PART I.

THE KING’S HIGHWAY.

The Way, the Truth, and the Life. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_,[4] lxxvi., vol. ii., p. 395.)

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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.

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Who is the Greater? (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lviii., vol. ii., p. 167.)

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_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.

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The First are Last and the Last First. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxvii., vol. ii., p. 285.)

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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.)

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_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.

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Whence the Rich? (_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xxxiv., vol. ii., p. 430.)

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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.

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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.

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Different Kinds of Friendship. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lx., vol. ii., p. 199.)

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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.

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The Voice of Good Deeds. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, xlvi., vol. ii., p. 14.)

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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.

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The Best Controversy. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, xv., vol. i., p. 201.)

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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_.

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The Tongue a Royal Power. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, li., p. 76.)

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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.

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Golden Vessels and Golden Hearts. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, l., p. 62.)

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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.)

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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.)

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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.

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The Archetype and the Type. (_Homilies on the Epistle to the Philippians_, xiii., vol. v., p. 136.)

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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.)

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_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.)

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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.

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The Victory of Our Faith. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxv., vol. ii., p. 376.)

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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_.

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Marriages as they were and as they are. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxiii., vol. ii., p. 355.)

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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.)

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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?

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Possessing the Land. (_Homilies on Second Epistle to Corinthians_, ix., vol. iii., p. 110.)

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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?

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The Word of Praise. (_Homilies on Second Epistle to Corinthians_, i., vol. iii., p. 8.)

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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.

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Sufferings of the Just. (_Homilies de Statuis_, xxi., _preached at Antioch_, t. ii., p. 13, _Benedictine Edition_.)

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_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.)

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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.

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The Abode of the Humble. (_Homilies on St. Matthew_, lxxii., vol. ii., p. 344.)

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_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.

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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.

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The Seed not vivified unless it dies. (_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xli., vol. ii., p. 517.)

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_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_.

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The Resurrection in Creation. (_Homilies on First Epistle to Corinthians_, xvii., vol. ii., p. 199.)

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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.

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Resurrection confirmed by Signs which followed. (_Homilies on the New Testament_,[12] viii., t. iii., p. 89.)

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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.