ON THE FOLLOWING TREATISE
Already above, in book II, number 6, Chrysostom proved that a monk, when compared with a king or emperor, is more fortunate and more powerful. He demonstrates this same point throughout this entire treatise; namely, that he who devotes himself to philosophy—for this is how he frequently refers to the monastic life—is wealthier and more powerful than a king, more courageous in battle, more capable of winning men’s favor and bestowing benefits, and more blessed at the hour of death. Since, therefore, this little book treats the same subject as the three preceding ones, it has been placed here together with them A because we believe it should be numbered among the more elegant works. We have taken care to edit the Greek text, while also emending the translation of Germanus Brixius, which, though quite accurate, was nonetheless incorrect in a few places.
COMPARISON OF THE POWER, WEALTH, AND EXCELLENCE OF A KING WITH A MONK LIVING IN THE MOST TRUE AND CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY
16 A 1. When I see that most men love and admire the things that seem to be good more than those which are truly and genuinely good, I consider it necessary that we speak briefly about each, and that we now set side by side those things which are regarded with excessive zeal, as well as those things which it is important for the sake of our salvation to prize, so that we may learn to despise what is worthless. For even though the masses call the rulers of the nations blessed, as they are carried on splendid chariots and are accompanied by the shouting of criers and a large retinue, they hold the life of those who are philosophizing and those who have chosen the monastic life to be despicable. The former, when they appear, make the people turn toward them, while the latter, should they appear anywhere, draw no one’s eyes—or at least very few—to behold them; and furthermore, no one would wish to become like them, whereas everyone wishes to be like the former. And yet, though it is difficult to obtain power and rule over some nation—requiring great wealth and beyond the strength of ordinary men, as for those whose minds are gripped by the love of rule—to choose the monastic life and to surrender one’s life to the service of God is equally easy and accessible to all. Add to this that the possession of power ends with this life, or rather, I should say, it abandons those who love it even while they are still alive; and it has cast many into danger, or at least into great disgrace. But the monastic life, after having filled the just with many good things here, leads them in the end of life, adorned and rejoicing, to the tribunal of God and the Father, at which time the majority of those who have held power pay great penalties for the sins they committed in life.
Come then, and by comparing the goods of philosophy and those which in this present life appear to be the goods of power and glory, let us learn the difference between both kinds of goods; for when set side by side in this way, they will be clearer. Or rather, if it pleases you, let us compare the very pinnacle of goods—I mean, kingship—with philosophy, and let us contemplate the fruits of each possession, having learned precisely over what things the king rules, and over what things the philosopher rules. B The king, then, rules over cities and regions and many nations, overseeing commanders, prefects, armies, peoples, and senates at his own nod; but he who has surrendered himself entirely to God, and has chosen the solitary life, rules over anger, envy, greed, pleasure, and the other diseases of the soul, constantly watching and meditating on how he might not permit his soul to be subjected to base affects, nor allow his reason to serve a bitter tyranny, but always keeps his thought raised above all human things, placing the fear of God over the diseases of the soul. Such, then, is the power the king has obtained, and such is the lordship the monk has acquired; so that one would more justly call this man a king than him who is adorned with purple and a crown, sitting on a throne of gold. He is truly a king who, restraining anger, envy, and pleasure, acts in all things according to the law of God, keeping his mind free and not allowing the domination of pleasures to rule over his soul. I would gladly see such a king granting laws to land and sea, to cities, to peoples, and to armies. For whoever has set reason as the guide for the affects of the soul, he could with very little effort be set over men in accordance with divine laws, so that his subjects would hold him in the place of a father, as he makes his own character available to the cities with all gentleness. But he who, while seeming to rule over men, is yet a slave to anger, to ambition, and to pleasures, this man is in the first place ridiculous to his own subjects
A in that he wears a crown bedecked with gems and gold, yet is not crowned with self-control, and while his whole body shines with purple, he has a soul unadorned. Furthermore, he will not even know how to administer his rule; for how could he who has not been able to rule himself be able to direct others by laws?
If you desire also to see the warfare of both, you will find the one fighting against demons, and overcoming them, and conquering, and being crowned by Christ; for he enters the battle with divine assistance, fortified with heavenly armor, so that his victory is certain; B but the king, fighting against barbarians. But by how much demons are more fearful than men, by so much is he who overcomes them more brilliant than the one who conquers the others. And if you should wish to learn the cause of each war, you will find that it is not at all equal. The one fights the demons for the sake of piety and the worship of God, desiring to rescue cities or villages from error; but the other fights against barbarians for the sake of places or borders or looted wealth, or because greed and a lust for unjust power incite him to battle; where indeed many kings, in desiring greater things, have lost even what they had.
The rule, then, and the wars have shown how much they differ from each other—the king and the one who has made it his aim to live for the worship of God. One might know them accurately by observing the life and daily actions of each. For he would find truly that the one converses with prophets and adorns his soul with the wisdom of Paul, and passes continually from Moses to Isaiah, C and from him to John, and from him to another; but the king converses constantly with military commanders, prefects, and guardsmen; and the character of a person is assimilated to those with whom he converses constantly. Therefore, the monk molds his mind after the character of the apostles and prophets, but the king after the character of the generals, the guardsmen, and the shield-bearers—men who are slaves to wine, who indulge in pleasures, and who spend the greater part of the day in drinking, knowing nothing essential or good on account of the wine. Thus, therefore, for this reason also, it is fitting to bless the monastic life more than one in power, in royalty, and in scepters.
3. Nocturnal time; which is the more blessed? — And if we should wish to examine the time of the night, we shall see the monk adorning himself with the worship of God and with prayers, singing long before the birds, living with the angels, talking with God, enjoying heavenly goods; D but the man who is set over many nations and peoples and armies, and who rules over much land and much sea, stretched out on his bed and snoring. For the one is nourished by as many foods as would not require a deep sleep from the monk; but luxury lulls the other to sleep and the drinking keeps him in his bed until the very day. Thus, for the monk, there is clothing and a moderate table, and fellow diners who are athletes of the same virtue; but the king must be adorned with stones and with gold, and must have a splendid table set, and must use fellow diners who, if he be a fool, are worthy of his own wickedness, but if he has sense and is temperate, are indeed perhaps decent and just, yet far inferior to that virtue of the others. Thus, even if a king practices philosophy, he will not be able to come even a little near to the excellence of the monk.
For indeed, he is heavy upon his subjects in his travels, and settling in a city, and enjoying peace, and engaging in wars, and collecting taxes, and gathering armies, and leading captives, and conquering, and being defeated; for when defeated, he fills those who are ruled with his own evils, and when victorious, he becomes unbearable, priding himself in his trophies, and thinking highly of himself, and granting the soldiers license to seize, to plunder, to mistreat travelers, to besiege cities while sitting at his post, to pillage the houses of the poor, and to extort from those who have received them, day by day, what no law allows, under the pretext of some ancient and unlawful and unjust custom. And the king has done no harm to the rich by such evils, but he has afflicted poverty, as if truly ashamed of the well-to-do. The monk, however, is not so; but as soon as he is seen, he comes bringing a certain favor to rich and poor alike, wearing one garment throughout the year, and drinking water more pleasantly than another drinks wondrous wine; for himself he asks no favor, neither small nor great, from the rich, but for those in need he asks many and constant ones, beneficial to both—to those who give and to those who are about to receive. Thus he is a new physician to rich and poor alike, freeing the one from sins through good admonition, and relieving the necessity of the others. But the king, in ordering taxes to be lighter, benefits the rich rather than the poverty; and in doing the opposite, he harms those who have acquired little. For the harshness of the taxes would harm the rich little, but it sweeps away the houses of the poor like a torrent, filling the villages with wailing, and there is no pity for the elderly who are being taxed, nor for the widowhood of women, nor the orphaning of children, but they revel all the time, common enemies of the region, exacting from the farmers things which the earth has not brought forth.
4. The charity of the monk is greater than the royal. — Come, let us also examine this, what the monk and what the king grants to his subjects. Therefore, the one gives gold, but the other [gives] the grace of the Spirit; and the one has solved poverty, when he is good, but the other has set free souls tyrannized by demons through prayers. And if it happens that someone is storm-tossed by such calamities, he passes by the king as if he were an inanimate thing, and flees to the house of the monks, just as one fleeing from a wolf, but he flees to a man who is a hunter bearing a sword in his hand; for what a sword is to the hunter, this prayer is to the monk. For the sword is not as fearful to the wolves as are the prayers to the demons.
ADMONITION ON THE TWO BOOKS ON COMPUNCTION
At what time Chrysostom published these two books, of which the former is inscribed to Demetrius and the latter to Stelechius, he himself indicates in Book I, no. 6, where he says: *“Οτε γὰρ πρώην ἐγὼ ἐγνώκειν, τήν πόλιν ἀφεὶς, ἐπὶ τὰς σκηνὰς τῶν μοναχῶν ἐλθεῖν, etc. When I had recently determined to leave the city and betake myself to the tents of the monks, I was anxiously seeking and inquiring whence a supply of necessities might be had, etc.”* When, therefore, he wrote this, he had recently withdrawn to the monasteries; now he withdrew in the year 374 or 375. Whence it follows that in the year 375, or at the latest 376, the first book at least, addressed to Demetrius, had been issued; for if we were to assign a later time, the word *πρώην*, “recently,” would seem unable to fit.
Tillemont, who seems not to have paid sufficient attention to the passage adduced above, and who did not notice the word “recently,” thinks he observes such a great difficulty against this temporal calculation that, almost led astray, he leans toward another opinion. His words are: «We place the books on compunction among those which Chrysostom published in solitude, that we may follow those who preceded us, namely Baronius, Hermant, and Du Pin. Yet we do not sufficiently perceive by what argument induced they may have determined this; indeed, Chrysostom seems in writing this to profess himself a presbyter, when he says: *“But we, on account of empty glory and absurd ambition, have also ruined this precept, while we rashly and without examination admit corrupt, incredulous men, weighed down by six hundred vices, to the participation of the mysteries, and before they have given an accurate proof of their mind and conviction, we reveal all dogmas to them, etc.”* I know indeed that he is speaking generally here of the evils which were admitted everywhere in the Church: but would a reader or a monk speak in such a way? Hermant certainly changed his opinion for this reason, thinking that the holy man wrote this when he was teaching the people publicly, i. e., when he was already a presbyter.»
Thus far Tillemont, who, while he says he is ignorant by what argument Baronius and others were led to think that Chrysostom wrote these words in retreat and solitude, demonstrates that he did not advert to these words of Chrysostom: *“When I had recently determined to leave the city and betake myself to the tents of the monks”*; for it is seen clearer than the light that it was a little after he had determined this that he wrote these things, and indeed while he was living in retreat, as is proven as much from these words as from those that follow. But that difficulty which he brings forward from Hermant—so far from being able to overthrow so manifest a testimony—is of no substance at all. For when he says: *“But we, on account of empty glory and absurd ambition, have also ruined this precept, while we rashly and without examination admit corrupt, incredulous men, weighed down by six hundred vices, to the participation of the mysteries, and before they have given an accurate proof of their mind and conviction, we reveal all dogmas to them; and although they have not yet been able to see the vestibules, we immediately lead them into the inner shrines, etc.”*—when he says these things, I say, he is in no way testifying that he or his fellow presbyters under Flavian admitted anything similar, as anyone can see, but by a trope familiar to him, he assumes the persona of those who would admit such things. For nothing is more frequent in Chrysostom than to assume the persona—of those about whom or on whose account he is discoursing—of priests, presbyters, and not rarely even of married men. Thus in the book to a faithful father, no. 4, after he proved that they are subject to the same secular duties as the monks were, he continues: *“Therefore, since, as has been clearly demonstrated by us, we are subject to the same duties to which the monks are, let us run the easier path, and draw our children to it.”* And ibid., no. 17: *“Therefore, let us not take our children away from the contemplation of the desert before the time, but let us allow the disciplines to be more deeply impressed, and the plants to be secured by their roots.”* So generally in Chrysostom the assumption of a persona is observed. Therefore, let us not overturn the calculation of time posited by Chrysostom himself, but we must confirm even that familiar mutation of persons with a new example.
We have furthermore published a new translation, because the old one of an uncertain writer was for the most part satisfying neither, nor was it sufficiently accurate.