...do not discard even the superfluous, but living in abundance, we disregard the holy ones. The earth again brought forth so many gifts for another friend of God from its own depths, such an abundance as was never seen before. And why do you marvel if they themselves were venerable, when even their garments and their shadows were fearful to demons, and to death, and to disease? And angels revered men, and honored them with excess. For how could they not, whom their own Master honored? And this can be seen in both the Old and the New Testament. For this reason it says: *According to thy height thou hast multiplied the sons of men.* Understanding therefore the magnitude of the honor, let us render the reward worthy of it, so that the excess of honor may not become for us a provision for punishment; from which may we all be delivered, both those who teach these things and those who learn them, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom belongs all glory, honor, and adoration unto the ages of ages. Amen.
EXPOSITION ON PSALM XII
*To the end, a Psalm of David.* Another: *A song of victory of David.* Another: *For victory.* *How long, O Lord, wilt thou forget me unto the end?* Another: *Thou wilt ignore me utterly.* *How long wilt thou turn away thy face from me?* Another: *Thou hidest.* *How long shall I set counsels in my soul?* Another: *I shall appoint opinions.* *Pains in my heart by day and by night.* Another: *Anxiety in my mind by day.*
1. It is no small good, this, to have a perception of the forgetfulness of God. Consider this forgetfulness not to be a passion, but abandonment. Many, surely, having suffered this, neither know it nor lament it; but this blessed man not only knew it, but also calculated the time. For the "How long" shows that the time was long; for this reason he also laments and mourns. But you, observe for me how he is nowhere pained for the sake of anything worldly, not for riches, not for glory, but everywhere for divine favor. And whence, he says, did he know that God had forgotten him? Because he knew when He was mindful of him, and he clearly understood what forgetfulness is, and what memory is; not like the crowd of men who, when they are wealthy, when they are esteemed by men, when all things go according to their desire, when they overcome their enemies, then they think that God is mindful of them; for this reason they do not know even when He forgets them. For those who do not know the sign of memory, do not understand the sign of forgetfulness either. For if they do not know the symbols of friendship, they do not know those of enmity. For God forgets many of those who have these things, and especially them; but He remembers often those who are in adverse circumstances. For nothing produces memory in God so much as doing something good, being sober, being vigilant, caring for virtue; just as nothing produces forgetfulness [so much] as being in sins and greed and rapacity. And you therefore, beloved, when you are in afflictions, do not say, "God has forgotten me"; but [say it] when you are in sins, and all things go according to your desire. For if you were to know this, you would quickly depart from wicked deeds. *How long dost thou turn away thy face from me?* This is intense forgetfulness. For from human traits He shows the energies of God, and characterizes His anger and His punishment. But God turns away His face again when we do things unworthy of His commands. For, He says, *When you sretch out your hands, I will turn my eyes away from you.* Then also the cause: *For your hands are full of blood.* But this also is again of great care, both the abandonment and the turning away of the face; He does this so that He may draw us to Himself more vehemently. For even a mad lover lets go and abandons the beloved who regards him with contempt, not casting him from his mind, but wishing to turn him around and join him to himself.
Having spoken of the turning away, he also speaks of the forgetfulness, and the things that came to him from it. What, then, are these? What he adds by saying: *How long shall I set counsels in my soul?* For just as he who has gone out of the harbor wanders everywhere, and he who is deprived of light stumbles in many things: so also he who has fallen into the forgetfulness of God is given over to worries, and anxieties, and pains continuously. But this too is no small thing for turning God back to oneself: to be anxious, to care, to be consumed, to be in pain, to make an account of His turning away. Which Paul also, writing to the Corinthians, said concerning himself: *And who is he that makes me glad, if not he who is grieved by me?* For it is no small gain, beloved, to have a perception of God's turning away, to be pained, to be distressed. For thus we shall quickly turn Him back to us. *How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?* *Look upon me, hear me, O Lord my God. Enlighten my eyes, lest I sleep in death.* For just as when God holds on and is with us, all things that grieve are moved out of the way; so when He stands apart and forgets, the soul is cut through, and the heart is pained, and the things that grieve trample over us, and everything is cliffs and precipices. But these things are permitted advantageously, so that, being bitten by all things, the more slothful may return more zealously [to the place] from which they fell. *For your apostasy will instruct you,* he says, *and your wickedness will reprove you.* So that even the abandonment of God is a form of providence. For when He who provides and cares is despised, He lets go for a little and abandons, so that then, the sloth being cast out, the negligent may become more zealous. *Look upon me,* he says, *see my enemy being exalted over me; and if not for my misery, at least for his arrogance and madness look...*
B upon me. And what do you ask? That you might conquer your enemies? He does not say this, but, *That the eyes of my heart may be enlightened, that the darkness which has covered the discerning faculty of my soul and blinded the eye of my understanding may be driven away.* This is what I ask, *Lighten my eyes.* *Lest at any time my enemy say,* when he sees me overthrown unto the death of sin: *I have prevailed against him.* I have overcome him; what I desired to see has happened to me. What is, *I have prevailed against him*? Even if he is not strong in himself, against me he certainly has become strong. Our defeat brings strength to him; it renders him powerful, and mighty, and unconquerable. B C We truly, when we sin, do not only disgrace and destroy ourselves, and cast ourselves into death, but by the fact that we are defeated, we proclaim our enemies strong and powerful; and not only this, but we also place them in great joy and exultation. Papae, what a great folly, what a great stupor it is to bring help to adversaries against oneself, and to provide a cause of joy and exultation to those who torture and afflict our soul! See how many absurdities there are. When I ought to conquer the enemy (for *his swords have failed for the end, and he has perished,* Ps. IX, 7), when, I say, I ought to conquer, I am conquered; and not only that, but I also render him strong and powerful: and our madness and extreme disease do not stop even there, but we provide for him even those things that bring him joy and exultation. Truly, sin is an extreme drunkenness and the greatest of evils. *They will exult,* if I am moved. The prophet offers three reasons to move the Lord and intreat Him, so that He might look upon him, and turn His face, and hear his prayer: the strength of the enemies, and before that their rising up and exaltation; third, their joy and exultation, as if to say: If not for the sake of my prayer, and not for the sake of my misery, You do not turn Your face toward me, O Lord; at least look upon me for the sake of the enemies' arrogance, in that they show off their strength and are very pleased with themselves; because they rejoice in my evils and mock my fall. *Hear me, lighten my eyes. Remove the heavy sleep* brought on by my sins, *with which, having been lulled, I have been led—so to speak—to the death of the soul. For if I am moved from your security, this is reckoned as joy, glory, and strength for them; on this account they boast, and are very pleased with themselves, and are intolerable; but if I am led to death, what would they not do? You see how great a loss the prophet considers it, and no less than punishment and torment, to provide joy to a common enemy, and to bring it about that he himself might seem powerful and exalted. For if he did not consider these things to be the greatest and most intolerable evils, he would not have proposed them to appease God and to draw His benevolence toward himself. Let us also do the same, and consider, and strive that we may not exalt the enemy, that we may not make him powerful, that we may not bring him joy, but on the contrary, we may render him humble, and cast down, and weak, and sad, and downcast. For if He sees that those who have sinned are acting rightly and from virtue, all these things happen at once. D *But I have hoped in Thy mercy.* What then, have you done rightly that you should ask, that He should again look upon you, that He should hear your prayer, that the eyes of your mind should be enlightened? And from where do you hope that these things will happen for you? Let others say, he says, if they can say anything; but I know one thing, I say one thing: I place all my hope in Him; I propose to myself that, Your mercy, Your clemency. *But I,* he says, *have hoped in Thy mercy.* Have you seen the humility of the prophet? Have you seen the pious and grateful soul of the man? Although he could tell of countless things he had done rightly, and through them entreat God, he says none of them, but takes refuge solely in God's mercy. Whence it is clear that when he says these things, namely, *If I have done this, if I have returned evil for good* (Ps. VII, 4-5), and things of this sort, he says them having been brought into great necessity; and if this is not present, he says none of those things, but proposes mercy and God's clemency as his entire supplication. Then, trusting that he would not be disappointed in his hope, he added, *My heart will exult in Thy salvation.* Giving of thanks before the benefit. Have you seen a soul hoping well? He requested, and before he received, as one who had received, he gives thanks, and sings a hymn to God, and does all the things that have been mentioned. And whence is he endowed with such good hope? From a pious and grateful soul, from great and vehement zeal in his petition; he knew that one who asks in this way is heard by God, from great heat and agitation of heart. Just as those who ask sluggishly and negligently, even when they have received, scarcely feel the gift; so those who ask with intense zeal and vehement tension of mind, even before they have received, from their great and pure affection, feel the gift as if they had received it, divine grace sending joy ahead: and on account of this they give thanks, and are not far from receiving. *My heart will exult in Thy salvation.* This, he says, fills my soul with joy, that I should attain salvation from You; my soul rejoices that You are its salvation. Do you see exultation over a fall, and the exultation of the soul over its own salvation? That one is of the Wicked One; this one is of those who are being saved. That one is the destruction of the one who seemed to exult, and of the one on account of whom he exulted; this one is the salvation and restoration of the one who exults. Let us therefore rejoice and exult with this exultation; let us flee that one and turn away from it. *I will sing to the Lord who has dealt bountifully with me, and I will chant to the name of the Lord Most High.* A monument, he says, of this benefit I will offer to the Lord, because He has treated me with a benefit, has rendered the enemy humble and cast down, has filled him with ignominy, has shown him to be weak, has heard my prayer, has turned His face toward me, with the mist and darkness dissolved through which I was being carried toward death; and, exulting on account of His salvation, as if some