuse us. This
done, he sent to summon us into court, though he had not cleared himself
from the charges made against him, which was manifestly against every
canon and every law. Now, we, knowing perfectly well that we were
invited, not to a court of justice, or we would have gone a thousand
times over, but to a foe and an enemy, as subsequent events, no less
than what had already taken place, have proved, sent to him Demetrius,
bishop of Pessinus, Eulysius, bishop of Apamea, and Lupicinus, bishop of
Appiaria, and the priests Germanus and Severus, who made careful answer
as befitting us, saying that we refused not judgment, but an outspoken
enemy and a declared foe. For how is the man who, without receiving a
charge against me, has so acted from the first, and held himself aloof
from church communion and prayers, and incited accusers, who has gained
the clergy to himself and emptied the cathedral, how is he fit to mount
the judge’s throne which is not his in any sort of way? For it does not
belong to Egypt to sit in judgment on Thrace, when, too, he of Egypt is
under accusation and a declared enemy. Yet he showed no regard to us,
being bent on carrying out his own purposes, though we showed that we
were equal to defend ourself before a hundred or a thousand bishops, and
to prove ourself innocent, as we are; but he would not abide it. Now, in
our absence, while we were demanding a synod and seeking judgment, not
avoiding a hearing but open enmity, he received accusers, absolved those
excommunicated by me, and took information from those very men who had
not cleared themselves of charges, and had it written down officially,
all which acts are against the ordinary course of custom and canon law.
Why need I go on? He left nothing untried until he had cast us out with
a high hand both from the city and the Church, and this late in the
evening, all the people pressing after us. I was taken and carried off
by the _curiosus_[27] in the midst of the city, thrown into a ship, and
I sailed through the night, all this because I had demanded a synod for
my just hearing. Who could listen to all this with dry eyes, however
stony his heart? But, as I said, we need not only to grieve for the evil
accomplished, we must also remedy it, and therefore I appeal to your
Charity to stand by us and sorrow with us, and to do everything you can
that it may go no further. For their illegal proceedings did not stop
here, but were aggravated by others besides their former ones. When our
most religious emperor turned them out of the church which they had
shamefully usurped, and many bishops present seeing their iniquity, and
flying from their approach as from a fire consuming everything, retired
into their own dioceses, we at last were recalled to the city, and to
the church from which we had been impiously cast out: more than thirty
bishops brought us back, our most religious emperor sending a notary for
the purpose, but he (Theophilus) took immediate flight. For what reason?
Because, when we came back, we entreated our most religious emperor to
call a synod to avenge what had taken place. Conscious, therefore, of
his deeds, and fearing to be convicted, the imperial letters having been
sent to all parts, calling all together, he threw himself in the dead of
the night into a little boat, and thus escaped, taking all his party
with him. But we in the security of our conscience did not desist from
entreating our most religious emperor as before, who with a kindness
worthy of him sent for him again from Egypt, and for those with him,
that they might give an account of what had taken place, and that he
might not suppose the iniquitous attempt made by a party in our absence,
in the face of all canon law, should be a sufficient excuse for himself.
Yet he did not heed the imperial letters, but stayed at home, alleging
the sedition of the people, and the untimely zeal of some who, forsooth,
were opposing him, although before the imperial letters this same people
had rained down accusations against him. However, we will not now enter
into these things, but we have said this much, wishing to show that he
was caught in the act of plotting. Moreover, after this, we did not
rest, but demanded a judgment founded on enquiry and answer, for I said
we were prepared to show ourself free from blame, and them most guilty.
For certain Syrians who had been with him at that time were left here,
and they had taken part in all his proceedings. These we approached in
our readiness for judgment, and often repeated our demand, asking for
the documents or heads of accusation, or to be told the nature of the
grievance against us, or who the accusers are. We could obtain none of
these things, and again we were thrust out of the see. How shall I
narrate what then happened—an unequalled tragedy? What words will
suffice? What ear will listen untroubled? Whilst we made the same offer,
as I was saying, a great military force collected on the great
Sabbath[28] itself, and we going into the church as the evening was
drawing on, they tore by force all our clergy from our side, and
surrounded the sanctuary with armed men. The women in the sacred
building, who had undressed for baptism at that very time, fled away
without their clothes in fear at this terrible invasion. Nor were they
allowed to cover themselves as much as womanly decency would require,
but many of them were wounded and thrust outside, the fonts were filled
with blood, and the sacred waters polluted. Yet the evil did not stop
even here. Proceeding to where the holy elements were reserved, the
soldiers, amongst whom some were known to me as not Christians,[29]
looked at everything within the veil (τὰ ἔνδον), and as it happens in a
great tumult, the most sacred Blood of Christ was spilt upon those
soldiers, and as in a barbarian captivity, everything was dared. The
people fled into solitude, and the multitude passed their time outside
the city, and the churches at so great a feast became empty, and more
than forty bishops, our companions, with people and clergy, went into
hiding for no cause. The sighs and groans and bitter tears called forth
by these misfortunes filled marketplaces, and houses, and deserts, and
every part of the city. Through the extreme wickedness of the deed, not
the sufferers alone, but also those who were not sufferers in this way,
sympathised with us: not the orthodox alone, but heretics, and Jews, and
heathens. There was everywhere trouble, and agitation, and grief, as if
the city had been taken by storm. And these things were attempted
against the intention of our most religious emperor, at nightfall, by
the machinations of bishops, who, in many instances, led the troops, and
were not ashamed to have the attendance of civil officers instead of
deacons. When day came the whole city was transported beyond the walls,
under trees, and in valleys, finishing the feast like straying sheep.
You will be able to surmise the rest, for, as I said, it is impossible
to repeat word for word what has taken place in each case. What is so
grievous is that evils so great and crying have not yet come to an end,
and that there is no hope of liberation. On the contrary, they increase
day by day, and we have become a laughing-stock to many. Or rather, no
man laughs, however unrighteous he may be, for all men are in tears, as
I have said, at this recent iniquity, which is the climax of misfortune.
What if we were to speak of the troubles of the other churches?—for the
evil was not restricted to Constantinople, but spread to the East. For
just as inflammation which begins in the head corrupts all the members,
so now iniquities arising from the fountainhead, as it were, of this
great city, have opened the door to a general agitation. Everywhere
priests are against bishops, bishops against bishops, and people divided
against themselves, whilst others are brooding sedition: badness is
growing apace, and the whole world is overturned. When you learn all
this, my most honoured and religious Lord, show forth a courage and zeal
befitting you, that so great a flood of iniquity against the churches
may be stemmed. For if this custom should obtain, and anyone who wishes
it should be allowed free ingress into the dioceses of others at so
great a distance, to thrust out those whom he chooses, to act on his own
authority, as it pleases himself, understand that all things will be
dissolved, that the whole world will be involved in irremediable war,
every man fighting everyone else. Now, in order that so great a
destruction should not overwhelm all things under the sun, I beseech you
to enjoin by letter that what has been iniquitously perpetrated against
us in our absence, and by one party, whilst we did not refuse judgment,
may have no force, as indeed it has none by its very nature, and that
those who are thus convicted may be subjected to the penalty of
ecclesiastical laws. With regard to ourself, who have been neither
condemned nor convicted, we ask you for the continued benefit of your
letters and of your charity, and of everything else which we previously
enjoyed. If they who have been so guilty would even now allege charges
by reason of which they iniquitously cast us out, not telling us of the
accusations nor making charges against us, the accusers not appearing,
let us have an impartial judge, and we will submit ourselves to his
sentence and prove ourself guiltless of what is brought against us, as
indeed we are. Their recent deeds are against all propriety and every
law and ecclesiastical canon. And why do I speak of ecclesiastical
canon? Not even in secular tribunals have such things been ever
attempted, nay, not amongst barbarians: neither Scythians nor Sauromites
have ever given sentence for one party alone, in the absence of the
accused, who was refusing, not judgment, but hatred, demanding a
thousand judges, declaring himself innocent, ready to clear himself from
charges in the face of the world, and showing that he is blameless in
everything. Considering all this, and learning things more clearly from
my lords and most religious brethren, the bishops, I beseech you show us
that zeal which becomes your office. Thus you will rejoice not us alone,
but all churches in general, and you will be rewarded by God, Who does
all things for their peace. Farewell, and pray for me, most honoured and
holy Lord.
Letter addressed to some Imprisoned Bishops and Priests, a.d. 404.
(_Benedictine Edition_, cxviii., t. iii., p. 689.)
You are dwelling in a prison and are in chains, and are shut up with
unclean and filthy men: who could be more blessed than you on this
account? Who wears on his head so noble a golden crown as he whose right
hand is fettered for God? What dwelling-place so vast and splendid as a
prison full of gloom, and dirt, and ill smells, and tribulation for the
same cause? Rejoice, therefore, exult, you are crowned, be glad that
these sad occurrences are the means of procuring you immense riches.
This is the seed full of unspeakable promise; this is the combat which
is secure of victory and reward; this is the voyage productive of a rich
return. With these things in your minds, my most honoured and religious
lords, rejoice and be of good cheer, cease not to give praise to God in
all circumstances. You are inflicting severe blows on the devil, and
laying up to yourselves a great reward in heaven. _For the sufferings of
this time are not worthy to be compared to the glory to come which shall
be revealed in you._ Pray write to me often. I desire most earnestly to
receive letters from men who are in chains for God’s sake, telling me of
your sufferings, and even in a strange land I shall be greatly consoled
by their perusal.
To the Priests and Monks Theodotus, Nicholas, and Cherea. Written from
his Exile at Kucusus, a.d. 405.
(_Benedictine Edition_, cxlvi., t. iii., p. 685.)
You allege the incursion of the Isaurians as the cause of your absence,
but I look upon you as present and myself as with you, and see no
obstacle in this against your arrival. For such are the wings of charity
that they fly swiftly and with great alacrity in every direction, in
spite of a thousand impediments. But if I am deprived of your bodily
presence, cease not from prayer, and our merciful God will grant it us.
Since I too, bearing you constantly in my mind, long for a sight of you
in the flesh, and I know that I shall have this too, as you are
earnestly beseeching Him Who can do all things to break up the winter
and to establish peace everywhere. Now, to gladden you with news of
myself, I am enjoying much quiet and leisure. And although many things
disturb my health, as, for instance, the absence of physicians and the
want of necessaries (for there are no shops here and no drugs), a bad
climate (for the summer tries me no less than the winter, by its
excessive heat as opposed to the cold), a siege severe and constant,
with perpetual fears of incursions from the Isaurians,—in spite, I say,
of all this and much more which is undermining my strength whilst
recovering from that great danger and severe illness, I am fairly well.
Do not fail to write to me often, and to tell me how you yourselves are.
For I view your affection as a great consolation and encouragement, as a
treasure producing a multitude of good things. And whenever I think
about your own state, your steadfast heart, your strong and enduring
love, I cannot put it out of my mind. I take refuge in the thought as in
a spacious and calm harbour away from the surging waves of tribulation.
To some Priests and Monks in Phœnicia, who were Instructing Heathens.
(_From Kucusus_, A.D. 405. cxxiii., t. iii., p. 663.)
Pilots, when they see the ocean stirred up from its depths, and a heavy
storm and disturbance, not only do not desert the vessel, but show
greater industry and more willingness by watching themselves and rousing
the others. And physicians, too, when they see that the fever is active
and very high, not only do not leave the sick man to himself, but then
especially do all they can, and show a greater diligence and readiness
both through others and through themselves so as to overcome the
disease. Why do I say this? That no one of you through the disturbance
which has taken place should desire to leave Phœnicia and to come here
for quiet. The more the trials, the angrier the waves, the heavier the
trouble, the greater the reason for your staying in readiness, and
watchfulness, and diligence, showing forth more eagerness, so that your
fine house may not fall, nor your labour be in vain, nor the fruits of
your agriculture disappear. For God is able to quell the disturbance and
to reward your patience. When things run smoothly our reward is not so
great as it is for you now when there is much difficulty, great
agitation, and when many are scandalised. Considering, therefore, the
work done, and the labour surmounted, and the good works which you have
accomplished, and that by the grace of God you have conquered impiety to
a certain extent, that things in Phœnicia had come to improve, that your
reward and crown are now greater, that God will remove obstacles before
long and give you many compensations for your patience, stand fast and
endure. Even now you should not want for anything, but it was my command
that you should have the same plenty and abundance, whether in clothes,
or shoes, or food, as the brethren. If I, who am in so much tribulation
and affliction in a solitude of Kucusus, take your good deeds so much to
heart, how much should you, who are enjoying great plenty, do your part,
as far as necessity allows you. I repeat, then, let no one frighten you,
for things gave good promise, and this you may ascertain from the
answers sent by his Reverence the priest Constantine. If you remain, be
there a thousand obstacles, you will overcome them all. There is nothing
equal to patience and endurance; it is like a rock. In truth, those
disturbances and plottings against Churches are like waves beating
against a rock, dissolving in their own foam. Consider what the blessed
Apostles suffered, both from their own people and from strangers; how
during all their time of preaching they passed through temptations, and
dangers, and plottings, and were consumed by prisons, and chains, and
stripes, and hunger, and nakedness. Still, dwelling in those very
prisons, they did not relinquish the stewardship entrusted to them.
Blessed Paul, in his prison, scourged, covered with blood, fastened to
the wood, in the midst of all this suffering, gave instruction, baptised
his jailor, and left nothing unturned. Pondering on all this, according
to my counsel, stand bravely and without flinching, with your hope on
God and on His help, which is before everything, and be careful to let
me have a detailed answer. On this account I have sent the priest John,
that he may quiet your minds, and not suffer you to be disturbed by
anyone. I have done my part, encouraging you by words, exhorting you by
advice, and offering you plenty of necessaries, so that you may want for
nothing.
· · · · · · ·
To Studius, the Prefect of the City, on the Death of his Brother.
(_From Kucusus_, A.D. 404. _Benedictine Edition_, cxcvii., t. iii., p.
710.)
I know that you have understanding and can reason, and that before my
letter reaches you you will have heard in meekness of your happy
brother’s departure, for I would not call it death. Now, since we, too,
must do our part, I invite you, my most honoured Lord, to show yourself
as you are at this time; not that you should not grieve, for this is
impossible, being a man clothed in flesh and looking in vain for such a
brother, but that you should restrain your sorrow. You know the
perishableness of human things, how worldly business is like flowing
rivers, and how we should call blessed only those who depart this life
with good hope. They go not to death, but from combat to rewards, from
wrestlings to crowns, from a storm-tossed sea to a calm harbour.
Pondering on these things, be consoled, since my own grief is not small,
and we have a sovereign consolation in it—his goodness, which, I think,
must offer you true solace. If the departed had been bad and full of
evil, we ought to weep and mourn for him; but being what he was, after a
life of mildness and goodness, as all the city knew it to be, fearing
what was just, showing a fitting courage, independence, and fortitude,
despising present things, a stranger to worldly cares, we should rejoice
with him and with you that you have sent before you _this_ brother, who
may place the treasure which was his on his departure in a sure and safe
place. Do not, then, my most honoured Lord, have any thoughts unworthy
of yourself, or be broken by grief, but show now what you are, and let
me see for my comfort that even _my_ letter has done something for you.
So, at our great distance from each other, I shall be proud to have
overcome much of your sadness by a mere letter.
To Malchus on the Death of his Daughter.
(Μαλχῳ, lxxi., t. iii., p. 632.)
Do not be sad; do not put down the beautiful death of your happy
daughter to your sins. She has reached the waveless shore and come to
everlasting life. Removed from the troubled waters of this present life,
she stands upon the rock, and whatever good things she has gathered
together, those she holds as a most secure treasure. You should rejoice
and exult and be glad that, like an intelligent gardener gathering the
ripe fruit, you have offered her soul to the common Lord of all.
Applying the remedy of such thoughts as these to yourself and to my most
honoured lady, her mother, increase the reward reserved to you under
these circumstances, so that not only on account of her excellent early
training, but also for humbly and thankfully bearing her happy departure
hence, you may receive a great crown from our merciful God.
To Olympias, A.D. 404.
(_On the Virginal Life_, ii., t. iii., p. 542.)
· · · · · · ·
Virginity is so great a thing, and requires so much labour, that when
Christ had come down from heaven in order to make men angels, and to sow
the heavenly life on earth, He did not venture even then to enjoin it or
to make a law of it, but He _did_ teach death to self, than which there
is nothing harder. He taught men to crucify themselves, always to do
good to their enemies, yet He did not make a law of virginity. He left
it to the free-will of His hearers, saying, _Let him who can, take it._
It is a weighty undertaking: it has arduous wrestlings with the sweat of
combat, and its path is rugged and precipitous. This is plainly shown by
those in the Old Law, who were full of good deeds. For Moses, that great
man who summed up the prophets in his person, the intimate friend of
God, who enjoyed so much favour with Him as to be able to snatch six
hundred thousand from the chastisement of a divine stroke, and was so
great as to command the sea, who parted the ocean, drew water from the
rock, and transformed the atmosphere, who changed the Nile’s waters into
blood, who opposed Pharaoh with an army of frogs and locusts, and
changed the whole face of creation, and worked a thousand other wonders,
and many virtuous deeds,—for he was remarkable in every way,—yet he
could not even look at _these_ wrestlings, but needed marriage and the
society of his wife, with its security. He dared not launch himself on
the ocean of virginity fearing its waves. Then there was the patriarch
who immolated his son and was strong enough to tread upon the most
tyrannical of nature’s feelings. He had courage to sacrifice his son,
that son being Isaac, in the bloom of his age, in the very flower of his
youth, his own and only-begotten son, vouchsafed to him contrary to all
hope, and full of righteousness, his one stay in his old age. He it was
who led this son forth to the mountain for that consummation, and
prepared the altar and laid the wood upon it, who placed the victim in
readiness, and drew the sword and held it to his son’s neck. For he who
was of adamant, or rather harder than adamant, both held him for
slaughter and drew the knife. He who was thus firm by nature increased
his natural fortitude by the mortification of his will, and gave proof
of angelical calmness in his deeds. Yet the man who could encounter so
great a battle, and go beyond nature itself, dared not face the combats
of virginity. He also dreaded its wrestlings, and took to himself the
comfort of marriage.
· · · · · · ·
The Blessedness of Suffering.
(_To Olympias_, A.D. 404 or 405. Ὀλυµπίαδι, xvii., t. iii., p. 604.)
Nothing strange or out of the way is happening to you, but it is
extremely fitting and proper that the strength of your spirit should be
increased by constant temptations, and your fervour and power in combat
become greater, and that you should reap therefrom much sweetness. It is
the nature of tribulation, when it encounters a brave and ardent soul,
to bring about these results. And as the fire refines gold by its
action, so does tribulation purify and refine golden souls. Therefore
Paul says, _Tribulation worketh patience and patience probation_. Hence,
I too am in joy and gladness, and in this vast solitude am consoled by
this fortitude of yours. Therefore, even if thousands of wolves hem you
in and endless evil plottings, I have no fear; but it is my prayer that
present temptation may pass away and that you may not encounter others,
thus fulfilling the divine law, which bids us pray not to fall into
temptation. And if, perchance, it should happen again, I have confidence
in your soul of gold, and in the great riches which you would gain for
yourself. With what threat will they who act against their own interests
be able to frighten you? By loss of money? But this, I know well, is
like smoke in your eyes, and is accounted more worthless than mud by the
way. Is it by exile from home and country? But you are able to live in
great and populous cities as well as in deserts, and to pass your time
in peace and quiet, and to put away worldly visions. Or do they threaten
you with death? This, too, has been always in your thoughts, and if they
should drag you to execution they will find a dead body in their hands.
Why need I say more? No one will be able to do anything to you which you
have not already borne with much patience. You, who have ever walked on
a steep and thorny path, have accustomed yourself to all these things;
you, who have shown consummate skill under training, now appear more
radiant in the combat: not only are you not troubled by what has taken
place, but you are soaring above the earth and rejoicing. You are glad
to have a part now in those combats for which you had prepared yourself,
and this in your woman’s body, which is weaker than a spider’s web.
Whilst men are raging and gnashing their teeth, you are treading their
madness under foot in much cheerfulness, and you would be ready to
suffer many more things than they could prepare against you. Blessed and
thrice-blessed are you by reason of the crowns to come, or rather by
those very wrestlings. For these struggles, even before the reward, and
in the oppression of the fight, have their present rewards, and
compensations, and sweetness; they have contentedness, and fortitude,
and steadfastness, and patience in making you invincible, unconquerable,
far above all; they so exercise you that you can suffer no evil from
anyone, and make you stand upon the rock in spite of angry waves, and
bear a furious ocean with great peacefulness. These are the rewards of
tribulation, even before the kingdom of heaven. I know that, already,
you account yourself divested of the body, on the wings of sweetness,
but that if called upon you would put it off more easily than others do
the clothes which they wear. Rejoice, then, and be glad both over
yourself and over those who die the blessed death, who die not in their
bed, not in their houses, but in prisons, and chains, and torments.
Grieve only for the doers of these things, and weep for them: this is
worthy of your virtue. Since you wish to hear about my bodily health, I
have so far got rid of the illness which troubled me and am better now,
if only winter when it comes does not affect my weakness of stomach. We
are also in perfect security from Isaurian invasions.
To Olympias.
(_From Arabissus_, A.D. 406. Ὀλυµπίαδι, xv., t. iii., p. 601.)
Would you, who have given proof of so much mortification from your youth
upwards, and have trodden human pride under foot, expect to live a quiet
life without combat? How should this be? For if men who are fighting
other men receive a thousand wounds in combats and wars, you who have
been armed against principalities, and powers, and the lords of darkness
in this world, against spiritual forces of wickedness, who have fought
thus valiantly, and set up victorious trophies, and thus vexed the
devil,—how should you hope to lead a peaceful and untroubled life?
Therefore you should not be disquieted because battles, and agitation,
and fears assail you on every side. You should wonder, on the contrary,
if none of these things came to pass. Labour and peril are the lot of
goodness. You knew this well enough before my letter, and do not need to
learn it from others. I write this, then, since I am not instructing one
who is ignorant. For we know that neither banishment from our country
nor the loss of money, though insupportable to most men—neither contempt
nor any other suffering of the kind, will be able to disturb you. For if
the companions of those who have suffered these things have become
enviable, how much more those who are actually suffering them?
Therefore, on both accounts, Paul proclaims believers amongst the
Hebrews, saying: _Call to mind the former days, wherein, being
illuminated, you endured a great fight of afflictions, and on the one
hand, indeed, by reproaches and tribulations, were made a gazing-stock,
and on the other became companions of them that were used in such sort._
Therefore, there is no need for _me_ to write a long letter. No man,
indeed, goes to offer assistance to a conqueror who holds a splendid
trophy of victory in his hands, but only praise. I, too, know how much
interior spirit you have shown in what has befallen you. I account you
blessed, and admire you for your patience in the present, as well as for
the rewards which it will bring to you. I am well aware, however, that
you wish to hear how I am getting on, for I have been silent for a very
long time. I have thrown off the violence of my illness, but still feel
its effects. I have had excellent physicians, yet the want of
necessaries destroys the good of my cure. For not only are there no
remedies here, and no one of the things required for a suffering body,
but both famine and pestilence are imminent.
· · · · · · ·
To Pœanius. ‘Glory be to God in all things.’
(A.D. 404. Παιανιῳ, cxciii., tom. iii., p. 708.)
You greatly refreshed me and made me rejoice, when, in telling me of
your misfortunes, you added the word, which we should always say in
everything befalling us: ‘Glory be to God in all things’. This is a
stroke which hits the devil in the right place; this is great security
and happiness in every danger to the man who utters it. In giving voice
to it, dark despondency vanishes. Cease not, then, from saying it and
from teaching it to others. Thus a destructive storm, even should it
increase in fury, will be changed into peace; thus the storm-tossed will
reap a greater reward, whilst they are also removed from evils. This it
was which crowned Job; this word overthrew the devil, and made him
retire in confusion; this removes all anxiety. Continue, therefore, to
use it on all occasions. Let no one be in trouble about this place. For
if Kucusus be indeed a solitude, I enjoy much quiet there, and I have
been able to cure a large part of the no small infirmity contracted
through weakness on my journey, by sitting constantly in the house.
· · · · · · ·
Vanity of Vanities.
(_Homily on Eutropius_,[30] _Benedictine Edition_, tom. iii., p. 381.)
At all times, but especially now, it is pertinent to say, _Vanity of
vanities, and all is vanity_. Where is now that splendid consulship,
those magnificent torches and applauding assemblies, those balls and
banquets and stately feasts? Where are those crowns and curtains, those
gatherings of a whole city, the cheerings of amphitheatres, the
flatteries of crowded houses? All these things have vanished: a mighty
gale has blown down the leaves, and shown us a naked tree, one shaken
from its foundations. Such has been the force of the wind that, after
sapping the tree’s life, it threatens to tear it up by the roots. Where
are now those false friends, and those drinking parties and banquets?
Where are those swarms of parasites, that wine which never ceased
flowing all day long, those wonderful dishes produced by the cooks,
those servants of the consulate,—all those who spoke and acted to curry
favour? They were a night’s dream, and they vanished with the daylight;
they were spring blossoms scorched by summer heat: they were passing
shadows, dissolving smoke, bubbles which have burst, a cobweb torn away.
Therefore I would put before you the frequent use of those spiritual
words: _Vanity of vanities, all is vanity_.
These are words which should be engraved on walls, on clothes, on the
market-place, in dwelling-houses, by the wayside, on doors and
thresholds, and, most of all, in the conscience of each one of us, which
we should regard through everything, since trickery and masks and
hypocrisy seem to be truth amongst the majority of men. These are words
which every man should speak to his neighbour both at the morning and
the evening meal, and at meetings, and which he should hear from others:
_Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity_. Was I not always telling you
that riches are fleeting? You would not believe me. Did I not tell you
that wealth is an arrogant companion? You would not be persuaded. Now, a
personal experience has shown you that it is not only fleeting, not only
arrogant, but also murderous, for it has caused your fear and trembling
at this hour. Did I not tell you, when you so often reproached me for
speaking the truth to your face, that I loved you better than your
flatterers? Am not I, your reprover, in greater trouble about you than
those who fawned upon you? Did I not add to these words that the wounds
inflicted by a friend are more to be trusted than the kisses of enemies?
If you had borne my wounds those kisses of theirs would not now have
brought forth death, for _my_ wounds work health, whereas their kisses
prepared a fatal disease! Where are now your cup-bearers? Where are
those who cleared the market-place before you, and who were full of your
praises in the crowd? They have fled, and given up your friendship; they
provide for their own safety at the cost of your agony. It is not so
with us, but we would not be rebuffed even when you did not want us, and
now that you have fallen we stand by you and protect you. That Church,
which was warred upon by you, has opened her heart to receive you;
whereas those fostered theatres, which you often fought us about, have
delivered you up to destruction. Still we ceased not to say, ‘Why do you
act thus? You rage against the Church and are walking towards a
precipice,’ and you heeded nothing. Yet the races, those squanderers of
your wealth, have sharpened their sword against you, whilst the Church,
the object of your unseemly wrath, hastens to meet you, wishing to
rescue you from their wiles.
I say these things now, not desiring to insult the fallen, but in order
to increase the security of those who have not fallen: not to tear open
the sores of the wounded, but to maintain in sound health those who are
not wounded: not to shipwreck the man tossed by the waves, but to warn
those who are sailing in calm seas so that they may avoid sinking. How
can this be done? By taking to heart the vicissitudes of human things.
For if _this_ man had feared a change of fortune, it would not have come
upon him, but neither his own lot nor that of others improved him: now
do you who are nursing your riches gather your lesson from this man’s
misfortune, for nothing is more insecure than human things.
Consequently, if a man were to call them neediness itself, he would say
less than the truth, whether he liken them to smoke or mire, or a dream,
or spring blossoms, or anything else, so perishable are they, and so
less than nothing. That nothingness has indeed much that is insecure is
evident from this: who was ever a mightier man than he? Did he not
surpass the whole world by his wealth? Did he not rise to the height of
honours? Did not all men hold him in fear and awe? Yet see, he is more
miserable than slaves, and more to be pitied than menials, in greater
want than the poor who are pinched with hunger, having before his eyes
day by day swords pointed at him, and dungeons and executioners, and the
road leading to death. Nor does he enjoy the memory of his past
pleasure, nor is he conscious even of the light; but in the midst of
day, as if in darkest night, encompassed by anguish, he is deprived of
his sight. Try as I will, however, I cannot measure that suffering by
words, which delivers him up to an hourly expectation of death. But what
need is there of our words since he bears them distinctly written on
himself for us, as if engraven on a statue? For yesterday men came to
him from the imperial court, wishing to drag him away by force, and he
took refuge amongst the sacred vessels: he looked already nothing better
than a dead man, his teeth were chattering, his whole body shivering and
trembling, his voice was broken, his tongue faltering, and he himself as
if the life in him had turned to stone.
I say these things, not in scorn nor in reproach at his misfortune, but
in the wish to soften your judgment, and to enkindle your pity, and to
persuade you to be satisfied with the chastisement already inflicted.
For there are amongst you many inhuman men who would even reproach me
for receiving him at the sanctuary. I should desire to soften their
cruelty by dwelling on the sufferings of this man. Why do you reproach
me, beloved brethren? Because, you say, he who warred incessantly
against the Church has found shelter in it. For this very reason you
should have praised God the more for allowing him to fall into a need so
great as to learn both the power and the kindness of the Church: the
power, on the one hand, to outlive so overwhelming a reverse inflicted
by his enemies, and the kindness with which she who was persecuted
extends her shield, and covers him with her own wings, putting him in
perfect security, and bearing no memory of former things, but opening
her heart to him with the most tender love. This is more wonderful than
any trophy, this is a magnificent victory: by this the heathen is
converted and even the Jew put to shame: this it is which shows forth
the brightness of her countenance; that, taking her foe captive, she
spares him; that whereas all men forsake him, she alone, as a tender
mother, hides him in her own sanctuary curtains, and encounters imperial
wrath, an angry populace, a boundless hatred, on his account. This is
the altar’s adornment. What adornment is it, you ask, that the man who
is abominable, and avaricious, and cursed, should touch the altar? Speak
not thus, since the harlot too touched the feet of Christ, and she was
indeed full of sin and impurity, yet it was no reproach to Jesus, but a
great wonder and song of praise, for she who was unclean did not defile
the Holy One; on the contrary, He, the Good and the Pure, made that
abandoned harlot clean through His touch. Do not bear malice, O man. We
are servants of Him Who was crucified, and Who said, _Forgive them, for
they know not what they do_. ‘But,’ you say, ‘it was he who, by various
laws and regulations, cut off flight to the altar.’ Consider, then, that
experience has taught him the value of his own action, and he himself
has been the first to break the law which he made. He has become a
spectacle to the world, and in his silence he raises a voice of warning
to all men, ‘Do not likewise, that you may not suffer in like manner’.
Through his misfortune he has become a teacher, and through it the altar
sends forth a great radiance. It is now especially terrible, and evident
to all men, because it holds the lion in chains. The royal statue would
be greatly adorned, not so much by depicting the king as he sits on the
throne, clothed in purple, and wearing his crown, as by barbarians under
the royal feet, with their hands tied behind them and their faces to the
ground. You yourselves, in your eagerness to come here, can testify that
he has spoken no word, for indeed the spectacle before us to-day is
noteworthy, and I see here as many people collected together as in the
holy Easter festival. He in his silence has called them; his deeds have
spoken louder than the voice of a trumpet. You have come here, virgins
from your chambers, women from your drawing-rooms, men leaving the
marketplace deserted, that you may contemplate human nature convicted,
and see the perishableness of earthly things laid bare, the shameful
spectacle of that which was yesterday, and but lately so brilliant. So
much for the success born of avarice, which is more shamefaced than any
old woman’s blotches: the change of fortune has passed over it like a
sponge, and wiped away both paint and titles.
Such is the power of this catastrophe: it has made him who was
conspicuous and illustrious now appear more miserable than all. If the
rich man come in, he will be taught much, for, contemplating him, who
had the whole world at his command, thrown down from so mighty a height,
trodden under foot, fallen lower than a hare or a frog, fastened without
chains to this pillar, and done to death by fear in his anguish though
unfettered, he restrains his wrath, humbles his pride, and draws that
lesson of wisdom which it behoves him to draw, from human things, and so
goes away, learning by facts what the Scripture speaks of in the words,
_All flesh is grass, and all human glory as the flower of the field_,
that the grass has been burnt up and the flower thrown away: that man
shall be burnt up as swiftly as grass, and trodden under foot as quickly
as the flower of the field: that our days are like smoke, and so on. In
his turn, the poor man comes in, and, gazing at this spectacle, he does
not despair of himself, nor is he afflicted at his own poverty, but he
is thankful to his neediness for providing him with a place of refuge,
and a calm harbour, and a wall of strength. And often, seeing these
things, he would prefer to remain where he is, rather than to have all
things for a short time, and then to be in danger of his life. See you
how this man’s flight hither is no small advantage to the rich and poor
alike, to small people and great people, to bondsmen and freemen? See
how each one has gone away with his own lesson drawn from the sight
alone? Now, have I succeeded in softening your passion and putting an
end to your anger? Have I extinguished your inhumanity and enkindled
sympathy within you? Indeed, I think so, for your faces show it, and
your tears. If, then, your stony hearts have been softened and mellowed,
put forth also the fruit of alms-giving, and, showing the ear of
sympathy, let us solicit the emperor, or rather let us call upon our
merciful God to mitigate the emperor’s wrath, and to make him kind, so
that he may grant us a full pardon. Already, indeed, since the day of
his flight, there has been no small change; for when the emperor learnt
that he had taken refuge in this place, in the presence of the soldiers
who were incited against his crimes and preparing to put him to death,
he made a long speech. In it he quieted their anger, alleging not only
this man’s delinquencies, but giving him credit for whatever good he had
done, and calling upon them to show him mercy in the one case, and in
the other to pardon him as a man. Upon their again urging him to avenge
the insulter of the emperor, crying out, stamping with their feet,
threatening him with death, and brandishing their spears, he drew floods
of tears from the driest eyes, and, reminding them of the sacred table
to which he had fled, he put an end to their anger.
Let us, then, do our part also, for what excuse would you have if the
emperor, when insulted, bears no malice, and you who are not insulted
should be thus angry? How, when this spectacle is removed, would you
approach the mysteries and recite that prayer in which we are commanded
to say, ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have
trespassed against us,’ whilst you are calling for revenge against
_your_ trespassers? Did he commit great injustice and look down upon
all? I do not deny it, but this is no time for judgment, this is the
time for mercy; not for chastisement, but for kindness; not for
examination, but for concession; not for strict justice, but for pity
and kindness. Therefore, let no man be wrathful nor discontented; rather
let us supplicate our merciful God to grant him a period of life, and to
snatch him from impending death, so that he may redeem his
transgressions. Let us go together to our merciful emperor, entreating
him, by the Church and by the altar, to release that one man who is
seeking refuge at the sacred table. If we do this, the emperor too will
approve, and God will ratify the emperor’s decision, and He will give us
a great reward for our mercy. For in proportion as He turns away from
the hard and inhuman man, and hates him, so does He protect and cherish
the kind and merciful man. If he be a just man also, God holds brighter
crowns in reserve for him: if he has sinned, He overlooks his
iniquities, and gives him this great reward for his kindness to his
fellow-man. _I desire mercy and not sacrifice_, He says. And everywhere
in the Scripture you find Him seeking for this and saying that it is the
remission of sins. So, then, we shall make Him merciful to ourselves,
and atone for our own sins. Thus we shall adorn the Church, and win the
applause of our merciful emperor, as I was saying, and all the people
will rejoice: the ends of the earth will be in admiration at the kind
and gentle spirit of our city, and throughout the whole world those who
hear what has taken place will sing our praises. In order that we may
enjoy these goods, let us fall down on our knees in supplication,
entreat, beseech; let us shield the captive from danger, from flight,
from death, so that we ourselves may enjoy lasting goods by the grace
and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory and might, now and
for ever and ever. Amen.
FOOTNOTES
[1]Card. Newman.
[2]Palladius, _Life of St. Chrysostom_, in his works, vol. xiii., pp.
39, 40.
[3]In writing the above sketch, Nirschl’s _Lehrbuch der Patrologie und
Patristik_ has been used, and Cardinal Newman’s notice of the Saint
quoted once or twice, and everywhere borne in mind.
[4]Translated from the Greek Oxford and Cambridge Edition
[5]Translated from the Greek Oxford Edition.
[6]Compare ἀλλ’ ἤτοι µὲν ταῦτα Θεῶν ἐν γούνασι κεῖται (Ἰλιαδος P. 514).
[7]St. Chrysostom here refers from memory to the _Acts_, where Peter and
_John_ are spoken of as “illiterate and ignorant men” (c. iv., v.
13).
[8]Translated from Greek Benedictine Edition in folio, tom. ii., p. 2.
[9]I have ventured to change ἐννατήν into _another_. It is part of a
long argument.
[10]δεκάτην αἰτίαν.
[11]Compare with St. Augustine, _Da amantem et sentit quod dico_.
[12]Translated from the Greek Benedictine Edition in folio.
[13]Compare with St. Augustine: Unde temporibus eruditis, et omne quod
fieri non potest respuentibus, sine ullis miraculis nimium
mirabiliter incredibilia credidit mundus?—_De Civitate Dei_, l.
xxii., c. viii.
[14]Μὰλλον δὲ οὐκ αὐτοὶ µόνοι, ἀλλὰ καὶ ὁ πάντων κορυφαῖος Πέτρος.
[15]Ὅµιλια προ τῆς ἐξορίας. Benedictine Edition. There is a doubt about
the authenticity of the latter part of this Homily, which has not
been translated.
[16]Ἐκκλησίας δὲ σάρκα ἀνέλαβε.
[17]Translated from the Greek German Edition, Περὶ Ἱερωσυνῆς. Leipzig,
1872.
[18]See Ezekiel, c. xxxiii., v. 6.
[19]Benedictine Edition, t. xii., p. 167.
[20]Greek Oxford Edition.
[21]Ἀλλ’ αὐτὸς ὁ σταυρωθεὶς ὑπὲρ ἡµῶν Χριστός.
[22]... µεταῤῥυθµίζει τὰ προκείµενα.
[23]The single word _altar_ has to stand for the Greekβωµός and
θυσιαστήριον, the former meaning the altar on which a bloody
offering is made, the latter the altar on which the sacrifice after
the order of Melchisedec is offered.
[24]P. 295 of the same Homily.
[25]Blessed Thomas More’s words to his wife will here occur to many:
‘How long, thinkest thou, I might still live?’ and when she replied,
‘Full twenty years, if it so pleases God,’ answered, ‘Should I give
up eternity for twenty years?’
[26]Benedictine Edition, tom. iii., p. 515. St. Chrysostom wrote this
letter, A.D. 404, before his second exile, from which he never
returned. Copies of it were sent to the Archbishops of Milan and
Aquileia.
[27]The _Curiosi_ were officers whose business it was to pursue crime
and treason of all kinds, and to summon and denounce the guilty to
the emperor.—_Benedictine’s note._
[28]Holy Saturday.
[29]Uninitiated (ἀµύητοι ἦσαν), to speak the language of that day.
[30]Eutropius, the eunuch, the unworthy minister of the emperor, who had
attempted to take away the right of asylum from the Church, fell
suddenly, and fled for refuge to the altar of the cathedral. On this
occasion Chrysostom defended him from the angry people and the
soldiers sent to apprehend him.
THE END.
INDEX.
A
Abraham, sacrifice of, 290.
Alexander, thirteenth god, 266;
his tomb obscure, 268.
Altar, radiance of, 301;
fruitfulness of, 233.
Almsgiving, by words, 65;
value of, 70;
interest of, 71.
Angels of the mysteries, 211.
Antioch, John of, 1;
surnamed Golden Mouth, 2.
Anthusa, St., mother of St. Chrysostom, 1.
Apostles, condition of, 102;
victory of, 103;
mines of, 109;
glory of, 96.
Arcadius, emperor, 6;
death of, 14.
Argument, an irrefutable, 98.
Arsacius, intruded into see of Constantinople, 12.
B
Basil, friend of Chrysostom, 3.
Bond of new Covenant, 219, 220.
Blood of Our Lord, 242;
drunk by Himself, 221.
Bread, one for all, 244.
C
Charity not consumed, 31.
Chastisement here, 123, 124.
Children, witness of, 50.
Christ, our High Priest, 214;
His Pasch, 229.
Christians, responsibility of, 62.
Chrysostom, government of, 8;
expulsion of, 11;
appeal to Pope, 12;
at Comana, 13;
death of, 14;
his body translated to Constantinople—to Rome, 15;
character of his works, 17;
summary of, 18, 19, 20;
his letter to Pope Innocent, 272;
unjustly summoned into court, 275;
thrust out of his see, 277;
in exile, 283.
Church, invincible, 90, 190;
brighter than sun, 190;
heaven made for it, 192;
soul’s remedies in, 194;
olives of, 240;
vengeance of, 298;
generosity of, 300.
Cities, strong walls of, 151.
Clothing Christ, 69.
Conquering by contraries, 141, 142.
Community life, 149.
Conscience, tribunal of, 122.
Constantine the Great, where buried, 269.
Crucified ever living, 267;
power of, 144.
D
Departed at the mysteries, 250, 254.
Diodorus, bishop of Tarsus, 3.
Dispositions for the mysteries, 215, 216, 238, 247.
E
Eucharist, union of, 243;
makes earth heaven, 246.
Eternity, proved by suffering, 131.
Eudoxia, empress, 9;
statue to, 11;
death of, 14.
Eusebius, bishop of Nicomedia, 5.
Eutropius, fall of, 296;
anguish of, 299;
spectacle to all men, 302.
F
Feast of the martyrs, what, 259.
Flavian, bishop of Antioch, 4;
election of, 7.
Forgiveness as we forgive, 304.
Friendships, spiritual, 48;
worldly, 47.
G
Gallic Rufinus, 8.
Gifts of God through senses, 237.
Gladness in tribulation, 126, 127.
God, good by essence, 42;
His instruments, 146;
His kindness, 179;
His paradoxes, 32;
in visible things, 120;
not to be encompassed, 166.
Golden heart, 68.
Goodness, a beacon, 58, 60;
voice of, 56, 57;
peace of, 81.
Gospel, propagation of, 89;
announcement of, 101, 104.
Gregory Nazienzen, St., 6.
H
Heathen, argument with, 97.
Holiness everywhere possible, 78, 80.
Holy Spirit, gifts of, 34.
Holy tears, 249.
Human glory, vanity of, 296, 297.
Humble, abode of, 148.
Humility in labour, 150.
I
In chains for Christ, 153, 154.
J
Jews, dispersion of, 181.
Jewish sacrifice ceased, 231.
Jona, son of, 183.
Joy for faithful departed, 287.
Judas, communion of, 218.
Judgment, proved by suffering, 25.
Jurisdiction, each province its own, 274.
K
Kindness, reward of, 305.
L
Loss of a daughter, 288.
Love, true, 46, 140.
M
Magi, faith of, 245.
Man made for eternity, 168;
the man not the state, 79, 82.
Marriages of old, 106;
money marriages, 107.
Martyrs, voice of, 261, 263;
shrines of, 264, 265.
Martyrdom, the blessed death, 293.
Matthias, election of, 189.
Meletius, bishop of Antioch, 3;
death of, 7.
Ministering to Christ, 75.
Miracles, spiritual, 86, 88, 175.
Mites, spiritual, 100.
Money, tyranny of, 41, 43.
More, Blessed Thomas, 262.
Mortification, happiness of, 121.
N
Nature, good, 28.
Nova Roma, see of, 9.
O
Oak, Synod of the, 10.
Olympias, 293;
fortitude of, 294.
P
Paschal Lamb, a figure, 230.
Patience, more than alms-giving, 135;
a rock of strength, 285.
Paul and Plato, 95.
Paul, humility of, 115;
chains of, 155;
voice of, 223;
heart of, 224, 225;
Peter’s companion, 227;
apostolate in prison, 286.
Persecution for justice, 282.
Peter’s prerogatives, 27, 184, 185;
Peter scandalised, 186;
before and after Resurrection, 176, 178, 187;
temptation of, 196;
sin of, 197;
at Jerusalem, 188.
Pilots, necessity of, in storm, 284.
Plato, achievements of, 143.
Pope Innocent, protest of, 12.
Poverty, 40;
voluntary, 44, 45.
Power of holy bodies, 270.
Priesthood, 202.
Priests, 195;
sinners not angels, 198;
spiritual generators, 201, 203;
responsibility of, 205;
purity required of, 206;
snares of, 207, 208;
rulers of the world, 209.
Priscilla and Persis, 105.
Privilege of servant, 156.
Probation, 133, 137.
Prosperity, vanity of, 303.
R
Resurrection, proved in nature, 159, 160;
by creation, 163;
by human things, 165;
confirmed by signs, 169, 170, 174;
by faith of world, 177;
same body in, 161, 162.
Riches and poverty, whence, 35, 39.
Rome, why blessed, 222.
S
Sacrifice of new law, 199, 200, 210;
for the dead, 251, 255.
Salt and light, 55.
Signs of Apostles, a testimony, 173;
greatest of, 52, 53.
Socrates, end of, 145.
Sojourners, 72.
Sorrow, false, 253.
Soul, worth of, 99.
Stilicho, 8.
Strength in weakness, 83.
Sufferings of just, 134, 137;
suffering its own reward, 292.
T
Table of peace, 235, 236.
Teacher’s example followed, 92.
Teaching by life, 77, 91, 93.
Temple, buyers and sellers in, 49.
Thanksgiving, 128, 129, 136, 138, 295.
The truth and the figure, 213.
Theodosius, death of, 4;
reign of, 6.
Theophilus, patriarch of Alexandria, 5, 273, 276;
enmity of, 9;
summoned to Constantinople, 10;
instigator of sacrilege, 278, 279.
Time and eternity, 33.
Timothy, 110;
infirmities of, 111;
advice to, 112, 113;
diligent in fasting, 114;
his zeal, 116.
Tongue, a hand, 64.
Touch of faith, 66.
U
Unleavened bread, 256.
V
Vespasian and Titus, 180.
Virginity not commanded, 289.
W
Way, truth, and life, 23.
Wickedness, way to unbelief, 167.
Why Our Lord ate after Resurrection, 172.
Wine, gift of God, 258;
drinking, 117, 118.
Working for eternity, 139.
Z
Zebedee, sons of, 26.
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Transcriber’s Notes
—Silently corrected a few typos.
—Retained publication information from the printed edition: this eBook
is public-domain in the country of publication.
—In the text versions only, text in italics is delimited by
_underscores_.
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