89 TESTIMONIA VETERUM 90
MONITUM. — I have thought it necessary to use the same caution in citing the writings of the ancients who, in commemorating the works of Chrysostom, have transcribed no small part of them, as I used above in selecting the writers of his life. For if I had woven together his life as it is copiously detailed by so many writers, and had related every testimony of the ancients and the fathers word for word, these surely would have constituted the fourteenth volume—nay, they could scarcely have been comprehended in one volume—and that to no profit, as we have already said above. Therefore, from A
EXCERPTS FROM PHOTIUS
I have read the discourses of the blessed Theodoret, which he composed on John, who is among the saints, Chrysostom; of which we have seen five thus far, from which we have transcribed the following selections. The first of these five discourses seems to succeed another prior to it, or to be a part of one. However, it discusses the source from which he came when summoned to Constantinople, and how he became its archbishop, and how he endeavored with all diligence to bring back the priesthood and the episcopal office to the ancient standard; and what he accomplished against Gainas—at once silencing him, that valiant John, and negotiating on behalf of the common interests of the state—and how envy voted his exile. And he passes over some things that occurred to the inspired man until the end of his life, or rather, he passes over most of them. The discourse that follows details certain brief praises, and is itself brief, beginning thus: "Again the memorial of John to us." The one after this also enters into the laws of encomium, but differs from those before it in the beauty of its words and thoughts. It begins as follows: "I see the present subject, needing a trumpet of many voices, now imperiled by a childish tongue, and the beauty of the athlete, described by myriad arts, now weak, set before me, the craftsman, for writing." Such is the prelude. "Another drags him to himself as a helper, being plundered; another calls upon him to be an advocate in a lawsuit; another, hungry, entreats for food, naked for clothing; another strips him; another, mourning, requires comfort; another, in bonds, begs to be released; one drags him elsewhere for the visitation of the sick; a stranger asks for lodging; another, standing by, laments his debt; another calls for him to be an overseer and conciliator of domestic strife. Not even a slave flees to another, lamenting the bitter indignation of his master; a widow cries, 'Have mercy,' another laments her orphanhood. Myriad are the turnings of the father each day toward each one, on behalf of each. Someone is carried off, and the father is the advocate; famine is troublesome, and the nourisher becomes the advocate; someone is sick, and the nourisher is transformed into a physician; someone has fallen into grief, and the nurse is found to be a comfort; the care of strangers has arrived, and he who had become all things is revealed as a host. And what need is there to speak of each one? As much time as measured out his life (not to speak of his episcopate alone), such a variety of saving works, progressing, never ceased among men. O soldier and, even after death, combatant! O formidable to enemies even after the tomb! O harmony of the lyre, loosened by death! O courts deprived of such a regulator! O saving net for men, snatched up to heaven! O tree divided between heaven and earth, providing its body to the one and its soul to the other! The mouth of the Church is enclosed in a tomb. What an eye of piety has been snatched from among men! Thou hast not died, O blessed father, but as the sun hast set; we do not grieve as for one dead, but as for one hidden from us; we do not seek thee as one dead, but as one who has departed to the heavens." But such is the third discourse. The fourth also preserves the type B of an encomium, beginning from the necessity of honoring fathers; of which these also are a part: "Of these shepherds, one is also John, the guileless intelligence, the many-eyed mind, the book of evangelical experience, more easily molded than wax for reconciliations, the sea for gifts, the guileless one against the deceits of those warring, the enclosure of the Church; no serpent of hypocrisy escaped him. From whence do you wish that we show John to be precious? From hospitality? And who is more hospitable than John? From the firmness in his administrations? And whom did power overawe? From the zeal regarding the Church? And whose is the harmony of the common folk’s psalmody even until now?" But such is this discourse also. The one that follows weaves the same crowns of praise, but declares the strength of his thoughts somewhat more brilliantly. All five discourses seem to have been composed after his return from exile. The excerpts of the following words are part of the current discourse: "Lend to us, O father, thy lyre, lend unto thy praise thy plectrum. For even if the hands have been loosened by the law of nature, yet the lyre resounds throughout the entire world by the gift of grace. Share with us that immortal tongue; for thy tongue alone is worthy of thy achievements. For this reason John has received John, the bold one the emulator, he who after death reproves him who preaches after death, the citizen of the wilderness the corrector of every city. Thou hast also another kinship with the apostles. Thou first didst plant altars among the wagon-dwelling Scythians; and the barbarian, scarcely leaping from his horses, learned to bend the knee and to be spread out upon the ground; and he who was not softened by the tears of the captives C