Therefore the publican went down justified rather than that Pharisee (Luke 18:10-14). Hear then, you who live well, hear, you who live badly, 'The sacrifice of praise shall glorify me.' No one offers me this sacrifice and is evil. I do not say, 'The evil man does not offer me this'; but 'No evil man offers me this.' For he who praises is good: because if he praises, he also lives well; because if he praises, he praises not only with the tongue, but his life also consents with the tongue. Exhortation. And therefore I beg you, most beloved brethren, as much as we can, with God's help let us strive that, as we praise God with our voices, so also we may praise him together with good morals. For it is better to be silent and do good, than to praise God and commit sins.
For he who praises God with life and tongue together, with voices equally and good works, doubly stirs up in himself the grace of God. But if he does not prevail to praise God with his voice, let him praise with good works, with assiduous prayers, with holy thoughts. For if we attend to these things diligently, both in this world we can praise the Lord with a secure conscience, and in the world to come we shall happily come to eternal joy. SERMON 54. On that which the Prophet says in Psalm 83, 'My heart and my flesh have exulted in the living God.' Full love of God excludes the love of the world. Whose heart and flesh exult in God.
According to the Apostle, most beloved brethren, whoever loves the world sufficiently does not have the full affection of divine love. For thus you have heard read: 'Whoever loves the world, the perfect charity of God is not in him' (1 John 2:15). And through this, then does a Christian begin perfectly to love the future and eternal life, when he has begun not to love the present life. And therefore it immediately follows in the Psalm, 'My heart and my flesh have exulted in the living God.' He confirms what he had said above, that he loves God, not the world. He exulted in the living God;
he did not exult in this world, nor did he exult in any of the delights that are of the world, that is, not in riches, not in honor, not in luxury, not in drunkenness, not in dead vanities, and vanities that soon will die together with all their charm, but in the living God. Why did he not say, 'In God' only, but added, 'In the living God'? Namely, to show that everything which does not pertain to the worship of God we ought to hold as dead. And at the same time consider in this saying the subtlety of the sacred discourse: 'My heart,' he says, 'and my flesh have exulted in the living God.' Would it not suffice to say, 'My heart has exulted in the living God,' unless he had added, 'and my flesh'?
Let us therefore see how both the heart and the flesh of man exult together in God. How, except that a man serves God both with flesh and with heart? For the heart exults in God when it thinks honorable and holy things, when it desires works that are religious and pleasing to God. But the flesh exults when it is chaste, when it is sober, when it is polluted by no impurity, when it is defiled by no unclean acts. See, on the contrary side, and recognize how true are the things I say: if any of you sees a man speaking unjust things, can he say that his heart exults in the living God? Or if anyone sees another drunken, unchaste, a fornicator, can he say that his flesh exults in the living God?
For no flesh exults in God which lives in vice. Therefore then the Prophet said, 'My heart and my flesh have exulted in the living God'; because he both retained in his heart the full faith of religion, and in his flesh preserved the devout sanctity of the body. Christ is turtledove and sparrow. The voice of the turtledove is the doctrine of chastity. Christ's house is the Church. The chicks are the Christians. And not without cause did the Psalmist immediately add in what follows, saying: 'For the sparrow has found herself a house, and the turtledove a nest for herself, where she may lay her young.' In the turtledove and the sparrow our Savior is signified, most beloved brethren. For the sparrow, as you know, is a very small bird; but the turtledove, as we read, is most chaste.
And therefore our Savior was called a sparrow, because he first taught humility; he was called a turtledove, because he first taught chastity. Whence also in the Song of Songs the prophet says, 'The voice of the turtledove has been heard in our land' (Song 2:12). The voice of the turtledove is understood as the doctrine of the Savior. He who has begun to hear it has fallen in love with the purity of chastity. 'For the sparrow has found herself a house, and the turtledove a nest for herself, where she may lay her young.' For what is the house of Christ, except the Church of God? What is the house of Christ, except the assembly of the Christian people? This house therefore the Savior sought with immense love, and found it; this house he peculiarly loves. Rightly does he peculiarly love that which he peculiarly purchased with his own blood.
In this house therefore the Savior gathers his young. Whom then do we believe to be Christ's young? Whom, except the Christian peoples? Finally, who are the young of our Lord, your very assembly today shows. For while I look upon your congregation, I see the Savior to have gathered his young in the church. Although we read written in other books, as I said above, 'And the turtledove a nest for herself, where she may lay her young'; yet both fit well in the person of the Church: that is, that the Savior both gathers us and lays us to rest. For he gathers us, that we may hear his doctrine: and he lays us to rest, that we may be able to be safe from the snares of the devil. That he may do this, and may do it daily, let us pray to God our Savior;
to whom, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, is honor and glory for ages of ages. Amen. SERMON 55. On that which is written in Psalm 118:66, 'Teach me goodness, and discipline, and knowledge.' What must be prayed for. Discipline is necessary to goodness, and knowledge to both. Among the other things by which blessed David heals the infirmities of our souls, under a certain rule of the Trinity he instructed us, like a most skilled master, to hold the form of praying, saying: 'Teach me goodness, and discipline, and knowledge, O Lord.' Attend therefore more carefully, brethren, to which virtues especially the prophetic king prays that they be granted to him: 'Goodness,' he says, 'and discipline, and knowledge teach me, O Lord.'
Truly he knows how to live rightly, who knows how to pray rightly. For he did not ask for the treasures of worldly riches, nor for neighboring kingdoms, nor for more prolonged times of living; but he begged to be taught goodness together with discipline. For goodness makes discipline lovable, and discipline makes goodness blameless. Nor do I think it hidden from anyone, that goodness without discipline is the mother of faults, and discipline without goodness is a certain sad bitterness of living. He implores knowledge to be granted to him equally, so that he may know skillfully and wisely to distinguish what are the limits of goodness, and what measure discipline ought to have;
lest perhaps either goodness be ill-advisedly disfigured by the fault of excessive laxity, or discipline grow cruel by its own harsh severity. Do you wish, brother, to be good to one who sins? You act kindly indeed: but that you may be truly good, apply to him the vigor of discipline; that your goodness may profit him unto salvation. For if you terrify him by no rebuke of restraining censure, this goodness of yours will be pernicious to him; because you permit the sinner to perish, whom you could have saved by correcting him. Again, if by excessive rigor of discipline you offer no medicine of the knowledge of goodness; while the sinner flees your rigor, you will not cure the sickness of his sin.
And what manner of life, or what justice will there be, that too lax a mildness should offer restraint to the sinner, or immoderate severity should not call back the offender from his fall? But that we may learn more fully and more perfectly that the mastery of this goodness and discipline was in our elders, let us review a few examples out of many of the venerable fathers. Peter exhibited these virtues in himself. Without doubt blessed Peter fulfilled the form of that goodness and discipline, when, as one truly good, he is said to have cured the sick offered to him; and as a lover of heavenly discipline, he is related to have punished liars with just retribution.
Indeed, that lame Aeneas testifies to the grace of his goodness, who, lame from infancy, sitting at the gate of the Lord's temple and begging, in the name of Christ Jesus, at the command of the healing Apostle, received his former health (Acts 9:34). Ananias and Sapphira also proved the severity of his discipline, who, selling off a field which no one compelled them to sell, while they lied to the Apostle about the amount of the price, purchased death for themselves by their falsehood (Acts 5:1-11). By which deed the most glorious Peter taught that goodness and discipline were in him; while he furnishes a remedy to the infirm, and takes fitting retribution from liars: which he rightly and holily did, as the consent of the heavenly judgment shows.
But of the perfection of his knowledge who would doubt, who knew that Christ the Lord is the Son of the living God, the Father revealing it to him from heaven? And because goodness and discipline and knowledge were not lacking, the Lord commended to him his little sheep to be fed (Matt. 16:16-19). Paul likewise. The most glorious Paul also held goodness and discipline, who, as his writings testify, held out to his disciples both the rod of correction and the spirit of meekness; on account of which goodness made him lovable to all, and discipline made him terrible. For even in the very beginnings of the world, that he might teach the churches the goodness and discipline of Christ, he both ordered the sinner to be removed from the communion of the saints (1 Cor. 5:5),
and ordered the same man, when corrected, to be received back (2 Cor. 2:6-9). But of his knowledge what shall we say, since all know that he learned in the heavenly places the things which he taught on earth? There he recorded himself to have been taught such things as it would not be lawful to speak to mortals (2 Cor. 12:1-4). Likewise John the Baptist. Nonetheless the Lord's witness and baptist John had goodness and discipline, who washed those turning back from their sins with the baptism of repentance by the address of prophetic piety; and, as a truly immovable guardian of the legal precepts, both accused King Herod concerning his unlawful wife, and enjoined the precepts of a purer life upon all who flocked to him.
But the fullness of his knowledge who can recognize, who first of all revealed that which came from heaven for the salvation of the world? Peroration. See therefore, brethren, by what a compendium of praying, and by what fewness of words the venerable Prophet sought the perfection of living. For in the briefest discourse he concluded whatever the multitude of spiritual virtues contains. If therefore that foremost of the Prophets so greatly prayed to be taught by God this way of a holier life; what ought we to do, who both are numb with the weakness of a dull sense, and are corrupted by the harmful habit of a more relaxed life? We, I say, ought rather to pray, saying: 'Teach us goodness, and discipline, and knowledge, O Lord':
so that in us goodness may conquer malice, discipline may restrain base things and pleasures, and the knowledge of truth may illuminate the blindness of ignorance. For if you know that God the Father almighty and his only-begotten Son are of one substance, and believe that the Holy Spirit likewise reigns in equal eternity, no vain persuasion of the Pagans, nor the perfidious impiety of the Arians will ever disturb you. If the knowledge of right judgment fills your heart and mind, you will have discipline in your morals. Again, if you keep the measure and rules of discipline itself, you will hold a fitting goodness in all things: because goodness is the tempering of discipline, and discipline is the seasoning of goodness.
Beware therefore, brother, lest you should so wish to seem good that you cast away discipline; or should so pursue an arduous discipline that you remove goodness. To which things blessed David for this reason prays that knowledge be joined, that by the direct judgment of our mind we may be able to know how there may be in us both a stricter goodness, and a milder discipline. SERMON 56. On the words of Psalm 135:1, 'Confess to the Lord,' etc., and also of Proverbs 3:11-12, 'Son, do not neglect the discipline of God,' etc. The necessity of confession. God's readiness to pardon. Confess to the Lord, most beloved brethren, for he is good, for his mercy is unto the age. We learn the remedies for purging our crime, the Holy Spirit instructing us;
that we cannot otherwise deserve to obtain pardon, unless we have confessed our crimes at God's command. For what does the sinner conceal, which he committed with God as witness? Why does he blush to confess, who did not blush to be defiled by sins? Let him therefore wash away by confessing what he had infected by sinning; let him wash off by satisfaction what he had befouled with the stains of his offenses: let him be more cautious after his offense, who before his offense had been more careless; let him follow Christ in good acts, who was following the devil in evil ones. 'Confess,' he says, 'to the Lord, for he is good.' He does not wish to avenge malice, who persuades to confess offenses: he desires to release those who confess, lest he be compelled to punish the obstinate.
Why the admonition of God should make one solicitous, lest his severity make one punished. That we are frequently scourged by the merits of our sins, no prudent man denies, no fool understands. For God wishes to admonish frequently those whom he thinks to be corrected: he wishes to correct by the severity of temptations those whom he has seen by his patience to be corrupted; he wishes, I say, thus far to reform sinners, to correct offenders, to call back the erring, and to raise up to the hope of recovering salvation those already dead. For God rejoices, if he sees corrected those whom he amends: he is glad also if he beholds changed for the better into just men those whom he scourges.
From that same disposition of love He desires that the terror, the threats, and the blows sent upon sinners should avail more to correct the wicked than to punish the guilty. For God wills to have mercy on all, He wills to pardon, He wills to show Himself merciful, if He should see any man corrected by amended deeds. 'If Thy children forsake My law,' He says, 'and walk not in My precepts, if they profane My ordinances, I will visit their iniquities with the rod, and their sins with stripes; but My mercy I will not scatter away from them' (Ps. 88:31-34). 2. The scourges of God are benefits and remedies; insensibility is to be lamented. These are the remedies by which God takes counsel for us; this is the medicine by which the wounds of men are healed;
by these profitable means men are amended, vices are corrected, and the malice of men is restrained. These are divine benefits, not blows; nor are they inflicted from on high to do harm, since they come for this end, that men may be cared for by a Father's clemency. 'As many as I love,' He says, 'I rebuke and chasten' (Rev. 3:19). And again: 'My son, neglect not the discipline of God, nor faint when thou art reproved by Him. For whom God loveth He correcteth, and He scourgeth every son whom He receiveth.' Therefore, if He scourges every son to this end that He may correct him, and corrects him for this end, that He may present him worthy of the Father, that is, of God, let him fear who is not scourged, lest he cannot be a son;
let him fear whom God wills not to correct in this world, because He has destined him to punishment after this world; let him fear who still rejoices and takes delight in this world, lest he be grieved and weep for eternity; let him fear who does not suffer with the just in this world, lest he tear himself with sinners in everlasting punishment. 3. Sinners are afflicted that they may be amended, and the just that they may be proved and make progress. But if sinners, one may say, suffer these things in this world by the merit of their offences, why are holy men also sometimes afflicted equally and alike with sinners, unless because these things profit sinners for amendment and the just for proving? For as sinners are corrected from evils by these remedies, so the just are hereby increased in good.
For those God amends, that He may correct them; but these He proves, that He may increase them: those He recalls from fault; these He reserves the more holy for Himself. There sins are corrected, here the merits of virtue are increased; there a penitent remembrance, here the joy of a pure mind rejoicing. The one longs for divine pardon; the other already thinks upon the promised rewards: the one asks pardon of a merciful judge; the other awaits a just rewarder: the one anxious, that he may obtain what he asks; the other secure, because he can receive what he deserves. For God at least wears down the sinning by amendment, lest, when malice grows, He find something to avenge; for He hates punishment, who beforehand builds a defence lest He condemn. Let the Christian rejoice in adversities;
because either he is being proved, if he is just; or if he is a sinner, he is being amended. Let him indeed be grieved whom the divine scourges cannot correct: let him fear the punishment of the judgment to come, who in the present world has despised the remedy of the judge. Let the sinner rejoice, if he is grieved together with the just in this world, that after this world he may be rewarded together with the same. 'You,' says the Lord, 'shall weep and lament; but the world shall rejoice. You shall be sorrowful; but your sorrow shall be turned into joy' (John 16:20). Who would not choose to be grieved for a brief time, that he may triumph in eternity with Christ in everlasting joy? Who would not desire to weigh the weeping of the present time against the joy to come?
Small, momentary, and brief is whatever of good or evil there is in this world. 'Let no temptation take hold of you,' He says, 'but such as is human. And God is faithful, who will not suffer you to bear more than you are able; but will make with the temptation a way of escape, that you may be able to endure it' (1 Cor. 10:13). But God also grants security, and at times indulges our frailty. 4. The soldier of Christ must always keep watch; in peace all the more must he watch. Let the soldier of Christ be armed, let him be watchful, let him be cautious, let him be secure in God alone. Let him keep watch in peace more warily than he was wont to watch in war: let him not be relaxed by security, lest from some quarter the enemy creep in. 'Be sober,' he says, 'and watch;'
'for your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goes about seeking someone to devour' (1 Pet. 5:8). When the enemy watches to do harm, so much the more let the Christian watch to conquer. For the enemy never creeps upon the watchful; the foe never surrounds the vigilant. For he is not then only to be guarded against, when he declares war upon the servants of God: in peace all the more must we keep watch; the mind must be exercised, virtue exercised, the intention of the mind must be strengthened by the fear of God. For the enemy makes secure those whom he desires to be captives; he makes them secure, I say, that he may subdue the incautious, may crush the drowsy and unarmed, may wound those whom he perceives to be least on their watch. If any soldier should join battle with the enemy under the sight of his commander,
with what earnestness, with what valour will he fight, that he may please Him under whom he serves! Nor will he be able to win pay or promotion, unless overcoming the enemy he conquers bravely. Watch, O Christian, beneath the eyes of God, that you may be crowned with perfect victory; fight with the devil, you who are already armed by Christ: God is with you, who wishes you to conquer; Christ is with you, who desires to reward you. Despise present things, that you may attain the future: scorn temporal things, that you may be able to receive the eternal. You shall possess heaven, which the devil could not possess; you shall have paradise, from which the enemy was shut out; you shall receive eternity, which the treacherous foe lost. Perfidy cast him down to earth; faith sets you in heaven:
he by his contempt was deprived of heavenly power; you by your service are upheld by angelic majesty: for him eternal torments are destined; for you divine rewards are prepared: he, the faithless one, shall perish with the faithless; you, sanctified, shall reign with the saints; so that you who had been temporal and a beggar may be adorned with eternal glory. Nor shall you dread anything in the world, because you have rejected, together with the world, the devil, the author of dread. Amen. SERMON 57. On the Valiant Woman and on the Church, on Proverbs chapter 31, verses 10-31. 1. The word of God must be cherished with fervour of heart. I beg you, dearest brethren, that after the custom of the faithful you receive in silence and quiet the things that are preached to you.
For our soul, when by God's gift it has been able to conceive something from the reading of the holy Scriptures, longs to find a spiritual nest in your hearts. And therefore, like most chaste turtledoves, strive to cherish the divine words with the fervour of the Holy Spirit in the nest of your heart, nor allow the word of God, the seed within you, to freeze from the cold of sins, according to that which is written: 'Because iniquity has abounded, charity grows cold' (Matt. 24:12). Rather be, as the Apostle says, 'fervent in Spirit' (Rom. 12:11). For as doves or turtledoves, after they have laid their eggs, if they let them grow cold, lose the fruit of them; so also
you also, if you allow the word of God once conceived to grow cold through forgetfulness, cannot have its desirable fruit. Provide within yourselves a nest for the holy words, according to that which is written: 'The turtledove has found herself a nest where she may lay her young' (Ps. 84:4). And since the Scripture of Solomon commends to us a great woman having a great husband, saying, 'Who shall find a valiant woman?', therefore concerning her we desire to convey to your ears the few things which God vouchsafes to suggest, according to their tenor. 1. The Catholic Church cannot be hidden. — 'Who shall find a valiant woman?' It is hard to find her, and hard not to know her. Is she not that city set on a mountain which cannot be hidden (Matt. 5:14)?
Why then was it said, 'Who shall find her?', when it ought to have been said, 'Who shall not find her?' But you see a city set upon a mountain: yet that it might be set upon the mountain, it had first to be found. For she is that sheep which had been lost. And truly, brethren, it is the Catholic Church, which is now brought to light: who then does not see her? When she lay hidden, who found her? For just as she has already been called that city, so also she is the sheep which the shepherd sought when it was lost. The shepherd himself is the mountain: the sheep therefore on his shoulders is the city upon the mountain. It is easy to see her placed upon the mountain. But how would you have found her, when she lay hidden among the brambles and thorns, that is, of her own offences? To have sought her there is a great thing; to have found her there is marvellous.
This difficult finding of her is commended, when it is said, 'Who shall find a valiant woman?', that is, the Church. Who does not see her, now found by Christ, now eminent, now conspicuous, now glorious, now adorned, now radiant; and, that I may explain it quickly, spread through the whole world? He who sought and found this woman, the Church, is recognized to be Christ. And after He found her, He not only rescued her from the thorns of her sins, but also adorned her with precious stones: therefore of her it is said, 'She is more precious than precious stones.' I wish to commend another thing to your Charity, as far as you can grasp it, how greatly I fear, and how greatly you also ought to fear concerning these precious stones.
There are in the Church precious stones, and there always have been, namely the learned, abounding in knowledge and eloquence and in all instruction of the Law. Truly these are precious stones; of their number was Cyprian, of their number was Ambrose, and the rest like them. Out of their number certain ones strayed away from the adornment of this woman. SERMON 58. On the same passage of Proverbs, chapter 31, verses 10-31. 1. The Church prefigured in many things. The Catholic Church, dearest brethren, was not only preached after the coming of our Lord and Saviour, but also from the beginning of the world was designated by many figures and more hidden mysteries.
For the Catholic Church existed both in holy Abel, and in Noah, and in Abraham, and in the rest, down to the coming of the Lord and Saviour: for concerning her Solomon says, 'Who shall find a valiant woman?' In that he said 'who shall find', we must understand the difficulty of finding, not the impossibility. This valiant woman is the Church. How is she not valiant, who from the beginning of the world is wearied by so many tribulations, and yet is not conquered? 'Who shall find a valiant woman?' Who else but Christ? Yet He did not find her valiant; but by finding her He made her valiant. For that He might find her, He left ninety-nine in the mountains, and sought the one that had gone astray, and, having set it upon His shoulders, brought it back to His own fold (Luke 15:4-5).
2. What wool and flax signify. — 'She made wool and flax with her hands.' The holy discourse describes this matron as a worker in wool and flax. Perhaps you ask of us, what is wool, what is flax? Wool signifies something carnal, flax something spiritual: because in the order of garments the linen vestments are the inner ones, but the woollen the outer. Wool moreover is born of the mingling of animals. But flax is produced from the earth without carnal pleasure; therefore it seems to bear the image of chastity: so much so that the priests of the Old Testament, by precept of the Law, wore linen drawers as a token of chastity. Therefore in wool something carnal, in flax something spiritual is signified.