Sermons & Tracts 2 part 2/18

I speak generally to all: hear me. Whoever recognizes himself to be what I say, let him strive to be a virgin in body and in heart. Let him so rejoice in the gain of the body, that he suffer no loss of the soul. Yet let him rejoice in so precious a gift of Christ; let him rejoice with humility, let him weep with piety. Let him give thanks, because he bears so great a felicity in integrity; let him be glad, because he shall follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes—if only in his mouth, as we read in the Apocalypse, no lie be found (Rev. 14:4-5). Let him pray for perseverance, that no delight of the world whatsoever, or envy of the devil, may take away so great a gift, may cloud so great a brightness, may darken so great a splendour.

Let him hold fast bravely, let him not lose an irreparable thing, let him not for one moment of delight forfeit the grace of the body, let him not contract foulness of soul through the beauty of a corrupted form, let concupiscence not overcome him. If he hears me, he remains; but if he does not hear me, he shall lose what he will never restore. 9. What to the married. What to widows. What to women. Again my sermon is to you who have spouses; I admonish you to keep them chastely. For Elizabeth also, who had lived chastely with her husband through many years, and both had been faithful before the Lord, was counted worthy at last to have a son from a dead seed, who both should adorn his parents by his holiness, and by his preaching should convert many unbelievers (Luke 1).

Again I speak to you who are widows: keep your widowhood, be not talkative; but with silence await the Lord, who upholds the orphan and the widow; but a good widow, but her who is prompt in prayer, in humility, in almsgiving: if indeed she has not the means to do so, let her have a good will and a sincere thought. Women, do not curse, do not swear, be not prompt to speaking. Perhaps you say that what I say is burdensome. It is not lawful for me to keep silent: I fear more him who commands than him who detracts. I say: let him who recognizes it amend; let him who does not recognize it in himself hear and hold it, that he may be able to say it to others for their salvation. 10. What to the penitents.

To weep skilfully. Now already I speak to you, penitents, who have received and are doing penance in the church. Persevere in weeping, in compunction weep skilfully. What is it, to weep skilfully? It is this: that you should not seek in prayer temporal things, but eternal blessedness and the remission of sins. He who so prays, he himself weeps skilfully. Your tears shall not fall to the earth; for he is truthful to whom the prophet said: 'Thou hast set my tears in thy sight' (Ps. 56:9). You especially ought now to love God, and to pass from fear already to love; for so we read in the Gospel concerning that sinful woman: 'To whom much is forgiven, she loves much' (Luke 7:47).

And you ought much to love God, who by awaiting you, and by not punishing you, deigned to lead you to penance. 11. Apostrophe to the poor. Now again my sermon is to you, poor. I call you poor, who beg, who live on the alms of Christians. Be comforted, be comforted: your tribulation shall be turned into joy, and your sorrow into gladness. Let it not be unwelcome to you that you beg, nor for that reason say anything in your heart against God; for he is just and holy in all his works. And therefore he made you poor, that by enduring a brief want you might acquire eternal life; and he made the other rich, that by giving you his superfluity he might acquire a remedy for his sins.

And therefore be patient, and await the Lord. 12. To slaves. My sermon is also to you, slaves. Whoever of you have masters according to the flesh, to whomever you owe the condition of service: obey your masters, love them from the heart, not serving to the eye, but doing your service out of love (Eph. 6:5-7); because God appointed both them to rule over you, and you to serve. Serve well for God's sake, because for good service you shall have a reward. If you are good, you shall be better than bad masters: because with God the soul of each one is not to be distinguished by nobility, but by work; nor by descent, but by action. Therefore my sermon has now been to all, because Christ died for all (2 Cor. 5:15).

And therefore keep what I have said, that I may have fruit of you, and that the merciful Lord may bring you all into the heavenly barns, where the grain is to be gathered—he who lives and reigns unto the ages of ages. Amen. Sermon 118. On the Nativity of the Lord, II. 1. The Son of God is not changed when he becomes man. Today, dearly beloved brethren, we celebrate the day of the Lord's nativity, that is, of our Lord Jesus Christ: who, though he possesses an equal Trinity with the Father, though with power equal to the Father he established heaven, earth and seas, and all things that are in them, in the last times deigned to be born as man from man, so taking upon himself our nature that he did not change his own.

For while the state of the Godhead remained whole and entire, the Son of God took to himself man; he did not lose what he was, but joined to himself what before had not been in him. Therefore the Son of God, invisible according to his divinity, took up a visible man; the immortal took up the mortal, the impassible the passible; and, to comprehend the whole briefly, God took up man. Whatever therefore of weakness we read of in Christ—that is, that he hungered, that he grieved, that he even endured death for our sins—let us assign to the man who was assumed for our salvation, preserving the reverence of him who assumed, that is, of the Word of God: who so joined humanity to his divinity that after the passion he makes it impassible;

yet not so that the Godhead itself—which it is a crime even to think—should become passible. 2. Christ's birth was true, but not according to custom. Yet through this he did not condemn marriage. For although in the Son of God there is one person out of divinity and humanity, nevertheless when you hear that the Son of God was born of man, do not believe that here his birth's beginning was the common one from the marital act—which indeed was ordained by God, that humanity might be propagated. Otherwise, I say, was the origin of humanity there, far different from our birth. For although in the same reality of flesh in which we naturally exist Christ was born,

yet not in the manner by which we are conceived and born of marriage—that is, whence the rest of us have come forth, though all men are procreated. For he too was procreated in a marvellous way. That lawful union of man to man, although according to divine authority it is not free from fault, is nevertheless not glorious. But in Christ's birth the propagation without union is heaped up with every possible glory and honour. Our Lord Jesus Christ therefore, apart from the order of birth, was procreated a true man from a Virgin, and was conceived and born by that same sign of omnipotence. He had a Virgin for his mother, both when he was carried in the Virgin's womb and when he was brought forth from the womb;

yet this birth did not condemn marriage, but honoured the power of the Godhead. 3. 'God with us.' Long ago the prophet Isaiah had foretold the sign of this new fecundity: 'Therefore,' he said, 'the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb and shall bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel' (Isa. VII, 14). This was most clearly prophesied of Christ our Lord, for Emmanuel is interpreted 'God with us.' Therefore our Saviour received this name also from the effect of things, that he should be called 'God with us.' And he himself then deigned to be God with us all, when he took up this flesh, that through the man who was visible he might be seen to dwell on earth.

For thus the prophet Jeremiah had promised, saying: 'This is our God, and no other shall be esteemed beside him. He found out all the way of discipline, and delivered it to Jacob his servant, and to Israel his beloved. After this he was seen upon earth, and conversed with men' (Baruch III, 36-38). Whence also the Lord himself says to his disciples in the Gospel: 'Have I been so long a time with you, and you have not known me? He that seeth me, seeth also my Father' (John XIV, 9), and the rest that follows. For the Son of God did such works through the man he had assumed, that from the very splendour of the works the divinity of both the Father and the Son together might be known.

But if we look carefully to the cause on account of which the Lord deigned to fulfil this whole mystery of the assumed man, then shall we truly grasp that the prophetic word was fulfilled for us. 4. The twofold cause of the Incarnation: our restoration and our instruction. For there is principally a twofold cause on account of which the Son of God became the Son of man. One is that, by suffering all things for us according to his humanity, he might free us from the bonds of our sins. For thus the prophet Isaiah had foretold: 'He hath borne our sins, and he grieveth for us'; and again, 'But he was wounded for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him; and by his bruises we are healed' (Isa. LIII, 4, 5).

But the other cause of the Lord's passion is that those whom he redeemed by his blood from vices and crimes he might kindle to the pursuit of holiness not only by the aid of doctrine and grace, but also by his own example; that we might follow with greater eagerness the Lord not only as commanding, but also as inciting us by his own example to the heights of virtue, and might worship the most just Lord and loving Father, according to the saying of blessed Peter, by imitation of the Son. For thus Peter says: 'Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example that you should follow his steps. Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, did not revile; when he suffered, he threatened not;'

'but delivered himself to him that judged him unjustly: who his own self bore our sins in his body upon the tree: that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice' (1 Peter II, 21-24). May our Lord Jesus Christ grant that, aided by his grace, you may hasten to follow his footsteps; and, being mortified to all sins and vices, may live only to exercise the works of justice, giving thanks to God the Father, to whom is glory and dominion, and to our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the Holy Spirit, unto the ages of ages. Amen. SERMON CXIX. On the Nativity of the Lord, III. 1. Proud man is restored through a humble God. The procreation of the first man is renewed.

We read, and faithfully hold, that at the very beginning of the nascent world God made us in the first man to his own image and likeness. Behold, in this day, the order being reversed, God is made to our image and likeness. In the first case he conferred from his own the better things; in the second he took up from ours the lower things. Through the taste of the forbidden tree the incautious frailty of the first man attempted, with a damnable ambition, to seek the divinity of his Lord, at the persuasion of the devil, who said: 'If you taste of this tree, your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as gods' (Gen. III, 5). And therefore let us acknowledge the admirable goodness of our loving Father. Man, at the enemy's instigation, wished to be God through pride;

and God was made man through mercy. In us there is renewed in a certain manner, through Christ's divinity, the appearance of that ancient and beginning age, when the first Adam was fashioned from the material of clay. For behold, now the second Adam is formed, as it were from untouched and virgin earth, from the flesh of the Virgin. Behold, I say, again, the laws of nature ceasing, the new man is perfected into a new life, God alone working. 2. The operation of the Holy Spirit declares Christ's holiness and divinity. A son, then, is promised to the Virgin through the visitation of the Holy Spirit. What wonder if he is born without corruption, who is conceived of sanctification? For it was not fitting that he who was bringing us salvation should snatch away her dignity from his mother alone.

'The Holy Spirit,' he said, 'shall come upon thee.' It was plainly fitting that she who was to be adorned with a royal burden should first be sanctified by the entrance of the heavenly King. Wherefore let us not believe our Lord and Saviour to be a mere man because we see him born of man: it is not right that he should not be believed God, for whom, as he was to descend to the earth, a dwelling-place was prepared by God. And so, by the operation of divine power, the inward parts of her who believed are made fruitful, and upon a mortal wood the tree of life is grafted, and the Power that bears all things in itself is borne by weakness; and he who is not contained by earth, sea, or heaven, is received within the members of a single little body. From his own creature the Creator of all is procreated, and from his own streamlet a great fountain arises;

the root of all is born from its own shoot, and the true vine becomes the fruit of its own branch. Behold, the most longed-for day is present, shining with grace redoubled, illumined indeed with the brightness of the accustomed light, but flashing chiefly with the beneficial radiance of its shining. O day, the newness of all days, the gain of light and the loss of blindness: on which the eternal Sun, descending from the highest height of the Father's brightness, unbarred the entrance of the virginal womb, and by its flashing coruscation drove back the darkness of the whole world! 3. The prophecy concerning the virgin birth. Draw forth, ye faithful of Christ, your most festive joys;

a new thing is this day perfected for us, which of old had been promised, that without loss of virginal modesty the breasts of a mother should give suck to a son. This is that novelty announced by the oracle of the prophet Jeremiah: 'The Lord,' he says, 'shall create a new thing upon the earth.' And, as though kindling a lamp for this obscurity, he immediately subjoined: 'A woman shall compass a man' (Jer. XXXI, 22): 'this,' he says, 'is the new thing which I say the Lord shall make upon the earth, that a woman shall compass a man.' Attend, brethren, and rather outrun me with your understanding: 'A woman,' he says, 'shall compass a man.' O woman blessed above women, who both knew not a man, and yet compassed a man in her womb:

who was not touched by carnal intercourse, and yet rejoices in fleshly offspring from a spiritual seed! Mary compasses a man by giving faith to an angel; because Eve destroyed a man by consenting to the serpent. 'The Lord,' he says, 'shall create a new thing upon the earth.' 4. The angel's address to Mary. When therefore the time came for displaying this newness, a heavenly messenger is sent ahead to the Virgin. The angel greets the maiden, ignorant of a man's greeting; the virgin is frightened by the newness of the words. To her the angel says: 'Fear not, Mary; for thou hast found grace with the Lord. Be not affrighted at my sight, O Mother of my Lord: I have come as the minister of thy conception; he himself sent me to thee who is to be born of thee;'

he himself, through me, announces to thee the joy, whom it has pleased to unite a mystical marriage with human nature in thy womb. Thou hast found grace with the Lord. Behold, thou shalt conceive and bear a son—not a man of any ordinary merit, but the Saviour of the whole world. Fear not, he says. Cast away from thee all dread of the world, thou who art to conceive the joy of the world. Turn over, O Mary, the prophetic reading: for the knowledge of the divine Books cannot pass thee by, thou who art about to bring forth the very fulness of the Prophets. Recall in the book of the prophet Isaiah the virgin whom thou hast read of; and rejoice, because thou hast been found worthy to be she. Thou art there foresignified as a virgin: behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, not of man, but of the Holy Spirit:

and thou shalt be with child, and shalt remain undefiled; thou shalt bear a son, and shalt suffer no loss of virginity. But she said: 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word.' 5. The grace of the Word's self-emptying. Straightway therefore the angel, having received the Virgin's consent, returns to the dwellers of the heavenly region: and behold, suddenly an ineffable power penetrated the secret of the Virgin. The Maker of the world enters the straits of the human belly, an untouched mother is made with child: and behold, like a bridegroom from his chamber, Christ comes forth from Mary's womb. The power of majesty is hidden in the members of an infant; God hangs at the breasts of his mother.

He is covered by the squalor of cheap swaddling-clothes, he endures the narrow straits of a most hard manger, and the merciful one humbly suffers all things, so long as the world which had perished might be set free. O blessed infancy, through which the life of our race is restored! O most gracious and delightful wailings, through which we have escaped the gnashing of teeth and eternal weepings! O happy swaddling-clothes, with which we have wiped away the filth of our sins! O splendid manger, in which not only lay the hay of the beasts, but the food of Angels was found! Give suck, O Mary, to thy Creator, thou who hast made the bread of heaven, the ransom of the world. Offer thy breast to him that sucks, that he for thee may offer his cheek to him that strikes. Let the infant be nourished by the milk of thy breasts, that he for thee may also receive the drink of gall.

Let thy hands now carry him, that his hands may afterwards for thee be fastened on the cross. Lastly, do thou minister to him, as a mother, temporal substance, that he to us and to thee, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, may grant everlasting life. May he himself deign to grant this, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and is glorified as God, through all the ages of ages. Amen. SERMON CXX. On the Nativity of the Lord, IV. 1. Through a woman sin arose. Through a woman it is uprooted. This day a child is born to us, this day a son is given to us (Isa. IX, 6). A child, I say, not feeble in the tenderness of his members, but illustrious by his blameless generation. For on this present day he declares the Holy Spirit to be the author of his mother's innocence and purity.

This day a son is given to us. Now is he given to us, who was born before the ages: given in the Virgin's childbearing, a son from the substance of the Begetter. When therefore the once-scorned Ruler was entering the servile cottage through the door of faith, inviolate virginity blushed. Nor did he break the bolt of modesty, and in her sacred inward parts the ray of eternal brightness shone forth. Let then all this world's exile rejoice, let the age but lately captive exult. God sent his Son, to be born and to terrify; to die and to conquer. For the newborn terrified Herod, the innocent crucified conquered the devil. Conceal, O Lord, beneath the skin of flesh the arms of thy power, hide for a little while the garb of thy majesty. Cover thyself in the Virgin's womb;

come forth and give battle from the tent of the sacred Virgin. Fit for me a snare, wherein thou mayest set free the whole creature. But let us treat both the cause and the miracle of so great a conception and birth. In order, then, that the world—captive already from its origin in paradise—might grow horribly foul with the defilement of vices worn out, a woman was the cause. For thus it is written: 'From a woman was the beginning of sin, and through her we all die' (Ecclus. XXV, 33). And the apostle Paul: 'The man,' he says, 'was not seduced; but the woman, being seduced, was in the transgression' (1 Tim. II, 14). Through her, therefore, the world, pressed down in wretched servitude, had submitted its anxious neck beneath the devil's yoke: for by whom a man is overcome, to him he is also delivered as a slave.

The flood, by the confederated frame of the elements, destroyed man, but could not destroy the crime. Isaac, a barren woman's son and not a virgin's, merited to bear the sign of the cross; he merited to be seized, he merited to be bound: yet he did not merit also to be slain. Moses is exposed to the waters to be purified; he rescues the Jewish host, at God's sending, but he does not free the whole world; he exterminates Egypt, but not sin; he slays king Pharaoh in the gaping sea, but he did not utterly destroy the devil with his legions. David confesses himself to have been conceived in iniquities: neither could he therefore take away the sin of the world. When therefore, through these wheels of revolving times, the mundane course was rolling on, and no one healed;

and, as guilt grew heavier, the members of the whole globe were being ground to dust by the blow and roar of a headlong ruin, and no one succoured: the cause returns to a woman, and the origin is lopped off through an origin. The origin of sin is extinguished through the Mother of Christ: the offspring of impiety is taken away through the offspring of piety, the stock of death through the stock of life. Thus far the cause; now let us also reveal the hidden things to the minds of the beholders. 2. The miracles of the virgin birth. A virgin bears Christ; nature is changed, and guilt is blotted out. That sentence of Eve's unhappiness is cut off, 'In sorrow shalt thou bring forth children' (Gen. III, 16): because this woman brought forth the Lord in gladness. For the one mourned, this one shone again; the one carried tears, this one carried joy in her womb:

because the one brought forth a sinner, this one brought forth the innocent. The Spirit sowed, not lust; God planted, not a husband. The Virgin bore, because a virgin conceived. She brought forth inviolate, because in the conception there was no lust. On both sides a miracle: both with child without corruption, and in childbirth a virgin-mother; a marriage in faith, a birth in a virgin. 3. Gabriel's words are weighed. The sublimity of Mary's faith. Gabriel was the go-between of these espousals. Let him relate what he said, what he heard: 'Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.' He begins with a salutation, who bore salvation on his tongue. Let now the deceitfully persuasive hissing of the tortuous serpent be silent from women; to the Mother of our Lord an angel has spoken:

'Hail,' he says, 'full of grace, the Lord is with thee.' Grace is rendered for guilt; she is called full, not empty: grace therefore has been fulfilled, and guilt emptied out. In this manner our venerable Virgin herself exulted in her Canticle: 'He hath filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he hath sent away empty.' 'Hail,' he says, 'full of grace, the Lord is with thee': with thee in thy heart, with thee in thy belly, with thee in thy womb, with thee in thy help. Rejoice, O Virgin, Christ the king comes from his heaven into thy womb. From the Father's bosom he deigned to descend into the womb of the Mother: yet neither did infinite majesty forsake his own region, nor did the virginal hall, when it received him, enclose him. Faith was raised up from earth to heaven:

on this Christ took his seat, but through it he entered into the temple of modesty. 4. Eve's curse is blotted out through Mary. A woman, yet a virgin. 'Blessed art thou,' he says, 'among women,' who hast borne life for both men and women. Bring forth, O blameless woman, the inviolable man; and thou shalt save both woman and man. The mother of our race brought punishment upon the world; the Mother of our Lord bore salvation for both woman and man. That authoress of sin was cursed: for thus is the sentence of the primal decree carried against her, 'Cursed art thou among women.' This authoress of merit therefore is blessed; for thus does the heavenly messenger bring word to her, 'Blessed art thou among women.'

By the sexual gender all are indeed commonly called women, yet also they differ by the peculiarity of modesty in incorrupt virginity. The one, by killing, brought harm; this one, by giving life, brought benefit: the one struck, this one healed. For obedience is exchanged for disobedience, and faith is compensated for perfidy. 5. Mary's song of exultation. Let Mary applaud again with the organs, and let the timbrels resound between her swift fingers: let the fingers echo back the songs, let her bring forth Christ with pealing psalms. Let choirs sing together rejoicing, and let sweet-sounding songs be mingled with alternating measures. Let Mary practise a musical strain among the maidens, because with modulating quills she brought forth the sweet Word of the Holy Spirit in the land of Judaea; she

who was fitting also the timbrel of cruelty, and was stretching Christ upon the wood. For after the wandering hand of wickedness had jarred with ill-ordered measures, straightway that barbarous crash of savage clamour roared out: 'Crucify him, crucify him' (Luke XXIII, 21). When therefore the day returned on which criminal Egypt was swallowed up, the timbrel of our Mary, being struck, gave forth the Word, and with the striking-instrument of her tongue our childbearer poured forth the glad songs of her mouth. Let us therefore hear how our timbrel-player sang: 'My soul doth magnify the Lord; and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour: because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid: for behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.'

'Because he that is mighty hath done great things to me.' The miracle of the new childbearing therefore overcame the cause of the prevailing error; and Mary's song shut out Eve's lamentation. 6. God is the author of the offspring. Finally, after the presage and triumph of that blessed salutation, the Virgin, in a silent contention of mind, strove within herself as to what manner of salutation this might be. Meanwhile the heavenly messenger proceeds: 'Fear not, Mary; for thou hast found grace with God. Behold, thou shalt conceive and bear a son, and shalt call his name Jesus.' But she, while she asks the manner, hears that God is the author of the offspring. 'How,' she says, 'shall this be done, since I know not man?' 'The Holy Spirit,' he says, 'shall come upon thee, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee.'

'And therefore that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.' Let faith now spread the fair pavilions of the resplendent womb, let power overshadow, let the Spirit whisper; and, natural heat being driven off, let a gentle breeze refresh the Virgin, and, with a bland coolness, let her be fanned by heavenly breathings, let the virginal belly be crowned with garlands of modesty. There let the flaming radiance of the rose glow, let the whitening lily gleam white, let the soft violet redden, let purple flowers be scattered, and let the bridal chamber of Christ, painted with varied brightness, be adorned. 7. The salvation of the world hung upon Mary's assent. Mary's faith opens heaven. Answer now, O sacred Virgin: for why dost thou make delays for the world? The Angel awaits thy assent; hence it is that this messenger tarries. Now thou hast heard how this shall be;