Opuscola

The Works of Saint Nicentius. First Work. On the Vigils of the Servants of God. Chapter One. It is a good and worthy and holy thing, and altogether fitting and sufficiently appropriate, to speak now of the holy vigils and to hold discourse, when the very night-watch is being kept by the diligent and religious. The night is dark, and the necessary darkness for bodies, which holds not only men but also animals in sleep, so that, with their strength restored through slumber, they may be able to sustain the labors of the day while awake. The good God, who so provided, so ordained, that man, about to go forth to his work and to his labor until evening, would have a substitute time, in which he might rest from hard labors and great fatigue (Psalm 103:23). Therefore, he made the day for work, the night for rest; and for this, as for all things, we ought to give thanks to him who granted it. Moreover, we know that many men, either to please their superiors or to gain some particular advantage for themselves, set aside a portion of the night for some small task, and count it as profit that they were able to work, having been roused from their sleep. But if, in carnal instruments, that is, in things necessary for food and clothing, those who keep vigil are not reproached, but rather praised, how much more ought we to observe and love the sacred vigils, so fruitful in spiritual work, that is, in prayers, hymns, and readings, that we may receive a reward from the Lord God.

Chapter II. There are indeed men who find fault with these practices, but they are alien to the Catholic faith and religion. Yet this is not surprising. For how can impious and profane persons be pleased by religious observances? If these did please them, they would be ours, that is, what we assuredly are, Christians. But if those whom the salutary practice of holy vigils offends are truly ours—to suspect nothing worse of them—they are either lazy, or drowsy, or old, or infirm. If they are lazy, let them blush; for the Proverbs of Solomon ring out against them: "Go to the ant, O sluggard, and emulate her ways" (Prov. 6:6). If they are drowsy, let them wake up, as Scripture proclaims: "Sluggard, how long will you sleep? When will you rise from sleep? You sleep a little, you sit a little, you doze a little, you clasp your hands a little to your breast. Then poverty will come upon you like a wayfarer, and want like a swift runner" (Ibid., 9-11). If they are old, who compels them to keep vigil? Although even without compulsion they ought to keep vigil on account of their age itself, and to pray to the Lord God more earnestly. Therefore they ought to keep vigil while seated, if they cannot stand. If they are infirm in their limbs, they do not find fault with what they themselves cannot do; rather, according to the prophet, they should wet their bed with tears and say: "Thus I remembered you upon my bed" (Ps. 69:7).

Let them also commend it to those who keep watch, that they may aid them with their prayers, so that, helped by the Lord, they may at some time deserve to sing over their bed of pain, saying: “In the mornings I will meditate on You, O Lord, for You have become my helper” (Ibid.). Otherwise, it is foolish and quite alien to religion that, because we ourselves cannot run, we disparage those who run well; for even if we cannot, we ought not to envy, but to congratulate those who are able. For just as one who consents to wickedness is a sharer in punishment, so participation in glory is to be hoped for from consent to goodness. For one is crowned by affection, another is gladdened by pious will. Nor indeed should it seem burdensome or difficult, even for delicate or weak bodies, to set aside for the service of God some portion of two nights in the week, that is, of Saturday and Sunday; for this is, as it were, a purification of the five days or nights in which we grow heavy with carnal stupor, or, beset by worldly affairs, rejoice. And let no one blush in a good pursuit of holiness, because the wicked do not blush in perpetrating a work of foulness. Rightly, therefore, does Scripture say in Proverbs: “There is a confusion which leads to sin” (Ecclus. IV, 25). For to be confused in a good work is a sin, just as not to be confused in doing evil is ruin. If you are holy, love vigils; so that, keeping watch over your wall by watching, you yourselves may be preserved in holiness.

If you are sinners, run all the more, so that, keeping watch and praying to God, you may be purified; so that, beating your breasts more frequently, you may cry out to the Lord from your whole heart, saying: “Cleanse me from my hidden faults, O Lord, and from those of others spare your servant” (Ps. 18:13). For those who desire to be cleansed from hidden faults, I do not know whether they take pleasure in being defiled by the same miseries. CHAPTER III The time demands, dearest ones, that we say a few words about the authority of vigils, about their antiquity, and about their very usefulness: for any labor is more willingly undertaken if the usefulness of the labor itself is set before one’s eyes. Ancient is the devotion of vigils, a familiar good to all the saints. Finally, the prophet Isaiah cries out to the Lord, saying: “By night my spirit keeps watch for you, O God, because your precepts are light upon the earth” (Isa. 26:9, according to the LXX). David, sanctified with both royal and prophetic unction, sings thus: “O Lord God of my salvation, by day I have cried out, and by night before you” (Ps. 87:2). Again he says: “I have remembered your name in the night, O Lord, and I have kept your law” (Ps. 118:55). Hear another utterance of the same prophet, which shows both the time and the attitude of prayer: “In the nights,” he says, “lift up your hands in the sanctuary, and bless the Lord” (Ps. 133:2). And lest you think that only the evening hours are called nights, it also occurs: “At midnight I rose to confess to you concerning the judgments of your justice” (Ps. 118:62).

You have both the appointed time and the concern for rising, and how you are to confess to God has been shown. Moreover, as I consider the intention of the saints, something greater and more laborious occurs, and something beyond the condition of human nature is suggested, when you hear the same prophet singing thus: “If I ascend into the bed of my couch; if I give sleep to my eyes, and slumber to my eyelids, or rest to my temples, until I find a place for the Lord, a tabernacle for the God of Jacob” (Ps. 131:3). Who would not be amazed at such devotion of soul in the love of God, that he utterly denied himself sleep, without which human bodies certainly fail, until the king and prophet found a place and a temple to be built for the Lord? This matter ought strongly to admonish us, that if we ourselves wish to be the place of God, and desire to be perpetually regarded as his tabernacle and temple, as the apostle Paul asserts, saying: “You are the temple of God” (2 Cor. 6:16), we should, as much as we are able, love vigils by the example of the saints, lest it be said of us: “They slept their sleep, and found nothing” (Ps. 75:6); but rather each one of you may already say joyfully: “In the day of my tribulation I sought God with my hands by night before him, and I was not deceived” (Ps. 76:3). For it is good to confess to the Lord, and to sing psalms to your name, O Most High; to announce your mercy in the morning, and your truth through the night (Ps. 91:2, 3).

These and similar things, so great and of such a kind, the saints sang and left in writing for this reason: that we, their later posterity, might be roused by their equal examples to celebrate also the vigils of our own salvation with our own wakefulness. But let us come from the old to the new; from the ministers of the Law to the ministers of the Gospel, so that the grace of the vigil may also be confirmed from the New Testament. Anna, daughter of Phanuel, a widow serving with continuous prayers and fasts, did not depart from the temple by day or night. In the Gospel it is read that those most holy shepherds, while they kept night watches over their flock, deserved to see angels in splendor and to be the first to hear that Christ was born on earth. Now does not the institution of the Savior rouse all hearers to watch, whether in the parable of the good sower teaching: "While men were sleeping, the evil one came and oversowed tares among the wheat, and went away" (Matt. 13:25)? If they had watched, perhaps the evil one could not have sown the tares. Or when he says: "Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning; and you be like those waiting for their master when he returns from a wedding. Blessed are those servants whom, when the Lord comes, he finds watching" (Luke 12:35-37): "And if the evening hour comes," he says, "and if midnight, and if at cockcrow, and he finds them watching, they are blessed" (Mark 13:35). "And so be ready," he says, "because you do not know at what hour the Son of Man is coming" (Matt. 24:44).

He taught us to be watchful not only by words, but also confirmed it by example. For the Gospel bears witness that Jesus spent whole nights in prayer to God (Luke 11:12). He spent the night not for himself, but that we might know what all ought to do. And He Himself rebukes Peter at the time of the Passion, saying: "Could you not watch with me for one hour?" And to all He now says: "Watch and pray, that you may not fall into temptation" (Matthew 26:40, 41). These words of His, joined with such an example, I ask you, whom could they not rouse even from the depths of death in a similar way? Instructed by these words, confirmed by these teachings, the blessed Apostles also both kept vigils themselves and commanded vigils. The Apostle Peter in prison is roused by night by an angel, and as he opens the iron gate, he comes to the house of Mary, where many were gathered, not sleeping, of course, but praying. The same Apostle sets this down in his Epistle and says: "Be sober and watchful, for your adversary the devil, like a roaring lion, goes about seeking whom he may devour" (1 Peter 5:8). Paul and Silas in the public prison, praying around midnight, are recorded to have sung a hymn while the prisoners listened (Acts 16:25); whereupon suddenly an earthquake occurred, the foundations of the prison were shaken, the doors opened, and all the chains were suddenly loosed. Likewise the blessed Apostle Paul, in exhorting the Thessalonians concerning the keeping of vigils, says: "Watch, and stand fast in the faith, be strengthened and act manfully" (1 Corinthians 16:13).

CHAPTER IV. Let these suffice concerning the authority and antiquity of the holy vigils. It remains that, according to the promise, we set forth something concerning their usefulness; although the usefulness itself can be felt more through practice than it can be narrated by the speech of a speaker. For it is seen by tasting, because the Lord is sweet (Ps. 34:9). Therefore, he who has tasted understands and feels how much sleepiness is laid aside by watching, how great a stupor of the mind is shaken off, how great a light illuminates the soul of the one watching and praying, what grace, what holy visitation gladdens all the limbs of the one watching. By watching, every fear is shut out, confidence is born, the flesh is mortified, vices waste away, chastity is strengthened, foolishness yields, prudence approaches, the mind is sharpened, error is blunted, the devil, the head of crimes, is wounded by the sword of the spirit. What is more necessary than this usefulness, what more profitable than these holy gains, what sweeter than this delight, what more blessed than this happiness? The prophet also bears witness, who, at the beginning of his Psalms describing the blessed man, placed the summit of his blessedness in this little verse, saying: If he meditate on the law of the Lord day and night (Ps. 1:2).

Daytime meditation is good, and prayer is good, but nighttime meditation is far more pleasing and effective; because during the day various necessities clamor, occupations shatter the mind, and manifold care scatters the senses: but the night is secret, the night is quiet and suitable for those praying, most fitting for those keeping vigil, while, freed from carnal occupations, with the senses gathered, it presents the whole person to the divine gaze. Therefore, know that vigils are pleasing to God for celebrating the blessing. Only, most illustrious ones, let him who keeps watch with his eyes also keep watch with his heart; let him who prays in spirit also pray with his mind; because it is not sufficiently useful to keep watch with the eyes and to doze in the soul, since on the contrary Scripture says through the person of the Church: "I sleep, and my heart keeps watch" (Song of Songs 5:2). It must also be taken care of above all that the hearts of our watchers are not burdened by excess of food or drink, lest, belching forth indigestion and drunkenness, we are not only unpleasant to ourselves, but are also judged unworthy of the grace of the Holy Spirit. For a certain man, eminent among shepherds, said: "Just as smoke drives away bees, so undigested belching turns away and casts off the gifts of the Holy Spirit." Therefore, as if about to celebrate a divine mystery, we ought to prepare ourselves beforehand by abstinence, so that we may keep watch whole and unimpeded; also, evil thought must be driven away, lest the prayer of those keeping watch badly become, as it is read, "into sin" (Psalm 108:7).

There are also evil and accursed vigils, as is read in Proverbs: "Because sleep has been taken from their eyes. For they do not sleep," it says, "if they have done evil" (Prov. 6:16). But let such vigils be absent, and far absent from this assembly; rather, let the breast of those keeping vigil be closed to the devil and open to Christ, so that what we utter with our lips, we may hold in our hearts. Then our vigils will be acceptable to God, then the night-watch will be salutary, if with fitting diligence and sincere devotion our ministry is offered to the divine gaze. These things about the authority and antiquity of vigils, as well as about their holy usefulness, suffice. Concerning the devotion of hymns and psalms, how pleasing and acceptable they are to God, I would now have said something, however brief, were it not that a more lengthy discussion would demand another volume: which, with the Lord's granting, will be presented in the following reading. OPUSCULUM II.

Let us speak of the benefit of psalmody, which God deigns to grant us. We, therefore, most beloved, who are all instructed by the prophetic, evangelical, and apostolic teachings, whose words and deeds we set before our eyes, through whom we are everything that we are—let us assert, beginning from the very first, how pleasing and acceptable to God spiritual songs are, with the same authorities. But if we ask who first introduced this kind of thing, we find no one other than Moses, who bore a notable song to God when, after Egypt was struck with the ten plagues and Pharaoh was drowned, the people, rejoicing, made their way through the unfamiliar paths of the sea to the desert, saying: "Let us sing to the Lord, for He has been gloriously honored" (Exod. 15:1). Therefore Moses, the leader of the tribes of Israel, first instituted choirs and, with himself and his sister leading, taught both sexes, divided into distinct groups, to sing a triumphal song to the Lord. Later, Deborah, a noble woman, is found performing this office in the Book of Judges. Yet Moses himself, about to depart from the body, repeated a fearsome song in Deuteronomy, which he left to the people in place of a written testament, so that they might know what punishment and what tribulations would follow them if they departed from the Lord. All are wretched and pitiable who, having neglected such a clear and evident warning, were unwilling to take precautions against sins and unlawful superstitions.

Now indeed you will find many afterwards, not only men but also women filled with the divine Spirit, who sang the mysteries of God, even before David, who from childhood was specially chosen by the Lord for this office, and deserved to be the prince of singers, the treasury of songs. While still a boy, singing sweetly and strongly on the cithara, he restrained the evil spirit that was raging in Saul: not because the cithara itself had such great power, but because the figure of the cross of Christ, which was mystically represented in the wood and the stretching of the strings, even then oppressed the spirit of the demon. What will you not find in these Psalms that serves for utility and edification, for the consolation of the human race, of condition, sex, age? In the Psalms the infant has what to suckle, the boy what to praise, the adolescent what to correct in his way, the young man what to follow, the elder what to pray for. The woman learns chastity, orphans find a father, widows a judge, the poor a protector, strangers a guardian, kings and judges hear what to fear. The Psalm consoles the sad, tempers the joyful, soothes the angry, refreshes the poor, admonishes the rich to recognize themselves, and rebukes them lest they be proud; to all who receive it, the Psalm contributes a fitting medicine; nor does it despise sinners, but healthily offers them a remedy through tearful penance.

Therefore our Lord God through his servant David prepared a drink, sweet to the taste through song and effective for healing the wounds of sinners through its power. For the Psalm is heard sweetly while it is sung; it penetrates the mind while it delights; the words of the Psalm are easily retained if they are frequently chanted; and what the severity of the law could not extort from human minds, these songs drive out through the sweetness of the melody. For whatever the Prophets, whatever the Gospels themselves command, is contained in these songs with the sweet delight of those who meditate upon them. God is shown so that he may be feared, idols are mocked, justice is urged, iniquity is forbidden, mercy is praised, unbelief is rejected, truth is sought, lies are condemned, deceit is accused, innocence is praised, pride is cast down, humility is exalted, penance is proclaimed, peace to be pursued is set forth. Protection is sought against enemies, vengeance is promised, sure hope is nourished; and what is more excellent than all these, the sacraments of Christ are sung in the Psalms. For his generation is expressed, and the rejection of the impious people, and the inheritance of the nations is named, the virtues of the Lord are sung, the venerable passion is depicted, the glorious resurrection is shown, and his seat at the right hand is wonderfully portrayed. Then the fiery advent of the Lord is manifested, the terrible judgment of the living and the dead is revealed.

What more? Even the emission of the creating Spirit and the renewal of the earth are revealed; after these there will be the eternal kingdom of the righteous in the glory of the Lord, and the perpetual punishment of sinners. CHAPTER II. These are the songs of God which the Catholic Church of God sings. These are what our assembly here also practices with the sound of the voice: these not only do not loosen the singer, but rather bind him. These songs please God, where everything that is done pertains to the glory of the Creator. Rightly does the same prophet exhort all and everything to the praise of God, who governs all, saying: Let every spirit praise the Lord (Ps. 150:6). He himself also, promising to be a praiser, said: I will praise the name of the Lord with a song, and I will magnify him in praise (Ps. 63:51). Praise the Lord in your life, offer to God the sacrifice of praise for your soul and your life, and through him it is shown to you in your soul, by which you may attain to his salvation.

Our Lord delights in praise emitted from a pure conscience, as the same hymnographer exhorts, saying: “Praise the Lord, for a psalm is good; let our praise to God be joyful and seemly” (Ps. CILIa v, 3). Bearing this knowledge, knowing this office to be pleasing to God, the same Psalmist testifies: “Seven times a day I have spoken praise to you” (Ps. CXVIII, 464). And he promises something even more: “And my tongue,” he says, “will meditate on your justice, your praise all day long” (Ps. XXXIV, 28). For he undoubtedly perceived the benefit of such a work, as he himself recalls, saying: “Praising, I will invoke the Lord, and I will be safe from my enemies” (Ps. XXVI, 4). Armed with such protection and such a shield, he had laid low that mightiest giant Goliath, and often carried off victory over the aliens. CHAPTER III. It would be long, dearest ones, to recount each thing that the history of the saints contains, especially since the matter demands that some things from the New Testament ought to be brought forth for the confirmation of the ancients and for your instruction. Therefore, you will first find Zacharias, the father of the great John, after that long silence, having prophesied in the manner of a hymn. Nor did Elizabeth, long barren, after giving birth to a son by promise, cease to magnify God from her very soul. When Christ was born on earth, the army of angels sounded praise: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will” (Luke 2:14). The boys in the temple proclaiming, “Hosanna to the son of David” (Matt.

they cried out; nor did the Lord close the mouths of the innocent when the Pharisees were raging with envy, but rather opened them, saying to them: Have you not read what is written: From the mouths of infants and sucklings have you perfected praise? And if these are silent, the stones will cry out (Ibid., 16). The Lord Himself, a teacher in words, a perfecter in deeds, in order to commend the most pleasing ministry of hymns, went out to the Mount of Olives with his disciples after having sung a hymn. Who now will doubt the religious observance of psalms and hymns, given such a testimony, when He who is adored and hymned by all the heavenly beings is Himself reported to have sung a hymn with his disciples? And John in the Apocalypse relates that he saw, with the Spirit revealing, and heard the voice of many waters and of mighty thunders saying Alleluia; from which no one should doubt that this ministry of the sacred vigils, if celebrated with worthy faith and true devotion, is joined to the angels, who are known to praise God in the heavens without sleep, without interruption, and to bless the Savior. Since these things are so, brothers, let us now with fuller confidence faithfully fulfill the mystery of hymns, believing that we have obtained great grace from God, to whom it has been granted to join with so many and such great saints—I speak of prophets and martyrs—in the miracles of the eternal God...

Here with David we confess to the Lord that He is good; with Moses we resound the power of the Lord in those great canticles; with Anna, who bears the figure of the Church, once barren, now fruitful, we are strengthened in heart in the praise of God; with Isaiah we keep vigil and sing psalms by night; with Habakkuk, with Jeremiah, with Jonah, the most holy prophets, we pray and sing; with the three youths, placed as if in a furnace, we sing psalms blessing the Creator of all, with every creature summoned. What is more useful than this benefit, what more delightful than this pleasure, because we are delighted by the Psalms, we are watered by the prayers, and we are nourished by the readings interspersed? And truly, just as good guests are delighted by a variety of dishes, so our souls are fattened by manifold reading and the performance of hymns. Only, dearest ones, setting aside superfluous fables, let us sing psalms with attentive mind and watchful spirit, so that we may not displease God. For the psalm exhorts us thus, saying: “For the King of all the earth is God, sing psalms wisely” (Ps. 46:8), that is, intelligently, so that we may sing psalms not only with the breath, that is, the sound of the voice, but also with the mind, and think upon what we are singing, lest the mind, captivated by fables and empty thoughts, have fruitless labor. Let the sound or melody also be sung in harmony with holy religion, not one that cries out with tragic difficulties, but one that demonstrates true Christianity in you; not one that smacks of anything theatrical, but one that produces compunction for sins.

But your voices must not be discordant, but harmonious. Let no one foolishly draw out the sound, or one lower his voice while another raises it; rather, let each one humbly strive to contain his own voice within the sound of the choir singing together, not raising it or drawing it out externally as if for foolish display, nor seeking to please men. For we ought to celebrate everything as if in the sight of God, not with a desire to please men. For we have a model or example of this vocal harmony set before us in those three most blessed youths, of whom the prophet Daniel relates: "Then," he says, "these three sang a hymn as if with one mouth, and glorified God in the furnace, saying: 'Blessed are you, Lord God of our fathers'" (Dan. 3:51-52). You see that it is set forth as a lesson that the three youths together praised God humbly and holily with one mouth. And we too, as if with one mouth, should all produce the same sound of the psalms and the same modulation of voice equally; but whoever cannot equal the others, it is better for him to be silent or to chant with a subdued voice than to clamor loudly and drown out everyone; for in this way he will both fulfill the duty of his ministry and will not cause offense to the brotherhood chanting humbly.

If, therefore, the voice of all of us is unoffending, or harmonious with the well-sounding cymbals of the lips, it will delight us, and edify the hearers, and the whole praise will be sweet to our God, who, as it is read, makes glad those who are of one mind in his house. For when a psalm is sung, let it be sung by all; when a lesson is read, let it be heard equally by all in attentive silence, so that while the reader reads, no one may clamor with loud voices. And before the reading, let all assemble; if, however, someone arrives while the lesson is being celebrated, let him only adore God, and with his forehead signed, let him diligently lend his ear to the word of God. The time for prayer is open when we all pray; the time is open when you wish, and as often as you wish, to pray privately; do not, under the pretext of the reading, grieve that you have lost the reading, because not everyone can always have it ready: for a great time is always at hand. Nor think that a small benefit arises for you from the hearing of sacred reading; for prayer itself becomes richer, while the mind is nourished by the recent reading, and runs through the images of divine things which it has just heard. For even Mary, the sister of Martha, who, sitting at the feet of Jesus while her sister was neglected, listened more intently to the word of the Lord, is confirmed by the Lord’s voice to have chosen the better part for herself.

For this reason, indeed, the deacon admonishes all with a clear voice in the house of God by a holy proclamation, that whether in praying, or in bending the knees, or in singing psalms, or in listening attentively to the readings, unity be preserved by all; because God loves men of one mind, and makes them dwell in his own house; in which house those who dwell are declared blessed in the psalm, because they will praise the Lord for ever and ever (Ps. 83:5). Amen.