A Tear up for me, O Lover of mankind, the bond of my sins, and show me worthy of the portion of those who are saved. May the drops of my tears toward thy compassion become rivers for the cleansing of my evils. What is there among the things present worthy to be compared to the glory of things to come? What is more to be desired than Christ? O the delusion! O the madness! O God before all time, let me not be separated from thy flock, nor let me become food for the teeth of the soul-destroying one. Spare me only, O Master; spare me even when thou judgest. Show a kindly eye to me. Extend thy right hand. Let the choir of angels assist my most miserable soul, that the dark faces may not be seen by the dying man. Soul, keep in mind the end, and mourn every day. For the mourning after the end brings no relief.
B O Word, who didst bind me to a perishable nature, having remembered what my substance is, save me as thou knowest how to save.
Another Alphabet
Consider, O my miserable and most wretched soul, the most dreadful judgment seat of the great trial. For you are about to stand naked and exposed, giving an account for what we have done in life, whether good things or bad, unjust or just. If you have been merciful while living, you shall receive mercy; or if you have given out of necessity, you shall likewise be saved. God is no respecter of persons; for he assigns equal rewards. If you have covered someone naked in this life, and have pitied the needy, and visited the sick, and filled the hungry, and satisfied the thirsty, and prepared a dwelling for the homeless and wanderers, the Judge will repay you with interest and grace. Likewise, he will make you a stranger to all kinds of goodness if you have not at all pitied any of the needy. If you have not filled the poor man, the hungry and the thirsty. If you have not clothed those who are destitute out of your wealth. If, having the power to save someone, you have not saved him from necessity. But you, O soul, being attentive and reflecting on these things, open your bowels of compassion to those in need. Distribute things that perish, so that you may gain things that remain. Lend pure love and faith to God, O soul, and love your neighbor as yourself, so that we may be deemed worthy of the kingdom above.
III. To my own soul
Soul, groan and with shedding of tears, hasten to erase the scroll of your sins; but do not wish to write new debts again, and provoke him. Christ, I know, is merciful; but if by chance the common end of life should seize you while so polluted and mired in filth, woe is me! What will you do? How will you drink the bitter cup which the wrath of the Lord mixes?
IV. To Lord Stylianos the Protosecretary
Who can easily bear the death of a friend? The death of a friend and intimate companion. As a horse separated from a horse bites,
and bereft of his usual companion, he sheds tears. What shall I do, deprived of my friend?
I, Stylianos, write this through tears: O pleasant greeting, remedy for my toils, Partner in all things, and sailing through the worse, Faithful love that looked not only to the day, Love that kept itself, nowhere bringing blame, Who was bound to me more by the bonds of desire— You have come, indissoluble, to the final breaths. And now I, wounded by longing for you, And finding nothing more for refreshment, With only groans and drops of tears, Cool my spirit, and offer up my heart. B
That Metaphrastes wrote commentaries on Luke, no one will attempt to prove by the testimony of Theophanes Kerameus in his *Homily on the Fifth Morning Gospel*; for he thus says: [Greek omitted from translation]. And so that we may not seem to divine without probable cause, we produce as a witness worthy of trust in this matter that Symeon who composed the Metaphrases so brilliantly; let him who judged thus in his Commentary on holy Luke suffice here. Whoever would affirm this, being himself deceived first by a wrong understanding of words, would afterwards deceive others, if they trusted him. But if anyone asks, just as he wrote Commentaries on the Prophets and other holy men of the Old Testament, as well as the New, whose mention exists in the sacred Scriptures, who will deny that he also wrote on Luke? Therefore, he also wrote an Interpretation on the Gospel of Luke. Not in the least degree. I find a double genus of the Saints whose Lives the Metaphrastes composed: one whose memory exists in Scripture; another whose does not. Regarding him whose memory does not exist, he himself, from what he had from the writings of others, digested them in his own narrative, with the series of time not disturbed, and named them Lives and Deeds, or Martyrdoms. Regarding him whose memory did exist, he took those words in which their deeds were contained, and by refining and enriching them with his own interpretation or that of others, he so prepared the events of that Saint, that he seemed to be writing a Commentary rather than narrating his deeds: and therefore he used no other title than that of Commentary. Hence with him: *Commentary on the holy Evangelist John*. *Commentary on the holy Prophet Daniel*. *Commentary on the holy apostle and Evangelist Matthew*. *Commentary on the Prophet Abdias*. *Commentary on the holy apostle Philip*. *Commentary on the holy apostle Andrew*. *Commentary on the holy apostle James*. *Commentary on the holy apostle of Christ Thomas*. By the same reasoning, *Commentary on the holy Evangelist Luke*, and it begins: "If indeed the memory of a just man is celebrated with praises," which Leo Centuripinus expressed more clearly, *On the holy apostle James son of Zebedee, an Oration which can serve in place of a Commentary in the demonstrative genre.*
Antonius Verderius, in his *Supplement to the Gesnerian Library* in the Catalogue presented by the Grammarian, lists the *Dioptra* of Symeon Metaphrastes. Regarding which I have nothing myself. Metaphrastes could have written it, just as he wrote other things, and perhaps he did, and it now lies hidden somewhere. We have not seen everything. Nor because it is unknown to us should it be considered not to have been written. In these recent days, when the most learned and erudite Simon Wagnereckius had inquired of me regarding the age of Symeon Metaphrastes, I replied as I could, and sent him that part of the *Diatribe* in which the age of Symeon is asserted and established. He read my work, examined it, and finally, doubting some points not without reason, wrote back. It is pleasing to append these things here, so that we may have a nearly absolute knowledge of the matters of Metaphrastes, to which I will add my own. If I have satisfied his doubts, it is well; if not, he will supply what is lacking.
To the most noble and erudite man, Lord Leo Allatius, his Simon Wagnereckius, S.I. In perceiving the times of the Metaphrastes, you have brought wonderful light to me...