Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew 11 part 2/2

Then, when we, having blotted these out, write the things that are from the Spirit, you depart, and, having given your hearts to the workings of the devil, you offer him again to write his own things over against ours upon you.

What, then, will be the end of these things—even if I do not say it—each one's conscience knows.

For my part, I will not cease from doing my own work, and from inscribing the right letters.

But if you mar our diligence, for us indeed the reward remains unmoved, but for you the peril is no small one.

Yet I wish to say nothing burdensome.

But I beseech and exhort you again: imitate at least the diligence of little children about these matters.

For they indeed first learn the shape of the letters;

then they practise distinguishing them even when they are distorted;

and then at last, in reading, they walk in the road that leads on from those things.

So, then, let us also do:

dividing up virtue, let us first learn not to swear, nor to forswear ourselves, nor to speak evil;

then, having come to another line, not to be envious, nor to lust after bodies, not to gormandize, not to be drunken, not to be cruel, not to be sluggish;

so that, passing again from these to spiritual things, we may practise self-control and contempt of the belly, temperance, righteousness, the being superior to glory, and gentle, and contrite in mind; and let us join these one to another, and inscribe them upon our soul.

And let us exercise ourselves in all these things—in the house, among our friends, toward our wife, toward our children.

And for the present let us begin from the first and easier things;

as, for instance, from not swearing;

and let us continually practise this element in the house.

For indeed there are many at home who hinder this practice;

For a servant provokes us, a wife by her grievances casts us into anger, and a child that is stubborn and unruly drives us to threats and to swearing of oaths.

If then, being continually chafed by these within thine own house, thou succeed in not being swept away into oaths, thou wilt easily be able to remain impregnable in the marketplace also.

Moreover, thou wilt likewise succeed in refraining from insult, neither insulting thy wife, nor thy servant, nor any other of those in the house.

For a wife oftentimes, by praising such and such a one and bewailing her own lot, kindles us to speak evil of that person.

But be not thou compelled to accuse the one who is praised; rather, bear all things nobly.

And shouldest thou see thy servants praising other masters, be not troubled, but stand firm nobly. Let thy house be a wrestling-school and arena of virtue, that having there trained thyself well, thou mayest with much skill engage those in the marketplace.

This do also in the matter of vainglory.

For if thou practise not to be vainglorious before thy wife and thy servants, thou wilt henceforth not easily be taken captive by this passion in any other case.

For everywhere indeed this malady is grievous and tyrannical, but most of all when a woman is present.

If therefore we there break down its strength, we shall easily prevail over it in all other things as well.

And with respect to the other passions likewise let us do this very same thing, training ourselves against them in the house, and anointing ourselves for the contest day by day.

And that our exercise may become the easier for us, let us also pronounce a penalty against ourselves whenever we transgress any of the things set before us.

But let the penalty again be not a loss, but rather

one that carries a reward, and procures the greatest gain;

and this it is, if we condemn ourselves to intensified fastings, and to sleeping on the ground, and to some other such austere discipline.

For thus from every side many gains will come to us: both here we shall live the sweet life of virtue, and we shall attain the good things to come, and we shall be continually friends of God.

But, that the same thing may not happen again — that, having here admired the things spoken, ye go away and, casting aside the tablet of your mind simply and at random, give occasion to the devil to blot these things out — let each one, on returning home, call his own wife, and report these things, and take her as a helper, and from this present day let him enter this goodly wrestling-school, using for oil the supply of the Spirit.

And even shouldest thou fall once, or twice, or many times while training, despair not, but stand up again and wrestle;

and depart not before thou hast bound about thy brow the bright crown against the devil, and hast laid up henceforth the possession of virtue in an inviolable treasure-house.

For if thou establish thyself in the habit of this goodly philosophy, thou wilt not thenceforth be able, even in slothfulness, to transgress any of the things enjoined, thy habit imitating the fixedness of nature.

For even as to sleep is easy, and to eat, and to drink, and to breathe,

so also will the things of virtue become easy for us, and we shall reap the pure pleasure thereof, sitting in a waveless haven, and enjoying continual calm, and bringing our vessel with much cargo to anchor in that City on that Day, and we shall attain the incorruptible crowns;

which may it be granted us all to attain, by the grace and lovingkindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory and the might, now and ever, and unto ages of ages. Amen.