From a most ancient and celebrated Sangallense (St. Gall) codex Mabillon culled twelve homilies of St. Maximus, which he transferred into his own Musaeum Italicum, as we have already said in the preface. This one, which is the fourth in order, was attributed to Maximus on the authority of no other manuscript monument. Now for the first time we confirm it by the authority of the codex of the greater church of Turin; in which it stands as number 3, with the title: Likewise concerning the same: Homily III, and on the vigil of the Lord's Nativity. It alludes indeed to the title of the homily beginning: How great is the gladness, and how great the concourse, etc., which title is likewise inscribed to this homily. Even were I to be silent, brethren, the season admonishes us that the nativity of the Lord Christ is near at hand.
For the final close of the days forestalls my preaching. For by its very straits the world declares that something is imminent whereby it may be restored to a better state, and with eager expectation it longs that the brightness of a more splendid sun may illumine its darkness. For while it has merited that its course be concluded by the brevity of the hours, by a certain hope it signifies that its year is to be reformed. This expectation of the creature, therefore, persuades us also to expect that the new Sun, Christ arisen, may illumine the darkness of our sins, and that the Sun of righteousness may by the vigour of His nativity dispel the long gloom of our transgressions within us: nor let Him suffer the course of our life to be concluded in the darkness of vice, but to be enlarged by the grace of His power.
Therefore, since we know the Lord's nativity even by the world's indication, let us also do what the world is wont to do: that is, just as on that day the world extends the span of its light, so let us also extend our righteousness; and just as the brightness of that day is common to poor and rich, so let our generosity be common to strangers and the needy; and just as then the world cuts back the gloom of its nights, so let us also cut away the darkness of our avarice; and after the manner of the winter season, just as in the cornfields, when the frost is melted by the sun's warmth, the seeds are nourished, so also in our breasts, when hardness is dissolved, may the warmed seed of righteousness grow together under the Saviour's ray.
Therefore, brethren, being about to receive the Lord's nativity, let us adorn ourselves with pure and shining garments. But I speak of the garments of the soul, not of the flesh. For the garment of the flesh is a cheap covering; the vestment of the soul is a precious body. The former is woven thick by human hands; the latter is instituted by God's hands: and therefore it is of greater solicitude to keep God's work without stain than to preserve the works of men undefiled. For a worldly garment, if it be soiled, the fuller can wash it out when hired; but the garment of the soul, if once stained, is scarcely washed except by one's own assiduous works. The craftsman's hand profits it nothing, the fuller's labour nothing:
for water can wash the polluted members of the conscience, yet it cannot cleanse them. These are the precious garments of the soul which the evangelist Mark (chapter 9) praises in the Saviour, saying: And His garments became shining, exceeding white as snow, so as no fuller on earth can whiten them. Christ's garment is praised, then, because it shone—not by its weave, but by grace; the vestment is praised, not because it was thickened by the fineness of the threads, but because it was conceived by the integrity of the body; the garment is praised, not because women's hands wove it, but because Mary's virginity brought it forth. And therefore in it the grace of its whiteness is magnified, because no craftsman's care had furnished that immaculate thing.
Such as no fuller, he says, on earth can make. Plainly the fuller cannot make Christ's garment; for the fuller can furnish brightness, cleanliness, purity, yet he cannot furnish virginity, righteousness, goodness. For the one lies in the art of the work, the other in the nature of virtue. For these garments of the virtues the holy Evangelist praises in Christ the Lord, which the blessed David also proclaimed with a like sentence, saying: Myrrh and stacte and cassia from thy precious garments (Psalm 44). For by these fragrances of spices the garments of the holy virtues are signified. Therefore, brethren, being about to receive the Lord's nativity, let us cleanse our conscience from every dreg. Let us equip ourselves not with silken robes, but with precious works.
For shining garments can cover the members, but cannot cleanse the conscience: except that it is of greater shame to walk shining in one's members and defiled in one's senses. Therefore let us first adorn the affection of the inner man, that the covering of the outer man too may be adorned. Let us wash away our spiritual stains, that the fleshly garments in us may shine. But it profits nothing to shine in raiment and to be filthy with crimes. For where the conscience is dark, the whole body is darkened. But we have that whereby we may wash away the stains of the conscience, for it is written: Give alms, and all things are clean unto you (Luke 11:41). Good is the commandment of almsgiving, through which we work with our hands, that we may be cleansed in heart. Here ends.