Now for the first time this sermon comes to light, which we have transcribed from a most ancient codex of the monastery of Appanni. It is, moreover, so similar in expression and style to the rest of Maximus' sermons that nothing more alike could be desired. When our Lord Jesus Christ was about to depart from that region of the shadow of death, in order to console His own—the apostles whom He had before instructed as most beloved in the faith—concerning the necessity of His absence, He promised the Holy Spirit, whose will is one and the same with Himself and the Father. (Fifteen lines are lacking in the original, the letters being worn away.) At His despoiling, hell together with its prince grieves; but at the restoration of its loss the whole heavenly host rejoices.
Today the flesh, which on earth by the operation of the Holy Spirit's power He had taken from the Virgin Mother, has been placed at the Father's right hand, and to it the natures of all the heavenly spirits are bowed down. Today that new way, of which the Apostle once spoke, has been inaugurated for us, because through that most blessed flesh of Christ the eternal entrance of heaven—through which no flesh had before passed—has been unsealed for us. Today that book which none but the Lamb could open has been unsealed; for in His death the mysteries of that same book were revealed, and the things which are found written in the law and the prophets concerning Him, by the completed dispensation of His majesty, have this day been fulfilled.
Christ first descended, that He might become a sharer of our nature; He now ascends, that He might make us partakers of His glory. Descending, by His wondrous manner of life He gladdened little ones with visible miracles. Ascending, He gave gifts to men, by which, having been instructed in the faith and trained unto manly strength, they should no longer crave His temporal vision, but should strive with all the earnestness of soul to follow Him whither He Himself had gone before them. Therefore, since we are bereft of His temporal presence, let us hasten with all intention toward His eternal vision, and let us say with the Psalmist: 'My heart said to You, I have sought Your face; Your face, O Lord, will I seek; turn not Your face away from me' (Psalm 26:8).
For the whole most holy dispensation of Christ's humanity aims at nothing, demands nothing else, than to direct us to the heights, so that, when the time of our mortality is completed, He may lead us to the manifest vision of Himself, and satisfy us with the eternal glory of His countenance; the Apostle testifying: 'We shall see Him then as He is' (1 Corinthians 13); and, as the Psalmist says: 'I shall be satisfied when Your glory shall appear' (Psalm 16); and we shall enjoy forever those good things which eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, which God has prepared for those who love Him (1 Corinthians 2). Which good things, indeed, as far as he could in an enigma, holy David beheld with wonder, when he said:
'What have I in heaven, and besides You what have I desired upon earth?' (Psalm 72). For he was able neither to unfold by speaking, nor to comprehend by thinking, the magnitude of the heavenly glory. Let us therefore not merely hunger for these things, but also thirst for the same, since for this the great High Priest ascended for us as forerunner into the Holy of Holies, and sits at the right hand of His Father, that by the example of His members He might confirm our hope, showing that at some time the lowliness of the whole flock shall come thither, whither it believes its Shepherd to have gone before. For thus the Lord Himself also promised His apostles, saying: 'Where the body shall be, there also the eagles shall be gathered together' (Matthew 24). For he calls the holy ones eagles, those who long to be dissolved and to be with Christ.
For it is said to be the nature of eagles that, when beyond the waves of the sea they sense carcasses by their scent, they betake themselves with swift flight to satisfy their hunger. Now this hunger of eagles signifies the desire of holy souls, whereby, perceiving with the nostrils of faith their Head, already set beyond the whirlwinds of the world in the highest repose, they would wish, with the flight of sweetest hope, to stand present before their Creator, and to rejoice in the fullness of His countenance. Let us believe that He reigns at the right hand of His Father, and let us ever strive toward Him as with the twin wings of the virtues, charity and hope. And that with Him we too may be able to reign in eternal life, [let us...]
(Five lines are lacking in the original.) ...that, cleansed from all vices, we may be made worthy to become a dwelling-place of God, who may ever abide within us. Here it ends.