Sermones Ad Populum. Classis V. Sermones Dubii

CLASS V. DOUBTFUL SERMONS.

Among these, those which appear to refer less to Augustine are shown in smaller type.

SERMON CCCLXIV.

On Samson. Judges chapters XIII-XVI.

Samson's strength was from the Spirit of God. Samson had strength from grace, not from nature. For if he had been strong by nature, when his hair was cut off, his strength would not have been taken away. And where was that most mighty strength, except in what the Scripture said, The Spirit of the Lord went with him? That strength belonged to the Spirit of the Lord. In Samson there was a vessel, in the Spirit there was fullness. A vessel can be filled and emptied. But every vessel has its filling from elsewhere. Therefore in Paul that very grace was commended, when he was called a vessel of election (Acts IX, 15). Let us see, then, what kind of parable Samson proposed to the Philistines. Out of the eater, he said, came food, and out of the strong came sweetness. This parable was brought forth, reported to his friends, and solved; Samson was conquered. If he is righteous here, it is hidden: the righteousness of this man lies very deep. For both what is read of his being conquered by a woman's blandishments, and that he went in to a harlot, seem to make his merit waver, for those who do not understand the secrets of the truth. For the prophet also is commanded by the Lord's precept to take a harlot as a wife (Hosea I, 2). Perhaps we shall be able to say that in the Old Testament these things were not criminal or damnable, since what he was saying or doing was prophecy.

Let us therefore ask what was signified by the one conquered, what by the conqueror, what by him who yielded to womanly flatteries, what by him who betrayed the secret of his riddle, what by him who went in to a harlot, what by him who caught foxes and, by the tails of the foxes to which he tied fire, set ablaze the fruits of his enemies. Those fruits he could indeed have set ablaze in a moment, had he not been thinking of a mystery in the foxes. For could dry stubble not have burned unless foxes carried fire through it? Let us understand, then, that great mysteries lie hidden.

I. Christ prefigured in Samson. Samson's wife. His riddle. What was Samson? If I say that he signified Christ, I seem to myself to speak the truth; but at once it occurs to those who consider: And is Christ conquered by womanly flatteries? And how is Christ understood to have been able to go in to a harlot? Then too, and when is Christ deprived of his head, shorn of his hair, stripped of his strength, bound, blinded, mocked? Be awake, faith; attend to what Christ is, not only to what Christ did, but also to what Christ suffered. What did he do? He worked, as one strong. He suffered, as one weak. In the one I understand both. I see the strength of the Son of God, I see the weakness of the son of man. There is also another point, because Christ is whole, as Scripture commends him, both head and body. As Christ is the head of the Church, so the Church is the body of Christ (Ephesians 4:15, and Colossians).

And indeed, so that she may not be [alone], the whole Christ is with her as her head. The Church, then, has within herself the strong and the weak; she has those who are fed on solid bread and those who must still be nourished with milk. I add another point, which must be confessed: within the very fellowship of the Sacraments, the sharing of Baptism, the partaking of the Altar, she has the righteous and the unrighteous. For now the body of Christ, which you know, is on the threshing floor; afterward it will be in the granary. Yet while it is on the threshing floor, it does not refuse to endure the chaff; when the time of storing comes, it will separate the wheat from the chaff. Some things, then, Samson did in the person of the head, some in the person of the body, yet all in the person of Christ. For in that Samson wrought mighty deeds and wonders, he signified Christ, the head of the Church; but in that he acted prudently, he bore the image of those who live righteously in the Church; where perhaps he was overcome and acted rashly, he prefigured those who are sinners in the Church. The harlot whom Samson takes in marriage is the Church, which before the knowledge of the one God played the harlot with idols, and whom Christ afterward joined to himself. But after she was enlightened by him and received the faith, she also merited this, that through him she should come to know the sacraments of salvation, and that the mysteries of heavenly secrets should be revealed to her by him.

For the question itself which it contains—that the food came forth from the eater, and sweetness came out of the strong—what else does it signify than Christ rising from the dead? From the eater, certainly, that is, from death, which devours and consumes all things, came forth that food which said, I am the living bread, which came down from heaven (John 6). Him human iniquity embittered, and to him it gave to drink the bitterness of vinegar and gall; from him the people of the Gentiles, being converted, received the sweetness of life. And so from the mouth of the dead lion—that is, from the death of Christ, who lay down and slept as a lion—came forth the swarm of bees, that is, of Christians. But what it says, You would not have found my parable, unless you had plowed with my heifer: this heifer is the Church, which brought forth the mysteries of the faith—of the Trinity, of the resurrection, of the judgment, and of the kingdom—and made them known to the ends of the earth through the teaching and preaching of the apostles and saints, and promised the rewards of eternal life to those who understand and know.

The companion who took his wife is a figure of the heretics. The foxes dragging fire in their tails. Then it follows: Samson was angry because his companion had taken his wife. That companion bore the figure of all heretics. A great mystery, my brothers. For the heretics who divided the Church wished to take and lead away the wife of their Lord. For it was from the Church and from the Gospels that they went out—those who, through the adultery of impiety, attempt to invade the Church, that is, the body of Christ, for their own part. Hence that faithful servant and friend of the Lord's bride speaks, saying: For I have espoused you to one husband, to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. And the companion's leprosy touches the person of the faithful with zealous reproof. And I fear, he says, lest, as the serpent seduced Eve by his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the truth which is in Christ Jesus (2 Cor 11:2). But who are the companions, that is, the heretical deserters who wished to invade the Lord's bride, but Donatus, Arius, Manichaeus, and the other vessels of error and perdition? Of such the Apostle says: I hear, he says, that there are schisms among you: for one says, I indeed am of Paul; another, But I am of Apollos; another, But I am of Cephas (1 Cor 1:11-12). Let us see, then, what this mystical Samson did when offended by his wife's act with a stranger. For he caught foxes, that is, the adulterous companions, of whom it is said in the Song of Songs: Catch for us the little foxes that destroy the vines (Cant 2). What is "Catch"?

That is, grasp them, convict them, refute them, lest the vines of the Church be destroyed. For what else is it to catch the foxes but to overcome heretics by the authority of the divine law and to bind and tie them fast with the testimonies of the holy Scriptures as with certain chains? He catches the foxes, and to their bound tails he applies fire. What do the bound tails of the foxes mean? What are the tails of the foxes but the latter things of the heretics, who have their first things smooth and deceptive: bound, that is, condemned, and dragging fire at the end, so that it may consume their fruit and works in those who consent to their seductions? He says to a man now, Do not listen to the heretics, do not consent to the heretics. He answers, Why? Did not that man and that man listen to the heretics? Did not some other Christian too commit such great evils, commit so many adulteries, carry out so many robberies? And what does he gather from that? The first things of the foxes are what the deceived pay attention to; and the fire is behind. Nothing, he says, happened to that man. Is it because it goes before that it drags nothing after itself? The fire that comes after is still to come. But do you think that the heretics drag fire by which the fruits of their enemies may burn, and that they themselves will not burn? For without doubt the foxes, when they have set the harvests on fire, have themselves also surely burned. See, then, the judgment upon the heretics behind them, how they do not see what is after them.

They have blandishments to soothe, and they show their leading parts free; in the judgment of God, in the bound tails—that is, in their hinder parts—they drag fire, because their wickedness precedes their punishments.

The approach to the harlot. The gates of the city, when he had risen from sleep, were carried away to the mountain. But as for his going in to the harlot: if anyone did it without cause, whoever did it is unclean; if however a prophet did it, it is a sacrament. If he did not go in in such a way as to lie with her, perhaps he went in for the sake of a mystery. But we do not read that he lay with her. It follows: But the enemies were waiting at the gates of the city, to seize him when he had gone out from the harlot to whom he had entered. But he was sleeping. See how it is not written that he was mingled with the harlot, but it is written that he was sleeping. When he rose, it says, in the middle of the night he went out, and took away the gates of that city with their bars, and lifted those same gates to the top of the mountain, and he could not be held by the Allophylites. The gates of the city, through which he entered to the harlot, he took away and lifted onto the mountain. What is this? Scripture joins both hell and the love of a woman. The house of the harlot held the image of hell. It is rightly set down for hell, because it repels no one, and draws every one entering to itself (Prov. 30:10).

We recognize in this passage the works of our Redeemer, after the Synagogue, to which he had come, was separated from him by the devil, after it trampled him underfoot—that is, crucified him in the place of Calvary—he descended to hell; and his enemies guarded the place of the one sleeping, that is, the tomb; and they wanted to seize the one whom they could not see. But he was sleeping there. I said this for this reason, because it was a true death. What was said, "At midnight he rose"—this signifies that he rose in secret. For he suffered openly; but he was made manifest, when he rose, to his disciples alone and to certain others whomsoever. Therefore, that he entered in, all saw; that he rose, few knew, few held him and touched him. Nevertheless he takes away the gates of the city, that is, he removes the gates of hell. What is it to take away the gates of hell, except to remove the dominion of death? For it was receiving and not releasing. But what did our Lord Jesus Christ do? With the gates of death taken away, he ascended to the summit of the mountain. For we know that he both rose again and ascended into heaven.

His strength was in his hair. The blinding and death of Samson. But what is the meaning of his having strength in his hair? Attend carefully to this too, brothers. He had strength not in his hand, not in his foot, not in his breast, not even in his head itself, but in his hair, in his locks. What is hair? What are locks? We see, and the Apostle, when asked, answers us: Hair is a covering (1 Cor 11:15). And in a covering Christ had strength, when the shadows of the old Law were covering him. Samson's hair, then, was in a covering, because in Christ one thing was seen and another understood. But what does it mean that the secret was betrayed and Samson was shorn? The Law was despised, and Christ suffered. For they would not have killed Christ if they had not despised the Law. Indeed they themselves knew that it was not lawful for them to kill Christ. They said to the judge, It is not lawful for us to kill anyone (John 18:31). Samson was shorn, the hidden things were revealed, the covering was removed; and Christ, who was hidden, appeared. But his hair grew back and clothed his head, because the Jews were unwilling to believe in Christ even when he rose again. He was indeed blinded in the mill, he was in the house of the prison: the house of the prison, or the mill, is the toil of this world. But Samson's blinding indicates those who, blinded by unbelief, did not recognize Christ either when he worked miracles or when he ascended to heavenly things. The blindness, then, which they brought upon him signified the blindness of the Jews.

But Christ was both arrested by the Jews and killed: yet in dying He killed the killers. His enemies therefore led Him forth to mock Him. Now here attend to the figure of the cross. For with His hands stretched out to two columns, He extended them as it were to the two beams of the cross: but being slain He crushed His adversaries, and His passion became the slaughter of His persecutors. And therefore Scripture concluded it thus: He slew more in death than He had slain in life. Which mystery was evidently fulfilled in our Lord Jesus Christ: our redemption, which He had by no means accomplished while living, He accomplished in dying: who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

SERMON CCCLXV.

On the verse of Psalm XV, I will bless the Lord, who hath given me understanding, etc.

God is to be praised with the heart, with His love. Praise without love is neither true nor acceptable to God. We have sung, and we have said, I will bless the Lord: would that with the heart, not with the mouth only: for if with the mouth and not with the heart, the praise of the Lord becomes foul in the mouth of a sinner; nor does the confession of the mouth profit him, if within there be not the profession of love. See, brothers: love is not a virtue of the mouth; there it fixes its seat, where the bride of the spouse is beautiful. But where is this beauty? All the glory of the king's daughter is within. That glory is nothing other than beauty, that beauty is nothing other than love, love is nothing other than life. Therefore, that you may live, love. If you love, you are beautiful: love is good, love is beautiful.

If that beauty is absent, you are not alive; you have indeed an appearance, but not within. Let that tomb, propped up by such great columns, be opened, let the marble be broken open; what else will meet you but a horrid corpse, stinking bones, ashes, worms? There is therefore an appearance, but it covers a dead man, at the sight of whom you shudder and tremble. But do you think the dead man says, I will bless the Lord? No indeed; as the Scripture testifies, The dead shall not praise you, O Lord, nor all who go down into hell (Ps. 113:17). Open the Gospel, you will hear the Lord rebuking and saying to the devil, Be silent (Mark 1:25). Why? Because the dead shall not praise you, nor all who go down into hell. No one praises him whom he does not love; or if an enemy praises, he loves the virtue which he praises in the enemy. Whoever sins wages enmity with God; therefore he neither praises God nor praises the virtue of God, because praise is some good, which does not fall under sin. Whoever praises someone and lies, slanders, or mocks rather than praises. Take charity away from the heart, and only falsehood remains. Do you wish falsehood to praise the truth, and God to receive praise from the very source from which blasphemy proceeds? Wise men do not think much of it when they are praised by the insane and the wicked: shall God be praised by an impure and most shameless heart, by a blasphemous and most demented mind? Say therefore, I will bless the Lord, who has given me understanding.

You are not insane, you have been healed, you have understanding; praise your God, who has granted you understanding, who provides the eye: understanding, that you may grasp; the eye, that you may look upon; that you may grasp—how great is the breadth and length of the love of God—that you may look upon the author and finisher of faith; that you may grasp charity, that you may look upon Christ; charity, that you may love; Christ, that you may bless; so that by loving and blessing you may know the Lord, who has granted you understanding; and by knowing, you may live: because, This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent (John 17:3).

Against the heretics, who boast that they have from nature the good understanding by which God is blessed. But whence, I ask, is this understanding of yours? Someone will come from the crowd and say: He who gave nature gave understanding; nature is good, understanding is good; let me obtain this good; it is enough: for the understanding will not be degenerate; from that source I will bless the Lord, from which he granted me understanding, that is, from nature. Heretic, have you then obtained a good nature? Let the Apostle be silent and be confounded: Not what I will, he says, the good, this I do (Romans 7:19); and yet he obtained a good nature, and in this good nature, the good that he wills to do, he cannot do. He wills, he desires, he strives: he wills weakly, he desires in vain; he strives fruitlessly; and contrary to what he wills, what he desires, what he strives for, this good he does not accomplish. A good nature, whose will is weak, whose desire is vain, whose strivings are useless!

Let the philosophers mind their own business, and they will be most grateful to you for indulging them with a nature so good for nothing. What of it? They have known the sky, they have known the earth, they have known the sea, they probe the depths, they scrutinize the hidden things of nature, they know the distinctions of things, their differences, their essences; on all these things they give an account. What of it? Go on, say more. After so many and such great things they fail, and they did not glorify God, and they became vain in their thoughts, and were made foolish, when they thought themselves wise, and they changed the likeness of God into the likeness of a calf that eats hay, and they were poured out in the error of the Baalim; and the God of this world blinded them, and they were handed over to shameful passions, and they became like the things they worshipped (Rom. 1:21-28). And yet they rejoiced in their good nature, and through nature in their understanding. You are not insane, you see whether this nature grants understanding, by which they may bless God? Rather, does it not grant understanding, by which they may curse God, and rise up against their Creator? Say rather, brothers, I will bless the Lord, who has given me understanding: had he not given it, I would not have understood; had I not understood, I would never have blessed him: he gave understanding, he gave the eye. A blind nature does not supply what it itself lacks. Make yourself understanding, and you will make yourself blind. The light that is in you is darkness. Say therefore, Enlighten my darkness, that I may never fall asleep in death (Ps. 12:4). What is it to fall asleep in death?

To hope for something from nature, to make one's own arm flesh, to fashion understanding for oneself: whoever has done these things is not only in death, but sleeps in death; he is more than four days dead, more than already stinking (John 11:39). If he were only in death, he could be raised; but in death itself he sleeps a sleep more than iron, he rests in it. It is all over with him.

Again they are refuted by the words of Solomon. But do you wish to know what he did who had obtained a good nature? Did he say, as you do: "In a good nature, understanding is good for me, and he who gave the one did not deny the other"? Let us crush the scorpion, let us tread it down, let iniquity's mouth be stopped. Read: "I obtained a good soul." Go on, let us hear what sort of treasure you have come upon, which perhaps will be turned into coals—and would that into coals heaped upon your head to consume your superfluities. "And when I was more good, I came to a body undefiled: and since I knew that I could not otherwise be continent unless God gave it—and this very thing was a mark of wisdom, to know whose gift it was—I went to the Lord and besought him" (Wisdom 8:19-21). Most truly you have obtained a good nature. Who denies it? For even the devil's nature is good, and all things that God made are good. But in this nature, though good, will you have a wise understanding, by which you may abstain from the concupiscences and desires that war against the soul, if God has not given it? Learn, heretic, learn at last.

And I knew that I could not otherwise contain myself, unless God grants it; and in this is the chief part of wisdom, which is wholly understanding: to know whence you may contain yourself, and that you contain yourself in no other way than by God alone. Excellent nature, that you can abstain from nothing! Nor can it do otherwise than fall, if God has not given understanding, by which it does not fall. Let us therefore sing, brothers, let us tread the path. I will bless the Lord, who has given me understanding: he gave nature, he gave understanding; he healed nature, he healed understanding. In both the pious Samaritan showed mercy; he came down, bound up the wounds, cleansed them with the wine that we understand, healed them, carried him into the stable, that is, into the Church, and commended him to the innkeeper (Luke 10:33-35). To what innkeeper? To the Holy Spirit, the indweller of the holy Church. He, having received the coin—but the coin that he who paid for the wretched poured out from a torn bag—healed with his own oil, his own ointment the wounds of the fallen and dying nature, and with the same oil that he kindled he illuminated my darkness and made my understanding clear. If you do not now believe this, the Samaritan will not be yours, and you will perish in your wound, you who refuse to admit the hand of the healer.

A good understanding is from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a gift of the cloud bought by the passion of Christ. Let the Apostles be asked, and let them say who on that fiftieth day from the resurrection of the Lord gave them understanding? Or perhaps they had stirred up that terrible noise by which the place was shaken in which they were awaiting the promises of the Father? Perhaps they had kindled that heavenly fire with which they were all burning? Perhaps they themselves created those fiery tongues? Perhaps they themselves procured for themselves those divine gifts, of which understanding is one, and poured them out upon themselves according to the desires of their heart? He who says this has no part in this sacred fiftieth day; nor does he receive understanding, who thinks that understanding is given according to nature. When, then, was understanding given, except when the Spirit also was given? Let us act together; now you are confounded, now you blush; and would that you were so confounded that you might be edified, so blush that you might be glorified. What is the Holy Spirit, but the promised nod of the Father, but the gift of the Son? If it is promised, you have one from whom it is promised; for the things that are promised are outside us; and that would be promised in vain which either would be in our power when it is promised, or would be possessed when it pleased us. I promise you this which you do not have, and it is in me when I promise it, so that what I promise may descend into you. The Holy Spirit is also a gift, and a gift above every gift, both because it is a gift owed and because it is a gift given by grace.

Christ was born, and reclined in a manger where he would become food for the pious beasts of burden; yet he suffered thirst and weariness, was sold by his own, handed over and accused by the Jews, scourged by the Gentiles, crowned with thorns, crucified, and at last enclosed in a tomb. To what end all these things? That he might buy for you that gift which he would afterward dispense to the believer; or rather, dispense it that you might believe. For unless he had first given it, you would have believed neither before nor after. Whence, if you have this gift from nature, you make the death of Christ, his passion and cross, vain. For he dies in vain to acquire for you what is already in you, and to give what you already possess. Give back to the Lord the humility of the manger, give back the curse of the cross, give back the abundance of blood poured out—all these things are in vain: you are sufficient for yourself, all these things are empty; you are rich, and among the good things of a rich nature you count the understanding that nature gave, not grace, and of which you are not a debtor to the Creator, except insofar as he bestowed nature, which made understanding for you.

At last they are convinced by the experience of their own weakness and concupiscence. You recognize, I think, the error; and would that your own reins might correct you (Ps. 15:7), so that you may recognize it better, and by recognizing seek, and by seeking obtain the spirit of understanding and counsel and fear, whereby you may come forth wiser, whereby you may become more cautious and more subject to the Lord. These things, brothers, even if I were not to treat of them, there would yet be another who would teach you; and among yourselves you would be your own teachers. For if—which God forbid—you had fallen into so gross and stupid an error as to think that understanding was given to you by nature, which you have from the grace and mercy of God alone, your own reins would correct you, and would cry out, Why do such thoughts arise in your heart (Luke 24:38)? Let each one consult himself, examine himself, search himself out, and not seek himself outside himself; let him interrogate his own reins, and they will say to him, that there was a law in my members contrary to the law of my mind (Rom. 7:23); I am prone to every outrage, the waves of concupiscence overwhelm me so that I am submerged daily, and I rush into the depths of sins.

Envy ascends, pride ascends, luxury ascends; having formed a battle line, they seek the wretched man. If I avoid Charybdis, I run into Scylla; if I drive off lust, I succumb to anger; if avarice does not master me, drunkenness strikes me; if I abstain from plunder, I close my hand and my heart to the poor; if I turn my ears away from slanders, death enters through the windows—that is, through my eyes I drink in the incentives of lusts and pleasures; in short, if I stop up one crack, a hundred stand open through which I receive the hostile rain, and at last I give way. These are the things your reins deal with in your presence, and, conscious of your own weakness, they instruct you, rebuke you, correct you, even into the night. What kind of night? The dark night of your conscience; wrapped in whose shadows you would wish, if you could, to hold these things out like a shield against the light of truth, and to hope well of your own strength. But your reins correct you. In the reins and the loins is strength, as it is somewhere in Scripture (Job 40:11); but since your loins are so enervated, your reins so weakened, they instruct and say: If in the reins, whence comes strength, there is such debility, such infirmity, what will it be in the rest? When our loins, then, have instructed us and taught us how vain is the salvation of men, what remains but that we gird our loins, so that they do not flow away?

When our paneled ceilings here—whether from excessive age, excessive heat, the force of storms, or some other cause—split open, we immediately fasten them together with nails and cords. Let this be done with your loins, that is, with your fortitude. They are loosened, they collapse, they crumble, the whole joint-work is dissolved. You have nails in the Crucified; drive them in boldly, and the better the deeper. Do not apply them to what is falling so that it may be propped up; thus the loosened joint-work will be made firm. The nails of the cross have power to raise the fallen, to restore the weak, to hold back the slipping. Drive, strike, even to the marrow, even to the soul itself; by this correction you will be healed, and once healed you will say to the Lord, My strength I will keep for you (Ps 58:10): from you my strength, for you my strength. Turned to the Lord, etc.

SERMON 366.

On Psalm 22, The Lord rules me, and nothing shall be lacking to me.

I. The psalm contains the mystery of man's reformation. To you, most beloved, who are hastening to the Baptism of Christ, we deliver this psalm in the name of the Lord to be stored in memory; it is necessary that, with divine grace enlightening us, we expound its mystery. For this psalm specifically contains the reformation of the human race's fall, and the discipline of holy Church, and at the same time the sacraments.

Let the ears of your heart, then, lie open in silence to hear, and may the seed of the word find the furrows of your intent prepared the more safely, so that what the thirsty earth has now received, when in the accepted time it has been made drunk with the blood of Christ, may spring up in the stalk and bring forth abundant fruits as it grows.

The figure of fallen man is in him who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho. The Lord rules me, and nothing shall be lacking to me. A great beginning, dearly beloved, of one making confession. For he strengthened the confidence of his defense; he confirmed the infinite substance of his riches. The Lord rules me—he strengthened the confidence of his defense. And nothing shall be lacking to me—he confirmed the infinite substance of his riches. But let us ask whose this confession is, and how great, and of what kind. It is his, dearly beloved, his—of him who, going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, fell among robbers. He who, despoiled of the dignity of his first origin and laid low on the ground by the sting of death, lay without strength and naked. He who, when the trumpet of the Law and the Prophets sounded, while he tried to rise by his own strength, drawn back by the pain of his wound, fell back more grievously into the fall in which he lay. Because the Law, as the Apostle says, brought nothing to perfection.

That Samaritan of ours—Christ, of course, who was called a Samaritan by the Jews, which is interpreted as Guardian—when in mercy he passed along that same road, that is, when he had come in the flesh, the just one for us sinners, to die, he lifted him from the ground and placed him on his own beast; and carrying him back like a straying sheep on his own shoulders, he recalled him to paradise, from which he had fallen, to the hundredfold, that is, to the perfect number (Luke 10:30-35). For he himself, as the prophet says, bore our sins and grieved for us (Isaiah 53:4). Say now, O man, say it as you sit on the beast of mercy and the shoulders of the Lord's delight, you who, once known, recognize your author and Lord: The Lord shepherds me. This surely you could not say unless raised up by the Lord. He himself was shepherding you, who carries you. For when you say, The Lord shepherds me, there is nothing of your own on which you may rely. Therefore beware lest you be exalted over your own merits. For they were nothing when the Lord came to raise you up. In short, he found you naked, not clothed; wounded, not whole; lying down, not standing; he found you straying, not returning. Beware of boasting, beware; because he who in mercy lifted you half-dead from the ground carries the humble, but casts down the proud. For when you have said in fear, and by walking in innocence, The Lord shepherds me, you may confidently add, and nothing will be lacking to me. Since nothing is lacking to those who fear him (Psalm

The safety of the sheep brought back to the fold through Christ. The pastures of the Christian soul. For so that you may know that nothing will be lacking to you, add what follows: He has placed me in a place of pasture; he has brought me up upon the water of refreshment. Recognize, O man, what you were, where you were, under whom you were. A wandering sheep yesterday, on a pathless and waterless place, you were fed on thorns and thistles; placed under a hireling, when the wolf came, you were not safe yesterday. But now, sought out by the true shepherd, carried upon his shoulders in his loving-kindness, you have been brought back to the fold, that is, to the house of God, namely the Church, where your shepherd Christ and the sheep gathered together remain. This shepherd is not like a hireling, under whom you labored in misery, under whom you feared the wolf. But do you wish to know how great a care he has for you, this good shepherd? He laid down his life for you. For he himself says in the Gospel: The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. This he did. For when the wolf lay in wait for you, he offered himself to be killed for you. Now therefore you remain secure in the fold. Nor do you need any other to close and open the door of your enclosure: because Christ is both shepherd and door for you; he himself is both pasture and provider. I am, he says, the door of the sheep. If anyone has entered through me, he will be saved; and he will go out and go in, and find pasture.

Therefore the pastures that this good shepherd prepared for you, in which he set you to be satisfied, are not the variety of green plants, in which some consist of sweet juice and certain others of the most bitter, which at one season of the year exist and at another do not. The pastures for you are the words of God and the sweet commandments sown. Of these pastures that man had tasted who said to God: How sweet to my throat are your words, sweeter than honey and the honeycomb to my mouth! Of these pastures the same man cries out to the Lord's sheep and says: Taste and see how sweet the Lord is. Read therefore the decalogue of the old Testament: You shall not kill, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, and the rest. Read the praise of the precepts of the new Testament: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the earth by inheritance, and the rest that follow, or similar things, and many things sown through the Prophets and Apostles. Of these pastures certainly the shepherd cries out to the sheep: Work for the food that does not perish. But it does not perish for this reason, because the word of the Lord endures forever. The word of the Lord is your food, and not only food but also drink. Hear him saying through the Prophet to the ancient people: Those who eat me shall still hunger, and those who drink me shall still thirst. Likewise through himself he says: My flesh is truly food, and my blood is truly drink.

But these pastures are not far from the water of refreshment. Their one place is the Catholic Church of Christ, where your pastures are the commandments of life, and the fountain of water springing up unto eternal life, whose streams you will be refreshed by when you are baptized, to be restored in Christ. Therefore, unless your pastures are watered by this water, you cannot be brought forth, because the commandments of God cannot sprout without the baptism of Christ, nor grow to the satisfaction of the soul.

Conversion comes from God's grace, not from merits. What are the paths of righteousness? Therefore, when through the water of refreshment in Christ you have begun to be fit, so as to be satisfied with the taste of the sweet pastures, then you will know, and you will cry out rejoicing, and say, He has converted my soul. He has led me along the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. The devil, through sin, overturned your soul and turned it away from God; the Father, through Christ, has converted it to himself, not by your merits, but for his name's sake. Now therefore, enlightened, now converted, now believing, now satisfied with the divine pastures through the water of refreshment, you will say, He has converted my soul. This is the glory of your confession, if there be no change in your conscience. For then you will say this with a true and unchangeable conscience, when you say it not on account of your merit, but for his name's sake. But what are the paths of righteousness along which he has led you? Hear your leader. How wide, he says, and spacious is the way that leads to destruction; but narrow and strait is the way that leads to life.

For every path is short and direct. God did not ordain that you should go to the kingdom of heaven through the delights of the world, through abundance of gold and silver, through being conspicuous with precious stones and garments and honored with every honor, endowed with nobility, swelling with all things through the wisdom of philosophers; because all these things, and things like them, which some use badly and others are given to use well, become for them a wide and spacious way, that is, only in hope which is seen; and when those who are in this present life have been deprived of it, it leads them not to the hope in which they did not have hope, but to perdition. For they slept their sleep, and all the men of riches found nothing in their hands. He has disposed you to go through the paths of justice, that is, through mercy and truth. For all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth. Having despised the wide and spacious way, he wants you to walk the narrow and direct paths, that is, through hunger and thirst, through nakedness, through fasting, through lowliness, through poverty, through patience, through contempt of all present things, and through the hope promised to those who obey. But do you wish to know clearly the directness of the paths by which you have been commanded to walk? You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and with your whole soul; and your neighbor as yourself. For on these two commandments the whole Law hangs and the Prophets.

Therefore, so that you may arrive quickly, if you are hastening to the kingdom of heaven, walk in the two paths that are the head of all and make one way; when you have reached all of them, rejoice that you have completed them vigorously and without weariness.

The shadow of death is the way of sin. Keep your steps in these paths, lest you run into the snares of the raging devil, so that you may safely sing and say: For even if I walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will not fear evil, because you are with me. The shadow of death is the way of sin, in which the devil, that rogue and pirate, spreads the nets of deception for those who walk rightly. It is a shadow, because light has nothing in common with darkness. The Apostle teaches that the works of this shadow are to be rejected, saying: Let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us walk honestly as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in beds and impurities, not in contention and envy (Rom 13). Therefore, as long as you remain in the present life, you walk in the midst of vices and worldly pressures, which are the shadow of death. Let Christ shine in your heart, who enlightens the lamp of our mind through love of God and neighbor; and you will not fear evil, because he himself is with you. He says through the prophet: I will not desert you, nor will I abandon you (Josh 1:5). Likewise in the Gospel: Behold, I will be with you all days, even to the consummation of the world (Matt 28:20). Your guardian is sufficient. The Lord your God is with you.

Take care lest through boasting you abandon your companion, and remain deserted in the shadow of a fragile reed.

The rod signifies discipline, the staff signifies help. The table prepared through Christ. Therefore, when you recognize that you are being attacked by the snares of the enemy in the shadow, and are being frightened, take hold of the rod of discipline, and lean confidently on the staff of mercy, so that when Christ, the sun of righteousness, has shone upon you with his help, you may truly say, Your rod and your staff, these have comforted me. For the rod rules the proud, according to what is said in the second Psalm concerning Christ: You shall rule them with a rod of iron and break them like a potter's vessel (Ps. II, 9). But the staff supports the weak and the weary. Remember, therefore, the correction and discipline of the rod, so that when you have been filled with the good things of God's gifts, you may not be puffed up with pride and murmur against him, because like a potter's vessel he will break you in his anger. Remember also the help of the staff, and do not stumble in your own strength, nor say, I am holy, I cannot falter. Our weakness has many falls, even though it is still governed on earth by the holiness of its works, which brings forth thorns and thistles, or possesses the glory of purity. Therefore, as long as it returns to the earth from which it was taken, it cannot stand unless it is governed by the staff of divine grace.

Whether, then, you prosper in God, or are troubled by the tempest of temptations, cast yourself, washed, upon the staff of God's mercy, so that when you have reclined above it to be fed with spiritual gifts, delighted by the taste of its sweetness, you may fittingly say: You have prepared a table in my sight against those who trouble me. You have anointed my head with oil, and your cup, making drunk, how glorious it is! This the whole Church, throughout the world, upheld by the staff of grace, sings. This she proclaims against heretics, Jews, and Gentiles, who trouble her by mocking, glorying not in herself but in the Lord. For the table of delight is the passion of Christ, who offered himself for us on the table of the cross as a sacrifice to God the Father, granting the holy catholic Church a life-giving banquet, that is, satisfying us with his body and making us drunk with his blood. Fed and given life by this table, the Church exults against those who trouble her, having the hope of eternal life through her life, the Lord Christ, who anointed her abundantly with the oil of gladness through the Holy Spirit. On account of this table the Apostle rebuked the Corinthians reclining at the idol's table, saying: You cannot share in the table of the Lord and the table of demons; you cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons (1 Cor 10:21).

Prevenient and subsequent grace. When, therefore, divine grace, toward which you were hastening, has brought you here, you recognize the table of the spiritual banquet, so that each of you, having come to know the truth, rejoicing and giving thanks to God, may now fittingly and confidently say, And your mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. A great consolation of glory accompanies you. For because of the misery of your weakness, the mercy of God follows you. But first, so that it may show you the way of eternal life, it precedes you, that is, it goes before you, according to what is said in another psalm, My God, his mercy shall prevent me (Psalm 58:11). His mercy, therefore, precedes you, that is, it leads you, who do not know the way, into the way; it calls you, who were far from God, to God; it draws the servant of sin, so that it may make him free, so that by walking in the way all the days of your life you may not wander. It also follows you, guarding your back, lest the serpent the devil, who lies in wait for your heel and with whom you have enmity, trip you up. For a robber either kills by rushing upon you from the front, or rises up behind your back. For this reason the mercy of God both precedes and follows you, so that you may walk safe and secure in the midst of it all the days of your life. Have hope, therefore, and glory, not in yourself, but in the mercy of God that precedes and follows: you were a sinner, prevented by it, so that you might be saved; you were not found righteous, so that you might glory as though you had been.

What is the end of grace and of the Christian profession. But see where he leads you, if you have not abandoned the one leading you. Not into the field of worldly misery, so that among thorns and thistles you gather bread in toil and sweat; not to the perils of the sea, so that for the sake of trade you pursue uncertain gain on a fragile plank, where many have drowned in their pursuit of profit. He leads you to the house of God, not as a guest for a time, so that you may depart from it, but as a dweller, so that you may remain in it. For there follows, And that I may dwell in the house of the Lord for length of days. This house of the Lord is paradise. The length of days is eternal life. There is no hunger there, no thirst, nor will you labor under the heat of the sun and the moon; you will not feel the cold and storms of winter. Sadness and sorrow are not in it. You will be blessed in the fellowship of the saints forever. You will rejoice with them and exult, living and praising God for ages of ages. For it says in another psalm, Blessed are they who dwell in your house; for ages of ages they will praise you (Psalm 83:5). This is the hope of your faith, most beloved. You have come to believe in the Lord; hasten and take care to lay hold by good conduct of what you have believed. For you are not made Christians for the sake of the present life, but for the sake of the future life, which the Lord Christ himself bestows upon you as you strive and persevere in him: who lives and reigns with God the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, for ages of ages. Amen.

SERMON CCCLXVII.

On the words of the Gospel of Luke, chapter 16, verses 19-31; where the rich man and Lazarus are discussed.

CHAPTER ONE. — i. The comparison of the rich man with Lazarus the poor man. Insatiable avarice. Your Holiness has noticed, dearest brothers, and, as I think, has perceived with the whole intent of the mind along with me, the wealth of the rich man and the destitution of the beggar; the one steaming with foods, and the other failing from hunger. Both indeed are men, both carnal, both mortal: but not both equal. One nature, but not one life. Neither of them is immune from the condition of death: and yet one feasts splendidly, and the other grows foul in rags and in misery. That one rejoiced in delicate foods by the invention of cooks: this one was waiting if the crumbs should fall from his table. Let the rich now hear, who do not wish to be merciful; let them hear that we are all born under one law, we live under one light, we breathe one air, and we are also extinguished by one death: which if it did not intervene, not even the poor man himself would endure. That Lazarus, full of sores and lying naked, is carried by the hands of Angels to Abraham's bosom. Behold, the rich man, refreshed and splendid, is shut in the prison of Tartarus. Where is that fine linen garment? Where is the life abounding and flowing with many resources? Do not all things pass away by death like a shadow? We brought nothing into this world, says the Apostle, but neither can we carry anything out (1 Tim 6:7). We take or snatch nothing with us. What if we were to take something away, would we not pray to living men?

What is this insatiable craving of desire, when even the wild beasts keep a limit? For they seize prey only when they are hungry, and they spare their prey once they have felt satiety. Only the avarice of the rich is insatiable. It always seizes and is never satisfied; it neither fears God nor reveres man; it spares neither father nor acknowledges mother; it does not obey brother nor keep faith with friend; it oppresses the widow, invades the orphan's property; it drags freedmen back into slavery, it produces a forged will. The goods of the dead are seized, as though those who do this were not themselves also going to die. What then is this madness of souls, to lose life and to seek death? To acquire gold and to lose heaven? But because no one thinks of God, therefore judgment remains in death.

CHAPTER II. — 2. Why the rich man was condemned. It was rightly said to the rich man, Because you received good things in your life, and Lazarus likewise evil things; but now he is comforted, and you are tormented. Let the rich hear these things, who do not wish to be merciful. Let them hear that punishments are inflicted on those who do not wish to bestow aid. Let them hear the poor man being refreshed, let them hear the rich man burning with heavier torments. Father Abraham, he says, send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame. But he said: Remember, son, that you received good things in your life, and Lazarus likewise evil things.

Punishments are weighed out in exchange for riches, relief in exchange for poverty, flame in exchange for purple, refreshment in exchange for nakedness, so that the fairness of the scales may be preserved, and the measure of that measuring may not lie: "In the measure," he says, "that you have measured, it will be measured back to you" (Matthew 7:2). Therefore mercy is denied to the rich man in his punishments, because he himself, while he lived, refused to show mercy. Therefore the rich man, when he begs, is not heard in his torments, because he did not hear the beggar poor man on earth.

CHAPTER III. — 3. He exhorts to almsgiving. The rich man and the poor man are two things contrary to each other, but again the two are necessary to each other. No one would be in need, if they supported one another; and no one would labor, if both helped each other. The rich man was made for the sake of the poor man, and the poor man was made for the sake of the rich man. It is the part of the poor man to pray, and of the rich man to give; it is God's part to weigh great things in exchange for small, and from his mercy great abundance is born from small things. The field of the poor is fruitful; it quickly returns fruit to those who own it. The poor man is the road of heaven, through which one comes to the Father. Begin, then, to give, if you do not wish to wander. In this life, resolve into a shackle the inheritance of yours by which you are bound, so that you may be able to approach heaven freely; cast away from yourself the burdens of riches, cast away your voluntary chains, cast away the anxieties and weariness that disturb you over many years. Give to the one who asks, so that you yourself may be able to receive; bestow on the poor man, if you do not wish to be burned by flames. Give to Christ on earth what he may return to you in heaven. Forget what you are, and attend to what you are going to be.

This present life is fragile and prone to death. No one can stand firm; but we are all compelled to pass away. We go unwillingly, we depart against our will, because we are evil. If, however, we were to send something on ahead of us, we would not come to an empty lodging. For what we give to the poor, we send on ahead of us; but what we seize by force, we leave behind here entirely.

SERMON 368

On the words of the Gospel of John, chapter 12, verse 25, "Whoever loves his life loses it"; and on the words of the Apostle, to the Ephesians, chapter 5, verse 29, "No one ever hated his own flesh."

CHAPTER ONE. — 1. If anyone loves his soul, how does he lose it? Just now, brothers, when the divine reading was being read, we heard the Lord saying, "Whoever loves his life loses it." To this sentence the Apostle's statement seems, as it were, contrary: "No one ever hated his own flesh." If, then, there is no one who hates his own flesh, how much more is there no one who hates his own soul? For the soul is greatly preferred to the flesh: because the soul is the inhabitant, the flesh the dwelling; and the soul rules, while the flesh serves; the soul is superior, the flesh is subject. If, therefore, no one ever hated his own flesh, who is there who would hate his own soul? On this account the present Gospel reading has raised no small question for us, where we heard, "Whoever loves his life loses it." It is dangerous to love the soul, lest it perish. But if it is for this reason dangerous that you love your soul—lest your soul perish—then you ought not to love it, because you do not want it to perish.

But if you do not wish that soul to perish, you love it. What is this? If I love it, I lose it. Therefore let me not love it, lest I lose it. But because I fear to lose it, I therefore do not love it; and yet I love that which I fear to lose. The Lord says elsewhere also: What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but suffers the loss of his soul (Matt. 16:26)? See, then, that the soul is to be loved in such a way that it is preferred to the gain of the whole world; and yet let him who loves his soul take heed, because if he loves it, he will lose it. You do not wish to lose it; do not love it. But if you do not wish to lose it, you cannot help loving it.

CHAPTER II. — 2. A certain perverted love and a certain right hatred of the soul. There are, then, those who love their soul perversely; and this is what the word of God wishes to correct, not that they should hate their soul, but that they should love it rightly. For by loving it badly they lose it, and something great, as it were, is turned upside down and made contrary: yet it comes about that if you love it perversely, you lose it; if you hate it rightly, you keep it. There is, then, a certain perverse love of it, and a certain right hatred of it. But the perverse love comes from hatred, and the right hatred from love of it. What is the perverse love of the soul? When you love your soul in its iniquities. Hear that this perverse love comes from hatred: But he who loves iniquity hates his own soul (Ps. 10:6). See, on the other hand, the right hatred, because it comes from love. In the same place the Lord continues and says: But he who hates his soul in this world will find it unto eternal life.

Certainly, that which you wish to find unto eternal life, you love greatly. For what does it profit you to love something for a time? Either you will be taken from it, or it will be taken from you. When you are taken away, the lover himself perishes; when that thing is taken away, what you loved perishes. Therefore, where either the lover perishes or the thing loved is no more, it is not to be loved. But what is to be loved? That which can be with us for eternity. But if you wish to have your soul saved for eternity, hate it for a time. Therefore right hatred comes from love; perverse love comes from hatred.

The manner of loving the soul. The twofold love. What, then, is the manner of loving the soul? Do you think the martyrs did not love their souls? You surely see now, if anyone's life in this present world is in danger, how his friends run on his behalf; how they run to the church, how the bishop is besought to interrupt whatever business he has, to run, to hasten. Why? For the soul. And all tremble, and with all other things set aside, they determine that haste must be made. All haste is praised, all delay is accused. Why? For the soul. What is this, for the soul? That the man may not die. The martyrs did not know how to love their souls; and yet this is for the soul, that the man may not die.

CHAPTER III. The death of man is iniquity. If you run a hundred thousand [paces] for this life, how many thousands ought you to run for eternal life? If you hasten to gain a few days, and those uncertain—for today a man has been freed from death, and he does not know whether he will die tomorrow—yet if such running is done for the gain of a few days, since even to old age the days are few, how ought one to run for eternal life? And yet for the sake of this, men are sluggish. With difficulty do you find one who moves even a single step for eternal life. Therefore a perverse love of the soul abounds; right love is [that] of very few. For just as there is no one who does not love his own soul, so there is no one who does not love his own flesh. Whence can it come about that both what the Apostle says is true—No one ever hated his own flesh—and yet the soul is not loved? Let us therefore strive, brothers, to love our souls. Every pleasure of the world is transitory. There is a useful love, there is a harmful love; love is hindered by love; let the harmful love withdraw, and let the useful love succeed. But because men are unwilling to depart from that [harmful love], for that reason something else cannot enter into them; so that they may receive, they are full; let them pour out, and they will receive. For they are full of the love of carnal pleasures, full of the love of the present life, full of the love of gold and silver, of the possessions of this world. Those, therefore, who are full are like vessels. Do you wish honey to enter, when you have not yet poured out the vinegar? Pour out what you have, so that you may receive what you do not have.

Therefore the first renunciation is of this world, and then conversion to God. He who renounces is poured out; he who is converted is filled—but only if this is done not in the body alone, but also in the heart.

CHAPTER IV. — 4. The beginnings of love. But it is asked, brothers, how this love grows. For it has its beginnings, it has its increases, it has its perfection. And we ought to know who has begun, so that we may urge him on to increase; who is about to begin, so that we may admonish him as he begins; who has both begun and grown, so that we may stir him on to perfection. First let your Charity attend to this: all loves and affections are first in men toward themselves, and then toward another thing which they love. If you love gold, you first love yourself, and then gold; because if you were dead, there would be no one to possess the gold. Therefore love begins for each person from himself; and it cannot begin except from himself. And no one is admonished to love himself. For this is present not only in men, but also in cattle. For you see, brothers, how not only huge beasts and great animals, such as oxen or camels or elephants, but even flies, but even the tiniest worms, how they do not wish to die, and love themselves. All animals flee death. Therefore they love themselves, they wish to preserve themselves; some by speed, some by hiding places, some by resisting and fighting back: yet all animals fight for their life, they do not wish to die, they wish to preserve themselves. They love themselves, then. Begin also to love another thing. But what is that other thing?

Whatever you have loved is either what you yourself are, or beneath you, or above you. If what you love is beneath you, love it for comfort, love it for handling, love it for use, not for binding yourself to it. For example, you love gold: do not bind yourself to gold. How much better are you than gold? For gold is earth shining; but you were made to be enlightened by the Lord, made in the image of God. Though gold is a creature of God, God did not make gold in his own image, but you. Therefore he placed gold beneath you. So this love is to be despised. These things are to be taken up for use, not clung to with the bond of love as though with glue. Do not make for yourself members which, when they begin to be cut off, you grieve and are tormented over. What then? Rise up from that love by which you love things inferior to what you are; begin to love things equal, that is, what you are. But why need many words? If you are willing, you can do it briefly.

CHAPTER V. — 5. In what order true and upright love is acquired. But in what order we may have true love and true charity, the Lord himself told us in the Gospel, and clearly showed. For thus he says: You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with all your strength; and your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:37, 39). First, therefore, love God, then yourself; after these, love your neighbor as yourself. Yet first learn to love yourself: so love your neighbor as yourself.

For if you do not know how to love yourself, how will you be able to love your neighbor in truth? For some men think that they love themselves in a lawful order when they seize what belongs to others, when they get drunk, when they serve their lusts, when they seek unjust gain through various slanders. Let such men hear the Scripture saying, Whoever loves iniquity hates his own soul. If, then, by loving iniquity you not only do not love yourself but even hold yourself in hatred, how will you be able either to love God or your neighbor? If, therefore, you wish to keep the order of true charity, do justice, love mercy, flee luxury; begin according to the Lord's command to love not only friends but even enemies. And when you strive with your whole heart to keep these things faithfully, by these virtues, as by certain steps, you will be able to ascend, so that you may merit to love God with your whole soul and with your whole strength. And when you have come to that blessed perfection, you will count all the desires of this world as dung; and with the prophet you will be able to say, But for me, to cling to God is good.

SERMON 369

On the Nativity of the Lord, I.

The twofold birth of Christ: the one before all days, the other in a day. The Nativity of Christ is made illustrious by divine testimonies. Our Savior, born of the Father without a day, by whom every day was made, willed to have on earth this natal day, which we celebrate today. Whoever marvels at this day, marvel rather at the One who endures before every day, who creates every day, who is born on this present day, who frees from the malice of the day. Marvel still more. She who gave birth is both mother and virgin; he whom she bore is both infant and Word. Justly did the heavens speak, the angels rejoice, the shepherds make merry. The Magi were changed, kings were troubled, little ones were crowned. Nurse, mother, our food; nurse, mother, the bread coming down from heaven, and laid in a manger as though fodder for the beasts of burden. For there the ox knew its owner, and the ass the manger of its Lord; namely, circumcision and the foreskin, clinging to the cornerstone, whose firstfruits were the shepherds and the Magi. Nurse the One who made you such that he himself might be made in you, who brought you both the gift of fruitfulness in his conception and did not take away the honor of virginity in his birth; who, before he was born, chose both the womb from which he would be born and the day on which he would be born. And he himself created what he chose, that he might come forth from there like a bridegroom from his bridal chamber, so that he could be seen by mortal eyes, and by the increase of the yearly light bear witness that he, the light of minds, had come. The prophets sang of the Creator of heaven and earth.

it would be on earth with men: the angel announced the Creator of flesh and spirit about to come in the flesh. John, from the womb, greeted the Savior in the womb; Simeon the old man recognized the infant God; Anna the widow recognized the virgin mother. These are the testimonies of your nativity, Lord Jesus: before the waves were laid beneath you and yielded to you as you walked, gave way to you as you commanded; before the wind at your bidding fell silent, the dead man at your calling lived, the sun at your dying grew pale, the earth at your rising trembled, the heaven at your ascending opened: before you had done these and other wonders in the age of your already youthful body. You were still being carried in your mother's hands, and already you were being acknowledged as Lord of the world. He himself is the little child from the seed of Israel, and he himself is God with us, Emmanuel.

The eternal Nativity of Christ. What is that generation of our Savior by which he is coeternal with the Father who begets him, when the world was struck with awe at this generation from the virgin, which pious faith acknowledged and held, while unbelief mocked it and pride feared it though conquered? What is that generation by which in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word? Or what is this Word, which, when about to speak, was not silent, and by whose speaking the one who spoke was not silent? What is the Word without time, through which times were made? The Word which no one's lips opened as begun, or closed as ended: the Word which has no beginning from the mouth of those who speak.

and he opens the mouths of the mute: the Word who is not made eloquent in the tongues of the nations, yet makes eloquent the tongues of infants. What, I ask, is that generation to which the Father does not yield by dying, because he does not precede it by living? From all intervals of places and times, from all the stretching out of spaces that we are accustomed to perceive either in days or in bodies, let us raise our soul to him, as far as we can with his help, if perhaps we may be able to grasp both that the one who begets is not born before the one who begets, and that the one who is begotten does not follow after the one who begets—Father and Son: not both fathers, nor both sons, but both eternal: not both generating, nor both being born, but the one not living without the other: and let us think, if we are able, that the Father has eternally begotten and the Son has eternally been born; if we are not able, let us believe. We cannot here express this in words, and yet it is not far from each one of us: for in him we live, and move, and have our being. Let us transcend our flesh, in which parents live before their children; for they grew up so that they could beget children, and as their children grow, they themselves grow old. For not yet did parents live for their children, since even when the parents are dead, the children will live. Let us transcend our souls as well: they too give birth to something by thinking, which they have with them by knowing; but they can lose it by forgetting, because they did not have it before by being born.

Let us transcend all things bodily, temporal, and mutable, so that we may see above all things the one through whom all things were made. Our ascent is in the heart, because he to whom we ascend is near. Yet we are far from him insofar as we are unlike him. Therefore our likeness to him—which he made and remade in us—ascends to him; but since it is not yet perfect, our weak sight falters and cannot gaze upon the ineffable brightness of eternal light. Whose brightness, then, can the keenness of the human mind grasp? Who shall declare his generation? But the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.

The temporal nativity of Christ. This generation, then, whose day we celebrate today—this generation in which he deigned to come through Israel and to become Emmanuel, God with us: with us in the weakness of the flesh, not with us in the iniquity of the heart; drawing near to us through that which he took from what is ours, and setting us free through that which remained in what is his (for the Lord visited his servants through mortal weakness, that he might make them free through unchanging truth)—this generation, then, which human frailty is in some measure able to grasp; not that generation which remains without time, without a mother, above all things, but this one which was made in time, without a father, among all things: this son of a virgin and bridegroom of virgins, born of an uncorrupted mother, bearing witness to incorruptible truth—let us praise, love, and adore, so that by his mercy, with the devil's cunning overcome, we may triumph.

The devil crept in upon us to deceive us through a corrupted woman's mind; Christ came forth to free us through an incorrupt woman's flesh; who is blessed with the Father and the Holy Spirit forever and ever. Amen.

SERMON 370.

On the Nativity of the Lord, II.

CHAPTER ONE. — 1. The four kinds of the nativity or condition of man. This present day has brought great joy to the human race for having the hope of eternal life. For the first man, by whose fall we all fell, whose ruin is our mortality, was not born but made; with no father, no mother, but by God's working. This is the first condition of man: Adam from the earth. The second condition of man is that by which the woman is created from the side of the man. The third condition of man is that by which man is born from a man and a woman. The fourth condition is that of God and man, by which Christ was born without a man, from a woman. Among these four conditions, only one is familiar to us; the other three are not in the eyes of the flesh, but in the faith of the heart. That a man was made without father, without mother, we do not know; that a woman was made from the side of a man we do not know; we have believed it as read and heard. That third one is familiar to us — the daily one from the union of man and woman; men are born daily. Already then there was one without man and woman, already there was another from a man without a woman, already there was a third from a man and a woman; the fourth remained, without a man, from a woman. But this fourth one freed the three.

For the first and second brought forth from ruin; the third they bore from ruin; in the fourth they found salvation.

CHAPTER II. — A. Every rank of the faithful bears witness to the Savior of all, who was born. Let the virgins therefore rejoice; a virgin bore Christ. Let them not think that anything they have vowed has been destroyed in her: she remained a virgin after giving birth. Let the widows rejoice; the widow Anna recognized the infant Christ. Let the married women rejoice; Elisabeth, a married woman, prophesied the Lord Jesus Christ who was to be born. No rank has been passed over, of which the salvation of all might not have its testimony. For do only virgins attain to the kingdom of heaven? Widows also attain. That holy widow Anna was of great merit. For from her virginity she had lived seven years with her husband; when he died she had come even to old age, and in her old age, blessed, she awaited the infancy of the Savior; so that the aged woman might see the little one, the old woman recognize the little one, and she who was about to depart might see the Savior as an infant entering the world (Luke 2:36-38). And in the male sex these same three kinds are commended. Christ himself was born as a boy; let the boys rejoice, vowing continence to the boy. He truly consecrated the integrity of chastity, who brought fecundity to his mother and did not take away her virginity. That old man Simeon had lived long, whose age is compared to Anna's; and he had heard the answer, that he would not see death unless he first saw the Christ of the Lord.

CHAPTER III. — 3. How great was the longing of the ancient saints to know Christ. Understand, brothers, how great a longing the ancient saints had to see Christ. They knew that he was to come, and all who lived piously used to say, If only that birth might find me here! O that I might see with my own eyes what I believe in the Scriptures of God! And so that you may know how great a longing the saints had, who had learned from the holy Scriptures that a virgin would give birth, as you heard when Isaiah was read, Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb, and shall bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel (Isa. 7:14). What Emmanuel is, the Gospel has revealed to us, saying, which is interpreted, God with us (Matt. 1:23). Let it not, then, seem strange to you, whatever unbelieving soul you are; let it not seem impossible to you that a virgin should give birth, that a virgin giving birth should remain a virgin. Understand that God was born, and you will not marvel at the virgin's childbirth. So then, that you may know that the ancient saints and righteous men longed to see what was granted to this old man Simeon, our Lord Jesus Christ, speaking to his disciples, said: Many righteous men and prophets desired to see what you see, and did not see it; and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it (Id. 13:). This old man was much advanced in years for hearing, but ripe for seeing. He did not wait to hear Christ speaking, because he recognized the infant. And this had been granted to him, now decrepit, as one longing and sighing and saying daily in his prayers: When will he come?

When will he be born? When will I see him? Do you think I will endure? Do you think he will find me here? Do you think these eyes here will see the one through whom the eyes of the heart will be revealed? He was saying these things in his prayers, and in answer to his longing he received the response that he would not taste death before he saw the Christ of the Lord. Mary his mother was carrying him as an infant; he saw him and recognized him. Where had he known the one he recognized? Or had he flown within, who was born outside? He saw and recognized him. Simeon recognized the silent infant; and the Jews killed the young man working wonders. So when he had recognized him, he received him into his arms—that is, into his embrace—and held him fast. He was carrying the one by whom he was carried. For he is the Christ, the wisdom of God, reaching mightily from end to end and ordering all things sweetly. How great was he there, and how great had he become, how small? He became small, he was seeking the small. What is it, he was seeking the small? Not the proud, not the lofty, but he was gathering the humble and the meek. He deigned to be placed in a manger, that he might be the food of the faithful beasts of burden. Simeon therefore received him into his arms and said: Now dismiss your servant, Lord, in peace. In peace—because I see the peace. Why then do you dismiss in peace? Because my eyes have seen your salvation. The salvation of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. Announce the day from day, his salvation.

CHAPTER IV. — 4. Children and old men and married persons bear witness to Christ. You have therefore, children, the child Jesus; holy old men, the old man Simeon. But if you seek that some married man also should bear witness to the Lord, consider Zachariah. Let no one therefore seek anything else, my brothers, Christian faithful, whether virgin, or widow, or married woman, or child, or continent, or married man: whatever anyone has wished to be more, he does not find how he belongs to Christ. We do not find that adulterers, fornicators, the unclean have borne witness to Christ. And that witness should be borne to him even by such persons, he himself provided, he himself granted. For no one is a holy man by his own strength. Let us therefore exult, most beloved. From today the days grow. Believe in Christ, and the day grows in you. You have believed? The day has begun. You have been baptized? Christ has been born in your heart. But did Christ, once born, remain thus? He grew, he came to youth: but he did not decline into old age. Let your faith therefore also grow, find strength, know no old age. Thus you will belong to Christ the Son of God, in the beginning the Word with God, the Word God; but the Word made flesh, that he might dwell among us. There majesty lay hidden, to you infirmity appeared. In his hands Simeon received infirmity, but within he recognized majesty. Let no one despise the one born, if he wishes to be reborn.

To him it belonged to be born for our sake; may it belong to us to be reborn in him: who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

SERMON CCCLXXI.

On the Nativity of the Lord, III.

CHAPTER ONE. — 1. The two nativities of Christ. The Savior is born to us today; and therefore today the true sun has risen upon the whole world. God became man, that man might become God; and that the servant might be turned into the lord, the Lord took the form of a servant. The inhabitant of heaven dwelt on earth, that man, an inhabitant of earth, might dwell in heaven. The Savior, then, is born to us; he has suffered the day of birth of the rejected Law's conception: but born of the Father always, of the mother once. For we have received two nativities of our Lord Jesus Christ: first the divine, then the human; but clearly both are wonderful: in that one, the offices of a mother ceased; in this one, those of a father: the one eternal, that he might create temporal beings; the other temporal, that he might bestow eternal ones. He, then, in the form of God, equal to the Father; he, in the form of a servant, subject to the Father. He, the creator of times, was born in time: and he was made so small that he might be brought forth by a woman; but so great he certainly remained, that he was not separated from the Father. These nativities of the Lord, then, are also attested by the two beginnings of the evangelists. For one of them says concerning the divine nativity: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word: this was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was made nothing (John 1:1-3).

Concerning this true human nativity, another evangelist relates thus: The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David. This day, therefore, is the Lord's birthday, this is the day of his second nativity: let us exult and be glad in it. And not without reason. The day has already begun to lengthen from this point; today the light receives increase, since for the human race the true light has come in this very day, so that rightly the day extends the sun's course, by which he brought in for us this one through whom we were to be set free from the shadows of death. The prophets, therefore, announcing him as about to come, went before like lamps before the day of his rising, and by their most brilliant proclamations declared the miracles he was to perform in the flesh. For it was fitting that it be preached that he was to come, lest when he had come he be doubted. And so this our God lived as a man among men. For he appeared to those who saw him as a man, to those who understood as God: offering himself as a man to those who looked upon him, preserving God for those who believed. Therefore the sight of his weakness saved the weak; the contemplation of his divinity seeks the strong.

CHAPTER II — 2. By the Incarnation God is shown forth as visible, that man may follow him. I beseech you, beloved, consider how great is this mystery of truth. For the saving of men he had given the Law, he had sent the Prophets; and because these remedies came beforehand for the healing of sicknesses, God willed to offer himself to men for their salvation. Moreover, men could not see God himself in his own substance; and men ought not to place their hope in man alone. What then was to be done here? They ought not to follow a man; but the man who could be seen was not one to be followed. God was to be followed, who could not be seen. Therefore, that there might be shown to man one who could be seen by man and whom man might follow, God became man. Finally, when he was already conversing among men, and, having brought three apostles aside in secret, stood in their midst, he suddenly shone upon them in that brightness of divine worship, which the apostles who were present could scarcely behold, overcome by the infirmity of human affection. He willed to be born after the manner of men, that we might be born in him, and might consecrate for his future worshippers the sacraments of a repeated birth: that we, who were held bound and liable from that birth, having followed the footsteps of our Savior, might attain by the sure protection of a second birth; whereby, born in God and of God, we might break the chains of ancient death, when we receive the Holy Spirit as the pledge of salvation.

CHAPTER II — 2. By the Incarnation God is shown forth as visible, that man may follow him. I beseech you, beloved, consider how great is this mystery of truth. For the saving of men he had given the Law, he had sent the

Therefore, when God wished to appear to men, and desired to teach them even in person the things he had previously commanded, he tempered his divine power by assuming a man, and he set darkness as his hiding place round about him (Ps. 17:12), when he covered himself with the tabernacle of the flesh. By so great and so ineffable a sacrament, therefore, Christ our God is both held to be man and God: man through his mother, God through his Father. And so it comes about that both those statements are true: what he said, The Father is greater than I (John 14:28), and, I and the Father are one (ibid. 10:30). For in his divinity he is equal to the Father, in his incarnation he is subject to the Father.

CHAPTER III — 5. How God and man could be mingled. The mingling of soul and body is more difficult. Yet some are accustomed to ask how man and God could be mingled. They seek the reason of this mystery, which was accomplished once for all, when they themselves can in no way give the reason of that which has always been, that is, how the soul is mingled with the body so that a man is made. Therefore, just as corporeal and incorporeal are joined together so that a man is made, so man is joined to God and made Christ. And yet, in order that Christ might be made, those two incorporeal things, that is, the soul and God, could more easily be joined and mingled than one incorporeal and the other corporeal, that is, the soul and the body, are mingled so that the person of a man exists. But if God, the creator of heaven and earth, when he was God, was made man, and humbled himself even to death, even death on a cross (Phil.

For what is earth and ashes, that it should be proud? See, brothers, how greatly God humbled himself for the sake of men. How greatly ought a servant to abase himself, when even the Lord descended to such great humility? This humility, dearest ones, if it is most fully possessed by men, will advance even to charity. For while each esteems the other as superior, love makes equality. Hence a man should not despise himself, for whose sake God deigned to undergo these things.

CHAPTER IV — 1. The dignity of man from God's condescension toward him. And indeed, brothers, for whom I desire to be spent and to be spent over and above, although I have always made you in my conscience as it were a sea, yet in a certain manner you become greater to me, when I consider how great is my Lord's condescension for man. You are the price of the Lord's incarnation, you are the price of the Lord's blood, you are the members of Christ, Christ is your head: for your sake he did not delay to be born, for your sake he endured all things; he bore even the cross itself for this end, that he might join you to himself in his household. You are called the brothers of Christ, you are called the heirs of Christ. Therefore, most beloved, let each one hold himself worthy, in whose presence he ought not to sin; let him consider himself worthy, in whose presence, if he has thought of a fault, he should blush. For you were bought at a great price: glorify and bear God in your body (1 Cor 6:20).

He was born for you, he was offered for you; he also, if you act worthily, dwells in you. Let us therefore act, meditating on the law of the Lord day and night, so that we may comprehend him, so that we may be found worthy to see him. Let us act, so that because God deigned to descend for the sake of men, man may be able to ascend to God.

SERMON 372.

On the Nativity of the Lord, iv.

CHAPTER ONE.—1. The twofold nativity of Christ. Your faith knows, most beloved, what has gathered this whole multitude, that the Savior has been born to us today. He is born of the Father always, of the mother once: of the Father without sex, of the mother without union. For in the case of the Father there was lacking the womb of the conceiver; in the case of the mother there was lacking the embrace of the sower. The first nativity from the Father preserved nature; the second nativity from the mother sowed grace. That one held the majesty of the divine substance; this one took on the fellowship of human mortality. But in this one he deigned to come so that he might become obedient even unto death (Philippians 2:8), and by dying conquer death. Both nativities are ineffable, both are wondrous. For what human heart could comprehend, or what tongue could explain, how Christ was born always from God, or how recently from the womb? Who could understand the Father coeternal with the Son, who could speak of the virgin mother? The one begetting without beginning, without end; the other conceiving without lust, giving birth without corruption? Both nativities are wondrous, because they are divine.

Whether, then, the human mind considers that generation or this one, it says most rightly, Who shall declare his generation? And what shall we do, brothers? Because we are unable to speak worthily, ought we to be silent? Far be it from us, far be it that the tongue of servants should be silent when it is the Lord's Nativity. Let us therefore say what we can, what we have read.

Jews and Gentiles invited to the marriage of Christ. We are fed on the flesh and blood of Christ. Christ the bridegroom and giant, beautiful and strong. Blessed David, speaking of Christ, said in the Psalms, In the sun he has set his tabernacle, and he himself as a bridegroom coming forth from his chamber has exulted as a giant. For today he has come forth from the sacred chamber, that is, from the hidden and incorrupt secret of the blessed virginal womb. Thence came forth the son of a virgin, the bridegroom of a virgin: the son, namely, of Mary, the bridegroom of the Church. For the Apostle was speaking to the whole Church when he said: I have espoused you to one husband, to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

CHAPTER II. — To such a marriage of Christ, the Father of the bridegroom first invited the people of the Jews. But what does the Gospel say? Those who had been invited were not worthy (Matthew 22:8). The multitude of all the Gentiles was invited; it filled the Church; it received from the Lord's table not cheap dishes or ignoble drinks, but it first tasted the flesh and blood of the Shepherd himself, of Christ himself who was slain. The innocent lamb himself was slain for his own marriage; he was slain for the marriage; and whomever he invited, he fed from his own flesh. Slain, he prepared the feast; rising again, he celebrated the marriage. Slain, he endured a voluntary passion; rising again, he led his appointed bride. In the womb of the virgin he received human flesh as a pledge; on the cross he poured out his most precious blood as a dowry; in his resurrection and ascension he strengthened the covenants of an eternal marriage. For he ascended on high, he led captivity captive, he gave gifts to men (Psalm 67:19). What gifts? The Holy Spirit, by whom, with charity poured into human minds, the Church has clung inseparably to Christ as to her husband. Therefore today he came forth like a bridegroom from his sacred bridal chamber, and, as the Psalm declares, He rejoiced like a giant to run his course. He came forth like a bridegroom, he rejoiced like a giant. Beautiful and strong: beautiful, as a bridegroom; strong, as a giant. Beautiful, that he may be loved; strong, that he may be feared: beautiful, that he may please; strong, that he may conquer.

Where is the beauty of this bridegroom found in the sacred Scriptures? "Fair in form beyond the sons of men: grace is poured out upon your lips" (Psalm 44:3). Where is the giant's strength found? "The Lord is strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle" (Psalm 23:8). But both — that is, both beauty and strength — Isaiah had seen and understood in him, when he said: "Who is this who comes from Edom? The redness of his garments is from Bosor, thus beautiful in the robe of his garment with strength" (Isaiah 63:1)? This prophet, then, who called him both beautiful and strong, knew the bridegroom and the giant.

CHAPTER III. — 5. How Christ ran the way. The hymn of Ambrose. Therefore, dearest ones, "He rejoiced as a giant to run the way." What way, if not the mortal way, which he deigned to share in common with us? That is the way through which the human race passes. For they pass through it by coming as those being born, and by departing as those dying. And this river of the human race, from the beginning even to the end, flows ceaselessly from the hidden veins of nature. From this swift and turbulent river Christ deigned to drink. You have just heard in the psalm, "He drank from the torrent in the way" (Psalm 109:7). This torrent brought us forth to birth, and led us on to death. As if from a hidden spring, Christ received the abyss of the sea. Both things he did for us: he was both born and died.

And because men, placed amid the allurements of this name, are for the most part delighted by the world's blandishments and enticements, which are wrapped in the mud of this torrent and plunge into the depths of hell those who, greedily drinking as they pass through the waves, are thus killed—desiring to stand in the rushing torrent and seeking fixed footholds in the commonwealth—therefore the Lord drank from the torrent on the way. What is "he drank on the way"? He drank as he passed through. For he drank and passed on; he did not remain, nor did he stand in the way of sinners. Likewise, men fear death, because it is necessary that all be swept away by the impulse of this torrent; but Christ could not fear the death he had taken upon himself willingly. Therefore it is said, "And he exulted like a giant to run his course." For he descended and ran; he ascended and sat. You know that you are accustomed to confess thus: after he rose again, he ascended into heaven, he sits at the right hand of the Father. This course of our giant the blessed Ambrose sang most briefly and beautifully in the hymn you sang a little while ago. For speaking of the Lord Christ, he says: His going forth from the Father, his return to the Father; his course down even to the underworld, his return to the throne of God. All these things, beloved, if we ask why they were done, we will find they were done for our sake. For he descended that we might ascend; he died that we might live; he rose again that we might rise again; he ascended into heaven that we might learn to despise earthly things and lift up our hearts on high.

Hence, to lift up our hope after himself, he first lifted up his own flesh; and so that we might hope that this would follow in us, that which he received from us went before.

SERMON 373.

On the Epiphany of the Lord, I.

CHAPTER ONE. — 1. Christ made manifest to the Magi. The solemnity which we celebrate today received the Greek name Epiphany because of the manifestation of the Lord. For on this day, when the Magi adored him as the firstfruits of the Gentiles, he was commended as manifest, who a few days earlier was delivered to us even as one born. That cornerstone, which as it were joined two walls—namely, of circumcision and of uncircumcision, that is, of Jews and of Gentiles coming from different directions—in its own unity, and became our peace, who made both one (Eph. 2:11-22); so that he might be announced to the shepherds of the Jews, angels came from heaven; and so that he might be adored by the Magi of the Gentiles, a star shone from heaven. Whether, then, through angels or through a star, the heavens declared the glory of God: so that in the grace of him who was born, the Apostles too might declare it, bearing the Lord as the heavens do, and so that their sound might go out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world (Ps. 19:2, 5). And since these things have come even to us, we believe, and therefore we also speak (2 Cor. 4:13).

CHAPTER II. — 2. The same argument is treated. Many things, therefore, brethren, must be considered in this Gospel reading which we have heard. The Magi come from the East, they seek the king of the Jews, whom so many kings of the Jews had never sought before. But they seek not one of manly age, or an elder, conspicuous to human eyes on a lofty throne, powerful in armies, terrifying in arms, gleaming in purple, radiant with a diadem [either exulting from the cross for himself, on which he would redeem all the martyrs confessing him, or rising again from the dead, or ascending into heaven]; but a newborn, lying in a cradle, clinging to breasts, distinguished by no adornment of body, no strength of limbs, no resources of parents, not by his own age, not by the power of his own. And they seek the king of the Jews from the king of the Jews; from Herod [a man], Christ [God and man; from an earthly king, a man, the king of heaven who had created man]: from the great the little one, from the illustrious the hidden one, from the exalted the humble one, from the speaking one the infant, from the wealthy the poor one, from the strong the weak one; and yet [although Christ rules over himself and others while Herod persecutes him], from the despiser one to be adored: truly in him no royal pomp was seen, but true majesty was adored.

CHAPTER III. — 3. Herod's fear and savagery in the slaughter of the little children. The innocent are crowned as martyrs. Finally, Herod is afraid; the Magi desire. They long to find the king; he fears to lose his kingdom. In the end both seek: they, one through whom they might live; he, one whom he wished to kill: he, against whom he commits a great sin; they, who forgives them all their sins. For Herod kills many little children while he seeks to reach the death of one. And when he had carried out a most savage and most bloody slaughter against so many innocents, he first of all killed himself by such great iniquity. Meanwhile our king [Christ], the Word [of God], an infant [God], with the Magi adoring him and the little children dying for him, whether he lay or sucked at the breast; and not yet speaking, he was finding believers; and not yet suffering, he was even making martyrs. Blessed little children, just born, never tempted, not yet having struggled, already crowned! Let him doubt your crown in suffering for Christ who does not even believe that the Baptism of Christ profits little children. You did not indeed have the age at which you might believe in Christ who was to suffer: but you had the age at which you might endure suffering for Christ who was to suffer. In no way would the grace of the infant Savior desert these infants, he who had come to seek what had perished, not only by being born in the flesh, but also by hanging on the cross [by descending to the underworld, and ascending into the heavens, and sitting at the right hand of the Father].

For he who, when born, could have angels as heralds, the heavens as narrators, and the Magi as worshipers, could also have granted to those men that they not die here in his place, if he knew that they would perish by that death, and would not rather live in greater blessedness. Far be it, far be it, that Christ, coming to set men free, should have done nothing regarding the reward of those who were killed for his sake, he who, hanging on the wood, prayed for those by whom he was being killed.

CHAPTER IV. — 4. The wretched Jews, very like the craftsmen of Noah's Ark and the milestone stones. What shall I say of the wretchedness of the Jews, who, when the Magi were seeking Christ, even brought forward the prophecy as a guide and designated the city of Bethlehem, which they themselves did not find? They are like the craftsmen of Noah's Ark, who provided for others where they might escape, and themselves perished in the flood; like milestone stones, they showed the way and could not walk it, because, being dull, they remained on the road. It was asked of them where Christ was to be born; they answered, In Bethlehem of Judea. For thus it is written by the prophet: And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are not the least among the leaders of Judah. For from you shall come forth a king who shall rule my people Israel. The seekers heard and went away; the teachers spoke and remained: and, separated by contrary affections, the former became worshipers, the latter persecutors. Even now the Jews do not cease to show us something similar.

For some of the pagans, so that they may know that Christ was foretold, when we bring forward clear testimonies from the Scriptures, suspecting that perhaps these things were fabricated by Christians, prefer to believe the books of the Jews; and just as the Magi did then, they dismiss those men to read in vain, while they themselves proceed faithfully to adore.

CHAPTER V.—5. A spiritual spectacle on this feast. Let us therefore celebrate rejoicing in the Lord, the feast day of the Lord; not only the day on which he was born of the Jews, but also the day on which he was manifested to the Gentiles. It is pleasing to gaze upon all things, and gathered into one view, to perceive with the mind in a spiritual spectacle. Christ is born: a virgin conceives, a virgin bears, a virgin nourishes; fecundity is present, nor is integrity absent. Angels announce, shepherds glorify, the heavens declare, the Magi desire, kings fear, the Jews point out, the Gentiles adore: the raging are frustrated, the infants are crowned, the believers marvel. What is this lowly loftiness, this strength of the weak, this greatness of the little one? Truly that Word made all these things, through which all things were made. The Word which was far from us was made flesh, that he might dwell in us (John 1:14). Let us therefore acknowledge in time the one through whom the times were made: and celebrating his temporal feasts, let us desire eternal rewards.

SERMON CCCLXXIV.

On the Epiphany of the Lord, II.

The Magi led to Christ by a star and by the revelation of angels. The anniversary celebration of this day demands from us an anniversary sermon, owed to your ears and hearts. On this day our Savior drew the Magi to himself from so distant a people. They came to adore the infant, the Word of God. Why did they come? Because they saw an unusual star. And how did they know that it was Christ's? For they were able to see the star; could it speak to them and say, "I am Christ's star"? Without doubt it was indicated otherwise, through some revelation. Yet an unusual king had been born, who was also to be adored by strangers. Were there not kings born before in Judea, or throughout the whole earth among various nations? Why is this one to be adored, and adored by foreigners—not by a terrifying army, but in the poverty of the flesh, with the majesty of his power hidden? When he was born, he was adored by Israelite shepherds, to whom angels announced him; but the Magi were not of the people of Israel. They worshiped the gods of the Gentiles, that is, demons, by whose deceitful power they were being deceived. They saw, then, a certain unusual star, and marveled; they asked without doubt whose sign it was, since they saw something so new and strange. And surely they heard—certainly from angels, from some admonition of revelation. Perhaps you ask, From good angels or from evil? Indeed even the evil angels, that is, demons, confessed that Christ is the Son of God.

But why did they not hear good things, when in adoring Christ their salvation was already being sought, and iniquity did not rule over them? The angels could therefore say to them: The star that you saw is Christ's; go and adore him where he was born, and at the same time make known what kind and how great a one was born. But they, having heard this, came and adored him. They offered gold, frankincense, and myrrh, according to their own custom. For they were accustomed to offer such things to their gods.

Christ was pointed out by the Jews themselves to the Gentiles. Yet before they did this, before they found him in the city where he had been born, they came seeking: Where is he that is born King of the Jews? Could they not also have learned this by revelation, just as they had learned that that star was the King of the Jews'? Could not the same star have led them to that city, as afterward it led them to the place where Christ the infant was with his mother? It could indeed, but it was not done, so that they might inquire this from the Jews. Why did God wish this to be inquired of the Jews? So that while they point out the one in whom they do not believe, they might be condemned by their own pointing out. Notice that even now the Magi are made the firstfruits of the Gentiles, and the more they were freed from a greater impiety, the greater glory they give to the one who freed them. They ask: Where is he that is born King of the Jews? Herod, having heard the name of king, trembles as if in rivalry. He summons the experts of the Law, and asks them from the Scriptures to indicate where Christ was to be born. They answer: In Bethlehem of Judah.

The Magi went and adored (Matt 2:1-11); the Jews remained, who pointed him out—a great sacrament! Today we convict them by the Jews' own books; the faithful are made by their books. We prove to the pagans what they do not want to believe. For sometimes the pagans raise this kind of question against us, when they see the things that are written thus fulfilled that they cannot deny at all that these things are brought about in the name of Christ among all nations—things which are read as foretold in the holy books—in the faith of kings, in the overthrow of idols, in the change of human affairs. And sometimes they dare to say: You saw these things happen thus, and you wrote them down as if they had been foretold. A certain poet of theirs did this; those who have read it recognize these things. He told of a certain man who descended to the underworld and came to the region of the blessed, and to whom were shown the Roman leaders who were to be born, whom the very man who was writing these things already knew to have been born (Virgil, Aeneid 6.752-887). For he narrated past events; but he wrote them down as if they had been foretold as future things. So too, the pagans say to us, you saw all these things happen, and you wrote books for yourselves in which these things are read as if foretold. O the glory of our King! The Jews were conquered by the Romans by their deserts, yet not wiped out. All nations were subdued by the Romans and passed into the laws of the Romans; this nation both was conquered and remained in its own law—as far as pertains to the worship of God, it kept the customs and rites of its fathers.

Even when their temple had been overthrown and the ancient priesthood extinguished, as was spoken by the Prophets, they still observe circumcision and a certain custom by which they are distinguished from the other nations. For what reason, if not as a testimony to the truth? The Jews are scattered everywhere, carrying the codices in which Christ is proclaimed and presented as he was foretold, so that he can now be shown to the pagans. I bring forward the codex, I read the prophet: I show that the prophecy has been fulfilled. The pagan doubts, lest perhaps I have fabricated this myself. My enemy has this codex, long ago entrusted to him by his ancestors. From it I convict both: the Jew, because I have recognized that this was prophesied and fulfilled; the pagan, because I did not fabricate it.

Sacrifice is owed to the one God. Therefore let not demons deceive the unwary by the appearance of divination, and those wickedly curious about temporal things; nor, deceiving the impious with proud arrogance, let them demand for themselves the honor of sacrifices. Truly divine men, disciples of the one God, foretold divine things. The true sacrifice is owed to the one true God. Before grace, its figures were shadowed forth by victims. What was to happen in one way, divine providence foretold in many ways, so as to show how great it was. He himself is the physician, he himself the medicine: the physician, because he is the Word; the medicine, because the Word was made flesh. He himself is the priest, he himself the sacrifice. He it is who changed the way of the Magi; he even now changes the life of the wicked.

His manifestation in the flesh, which in Greek is called Epiphania, having been justified in the spirit, the Gentiles celebrate together on this day's solemnity: that the solemnity may renew the memory, that piety may flourish in devotion, that charity may burn in the gathering, that truth may shine before the envious.

SERMON 375

On the Epiphany of the Lord, III.

Christ was first manifested to the Jews and afterward to the Gentiles. Infants made martyrs. The two walls meeting at the corner. Epiphania in Latin is "manifestation." The Lord Christ, a few days ago, was manifested by his birth to the Jews; but on this day he was declared to the Gentiles by a star. The ox knew its owner, and the ass the manger of its Lord (Isa. 1:3). The ox is from the Jews, the ass from the Gentiles; both came to one manger, and found the food of the word. The Magi who came to adore Christ, and who signify the firstfruits of the Gentiles, did not receive the Law, did not hear the Prophets: the star was the tongue of heaven. As if it were said to them, What profit have I sought from you? The heavens declare the glory of God (Ps. 19:1). And yet Herod, troubled, asked the Jews where Christ was to be born. And they answered, In Bethlehem of Judah: and they cited the prophetic testimony; and while the Magi went on to adore, they themselves remained unmoved. On the embankment there are stones; they point out the way, and they themselves do not walk. Nevertheless the Magi went on to Bethlehem; but once the city was found, how could they find the house?

Behold, that star which shone from heaven led them on earth and stood over the place where the child was. How great was the service of the elements, and the wickedness of the Jews! Herod was troubled, as though Christ had come to seek a kingdom and to find an earthly one. The lion of heaven is born, and the earthly little fox is troubled. The Lord said concerning Herod: Go, tell that fox. Being troubled, what did he do? He killed the infants. What did he do? He killed the infants for the infant Word. Before they could confess the Lord with their mouth, they were made martyrs in blood. These firstfruits Christ sent to the Father. The infant came, and the infants went; the infant to us, the infants to God. Out of the mouth of infants and sucklings you have perfected praise. Let us rejoice, the day has shone upon us. The Magi, the firstfruits of the Gentiles, signified us. The Jews recognized when he was born, the Gentiles recognized it yesterday. Different walls came to the cornerstone, on one side the Jews, on the other the Gentiles; from different directions, but not to different destinations. You have seen and you know that walls are as far from each other as they are distant from the corner. As much as they approach the corner, they approach each other; when they have come to the corner, they cling to one another. This Christ has done. Jews and Gentiles had been far from one another, circumcision and uncircumcision, those under the Law and those without the Law, worshippers of the one true God and of many false ones. How far? But he is our peace, who has made both one.

But those who came from the Jews are themselves counted on the good wall; for those who came did not remain in the ruin. He made us one, them and us: but in one, not in a cloud (Eph. 2:11-22). From where was Christ born? From the Jews. Thus you have it written, Salvation is from the Jews (John 4:22): but not for the Jews alone. For he did not say, Salvation for the Jews; but, Salvation from the Jews. They grasped, and themselves lost; they bound, and he fled from them; they saw, and killed; we neither grasped, and we hold; nor saw, and we believe; we are later, and we have come first. They who preceded us lost the way: but we both found the way, and walking in it have come to the fatherland.

SERMON 376.

The Sunday in the Octave of Easter.

CHAPTER ONE. — 1. A great miracle, to enter with the doors closed. Your Charity heard, when the holy Gospel was read, that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ after his resurrection entered to his disciples with the doors closed. A great miracle: but you cease to wonder, if you have thought of God. For it would be wonderful, if man alone had done this. Refer it to omnipotence, not to illusion. He entered with the doors closed. I answer you, so that you may know that it was true flesh, he showed his scars to be touched (John 20:19-27). But just as it is not, you say, of bodily nature to enter through a closed door, so it is not of bodily nature to walk upon the waves of the sea.

He entered through closed doors—answer me, give me the solidity of flesh. He walked upon the waters of the sea—you too give me the weight of flesh. Do you wish to know that this was of omnipotence? He gave it also to Peter (Matt. 14:25-29). He who gave what he willed kept what was his own. For he who entered while living through closed doors is the same who by being born did not violate the integrity of his mother. Therefore, brothers, let us believe with admiration, let us obey by believing, and by obeying let us hope for the promises, if we do the commandments; because to do the commandments, he himself helps us, from whom we hope for the promises.

CHAPTER II. — 2. The octave of infants. The old and the new man. Today the octave is said of the infants; their heads are to be uncovered, which is a sign of liberty. For this spiritual birth has liberty; properly, however, the birth of the flesh is slavery. There are indeed two births of man: to be born and to be reborn. We are born to labor, we are reborn to rest; we are born to miseries, we are reborn to eternal happiness. For those boys, infants, little ones, sucklings, clinging to their mothers' breasts, and not knowing how much grace is conferred upon them—as you yourselves see, because they are called infants, they too have their octave today; and these old men, young men, youths, are all infants. For the infancy of the one belongs to oldness, the other to newness. For those whom you see fresh from birth are born old. Our old man is called Adam, from whom we are born; the new man is Christ, through whom we are reborn.

These, then, are both new and reborn to another life, and in them, if it can be said, there is a new oldness when they are born.

He exhorts the baptized not to imitate bad Christians. In the Church the bad are mingled with the good. Behold, today our infants are mingled with the faithful, and they fly as it were from the nest. It is necessary, then, that we address them as women in labor do. For, as you recall, my brothers, when the chicks of swallows or of house sparrows begin to fly from the nest, their mothers fly around them with a clamor, and by their affectionate cries they testify to the dangers of their children.

CHAPTER 111. — We know, then, that many who are called faithful live badly, and do not conform by their conduct to the grace they have received; they praise God with their tongue and blaspheme with their life. But we know that others among these many, as among much and abundant chaff, are like grains groaning on the threshing floor, yet consoling themselves with the hope of the granary. We know that these two kinds of people are in the Church. We know the Church to be the Lord's threshing floor: we hope for the winnowing on the day of judgment, we desire the mass of grain in the resurrection, we long to receive the granary in eternal life. There no chaff will be, just as in hell no grain will be. Now, then, my brothers, since we know that these two kinds of people are in the Church—the pious and the impious, the good and the bad, the groaning and the contemptuous—we do not know with which of them those are joined.

But what we wish, they themselves also know; whether our prayers for them are fulfilled, human ignorance is wearied by anxiety, and sometimes is even stirred by false suspicions. From these things one learns, in this land where one does not live without temptation. I admonish you therefore, holy shoots; I admonish you, new plants in the Lord's field, that of you be said what was said of the vineyard of the house of Israel: I expected that it would make grapes, but it made thorns (Isa. 5:2). May he find a cluster in you, who was trodden as a cluster for us. Bear the grape, live well. For the fruit of the Spirit is, as the Apostle says, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faith, continence, chastity (Gal. 5). When our farmer comes to us, whose laborers we are, he who gives the increase within—for we know how to plant and water from without; but the Apostle says, Neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters; but God who gives the increase (1 Cor. 3:7)—he who now sees how you hear, who now inspects how you are formed, or whether you are already beginning to fear: when that farmer comes to you, may he find in you what the Apostle had said: My joy and my crown, all you who stand in the Lord (Phil. 4:1).

CHAPTER IV. — 4. Evil men who lead others into sin are to be avoided. Unlawful remedies of incantations. Almsgiving. Brethren, most sweet sons, most dear sons, imitate the good, beware of the evil. I know that evil men will come to you, and will persuade you to drunkenness, and will say to you, Why? Are not we also most faithful? I know it, and for that reason I grieve, for that reason I fear. Already if you have said firmly: Brother, I would not wish to do what you do, but if I cannot lead you into my good, at least do not drag me into your evil. To these men, as is wont to happen, their head will ache. Your neighbor, man or woman, will say to you: Here is an enchanter, here is a healer, and I know not where there is a sorcerer. You say: I am a Christian, it is not lawful for me. And if that one has said to you, Why? Am not I also a Christian? you are to say, But I am faithful. And he to you: And I am baptized. They are made angels of the devil, members of Christ. Because the enemy possesses him, he seeks to drag another also. May he find you ready, who has prepared these things for you. Therefore I speak, therefore I testify, therefore I do not keep silent, therefore I shake out my garments, therefore I hold myself excused before the tribunal of my God. I shall say to God: Lord, I did not keep silent; Lord, the talent which you gave me I did not hide, but I distributed it. This he will be able to say to me: Wicked servant, you should have given it, and I would have demanded it. Behold, Lord, I have given; you demand. And if perhaps old habit has tickled you, you have one to whom you may appeal.

Greater is the helper than the attacker. Therefore you groan, therefore you pray, therefore you say, Lead us not into temptation. Observe also, my brethren, what you say above, Forgive us our debts; so that you may do what follows, as we also forgive our debtors. You give alms, you receive alms. You forgive, and you shall be forgiven. You give, and it shall be given to you. Hear God saying, Forgive, and it shall be forgiven you; give, and it shall be given to you. Keep the poor in mind. I say to all: give alms, my brethren; give, and you shall not lose. Believe God. I say to you not only that you do not lose what you give to the poor, but plainly I say to you: this alone you do not lose; the rest you lose. See, let us consider whether you have today made the poor glad; you are their barns, so that God may give you whereof to give, and may forgive what perhaps you sin. Enclose almsgiving in the heart of the poor, and it shall entreat the Lord for you; to whom is honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

SERMON CCCLXXVII.

On the Kindling of the Lord.

1. The Word of God cannot be worthily praised by us. How did he rejoice to run his course? Why is it said in the Psalm, Lift up the gates, etc. — Dearest brethren, concerning the eternal Word, who can worthily utter a temporal word? How can the lowest things suffice for the great? The heavens praise, the virtues praise, the ethereal powers praise, the luminaries of heaven praise, the stars praise, as the earth also praises — not that it may praise worthily, but that it may not condemn itself as ungrateful. Who explains, who speaks, who even understands him who reaches from end to end mightily and disposes all things sweetly (Wis. 8:1), how he rejoiced to run his course, that his going forth is from the highest heaven, and his return even to the highest heaven (Ps. 18:6-7)? If he reaches everywhere, whence did he go forth? If he reaches everywhere, where does he go? He is not stretched out in places, nor varied by times, nor does he have comings and goings: remaining in himself, he wholly encircles all things. What are the spaces that do not hold the Almighty, that do not contain the Immeasurable, that do not receive him when he comes? If you think of a word, we have said nothing. But in order to teach the humble to say something of himself, he humbled himself, taking the form of a servant (Phil. 2:8). In this form he descended, in this form, according to the Gospel, he advanced in the study of wisdom (Luke

In this form he was patient, in this form he fought bravely, in this form he died, in this form he conquered death and rose again, in this form he returned to heaven, who never departed from heaven. Blessed, therefore, is he in the firmament of heaven, who was made for us, according to the Apostle, a curse, that in the Gentiles the blessing of Abraham might come to be (Galatians 3:13-14). He rejoiced as a giant (Psalm 18:6). What kind of giant? By dying he overcame death. What kind of giant? He broke the gates of hell: he went forth, and he ascended. Who is this King of glory, on account of whom it was said to certain princes, Lift up your gates, O princes; and be lifted up, you everlasting gates? Be lifted up, he is great: this is of the august one, not of the head, be lifted up. Why this? That the King of glory may enter in. They tremble: Who is this King of glory? Is he not recognized? He is not only God, but also man: he is not only man, but also God. He suffers—is he surely God? He rises again—is he surely man? Or is he both God and man? For truly he suffers, and truly he rises again. But this is said twice in one and the same psalm: Lift up your gates, O princes; and be lifted up, you everlasting gates, and the King of glory shall enter in. And this very thing is repeated after the same words, as though it were thought superfluous and unnecessary. But in the repetition of the same words attend to the ends, and notice why it was said twice. For as though to one rising once, and ascending once, the gates of hell and of heaven are opened to him twice.

For this is a new thing: God present in the underworld; a new thing: man taken up into the heavens. In both times, in both places, the princes are terrified. Who is this King of glory? How do we discern this? Hear what is answered to both. To those who ask it is said, The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. In what battle? To undergo death for mortals, to suffer alone for all, not to resist though all-powerful, and yet to conquer the dying. Great, then, is this King of glory, even among the underworld. This is repeated also to the heavenly powers: Lift up your gates, O princes; and be lifted up, you eternal gates. Are they not eternal gates, whose keys Peter received? But because he lifts up man with himself, there, as if unrecognized, it is said: Who is this King of glory? But there, because he is now not a fighter but a victor, because he does not battle but triumphs, there it is not answered, The Lord mighty in battle; but, The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory.

SERMON CCCLXXVIII.

On the day of Pentecost.

Love is the effect of the presence of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the pledge of eternal life. The difference between a pledge and a surety. The pledge of eternal life is given so that we may desire it. The solemnity is pleasing to God where piety thrives and love burns. For this is the effect of the presence of the Holy Spirit: which the Apostle teaches, saying, The love of God is poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us (Rom. 5:5). Therefore the coming of the Holy Spirit filled one hundred twenty men gathered in one place. When the Acts of the Apostles were being read, we heard, They were gathered together in one place, one hundred twenty, holding to the promise of Christ (Acts 1). For they had been told to remain in the city until they were clothed with power from on high. For I, he says, will send my promise upon you (Luke 24:49). Faithful promiser, kind giver. What he promised while he was on earth, he ascended into heaven and sent. We have the pledge of the future eternal life and of the kingdom of heaven. Has he not defrauded us of a recent promise, and will he defraud us of the future expectation? All men, when they contract any business among themselves and are released by the guarantee of a monetary transaction, generally receive a pledge or give one: and a pledge given makes good faith, that even that matter will follow, whose pledge has preceded.

Christ has given us the Holy Spirit as a pledge: and he who cannot deceive us has made us secure, in that he gave a pledge, though even if he had not given it, he would without doubt have furnished what he promised. What did he promise? Eternal life, of which he gave the Holy Spirit as a pledge. Eternal life is the possession of those who dwell there; the pledge is the consolation of those who are on a journey. For it is better called a pledge than a surety. These two indeed seem similar to each other; but nevertheless they have some difference not to be neglected. Both when a surety is given and when a pledge is given, it is done so that what is promised may be fulfilled: but when a surety is given, a man returns what he received, once the matter for which he received the surety is completed; a pledge, however, when it is given, is not taken back, but is added over and above so that it may be fulfilled. We have the pledge, then: let us thirst for the very fountain from which the pledge comes. We have the pledge, a certain sprinkling of the Holy Spirit in our hearts: if anyone feels this dew, let him long for the fountain. For why do we have the pledge, except that we may not fail from hunger and thirst on this journey? For we hunger and thirst, if indeed we recognize that we are on a journey. He who is on a journey, and knows that he is on a journey, longs for his homeland; and while he longs for it, the journey is troublesome to him. If he loves the journey, he forgets his homeland, and does not wish to return. Our homeland is not such that we should prefer anything to it. For sometimes men, while on a journey, become rich. Those who were needy in their own homeland grow rich by the journey, and do not wish to return.

We are all pilgrims from our Lord, from the time he breathed the breath of life into the first man. Our homeland is in heaven, our fellow citizens are the angels. From our homeland, to urge us to return, letters have been sent to us, which are read daily among the peoples. Let the world grow cheap; let him by whom the world was made be loved.

SERMON 379

On the Nativity of John the Baptist

John was so great a man that he preached Christ as God. Why so many prophets were sent before through Christ. Blessed John, dearest brothers, whose nativity we celebrate today, was so great among men that our Lord Jesus Christ bore such testimony to him, saying: Among those born of women there has not risen a greater than John the Baptist (Mt 11:11). We have heard, when the Gospel was read, how wondrously he was conceived from despair, and by how great a testimony of the Holy Spirit he was brought forth. His father, because he did not believe, fell silent. Announced therefore by the angel and not believed, he took away his father's voice; once born, he loosed his tongue (Lk 1). Receive therefore in the mystery of this matter a great sacrament. Before the Lord Jesus Christ, John was sent ahead; prophets were sent through earlier ages, nor were there lacking those who preached Christ. For so great a judge was to come that many heralds had to go before him. From the very beginning of the human race Christ did not cease to prophesy himself and to announce that he would come.

Last of all was John sent, a man, but than whom no greater man has arisen. The Lord Jesus was to come, not only man but also God: certainly both God and man; God always, man for a time; God before the ages, man at the end of the ages; God before the world, man at the end of the world. God who made man deigned for man's sake to become man, the very man he made. Therefore, since the Lord Jesus Christ was to come, who is more than a good man, lest he be thought to be only a man, a great man had to bear witness to him. Christ, I say, the Lord, not only God but both God and man: God who made us, man who remade us. But John was only a man—yet what a man! Hear God speaking of him and calling him a man. Lord Jesus Christ, who is John? And God says, Among those born of women there has not arisen a greater than John the Baptist. John, a great man, than whom none greater has arisen among those born of women—and do you tell me, O great man, who is this who is thought to be only a man? Who he is, hear: He whose sandals, he says, I am not worthy to carry. We have learned, then, through John, and through a man, that we must believe in Christ, and that hope is not to be placed in man, but in Christ. Behold, you have a great man, than whom none greater has arisen, and he is John. But see that this John is the friend of the bridegroom; he is zealous for the bridegroom, not for himself.

For he says to those who come to him: I baptize you with water; but he who comes after me is greater than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to loose; he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit. Come after me, but do not remain in me: pass over to him who created you and me, because he will give you life and Inc.

SERMON 380

On the Nativity of John the Baptist, II.

i. I, John, preceded Christ born in time. The two nativities of Christ. Pride, swelling. The cause of the Incarnation, that God might give man an example. For quiet, even a small voice suffices. But if you wish, brothers, to listen quietly, do not have your heart in your ears, but your ears in your heart. The Church hands down and believes that today the solemnity of blessed John the Baptist has dawned. But we ought to believe this about the day itself, which the whole world acknowledges without variation: but because no one doubts that it is John's day—not John who wrote the Gospel, but John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Lord, who appeared as great as he showed himself humble, saying, when Christ himself was thought to be he, that he was not worthy to loose the strap of his sandal for him whom he acknowledged as Lord, so that he might deserve to be a friend. Some, however, think that the day of his passion is celebrated today. Let your Holiness know first that it is the day of his nativity, not of his passion. For from the gospel reading it is found that his nativity precedes the Lord's nativity by six months.

And since the consensus of the Church hands down that the day of the Lord's nativity is the eighth day before the Kalends of January, it remains that today is understood as the nativity of John.

The same argument is treated. John therefore preceded the Lord, not as a master precedes a disciple, but as a forerunner precedes the judge; not to impose power, but to offer service. Now John's own testimony concerning this matter stands as follows: He who comes after me was made before me, because he was prior to me. The Lord came after John by being born of the virgin Mary, not from the substance of the Father. For we have received two nativities of the Lord, one divine, the other human; yet both wonderful: the former without a mother, the latter without a father: the former eternal, that it might create the temporal; the latter temporal, that it might bestow the eternal. For he of whom John speaks—not the Baptist, but the Evangelist—says: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word, and: all things were made through him, and without him was made nothing (John 1:15, 1, 3): that one, so great in the form of God, equal to the Father, that one fashioning times without time, that one, judge of the world from no age before all ages, was made so small that he was born of a woman; but he remained so great that he was not separated from the Father. Offering him service and testimony, as a lamp to the coming day, all the Prophets came before him by being born before him, and adhered to him by believing after him.

For it was necessary that he be foretold who was to come and work miracles: by which miracles he would be indicated as God to those who understand well; but to those who look with human sight he would appear as a man, small to the small, but humble to the proud: by his smallness teaching man to recognize himself as small, lest, by not growing great but by swelling up, he believe himself great. For pride is not greatness but swelling. So then, that he might heal this swelling of the human race, the physician himself, the medicine himself, not only applying the remedy but casting himself as the remedy, appeared among men as a man, offering man to those who see, preserving God for those who believe. For the sight of his humanity healed the weak; the contemplation of his divinity seeks the strong. And not yet were there men who could see God in man, nor could they see anything but a man; and yet they ought not to place their hope in man. What then was to be done? Man can see man, but man ought not to follow man. God was to be followed, who could not be seen; man was not to be followed, who could be seen. Therefore, that there might be shown to man both one who could be seen by man and one whom man should follow, God became man. O man, for whose sake God became man, you ought to believe something great of yourself: but descend, that you may ascend; because God also by descending became man. Cleave to your remedy, imitate your teacher, acknowledge your Lord, embrace your brother, understand your God.

This great and so small one, a worm, not a man—but the one through whom man was made. This, then, is what he says: what is John but what the Lord says of him, what the truthful one says of him, what the Truth says of him? For if we owe it to John himself to believe the Truth, do we not believe the Truth about John?

On the words of John, the calumnies of the Arians. The Word, indeed, was in the beginning; he was not made. Let the partaker of the Truth first bear witness to the Truth itself, and let the Maker of man bear witness to man. First let us hear what John says about Christ, and then what Christ says about John; let us hear the former first, but understand the latter. Let the one born first speak first, but let him be confirmed by the one by whom he was made. He says: He who comes after me was made before me. Here now those who believe that he was made before all things, he through whom all things were made, cavil at these words, or by these words against us, and they say: Behold, he was made; John says, He who comes after me was made before me. Explain to me what this means: he was made before me. I state their words and set them out to be examined. You are accustomed, they say, when something of this sort is said about Christ that shows him to be less than the Father, to say that the statement must be referred to the man; so that what is in the form of God is equal to the Father, but because he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men and found in fashion as a man, the Father is greater. What then will you say to this, that John says: he was made before me?

Hear what we say; but first consider this, that the Apostle, distinguishing both and yet commending one and the same in both, did not say, "taking the form of God." But of the form of God what did he say? "Though he was in the form of God"—looking to him who was called before him, in whose Gospel it is written, "In the beginning was the Word"; or rather looking to that light from which he too said this. For John did not say, "In the beginning God made the Word"—he who could have said it as Moses said, because he was speaking of a creature made by the Lord God, "In the beginning God made heaven and earth." Since therefore he, if he had held what the Arians hold, could have said, "In the beginning God made the Word," he did not say this; but he said, "In the beginning was the Word." What was in the beginning was not made. For nothing of the Word that was made came first. For all things that God made, he made by the Word: "He spoke, and they were made; he commanded, and they were created." Between the one speaking that it be made, and what was made by the speaker, there is a great distance; but if there is a speaker, he has a Word; if he has a Word, he made through the Word; if he made through the Word, he did not make the Word.

The cavil of the Arians: that it was said similarly in Genesis, "The earth was." Why, they say? Have you not heard also concerning the earth, "The earth was invisible and unformed" (Gen. 1:1, 2)? If, they say, you therefore claim that the Word was not made, because it is written, "The Word was," then neither was the earth made, because it is written, "The earth was." Blind and heretical madness! Attend, if you have the wherewithal to attend; be bare, if you have the wherewithal to hear: lest the sound strike the ear in vain, when the truth does not illuminate the heart. I am about to recite the words of the same Scripture, which you found when you read, and passed over when you argued. Surely you think that something of this sort was said of the Word of God, when it was said, "In the beginning was the Word," such as was said of the earth, because it was said, "The earth was invisible and unformed." In this book of Genesis I will recite to you the earlier words, because before the servant of God, the writer, said, "The earth was," so that it might be apparent that it had been made, he first said, "In the beginning God made heaven and earth." Behold, I have first set before you the earth as made; and made, certainly, by God, with Scripture sounding forth and bursting into the ears of the one who refuses, "In the beginning God made heaven and earth." These things had been made; but not yet adorned, not yet set forth: the earth not yet distinguished, but nevertheless already made.

But lest you think that the earth was made at once in such a way that there was nothing in it to be adorned, he continued and said: It had indeed been made, because in the beginning God made heaven and earth; but the earth, which God made, was still invisible and unformed. He showed you what kind it was, having been made; not that it was, which had not been made. John, therefore, could have said, In the beginning God made the Word, but the Word was; just as, In the beginning God made heaven and earth; but the earth was: so that the order of words would be, In the beginning God made the Word, and the Word was with God; so that we would understand that this Word was with God, which Word God had made. But now you hear, In the beginning was the Word. Why do you seek what is earlier, having been made the more outcast? For you have been made the more outcast in your error: you speak from the depths, and you look back to the depths. I wish that, if you spoke from the depths, you would lift up your heart on high, and cry out from the deep to the Lord: then the clouds of your flesh's darkness would burst, the light that came in lowliness would open the eyes of your lowliness; you would see, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; this was in the beginning with God. Let Paul also say, Who, though he was in the form of God. What does John say of the human birth? And the Word was made flesh. Let Paul also say, He emptied himself, taking the form of a servant. What then were you saying about the words of John the Baptist? Repeat those same words to me now, speak them now.

What does John the Baptist say? He who comes after me. I recognize the nativity. The one from the barren woman, the one from the virgin. Barrenness was turned into fruitfulness; virginity remained after fruitfulness.

Objection: Christ is said to have been made, inasmuch as he is the Word. Christ was made before John, that is, he was placed before him and preferred to him. But John, they say, if he had said "made" according to that by which he was born of the virgin, he would not say, "He was made before me," because he was made of the virgin after him. Therefore, "He was made before me," what is it, except that in the beginning the Word was made? For thus he was before John; for from the virgin he was after John. Hear, and if you do not quarrel, pay attention. For perhaps what you wish to understand is somewhat obscure, so that by quarreling you increase the smoke for yourself, by which you may be hindered from understanding. First look upon that Scripture, which teaches you to become teachable. Be gentle to hear the word, that you may understand (Sirach 5:13). Therefore endure for a little while: perhaps we shall find how it was said, "He was made before me"; provided, however, that we do not understand the Word to have been made, through whom all things were made. How, he says? If I can, I will say: if I cannot say, there is still that which he who could say would say. But I believe and hope that the majesty of the Only-begotten, who, when he was the Word, was made an infant, will open the infancy of my tongue and will make in my mouth the offspring which he made in my heart as a conception.

Behold, I will speak as I am able; understand as you are able; and what you are unable to understand, do not censure, as though you were already great; but defer it, so that you may deserve to grow. Surely this moves you, how it was said, "He who comes after me was made before me." Let it move you plainly as one who seeks, not as one who quarrels. Surely I too seek with you: together we shall find, if together we seek; both shall receive, if both ask; to each of us it shall be opened, if both knock. "He comes after me," he says: acknowledge the nativity from the virgin Mary. "He was made before me": what is this, "he was made before me"? Understand: he was placed before me. So that he who comes after me was made before me. It is as if two were walking on a road, and one were slower, the other faster, and the slower went ahead for a little while, but after a short time the faster followed; the slower, going ahead, looks back at the faster following, and says, "He comes after me." And behold, as that one hastens, and draws near, and comes close, and passes by, he sees him ahead whom he was looking back at as behind: surely if he is in some way struck with dread at his speed and marvels, can these not be his words: "Behold, the man was after me, and was made before me"? What is this, "he who was after me was made before me"? He who was walking after me, by his speed it came about that he was before me. For if you read anywhere "he was made," you understand nothing other than that he was formed who was not; and you are going to say that the Lord God was made, of whom it is said, "The Lord was made a refuge for me" (Ps.

The Lord became my helper, and He became my salvation. How often “became”? Yet He Himself made all things. Therefore understand the words with me. For that same John did not keep silent about this either—that He was the Word—lest you think that he meant the Word when he said, “He was made before me”; so that you may know that “He was made before me” pertains to this: that He preceded me, that He was glorified more than I, that when men were looking to me as the forerunner, they recognized the Lord, whom I had preceded by being born, whom I had announced by serving; and their hope, their gathering, became that Lord; He was glorified as the Son of God, made before me, according to what the Apostle says: “Therefore God exalted Him, and gave Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, on earth, and under the earth.” His glory, then, did not begin to be, but became known. He was made before John, because He preceded John in honor.

The words of John that follow agree with the interpretation given. But see whether it is deservedly so. Ask John himself: He who comes after you, why was he made before you? He who was following you, why was he preferred before you? It follows: Because he was before me. That is, In the beginning was the Word. Therefore deservedly was he made before me, because he was before me. Before John, before Abraham, before Adam, before heaven and earth, before the Angels, Thrones, Dominations, Principalities and Powers. Why before? Because all things were made through him. Let the servant acknowledge his humility; let the Lord show his majesty. Let the same John say, I am not worthy to loose the strap of his sandal. He would humble himself greatly if he said, I am worthy. For what if he said he was worthy? Was he worthy to sit in judgment at the right hand of the Father? Was he worthy to come to judge the living and the dead? What if he said he was worthy to loose the strap of his sandal? Great humility, if he is worthy of this as the friend of the bridegroom. For he was about to say that he was the friend of the bridegroom; and lest in that friendship equality should perhaps be understood by someone imprudent, he calls himself a friend out of love, he casts himself down at the feet out of fear. And it is a small thing that he lays himself down at the feet; he does not even say he is worthy to loose the strap of his sandal. Humble indeed, if he were worthy to loose it; but because he does not even say he is worthy to loose it, he is worthy to be exalted by his humility. Let him say also more openly, let him say more distinctly, what is this: He comes after me, and was made before me.

For he also gave the reason: because he was before you. For, In the beginning was the Word; and, Though he was in the form of God, he did not consider it robbery to be equal with God. He must increase, but I must decrease (John 3:30). It was fitting that he who came later should increase, and that he who came earlier should decrease. If he who came later increased, by increasing he was made before him. He, he says, must increase, but I must decrease. That is, he was made before me. And how did Christ increase, and John decrease? John preceded the Lord in human birth; both grew with advancing years, in bodily stature, and arrived at a certain measure like men. But John is man, Christ is God and man. If we understand that Christ increased in divinity, we are absurd and err exceedingly. For something increases so that it may progress. God has nothing by which he may increase; for if he had that by which he might increase, he was less before he increased. Let us return to the form of the flesh. That flesh grew with John, but it did not grow while he decreased. Let us perhaps refer this to glory; and let us understand, He must increase, but I must decrease, according to this saying: that he came after me, and was made before me. For John bore the person of man, and spoke in the figure of the human race, for whose salvation Christ had come. But we had said, brothers, that the humble God came to the proud man. Let man recognize himself as man, and let God appear to man.

For if Christ came for this reason, that man might be humbled, and that man might grow from humility, it was fitting that the glory of man should now cease, and the glory of God be commended: so that man's hope might be in the glory of God, not in his own glory, as the Apostle says, He who glories, let him glory in the Lord (1 Cor 1:31). Rightly, therefore, it is said to man, What do you have that you did not receive? But if you received it, why do you glory as though you had not received it (1 Cor 4:7)? John, showing this figure of human humility—because as the opinion and fame of Christ increased, not the stature of Christ, not the majesty of Christ, not the wisdom, not the Word of God, but that fame which began from the least and now holds the whole world—[showed] the glory of Christ, not the glory of man, so that man might acknowledge his own humility and God might impart his divinity. For the glory of God, brothers, is our glory. The more sweetly God is glorified, the more it profits us. For God will not be higher because we honor him; let us humble ourselves, and exalt him. For it is written, I will exalt you, Lord (Ps 29:2). What is, I will exalt you? He was on the earth, and when you placed him in heaven? And does man exalt God? What is, I will exalt you? I will confess you to be high. Let man therefore confess himself to be man; let him decrease first, that he may increase. Let John say, by decreasing into humility, that he is not worthy to loose the strap of his sandal, and let him understand that by participation he is made enlightened.

John the Baptist was not the light, in comparison with Christ the true light. Yet John was a light by participation in wisdom. For this is what John the evangelist said of him: He was not that light. Perhaps he did John an injury, because he said, He was not that light, when the Lord said to the apostles, You are the light of the world? Did the apostles set themselves before John? They do not, lest they judge the Lord himself a liar, who said, Among those born of women none has arisen greater than John the Baptist (Matt. 11:11). Not surely greater in bodily stature, but in the grace of participated wisdom, the grace of participated salvation. What then does this mean, He was not that light, but that he might bear witness of the light? Why did he say this? I know, he says, what I am saying, that he might bear witness of the light. For there was a true light distinct from John, lest John be altogether not a light, but so that it be understood as said in comparison with this light, He was not that light; according to what he said, because He was the true light. How do you distinguish this true one? That which enlightens, he says, every man coming into this world. If every man, then also John. But lest we seem to gather from words what was not said, although it must be understood accordingly, let John himself say: We all have received of his fullness (John 1:8, 9, 16). Therefore he was the true light. John a light enlightened, Christ the light enlightening. For that you may know that John was a light, let the Lord now also bear witness to him.

He himself bore testimony to his Lord, a testimony of truth concerning his Lord, which he had from his Lord. For he had received from his Lord the power to speak concerning his Lord; but that he should speak concerning his servant, he had not received from his servant. And so Christ is in himself concerning John, and in John Christ is concerning himself. Therefore let the Truth himself bear testimony, and let us hear that John is a light. It is said to the Jews concerning John: He was a burning and shining lamp. And indeed a lamp is a light, not like the day, but still it is a light. Therefore a lamp is kindled so that it may shine, and John was enlightened so that he might speak. If, then, John was enlightened so that he might speak, let him recognize himself as a lamp, lest he be extinguished by the wind of pride. But perhaps the disciples are a light, and John a lamp? For the Lord says concerning John: He was a burning and shining lamp; but concerning the disciples: You are the light of the world. Did he prefer his disciples to John? Are those faithful also, to whom Paul speaks, to be placed before John, to whom he says: For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord? Therefore the apostles are a light, and the faithful are a light, justified from sinners, made faithful from unbelievers; yet the disciples were not called a lamp. Attend: perhaps they were called so, and not in another place, but there: to show in what way he called them a light; because it is not the true light, which enlightens every man coming into this world; follow the words of the Gospel: You are the light of the world.

A city cannot be hidden when set upon a mountain. But did he speak of the city, not of the light? Follow on further: Neither do they light a lamp and put it under a bushel. You are a light such as John was: a lamp lit. As if his voice, or whose voice had gone before: You will light my lamp, O Lord; my God, enlighten my darkness. What darknesses in the apostles? We too were once, etc., as were his reprobate and blasphemous, who was formerly a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and an insolent man. Behold the darknesses; let the lamp be lit: But I obtained mercy. And so that you may know that it was said of them, Neither do they light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but upon a lampstand, so that it may shine for all who are in the house; immediately it follows, So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works: but in humility, because the man must decrease. How then must God increase? And let them glorify your Father, who is in heaven. The Father is glorified, the Son is glorified: because the Father glorifies the Son, and the Son glorifies the Father. Let man therefore acknowledge himself humble, let him acknowledge God exalted, humbled for his sake, so that man, who had been humbled in the confession of sin, may be exalted in the obtaining of righteousness. These two things: the Lord and John, humility and brightness: God humble in brightness, man humble in weakness; God humble for the sake of man, man humble for the sake of man.