How the impatient and the patient are to be admonished. (Admonition 10.) The impatient are to be admonished in one way, and the patient in another. For it must be said to the impatient that, while they neglect to bridle their spirit, they are hurried through many precipices of iniquity which they do not even desire, because indeed fury drives the mind whither desire does not draw it; and it acts when disturbed as though unaware, whence it afterward grieves when it is aware. It must also be said to the impatient that, while headlong through the impulse of agitation they carry out certain things as if beside themselves, they scarcely recognize their own evils after these have been committed.
For while they do not in the least resist their own perturbation, they confound even the things they had well done with a tranquil mind, and by a sudden impulse destroy whatever perhaps they had long built up with provident labour. For that very virtue which is the mother and guardian of all virtues, the virtue of charity, is lost through the vice of impatience. For it is written: 'Charity is patient' (1 Cor. 13:4). Therefore, when it is not at all patient, it is not charity. Through this vice of impatience also, teaching itself, the very nurse of the virtues, is scattered. For it is written: 'The learning of a man is known by his patience' (Prov. 19:11). So much the less, then, is anyone shown to be learned, by how much the less he is proved to be patient.
For he cannot truly impart good things by teaching, if in his living he does not know how to bear with equanimity the evils of others. Through this vice of impatience also, the fault of arrogance often pierces the mind; for while a man does not endure to be despised in this world, if there be any good things hidden in him, he strives to display them, and thus through impatience he is led even to arrogance; and while he cannot bear contempt, by unveiling himself he glories in ostentation. Whence it is written: 'The patient man is better than the arrogant' (Eccl. 7:9). For indeed the patient man chooses to suffer any evils whatever rather than to have his hidden good things made known through the vice of ostentation. But on the contrary the arrogant chooses that good things about himself, even false ones, be boasted, lest he be able to suffer even the least evils.
Since, therefore, when patience is abandoned, even the remaining good things that have already been done are destroyed, it is rightly commanded to Ezekiel that a trench be made in the altar of God, so that upon it the burnt offerings placed thereon might be preserved (Ezek. 43:13). For if there were no trench in the altar, every sacrifice it received an oncoming gust of wind would scatter. What, then, do we understand by the altar of God, but the soul of the righteous, which places upon itself before his eyes as many sacrifices as it has done good deeds? And what is the trench of the altar, but the patience of the good, which, while it humbles the mind to endure adversities, shows it, as it were in the manner of a pit, to be set low? Let there be, then, a trench in the altar, lest a gust of wind scatter the sacrifice placed thereon:
that is, let the mind of the elect guard by patience what it does, lest, moved by the wind of impatience, it lose even that which it had well done. And this same trench is well shown to be of one cubit (Ezek. 43:13); for surely, if patience is not forsaken, the measure of unity is preserved. Whence Paul also says: 'Bear one another's burdens, and so you shall fulfil the law of Christ' (Gal. 6:2). For the law of Christ is the charity of unity, which they alone fulfil who do not overstep even when they are burdened. Let the impatient hear what is written: 'The patient man is better than the strong, and he who rules his own spirit than he who takes cities' (Prov. 16:32). For less is the victory over cities, because the things subdued are external;
but far greater is that which is conquered through patience, because the mind is overcome by its own self, and subjects itself to itself, when patience compels it to bridle itself within. Let the impatient hear what the Truth says to his elect: 'In your patience you shall possess your souls' (Luke 21:19). For we are so wondrously constituted that reason should possess the soul, and the soul possess the body. But the right of the soul over the possession of the body is thrust away, if the soul is not first possessed by reason. Therefore the Lord has shown patience to be the guardian of our estate, who taught us in it to possess our very selves. How great, then, is the fault of impatience we recognize, through which we lose the very possession of what we are.
Let the impatient hear what is again said through Solomon: 'The fool brings forth his whole spirit, but the wise man defers and reserves it for afterward' (Prov. 29:11). For under the impulse of impatience it comes to pass that the whole spirit is brought forth outwardly; and perturbation casts it out the more quickly, because no inward discipline of wisdom encloses it. But the wise man defers and reserves it for afterward. For when injured, he does not desire to avenge himself in the present, since even in bearing it he chooses that the offender be spared; yet nonetheless he is not ignorant that all things will be justly avenged at the last judgment.
But on the contrary the patient are to be admonished, lest they grieve inwardly over that which they bear outwardly, lest they corrupt inwardly with the plague of malice a sacrifice of so great a virtue which outwardly they offer whole; and lest, when it is not perceived by men but nonetheless sinned under the divine scrutiny, the fault of grief become so much the worse, by how much a man claims to himself before men the appearance of virtue. And so it must be said to the patient that they should strive to love those whom they are compelled to bear; lest, if love does not follow patience, the virtue displayed be turned into the worse fault of hatred. Whence Paul, when he had said, 'Charity is patient,' immediately added, 'it is kind' (1 Cor. 13:4);
showing plainly that those whom out of patience he bears, out of kindness he also does not cease to love. Whence the same excellent teacher, when he was urging patience upon his disciples, saying, 'Let all bitterness, and wrath, and indignation, and clamour, and blasphemy be put away from you' (Eph. 4:31), as if all outward things being now well ordered, he turns to the inner things, when he adds, 'with all malice' (Eph. 4:31); because surely indignation, clamour and blasphemy are in vain removed from outward things, if within the mother of vices, malice, holds sway; and to no purpose is wickedness cut off from the branches without, if, destined to rise again more manifold, it is preserved within in the root. Whence also the Truth says through himself:
'Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute and calumniate you' (Luke 6:27). It is therefore a virtue before men to bear with adversaries; but it is a virtue before God to love them; for God accepts this alone as a sacrifice, that which before his eyes upon the altar of a good work the flame of charity kindles. Hence it is that again to certain who are patient, yet not loving, he says: 'Why do you see the mote in your brother's eye, and see not the beam in your own eye?' (Matt. 7:5; Luke 6:41). For the perturbation of impatience is the mote; but malice in the heart is the beam in the eye. For the gust of temptation stirs the former, while the latter, being consummated wickedness, one carries almost immovably.
And rightly is it there added: 'Hypocrite, cast first the beam out of your own eye, and then you shall see to cast out the mote from your brother's eye' (Luke 6:42). As if it were said to the mind wickedly grieving within, yet showing itself outwardly holy through patience: First shake off from yourself the mass of malice, and then reprove others for the fickleness of impatience, lest, while you do not strive to overcome your own dissimulation, it be worse for you to tolerate the depravities of others. It also often happens to the patient that at the very time when they either suffer adversities or hear insults, they are struck by no grief, and so exhibit patience that they do not fail to guard even the innocence of the heart;
but when after a little while they recall to memory these very things which they had endured, they inflame themselves with the fire of grief, they seek out arguments for vengeance, and, brooding over the meekness which they had while enduring, they turn it into malice. To whom help is more quickly afforded by the preacher, if the cause of this reversal be disclosed. For the crafty adversary stirs up war against two men: inflaming the one to be the first to inflict insults, and provoking the other, when injured, to return insults. But for the most part, while he is already the victor over the man who, being persuaded, inflicts the injury, he is conquered by the one who bears with equanimity the injury inflicted upon him.
Being therefore the victor over the one whom by stirring up he subjugated, he raises himself with all his might against the other, and grieves that this man, resisting bravely, is also victorious; and since he could not stir him up in the very hurling of the insults, resting meanwhile from open combat, and harassing the thought by secret suggestion, he seeks a fit time for deception. For because he lost in the public war, he burns to practice his snares in secret. For in the time of quiet he returns to the mind of the victor, and recalls to memory either the loss of goods, or the darts of injuries, and, vehemently exaggerating all the things that were inflicted upon him, shows them to be unbearable;
and with so great a sorrow disturbs the mind that for the most part the patient man, after the victory taken captive, blushes to have borne those things with equanimity, and grieves that he did not return the insults, and, if occasion be offered, seeks to repay worse things. To whom, then, are these men like, but to those who through fortitude are victors on the field, but afterward through negligence are captured within the enclosures of the city? To whom are they like, but to those whom a grave sickness rushing in does not withdraw from life, but a returning fever, coming gently, kills? The patient, therefore, are to be admonished to fortify the heart after the victory, and to attend to the enemy overcome in open war as he lays snares against the walls of the mind;
so that they may fear the more the sickness that creeps back again, lest the crafty enemy afterward rejoice with the greater exultation in his deception, in that he tramples down those necks of the victors that but lately were stiff against him.