Works 4 part 7/9

But nevertheless, dearest brothers, because ships, after they have overcome and vanquished the waves of the sea, are wont to labor even in the safest harbor and, unless there be great caution, almost to be submerged — with the utmost humility and immense reverence we admonish that, because Christ has freed you from capital crimes as from perilous waves, you who are established in the harbor of quiet and blessedness should hasten continually, with all vigilance and with Christ's help, to bail out the little negligences and, as it were, the tiny sins which so flow together in the soul as drops run together into the bilge through the tiniest cracks of a ship. For just as a ship, after it has escaped the waves of the sea, if it be not drained in the harbor, is filled and sunk by the tiniest drops, so also the monk, when the crimes of this world are vanquished and overcome as perilous waves, when he has come to the harbor of the monastery, if he neglects to bail out of the bilge of his soul the vices that creep in and the small and daily sins, incurs the peril of shipwreck in the very harbor.

But someone says: how can the soul be bailed out? Assuredly by praying, by fasting, by keeping vigil, by exhibiting true charity and true humility and true obedience. Attend, brothers, I beg you. Just as a ship is bailed out with a bucket, so the soul is freed from evil works by the Lord's Prayer, if it says — and says truly — 'Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.' For he who has clemently forgiven all who sin against him, no trace of any sin will remain in his soul. Attend, brothers, and consider what I have said: 'he who forgives the one sinning against himself' — I did not say that you ought to forgive the one who sins against God; but if anyone has sinned against you, you ought to grant him pardon.

What is worse, sometimes we grant pardon to one who has sinned against us either slowly or with difficulty, while to one who has offended against God we forgive quickly. But if we wish to act justly, we ought not at all to pardon, without the strictest severity, the one who has sinned against God, lest, while pardon is granted him through indiscreet mercy, an example of perdition be offered to others. Let each one, therefore, show himself clement in his own case, because the Lord says: 'If you forgive men their sins, your heavenly Father will forgive you your sins.' But when anyone presumes to commit a sin against God, he ought to undergo monastic discipline.

And this ought to be done with a good and pious mind, that he may be so corrected by spiritual chastisement in this world that he may not perish in the world to come, because every sin which is not corrected in this world will be punished in the world to come. For thus does divine Scripture record concerning a son, concerning a servant: 'Thou,' it says, 'shalt strike him with the rod and shalt free his soul from hell.' And therefore, as I suggested above, let us guard against not only capital crimes, but let us also spit out, as it were, the daily poisons of the devil, the small negligences. For there are some who, after the profession of religion, because they seem to have gone out from the world, are loosed by excessive security, and in them is fulfilled the Lord's saying, in which it is said: 'Would that thou wert cold or hot.'

'But now, because thou art lukewarm, I will begin to spew thee out of My mouth.' What is it that He said: 'Would that thou wert hot or cold'? This is what He means: it were better for thee to have remained cold in the world or to have been fervent in the monastery; but now, because thou hast both departed from the world and hast been unwilling, through thy negligence, to lay hold of spiritual fervor, thou art made lukewarm, and, scarcely to be received again, thou art spewed out of the Lord's mouth. And therefore, dearest brothers, with God's help attend diligently to the saying of divine Scripture, in which it is said: 'With all watchfulness keep thy heart.'

For just as one ought to rejoice over a monk who, being meek and humble, is willing to exhibit gentleness, obedience, and patience in the monastery, so on the contrary one ought to mourn over him who seems to have gone out of this world only in body, while in heart he is known either to have remained faithlessly in the world or to have returned unhappily; and instead of humility he displays pride, instead of patience wrath, instead of obedience contempt, and instead of the medicine of charity he pours out the poison of malice. To such ones is fitting that true and greatly to be feared saying of blessed Peter: 'It were better for them,' he says, 'not to have known the way of justice, than after knowing it to turn back'; and again: 'The dog returned to his vomit, and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.'

But not even of such ones should we despair, brothers, because God is able, while you pray, to kindle a spark of compunction and to consume with a wholesome fire every pleasure of the world like the thorns and briars of wickedness — with that fire, assuredly, of which the Lord says: 'I came to send fire upon the earth, and what will I but that it burn?' Pray therefore, most beloved brothers, not only that God may deign to grant you good perseverance, but also that those who are negligent may at last raise themselves out of the pit of pride and rescue themselves from the snares.

For if, while you pray and give counsel with charity, those who are lukewarm and negligent be amended, the Lord will deign to recompense you with a doubled reward, both for your own and for their correction. For neither ought those who are good to exalt themselves as though on account of their own merits, nor ought those who are negligent to despair of God's mercy; but let the former guard God's gifts with humility, and let the latter, with great compunction, flee more swiftly to penance and to the medicines of correction; because he who is good, if he begins to be proud, will be humbled, and he who is proud, if he humbles himself, will be lifted up through God's mercy.

For it is enough that he not allow himself to be pressed further under the harshest yoke, nor be hardened longer by persevering in his sins through excessive and perilous dissimulation, but flee so quickly to the mercy of God that he leaves in himself no trace of sin. Best of all is the poultice or clasp applied to wounds still warm, because, if the intention of rising again be swift toward the heavenly Physician, the trace of sin will not be able to remain with the fallen one, since under the hand of the almighty Physician, God, the disease both quickly perishes and the sick man is swiftly healed.

Again and again I beseech and admonish you, brothers, that you strive continually to exhibit obedience and humility and charity not only to elders and equals, but also to juniors; because, whatever good things a servant of God strives to have, he loses them all in a moment if in him there be not true humility and charity. Do not murmur, brothers, for it is written that those who murmured perished by serpents. Do not disparage, brothers, because it is written: 'He who disparages his brother shall be rooted out.' Do not keep wrath in your heart, because it is written: 'For the wrath of man worketh not the justice of God.' Do not hate one another, on account of that which is written: 'He who hates his brother is a murderer.'

But there is no need for us to instruct your holy charity longer with words concerning that which we both know and rejoice that you fulfill in works unto the glory of Christ. This one thing only we especially ask: that, because God has deigned to place you in a place of quiet and tranquillity, you would more abundantly supplicate the Lord for us whom the tempests and innumerable waves of this world afflict, so that, if glory be not given to us because we do not deserve it, at least, through your prayers, pardon of sins may be granted. Amen. XXV. A SERMON BEFORE LENT.

I beseech and admonish you, dearest brothers, that in this lawful and most sacred season, except on the Lord's days, no one presume to dine, unless perhaps he whom infirmity does not permit to fast; because to fast on other days is either a remedy or a reward, but not to fast in Lent is a sin. At another time, he who fasts will receive indulgence; in Lent, he who is able and does not fast will feel punishment.

And yet let even that one who is not strong enough to fast prepare for himself alone, more privately, or, if there is another infirm one, together with him in his own dwelling, that which he may eat; and let him not invite those who are healthy and strong enough to fast to eat with him, because, if he does this, not only God but also men can understand that he is unable to fast not because of infirmity, but is unwilling to fast because of gluttony. Let it suffice him that he is not strong enough to fast, and rather with groaning and sighing and grief of soul let him eat, because, while others fast, he himself cannot.

Let each infirm person have prepared what is needful for him more privately, either for himself alone or for another infirm one likewise, because it does not befit him to invite any healthy person to a meal, lest he increase for himself sin even from another's gluttony. Yet, in return for the fact that he cannot fast, he ought to bestow the more upon the poor, that the sins which he cannot cure by fasting he may be able to redeem by giving alms. It is good to fast, brothers, but it is better to give alms. If anyone can do both, it is a double good. But if he cannot, it is better to give alms. If there be no possibility of fasting, almsgiving suffices of itself without fasting; but fasting without almsgiving is by no means sufficient.

Therefore, if anyone cannot fast, almsgiving without fasting is good. But if fasting together with almsgiving prevails, it is a double good — while fasting without almsgiving is no good at all — unless perhaps someone be so poor that he has nothing whatsoever to give. To those, then, who have not the means to give in return, a good will suffices, according to that which is written: 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will.' But who will there be who can excuse himself, since the Lord has promised that He will render a reward even for a cup of cold water? And why did He say 'cold'?

Lest perhaps some poor person be able to excuse himself on account of a scarcity of firewood, or should surely say that he has no little vessel in which to heat the water. In short, dearest brothers, also through the blessed prophet the Lord thus exhorts and admonishes that alms be given, so that there be almost no poor person who is able to excuse himself. For thus He says: 'This is the fast that I have chosen, saith the Lord: break thy bread to the hungry.' He did not say that he should give the whole, since perhaps that poor man had no other, but 'break,' He says — that is to say: even if thy poverty be so great that thou hast but one loaf, yet break from it and bestow on the poor. 'And the needy,' He says, 'and the homeless bring into thy house.'

If anyone is so poor that he has nothing wherewith to give food to the poor, let him at least prepare a bed for the stranger in some corner of his own house. What then shall we say to this, brethren, or what excuse shall we be able to have, we who, possessing ample and spacious houses, scarcely ever deign to receive a stranger, being ignorant, nay rather not believing, that in every stranger Christ is received, even as he himself said: 'I was a stranger and you took me in,' and: 'As long as you did it to one of these least, you did it to me'? It is laborious and irksome to us to receive Christ in the poor. Here in our own land I fear lest he repay us in kind, lest he receive us not into his blessedness.

We despise him in the world; I fear lest he in turn despise us in heaven, according to that which he himself said: 'For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, and I was a stranger and you took me not in,' and: 'As long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to me.' And as for what follows after, brethren, may God turn it away from us; for he added this afterward, saying: 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels.' These things therefore, dearest brethren, let us not hear in passing nor with the bodily ears alone, but hearing them faithfully, let us teach them by word and by example alike, so that others too may hold and fulfil them. What then did the Lord say after these things through the prophet?

'If you see one naked,' he says, 'cover him.' In this saying I judge no one; let each one attend to his own conscience. Yet I accuse and reproach myself, because perhaps it has sometimes happened that through my negligence my little garments, which the poor ought to have received, were devoured by moths. And I fear lest my very rags be brought forth as testimony against me in the day of judgment, according to that which the apostle James terribly rebukes, saying: 'Go to now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver is cankered, and the rust of them shall be a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh like fire.'

'You have heaped treasure together upon earth, and you have nourished your hearts in luxury against the day of slaughter.' All these things, as I have said, dearest brethren, which Christ has threatened through the apostle, although they greatly terrify us, yet we must not despair of God's mercy. For even now both I and those like me, though negligent, can with God's help amend ourselves if we will; if both we bestow more liberally the alms which up to now we have given too sparingly, and for our past sins with grief and groaning and with hope of restoration entreat the mercy of God. Therefore, as we suggested above, dearest brethren, let the richness of alms commend our fasts, since a fast without almsgiving is like a lamp without oil.

For just as a lamp which is lit without oil can smoke but cannot give light, so a fast without almsgiving indeed torments the flesh, but does not illumine the soul with the light of charity. Meanwhile, while it is permitted, as regards the present matter, brethren, let us so fast that our meals may be bestowed upon the poor; so that what we were about to eat we may lay up, not in our own purses, but in the bellies of the poor, since the hand of the poor is the treasury of Christ. Whatever it receives is laid up in heaven, that it perish not on earth; for although the food which the poor man receives is consumed, yet the reward of the good work is stored up in heaven. For if we are eager to spend our meals with choice flavors and

and manifold dishes to expend them on our supper, thus delights are not withdrawn from our body, but are even doubled; and just as in this way nothing is diminished from our body, so nothing is added to the soul. These things, brethren, I admonish rather out of fear than because I believe anything sinister concerning you. Yet I know that many of you, by God's favor, both continually receive strangers and frequently give alms to the poor. And therefore let what I suggest profit to this end, that he who was doing it may do it the more; but he who was not doing it, or perhaps was doing it too tardily, may make so holy a work, pleasing to God, into a habit.

And although I believe that, by God's inspiration, whenever festivals draw near your charity keeps chastity for many days beforehand—even with your own wives—yet, though it be superfluous, I nevertheless admonish you out of the regard of charity, as I believe you already do, that keeping chastity, with God's help, throughout the whole of Lent even to the end of Easter, in that most sacred paschal solemnity, clothed with the light of charity, resplendent with alms, adorned with prayers, vigils, and fasts as with certain heavenly and spiritual pearls, being at peace not only with friends but also with enemies, you may with a free and untroubled conscience approach the altar of the Lord and receive his body and blood not unto judgment but unto a remedy.

But when I speak of alms, let straitened poverty not be troubled. For he has fulfilled all things who did what he could, since the perfect will to do is reckoned in place of the deed done. But this he will be able to fulfil who is willing to regard every poor man as his very self. Let him so bestow upon the poor man as he would desire to have done for himself if he himself were in such need. He who does this will fulfil the precepts both of the New and of the Old Testament, fulfilling that gospel saying: 'All things whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do you also to them likewise.'

For this is the law and the prophets; to which law of true and perfect charity may the Lord himself lead us under his protection, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns unto the ages of ages. Amen. XXVI. A SERMON ON LENT. I believe, most beloved brethren, that you are troubled as to why we ran ahead to the previous Sunday, and why, though today is its beginning, we began to celebrate its festival a week beforehand. This overly hasty observance cannot be reproved. For it is a mark of devotion to carry out the law before knowing the law's statutes, and to obey the precepts before the precepts compel obedience.

For the one belongs to love, the other to fear; the one is exacted by command, the other is offered devoutly; here a debt is paid, there a gift of bounty is bestowed. Wherefore we too have offered a devout gift to God, in that we fasted the more. For a hastened festival cannot be reproved. For in rejoicings the vows always anticipate the solemnity, and longed-for devotion anticipates the coming gladness. Therefore it was done not only not reprehensibly, but even prudently. For in doubtful matters one ought always to add something more for safety's sake, because what is more can be cut back, but what is less cannot be lengthened, as has been done in this observance.

For in that we fasted more on account of Lent, we did not diminish Lent, for it remains entire for us. But if we had fasted less, we could not have restored it up to its full number of days. But perhaps the objection is this: why does the fast which we have fasted not profit us toward Lent? It will plainly profit us; for even if it does not profit toward Lent, it profits toward salvation; if it does not profit toward the number, it profits toward merit. For whom did it ever not profit to pray, to read, to fast? Whom did chastity, sobriety, meekness not profit? Except that I rather reprove those who, though they had been ready to fast, afterward, when they heard of the festivals, doubtfully neglected to fast.

Assuredly they showed that they were not willing to live religiously, but were compelled. They feared, I believe, lest by the fasts of five days being prolonged their flesh and body should fail them, and lest, being thin and weak, they should not be able to endure the abstinence of Lent. Let them hear then, both the well-fed and the robust, and the thin and pale, that today is Lent. Let those, I say, hear, so that these may begin to fast, and those may not cease to abstain, and let them together hasten to enter the ark of Christ. Nay, let them hasten the more, because they began to abstain too tardily, so that they may enter more chastened and purer; for the ark of the Lord in perils has power to sustain the fasting man, but knows not how to bear up the drunken.

Therefore we admonish you, as we have already said before, we men of our own time, that in these whirlwinds of the world each one may vie to flee to the house of God, even as the just Noah admonished the men of his own time. For he admonished them and did not cease to proclaim the coming flood; and although the voice of his preaching was not heard, yet, even if his tongue was silent, he spoke by his work; even if he was silent from speaking with the voice, the axe resounded. For while he was building so great a work, he attested by the very work the reason why the ark was being made. For he attested by the very equipping that new dwellings would be of profit in new perils.

For any wise man could understand that some kind of shipwreck was impending, when such a house was being made, one which did not cling to the earth but floated on the flood; when a lodging of this sort was being prepared, which neither fixed its floor to the ground nor let the wave sink it in the billows. Who, I say, that was wise would not understand that a flood was at hand, when he saw such a dwelling being made, one which would not so much shut in those it received within itself as carry them; which would not so much ward off the showers of rain as fend off the storms of shipwreck? What men, I say, would that peril not turn away from such a lodging—a lodging in which one was not to dwell, but rather to be an exile?

In whatever part of the world he was to be, along with the very dwellings, a stranger and pilgrim. Therefore holy Noah himself preached to the peoples by his work, and spoke that gospel saying of the Lord: 'If you believe not me, believe the works.' XXVII. A SERMON ON THE BURIAL OF SAINT AUGUSTINE. Today, dearest brethren, we celebrate the burial of holy remembrance, of our lord and father Augustine the bishop. For while I silently marvel with myself at his apostolic merits, there comes to my mind the array and vesture of that highest priest Aaron, by which diverse graces and virtues are prefigured. Among the institutions of the Old Testament, according to the venerable mysteries of the ancient law, the great pontiff, about to enter the holy of holies, was adorned with various insignia.

Among the beautiful varieties—which indeed to the beholders displayed marvels, but to those who understood, sacraments—there flowed down along the borders of the tunic even to the feet, and along the lowest hems a row of little bells joined together with skillful art, which resounded about his venerable gait, so that the very vesture might show that in holy things it is not lawful for the pontiff to be silent.

But that, when the priest entered the holy of holies, the bells sounded not in some other place but on the outermost part of the garments—this without doubt signified that, as often as the priest has entered the temple of God, he should not cease to cry out concerning the end of this world and the close of the age, always announcing the rewards of the just and the punishments of sinners; so that, while the former are stirred up to good and the latter deterred from evil, they may together attain to the eternal rewards. Wherefore I too now do not fear to be presumptuous in preaching confidently of so great and so worthy a patron of ours, our own particular saint Augustine.

I say I do not fear it to be presumption if, since he himself was spiritually clothed and endowed with the dowry of so great virtues, I profess myself to be as it were one little bell of his outermost garment; so that, clinging as it were about the footsteps of his teaching, from his merits I may receive the sound of a voice, and as though stirred by his movements—that is, by his virtues—I may render whatever small tinkling I can, and by the commemoration of his merits may strike your hearts. Now besides these ornaments, as we have commemorated, which divine indulgence granted in holy Augustine by the light of his merits, we read yet another likeness in the Old Testament.

For before the forehead of the pontiff a plate of gold shone forth extended, which by the brightness of the metal displayed the purity of conscience. No less was there fitted to him a jeweled ephod on the shoulders and a precious breastplate over the breast, so that the dignity of the exterior might likewise admonish how the interior ought to be cultivated. On that very breastplate too the priest Aaron bore the names of the sons of Israel woven in jeweler's work. This magnificence, therefore, of his sacred vestments we rejoice to see shining in the praiseworthy institutions of Augustine of holy remembrance and in the spiritual pearls of his diverse graces; but in him they are proved to have shone far more, and far more truly.

For those things which in Aaron were represented in his garments, in him were plainly expressed either in his grace or in his merits. In Aaron a plate of gold adorned the prominence of his forehead; in this man a golden modesty and precious sincerity irradiates the forehead of his mind. Those ancient ornaments of foreign stone and the emblems of elaborate beauty seemed to Aaron to be added on; to this man they are proved to have been granted by the bounty of grace. In Aaron they were sketched by the hand of a craftsman; in holy Augustine they were made perfect by the gift of the Creator. Aaron took them up once a year to be soon put off again; this man knows how to put on the very things incorporated into his nature, but never knows how to put them off, things not to be laid aside even with the body, but to be carried back to their Author with the spirit.

In Aaron there was a passing figure; in this man an abiding truth. It remains that you should profit in all things by the heavenly institutions and singular examples of holy Augustine. For all things are abundantly at hand for you in him, whether what pertains to edification, or what looks to glory, or what calls to life, or what exalts to glory. For in him, if you seek the affection of good will, the works of mercy cry out; if you desire patience, there stand forth the ornaments of meekness; if the secrets of a pure conscience are to be inquired of, the insignia of chastity answer; the balsams of kindness are fragrant, the aromatic spices of piety; the necklaces of knowledge and wisdom shine forth.

Among these things we greatly fear lest, while the affection of our preaching hints at the merits of holy Augustine, the thinness of our speech should conceal them. For indeed, before this follower of heavenly things put off the secular habit and took up the standards of the sacred warfare, for some time in secret he bore a hidden soldiership in the fear and dread of the Lord; long placed in this world, he was at the very edge of the world; and thus, having taken up a public manner of life, he did not so much begin to be what he was not, as reveal what lay hidden.

Therefore when his youthful age, with the deceits of wantonness prevailing, strove to paint and prescribe to him the appearances of fleeting things; when the fugitive sweetness of pleasures that pass by and destroy assailed his senses, and the world, by adding it, bound him fast to itself with diverse bonds and violences; and when the pleasantness of this life sought as it were to hold in its embrace him who was mighty in birth, means, character, keenness, and capacity of memory, and who through his riches was bringing forth into the open the gifts of manifold grace—he, feeling all these charms as so many chains about himself, resolved to refuse credence to uncertain things and determined that he could not consent.