Institutes & Conferences 1 part 28/44

Wherefore this is, as we have said, the faithful and insoluble union of friendship, which is confederated by the parity of virtues alone: for 'the Lord makes those of one manner to dwell in a house.' And therefore indissoluble love can abide only in those in whom there is one purpose and will, one willing and not-willing. If you too desire to retain this inviolable, you must hasten, having first cast out your vices, to mortify your own wills, and with united zeal and purpose diligently to fulfil that in which the prophet greatly delights: 'Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.' Which ought to be understood not locally, but spiritually.

For it profits nothing if those who differ in character and purpose are joined in one habitation, nor does it hurt those who are founded on equal virtue to be separated by intervals of place. For with God it is the cohabitation of character, not of places, that joins brethren in a united dwelling; nor can the integrity of peace ever be preserved where a diversity of wills is found. GERMANUS: What then? If, when one wills to accomplish something which he has perceived to be fitting and salutary according to God, another does not lend his assent, is it to be carried out even against the brother's wish, or to be neglected according to his judgement? JOSEPH:

For this reason we have said that the full and perfect grace of friendship cannot endure except among perfect men of the same virtue, whom one and the same will and one purpose suffers either never or at least rarely to feel differently, or to disagree in those things which pertain to the advancement of the spiritual life. But if they begin to seethe with spirited contentions, it is plainly evident that they were never in accord according to the rule which we set forth above.

But since no one can have a beginning of perfection unless he has begun from its very foundation, and you inquire not how great its magnitude is, but in what way one may arrive at it, I think it necessary to open up to you in a few words its rule and a certain path by which your steps may be directed, so that you may more easily obtain the good of patience and peace. The first foundations, then, of true friendship lie in the contempt of worldly substance and in the despising of all the things which we possess. For it is exceedingly unjust and impious if, after having renounced the vanity of the world and of all the things that are in it, the cheapest utensil that remains should be preferred to the most precious love of a brother.

The second is that each one should so prune away his own wills that, judging himself to be wise and prudent, he should not prefer to obey his own determinations rather than his neighbour's. The third is that he should know that all things, even those which he deems useful and necessary, are to be set after the good of charity and peace. The fourth is that he should believe that he must not be angry for any cause whatsoever, whether just or unjust. The fifth is that he should desire to heal a brother's wrath conceived against himself, even without reason, in the same way as he would his own, knowing that another's sadness is equally pernicious to himself as if he himself were stirred against another, unless, so far as in him lies, he has driven it away even from the brother's mind.

This last remedy is one which, without doubt, is the destroyer of all vices in general: namely, that a man should believe that each day he is about to depart from this world. Such a conviction will not only allow no sadness to lodge in the heart, but will also restrain every impulse of concupiscence and of all sins. Whoever, therefore, holds fast to this, will be able neither to suffer nor to inflict the bitterness of anger and discord. But when these have ceased, then, as soon as that rival of charity has stealthily poured the poison of sadness into the hearts of friends, it must needs be that, love being little by little cooled by frequent quarrels, he should at length sunder the hearts of those who love, long since inwardly wounded. For he who walks by the path

of the aforesaid direction—in what way could he ever fall out with his friend, if, claiming nothing as his own, he has cut off at the root the first cause of strife, which is wont to be engendered over the smallest and most worthless matters, guarding with all his strength that which we read in the Acts of the Apostles concerning the unity of the believers: 'And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and one soul; neither did any of them say that aught of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had all things common'?

Next, how could there arise from that same man a seedbed of dissension, when he, serving not his own will but his brother's, has become an imitator of his Lord and Maker, who, speaking in the person of the man which He bore, said: 'I came not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me'? And in what way could he stir up any kindling of contention, who has resolved to trust his own understanding and judgment not so much to his own verdict as to his brother's examination—approving, that is, or disapproving his own findings according to that brother's decision, and consummating that Gospel word with the humility of a devout heart: 'Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt'?

Or by what reasoning could he admit anything whereby his brother might be made sad, when he judges nothing more precious than the good of peace, never losing the memory of that saying of the Lord: 'By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another'—by which love, as by a special seal, Christ willed His flock of sheep to be recognized in this world, and to be distinguished from all others by this mark, so to speak?

And on what ground could he endure either to take into himself or to let lodge in another the rancour of sadness, for whom it is a settled maxim that there can be no just causes of that anger which is pernicious and unlawful; and that in the same manner in which he cannot pray while a brother is angry with him, so neither can he pray if he himself be angry with his brother—ever retaining in his humble heart that saying of the Lord and Saviour: 'If thou offer thy gift at the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go first, be reconciled to thy brother, and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift'? For it will profit nothing if thou indeed assert that thou art not angry and believe that thou fulfillest that command which says: 'Let not the sun go down upon your anger,' and:

'He that is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment'—if with an obstinate heart thou despisest another's sadness which by thy meekness thou couldst have soothed. For in the same manner thou art punished for the transgression of the Lord's precept. For He who said that thou oughtest not to be angry against another, said also that another's sadness ought not to be despised, since it makes no difference before God—who willeth all men to be saved—whether thou dost destroy thyself or some other person. For by the ruin of any one soul there arises loss to Him; and likewise, to that one to whom the perdition of all is pleasing, a single gain is procured by thy death or thy brother's. How, finally, could he retain even the slightest sadness against a brother, who believes that daily—nay, continually—he is about to depart from this world?

As, therefore, nothing is to be set before charity, so, on the contrary, nothing is to be reckoned after fury or anger. For all things, however useful and necessary they may seem, are nevertheless to be spurned, that the disturbance of anger may be avoided; and all things, even those that are thought adverse, are to be undertaken and endured, that the tranquillity of love and peace may be preserved unimpaired—since we must believe that nothing is more pernicious than anger and sadness, and nothing more profitable than charity.

For just as the enemy quickly, with his gall, sunders brothers who are still carnal and weak on account of some cheap and earthly possession, so also among the spiritual he begets discord over diversity of understandings, from which, without doubt, there frequently arise those contentions and strifes of words which the Apostle condemns; whence, in consequence, the envious and malignant foe sows divisions among brothers of one mind. For true is that saying of the most wise Solomon: 'Contention stirreth up hatred, but friendship shall protect all those who do not contend.'

Wherefore, to preserve perpetual and undivided charity, it profits nothing to have cut off the first cause of division—which is wont to arise from perishable and earthly things—and to have despised all carnal matters, and to have granted to the brethren an undivided community of all the things our use requires, unless we shall have likewise cut off the second cause also, which is wont to arise under the appearance of spiritual perceptions, and shall have acquired in all things a humble mind and harmonious wills. For I remember, when as a younger man I was still clinging to my companion of like age who exhorted me, that this kind of understanding was frequently instilled in us, whether in moral disciplines or in the sacred Scriptures, so that we believed nothing truer nor more reasonable than it.

But when, coming together in one, we began to bring forth our opinions, certain matters, being examined by common scrutiny, were first noted by one of us as false and harmful, and soon after, being pronounced pernicious by common judgment, were condemned—things which, before, having been poured in by the devil, so gleamed as with a light that they could easily have generated discord, had not the precept of the elders, guarded like some divine oracle, recalled us from all contention; whereby it was prescribed to us by them, as by a certain lawful sanction, that neither of us should trust his own judgment more than his brother's, if he would never be deluded by the craft of the devil. For often it has been proved to happen as the Apostle says:

'For Satan himself transformeth himself into an angel of light,' that he may fraudulently pour over the mind, in place of the true light of knowledge, a dark and foul gloom of the senses. And these things, unless, being received with a humble and gentle heart, they be reserved for the examination of a most mature brother or a most approved elder, and, diligently sifted by their judgment, be either rejected or received by us, without doubt, venerating in our thoughts the angel of darkness in place of the angel of light, we shall be smitten with a most grievous ruin. From which destruction it is impossible for anyone to escape who trusts in his own judgment, unless, having become a lover and executor of true humility, he shall have fulfilled with all contrition of heart that which the Apostle earnestly entreats:

'If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of charity, if any bowels and mercies, fulfil ye my joy, that ye be of the same mind, having the same charity, being of one accord, of one mind; doing nothing through contention, neither by vainglory, but in humility esteeming each the other better than himself'; and that: 'in honour preferring one another'—so that each one, ascribing to his companion the sum of knowledge and holiness, may believe that the highest point of true discretion stands rather in another's judgment than in his own.

But it often happens, whether by the delusion of the devil or through the intervention of human error—by which there is none in this flesh who, being human, cannot be deceived—that even he sometimes who is of keener wit and greater knowledge conceives something false in his mind, and he who is of slower wit and lesser merit perceives something more correct and truer. And therefore let no one, however endowed with knowledge, persuade himself in empty conceit that he can have no need of another's conference. For even if the delusion of the devil deceive not his judgment, yet he will not escape the graver snares of elation and pride.

For who could arrogate this to himself without enormous peril, when the vessel of election, in whom Christ (as he himself professed) spoke, asserts that for this reason alone he went up to Jerusalem—namely, that he might confer in secret examination with his fellow apostles the Gospel which, by the Lord revealing and cooperating, he preached to the Gentiles? Whereby it is shown that not only is unanimity and concord preserved through these precepts, but also that all the ambushes of the adversary devil and the snares of his delusions are not to be feared. Finally, to such a degree is the virtue of charity exalted, that the blessed Apostle John pronounces it to be not only a thing of God, but even God Himself, saying: 'God is charity: he that abideth in charity, abideth in God, and God in him.'

For to such a degree do we perceive it to be divine, that we most manifestly feel that word of the Apostle to have force in us: 'For the charity of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who dwelleth in us.' Which is as if he should say: 'For God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who dwelleth in us.' Who also, when we know not what we should pray for, maketh intercession for us with unspeakable groanings: 'But he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what the Spirit desireth, because he asketh for the saints according to God.' That charity, therefore, which is called agapē, is possible to be shown toward all.

Concerning which the blessed Apostle says: 'Therefore, while we have time, let us work that which is good toward all men, but especially toward them who are of the household of the faith.' Which is so to be shown generally toward all, that we are commanded by the Lord to bestow it even upon our enemies: for He says, 'Love your enemies.' But diathesis—that is, affection—is shown to very few, and to those who are joined to us either by likeness of character or by fellowship of virtues; although even this diathesis seems to have much difference within itself. For parents are loved in one way, spouses in another, brothers in another, children in another; and in the very bond of these affections there is a great distance, nor is the love of parents toward their children found uniform.

This is proved also by the example of the patriarch Jacob, who, though he was father of twelve sons and loved them all with paternal charity, yet loved Joseph with a more inclined affection, as the Scripture openly records concerning him: 'But his brethren envied him, because his father loved him'—not, to be sure, that the just man and father did not greatly love his other offspring also, but that he clung to the affection of this one somewhat more sweetly and indulgently, because he prefigured a type of the Lord. This also we read to be most evidently signified concerning John the Evangelist, when it is said of him:

'That disciple whom Jesus loved'—although He assuredly embraced the other eleven, likewise chosen, with so preeminent a love that He signified this even by the Gospel attestation, saying: 'As I have loved you, so love ye also one another'; concerning whom it is also said elsewhere: 'Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them unto the end.' But here the love of one expressed not a lukewarmness of charity toward the rest of the disciples, but a more abundant superabundance of love toward this one, which the privilege of virginity and incorruption of the flesh conferred upon him. Which is therefore marked as something more sublime, with a certain exception, because it is exalted not by comparison of hatred, but by the more overflowing grace of a most exuberant love.

Something of this kind we read also in the Canticle of Canticles, spoken from the person of the bride, saying: 'Order charity in me.' For this is truly ordered charity, which, hating no one, loves certain ones the more by the just claim of their merits; and which, though it loves all generally, yet sets apart for itself, from among these, those whom it ought to embrace with a special affection; and again, among those very ones who are supreme and preeminent in love, it selects for itself some who are to be exalted above the affection given to the rest.

On the contrary, we know (would that we knew it not!) that some of the brethren are of such obstinacy and hardness that, when they have perceived either their own minds stirred against a brother or a brother's against themselves, in order to dissemble the sadness of their mind which arose from indignation at some mutual commotion, withdrawing from those whom they ought to have soothed by humble satisfaction and conversation, they begin to chant certain little verses of the psalms. And while they think to soothe the bitterness conceived in their heart, by their insulting they increase what they could at once have extinguished, had they chosen to be rather anxious and humble, so that a timely compunction might both heal their own hearts and soothe the brethren's minds.

For in that manner, assuredly, they flatter and nourish the vice of their pusillanimity—nay, of their pride—and rather feed than uproot the kindling of quarrels, unmindful of that precept of the Lord whereby He says: 'He that is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment,' and: 'If thou rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go first, be reconciled to thy brother, and then coming thou shalt offer thy gift.' To such a degree, therefore, does our Lord not wish us to hold another's sadness in contempt, that if a brother have aught against us, He receives not our gifts—that is, He allows not prayers to be offered to Him by us—until, by speedy satisfaction, we take away from his mind the sadness, whether justly or unjustly conceived.

For He does not say: 'If thy brother has a linked grievance against thee, leave thy gift before the altar and go, first be reconciled to him'; but: 'If thou rememberest,' He says, 'that thy brother hath aught against thee'—that is, even if it be something light and worthless whereby the brother's commotion has been stirred against thee, and this has struck thy memory by a sudden recollection, know that thou oughtest not to offer the spiritual gifts of thy prayers, unless thou first drive away, by kindly satisfaction, the sadness that has arisen from whatever cause from thy brother's heart.

If, therefore, the Gospel word commands us to give satisfaction to those who are angry even for a past and slightest quarrel and for causes arising from trifling matters, what will become of us wretched ones, who, with obstinate dissimulation, despise recent and greatest causes committed by our own fault, and, puffed up with a devilish swelling, while we blush to be humbled, deny that we are the authors of our brother's sadness, and, disdaining with a rebellious spirit to be subject to the Lord's precepts, contend that these ought by no means either to be observed or to be able to be fulfilled? And thereby it comes to pass that, judging Him to have commanded impossible or incongruous things, we become, according to the Apostle, not doers but judges of the law.

This too is to be bewailed with what tears—that some of the brethren, when they have been inflamed by the insult of some word, if they be wearied by the entreaties of some other person who desires to soothe it, when they have heard that sadness ought by no means to be conceived or retained against a brother, according to that which is written: 'He that is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment,' and: 'Let not the sun go down upon your anger'—at once cry out: 'If some pagan, if some worldly person had done this or said these things, it would rightly have had to be borne. But that one should endure a brother privy to so grave a fault, or one uttering so insolent a reproach from his mouth!'

As if forsooth patience were to be applied only to the unbelieving and sacrilegious, and not to all generally; or anger against a Gentile were to be esteemed harmful, but against a brother useful—when assuredly the obstinate commotion of a disturbed mind, against whomsoever it be excited, brings upon itself no dissimilar loss. But of how great obstinacy—nay, of madness—is it, that they cannot even distinguish, through the stupor of a brutish mind, the very propriety of the words! For it is not said: 'Everyone who is angry with a foreigner shall be in danger of the judgment' (which perhaps, according to their sense, could except those who share our faith and manner of life), but significantly the Gospel word expressed it, saying: 'Everyone who is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment.'

Although, therefore, according to the rule of truth we ought to receive every man as a brother, yet in this place one who is faithful and a partaker of our manner of life, rather than a heathen, is designated by the very word 'brother.' But of what sort is that—that sometimes we believe ourselves to be patient because, when provoked, we disdain to answer, but so mock our aroused brethren with bitter silence or with a derisive movement and gesture, that we provoke them to anger more by our silent countenance than swelling reproaches could have incited them—reckoning ourselves in this the less guilty before God, because we have uttered nothing with our mouth that could brand us in the judgment of men or condemn us?

As if forsooth before God only words, and not chiefly the will, were called into blame; and only the deed of sin, and not also the wish and purpose, were held in the crime; or only that which each has done, and not also what he has disposed to do, were to be sought in judgment. For not only the quality of the commotion inflicted, but also the purpose of the one provoking, lies in the fault; and therefore the true examination of our Judge will inquire not in what manner the quarrel was excited, but by whose vice it blazed up: for the effect of the sin, not the order of its commission, is to be considered. For what does it matter whether one has himself slain a brother with a sword, or has driven him to death by some fraud, when it is agreed that he was destroyed by that man's deceit or crime?

As if forsooth it were enough not to have thrust a blind man headlong with one's own hand, when he is equally guilty who, though he could, disdained to call back one already prone and hanging over the pit; or he alone were in the crime who ensnared someone with his own hand, and not also he who either prepared or set the snare, or at least, when he could, was unwilling to remove it. So, therefore, to be silent profits nothing, if we impose silence upon ourselves for this reason: that what was to have been done by reproach, this we may do by taciturnity, simulating certain gestures whereby both he who ought to have been healed may burn with more vehement anger, and we, above all this, may be praised for his loss and perdition:

As if forsooth one were not the more criminal in this very thing, that he wished to procure glory for himself from a brother's perdition. For to both such silence will be equally harmful, because, as it heaps up sadness in the other's heart, so it does not permit it to be extinguished in one's own—against whom that malediction of the prophet is quite fittingly directed: 'Woe to him that giveth his friend to drink, casting in his gall, and making him drunk, that he may look upon his nakedness. He is filled with shame instead of glory.' That too which is said through another concerning such persons: 'For every brother supplanting will supplant, and every friend will walk fraudulently. And a man shall deride his brother, and they shall not speak the truth. For they have bent their tongue like a bow of falsehood and not of truth.'

But often feigned patience inflames to anger even more sharply than a word, and a malicious taciturnity transcends the most atrocious injuries of words; and the wounds of enemies are more easily borne than the treacherous blandishments of mockers. Concerning whom it is fittingly said through the prophet: 'His words are softened above oil, and the same are darts,' and elsewhere: 'The words of the crafty are soft, but these strike into the inmost parts of the belly.' To whom that also can be elegantly applied: 'With his mouth he speaketh peace with his friend, and secretly he layeth snares for him'—by which, nevertheless, he who deceives is himself the more deceived; for 'he who prepareth a net before the face of his friend surroundeth it about his own feet,' and: 'he that diggeth a pit for his neighbour shall fall into it himself.'

Finally, when a great multitude had come with swords and staves to seize the Lord, no one showed himself more bloody a parricide against the Author of our life than he who, forestalling all with the feigned honour of a greeting, thrust upon Him the kiss of treacherous charity. To whom the Lord said: 'Judas, dost thou betray the Son of Man with a kiss?' That is: 'The bitterness of thy persecution and hatred has assumed this covering, by which the sweetness of true love is expressed.' More openly too and more vehemently He magnifies the force of this grief through the prophet: 'For if my enemy,' He says, 'had cursed me, I would verily have borne it; and if he who hated me had spoken great things against me, I would perhaps have hidden myself from him. But thou, a man of one mind, my guide, and my familiar:'

'who together with me didst take sweet food; in the house of God we walked with consent.' There is also another profane kind of sadness, which would not have been worthy of mention, had we not known it to be committed by some of the brethren, who, when they have been saddened or angered, obstinately abstain even from food itself, so that—what we cannot even say without shame—those who, while they are calm, deny that they can defer the refreshment of food beyond the sixth or at most the ninth hour, when they have been filled with sadness or fury, feel not even two-day fasts, and sustain so great a failing of abstinence by the satiety of their anger.

In which they plainly and evidently incur the crime of sacrilege, enduring fasts—which are to be offered specially to God alone for the humiliation of the heart and the purgation of vices—for the sake of a devilish swelling. Which is as if they should offer prayers and sacrifices not to God, but to demons, and deserve to hear that Mosaic rebuke: 'They sacrificed to demons and not to God, to gods whom they knew not.'

Nor are we ignorant of yet another kind of madness, which is found in some of the brethren under the colour of a counterfeit patience, to whom it is too little to have stirred up quarrels, unless with provoking words they also incite others to strike them; and when they have been touched even by a slight blow, they present another part of the body also to be beaten, as though by this they would fulfil the perfection of that command which says: 'If anyone strike thee on thy right cheek, offer him the other also'—being utterly ignorant of the force and purpose of the Scripture.

For they think to exercise Gospel patience through the vice of anger, on account of which, to be cut off at the root, not only is the requital of retaliation and the provocation of contending forbidden, but we are also commanded to mitigate the fury of the one striking by the endurance of a doubled injury. GERMANUS: How is he to be reprehended who, satisfying the Gospel precept, not only has inflicted no retaliation, but is even prepared that the injury be doubled to himself? JOSEPH: As was said a little before, not only the thing itself which is done, but also the quality of mind and the purpose of the doer, is to be regarded.