Works (CSEL) 8

BOOK ONE. Good discourse is necessary to discipline for all, full of prudence, and a mind intent on reason runs ahead by virtues and curbs the passions; for virtue is teachable. Indeed it is sought by zeal and learning, and lost by neglect. Otherwise, were not good discourse necessary for correction, the law would never say: 'Thou shalt not commit adultery.' But because bare discourse, useful for admonishing, is weak for persuading, therefore the consideration of right reason must be applied, that what good discourse has prescribed, reason, more fully handled, may persuade. For we are constrained to obedience by no servile necessity, but by the arbiter of the will, whether we incline toward virtue or are bent toward fault.

And therefore either free affection draws us to error, or the will, following reason, calls reason back. But the gravest passion of fault is concupiscence, which reason softens and represses. For it can soften it, but cannot eradicate it, since the mind, which is capable of reason, is not the master of its own passions, but their repressor. For it cannot come to pass that one prone to anger should not be angry, but that he should temper himself by reason, restrain his indignation, and call himself back from punishing, as the prophet too teaches us, saying: 'Be angry, and sin not.' He conceded what belongs to nature, he denied what belongs to fault. And so every... takes its origin from other things, not from itself, and therefore is secondary. For it is received either from natural things or from useful ones.

And so it either tempers natural things or is an asserter of usefulness. In short, it does not cut out concupiscence from the mind, but brings it about that we do not serve concupiscence. For who is so great that he could take away the bodily impulse, save He alone who was able to say of the unfruitful fig tree — that is, the malice of the Jews: 'Behold, these three years I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree and find none: cut it down, then.' To whom the servant answered: 'Let it alone this year also, until I dig about it and put a basket of dung.' And if indeed it bears fruit, well; but if not, in time to come cut it down.' Rightly did he refer the matter to the Lord, because he could not claim for himself the power of cutting out the bodily fall, but reserved it for the Lord.

In short, what man shall we take up as better and stronger than holy David, who could not take away from himself the desire by which he had longed for water from the cistern of Bethlehem, cut off by the hostile army, but could mitigate it? For since we do not find that water was lacking to others — that is, to so great a number of an army — when surely much less could water from other springs be lacking to the king, suffering a kind of irrational concupiscence, he desired that water which was walled about by the encircling of the enemy, whence it could not easily be brought without the greatest danger. And so he says: 'Who will give me a drink from the cistern that is in Bethlehem by the gate?'

And when three men had been found who broke through the enemy's camp and brought the water which he had desired with the utmost longing, perceiving that the same water had cost him at another's peril, he poured it out to the Lord, lest he should seem to drink the blood of those who had brought it. This thing is an indication that concupiscence indeed runs ahead of reason, but reason resists desire. David therefore suffered what is human, in that he irrationally desired; but this is praiseworthy, that he defrauded the irrational concupiscence by a rationally prepared remedy.

While I praise those men who blushed at their king's desire and chose rather to put an end to it even at the risk of their own safety, I praise still more the one who, in his own desire, blushed at another's peril and weighed water bought at the price of a doubtful lot against blood. At the same time, as a victor checking his craving, as it were, he poured out the water to the Lord, to show that he quenched his own longing by the consolation of the word. A sober mind, therefore, is able to rein in and repress the impulses of even the gravest passions, to cool all the heat of the most burning desire, to divert its motions elsewhere, and by the exercise of right reason to spit out the passions.

For when God established man and planted in him character and senses, he then imposed upon man's motions the royal command of the mind, so that all of man's senses and motions might be ruled by its vigor and power. To the grace of the creature he added this, that he should form the mind itself by divine precepts and instruct it in the disciplines of wisdom, by which it might know both what to avoid and what to choose. The mind, therefore, holding fast by right reason the discipline of wisdom, that it may know things divine and human, is trained in the law, through which it learns which passions it ought to subject to itself. Now the leaders of the passions are, as it were, the natural ones, pleasure and pain, which the rest follow.

For these embrace them all, and each of the two is a passion not only of the body but also according to the soul. And since we have said that under these lie other passions: before pleasure comes desire, after pleasure comes rejoicing; while before pain comes fear, and after pain comes sadness; and agitation of the mind is a passion common to both pleasure and pain. I shall pass over the others—namely pride, avarice, ambition, contention, envy, which are passions according to the soul; I shall pass over also the insatiable lust of devouring and the excess of luxury and wantonness, which are vices bound up with the body and operate according to it.

And rightly does temperance most of all quench the ardor of these passions, for it first tempers the soul by sobriety and moderation and forms the mind, then also by abstinence from delicacies it draws tight the reins of bodily fierceness. Therefore the law cut back the license of foods and the abundance of feasts, not only to prune away luxury, but also so that, by contemplation of the restraining precept, it might open the way to the exercise of reason, which would cut back the incitements of gluttony and the other desires and restrain the bodily passions and their motions. Temperance, then, is the forerunner of correction, the mistress of discipline.

Setting out from this, holy Jacob received from his brother the birthright which he did not possess, and being preferred by his consent, he taught for the future that the intemperate are by their own judgment of little worth to themselves. Setting out from this, Joseph both subdued the heat of youth and, when tempted by adulterous allurements, strengthened his mind by the persuasion of right reason. In short, though he was brave and strong, he chose rather to support himself by the exercise of reason, saying to his master's wife: «If my master knows nothing because of me in his house, and has given into my hands all things whatsoever he has, and nothing has been kept back from me except you, because you are his wife—how then shall I do this evil thing and sin before God?»

This, then, is the exercise of right reason, which the Greeks call logismos, by which the mind, intent upon wisdom, is made firm. For the reasoning is beautiful, that he ought neither to be ungrateful for his master's kindnesses, nor could the sin be hidden which he would commit with God as witness, from whom he could not hide. Good reason, therefore, which both strips away for the most part a hostile disposition and sets aside the pain of injury. In short, even on the battle-line it often calms the victor and slows the sword of one about to strike and snatches a suppliant from death, because just reason persuades one to spare the subdued. For about excluding or softening the pain of injury, what better teacher than the patriarch Jacob, who, rebuking his own sons Simeon and Levi, said:

«You have made me hateful, so that I seem cruel.» And indeed they had avenged the wrong done to their sister, who, contrary to the customs of her fathers, had been outraged by the violation of her chastity. Yet Jacob, the teacher of discipline, the guardian of chastity, could not approve the rape that had been committed, but chose rather that the insolent be restrained by reason, knowing that reason could temper indignation. Temperance, then, is what prunes away desires. This God commanded the first human beings to hold fast, saying: «But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of paradise, you shall not eat nor touch it, lest you die.» And because it was not held fast, therefore the transgressors of that excellent virtue were made exiles from paradise and deprived of immortality. This the law teaches and pours into the affections of all.

That it is to be taught—both as wisdom and as discipline—Scripture bears witness: concerning temperance in the law, concerning the rest in the book of Job, in which it is written: «Is it not the Lord who teaches understanding and discipline?» And in the Gospel the Lord himself says: «Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart.» And elsewhere he says to his disciples: «Go, teach the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.» But whence are they called disciples, or what else did they learn from Christ but to practice the precepts of the virtues? Finally David says: «Come, children, hear me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord.» Surely the fear of God is among the number of the virtues, for the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, through which is acquired the form of godly teaching, of which Paul says:

«But thanks be to God, that, though you were slaves of sin, you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine into which you were delivered; and being set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.» Teaching, therefore, brings it about that we are able to attain to righteousness. Righteousness can therefore be acquired by learning. Let us, then, apply ourselves with zeal to the form of the Gospel's teaching. The least bit of zeal is often reckoned for the greatest. For everything lies in zeal, through which obedience is brought to bear, which will incline toward whichever side—either fault, or grace which it joins to itself. This drew us in the first Adam to death; this in the second Adam called us to life. There is no reason for us to ascribe our wretchedness to anyone but our own will.

No one is bound to guilt unless by his own will he turns aside. There is no crime in things that are inflicted upon the unwilling; only the deeds done willingly does the odium of offenses follow—which we transfer onto others. Christ chooses for himself a willing soldier; the devil buys at auction for himself a willing slave. He possesses no one bound by the yoke of servitude unless that one has first sold himself to him for the price of sins. Why do we accuse the flesh as though it were weak? Our members are weapons of unrighteousness and weapons of righteousness. You saw a poor man receiving injury; you protected him: your members are weapons of piety, by which you vindicated the poor man from wrong. You saw a needy man; you gave to him gifts: with your right hand you repelled death from your breast.

You saw one being led to death; you snatched him away, for it is written: «Snatch away him who is led to death»: your members are weapons of righteousness, if you did not allow a man to perish unjustly. You saw a woman; you chastised your body, you put to death your lusts, and turning away from the bold eyes of the harlot you forsook her: your members are weapons of chastity. But on the contrary, if your eye looked upon a woman to desire her, you opened a wound, you drove a spear into your own body: your members are weapons of sin. You saw the property of orphans, and you drove them from their fathers' homes, you removed the boundary-stones which your fathers had set: your members are weapons of iniquity.

The disposition, therefore, not the flesh, is the author of guilt; the flesh, however, is the minister of the will. Let not our will, then, sell us. The apostle cries out: «Do you not know that to whomever you present yourselves as slaves to obey, you are the slaves of him whom you obey—whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?» Therefore, if we serve either sin or righteousness, let us consider in which case the servitude is more bearable and the fruit more abundant. But what fruit can there be in death? For the wages of sin is death, and therefore there is no fruit in it, but loss of honor, since we blush at what we have done. But to serve righteousness is liberty; for he who has been called in the Lord as a slave is the Lord's freedman; likewise he who has been called as free is Christ's slave.

Both conditions are best—to be under Christ, under whom is both precious servitude and glorious liberty: precious servitude, as having been purchased at the price of so great a blood; glorious liberty, which no servitude of fault, no chains of sins constrain, which no burdens of disgraceful deeds, no traffickings in crimes consign to the bond of base servitude. Learn humility, O man; recognize the force of the apostolic teaching. If you call yourself a slave, you are a freedman; if you boast yourself free, you are a slave. For both he who has been redeemed as a slave has liberty, and as for him who has been called as free, it is good for him to recognize that he is Christ's slave, under whom servitude is safe and liberty secure.

Who asserts that Paul was, as it were, an amateur even in matters of law? He knew how to distinguish between a freedman and a freeborn man, and therefore he spoke not carelessly but precisely: «For he who has been called in the Lord as a slave is the Lord's freedman; likewise he who has been called as free is Christ's slave.» For in truth we are all Christ's freedmen, no one freeborn; for all were begotten in servitude. Why do you, of servile inheritance, take to yourself the arrogance of freedom? Why do you usurp the titles of nobility? Do you not know that the guilt of Adam and Eve enslaved you to servitude? Do you not know that Christ redeemed you, did not merely buy you? «You were not redeemed with gold and silver from your vain manner of life handed down by your fathers, but with the precious blood of the Lamb,» cries out the apostle Peter.

Therefore you have been redeemed by the Lord and you are a slave, because you were created; you are a slave because you were redeemed, and you owe servitude both as to a master and as to a redeemer. And do not think that freedman-status under Christ is anything inferior to liberty. In dignity it is equal, in protection it is more excellent, in grace it is on a par, against the fall it is more guarded, against pride it is more sheltered. You have so received liberty that you ought to remember the one who set you free, that you may know that lawful homage is to be rendered to your patron, lest your liberty be revoked because of ingratitude. What is more blessed than you, who reign under a master and serve as a soldier under a patron? But what is there that the Lord has not bestowed upon you? He gave the law, he added grace.

For the law denounced sin, but in our slippery condition it could not utterly restrain it. «For I came to know sin, which I did not know; I came to know that covetousness is sin; and by this occasion of the knowledge of sin, the debts were heaped up, because sin, which before through my ignorance seemed dead, revived in me; but I died under the wound of sin,» because the knowledge of fault, which seemed likely to profit me, this harmed me—that I should know what I could not avoid. For it betrayed sin, and through the good of its own denunciation it heaped up the odium of sin itself. And so sin became to me beyond measure, because it was heaped up by the denunciation of the commandment; for guilt grows when it is exposed and not guarded against.

How then is the commandment good, which is death to me? Or how is it not death to me, that sin, to be made manifest through the good of its own signifying, wrought death in me? For it is certain that death came to me, while I recognize as sin that which I do, just as the Lord himself says: «If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin.» Why then do you marvel if the law is death to some, since even the saving coming of the Lord, through whom we have been redeemed, is death to some? For the unbeliever seeks death for himself out of grace, while the grace of the commandment remains. For just as the knowledge of poisoned cups is perfected for the discipline of medicine, so the divine commandment is perfected unto eternal life.

But just as, to one who misuses harmful potions, the knowledge of them turns to evil and peril, and the more he comes to know poisons, the more he understands himself to be in danger, so the form of the commandment is the author of death to those who interpret the law wrongly, or who, though the sins are pointed out and forbidden, cannot avoid them. Just as, therefore, a good antidote is not good to one who is imprudent or intemperate, so a good commandment is not good to the intemperate. Therefore the commandment is good, which to someone is death. Take, then, your answer to the first proposition, that the commandment which is death to me can be good: good by the nature of the saving precept, death through the intemperance of the flesh.

And since we have learned that the commandment which is death to me is good, let us now examine how that which through the good has worked death for me is not death to me. For the apostle proposed it thus: «Did then that which is good become death to me? Far from it; but sin, that it might appear as sin, through the good wrought death in me.» And so let us look at the particulars. The commandment is indeed of the law, but the law is spiritual, whose grace I see, whose beauty I praise. I proclaim its form, I admire the precept: but because I am carnal and have been sold under sin, I am dragged unwilling to fault. For guilt lords it over me as over a slave. And so I hate the crime and yet do it. The mind hates, the flesh lusts:

Yet I am in both: I who consent to the law with my mind, and with my flesh do that which I do not will. Good, therefore, is the commandment to which I consent, and good is the mind which chooses that which is good. Good for judging, but for the most part weak for resisting, because the body's appetite fights against it and drags it captive to the allurements of error. In which peril there is one remedy: that the grace of God should free him whom the law could not free. For so it is written: «O wretched man that I am, who shall free me from the body of this death? The grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord.» And so it comes about that, although the sin which lay hidden—that is, my covetousness, which I did not think to be sin—has wrought death for me,

while it is exposed, and the sin itself has been made beyond measure—for it was sin even though it was not known, but by knowledge it was heaped up and took on, as it were, an increase of error, and the form of the commandment passed over into the nature of an offense—yet it is not death to me, for whom it is ready to flee to Christ, through whom we are released from all peril of death. The second proposition, therefore, is also resolved: that the commandment of the law is not death to me, even if it works death. For our being troubled belongs to frailty, but our escaping belongs to Christ.

Therefore, to return to the beginning of this discourse: good is the mind which has the exercise of reason and is intent upon the disciplines of wisdom, but it has a grievous struggle with the body of death, and for the most part the allurement of the flesh overcomes the reason of the mind. Therefore the Lord first gave the law, to which the mind of man gave itself for obeying and began to serve it, that it might be made subject; but the flesh was not subject, because the wisdom of the flesh is not subject to the law and was fighting against its precepts. For it could not obey virtue, being given over to desires and entangled in carnal enticements. Therefore we must labor to hold fast the grace of God. The mind, then, is good if it is intent upon reason, but little perfected unless it has the governance of Christ.

For the Lord Jesus came, who would fasten our passions to his cross and forgive our sins. In his death we have been justified, that the whole world might be cleansed by his blood; in short, in his death we have been baptized. If, therefore, in his death our sins are remitted to us, let the passions of our sins also die in his death, let them be held fast, fastened by the nails of his cross. If in his death we have died, why are we recalled again, as though living, to the things that are worldly? What have we to do with the elements of the world, what with desires, what with luxury and wantonness, to which we have died in Christ? But if we have died in Christ, in Christ we have risen again;

let us therefore dwell with Christ, let us seek with Christ the things that are above, not the things that are corruptible and earthly. Christ, rising from the dead, left the old man fastened to the cross and raised up the new. Christ died for this reason, that we too might die to sin and rise again to God. Our flesh is dead; why does it live again to sin, why does it again obey sin? Why does sin again reign in the dead, since death is the end of sin? We are dead in the flesh; we have been renewed in the spirit. Let us walk in the spirit, because we have received the Spirit of Christ. But if Christ is in us, then let our flesh be dead because of sin, but let the spirit live because of justification.

Thus that which was impossible to the law is resolved, if we walk in the spirit: thus we bury the passions, if we do not loosen the cross of this body, if we do not rewrite the handwriting of sin which was blotted out on the cross of Christ, if we do not put on again the garment of the old man which we have stripped off. For it is written in the Song of Songs: «I have put off my tunic; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?» The members of the body, therefore, have been put to death for us; why do its vices sprout up again? For this reason the law did not prevail, because it did not mortify the flesh; for this reason it passed by like a shadow, because it gave no color; for this reason it even overshadowed us from the Sun of righteousness, because it heaped up crimes: therefore it even did harm.

Why then was it necessary that the law be promulgated, if it was not going to profit? We already had the law of nature; each one was a law to himself, who had the work of the law written in his heart. That we did not keep: why was another also added, in whose works the flesh could not be justified? A bond was added, not a release; the recognition of sins was added, not their remission. We all sinned, who could put forward an excuse through ignorance: the mouth was stopped for all. Yet it profited me. I began to confess what I was denying, I began to recognize my offense and not to cover up my unrighteousness, I began to pronounce against myself my unrighteousness to the Lord, «and you forgave the impieties of my heart.»

But this also profits me, that we are not justified by the works of the law. I have nothing, therefore, in which I might glory in my own works; I have nothing in which to boast, and therefore I will glory in Christ. I will not glory because I am righteous, but I will glory because I have been redeemed. I will glory not because I am empty of sins, but because my sins have been remitted to me. I will not glory because I have profited anyone, nor because anyone has profited me, but because Christ is my advocate before the Father, because the blood of Christ was poured out for me. My fault has become for me the price of redemption, through which Christ came to me. For my sake Christ tasted death. More fruitful is fault than innocence. Innocence had made me arrogant; fault rendered me submissive.

You have, therefore, the ways in which the giving of the law profited you. But you say that through the law sin abounded. Yet where sin abounded, grace also abounded. You have died to sin, O man; therefore the law no longer hinders. You rise again through grace; therefore the law profited, because it acquired grace. You have also received the pledge of Christ's love, since he who died for you is your advocate and reserves the reward of his blood, and he who reconciled the sinner to the Father much more commends the innocent and protects the subject, because he has adopted the guiltless. Being then a debtor of so great a benefit, do you not repay homage? He has made you an heir, he has made you a co-heir, an heir of God, a co-heir of Christ: he has poured into you the spirit of adoption.

Count these things and add them up, not so much toward the bond of debt as toward the preservation of the gift received. You are a co-heir of Christ, if you suffer with him, if you die with him, if you are buried together with Christ. Take up his sufferings, that you may deserve to be with him above the sufferings. See how he has forgiven you your former sins, so that he made what you sinned do no harm. See how he exhorts you not to lose what you have received. The goal of this brief labor is near, and the crown is the fruit of perpetual reward; the suffering is bearable, the recompense beyond all reckoning. For what afflicts you? Is it the abjectness of obscurity? But there will be for you in the future the glorious nobility of devotion and faith. Is your estate too slender, your sustenance too narrow?

But there will be for you the riches of eternal recompense, in which you can lack nothing whatever. Is it the loss of children? You will receive perpetual ones, whom you had received as temporal. It will be said of you: «Blessed is he who has seed in Zion and household members in Jerusalem.» «The sufferings of this present time,» she says, «are unworthy to be compared to the glory to come»—so Scripture tells you. Add that the blessed life is not diminished by these adversities of worldly troubles or bodily sufferings, but is rather proven. Add that it does not feel the losses of patrimony, or hides with a brave mind the loss of kindred, and swallows up grief. Add that he knows no shipwrecks who is ever in the harbor of tranquility.

What of this, that your labor is shared in common with the whole of creation, since for your sake the world itself endures the servitude of corruption, since with the saints you have a common fellowship of this labor and of expectation? The sun acknowledges its own setting, the moon its waning, the lights of the stars their wandering, while the redemption of our whole body is awaited. But do you fear the doubtful windings of life and the snares of the adversary, when you have the help of God, when you have so great a regard from him that for your sake he did not spare his own Son? Scripture has used a beautiful word, to declare the loving purpose of God the Father toward you, who offered his Son to death. And the Son could not feel the bitterness of death, in that he was in the Father:

He kept nothing for himself, he offered all for you, in that, in the fullness of his divinity, he himself lost nothing and yet redeemed you. Consider the Father's love. As an act of devotion he took on, as it were, the peril of a Son about to die, he drank, as it were, the grief of bereavement, lest the fruit of redemption should be lost to you. So great was the Lord's zeal for your salvation, that he all but put himself at risk, while he was gaining you. He, for your sake, took on our losses, that he might graft you into things divine and consecrate you to the heavenly. Marvel that Scripture even added: «For us all he delivered him up,» to show that he so loves all, that he delivered up for individuals the Son most dear to himself.

For those, then, for whom he gave that which is above all things, can it come about that he has not given them all things in him? For he excepted nothing who yielded up the author of all. There is nothing, therefore, which we should fear can be denied us, nothing in which we ought to lose our perseverance and distrust the divine bounty, whose generosity was so long-lasting and continuous, that first he predestined, then called, and those whom he called these he also justified, and those whom he justified these he also glorified. Can he forsake those whom he has followed up with such great benefits all the way to their rewards? Among so many benefits of God, are any snares of the accuser to be feared? But who would dare to accuse those whom he sees chosen by divine judgment?

Can God the Father himself, who bestowed his gifts, rescind them, and banish from the grace of paternal affection those whom he received by adoption? But is the fear that the judge may be too severe? Consider whom you have as judge. Surely the Father has given all judgment to Christ. Can he then condemn you whom he redeemed from death, for whom he offered himself, whose life he recognizes to be the recompense of his own death? Will he not say: «What profit is there in my blood, if I condemn him whom I myself have saved?» Then you consider the judge, you do not consider the advocate. Can he pass a more severe sentence, who does not cease to intercede, that the grace of the Father's reconciliation may be conferred upon us? But even if some grievous things should threaten, by no means should they separate us from Christ.

Why should we not, for his sake, endure even hard and bitter things, who for our sake took on things so unworthy? And therefore love ought to be in us, so that by no perils we are called back from Christ. For it is written: «Many waters will not be able to extinguish love, and rivers will not enclose it, for the soul of one who loves crosses the torrent.» No tempest, no deep peril, no terror of death or punishment diminishes the force of love; for in these we are proven, in these is the blessed life, even if it be flooded with many perils. For the wise man is not broken by the pains of the body, nor harassed by misfortunes, but even amid afflictions he remains blessed.

For the adversities of the body neither diminish the gift of the blessed life, nor sip away anything of its sweetness, because the blessedness of life is not in the delight of the body, but in a conscience pure from every stain of sin, and in the mind of him who recognizes that what is good delights, even if it be harsh, while what is unseemly, even if it be sweet, does not soothe. The cause, therefore, of living well is not bodily delight, but the prudence of the mind. For it is not the flesh, which is subject to passion, but the mind, which judges, because nothing delights better than the honorableness of counsels and the beauty of works; this, then, is the interpreter of the blessed life.

For prudence, or reason, the arbiter of passion, is better than passion, and that which judges is more excellent than that which is subject to judgment. For it cannot be that what is irrational should be better than reason. He therefore has in himself his own recompense, who follows Jesus, and in his own disposition he has reward and grace. Even if he endures hard things, he is nevertheless blessed in his own character, blessed in the very perils, as the Lord defined when he said: «Blessed are those who suffer persecution for the sake of righteousness.» There is, then, a blessed life in human beings, but in those, namely, in whom life shall have been perfect. But the perfect life is not this sensible one, but that rational one, according to the exercise of reason and the liveliness of the mind.

In which there is not a portion of the man, but the perfection, which lies not so much in the condition of the man as in his operation; for this is what makes him blessed. To this man, then, what is good except he himself to himself? That which he has, this good is also present to him and will be for him the cause of future goods. Of this good Solomon said: «Drink water from your own vessels and from the springs of your own wells. Let your waters overflow from your own fountain, but let them run abroad in your streets. Let them be set apart for you alone, and let no stranger be a partaker with you. Let the fountain of your water be your own.» Use, therefore, your own inner good. The greatest testimony of this good is that he who has it does not seek other things.

For what should he seek who despises lower things and clings to the most excellent, as it is written: «Let the deer of friendship and the colt of graces converse with you? Let friendship go before you and be one with you in every time»; for good is the friendship of the virtues and the love of the highest good. And so that perfect man seeks nothing else but the one and surpassing good. Whence he also says: «One thing I have asked of the Lord, this I will seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, and behold the delight of the Lord.» Nor indeed should you disdain him as though he were narrow and poor, because he is content with the, as it were, solitary fellowship of the one good. For surrounded by the friendship of this good he will be most abundant.

For to a man of this kind there abounds enough for blessedness and for the possession of the good, and therefore he desires nothing else. For he seeks nothing as though it were new, who has all things. For there is nothing of good which he does not have, nor is he delighted by superfluous things, but by necessary ones—and by that very thing which is necessary not to himself but to the flesh that cleaves to him; and he indulges that which does not differ from the purpose of the inner man, so that he may make both one and reconcile the inner man to God, together with the outer, that in both there may be one spirit. The man, then, of this purpose is neither diminished by losses, nor broken by adversities, nor hindered by barriers, nor saddened by the losses of his own. For their instruction the apostle says:

'We would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning them that are asleep, that you be not sorrowful, even as the rest who have no hope.' For he consoles himself with faith in the resurrection and with the grace of the reward to come, nor does he receive sadness into that mind by which he cleaves to God and rejoices in the delight of the divine presence. But he who is grieved over these things is not grieved according to God, and what is not according to God is full of folly. From the perfect man, therefore, the sorrow of this world is far removed, which is not according to God, as is also every anxiety over bodily hardship.

For to this disposition of mind and substance there is not reckoned the condition of the body, nor any external use of nature, since the unconquered soul ought to preserve a uniform constancy alike against the pleasures of the body and the very frailty of nature, against bereavements, losses, and insults. Thus he who desires to hold the palm of blessedness must cut into the body itself and strip off the senses of the flesh, for the fruit of that blessedness lies not in the possession of one virtue but, if it be possible, in the fellowship of many, indeed of all the virtues. The perfect man, therefore, neither knows the discomforts of this body nor the adversities of the world, nor does he feel them, since he bears a mind alien to any fear that they may befall him. For the more perfect life is not defined by being free from these things, but by despising them.

For if it were so defined, that the blessed life were one which could be found free and empty of such mishaps, then surely when these things befell, no one could be defined as blessed. These things, therefore, are set aside, and this alone is required in the estimation of the blessed life: that its definition be held not in other things, but in the possession of what is true and good; since he who has this spurns the rest and seeks them not. I now ask whether the wise man takes delight in bodily health. We cannot deny that he delights in it according to nature, and that he gladly accepts feeling no pain rather than pain — unless perchance for Christ's sake, for whom, if the cause demand it, he would readily accept even the disabling of his body and offer his whole body to death.

Yet the same man, even apart from the cause of faith and righteousness, if health be lacking, is not stricken in soul nor broken by bodily pain, for he can console himself with the perfection of the virtues. I ask also whether he delights in children. Who would deny this? For it is not a hard and iron man, but a perfect man, that is sought. Yet even if he lose his children, he is not therefore less blessed, who is therefore no less perfect; for what is perfect is blessed. Indeed, such a perfect man is wont to appear more so if he endures adversity than if he abounds in prosperity; although neither when external advantages or bodily joys are absent nor when they are present is anything wont to be taken from his virtue or added to it. Yet for very many it has redounded as much to praise to have borne adversity bravely as never to have fallen into it.

But these things are weighed by appearance, not by true worth. That is the deep thing: that the righteous man wills nothing save that one and surpassing good; that he reaches out to this alone, accounts this one thing among his goods, ever desires not another thing along with it but it alone, and in this takes his delight. If to him another thing be joined which delights him — as is the sweetness of children — that one good is not lost, but this other is added. For accidents do not diminish the blessedness which they cannot increase, because that good remains full and inviolable, into which the soul clothes itself and into which it has grafted and poured itself. Perfect virtue remains ever amid adversities and delights, and neither do adversities diminish anything of its perfection nor do delights add to its perfection.

For what is there that he who has ascended to the summit should feel either of loss from perishable things or of advantage? Nor indeed — though this is held by most to be the gravest of evils — will he think himself wretched if he himself or his children should come into captivity; for he will not bear intolerably what nature holds, or what seems good to the Lord. Indeed the righteous man said: 'Good is the word that the Lord has spoken'; and he said: 'Let there be peace and faithfulness in my days.' Surely this righteous Hezekiah did not rejoice that the hardship of captivity had passed down upon his sons; but he could not gainsay the will of the Lord, and therefore he received His commands with an even mind, like a humble servant. There is added this also: that he could reckon that even in captivity the merit of virtue could shine forth.

For Jeremiah was no less blessed in captivity, nor Daniel less, nor Ezra less, nor were the blessed Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishael less blessed than if they had not fallen into captivity; for they were led into captivity precisely that they might bring to the people both present comforts in captivity and hope of escaping captivity. For it belongs to the perfect man to sustain the common lot of nature by strength of soul and to lead it to better things, and not to succumb to those things which seem to most men terrible and dreadful, but, like a brave soldier, to bear up under the assaults of the gravest disasters, to undergo the conflicts; and, like a provident helmsman, to steer the ship in a storm, and, by meeting the rising waves, rather to avoid shipwreck by cleaving the waves than by shunning them.

This man is not fearful in persecution, not softened amid torments so as to provoke the torturer; but like a brave athlete who strikes back at the one who scourges him — if not with blows, at least with the lash of his speech — who despises the torments dreaded by many, saying: 'The strokes inflicted on them have become the arrows of children.' Though he wrestle with the gravest pain, he does not show himself pitiable, but displays, as a light in a lantern, that even amid harsh tempests and the gravest blasts his light shines, and that the virtue of his soul cannot be extinguished.

This man is not soft under wrongs done to his own, nor anxious about the tomb of his own body, knowing that heaven is owed to it; not more abject in the captivity of his fellow citizens, but like a stern judge condemning the perfidy and errors of the unfaithful — as did Daniel, who exposed the thefts of the priests and refuted their superstitions, showing that they rested on no truth but were veiled by frauds. Such, in short, is the perfect man, who would have all act well and that no evil befall anyone; and if, against his will, evil should befall, he himself nonetheless loses nothing of his own blessedness.

But perhaps someone might think that sickness and weakness of the body are a hindrance to fulfilling the office of perfection, on the ground that no works of the hands or deeds can proceed. But the righteous man will not feel these to be a hindrance to himself; nay, he will rebuke even the man who pitiably bewails such things and convict him as it were of cowardice, because he reckons more in the use of the body than in the virtue of the soul; because he desires those things to which he would be a slave, when he has that whereby he could rather command others; because he groans in poverty, who could be above the world's wealth — for to the faithful man the whole world of riches belongs — because he laments his lowly birth, who ought to despise royal powers and to command the rich and the mighty.

For this is the life of the righteous man: who ought to reckon as common even the means he has, nay even to divide them among the needy, to dispense to the poor; to cut back his own pleasures, to reduce his expenditure, to apply the thrift of temperance, to keep sobriety in prosperity, patience in adversity, endurance in pain, magnanimity in dangers; to know no vows for perpetual health, not to be shaken by the terror of impending death, nor to think him more excellent for whom, according to nature, children, kinsmen, well-being, gladness, and abundance have overflowed, than him to whom these have been lacking; and to weigh merits not by the externals of the world but by the household goods of virtue. Who would deny that this too is the pattern of the righteous man: to fear nothing,

to dread nothing except the losses of virtue, and to repress the empty fears of others — fears which they have over the anxiety of dangers, the dread of death, the infirmity of the body — so that he may teach that to be dissolved from the body and to be with Christ is much better, and may show that operations are not hindered by the weaknesses of the body, but are increased; and that a man is commended not by the splendor of his lineage, nor by the support of his kinsmen, nor by his wealth, but by a good disposition of heart.

For Elijah was no less blessed than Moses, although the one, needy of food, in a cheap sheepskin, without children, without provision, without companion, and the other, leader of peoples, glad in his offspring, girded with power, by their diverse manner established an equal merit — as was declared in the Gospel when they shone forth with the Lord Jesus in the glory of the resurrection; for He seems to have given them an equal reward as if to equal witnesses of His glory. Nor was Elisha less blessed than David, although the one was subject to kings and the other endowed with royal power, they attained a grace of prophetic sanctification by no means unequal. For what is lacking to him who possesses that good and has ever as his companion and consort virtue itself? In what state is he not most powerful?

In what poverty is he not rich? In what lowliness of birth not illustrious? In what leisure not industrious? In what disability not vigorous? In what infirmity not strong? In what quiet of sleep not at rest — he whom his own virtue does not forsake even while he rests? In what solitude not thronged — he whom the blessed life surrounds, whom grace clothes, whom the mantle of glory illumines? For he is no less blessed at leisure than when he works, no less glorious sleeping than waking, because he is no less safe and sound asleep than when awake. But when can he seem to be at rest, whose mind ever works? And when is he alone, who is ever with that good, of which the prophet says: 'We shall be filled with the good things of Your house'?

When is he cast down, whose conversation is in heaven? When is he not comely, who conforms himself to the likeness of that comely and only good — who, even if he be loosed in his limbs, yet lifts himself up in mind? And just like one accustomed to play upon the lyre: if he should see it broken to pieces, its strings slackened and shattered, and its use interrupted,

would cast it away and not seek out its melodies, but would soothe himself with his own voice — so this man too will suffer the lyre of his body to lie idle, and will delight himself in his heart, soothe himself by the remembrance of a good conscience, lift himself up by the divine oracles and the prophetic writings, holding that sweet and joyful thing in his soul, embracing it in his mind, to whom nothing sad can befall, since the grace of the divine presence ever breathes upon him, and he himself is present to himself, suffused with the highest tranquillity of soul. THE SECOND BOOK. In the previous book we discoursed on the precepts of the virtues; in the one that follows let us make use of the examples of illustrious men, who, placed in the gravest dangers, did not lose the blessedness of life, but rather gained it.

Was not Jacob also blessed, even when he forsook his fatherland? Nay, plainly blessed, who took up the hardships of exile in order to soften his brother's wrath. For if he is blessed who turns aside from sin, surely he cannot be denied blessed who lightens another's fault and averts a crime. And so by voluntary exile he turned aside a parricide that was prepared, and by that deed sought safety for himself and bestowed innocence upon his brother. Deservedly, then, divine grace accompanied him everywhere, so that even when he slept he acquired the gift of the blessed life. For he saw the mysteries of things to come and heard divine oracles. A good laborer in sleep and rich in poverty, who by the service of a hireling's life procured both a patrimony and a marriage by the same office.

This same man, an excellent reconciler of brotherly affection, strove with gifts and acts of deference to shut out all indignation and to turn away the pain of offense, showing that he had not been made the less by exile, who could lavish what he had not received. But I am hastening too much to lower matters and running over things merely useful, when first it must be defined what 'blessed' is. For it is written:

'Blessed is the man who has not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, and has not stood in the way of sinners, and has not sat in the seat of pestilence' — Scripture thereby signifying that he is blessed who has either kept himself from the fellowship of the faithless (for this is impiety: not to acknowledge the Author of life and a certain Parent of salvation), or has not abided in sin, or has not persevered in luxury and wantonness. And it signifies that he too, meditating in the law of the Lord day and night, shall be like a tree that shall give its fruit in its season. The former are merits leading to rewards; this is the reward of merits.

Which of these things that pertain to the blessedness of merits was lacking to holy Jacob, who was so far from the fellowship of the ungodly that from him the faithful people received its name, being called Israel — because with the eyes of his inner mind he beheld God, abstaining from sin, sober from all the drunkenness of luxury, so that he swallowed up the hardships of labors and neglected the security of leisure? Was it not beautifully and truly said of him that he too 'shall give his fruit in its season,' of whom it is written: 'Behold, the smell of my son is as the smell of a full field'? For he was perfect in every flower of the virtues and breathed forth the grace of sacred blessing and heavenly blessedness.

For he himself is the field which the Lord blessed — not that earthly field, rough with woods, or broken with torrents, or marshy with sluggish waters, or barren of grain, or useless for vines, stony with still-unfruitful gravel, or cracked and dried up with drought, or soaked with blood, or untended and overgrown with brambles and thorns — but that field of which the Church says in the Song of Songs: 'I have adjured you, daughters of Jerusalem, by the powers and strengths of the field.' For this is the field of which the Lord also says: 'And the beauty of the field is with me.'

In this field is found that grape which, when pressed, poured forth blood and washed the world; in this field is that fig tree, beneath which the saints shall rest, refreshed by the sweetness of spiritual grace; in this field is that fruitful olive, flowing with the ointment of the Lord's peace; in this field bloom the pomegranates, which cover their many fruits under the one safeguard of faith and cherish them in a certain embrace of charity. These fruits, then, did Jacob breathe forth, who followed God through dangers and believed himself everywhere safe under His guidance. For although the sweet and pleasant fragrance of the field belongs to it because it is the fragrance of nature, yet in the holy patriarch it was the grace of the virtues that breathed. How temperate was his thrift, who did not even crave the food prepared for himself,

but yielded it without delay to his brother who asked. From him he received the primacy of the blessing. How dutiful toward his parents, that he deserved by his mother's affection to be preferred to his elder brother and to be hallowed by the gift of his father's blessing! How religious, that he refused to wound his brother; how modest, that he feared to deceive his father; how honoring, that he could not refuse his mother what he was commanded! But neither must the parents be left unexcused by us, in that they preferred the younger son to the elder. At the same time, we must beware lest anyone, while attending to their example, hold an unjust judgment among his children, so as to think one to be loved and the other passed over. For from this brotherly hatreds are stirred up, and over the increase of vile money a parricidal crime is contrived.

Let the same measure of love cherish one's offspring. Yet grant that affection may seize something more around the more endearing or the more like child: the form of justice ought to be equal toward all. More is conferred on the beloved, for whom the love of his brothers is sought; but more is taken away from him who is burdened with the resentment of an unjust preference. Esau threatened that he would kill his brother, and neither brotherly kinship nor reverence for his parents recalled him from his parricidal fury; and he grieved that the blessing had been snatched from him, of which assuredly he ought to have proved himself worthy by gentleness, not by crime. But Rebecca too preferred not so much son to son as the just to the unjust. For with a devout mother the mystery outweighed the mere pledge of blood:

she was not so much preferring him to his brother as offering him to the Lord, whom she knew able to preserve the gift conferred on her. In this she was also taking thought for the other, whom she was withdrawing from a divine offense, lest he be entangled in a graver guilt, if he were to lose the grace of the blessing once received. Yet receive a good contest between the parents. Let the mother bring affection, the father judgment. Let the mother incline with tender devotion toward the younger; let the father preserve toward the elder the honor of nature. Let the one honor the more, the other love the more. While each cherishes one, let them not conspire against either, defrauding the other. Let there be equality amid diverse contests, and by unequal pursuits let grace be conferred equally on both by the equal love of the parents. Let the one make up for what the other diminishes.

Thus with devout affection did the patriarch Isaac and holy Rebecca contend, so as to make neither the inferior, but both equal. Yet he prevailed who was preferred by the oracle; promptness prevailed over slowness, gentleness over harshness. While the one sought rustic prey by rough hunting, this one ministered to his devout father foods of gentle manners, domestic grace, sweet feasts of tender meekness and piety. Whatever comes of its own accord pleases more in the affections than whatever you may have thought must be presented studiously. Jacob went to the sheep and brought the offspring of innocence, or rather the gifts of sacred prophecy; for he believed no food sweeter to the patriarch than Christ, who was led as a sheep to the slaughter and as a lamb to the sacrifice.

This food, profitable both for the parent in public office and for the people whose type he bore, he judged to be that whereby there was to be the remission of sins. Therefore he received the robe of his brother, because he excelled in aged wisdom; therefore the younger brother stripped the elder brother, because he shone forth in the dignity of faith. This robe, in a type of the Church, Rebecca brought forth and gave to her younger son — the robe of the Old Testament, the prophetic and priestly robe, that royal robe of David, the robe of Solomon, of the kings Hezekiah and Josiah — and gave it to the Christian people, who would know how to use the mantle received, since the people of the Jews had it without use and knew not their own adornments. This robe lay in shadow, set aside and neglected;

for it was darkened by the gloomy mist of impiety, nor could it be more amply unfolded in the narrow heart of the people. The Christian people put it on, and it shone forth. They illumined it with the clarity of their faith and with the light of devout deeds. Isaac recognized the familiar smell of his own kindred, recognized the robe of the old Scripture; but the voice of the old people he did not recognize, and therefore knew it to be changed. For the same robe remains even today, but the confession of the more devoted people has begun to be melodious; and he rightly said: 'The voice indeed is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.' And he smelled the smell of the garments.

And perhaps this is the meaning: that we are justified not by works but by faith, since carnal infirmity is a hindrance to works, but the clarity of faith overshadows the error of deeds, and merits pardon for offenses. After the blessing had been celebrated, the elder brother afterward arrived. By this it is declared that the kingdom of the Church was conferred earlier than that of the Synagogue in predestination, but that the Synagogue entered in afterward, that sin might abound, and when sin had abounded, grace also might abound; and at the same time that it might be made clear that the candidate for the heavenly kingdom must be diligent, so that he may snatch the blessing first and claim the prerogative of his commendation. Hence the younger son was not censured by his father, but praised, in that Isaac said:

'Your brother came with guile and received your blessing.' For good is the guile where the seizure is irreproachable; and irreproachable is the seizure of piety, since 'from the days of John the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent seize it.' For the fathers, hastening, kept the Passover, who in haste ate the lamb, not lingering; and holy Joseph, by a contrivance of devout deception, summoned and held his brother Benjamin. And yet he himself, by compelling, drew out and obtained a blessing for himself to be blessed — but that blessing which should agree and accord with the former, namely, that he should serve his brother. For he who could not command and rule another ought to serve, that he might be ruled by the wiser.

For it was not the part of the holy patriarch to assign his son to the degenerate condition of servitude, but, like a good father who had two sons — the one intemperate, the other prudent and sober — to take counsel for both, he set the sober over the intemperate and ordained the foolish to obey the prudent; because the foolish cannot be a willing disciple of virtue nor persevere in zeal, since the fool 'is changed like the moon.' And deservedly he denied him the liberty of his own choice, lest like a ship in the waves he should drift without a helmsman. But he subjected him to his brother according to what is written: 'For the imprudent serves the prudent.' Rightly, then, did he subject him, that by the command of the one ruling he might better his own disposition. And therefore he says:

'By your sword shall you live, and you shall serve your brother'; for piety is the mistress of cruelty, and meekness prevails over harsh impulses. Everyone serves who has not the authority of a pure conscience; everyone serves who is either broken by fear, or ensnared by pleasure, or led by lusts, or exasperated by indignation, or cast down by grief. For every passion is servile, since 'he who commits sin is the servant of sin,' and what is worse, he who is subject to vices is the servant of many. He has handed himself over to many masters, so that he can scarcely be permitted to go out from such servitude.

But truly that man who is the arbiter of his own will, the judge of his own counsel, the interpreter of his own choice; who restrains the appetite of bodily passion; who does well the things he does — and doing well, he acts rightly, and he who acts rightly acts blamelessly and irreproachably, having power over his own acts — he assuredly is free. For he who does all things prudently and so as he wills, he alone is free. It is not chance condition that makes a slave, but shameful folly. Indeed, a prudent servant rules foolish masters, and 'their own servants shall lend to their masters.' What shall they lend? Not money, surely, but wisdom, just as the law also says: 'You shall lend to many nations, but you yourself shall not borrow.'

For the Jew lent to the proselyte the oracles of the divine law; but because he himself could not see the mysteries of the law and knew not the oracles he possessed — he who lent the letter to the nations — now from them he borrows the grace of spiritual doctrine, and deservedly has been made subject to servitude, since he who borrows is a servant, as one bound to the interest of his creditor; whereas he who imparts the interest of devout doctrine, he is the prince, just as the law says: 'You shall be prince of many nations, but princes from among them shall not be over you.' For he is a prince who rules and who has the principate of wisdom. This the people of the Jews had; but since it could not keep what it taught, it must learn what it knew not how to teach. This, then, is what the patriarch Isaac says:

'You shall serve your brother. But it shall come to pass when you shall lay down and loose his yoke from your neck' — signifying that there would be two peoples to come, the one the son of the bondwoman, the other of the free (for the letter serves, but grace is free), and that the people which attends to the letter would be a servant so long as it should follow the interpreter of spiritual doctrine. Then too there shall come to pass that which the Apostle says: 'That the remnant may be saved according to the election of grace.' You shall serve your brother, therefore; but then you shall feel the gain of servitude, when you shall have begun to obey your brother willingly rather than by compulsion. Hence arose envy, and Esau threatened that after his father's death he would kill his brother.

But if this should happen, let us learn from Rebecca how it must be provided against, lest envy stir up wrath and wrath break out into parricide. Let Rebecca come — that is, let one be clothed with patience, the good guardian of innocence — and let her counsel that we give place to anger. Let us withdraw somewhat further off, until indignation be softened with time and forgetfulness of the offense creep in. And so patience does not dread exile, but undertakes it readily, not so much to avoid peril to safety as to turn aside the incitement of crime. The devout mother too endures that her most beloved son be away from her, conferring the more upon him whom she has hurt, yet taking thought for both, that she might keep the one free from parricide and the other untouched by crime.

We have heard what intemperance, drunk with bodily lusts, has said; let us consider what true virtue does. It requires nothing save the grace of God; it follows that one and highest good alone; it is content with Him alone, from whom we receive all things, while to Him we ourselves confer nothing, since He has need of nothing. As David says: 'I said to my Lord, You are my Lord, since You have no need of my goods.' For of what has He need who abounds in all things and lavishes all upon us, and ministers everything without defect? 'And Jacob set forth and slept' — which is the token of a soul at quiet — 'and he saw the angels of God ascending and descending.'

This means that he foresaw Christ on earth, to whom a host of angels descended and ascended, to render service in dutiful ministry to their own Lord. And he came to the well, that he might drink of his own vessels and from the springs of his own wells, and that the waters might overflow for him from his own fountain; for 'the fountain of life is in the hands of the righteous.' And he came to Laban and pastured his sheep. Iniquity dwells unaccompanied; wisdom does not omit the office of ruling. It knows not to be idle even among things that are another's; it knows not to be an exile among strangers. For how should it be — wisdom, which everywhere preserves its own right and holds within itself what it possesses?

As a hireling the righteous man enters in and yet is a ruler, who was gathering for himself, by the ministry of evangelical preaching, a flock shining with the splendor of many surpassing virtues, so that he set before the sheep about to drink the rod of storax and of the nut tree and of the plane tree in the troughs, that, conceiving by the conception of a devout mind the prefigured mysteries of the most blessed Trinity, they might form by no means discolored offspring. Good sheep, which brought forth not degenerate offspring of good works of sacred faith. By the storax is signified the incense and the evening sacrifice which is offered to God the Father in the Psalm. By the rod of the nut tree the priestly office is offered to Christ;