Sermo exhortatorius de temperantia

3. Another exhortatory discourse on temperance. Those who attend to any studies and show diligence under the compulsion of the teacher, their zeal is considered the result of the teacher's fear; but when, in the teacher's absence, they persist in the care of good things, their diligence is the result of pure choice. We too are students of the lessons of fasting; but when fasting is present, we display philosophy, as if we are diligent from a pedagogical impulse; now, however, when it has withdrawn for a short time, those who practice temperance in moderate satiety have a pure praise of their judgment, as philosophers without necessity, as steadfast by choice, as knowing how to hold fast to the good things they have stored up by their previous labors. For the one who goes out into excess of foods does not know what he gathered while fasting, does not know what resources he collected, but as if having nothing stored up within, as if having treasured nothing in himself, he is open to excess of food, he does not apply bolts to his appetites, he does not secure himself with doors of moderation; and this is no wonder. For such is every poor person: he has no concern for doors and bolts, he is not weighed down by anxieties about plots, he sleeps with a carefree mind, as if having nothing to provoke thieves, as if unable to be robbed because he is without resources; but those who possess a wealthy house are on guard, as if treasures were stored within, through doorkeepers guarding the entrance. We too have become wealthy through fasting; and the signs of wealth are evident: we have acquired pleasures as slaves, we have mastered the belly, to which we were formerly enslaved.

we acquired an incorporeal life, we set before ourselves a new house of temperance, and we have laid its foundations for the time being. But the work requires consolidation, it needs a tightening tension; intoxication belongs to those who loosen, not those who tighten, to those who relax, not those who strengthen the foundations. No one who has properly tightened shakes a foundation; no one opens a treasury of wealth carelessly; but the soul of a faster is a storehouse of some rich and approved person, and it needs careful guarding, lest it fall into some robbery; for the soul is plundered like a house. David had his soul's house full, but it was plundered by a predatory pleasure; for he left the entrance open, and did not secure it with the bolt of sobriety. And what is this negligence concerning sobriety? The broad indulgence of the body. For it happened, it says, at the time of evening, and David arose from his bed, and walked on the roof in the palace; evening, and he arose from sleep and walked; sleep, and after sleep a walk, of one seeking relaxation. A walk broad with gluttony. What then is the harm? And he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful in appearance. And sending for her, he dishonored her.

To see is blameless; for no one would accuse the eyes, because they see what is seen; but the blameless thing has a blameworthy charge when it proceeds toward sin; for it did not see the form and overlook it, but as if it were nailed to the beauty; it fixed its gaze upon the body, it dipped the pupils in contemplation; it had not pupils in its eyes, but prostitutes. Such an evil is the impulse of a glance, if you let it go unbridled. So also now we have authority over food, just as then David had over the use of his eyes; but the byway of sin makes the innocent one liable. What then? Let the body be coaxed with food; for the laborer is worthy of his food; but let Paul be present with us as we dine, and if he sees us somewhere disorderly toward food, as a physician will cry out to those who are disorderly: "Having sustenance and shelter, let us be content with these." Sustenance, not luxury; sustenance, not the overturning from drunkenness. Luxury once roused Israel to idolatrous dancing; for drunkenness took the mind captive: "For the people sat down," it says, "to eat and drink, and they rose up to play." Therefore let us keep the self-sufficiency of need; let the body be tended with food; seeking comfort from relaxation, let us not be broken by the burden of repletion; let us exercise measured authority over eating; let us avoid the unseemliness of drunkenness, and we shall have no danger; let us obey Paul as he exhorts: "Do not get drunk with wine, in which there is profligacy, but be filled with the Holy Spirit," to whom is glory forever. Amen.