Sermones Dubii. Sermo De Tempore Barbarico

SERMON. ON THE TIME OF THE BARBARIAN INVASION. CHAPTER ONE. — 1. That Penitence Must Be Embraced, When God Chastises Because of Sins. All Are Rightly Crushed by the Scourge of God. Our Lord God warns us that we ought not to neglect our sins, by showing His wrath in such a manner. For He Himself justly punishes the guilty, because He finds no one penitent. How often, dearest brothers, have the divine trumpets thundered and still thunder: Do penance; for the kingdom of heaven has drawn near to you (Matthew IV, 17)? And with the ears of the heart closed, we rather work evil, and ask that good may come. But the Apostle says that another judgment is just. For in that very fact that those who are such think thus, that from evil works they can receive good things, we are hardened, they seek no place for penitence. Rightly are they judged, who are found to be condemned by themselves. Although this sermon of ours does not touch all, yet the divine word binds all, saying: All have declined, together they have become useless; there is no one who does good, not even one (Psalm XIII, 5). How are all, and how are not all? How are not all? Because there are many who groan and grieve over the iniquities which are committed in their midst, wishing to resist: but they do not dare, because of fear of worldly things, which human frailty either still desires to obtain, or infirmity fears to lose.

according to what grieves, not all: according to what they fear, which is not to be feared, all have declined, and have become useless together; because the fear of man is valued more than the fear of God, and men prefer the things they have received from God to God Himself. Let a wicked man take away a thing. God, through whom man was made, is despised. I would that you who are still such, and, bound by love of worldly things, either spare sinners or favor them; I would that I might admonish you with some exhortations, what you ought to prefer to what: were it not that a river of tears compels us to bewail those who sin and are unwilling to do penance. If there were in us human affection, if there were a sense of compassion, we ought to weep, grieve, and lament the death of one man: with what tears, with what groaning, with what lamentations are we agitated, when we lament either the greatest part, or almost the whole city? A dear one is sick, and his vein gives a bad report; all who love him are sick in mind at the same time. If they see him laughing in the very nearness of death, how they feel that all hope of health is taken from him, and they rightly lament him, still alive, as if dead? The whole province is placed in such great straits and at the very end of things, and spectacles are frequented daily: the blood of men is daily shed in the world, and the cries of the mad crackle in the circus. A lament more acceptable than all sadness! O lament afflicting the heart with all sorrow! It is pleasing to weep.

We weep, dearest brethren, both for them and for ourselves, because we deserve to be justly scourged along with such men. For we, when we accuse others, have all declined, have become useless together, absolutely all. No one is excused; because the judge is such that every man is found guilty by him. For when a just king sits on his throne, who will boast that he has a pure heart? Or who will boast that he is clean from sin (Prov. xx, cl 9)? That time has come which the Lord foretold: Do you think, when the Son of Man comes, he will find faith on earth (Luke XVIII, 8)? Who has faith? Who believes the words? Let someone among us claim faith for himself, when he hears the Lord saying to the disciples: If you had faith as a grain of mustard, you would say to this tree, Uproot yourself, and be planted in the sea; and it would obey you (Id. xvii, 6)? Who will dare claim for himself that he does all that God commands? No one, absolutely no one. We preach, and we do not do; you hear, and you do not care to do. Justly all are under the scourge, both teacher and doer, both hearer and despiser. We strive to reproach one another, and we do not strive to examine our own works. Neighbor slanders neighbor, cleric slanders cleric, layman slanders layman. I see them indeed attacking one another, but I see no one justly excusing himself. For each one, dearest brethren, carries his own burden. Do not slander one another, brothers, says the apostle James.

For whoever slanders a brother or judges a brother slanders the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law, but a judge. For there is one lawgiver and judge, who is able to destroy and to set free. But you, who are you, who judges your neighbor (James 4:11-13)? Chapter II. — 3. Penance is to be done before the tree is cut down. Yet the voices of slanderers cannot impose silence upon the word of God. He cries out through the good and through the evil: Do penance, the kingdom of God draws near to you. Do not be hearers of the law only, but doers (James 1:22). Produce worthy fruits of penance. For behold, says the Evangelist, the axe is placed at the roots of the trees. For every tree not bearing good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10 and 12). I see, he says, all men as diverse trees, also having diverse fruits: but good fruit is sought, which nourishes, not which stings. For there are also thorny trees, consigned to the fire, rightly to be burned, because in them there is no fruit for the soul. Do you think, dearest brethren, that we are all such as have been left in these evils on account of our sins? The farmer has sharpened the iron, he cuts down the useless wood, he keeps the cut piece to be consumed by fire. This is now being done by the true farmer. The evil indeed seem to themselves still to stand, still to flourish.

Whoever you are who are such, whoever you are who are evil, whoever you are who refuse to be corrected, let not your high station console you; for a greater ruin awaits you, and a more vast flame sustains you. Because the axe has not yet come to you, do you think you can always stand? When you see or hear that other trees, greater than you, have fallen. That the farmer here delays you is a matter of his patience, lest perhaps a place of penitence intercede for him with him. For that farmer in the Gospel, who interceded for the tree which the master wished to uproot, because it had not borne fruit for three years, see what he says: "Lord, leave it this year also; I will dig a trench around it, I will put a basket of manure on it: if it bears fruit, well; if not, you will cut it down" (Luke 13:8-9). This barren tree is the race of men not having the fruit of penitence. Its master, its creator, is the Lord. The intercessor for this tree is the Apostle Paul. How do we prove this? Hear in a certain epistle of his how he interceded for such: "I bend my knees," he says, "to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that he may give you strength" (Ephesians 3:14, 16). So he was asking this for them, that they might receive what they did not have. "I will dig a trench," he says, "I will put a basket of manure on it." The trench is a place of humility; the basket of manure is the tears of the penitent. If anyone scorns this place, he will suffer greater torment when he feels the very sharp iron tool of that farmer.

Act, evil ones, do penance; correct yourselves, evil ones, because along with you the good are also scourged. CHAPTER III. — A. Why the good are punished with the evil. Someone will say: If the evil are deservedly scourged, why do the good suffer such things with the evil and at the hands of the evil? Why? Because in a certain sense they are called good; but according to the right and true good, No one is good except God alone (Luke 18:19). Therefore even the good themselves, whoever are good, are not such as they ought to be good: for they are not perfect good; for they advance from day to day. If they advance, they certainly advance by means of exercises. Let no one justify himself, as though he were already perfect. Let the Pelagian false justifier withdraw, let the Arian heretic be confounded: for no one is good except God alone. What then? Is Christ not God? Clearly God. For Scripture says of him: This is the true God, and eternal life (1 John 5:20). What of the Holy Spirit, is he not God? Clearly God. How do we prove that he too is God? Hear in the Acts of the Apostles Peter rebuking the defrauder Ananias: Ananias, he says, why did Satan fill your heart, to lie to the Holy Spirit? You have not lied to men, but to God (Acts 5:3-4). Behold, the Holy Spirit also is God. Therefore the Trinity is one God: and it is true that no one is good except the one God. Be patient, good ones, that you may be truly good: be patient until the coming of the Lord.

Endure the evils you suffer along with the wicked, because this trial is your testing. If you are gold, why fear the chaff, why fear the fire? You will indeed be together in the furnace, but the fire turns the dross into ashes, while it removes your impurities. If you are grain, why fear the threshing? You will not appear as you once were in the ear unless the threshing separates the chaff from you by crushing. If you are oil, why fear the press of the winepress? Your quality will not be revealed unless the weight of the stone also separates the lees from you. Nevertheless, let each soul question itself and see if it suffers unjustly. Let the scales of justice be brought forth, let the love of the world be weighed against the love of God; see how much the love of the world outweighs. Let the mirror of divine Scripture be brought forth. This mirror flatters no one: such as you are, it shows you to yourself. Pay attention and see, and if there is anything that offends, go away ashamed and return corrected. Will you not be ashamed, and will you boast in your evils? For you will be a perfect evil, not any kind of good. Do you not wish to be scourged along with the world, or do you murmur under the scourge when scourged? Evil servant, have you done what the Lord commanded? Lest you be beaten, these scourges were foretold to you beforehand. Who commanded? The Lord commanded, your Creator commanded. What did he command? "He who loves," he says, "a father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." Behold what he commanded. Or, "He who loves a son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me" (Matthew 10:37). Behold what he commanded.

And who is it, he says, who hates his father or mother or children? He did not command us to hate them; but he commanded that we love ourselves as much as them. Indeed, you ought to have loved the Creator more than the creature; but if you cannot prefer Him, at least deign to equal Him. Truly you would love your children if you preferred Christ to your children, and entrusted those same children to Him. Truly you would love your children if you loved them in Him who gave them to you to love. Or do you seem to love them because you indulge their pleasures? You hear blasphemers and bear it patiently, Christian, when King Nebuchadnezzar, a foreigner, could not endure it, saying: If anyone speaks blasphemy against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, he shall be put to death (Dan. 3:29). You see them frequenting spectacles, and you do not call them back. You see them indulging in luxury, and you do not strike them. Nor can you show yourself such a father as to be ready to disinherit or cast out undisciplined children, when you ought to have been ready, like Abraham, even to sacrifice your son. For everyone who slays the pleasures of his children offers to God a sacrifice such as Abraham offered. But while these things are not done, and while those who use this world are wickedly nurtured in these depraved customs, the world is weakened, and not without reason does the prophet say: The earth has flowed away, and all who dwell in it (Isa. 24:4). Even now men do not cease to murmur, to praise past times, and to accuse Christian times.

Great were the times of our fathers," they say: "Oh, how good were the times our fathers had!" CHAPTER IV. — 5. Let each one chastise and punish vices in his own, excepting the old. But see what our fathers did. Phinehas slew with his own hand a man sacrificing to idols, to appease the wrath of God (Num. 25). Moses, when the people went astray and worshipped the golden calf, restrained them with such certain correction that, calling one tribe out of the twelve to himself, those who wished to follow God, he gave them a command: that, taking swords in their hands, sons should strike down parents, and parents should kill their children (Exod. 32:26-28). No affection recalled them, no place was reserved for humanity; because the fear and love of God were borne before every love of carnal desires. Jephthah, in order to overcome enemies who were sacrificing to gods and demons, gave his only daughter in sacrifice (Judg. 11). Samson, when he had long worn down and exhausted the demon-worshipping nations with the strength he had received from the hair of his head, and later, seduced by a woman, had lost his eyes and at the same time the strength of his hair, after he learned that all those people had gathered at the temple of their idols to his disgrace, and were magnifying their gods because they had handed over to them their fiercest enemy, since with the regrowth of the hair of his head his strength had also grown back, he asked the boy who was guiding him to give him his hand, and demanded to be led to that temple.

When he had arrived there, he seized with each hand one of the two columns upon which the entire building rested, intending to be crushed together with them in the ruin, so that he would not willingly allow anyone to hear the praises of demons uttered to the dishonor of God (cf. Judg. 16). Daniel would not make any request of a human king, but of the living God, who bestows all good things upon his own; he was given as food to fasting lions to perish, but the Lord, not abandoning his faithful servant, preserved him unharmed and fed both him and the lions through the prophet Habakkuk (Dan. 14:30-40). What shall I say of the three youths, who, when they would not adore the royal image, laughed at the fires? In these youths, shining grace so blazed forth that, bound and cast into the furnace, they were seen walking about, opening their mouths and praising God, not admitting the flames to themselves but putting them to flight; so that they merited having the Son of God with them before he appeared to the world in human form; so that the flame was their avenger, and the furnace, devouring the Chaldean attendants, consumed them; and when brought forth from the furnace unharmed, they rendered the people wondrous in themselves, and changed the king, making him an adorer of his God, whom they had previously experienced as a persecutor (cf. Dan. 3). But all these things faith, fear, and love of God accomplished. These men hated not only all that they possessed for the sake of God, but even their own lives; and God made them illustrious here and enriched them with the reward of eternal life.

What such thing, dearest brethren, have we done? On the contrary, what evils have we not done? They, neither by threats nor by tortures, were compelled to sacrifice to demons. Did he not sacrifice, who most willingly watched the images of idols playing through the night, which they call the Nocturnum? He sacrificed, he absolutely sacrificed; and, what is worse, not a bull or some victim of any beast, but the precious soul of a man. In this so nefarious sacrifice, not one or a few are accused; the whole city did this, which gave its whole consent. Nor by enemies, nor by barbarians, but by himself, every man inwardly killed himself in his soul by watching, by consenting, by not forbidding; we all remained guilty: and while we do not wish the perverse peace of the city to be disturbed, we do not receive the right peace which we desire. We scorn to keep the peace of good morals, and the peace of our times has perished. Learn even now, dearest brethren, what you ought to prefer to what. Do not love vices in children, in friends, in servants, in all acquaintances. Let singular power be preferred to every power; let us show honor to Caesar as to Caesar, but fear to God. Let the Creator be preferred to the creature: let us love God, because He loves us; and in this, that He so scourges us, He loves. For what son is there, whose father does not give him discipline (Heb. 12:6, 7)?

Whoever has sound consideration, whoever believes the words of God, fears eternal fire more than the iron of any savage barbarian; he fears perpetual death more than any death, however terrible, here. Let the unbelievers mock, let the foolish mock, let them refuse to believe even in things that have been experienced. Behold, they are crushed, behold, everything perishes, behold, the world which they loved cannot stand with them, behold, they are dragged to God whose commands they despised: for he goes willingly who dies blaspheming. Behold, they go: when they have arrived there, what is done? Where do they go? Through whom do they go? Who is compelled to return here again? It is finished, and what he had done badly, it is finished to correct. Return, sons, return; return, transgressors, to your heart (Isaiah 46:8): make joy from your conversion, let your hearts be corrected, let your works displease you. Be strong, let the tribulation of the world not break you: the Lord is near; be anxious for nothing (Philippians 4:5-6).

CHAPTER V — 6. The Fortitude of the Martyrs, Specifically Perpetua and Felicitas. You have great examples of brave men. The martyrs conquered the world; among these martyrs, women were found stronger than men. A few days ago we celebrated the feast of the martyrs Perpetua and Felicitas, and their companions. And although there are so many men there, why are these two named before all, except that the weaker sex either equaled or surpassed the fortitude of men? One of them was pregnant, the other nursing. Felicitas was in labor, Perpetua was nursing. But Perpetua nursed as long as she could receive from that shepherd, who was also the father, a morsel of milk; once she accepted it, the sweetness of perpetual felicity made her despise her son, spurn her father, not cling to the world, and lose her life for Christ. Felicitas, who had Perpetua as her companion, was in labor and in pain, but when thrown to the beasts she rejoiced rather than feared. What virtue in women! What great grace, which, when it pours itself in, judges no sex unworthy! Thanks be to grace: for it restored the female sex. A great reproach had remained upon woman; because from the beginning sin came through woman, and because of her we all die. The devil cast down one Eve: but Christ, born of a virgin, exalted many women. Perpetua and Felicitas trampled the head of the serpent, which Eve had admitted into her heart.

That woman he deceived by false promises; those women he could not overcome by cruelty. He tricked her with the happiness of paradise; these he could not approach, even when they were placed under the power of so great a one. He rejoiced in that one’s ruin amid the delights of paradise; the devil himself, in some way, was terrified by these women’s constancy of fortitude amid the frosts. Rightly are they so exalted, rightly are they either equal to or placed before men. For although in Christ Jesus there is neither slave nor free, neither male nor female (Galatians 3:28), but all are one, meeting in the perfect man (Ephesians 4:13), yet this gift descends from great grace. For Perpetua and Felicitas are the names of these holy women, the reward of all the holy martyrs. CHAPTER VI — 7. The Patience of Job. That Job, most well-known to all, also conquered the world, tempted so many times but least of all overcome. He fulfilled the Lord’s command: he scorned his children, lest he blaspheme the one who had given the children. He thrust from himself his wife, who was urging blasphemy upon him, whom the devil had left alone for this reason because he knew she was necessary to him. For he had not left her to her husband as a comforter, but as an assistant to his temptation: he had made her a new Eve, but that man was not the old Adam. He thought he could also deceive this man, as he had that one, through a woman: but this man, by spurning his wife who was suggesting the worst, divinely aided, was able to overcome even the devil himself in her.

Job was stronger in his sufferings than that Adam in the groves: this man did not yield to torments; that man was overcome by pleasures. You see, dearly beloved, what temptation does, how useful the pressures of this world are, and how earthly delights corrupt. Job despised his wife, his children, all his possessions, and later even his own flesh. He loved the one who gave more than what was given. He used what he had received as a good traveler: he possessed, but was not possessed. And when it pleased the one who gave to take it away, he blessed, not blasphemed: "The Lord," he said, "gave, and the Lord has taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so it has happened; let the name of the Lord be blessed" (Job 1 and 2). Imitate such a man, imitate being such children even when scourged, so that you may deserve to be received. For he scourges every child he receives. Endure his discipline: just as children, so does God approach you. CHAPTER II — 8. The Parable of the Prodigal Son. The side of Christ is opened, so that all may enter through it. This is proved by that younger son placed in the Gospel, who despised his father's discipline, squandered his substance on harlots, tended swine, was worn down by hunger, could not fill his belly with the husks of the pigs; finally he returned to himself, and found himself who had lost himself. It came into his mind that none of his father's hired hands abounded in bread, while he himself perished from hunger.

Immediately he arose, ran back to his father, and begged not to be considered a son, but to be counted as one of the servants. Humility bows down, mercy is stirred up: the cries of the penitent son shake the father’s heart. The son declares himself unworthy, so that he may judge him worthy; he begs to be ordered to be received among the number of servants: the father orders that first robe to be brought to him, slaughters a fatted calf, gathers a chorus, invites friends, and makes a great feast. Why? Because “this son of mine,” he says, “had been dead, and has come back to life; he had been lost, and has been found.” The Lord set forth this similitude in the Gospel, which he himself explained, saying that such joy occurs in heaven over a sinner doing penance. Now, since it is time to exhort all to penance, so that erring sons may return, and a feast of a fatted calf be prepared for them by the father, let us also, dearly beloved, be prepared to attend this feast as friends and members of the household: especially because, daily approaching the table of this same father of the household, he now deigns to call us not servants, but friends. Let us run through, if you please, the parable itself set forth by the Lord in the Gospel, in which he showed us both the father’s pious affection and indicated the return of the lost son, and related the disturbed mind of the elder son who had not departed from the father’s house. For this is what the text of that reading contains.

His eldest son, coming from the field, when he heard the music, asked the servants what it was; and they said to him, "Your brother has returned, and your father has killed a fatted calf for him because he received him safe and sound." And he was indignant and refused to enter. But his father went out to him to bring him in. And he reproached his father, saying that he had always labored with him and had never been shown such things; but when that son came who had wasted all his father's substance in dissipation, he had a fatted calf killed for him. And the father gives the reason for his action and consoles his son who remained with him, who did not leave the house, and says to him, "Son, you are mine, and you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours; nevertheless, we had to do this, because your brother was dead and has come back to life; he was lost and has been found" (Luke 15:11-32). This parable, set forth by the Lord, is not without meaning. May He who set it forth grant us to demonstrate that He Himself fulfilled this, which through a certain likeness has in a way roused us to inquire into something. No Christian doubts that our Lord Jesus Christ showed a father's affection for his own. Let us rather inquire who is the younger son, who lived prodigally and squandered his father's substance, and who is the eldest son, who, indignant that a fatted calf was killed for the lost son upon his return, refused to enter.

Who is this lost son, who squandered all his father's substance on prostitutes, if not that thief who, by dissipating through his crimes the substance of the soul given to him by God, also hung on the cross? He fed pigs when he fulfilled the pleasures of demons by his deeds. Perhaps he fed those pigs which the devil had asked from the Lord, saying: "Order us to enter the herd of pigs" (Matthew 8:31). He was consumed by hunger, because he did not find the bread of the word of God. He desired to fill his belly with husks, when he filled his soul with twisted thoughts. But let him return to himself, let him see himself as a thief hanging on the cross, let him run to his father, let him say, hanging on the cross: "Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom. Lord, remember me; I am not worthy to be called your son, receive me as one of your servants. Lord, remember me." For the thief, considering his own merits, despaired of himself; but the Lord, like a merciful father, offered to the thief, as to a son, what he had despaired of. Let this father bring forth that first robe, let him clothe his son with immortality, whom he sees hanging with him on the cross, let him bring him into the house: let Christ say to the thief, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise" (Luke 23:42, 43). Let him kill the fatted calf, that man received, crucified even for thieves: let him summon his friends, the disciples to whom he said, "If you do what I command you, I will no longer call you servants, but friends" (John 15:15).

Let that heavenly banquet be prepared, let that chorus of Angels stand by, sweetly proclaiming: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will" (Luke 2:14). Let that firstborn son also come, and be unwilling to enter. Who is that firstborn son who was unwilling to enter, if not that first of the Apostles, Peter, who, at the questioning of a single maidservant in the court of the high priest, dared three times to deny the Lord? You said indeed, O Peter, as if to your father Christ, "I have labored with you": when you said to the Savior, "I am with you unto death" (Matthew 26:69, 74, 35); "I will lay down my life for you" (John 13:37). Where is what you promised? You are questioned once, and you deny; you are questioned a second time, and you deny; a third time, and you deny. You do not wish to enter the banquet, therefore you dared three times to deny the Lord. Where is, "I will lay down my life for you"? The one who denied three times was not terrified by a hoof, but a single little woman overwhelmed him. Certainly, "I am with you unto death." See, see then, Peter, how much you presumed of yourself before: behold now, by denying three times, you are convicted by the testimony of a rooster. But let the father go out to the firstborn son unwilling to enter: let Christ say to Peter, "Enter into the joy of your Lord" (Matthew 25:21). Let him look upon the one who denies, and make him a confessor: let him prick the weeping one, make him a lover. Let him exhort him with a fatherly voice: "Son," he says, "you are mine: You are Peter; and even if you denied me, you are mine. You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church.

You are mine, and all that is mine is yours: I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 16:18-19). With you, Peter, are the keys: deign now to enter the banquet. These things had to happen, because your brother the thief was dead, and came back to life; he was lost, and was found. If Peter received the keys of the kingdom of heaven before Christ was crucified for all, how did that thief, no longer guilty, enter there except through the side which the Jew opened? And now let all come who love paradise, the place of rest, the place of security, the place of perpetual happiness, the place where you do not fear the barbarian, where you suffer no adversary, where you have no enemy: come all, enter all; there is a way you can enter, the side lies open. For that thief showed where all ought to enter, teaching no one by his example to despair. CHAPTER VI.—On avoiding the Arian heresy.—Strive, says the Lord, to enter through the narrow gate (Luke 13:24). What is narrower than that opening which one of the soldiers made by striking the side of the crucified? And yet through this narrowness almost the whole world has already entered. Come, you Jews as well, the Son of God whom you crucified calls you. Strive to enter through the narrow gate: for through this your fathers entered. Those who cried out for him to be crucified, who saw him hanging on the wood, who mocked him, who shook their heads, even they entered through this narrowness.

For not in vain did he cry out as he hung on the cross: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). Through these straits, therefore, as I have said, through the narrow gate of Christ's side, the thief entered, changed, penitent. The Jew, every pagan converted, and from it went forth the evil Arian heretic. He went forth, because he was not of the number of those who remain. For he was of those of whom John says: "They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would surely have remained with us" (1 John 2:19). Arian heretic, the thief on the cross acknowledges Christ hanging there, the hostile Jews themselves feared him rising again, and you treat him wickedly reigning in heaven! Beware, dearest ones, of the Arian plague; let them not separate you from Christ by promising earthly things, let them not strip you of faith for the sake of a tunic. Members of Christ, preserve the unity and integrity of the one tunic, which not even the persecutors of Christ dared to tear. Do not inflict injuries upon your head: for you he died, lest you should die. Whom Christ has brought to life through Baptism, why does the Arian kill him by rebaptizing? Blush, blush, heretic. Peter denied, and returned, and by weeping blotted out what he had denied through fear. Paul persecuted Christ in his own, but at his voice he fell and rose. He fell one way, he rose another: he fell as a persecutor, he rose as a preacher.

In Christians the kings persecuted Christ: but they greatly benefited them, when the members quickly passed over to their head. No one inflicts such losses on Christ as you do: you wish to kill the souls of many, for whom Christ came in the flesh to be killed. Blush, blush, heretic. Why do you repeat what is given once? In his members Christ has already been struck; do not wish to rebaptize him in them? For once he deigned to descend into the water with John for all (Matt. 3:16). Christ redeemed the souls; guard what he redeemed. Assign the intact estate to the intact Christ. Let no one invade, let no one consent to the invader: let no one wipe away the Lord’s brand, let no one remove Christ’s titles. You will render account to the Lord King, good servants; an opportunity for good work has been given to you. There are many pilgrims, captives, despoiled. Make friends for yourselves from the mammon of iniquity, so that they too may receive you into eternal tabernacles (Luke 16:9).