Works (City of God, On the Trinity, etc.) 43

I. 1. You have asked me, brother Deogratias, that I should write something to you concerning the catechizing of the uninstructed, which might be of use to you. For you said that often at Carthage, where you are a deacon, there are brought to you those who are to be first instructed in the Christian faith, because you are esteemed to have an abundant faculty for catechizing, both by the doctrine of the faith and by the sweetness of speech: but that you yourself almost always suffer straits as to how that very thing whereby we are Christians by believing may be fittingly imparted; whence the narration is to be begun, and to what point it is to be carried through; whether, the narration being ended, we ought to add some exhortation, or precepts only, by whose observance he to whom we speak may know that the Christian life and profession is to be maintained.

And you confessed and complained that it had often befallen you that, in a long and lukewarm discourse, you yourself became worthless in your own eyes and grew wearisome to yourself, still more so to him whom you were instructing by speaking, and to the others who were present as hearers: and that by this necessity you were compelled to constrain me, by that charity which I owe you, not to be reluctant, amid my occupations, to write something to you on this matter. 2. But I am compelled, not only by that charity which I owe you familiarly, but also by that which I owe universally to our mother the Church, by charity and service, if by my labour — which by the bounty of our Lord I am able to render — the Lord bids that those same persons whom He has made my brethren be aided, in no wise to refuse, but rather with a ready and devoted will to undertake it.

For the more I desire that the Lord's money be more widely distributed, the more it behoves me — if I know that any of my fellow-servants the dispensers feel any difficulty in the disbursing — to do what in me lies, that they may be able easily and expeditiously to do what they diligently and zealously wish. II. 3. But as to what pertains properly to your own consideration, I would not have you moved by the fact that you have often seemed to yourself to have a mean and wearisome discourse. For it may be that it did not so seem to him whom you were instructing, but that, because you were desiring that something better should be heard, that which you were saying seemed to you unworthy of the ears of others. For to me too my own discourse almost always displeases.

For I am greedy of something better, which I often enjoy within, before I begin to unfold it in sounding words: and when I prove less than it is known to me within, I am saddened that my tongue could not suffice to my heart. For I wish that whoever hears me may understand all that I understand; and I feel that I do not speak so as to bring this about: chiefly because that understanding floods the mind as it were with a rapid flash; whereas that utterance is slow and long, and far unlike it: and while this is being unrolled, already that has hidden itself away in its secret places: yet because it has in a wondrous way imprinted certain traces upon the memory, those traces endure along with the little delays of the syllables;

and from these same traces we effect sounding signs, which are called a language, whether Latin, or Greek, or Hebrew, or any other; whether these signs be thought, or even be uttered by the voice; whereas those traces are proper neither to Latin, nor Greek, nor Hebrew, nor of any other nation, but are wrought in the mind as is the countenance in the body. For anger is called one thing in Latin, another in Greek, and yet another by the diversity of other tongues; but the countenance of an angry man is neither Latin nor Greek. Not, therefore, do all nations understand, when anyone says, I am angry, but the Latins only: yet if the affection of the kindled mind come forth into the face and make a countenance, all who behold the angry man perceive it.

But neither is it permitted so to draw forth and as it were spread out, through the sound of the voice, into the sense of the hearers those traces which the understanding imprints on the memory, as the countenance is open and manifest: for those are within in the mind, this is without in the body. Wherefore it must be conjectured how far the sound of our mouth is distant from that stroke of the intelligence, when it is not even like to the impression of the memory itself. But we, for the most part vehemently ardent for the profit of the hearer, wish to speak just as we understand at the time, when through that very intentness we cannot speak: and because we do not succeed, we are distressed, and, as though we spent our labour in vain, we languish with weariness:

and from this very weariness the same discourse becomes more languid and duller than it was, whence it led us to weariness. 4. But often the zeal of those who desire to hear me shows me that my eloquence is not so frigid as it seems to me: and that they take something useful from it, I recognize from their delight; and I diligently strive with myself not to fail in rendering this ministry, in which I see them well receive what is rendered. So too you, from this very fact that there are more often brought to you those who are to be instructed in the faith, ought to understand that your discourse does not so displease others as it displeases you: nor ought you to think yourself unfruitful, because you do not unfold as you desire the things which you discern; since perhaps you cannot even discern them as you desire.

For who in this life sees save in a riddle and through a glass? (1 Cor. 13:12) Nor is love itself so great that, the darkness of the flesh being rent asunder, it penetrates into the eternal serenity, whence even these things that pass away somehow shine forth. But because the good advance from day to day toward seeing the day without the revolution of heaven and without the incursion of night, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it ascended into the heart of man (1 Cor. 2:9): there is no greater cause why in instructing the uninstructed our discourse should grow worthless to us, save that it pleases us to discern in an unwonted manner, and it wearies us to speak in the wonted manner. And in very truth we are heard far more gladly when we too are delighted with the same work:

For the thread of our discourse is affected by our very own gladness, and it flows out more easily and more acceptably. It is therefore no difficult task to prescribe which of the things that are set before us for belief should be narrated, and how far the narration should extend; nor how the narration is to be varied, so that at one time it may be shorter and at another longer, yet always full and complete; and when the shorter and when the longer form is to be used. But the greatest care is this: by what means it may be brought about that each one may catechize with gladness (for the more gladly he can do it, the more pleasing he will be). And indeed the precept concerning this matter is ready at hand. For if even in bodily wealth 'God loveth a cheerful giver' [2 Cor. ix.], how much more in spiritual things?

[7] But that this cheerfulness should be present for the hour belongs to the mercy of Him who gave these commands. And so we shall discuss first the manner of narration, which I have learned that you desire [see chapters iii-vi]; then the manner of instructing and exhorting [chapters vii-ix]; and afterwards the procuring of this cheerfulness [chapters x-xiv], according as God shall suggest. III. 5. The narration is full when each one is first catechized from that which is written, 'In the beginning God made heaven and earth' [Gen. i. 1], down to the present times of the Church.

Yet we ought not on that account to recite from memory the whole Pentateuch, and the whole books of Judges and of Kingdoms and of Ezra, and the whole Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles, if we have learned them word for word, or to unfold and explain in our own words, by narrating, all that is contained in these volumes; for neither does the time allow it, nor does any necessity demand it. Rather we should embrace the whole summarily and generally, in such a way that certain more wonderful things are chosen out, which are heard with greater pleasure and are set as it were at the very joints; so that we ought not to display them as though wrapped up in coverings and at once snatch them away from sight, but rather, dwelling upon them a little, we should as it were unfold and spread them open, and offer them to the minds of our hearers to be examined and admired;

but the rest we should weave in by inserting them in a swift passing-over. Thus even those things which we most wish to commend stand out the more by the subordinating of the others; nor does he whom we wish to rouse by our narration arrive at them wearied; nor is his memory, whom by our teaching we ought to instruct, thrown into confusion. 6. In all things assuredly we ought not only to keep in view the end of the precept, which is 'charity out of a pure heart and a good conscience and faith unfeigned' [1 Tim. i. 5], to which we should refer all that we say; but also the gaze of him whom we instruct by our speaking must be moved toward this and directed thither.

For all the things that we read in the holy Scriptures were written before the coming of the Lord for no other reason than that His coming might be commended, and the future Church, that is, the people of God throughout all nations, which is His body, might be prefigured; together with all the saints being joined and reckoned in, who even before His coming lived in this age, so believing that He would come, as we believe that He has come. For just as Jacob, while he was being born, first put forth his hand out of the womb, by which he even held the foot of his brother who was being born before him, and then indeed the head followed, and after that of necessity the rest of the members [Gen. xxv. 26]:

but nevertheless the head precedes in dignity and power not only those members which followed, but also the very hand which went before in the birth; and although not in the time of appearing, yet in the order of nature it is prior: so also the Lord Jesus Christ, although before He appeared in the flesh and, as it were, came forth from the womb of His secrecy to the eyes of men as the Mediator of God and men, the man 'who is over all, God blessed for ever' [Rom. ix. 5], He sent before Him in the holy Patriarchs and Prophets a certain part of His body, by which, as by a hand, announcing beforehand that He was to be born, He also overthrew the people that proudly went before Him, tripping them up with the bonds of the law as with five fingers:

(because He did not cease to be foretold and prophesied as about to come through five epochs of the ages; and in harmony with this, he through whom the law was given wrote five books: and those who understood carnally in a proud way, and wished to establish their own righteousness [Rom. x. 3], were not filled with the blessing by the open hand of Christ, but were held back by a hand clenched and closed: and so 'their feet were bound, and they fell; but we are risen and stand upright' [Ps. xx. 8 (xix. 9)]). Although therefore, as I have said, the Lord Christ sent before Him a certain part of His body in the saints who went before Him in the time of birth, nevertheless He Himself is the head of the body, the Church [Col. i. 18];

and all those men cleaved to that same body of which He is the head, by believing in Him whom they foretold. For they were not torn away by running ahead, but rather were joined on by their obedience. For although a hand can be sent forth before the head, yet its connection is under the head. Wherefore all the things that were written before were written that we might be taught, and they were figures of us, and in a figure these things happened unto them; but they were written for our sakes, upon whom the ends of the ages have come [Rom. xv. 4; 1 Cor. x. 11]. IV. 7. But what greater cause is there of the Lord's coming than that God might show His love toward us, commending it vehemently; because 'while we were yet enemies, Christ died for us' [Rom. v. 8, 10].

And this indeed for the reason that 'the end of the commandment and the fulfilling of the law is charity' [1 Tim. i. 5; Rom. xiii. 10]; that we also may love one another, and, even as He laid down His life for us [1 John iii. 16], so we also may lay down our life for the brethren: and as for God Himself, since 'He first loved us' [ibid. iv. 10], and 'spared not His own only Son, but delivered Him up for us all' [Rom. viii. 32], if it irked us to love Him, at least now let it not irk us to love Him in return. For there is no greater invitation to love than to anticipate in loving: and that heart is too hard which, though it was unwilling to bestow love, is yet unwilling to repay it.

But if in those very shameful and sordid loves we see that those who wish to be loved in return do nothing else than open up and show, by such proofs as they can, how greatly they love, and strive to put forward that image of justice, so that they may in a manner demand that a return be made to them by those souls which they are contriving to allure; and they themselves burn the more ardently, when they perceive that those minds which they desire are now stirred by the same fire; if therefore even a soul that was sluggish is roused when it feels itself loved, and one that was already fervent is the more kindled when it learns that it is loved in return:

it is manifest that there is no greater cause by which love may either be begun or increased, than when one who does not yet love comes to know that he is loved, or when one who loves first either hopes that he can be loved in return, or already proves it. And if this is so even in base loves, how much more in friendship? For what else do we guard against in the giving of offence to friendship, except that the friend should not think that we either do not love him, or love him less than he himself loves us? For if he should believe this, he will be colder in that love by which men mutually enjoy one another in familiar intimacy: and if he is not so weak that this offence makes him grow cold from all affection, he holds himself in that love by which he loves not to enjoy, but to be of service.

It is worth while, however, to observe how, although even superiors wish to be loved by their inferiors, and are delighted with their zealous deference toward them, and the more they perceive this, the more they love them; nevertheless with how great a love the inferior kindles when he has felt himself loved by his superior. For love is there more welcome, where it does not burn with the dryness of need, but flows forth from the abundance of beneficence. For that love springs from misery, this from mercy. And now indeed, if the inferior had even despaired of being able to be loved by the superior, he will be moved unspeakably to love, if of His own accord that Superior has deigned to show how greatly He loves him who would by no means have dared to promise himself so great a good.

But what is higher than God who judges, and what more desperate than man who sins? Who had bound himself over the more to be governed and subjugated by the proud powers which cannot make blessed, the more he had despaired that care could be taken of him by that Power which does not wish to be exalted by malice, but is exalted by goodness. 8. If therefore Christ came chiefly for this reason, that man might come to know how greatly God loves him; and that he might come to know it in order that he might be inflamed into the love of Him by whom he was first loved, and might love his neighbour at the bidding and showing of Him who, by loving not a neighbour but one wandering far away, became a neighbour; and if all the divine Scripture that was written before was written to foretell the coming of the Lord;

and whatever was afterwards committed to writing and confirmed by divine authority narrates Christ and admonishes to love: it is manifest that not only the whole Law and the Prophets hang on those two commandments of the love of God and of one's neighbour [Matt. xxii. 40]—which was still the only holy Scripture when the Lord said this—but also whatever volumes of the divine letters were afterwards profitably written down and committed to memory. Wherefore in the Old Testament there is a concealment of the New, and in the New Testament there is a manifestation of the Old. According to that concealment, those who understood carnally, being carnal, both then and now have been subjugated by penal fear.

But according to this manifestation, the spiritual—both then those to whom, as they knocked with piety, even the hidden things were laid open, and now those who seek without pride, lest even the open things be closed—understanding spiritually, have been set free by the gift of charity. Since therefore nothing is more contrary to charity than envy, and the mother of envy is pride: the same Lord Jesus Christ, God-man, is both a token of the divine love toward us, and an example of human humility among us, so that our great swelling might be healed by the greater contrary remedy. For a proud man is a great misery: but a humble God is a greater mercy.

With this love, therefore, set before you as it were an end, to which you refer all that you say, so narrate whatever you narrate that he to whom you speak, by hearing may believe, by believing may hope, by hoping may love [1 Cor. xiii. 13]. V. 9. Out of the very severity of God, by which the hearts of mortals are shaken with a most salutary terror, charity is to be built up, so that, rejoicing to be loved by Him whom he fears, one may dare to love Him in return, and may fear to displease His love toward him, even though he might do so with impunity. For it very rarely happens—nay rather never—that anyone comes willing to become a Christian who has not been struck by some fear of God.

For if he wishes to become a Christian by expecting some advantage from men whom he thinks he cannot otherwise please, or by avoiding some disadvantage from men whose displeasure or enmities he dreads; he wishes rather to pretend than to become one. For faith is not a matter of the body that pays respect, but of the mind that believes. But plainly the mercy of God is often present through the ministry of the catechist, so that, moved by the discourse, he now wishes to become that which he had resolved to feign: and when he has begun to wish this, then let us reckon that he has come. And it is indeed hidden from us when he comes in mind, whom we already see present in body: but nevertheless we ought so to deal with him, that this will may come to be in him, even if it is not.

For nothing is lost, since, if it is present, it is assuredly strengthened by such action of ours, although we may be ignorant at what time or at what hour it began. It is indeed useful that we be forewarned beforehand, if it can be done, by those who know him, in what state of mind he is, or by what causes he has been moved to come to embrace religion. But if there is no other from whom we may learn this, he himself is also to be questioned, so that from what he answers we may draw the beginning of our discourse. But if he has come with a feigned heart, desiring human advantages, or fleeing disadvantages, he will assuredly lie: nevertheless from that very thing that he lies, the beginning is to be taken; not so as to refute his lie, as though it were certain to you;

but so that, if he has said that he came with such a purpose (which is truly to be approved, whether he speak the truth or a falsehood), then, approving and praising such a purpose as that with which he answered he had come, we may make him take delight in being such as he desires to appear. But if he has said something other than what ought to be in the mind of him who is to be imbued with the Christian faith; then, more blandly and gently rebuking him as untutored and ignorant, and by demonstrating and briefly and gravely praising the truest end of Christian doctrine, lest you either take up the time of the future narration, or dare to impose it before his mind is composed, you may make him wish that which he did not yet wish either through error or through pretence. VI. 10.

But if perchance he answers that he has been divinely admonished or terrified into becoming a Christian, he affords us a most joyful entrance for beginning, how great is God's care for us. Certainly his attention is to be transferred from miracles or dreams of this kind to the more solid way of the Scriptures and to surer oracles: so that he may know that even that admonition which was mercifully bestowed on him beforehand, was given before he should cleave to the holy Scriptures.

And assuredly it is to be shown to him that the Lord Himself would not admonish or compel him to become a Christian and to be incorporated into the Church, nor instruct him by such signs or revelations, unless He wished him to pursue more securely and safely a way already prepared for him in the holy Scriptures, where he should not seek visible miracles, but should grow accustomed to hope for invisible ones, and should be admonished not while sleeping but while waking. From that point now the narration is to be begun, from that which 'God made all things very good' [Gen. i. 31], and to be carried on, as we have said, down to the present times of the Church: in such a way that the causes and reasons of the several matters and deeds which we narrate may be rendered, by which we may refer them to that end of love [1 Tim. i.

5], from which the eye neither of one who does anything nor of one who speaks is to be turned away. For if the feigned fables of the poets, devised for the pleasure of minds whose food is trifles, are nevertheless attempted to be referred to some usefulness by those who are held and called good grammarians—although even that be a vain usefulness and greedy for worldly fattening—how much more does it befit us to be more cautious, lest those things which we narrate as true be believed without the rendering of their causes, either through empty pleasantness, or even through pernicious desire. Yet let us not so assert these causes, that, the thread of the narration being abandoned, our heart and tongue run out into the knots of a more difficult disputation;

but let the very truth of the reason applied be as it were the gold that binds the order of the gems, yet not disturbing by any immoderation the series of the ornament. VII. 11. The narration being finished, the hope of the resurrection is to be intimated, and, according to the capacity and strength of the hearer, and according to the measure of the time itself, we must treat, against the empty mockeries of unbelievers, of the resurrection of the body, and of the future last judgment—of its goodness toward the good, its severity toward the evil, its truth toward all; and, the punishments of the wicked being recalled with detestation and horror, the kingdom of the just and faithful, and that heavenly city, and its joy, are to be proclaimed with longing.

Then indeed the weakness of man is to be instructed and animated against temptations and scandals, whether without or within the Church itself: without, against Gentiles or Jews or heretics; within, against the chaff of the Lord's threshing-floor [Matt. iii. 12]. Not that a disputation should be held against each single class of the perverse, and all their depraved opinions be refuted by set questions: but for a brief time it is to be shown that it was thus foretold, and what is the usefulness of temptations for the instructing of the faithful, and what the medicine in the example of God's patience, who has determined to permit these things even unto the end.

But when he is being instructed against those whose perverse throngs corporeally fill the churches, at the same time let the precepts of Christian and honourable conduct also be briefly and becomingly recalled, lest he be so easily seduced by drunkards, misers, cheats, gamblers, adulterers, fornicators, lovers of spectacles, binders-on of sacrilegious remedies, enchanters, astrologers, and diviners of whatever vain and evil arts, and the rest of this kind, and reckon that it will go unpunished for him, because he sees many who are called Christians love and cling to and defend and urge and persuade these things.

For what end has been appointed beforehand for those who persevere in such a life, and how such are to be tolerated within the Church itself, from which in the end they are to be separated, is to be taught from the testimonies of the divine books. It is also to be foretold that he will find in the Church many good Christians, truest citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem, if he himself begins to be one. Finally, he is diligently to be admonished that his hope be not placed in man: because neither can it easily be judged by man which man is just; and if it easily could be, examples of the just are not therefore set before us that we might be justified by them, but that, imitating them, we might know that we too are justified by their Justifier.

For hence will come to pass that which is most of all to be commended, namely, that when he who hears us—nay rather hears God through us—has begun to make progress in morals and knowledge, and eagerly to enter upon the way of Christ, he may not dare to ascribe it either to us or to himself; but may love both himself, and us, and whatever other friends he loves, in Him and for His sake who loved him while an enemy [Rom. v. 10], that by justifying He might make him a friend. Here now I do not think you need an instructor, so that when times are occupied, whether yours or those of your hearers, you may act briefly; but when they are more ample, you may discourse more amply: for this the very necessity prescribes with none admonishing. VIII. 12.

But this plainly is not to be passed over: that if anyone to be catechized comes to you polished with the liberal doctrines, one who has already resolved to be a Christian, and has come for this purpose that he may become one, it is altogether most difficult that he should not have come to know many things of our Scriptures and writings, being already instructed in which he has come merely for participation in the sacraments. For such men are wont, not in the very hour in which they become Christians, but beforehand, to inquire diligently into all things, and to share and discuss the movements of their mind with those with whom they can. With these, therefore, we must deal briefly, and not by hatefully hammering in what they know, but by modestly touching upon it; so that we may say that we believe they already know this or that:

and in this way to run over cursorily all the things which are to be inculcated upon the rude and unlearned: so that, even if this learned man knows anything, he may not hear it as from a teacher; and if he is as yet ignorant of anything, while we mention those things which we believe he already knows, he may learn it. Nor indeed is he himself uselessly questioned by what things he has been moved to wish to be a Christian:

so that if you see he has been persuaded by books, whether canonical or of useful commentators, you may say something at the beginning about these, praising them according to the diversity of their merits—of the canonical authority, and of the most skilful diligence of the expounders—and most of all commending in the canonical Scriptures the most salutary humility of their admirable loftiness, but in the others, according to each one's ability, a style of more sonorous and, as it were, more polished eloquence, suited to prouder and thereby to weaker minds. Assuredly it is also to be drawn out from him, that he may indicate whom he has chiefly read, and to what books he has more familiarly cleaved, whence he was persuaded to wish to be associated with the Church.

And when he has said this, then, if those books are known to us, or if we have at least received from ecclesiastical report that they were written by some catholic man of note, let us gladly approve. But if he has fallen upon the volumes of some heretic, and, not knowing perchance what the true faith disapproves, has held it in his mind and thinks it to be catholic; he is diligently to be taught, the authority of the universal Church being set before him, and that of other most learned men flourishing in its truth by both disputations and writings.

Although even those who departed this life as catholics, and left something of Christian letters to posterity, have in certain places of their little works—either not being understood, or, such as human weakness is, being less able with the edge of the mind to penetrate the more hidden things, and straying from the truth by a likeness to the truth—been an occasion to the presumptuous and audacious for contriving and begetting some heresy. And this is no wonder, since even from the canonical letters themselves, where all things are most soundly spoken—not indeed by taking certain things otherwise than either the writer meant, or than the truth itself holds:

(for if this alone were the case, who would not gladly pardon human weakness, ready to be corrected?) but because what they perversely and wrongly opined, defending it obstinately with the fiercest animosity and stubborn arrogance, many have brought forth many pernicious dogmas, the unity of communion being cut asunder. All these things are to be treated by a modest conference with him who comes to the fellowship of the Christian people, not an idiot, as they say, but polished and refined by the books of the learned; only so much authority of instructing being assumed as to warn him to beware the errors of presumption, in so far as that humility which brought him is now perceived to allow.

But the rest, according to the rules of sound doctrine, whatever things are to be narrated or discussed, whether concerning faith, or concerning morals, or concerning temptations, are, by running over them in the manner I have said, all to be referred to that more surpassing way [1 Cor. xii. 31]. IX. 13. There are likewise certain ones coming from the most usual schools of the grammarians and orators, whom you would neither dare to number among the idiots, nor among those most learned men whose mind has been exercised in the questions of great matters.

To these therefore, who seem to excel other men in the art of speaking, when they come to become Christians, we ought to impart this something more than to those unlettered ones, namely, that they are diligently to be admonished that, being clothed with Christian humility, they may learn not to despise those whom they have come to know avoid the vices of morals rather than of words; and that they may not dare even to compare with a chaste heart a well-exercised tongue, which they had even been accustomed to prefer. But especially these are to be taught to listen to the divine Scriptures, lest solid eloquence be distasteful to them because it is not inflated;

nor let them think that the words or deeds of men wrapped up in carnal coverings, which are read in those books, are not to be unfolded and laid open in order to be understood, but are to be taken just as the letters sound; and concerning the very usefulness of that secrecy—whence they are also called mysteries—what force the recesses of enigmas have for sharpening the love of truth and shaking off the torpor of loathing, this is to be proved to such men by experience itself, when something which, set out openly, did not so move them, is dug out by the unravelling of some allegory. For to these it is most useful to know that meanings are to be preferred to words, just as the soul is preferred to the body.

From which it comes to pass that they ought so to prefer to hear truer rather than more eloquent discourses, just as they ought to prefer to have wiser rather than more handsome friends. Let them also know that there is no voice to the ears of God but the affection of the mind: thus indeed they will not mock, if they should perchance observe some prelates and ministers of the Church invoking God even with barbarisms and solecisms, or not understanding the very words which they pronounce, and dividing them confusedly. Not that these things are by no means to be corrected, so that the people may say Amen to that which it plainly understands: but nevertheless they are piously to be tolerated by those who have learned that, as speech is well pronounced in the forum, so vow is well pronounced in the church.

And so that eloquence of the forum, though sometimes perchance good speaking (dictio), can never yet be called good blessing (benedictio). But concerning the sacrament which they are about to receive, it suffices for the more prudent to hear what that thing signifies: but with the slower we must deal with somewhat more words and comparisons, lest they despise what they see. X. 14. Here perhaps you desire some example of a discourse, so that by the very work I may show you how these things which I have advised are to be done. This indeed I will do, as far as with the Lord's help I shall be able: but first I must speak, as I have promised, concerning the procuring of that cheerfulness.

For now, concerning the very precepts of unfolding the discourse in catechizing him who comes so as to become a Christian, I have, as far as seemed sufficient, discharged what I had promised. It is indeed a debt that I should also myself do, in this volume, that which I prescribe ought to be done. If therefore I shall have done it, it will avail for a heaping up (of the measure): but in what way can the heap be poured over by me, before I have fulfilled the measure of the debt? For I did not hear you complain chiefly of anything, except that your discourse seemed to you cheap and mean, when you were imbuing someone with the name of Christian. But this I know comes to pass not so much from a lack of the things which are to be said—for which I know you well enough prepared and instructed—nor of the speech itself, but from a weariness of mind;

either from that cause which I have mentioned, because that which we behold in silence with the mind delights and holds us more, and we are unwilling to be called away thence to the far different noise of words; or because even when the discourse is pleasant, we would rather hear or read those things which have been better said, and which are brought forth without our care and solicitude, than to fit sudden words to another's sense with an uncertain outcome—whether they may occur to match the thought, or whether they may be usefully received; or because those things which are instilled into the rude, inasmuch as they are most well known to us and no longer necessary to our advancement, it irks us most often to return to them, nor does the mind, now somewhat grown up, walk with any pleasure among things so customary and, as it were, childish.

An unmoved listener also produces weariness in the speaker (whether because he is not stirred by feeling, or because by no movement of his body does he show that he understands or that what is said pleases him) — not because it is fitting that we should be greedy for human praise, but because the things we minister are God's; and the more we love those to whom we speak, the more we desire that the things which are offered for their salvation should please them. But if this does not come about, we are saddened, and in the very course of our speaking we are weakened and broken, as though we were wasting our labour in vain.

Sometimes too, when we are called away from some task which we desire to be doing, and whose performance either delighted us or seemed to us more necessary, and we are compelled — whether by the command of one whom we do not wish to offend, or by the unavoidable insistence of certain persons — to catechize someone, we approach already disturbed a business that requires great tranquillity, grieving that we are neither permitted to keep the order of our actions as we wish, nor able to suffice for all. And so the discourse, proceeding from this very sadness, is less pleasing, because from the dryness of grief it flows less abundantly. Sometimes again, from some scandal, sorrow has beset the heart, and then someone says to us: 'Come, speak to this man, he wishes to become a Christian.'

For those who do not know what burns shut up within us say this to us; and if it is not fitting to disclose our feeling to them, we take up more grudgingly what they wish, and assuredly that discourse will be languid and unpleasant, driven through the seething and smoking vein of the heart. Therefore, for however many causes any one of these may cloud the serenity of our mind, remedies are to be sought according to God, by which that contraction may be loosened, and we may exult in fervour of spirit and rejoice in the tranquillity of a good work. For God loves a cheerful giver (2 Cor. 9:7).

For if the cause that saddens us is that the listener does not grasp our understanding — for descending, as it were, from a certain summit of it, we are compelled to linger in the slowness of syllables far below, and we take pains how, through long and winding circuits, that may issue from the mouth of the flesh which is imbibed by the swiftest draught of the mind, and because it comes forth very unlike itself, it wearies us to speak and we long to be silent — let us think what has been granted to us beforehand by Him who showed us an example, that we should follow His footsteps (1 Pet. 2:21). For however much our articulate voice differs from the liveliness of our understanding, far more different is the mortality of the flesh from the equality of God.

And yet, though He was in the same form, He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant (Phil. 2:7), and so on, even unto the death of the cross. For what reason, save because He became weak to the weak, that He might gain the weak? (1 Cor. 9:22). Hear His imitator elsewhere also saying: 'For whether we are beside ourselves, it is to God; or whether we are sober, it is for you. For the love of Christ constrains us, because we judge this, that one died for all' (2 Cor. 5:13–14). For how would he have been ready to be spent for their souls (2 Cor. 12:15), if it had irked him to bow down to their ears? Hence, then, he became a little one in our midst, like a nurse cherishing her children (1 Thess. 2:7).

For does it delight anyone, unless love invites, to murmur curtailed and maimed words? And yet men long to have infants, to whom they may show this; and it is sweeter to a mother to spit little chewed morsels into her small son's mouth than to chew and devour larger pieces herself. Let there not then depart from our heart even the thought of that hen (Matt. 23:37), which with drooping feathers covers her tender brood, and with broken voice calls her chirping chicks; whose caressing wings the proud, fleeing from them, become the prey of the birds of prey.

For if the understanding delights us in its most sincere inner recesses, let this also delight us to understand: how charity, the more devotedly it descends to the lowest things, the more robustly it returns to the innermost, through a good conscience of seeking nothing from those to whom it descends, save their everlasting salvation. XI. 16. But if we rather desire to read or hear the things that are already prepared and better expressed, and therefore are loath to adapt for the moment, with uncertain outcome, the words we speak: provided only the mind does not stray from the truth of things, it is easy that, if something in our words has offended the listener, we should learn from that very occasion how, when the matter is understood, it is to be despised if it could sound less perfectly or less properly — for it sounded thus only that the matter might be understood.

But if the effort of human weakness should even stray from the very truth of things — though in catechizing the unlearned, where the most beaten path is to be kept, this can hardly happen — nevertheless, lest perchance it happen that the listener be offended even from this, it ought not to seem to us to have happened for any other reason than that God willed to test us, whether we correct ourselves with placidity of mind, so as not to be plunged, in defence of our error, into a greater error. But if no one has told us of it, and it has remained entirely hidden both from us and from those who heard, there is no grief, provided it does not happen again.

But for the most part we ourselves, recalling what we have said, find fault with something, and we do not know how it was received when it was being said; and we grieve the more, when charity glows within us, if what was false was received with pleasure. And therefore, when opportunity is found, just as we reprove ourselves in silence, so care must be taken that even they be gradually corrected who have fallen into some falsehood — not through God's words, but plainly through ours. But if some, blinded by mad envy, rejoice that we have erred — whisperers, backbiters, hateful to God (Rom. 1:30) — let them furnish us with material for exercising patience together with mercy, since even the patience of God leads them to repentance.

For what is more detestable, and what more heaps up wrath against the day of wrath and of the revelation of the righteous judgment of God (Rom. 2:4–5), than to rejoice over another's evil, in likeness of and imitation of the devil? Sometimes too, even when all things are rightly and truly said, either something not understood, or something harsh by its very novelty, contrary to the opinion and habit of an old error, offends and disturbs the hearer. And if this becomes apparent, and he shows himself curable, he is to be healed without any delay by an abundance of authorities and reasons. But if the offence is silent and hidden, God's medicine can bring aid.

But if he recoils, and refuses to be cured, let that dominical example console us — He who, when men were offended at His word and fled from it as though it were hard, said even to those who remained: 'Do you also wish to go away?' (John 6:67). For it ought to be held fixed and immovable in the heart that captive Jerusalem is to be freed from the Babylon of this world when its times have run their course, and that none of her shall perish; for he who perishes was not of her. For the firm foundation of God stands, having this seal: 'The Lord knows those who are His; and let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity' (2 Tim. 2:19).

Thinking on these things, and calling upon the Lord in our heart, we shall fear less the uncertain outcomes of our discourse on account of the uncertain motions of our hearers, and the very endurance of troubles for a work of mercy will delight us, if we do not seek our own glory in it (John 7:18). For then indeed the work is good, when the intention of the one acting is launched from charity and, as though returning to its own place, comes to rest again in charity. But as for the reading that delights us, or some hearing of better eloquence — such that, wishing to prefer it to our own discourse in the delivery, we speak with sloth or weariness — it will receive us the more eagerly, and will be rendered the more pleasant, after the labour;

and with greater confidence we shall pray that God may speak to us as we wish, if we cheerfully accept that He should speak through us as we are able. Thus it comes about that for those who love God all things work together for good (Rom. 8:28). XII. 17. But now, if we are disgusted at often repeating the customary things suited to little ones, let us be attuned to them through brotherly, fatherly, and motherly love; and when we are joined to their heart, even to us these things will seem new. For so great is the power of a sympathizing soul's affection, that when they are affected as we speak and we as they learn, we dwell in one another; and thus both they, as it were, speak in us the things they hear, and we in some way learn in them the things we teach.

Does not this usually happen, when we show certain broad and beautiful places, whether of cities or of fields — which we ourselves, by often seeing, used to pass by without any pleasure — to those who had never seen them before, so that our own delight is renewed in the delight of their novelty? And the more so, the dearer they are; because through the bond of love, insofar as we are in them, so far do those things which were old become new even to us. But if in the contemplation of things we have made some progress, do we not wish those whom we love to rejoice and marvel when they behold the works of men's hands;

but we wish rather to lift them up to the very art or design of the maker, and thence to rise into admiration and praise of God the Creator of all, where is the most fruitful end of love. How much more, then, ought we to be delighted when men now approach to learn God Himself, for whose sake are to be learned whatever things are to be learned; and to be renewed in their newness, so that, if our accustomed preaching has grown colder, it may grow warm again through the unaccustomed hearing of them? To this is added, for the procuring of joy, that we think and consider from what death of error into the life of faith a man is passing over. And if we pass through the most familiar streets with kindly cheerfulness, when perchance we point out the way to someone who has laboured in wandering:

how much more eagerly and with greater joy ought we to walk through, in the doctrine of salvation, even those things which for our own sake it is not needful to unfold anew, when we lead a soul — pitiable and wearied by the errors of the world — along the paths of peace, at the command of Him who bestowed it upon us? XIII. 18. But in truth it is a great thing to persevere in speaking up to the appointed end, when we do not see the hearer moved: whether because he does not dare, being constrained by religious fear, to signify his approval by voice or by any movement of the body, or is held back by human modesty; or because he does not understand what is said, or despises it;

since indeed, as long as we do not discern his mind, it is uncertain, everything is to be tried by discourse that can avail to arouse him and, as it were, to draw him out of his hiding-places. For an excessive fear that hinders the declaration of his judgment must be driven off by gentle exhortation, and his modesty tempered by intimating brotherly fellowship, and it must be sought by questioning whether he understands, and confidence must be given, so that, if anything seems to him to be contradicted, he may bring it forth freely. It must also be asked of him whether he has ever heard these things before, and whether perhaps they do not move him as being known and commonly current;

and according to his answer we must act, so that either we speak more plainly and clearly, or refute the contrary opinion, or, as for the things that are known to him, we do not expound them at greater length but fold them together briefly, and choose some of those things which are said mystically in the holy books, and especially in the narration itself, so that by opening and revealing them our discourse may grow sweet. But if he is too dull, and is dense and averse to all such sweetness, he must be mercifully borne with, and, the rest being briefly run through, those things which are most necessary — concerning the unity of the Catholic Church, concerning temptations, concerning the Christian manner of life in view of the future judgment — must be terribly impressed upon him; and more must be said to God on his behalf than to him about God. 19.

It often also happens that one who at first was listening gladly, wearied either by hearing or by standing, no longer praising, opens his lips in yawning, and shows, even against his will, that he wishes to depart. When we perceive this, either we ought to renew his mind by saying something seasoned with becoming cheerfulness and apt to the matter in hand, or something exceedingly wonderful and amazing, or even something sorrowful and lamentable — and rather about himself, so that, pricked by concern for his own case, he may awake; yet in such a way as not to offend his modesty by any harshness, but rather to win him over by familiarity — or to relieve him by offering a seat; although without doubt it is better done, where it can decently be done, that he should sit and listen from the beginning;

and it is far more advisable that in certain churches across the sea not only the bishops sit as they speak to the people, but seats are also provided beneath the people themselves, lest anyone weaker, wearied by standing, be turned away from the most wholesome attention, or even be compelled to withdraw. And yet it makes a great difference whether someone from a great multitude withdraws to restore his strength, one who is already bound by the fellowship of the sacraments; and whether he departs — as often unavoidably presses upon him, lest, overcome by inward failing, he even fall — who is to be imbued with the first sacraments. For out of shame he does not say why he goes, and out of weakness he is not permitted to stand. I speak from experience:

for a certain rustic man did this, while I was catechizing him, from which I learned that great caution must be taken. For who would endure our arrogance, when we do not make our brother men — or even those who, with greater solicitude, are to be cared for that they may become our brothers — sit in our presence, whereas our Lord Himself, whom the angels attend, was listened to by a woman as she sat (Luke 10:39)? Certainly, if either the discourse is going to be brief, or the place is not suited for a sitting company, let them listen standing; but this when many are listening, and not when persons are then to be initiated. For when it is one, or two, or a few who have come precisely that they may become Christians, we speak dangerously to those who are standing.

Nevertheless, if we have already begun thus, then at least, when the hearer's weariness is noticed, a seat is to be offered — nay rather, he is by all means to be urged to sit — and something is to be said whereby he may be renewed, and whereby also any care that has perchance rushed in and begun to call him away may flee from his mind. For since the causes are uncertain why, now silent, he refuses to listen, let something be said to him, now seated, against the incidental thoughts of worldly affairs, either in a cheerful, as I have said, or in a sad manner: so that, if these are the very things that had occupied his mind, they may give way as though accused by name;

but if these are not the ones, and he is wearied by listening, then — speaking about them as though they were the very ones (since indeed we do not know) — we say something unexpected and extraordinary, in the manner I have described, and his attention is renewed from its weariness. But let it also be brief, especially because it is inserted out of order, lest the very medicine also increase the disease of loathing which we wish to relieve; and the rest must be hastened, and a nearer end must be promised and displayed. XIV. 20. But if the dismissal of another action, to which as though more necessary you were already held in suspense, has broken your spirit, and therefore, being sad, you catechize unpleasantly:

you ought to consider — apart from the fact that we know we must act mercifully in whatever we do with men, and out of the duty of most sincere charity — this, then, being set apart, that it is uncertain what we do more usefully, and what we might more opportunely either interrupt or altogether omit. For since we do not know of what sort the merits are, before God, of the men on whose behalf we act, we surmise rather than comprehend, by no conjecture or by the slightest and most uncertain conjecture, what is expedient for them at the time. Wherefore we ought indeed to order the things to be done according to our capacity; but if we have been able to carry them through in the manner we have determined, let us not rejoice on that account because it pleased us, but because it pleased God that they should be done so:

but if some necessity has arisen by which that order of ours is disturbed, let us bend easily, lest we be broken; so that he whom God has set over us may be our own. For it is more equitable that we should follow His will than that He should follow ours. Because even the order of things to be done, which we wish to keep by our own judgment, is surely to be approved where the more important things come first. Why then do we grieve that men are outstripped by the Lord God, so much more important, so that by that very thing whereby we love our own order, we desire to be disordered? For no one better orders what he is to do than he who is readier not to do what is forbidden by divine power than desirous to do what he contrives by human thought.

For many are the thoughts in the heart of a man, but the counsel of the Lord abides forever (Prov. 19:21). 21. But if the mind, disturbed by some scandal, is not able to bring forth a serene and pleasant discourse, so great ought charity to be toward those for whom Christ died — willing to redeem them by the price of His blood from the death of worldly errors — that this very thing which is announced to us in our sadness, namely that someone is at hand who desires to become a Christian, ought to avail for the consolation and dissolving of that sadness, just as the joys of gains are wont to soothe the grief of losses. For a scandal does not sadden us on anyone's account, save one whom we believe or see to perish, or the weak one through whom he perishes.

Therefore let the one who has come to be initiated, while it is hoped that he can make progress, wipe away the grief for the one who is failing. Because even if that fear is suggested, lest he become a proselyte who is a son of Gehenna (Matt. 23:15), while many such persons move before our eyes, from whom arise those scandals by which we are burned, this ought not to pertain to retarding us, but rather to arousing and sharpening us: namely, that we should warn the one whom we are instructing to beware of imitating those who are Christians not in truth itself but in name only; nor, moved by their crowd, either to wish to follow them, or to be unwilling to follow Christ on their account, or to be unwilling to be in the Church of God where they are, or to wish to be there such as they are.

And I know not how, in admonitions of this kind, the discourse is more ardent, to which present grief supplies fuel: so that we are not only not more sluggish, but by that very thing speak the more kindled and vehemently what, more secure, we would speak more coldly and slowly; and let us rejoice that occasion is given us where the motion of our mind may not pass without bearing fruit. 22. But if sadness over some fault or sin of ours takes hold of us, let us remember not only that a sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit (Ps. 51:17), but also this: that 'as water quenches fire, so almsgiving extinguishes sin' (Sir. 3:30). And, 'I desire mercy,' He says, 'rather than sacrifice' (Hos. 6:6).

As, therefore, if we were endangered by a fire, we would certainly run to water by which it could be extinguished, and would be glad if someone offered it from close by: so if from our own hay some flame of sin has arisen, and we are therefore disturbed, when occasion for a most merciful work is given, let us rejoice as though at a fountain offered to us, that thereby that which had blazed up may be suppressed. Unless perhaps we are so foolish as to think we should run more eagerly with bread, to fill the belly of the hungry, than with the true bread of God, to instruct the mind of the one eating it. To this is added, that if it merely profited to do this, but not to do it would do no harm, it would be unhappily in peril — not now of a neighbour's salvation, but of our own — that we should spurn the remedy offered.

But since from the mouth of the Lord it sounds so menacingly: 'Wicked and slothful servant, you should have given my money to the money-changers' (Matt. 25:26–27) — what madness is it at last that, because our sin distresses us, we should therefore again wish to sin, by not giving the Lord's money to one who wills and asks for it? By these and suchlike thoughts and considerations, once the fog of wearinesses is dispelled, the intention is fitted for catechizing, so that what bursts forth diligently and cheerfully from the abundance of charity may be sweetly imbibed. For these things not so much I to you as to us all speaks that very love which is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who is given to us (Rom. 5:5). XV. 23.

But now even that which, before I promised it, I did not owe, you perhaps demand as now due: that I should not be loath to unfold some example of a discourse, as though I were catechizing someone, and to set it before your view. Before I do this, I want you to consider that the intention of one dictating is one thing, when a future reader is thought of; and another that of one speaking, when a present hearer is attended to: and within this itself, one thing that of one admonishing in secret, while no other who may judge concerning us is at hand; another that of one teaching something openly, when the hearing of those who think differently stands around: and in this kind, one thing when one man is taught, while the rest listen as though judging or attesting the things known to them;

another when all in common await what we may bring forth to them: and again within this itself, one thing when we sit down as though privately, so that a conversation may be woven together; another when a silent people, in suspense, gaze upon one who is about to speak from a higher place. And it makes much difference, even when we speak thus, whether few be present or many; learned or unlearned, or of both kinds mixed; townsmen or rustics, or these and those together, or a people tempered from every kind of men.

For it cannot be but that they affect the one who is to speak and discourse in one way and another, and that the discourse which is uttered bears, as it were, a certain countenance of the disposition of the mind from which it is uttered, and, according to that same diversity, affects the hearers diversely, since they too diversely affect one another by their very presence. But since we are now treating of the instructing of the unlearned, I bear witness to you from my own self, that I am moved in one way and another, when I see before me one to be catechized who is educated, or dull, a citizen, a foreigner, rich, poor, a private person, one held in honour, one set in some office, a man of this or that nation, of this or that age or sex, coming from this or that sect, from this or that common error:

and according to the diversity of my emotion the discourse itself both proceeds and advances and is concluded. And because, though the same charity is owed to all, the same medicine is not to be applied to all: charity itself likewise travails with some, while it is made weak with others (Gal. 4:19; 1 Cor. 9:22); it seeks to edify some, it trembles to offend others; toward some it inclines itself, toward others it raises itself; to some gentle, to others severe, an enemy to none, a mother to all. And he who has not experienced by the same charity what I say, when he sees us — because some faculty granted to us gives delight — become praiseworthily known in the mouth of the multitude, thinks us blessed on that account: but may God, into whose sight enters the groaning of the fettered (Ps. 79:11; Ps. 25:18),

see our humility and our labour, and remit all our sins. Wherefore, if anything in us has pleased you, so that you sought to hear from us some observance of your discourse, you would learn it better by living and hearing us while we do these things, than by reading while we dictate these things. XVI. 24. But nevertheless let us suppose that someone has come to us who wishes to be a Christian, and indeed of the class of the uneducated, yet not of the rustics but of the townsfolk, such as at Carthage you must needs meet with in numbers: and that, being asked whether it is for some advantage of the present life, or for the rest which is hoped for after this life, that he desires to be a Christian, he has answered, for the future rest:

such a one perhaps would be instructed by us with this address. Thanks be to God, brother; I heartily congratulate you, and rejoice over you, that in such great and so perilous tempests of this world you have thought upon some true and certain security. For even in this life men seek rest and security with great labours, but by depraved desires they do not find them. For they wish to rest in unquiet and impermanent things; and because these are withdrawn by time and pass away, they agitate them with fears and griefs, and do not permit them to be at peace. For whether a man wishes to rest in riches, he is made proud rather than secure.

Or do we not see how many have suddenly lost them, how many too have perished on account of them, either when they desire to have them, or when, being oppressed, they are taken away by those more covetous? And if they even remained with a man throughout his whole life, and did not desert their lover, he himself would desert them by his death. For how great is the life of man, even if he grows old? Or when men wish old age for themselves, what else do they wish but a long infirmity? So too the honours of this world, what are they but conceit and emptiness and the peril of ruin? For thus says Holy Scripture: 'All flesh is grass, and the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass has withered, the flower has fallen: but the word of the Lord abides forever' (Isa. 40:6–7; 1 Pet. 1:24–25).