An Exhortatory Discourse by the Same Author

we shall not be negligent, as far as our ability permits. For perhaps it will be of some additional benefit for you to endure your present situation bravely; but if we should accomplish nothing of the sort, nevertheless, that nothing of what has fallen to us has been omitted will make us feel more at ease for the future. For the one who has fulfilled all things that he might think would lead to the resolution of the grievous things that possess him, even if he achieves nothing, is at least released from blame by his own reasoning, and having laid aside the burden of his shortcomings, he is compelled to endure only the weight of the despondency itself.

If, therefore, I happened to be one of those who are approved by God and have great power, I would not have ceased begging and entreating on behalf of the head that is precious to me; but since the multitude of my sins has deprived me of that boldness and that strength, I shall attempt to bring to you the consolation that comes through words. For indeed, in the case of those who are suffering in their bodies, while it belongs to the physicians to cause the pains to vanish and to stop the disease, those who are among the attendants do not fail to offer comfort; nay, it is these ^B who are the ones who expend most of their words upon these things, whenever they happen to be those who have authority over them. If, therefore, anything is said by us that is able to extinguish this immeasurable pain, that which we pray for has come to pass; but if we find nothing to utter of such a kind, at any rate we shall certainly be accepted for our readiness by the One who commanded through the blessed Paul to weep with those who weep and to be led away with the humble.

Stagirius is vexed by a demon.

There is also a fifth point in addition to these: to see your peers, who began this way of life with you, spending their time in cheerfulness, while you remain in the most grievous stormy-sea and still inhabit the prison, [the one] most pitiful of all. For you said that one should not weep so much for those who are bound with iron as for those who are wrapped in this chain. You also told me there was another thing in addition to these that troubled you most: for you feared for your father and trembled, lest, upon perceiving [it], he might work great terrible things against the holy men who took you in at the beginning; for, trusting in his power and his wealth, he acts as one possessed by despondency and will dare everything to strike out at those in his path. And up until the present you had been able to hide the event from your mother, and many times to deceive him when he inquired after you; but if more time passes, the mother’s pretense will be detected, and he will become unbearable to her and to the monks.

The summit of the evils is that you have no confidence even regarding the future, nor do you know clearly whether there will ever be a resolution and release from this disease, because, having expected this so many times, you have fallen back into the same things. Surely these things are enough to trouble a soul and to fill it with much turmoil—but [this is for] a soul that is relaxed, untaught, and sluggish. If we, however, are willing to look a little closer and to stir up pious reasonings, like some fine dust, we shall shake off these causes of despondency. Yet do not think that, because I stand outside of this pain and this turmoil, I am now promising these things to you with ease. For even if I seem to some to speak of unbelievable things, nevertheless I shall speak; for you yourself will not disbelieve us along with the others. For since that wicked demon leaped upon your soul at the beginning and cast you down while you were praying in the midst of everyone, I did not happen to be present (and I give thanks to the philanthropic God), but I learned everything with accuracy, as if I were present. For my friend and yours, Theophilus the Ephesian, came and recounted everything to me clearly: the twisting of the hands, the distortion of the eyes, the foam from the mouth, that abominable and inarticulate voice, the trembling of the body, the insensibility that lasted for a long time, and the dream that appeared during that night; for he said that a certain wild boar, defiled with much mire, was leaping upon you continuously and wrestling with you; and then, that the one sleeping beside you, having been disturbed by the sight, was stirred up and again found you being moved by the demon.

2. Since, therefore, he reported these things, as much as this demon occupies your soul, [so much] he has taken possession of our own heart. And when I had borne it for a long time, nothing of the terrible things in this world seemed to me...

as sweet; but although I had long since condemned the vanity of life, I suffered this all the more then, and a greater longing ^B for your affection stole into my soul. For such is the nature of grief that it is accustomed to intensify friendships, and it is evident from this that it can also easily dissolve enmities. For there is almost no one so savage or so deranged that, if he sees a friend suffering under some terrible blow, he can maintain his hatred against him. But if we pity even our enemies and regard them as friends when we see them suffering something severe and unexpected, consider, I pray you, carefully what I must have suffered and what must have been my state of mind when I heard that the one whom I love most of all, and whom I hold as dear as my own life, was being cruelly harassed and was wasting away with grief. Do not, therefore, think that we are immune to your distress or that we are merely offering you the comforts of consolation. For even though, by the grace of God, I am delivered from that disturbance and dejection caused by the demon, I nevertheless claim for myself an equal share with you in this sorrow and pain; and in this, those who know how to love as they ought will believe me. Come, then, let us shake off this dust; for this burden of grief will be bearable and light if we do not, by yielding to the illness, wish to be dragged down to the precipices, but rather [choose] to be vigilant and think about what needs to be done. For many of the things that seem most grievous, before they are examined carefully, are thought to be heavy and intolerable; but if anyone discusses them in his own mind, he will find them to be much lighter than opinion [suggests], which I do not despair will happen ^C in this case as well. But do you rouse yourself, and do not, by acquiescing to the vain and foolish opinion of the crowd, establish the enemy as stronger against us.

If, then, I were conversing with some infidel, or with those who imagine that all things are carried along by chance, or those who attribute the providence of the world to wicked demons, there would be more labor incumbent upon me, and first the erroneous opinion would have to be driven away, and then, after the truth of providence were shown, consolation would have to be applied; but since, instructed by the grace of Christ, you have learned the sacred scriptures from infancy and have received true and salutary dogmas from the succession of your forefathers, and believe without any hesitation that God has care for all things, and especially for those who are bound to Him by faith, let us omit this part and take our beginning from elsewhere.

In the beginning, when God created the angels—or rather, to carry the discourse higher: before He fashioned the angels and the rest of the celestial Powers, God existed without any beginning of being. Since He was always in need of nothing—for this is proper to Divinity—He created angels, archangels, and all the rest of the incorporeal substances. And He created them for no other reason than for the sake of His own goodness alone. For He would never have created those for whose service He had no need, unless He were supremely good. After their creation, He made man for the very same reason, and ^D having adorned this whole world with countless goods, He set him, though small and most insignificant, over all these things, establishing him on earth as [God] Himself was in heaven. For the statement, *Let us make man according to our image and likeness* (Gen. 1:26), signifies nothing else than that all earthly things were placed under his authority. When, therefore, He had placed him, thus fashioned, in such great honor, He assigned to him, as though to a king, the garden of Paradise, the most beautiful place of all earthly things. Wishing, furthermore, to show him from another aspect how much he excelled the rest of the animals in honor, He brings all of them to him and orders him to impose names upon each one; and He gives none of them as a helper to him, straightway adding the cause: *For there was not found a helper like to him* (Gen. 2:20). But when by all these things He had taught him that he was in the middle [position] of either nature, and that he himself was more honored than all and there was nothing like him, then He also creates the woman, again honoring him in this and making it manifest that He had created her also for his sake, just as Paul also says: *For man was not created for the woman, but the woman for the man* (1 Cor. 11:9).

III. Man addicted to labor

What, therefore, [did he do] after such great and singular benefits? He deemed the enemy more worthy of faith than his Benefactor, and having spurned the command of his Creator, he preferred the deceit of him who desired to destroy him entirely and to cast him out from all good things. And he preferred him, although he had obtained not even a small or a great benefit from him, and had only heard his word with his ear. But did God destroy him, showing from the very beginning and from the very starting-gates, so to speak, such signs of an ungrateful soul? For the law of justice demanded that he who, having been affected by countless benefits before, had begun his life straightway with disobedience and ingratitude, should be destroyed and removed from the midst. But God did not persist in doing him good any less than before, showing by this that even if we sin a thousand times and turn away from Him, He Himself never ceases to look after our salvation, so that if indeed we are converted, we might be saved; but if we persist in vice, He Himself is at least seen to have done what was His own. Thus, indeed, that expulsion from Paradise, the prohibition of the tree of life, and the sentencing to death seem to be the acts of one who is tormenting and punishing; yet they are the acts of one who is providing for [our] salvation no less than the former [acts]. For even if what we are saying seems miraculous, it is nonetheless most true: for those things that were being done, although they seemed contrary, were nevertheless agreeing with one another toward one concordant end. For example: that He excluded him from Paradise, that He placed him opposite Paradise, and forbade the tree of life, that He made him mortal, that He seemed for the time being to be superior in that decree—all these things, I say, and what follows from them, were done for his salvation and honor.

3. Man addicted to labor.—By what means, then, can we know that these second things were also for his benefit? If we consider what he would have suffered had these things not come to pass. What then would he have suffered? If, when the devil after the transgression promised that he would show them to be equal to God, he had remained in the same honor, he would have fallen into three of the most extreme evils. First, he would have thought God to be malevolent, a deceiver, and a liar; secondly, he would have deemed the true deceiver, the father of falsehood and malevolence, to be a benefactor and a friend; and in addition to these, he would have continued to sin immortally from that time on. But He delivered him from all these things, casting him out of paradise at that moment. For so a physician, if he neglects a wound, causes a greater rot, but by cutting it prevents the malice of the wound from proceeding further. What then? He says. He did not stop at these things, but He also added sweats and labors, because nothing is so useless to comfort as human nature. For if, even with these things imposed upon us, we do not cease from sinning, what would we not have dared if God had left us to luxury and idleness? For idleness, he says, taught every vice (Eccl. 33:29). The things that happen every day, and those that happened to our ancestors, bear witness to this argument. For the people sat down, he says, to eat and to drink, and they rose up to play (Exod. 32:6). And again: The beloved waxed fat, grew thick, and kicked (Deut. 32:15). Blessed David speaks consistently with these things, saying: When He slew them, then they sought Him, and returned and sought God early (Ps. 77:34). And God speaks to Jerusalem through Jeremiah: Be instructed, O Jerusalem, lest My soul depart from you (Jer. 6:8). And that it is for salvation that not only the wicked, but also the righteous, are humbled and bowed down, the prophet again says: It is good for me, O Lord, that You have humbled me, that I might learn Your statutes (Ps. 118:71). And after him, Jeremiah cries out these very same things, though not in the same words: It is good for a man, he says, when he bears a heavy yoke from his youth; he shall sit alone, and be silent (Lam. 3:27). And regarding himself he entreats God, saying: Do not become a stranger to me in an evil day (Jer. 17:17). And the blessed Paul, who shone so much in grace and surpassed human nature, yet even he himself needed the benefit of this good; wherefore he also said: There was given to me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me, that I might not be exalted. For this I besought the Lord thrice, and He said to me: My grace is sufficient for you; for My strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:7-9). And yet it was possible for the preaching to be established even without persecutions and afflictions and labors and sweats, but Christ did not desire this, sparing those who preached. Therefore He says to them: In the world you shall have tribulation (John 16:33). And for those wishing to walk into the kingdom, He commands them to do so through the narrow way, as if it were not possible to arrive there from any other place (Matt. 7:13). Thus afflictions and trials and the painful things that happen to us show us the care of God no less than the good things. And why do I speak of the afflictions of this life? For the threat of hell displays His loving-kindness no less than the kingdom of heaven. For if hell had not been threatened, one would not quickly have attained the good things of heaven. For the promise of good things alone is not sufficient to incite to virtue, if the fear of terrible things does not also impel those who are more sluggishly disposed toward it. For this reason He cast the first-formed man from the beginning of paradise, because the honor bestowed upon him would have made him worse, had that commandment remained unshaken and firm. And why do I speak of Adam? For what would Cain not have done while wandering in paradise and enjoying such great luxury, whereas, even deprived of these things and seeing his father's punishment before his eyes, he was not even thus sobered, but fell into greater wickedness, being the first to both invent and dare murder, and the most abominable murder of all? For he did not approach this new contagion little by little, nor in a long span of time, but he leapt at once and suddenly to the very peak, having lain in wait for and slain him who shared the same pangs of birth as himself, him who had harmed him not at all—unless he thought it an offense that he honored God. And do you, here too, observe the loving-kindness of God: for when he insulted Him, He admonishes him with words and comforts him as he is grieving; but when he went mad against his brother, then indeed He proceeds against him and inflicts the punishment. And yet even the former acts were worthy of the same punishment, or rather, of a still harsher one. For if among men, when one of the servants keeps the better things for himself and brings the inferior things to the master, it is considered a terrible thing and an insult, how much more so before God? Cain did not only sin in this, but also in another way, no less significant: that he was vexed at his brother's honor. For had he repented as one who had sinned, he would have been acceptable for this most excellent change; but as it is, the confusion was not of repentance, but of zeal and envy, as the outcome showed. For he was all but angry at God, because He did not honor him, but insulted him and preferred the profligate to the upright; yet even so, with his sins demanding so severe a punishment, He uses a measure far less than what was deserved for the offender, and attempts to calm his boiling soul. For that sadness was from anger; wherefore He also says to him: Be still. He said these things, knowing where the evil would proceed, but wishing to cut off every pretext for those who are ungrateful. For if he had been punished at the beginning, many would have said such things; for it was not possible to exhort by word, and to admonish, and to rebuke first, and only then, if he persisted in the same things, to punish! Such a punishment would have been of great cruelty and harshness. For this reason God is long-suffering toward the insults against Himself, at once silencing those men, and at the same time showing that He also educated the father of Cain out of goodness, and furthermore, that He leads those who come after to repentance through such kindness of His. And since, according to his hardness...

and impenitent heart he had stored up wrath for himself, He took vengeance on him then; but had he remained unpunished after the murder, he would have progressed to yet another, greater wickedness. Nor can we say that he committed sin through ignorance; for what the younger understood, how could the elder, who was older, be ignorant of it? But let it be that he sinned through ignorance: after he heard "Quiet," after he had obtained pardon for his former guilt, from what ignorance did he break through to parricide, and pollute the earth, and subvert the laws of nature? Do you see how even the former offense came not from ignorance, but from malice and wickedness and the ultimate audacity of crime? What then was his punishment? "You shall be groaning and trembling upon the earth" (Gen. 4:12). It seems, indeed, to be a heavy punishment; but it will no longer seem so if we consider the sin and contemplate the punishment itself more diligently. For since he had offered poorly, he took it ill that, after the injury brought upon God, he was not honored by Him; he rejected the One reproving him, and was the first to commit parricide—nay rather, a crime far more wicked than parricide: for he pierced his parents with incredible grief, and even lied to God. For, says he, "Am I my brother's keeper?" (Gen. 4:9). And for all these things he is tortured only by fear and trembling. ^B Yet I would say that the kindness of God is manifested not only from the fact that He applied a milder punishment to so great a crime, but because in the very punishment itself a profit not to be scorned appears to be contained. This profit, indeed, was that all men thereafter were warned by that very chastisement to repent from evils, and to become better. Therefore, He did not kill him for this reason: because there would surely have been no equal utility for those who heard that Cain, after destroying his brother, had been punished by death, and for seeing the parricide himself paying the penalties. For perhaps that, once heard, would have been considered impossible because of the enormity of the crime; but now, while he is seen, while he is present before us, he leaves behind many witnesses of his punishment who survive for a long time; he makes that crime certainly manifest and credible both to the men of his own age, and to all those who were to follow thereafter.

What then, you will say, did this avail him? It was looking, in the highest degree, to his own salvation, since it restrained his rage, as far as it was in him, by the chastisement of words. But not even the punishment itself that was inflicted upon him, if anyone examines it more diligently, is devoid of the greatest utility for him. For if He had killed him immediately, He would have given him no time for repentance, through which he might have turned out better: but now, living his life in fear and trembling, unless he were too senseless and a beast rather than a man, he was able to derive more benefits from such a life. Besides, the present time's punishment renders the future punishment lighter: for those punishments which are brought upon us in this life cut away no small part of the future torments by divine providence. And we can easily bring forward testimonies of these things from the divine Scriptures. For Christ the Lord, speaking to the disciples about Lazarus, related concerning Abraham that, when he was asked by the rich man to send Lazarus to drip a little water from the tip of his finger onto his burning tongue, he said to him: "Son, remember that you received your good things in your life, and Lazarus likewise evil things: but now he is comforted here, and you are tormented" (Luke 16:25). ^C Paul also (and when I say Paul, I again repeat the precepts of Christ: for Christ surely, in my opinion, was urging on his blessed soul), while writing to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 5:5), sometimes commands that he who had fornicated most gravely be delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit might be saved in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. And again, when he was admonishing the same ones concerning those who were partaking of the sacred mysteries unworthily: "For this reason," he says, "among you many are infirm and weak, and many sleep. For if we judged ourselves, we would not at all be judged: but when we are judged by the Lord, we are chastened, that we may not be condemned with this world" (1 Cor. 11:30–32). Do you see the riches of His kindness? Have you seen how God does and maneuvers everything so that, even after sin, we are either punished with a milder penalty than we deserve, or are even liberated entirely?

^D

The assaults of the devil upon us are an argument of our merit, and material for crowns. Furthermore, why God has not removed the devil from the midst.

Now if anyone inquires more curiously for what reason He did not immediately destroy that ancient seducer, he will discover that this, too, was done out of the greatest care for us. For if that wicked one ruled by force, perhaps this inquiry would be reasonable: but since, deprived of that power, he is only able to persuade and entice, and it is in our power to reject the allurements of that persuasion, why do you take away the argument of merit and cut off the material for crowns? To these things, if God had let him go knowing that he would be unconquerable and overcome everyone, not even so would there be an issue to raise. For even then, that he would obtain or conquer those who were not resisting, but were yielding and succumbing of their own accord, would surely have proceeded from us: however, for those who wish to act ungratefully, not even this would be enough. But if many indeed break his power and strength, and many likewise are going to overcome him hereafter, why do you deprive those who are to be most approved and distinguished by a most clear victory of such great honor? For He let him go for this reason: that they might overthrow him who had previously been conquered by him, which is more grievous than any punishment and will lead him to the final condemnation. But not all, you will say, are going to overcome him. What is this to the matter? For assuredly it is much more fitting that opportunities be supplied to the just by which they may show their will, and that those who are not of this sort be punished by their own negligence, than that for the sake of these, loss be brought even upon the others. For now, he who is evil—if he is harmed—is overcome not by the adversary's strength, but rather by his own sluggishness: which the multitude of the victors indicates. At that time, however, all the upright would have been defrauded of deserved honors on account of the wicked, not having—by their fault—where they might exercise their strength; just as if someone, a giver of games having found two athletes, the one indeed prepared to engage with the adversary and to show all endurance and to carry off the crown from the contest, the other preferring the idleness of that labor and luxury, taking the adversary from the midst, would send both away without action from his…

^A part. Thus, indeed, the zealous man is insulted because of the base, and that one is no longer base because of the noble, but because of his own wickedness. And although now the point being investigated by them seems to concern the devil, yet in the logical sequence, this argument, as it proceeds, will accuse and blame many things, and even the providence of God, and will vilify his entire creation. Indeed, it will accuse the design of the mouth and the eyes; for through these, in fact, many crave what they should not, and fall into adultery; while through that other source, others blaspheme and bring forth pernicious dogmas. Would it then have been necessary for men to be born without tongues and eyes because of this? We would then also have to cut off feet and amputate hands, since these are full of blood, while those run towards wickedness. But not even the ears will be able to escape the harshness of this argument; for they receive vain hearings and transmit the corruption of dogmas to the soul; so we would have to remove these as well. If this were so, [we would have to remove] food, and drink, and heaven, and earth, and sea, and sun, and light, and moon, and the chorus of the stars, and all the genera of brute animals; for where would these be useful, if the one for whom all things were made had been so piteously cut down? Do you see the mockery and the absurdity to which the argument is forced to conclude? For the devil is evil to himself, not to us; for we, if we wish, shall also reap many good things through him, albeit against his will and desire; and the wonder is even greater in this, and [it shows] the excess of God’s philanthropy. For the fact that men become better bites him, both in itself and of its own accord, and grieves him; and when this is even procured for us through him, he will not be able to bear the insult. How, then, is it procured through him? Fearing his cruelty and his continuous plots and successive machinations, we shake off heavy sleep, we are sober, we remember the Lord at all times. And that this is not my own argument, but that of the blessed Paul, listen to how he rouses the sleeping among the faithful with almost these same words. For writing to the Ephesians, he says approximately this: *Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness of this age, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places* (Eph. 6:12). He said these things, wishing to rouse them, not to cast them down. And Peter also says: *Be sober, be watchful* ^B *because your adversary the devil walks about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour; whom resist, steadfast in the faith* (1 Pet. 5:8). He said this wishing to make them more vigorous and to persuade them to have a greater intimacy with God. For one who sees the enemy standing by runs rather to Him who is able to help, and clings to Him. So too do small children, when they see one of the fearsome things, run to the refuge of their mother’s bosom, and clinging to her garments, they hold onto them securely, and though many may pull at them, they do not depart; whereas when there is nothing to alarm them, they do not even endure her when she calls and pulls them, but even spit upon her when she calls, and turn away from her, even though she is contriving many things to draw them to her, and they despise the table that is set. For this reason, many mothers, when they avail nothing by beseeching, contriving hobgoblins and phantoms, in this way manage their return, and persuade them to run back to them. This does not happen only in the case of children, but also in our own. For when the Evil One frightens and disturbs us, then we are brought to our senses, then we recognize ourselves, then with much zeal we run to God; but if he had vanished at the beginning and had been removed from the way, perhaps many would not even have believed concerning the things of the past—such as that he deceived man and cast him out of those many goods; rather, they would have said that God had done this out of envy and malice. For where, even now, there are those who dare these things after such a demonstration of his deceit, if they had not received any experience at all of that one's malice, what would they not have said, what would they not have uttered? But on the whole, if one must attend with accuracy to what has happened, the devil does not thrust us into everything; rather, he does commit many evils himself, but many [we commit] to ourselves ^C through mere sloth and contempt. For where, to return to the beginning again, did the devil approach Cain and exhort him to commit the murder? For to his mother he appears to be conversing and contriving the deceit; but here, not so, unless one were to say that he prompted the evil thoughts, and this too [was] by the fault of the one who accepted it, and was persuaded, and provided him the beginning of the assault. Yet not even so did God abandon him, but He remained, instructing and admonishing, through the very things by which He seemed to be punishing him. And why do I speak of the punishment of Cain, of one man, when even the flood, where the destruction of such men [as lived then] could show us the care of God? For first of all, He did not bring those terrible events simply or unexpectedly, but He even foretold them, and not a short time before, but a hundred and twenty years before. Then, so that they might not fall into forgetfulness and sloth on account of the length of the prediction ^D, He caused the ark to be built before their very eyes, crying out the threat of God more clearly than any voice. For Cain had already fallen from the minds of men, but that [ark], lying before their eyes, was continually stirring up the memory of the things threatened. Yet not even so were they brought to their senses, but they remained challenging and drawing the evils upon themselves. For God desired neither to threaten a flood nor to bring it, just as He did not [desire to bring] hell itself; rather, we are the causes of all these things; a fact which a certain very wise man perceived when he said: *God did not make death, nor does He delight in the destruction of the living* (Sap. 1:13). And He Himself says through the prophet: *Do I indeed desire the death of the sinner, as that he should turn and live?* (Ezech. 18:23). But when we do not turn, we bring destruction and death upon ourselves, not God, Who does not wish us to perish, and who points out the way to flee from the devil.

^A What follows, then? Shall we say that we have nothing to report regarding the flood, and that we shall find no profit resulting from it? In truth, it is impossible to say how much utility accrued from it, both to those who perished in that inundation and to those who came after. The former were hindered from advancing further into vices and shameful acts; the latter gained even greater profits than they, since the leaven—so to speak—and the very source of evils were removed from the midst, and the sinners were extinguished. For if, even without examples, men easily find evils on their own, what would they not have done had they been invited to pernicious acts by the example of many? So that this would not happen, and so that those in the future might not have so many masters of wickedness, He destroyed them all at once.

^B But who is that wise person—or rather, that foolish one—who, while wishing to perform no good deeds, scrutinizes and investigates everything so that he may attribute the cause of his own sins to God? "Unless God had permitted it," he says, "the devil would not have approached, nor would he have deceived [us] from the beginning." But without this, Adam would neither have known how great a good he possessed before, nor would he ever have abandoned that arrogance of his. For he who had raised himself to such a pinnacle of honor that he even expected to become a god—to what lengths of audacity would he not have rushed, had he not been reduced to a sound mind? Let us imagine that the devil had offered no counsel, and had spoken nothing at all to Eve concerning the tree: would they have remained without sin, had that not happened in such a way? By no means; for the one to whom the woman so easily persuaded what she wished, he, even if the devil did not exist, would have fallen into sin from himself as soon as possible, and would have deserved to be punished with a greater penalty. Furthermore, not even then was all that seduction caused by the devil alone; rather, the woman was corrupted and fell by her own concupiscence. The Holy Scripture indicates this when it says: *And the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and pleasant to the eyes to see, and beautiful to contemplate; and taking of its fruit, she ate* (Gen. 3:6). Indeed, I do not say these things now as if wishing to clear the devil of the charges of his snares, but desiring to show that, had they not fallen of their own will, they could never have been cast down by anyone. For he who so easily accepted the deceit offered to him by another is shown to have been negligent and remiss even before the deceit; for the devil would not have been able to achieve so much had he addressed a sober and vigilant soul.

There are, however, many who, being refuted in this part, leave the devil aside and pass on to the commandment, and—while refraining from the man who was waiting—they cast the blame upon God, saying: "For why did He give a commandment to those whom He knew would sin?" These are truly the words of the devil and the inventions of an impious mind. For it is plain that giving a commandment is the act of a far greater providence than not giving one. Suppose that Adam, having the inclination and an intention as negligent as the end displayed, were to receive no commandment but persist in his delights: would his feebleness and negligence, through such license, break forth toward better things or toward worse? It is surely clear that he would have reached the highest summit of vices if he were without care. For if, not yet secure in immortality, and not ignorant that this hope hung in the balance, he had been lifted into such arrogance and madness that he hoped to become a god—and this, even when he saw that the one promising it was in no way reliable—to what degree of arrogance would he not have progressed had he thought his immortality secure? What would he not have sinned? When would he have obeyed God? You, indeed, while blaming these things, are doing exactly what someone would do if he were to criticize one who forbids fornication, on the grounds that many who hear these things would proceed to fornicate. Are these not the words of extreme madness? If, when no commandment had been received, the devil had approached him and advised him to withdraw from God, he would easily have persuaded him of it. For if he so despised the one commanding after he had received the commandment, if he had heard nothing at all from Him, he would quickly have been ignorant of the fact that he was under a Master. Therefore, God early on teaches him, from those things which He commands, that he has a Master, and that he ought to obey Him in all things. And what more has come of this, they ask? Even if nothing else had followed, it should not be imputed to the God who teaches, but rather to the man who does not accept this excellent discipline. Yet not even then was the exhibition of the commandment useless, even after the prevarication. Are not those hiding places, that confession of sin, that eager shifting of the blame from the man to the woman, and from the woman to the serpent—are not all those things the actions of those who are afraid and trembling, and who are acknowledging the authority of God? Moreover, no one is ignorant of how much profit it was that they were transferred into such a state of fear from that diabolical expectation. For he who had earlier meditated on equality with God was now shrinking in such humility that he feared the punishment and the torture, and confessed his sin. Truly, not to sin without perception, and quickly to acknowledge the offense, is no small thing, but it is a certain path and a beginning leading to amendment and change for the better. Therefore, it is impossible to learn or to recount all of God's kindness toward us; nevertheless, I am about to sum up those things that we know. For after such disobedience, after such crimes, when the whole world was already being oppressed by the tyranny of sin, when the extreme penalty was already to be paid, when the whole race of mortals was to be destroyed, and the very name of humans deservedly exterminated, then truly He showed us the greatest benefit of all, delivering His Only-Begotten for enemies, for those alienated from Himself, for those who hated and opposed Him, handing Him over to death, and thus working our reconciliation, promising that He would give us the kingdom of heaven and eternal life and countless other good things, which *eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man*. What, therefore, can be compared to this providence, to this clemency, to this goodness? Therefore He Himself said: *As the heaven is distant from the earth, so are the heavens from the earth, so are My ways from your ways, and My thoughts from your thoughts* (Isai. 55:9). David also, most mild, when he was speaking of His clemency, said: *According to the height of heaven above the earth, the Lord hath strengthened His mercy upon them that fear Him; as far as the east is from the west, so far hath He removed our iniquities from us. As a father hath compassion on his children, so hath the Lord compassion on them that fear Him* (Ps. 102:11). ^{C D}

^A We know no other example of such extreme affection. And indeed, Isaiah taught something even greater than this; for, taking a mother as an example—she who is far more sympathetic toward her offspring than a father—he says this: *Will a woman forget her child, or a mother not have compassion on the offspring of her womb? But even if a woman should forget these, yet I will not forget thee, saith the Lord* (Is. 49:15), showing that God’s mercy is superior even to natural affection. These things the prophets said; but Christ Himself, speaking to the Jews, said: *If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?* (Matt. 7:11). By this He reveals nothing other than that, as great as the distance is between the good and the evil, so great is the difference between God’s providence and a father’s. And do not stop here, but go further with your mind; for this, as far as it is possible for you to hear, has been said; for where His understanding is infinite, so also is His kindness, and clearly His love for mankind. And if we do not suspect this from each of the things that come to pass, this too is a sign of His infinity. For many and great things are ordained every day for our salvation, which are known to Him alone. And because He benefits our race out of kindness, neither needing glory from us nor requiring any other reward, He lets most things remain hidden from us. But if ever He reveals them, He does this for our sake, so that, disposing ourselves gratefully, we may draw to ourselves even more of His help. Let us, therefore, give thanks to Him not only for these things we know, but also for those we do not know; for He knows how to treat us well even against our will. Paul, knowing this, exhorted us to give thanks always and in all things. ^B And that He cares not only for all men in common, but for each person individually, this also is ours to hear when He says: *It is not the will of My Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish* (Matt. 18:14), speaking of those who believe in Him. For He wills that even those who do not believe in Him should be saved by changing and believing, as Paul also says: *Who wills all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth* (1 Tim. 2:4). And He Himself said to the Jews: *I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance* (Matt. 9:13); and again through the prophet: *I desire mercy and not sacrifice* (Hos. 6:6). But when, despite having enjoyed even such care, they are unwilling to become better and to recognize the truth, not even then does He abandon them; but since they willingly deprived themselves of the heavenly life, He grants them all things that pertain to the present life, making His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sending rain on the just and the unjust, and providing all other things that contribute to the sustenance of this present life. Now if He exercises such providence for His enemies, how will He ever overlook those who believe in Him and serve Him to the best of their ability? This cannot be, it cannot be; rather, He holds them in greater concern than all others. For *the very hairs of your head*, He says, *are all numbered* (Luke 12:7).

^A 6.

That God’s promises are to be believed.

^A are. After this, they who had bought him, sold him again, not to a free man, but to a royal slave. Nor did his troubles stop there; he fell into a false accusation by his mistress, and, being condemned, he lived for many years in prison, and while others escaped, he himself remained there for a longer time. And although there were so many things that could have disturbed his soul, he nevertheless remained steadfast.

Such indeed are our own affairs—nay, they are even far more perplexing. For the things promised to us are the kingdom of heaven, and eternal life, and incorruption, and are infinite goods; but the things that happen in the meantime are very remote and alien from these: namely, death and corruption, punishment and torment, and various and frequent trials. For what reason, therefore, does God do this, and permit things contrary to his promises to happen? Doubtless, so that he may elicit two greatest goods from this: from the one, providing a most certain proof of his own power, that he is able to bring his promises, even when desperate, to a better fulfillment through hope and belief; and from the other, instructing our souls so that we may trust in him in all things, even if events seem to appear contrary to his words. For such is the strength of hope, that it never permits one who sincerely adheres to it to be confounded. For if those who received promises in this world were so remarkably affected, how much more is it necessary for us to do this, we who do not expect the outcome of goods in the present life, but in other ages. For in this present life, he has promised us pressures and anguish.

What, therefore, is it that disturbs you? By what reasoning do you hold the promises of God to be suspect? For when you say that you are neglected by him, for whose sake you have despised the whole world, you clearly show that you do not trust him, and that you hold him suspect, and consider his promise deceptive. But that is truly to be seized by a demon and to provoke the fire of hell. But there are those who, given over to the business of the world, live in quiet. And Christ also predicted this: "Amen, amen, I say to you," he says, "that you shall lament and weep, but the world shall rejoice" (John 16.20). But even in previous generations, the Babylonians, while they ignored God, flourished in wealth, power, and glory; but the Jews were oppressed by captivity, servitude, and extreme calamities. And that Lazarus (Luke 16), who was worthy of the heavenly kingdom, full of sores, was exposed to the tongues of dogs, and fought perpetually with hunger; but the rich man led his life in honor, in a frequent retinue, in rest, and in delicacies. But just as all those things did nothing to profit the rich man among the dead, so neither did hunger or sores stop Lazarus from living rightly; but like some strong athlete wrestling in the most violent heat and cold, he both conquered and was crowned.

Therefore, a wise man used to say: "My son, if thou come to the service of God, stand in justice and in fear, and prepare thy soul for temptation: humble thy heart, and endure, and make not haste in the time of clouds" (Eccli. 2. 1. 2). And after a few words: "For," he says, "gold is tried in the fire, but acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation" (Ib. v. 2). And again in another place it is written: "My son, reject not the discipline of the Lord: and do not faint when thou art rebuked by him" (Prov. 3. 11). For he who puts gold into the furnace knows how much it should be heated, and when it ought to be taken out of the fire. And therefore he here says: "Make not haste in the time of clouds": and Solomon, teaching this very thing, says: "And do not faint when thou art rebuked by him." ^B Great, truly, I say, great is the pressure for making a man notable and for teaching the virtue of patience. What then, you will say, if its magnitude overturns and casts us down? "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it" (1 Cor. 10. 13). For if correction comes from love, and abandonment from hatred, it is not the nature of the same person to both love and hate, nor to correct and abandon at the same time. How then, you say, have many fallen? They deprived themselves of God, but were not abandoned by God. "For behold," he says, "they that go far from thee shall perish" (Psalm [LXXI. 27]). They do not endure his discipline, but are angry and indignant; and like perverse children, when handed over by their parents to teachers, either impatient of the labor or fleeing the lashes, they turn away from the sight of their parents, they gain nothing from it, but entangle themselves in more serious inconveniences, and are forced in a foreign land to undergo the hardships of hunger and error and diseases and ignominy and servitude: so also those who do *not* bear the discipline of God with a grateful heart, and are indignant and take it grievously, besides the fact that they gain nothing from it, inflict upon themselves the greatest calamities. Therefore we are admonished to tolerate it, and to direct our heart.

But you will say that you suffer much worse things. Not even trainers of boys exercise everyone equally and in the same way, but they hand over the weak to the weak, and those like themselves to the strong. For he who has encountered a weaker opponent for his own strength, even if he wrestles with him the whole day, yet remains unexercised. Why then, you will say, does he not make all who have chosen the same life struggle with the same labors? Because there is not one kind of exercise before God, nor do all have need of the same, even if they are in the same kind of life; indeed, although many labor with the same inconveniences of diseases, they do not need the same medicines, but some are applied to these, others to those. And thus even the modes of scourges are various and different; and one is tried by a long-standing disease, another by the most severe poverty, another by force and injury: the constant and perpetual deaths of children and relatives and others rack this one, and he is cast off by all, and is esteemed worthy of nothing: that one is accused of things of which he is conscious of nothing, and bears the weight of a bad reputation: and another is afflicted in another way. For it is not possible to enumerate all things now to a nicety. But these single things—if they were to be compared with your own hardships—would seem light and nothing to you; but if you had experienced these, you would certainly learn that that which now torments you is more tolerable than all these. ^C But even if there are some whose chastisement is lighter than ours, let us not be disturbed for that reason: for the addition of labors is an increase of rewards and our most firm safeguard, relying upon which we may never fall, either willingly or even unwillingly: for it compresses the swelling, lest it be carried into pride, and turns away sloth, and brings [to senses]... ^D

makes us more cautious. And, in short, if one were willing to enumerate everything, you would find many profits in temptations; and there is no one among those who have great importance before God who is without affliction, even if it does not appear so to us. ^A Since the blessed Paul endured so much hardship, and no one is greater than him, nor even his equal, how is it possible that they [others] should not have need of this assistance? But if some were not brought to their senses even by these afflictions, this is no longer due to the cause of Him who brought the discipline, but to the negligence of those people. If the medicine had not been applied, they would have been considered to have perished through neglect; but now, it is no small thing that the physician is not blamed, but rather the sufferers and their own inattention. But if some, while walking uprightly before the temptations, fell after their introduction, and others, having run through every form of wickedness, experienced no affliction at all, while others from their earliest age until their final breath have continued being worn down by myriad calamities, let us not be disturbed by any of this ^B nor let us fall. For if, being able and obliged to know the providence of His dispensation, we were ignorant of these things, we ought to be disheartened and troubled; but if even he who was a partaker of so many mysteries, and who had ascended to the third heaven, became dizzy before this abyss, and looking down into the depth of the riches and the wisdom and the knowledge of God, was merely struck with amazement, and immediately withdrew, why do we vainly beat ourselves, inquiring into the unsearchable and seeking to trace the untraceable? And as to a physician, we will not speak against him when he often orders things contrary to what appears beneficial to us, and commands us to subject an inflamed limb to a fountain of water, and does many other such paradoxical things; but since we have previously persuaded ourselves that he does this according to the reasoning of his art, we yield with readiness, even though he might often fail; yet shall we question God, who stands so far removed from us in all things, who is Wisdom itself, who never fails? And if it were necessary to demand accounts, we would trust in Him simply, yet Him whom we ought to trust in alone, we demand justice and accounts from, concerning the things that are done, and we are vexed at our ignorance? And is this the mark of a pious soul? No, I beg and beseech you, do not let us go to such a pitch of madness, but in all matters where we might be perplexed, let us say this: Thy judgments are a great abyss (Ps. 35:7). For indeed, this very thing is a part of God’s wisdom, that we do not know everything clearly. For if we were persuaded by God because we knew the causes of what is happening, our reward would not be great, nor would the matter be a demonstration of faith; but when we know nothing of these things and yet are content to yield to all His commandments, and to show forth genuine obedience and sincere faith, we profit our souls most greatly. For we ought to be convinced of one thing only: that everything is brought upon us by God conveniently; but we ought no longer to seek the manner [of it], nor, being ignorant, to be vexed or disheartened. For it is neither possible to know these things, nor is it beneficial—the one because we are mortals, the other because we are quickly lifted up into arrogance. We do many things that seem to our children to be harmful, yet are nevertheless beneficial; and neither do they deem it necessary to learn the cause, nor do we, before first persuading ourselves that what is being done is beneficial, go on to do it, but to this point alone do we instruct them: to yield to whatever their parents command, and to seek nothing further. Then, towards parents, who are of the same nature as ourselves, we will be disposed in this way and will not be indignant, yet towards God, whose distance from us is as great as between God and men, shall we be vexed because we do not know everything? And what could be equal to this impiety? ^C For against such as these the blessed Paul, indignant, said: Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? (Rom. 9:20). And I indeed used the example of children, but he set forth one much greater than this, namely that of the potter, and of the clay being molded by him. For just as the clay follows wherever the hands of the one forming it lead, so also must man follow wherever God commands, and receive with thanksgiving whatever He brings upon him, saying nothing against it, nor inquiring curiously in order to learn. For these things are not difficult [only] to us, but also to those holy and admirable men before us. For Job said: Wherefore do the wicked live, are they become old in riches? (Job 21:7) and the rest. And the blessed David: My feet were almost gone, because I was jealous of the lawless, looking upon the peace of sinners; because there is no turning back in their death, and firmness in their scourging; they are not in the labors of men, and they shall not be scourged with men (Ps. 72:2–5). And after him Jeremiah also said: Righteous art thou, O Lord, yet I will speak judgments with thee. Why does the way of the wicked prosper? (Jer. 12:1). These men truly were questioning and seeking, but not on equal terms with the wicked, nor accusing God, nor condemning His justice from the things that were happening. For the one said: Thy righteousness is as the mountains of God; thy judgments are a great abyss (Ps. 35:7). And the other, having suffered so much, says that he gave no foolishness to God, and in the middle of the book he said, explaining the incomprehensibility of His wisdom and economy, since he had discussed creation: Lo these are parts of his way, and we shall hear a drop of a word in him (Job 26:14). But Jeremiah, foreseeing this very thing, lest anyone might ever suspect [him], puts his own judgment before the question, saying: Righteous art thou, O Lord; that is, I know that all things are done righteously by Thee, but I do not understand the manner according to which it is done. What then? Did those men learn anything more? ^D Nay, they did not even obtain an answer concerning these things; which the blessed David also declares, saying: And I thought to understand, that this is the labor before me (Ps. 72:16). But they did not obtain an answer, in order that they might instruct those after them not to ask. And they indeed sought only this, why the wicked live in abundance of all things...

^A and prosperity, and even so they did not learn; yet these men now inquire into matters far more numerous than those. For the things which are now proposed are much more serious. Therefore, let the clear rationale for these things be entrusted to Him who knows all things before they come to pass.

If, however, it is necessary that we also devise a solution and consolation for those who are seeking, from things already known to us, I say this for the sake of those who are so curiously investigating these matters: that it is no longer worthy to ask why the good remain in pressures, while the wicked remain in rest, now that the heavenly kingdom has been revealed and the reward of the age to come has been shown to us. For since in that life each shall receive what is worthy of his merits, why are we disturbed now by those things which happen here to the good or to the bad? For God, as if they were very strong athletes, exercises those who cleave to Him with labors of this kind, but the weaker and slower, and those who are able to bear none of the hard labors, He urges ^B towards good works. But if the contrary happens sometimes, and many of the just live their life here in rest and with honor, while the wicked persist in ignominy and the greatest adversities, the former objection, which used to complain that the good are afflicted while the wicked are always in luxury, is defeated and destroyed by this rationale. But if we also wish to inquire into the cause of this matter, I would certainly say this: that God is not accustomed to govern all our affairs in one way, but, being endowed with an abundance of resources, He paves many ways for us toward salvation. And so, because there are many who persistently refuse to admit the doctrine of the life to come and of the resurrection, He shows here, as it were in a short table, an image of the future judgment, when He punishes the wicked and rewards the good. And since that is to happen generally in that supreme judgment, it is brought about even now in some measure, so that those who have slipped in their hope concerning that far-off judgment might, by being admonished by the things that happen in this age, become more gentle and better. For if no wicked person were punished here at all, and no good person honored, very many of those who do not believe in the resurrection would flee from virtue as if it were the cause of evils, and would pursue vice as if it were the cause of ^C goods; if, on the other hand, each received here according to his merits, they would consider the doctrine of judgment to be superfluous and false. And so, lest it not be believed, and lest the vast and common crowd become worse through contempt, He avenges many sinners here, and rewards some for their right actions, so that from the fact that He does not do it in all things He might assert the faith of the judgment, and from the fact that He affects even some wicked people with punishments before the judgment, He might awaken those buried in the deepest sleep. For from the punishment of the wicked, very many are corrected by fear, lest they suffer the same things; from the fact, however, that it is not rendered here to everyone according to his merit, they are compelled to think that rewards of this kind are reserved for another time.

Why God does not punish everyone here.

Why many are afflicted for their whole life.

do these things during the time of the demon’s possession, but after that madness has subsided. For they overeat, steal, get drunk, and do things far more shameful than these. Just as, therefore, in the case of evildoers, the judge permits most of them to live in prison for a long time, so that they often even end their life there, but when he wishes to admonish others from the crowd, he takes one or two from them, and having seated them on high on the judgment seat, with everyone standing around, he thus commands that they be led to death, and there is no need for all the wicked to be punished for the sake of the fear of the rest; so too with God, it is not necessary when He wishes to discipline us that He act toward all the wicked, but having taken some from among them, whom He knows possess no hope of correction, He demonstrates His power and His wrath, accomplishing much from this. For both the wicked are thus exhorted to a change of wickedness, if they should wish, and the good are made more attentive, and He demonstrates His own long-suffering, and the teaching concerning the resurrection, which I previously said, He makes manifest to all.

What, then, you say, are these things to those who in calamities have been raised throughout their whole early childhood, and have breathed their last before arriving at discerning good or evil? And what terrible thing do they suffer, tell me, not yet having the perception of what they suffer, nor having learned to grieve and to rejoice? I, however, do not resolve this matter by this alone, but because their parents and brothers and relatives were brought to their senses by such calamities; and this is no small gain, that from those things for which another has been wronged in no way, another should be greatly benefited. It is likely too that there is some other unspeakable cause, manifest only to the Creator of all.

9. Why some sin after affliction

9. One argument still remains: why ever those who walk the straight path fell after the testings. Who, then, truly knows those who walk the straight path, except Him who fashioned our hearts alone, and who understands all our deeds? For many who seem to be righteous are often more wicked than all others. And this has already been demonstrated both in the present life, but only in the case of some, when some circumstance or necessity arises. But when He who proves the hearts and reins, the living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, who penetrates to the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, the judge of the thoughts and intents [Hebr. 4.12], sits to judge us, then indeed, you will see not just a few from the many, but all such people exposed; and neither will a sheep’s skin be able to hide the wolf, nor the whitewash [hide] the filth within the tomb. For there is no creature invisible before Him who judges then, but all things are naked and opened to His eyes; which Paul signifying writes to the Corinthians: Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts [1 Cor. 4.5].

But so that we might leave aside the hypocrites and come in our discourse to those who live rightly, whence is it clear, if other things have been accomplished by them, that the primary point of goods, humility, has been neglected? And because of this, God left them, so that they might learn that they did not accomplish those things by their own power, but by the grace of God. If anyone should say that it is better to be raised up while accomplishing things than to fall and be humbled, such a one is very ignorant of the damage of arrogance and the gain of humility. For know well that a man accomplishing things with pride, if indeed this is accomplishing anything at all, will quickly fall into the ultimate destruction. And he who is permitted to slip, and has learned modesty from the fall, will both rise and regain himself more quickly, if he should wish; but he who seems to be doing well with arrogance, while suffering nothing terrible, will never receive perception of his own transgression, but will even increase the evil, and will escape by departing from here empty; just like that Pharisee [Luc. 18.10], who went up thinking he was rich in all good things, but went down having learned that he was poorer than the tax collector.

There is also another type which possesses great strength to empty out the good things gathered with many sweats and toils: the wind of vainglory. For just as wind, truly, having entered, blows out all the treasures of virtue. Behold, therefore, a second reason has appeared to us for those who walk the straight path, as you said. For many among us, who seem to have endured many labors for the sake of virtue, and who were enduring them, since they were looking toward the honor from men, and were not doing everything for God, were permitted to fall into trial, so that, having been deprived of the glory from the many for the sake of which they were deprived of everything, and having learned the nature of it, that it exists as nothing better than the flower of the grass, they might attend to God alone for the future, and do everything because of Him.

And there are other reasons besides these, far more than these, to us indeed invisible, as I have said, but known to God who made them. Let us not, therefore, be distressed at what is happening, but let us give thanks; for this is the mark of grateful servants. But you, wondering why not sooner, when you were living in luxury and were surrounded by worldly pretense, but now, when you have cast all those things away, and have dedicated yourself wholly to God, then this filthy one suddenly rushed [at you], you behave similarly to how you would if you wondered why, when no one molests the spectators, yet for the one who has registered to box, and has trained, and has entered the contest, for this one alone of all, the antagonist comes, striking the head and bruising the face. This is not at all wonderful nor worthy of despondency, if, because we have chosen to box, he oppresses and distresses and loads us; for this is the law of boxers; but if he overthrows and casts down and takes away the prize, this is the terrible thing. But as long as he is not able to do this, he has not only harmed nothing, but has even benefited us greatly by making us more dignified through the fierce struggle. For even in the camps, he is the best of all who has many wounds to show, and who has undertaken single combats against the more vigorous of the enemies; and we admire the athletes who grapple with the "unconquerable" [this is what they call the more contentious of the antagonists]; and that hunter is most of all a hunter who is held fast, who undertakes the catching of the beasts that are hard to capture. Impudent and fearless is [this demon].

447 S. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM, ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE

and I for this reason do not cease to wonder and to be amazed that, having encountered such a violent antagonist, you have not collapsed, nor endured to come to surrender, but have remained unbending, yielding in no part to his wickedness. ^B But that I say these things now not to flatter you, but that you might truly reap the greatest rewards from this affliction, allow me to use boldness in speaking; for I could not otherwise furnish proof of this matter. You surely know and remember your former manner of life which you led before this kind of temptation. I would wish that you diligently examine this, and compare it with the present life you live; you will see surely how much gain you have obtained from this conflict. For now you apply yourself most intently to fasts, vigils, reading, and perpetual prayers, and have obtained gravity and humility in an excellent degree; previously there was no account of books for you, but you had devoted all your study and labor to the trees of your orchard. I heard many at that time who, rebuking you, called you arrogant and proud, and in this part imputed [the blame to] the nobility of your lineage, the brilliance of your father, and the fact that you had been raised in great wealth; as for vigils, however, how negligent you were then, you yourself know better. For often, while others were rising at deep night, you yourself were sleeping, buried in heavy slumber, and when others would wake you, you were indignant. But now, since you have undertaken this war and battle, all those things have been dissolved and changed for the better. But if you should ask of me why, when you were living in luxuries and were entirely intent upon worldy affairs, God did not send this dæmon upon you then, I shall answer that this also was done by His providence. For He knew then that you were weak, easily overcome, and would soon perish. And therefore He did not call you to this struggle immediately when you had come to the life of the monks, but He allowed you first to be exercised and to spend a long time [in preparation]; but after you had become most robust, then He drew you to this laborious stadium. You still, therefore, make mention of those who are in the world, and you bring your servant into our midst; for I think that you intended to signify him when you said that many secular men, when they had fallen into this disease, were quickly and most completely liberated. But your servant, O most beloved, and as many as have undergone the same mishaps, have not ^C struggled with this kind of evil for the same cause as you do now. For upon them, and upon others like them, God sent this beast only for the sake of terrifying them, that through such fear they might become better; but to you, [He sent it] that you might fight bravely and strenuously and win, and carry off for yourself the crown of patience. Moreover, there is victory then—not when one, while the theater is still standing, withdraws himself from his adversary by struggling, but when he always offers himself to the wrestler prepared for the contest, so that the adversary, suggesting absurd thoughts because of [your] sorrow, can accomplish nothing. And that the matter so stands, I thus properly conclude. It is clear surely to all, however much you through humility debase yourself, that your life differs most significantly from that of your servant, and is superior: it is necessary, therefore, that God has a greater care for you than for him. Since this is patent, that also will be similarly clear: namely, that if that permission [of the trial] were a matter of hatred, He would surely never have increased it upon him whom He loved the more, after He had so quickly snatched away from the dæmon him who had been by far the worse. Nor would I assert this from this alone, but from those things by which you think yourself to be deserted by God, from those I shall attempt to show most of all that His care for you is supreme. For if you had not done all things most studiously hitherto, if you had not undertaken long journeys, that you might encounter those holy men most powerful in solving such bonds, perhaps some would have rightly doubted, since the cause for which He left you [in this state] for so much time did not appear clear enough; but after you went often to the places of the martyrs, where many of those also who were devouring men have often been healed, and you spent much time among those wonderful and most strenuous men, who had never attempted a cure in vain, and you omitted nothing at all which might be seen in any way to be able to contribute to this liberation, and you returned carrying the enemy with you—you have brought back a clear and most certain proof of divine providence concerning you, manifest even to those who are very foolish. For God would surely never have hindered such grace, nor would He have allowed His own servants to be so covered with shame, unless He had known that it would be vehemently expedient for both your probation and your utility. And so, what seems to be a sign of divine abandonment, that is an argument of His supreme affection and love for you.

OF THE SAME TO STAGIRIUS, THAT SORROW IS MORE GRIEVOUS THAN THE DÆMON HIMSELF. BOOK TWO.

^D It should suffice to have said that He is not turning away, nor hating, but rather loving you very much, and that He trains you in this way. But since you have complained that you are vehemently tormented also from another side, because the dæmon often tries to persuade you to snatch away your life either by the sea, or by a precipice, or by some other kind of death, come, let us discuss also these kinds of thoughts briefly. For that counsel is not of the dæmon alone, but also of sorrow: or rather, more of sorrow than of the dæmon, or perhaps indeed of sorrow alone. That this is so is surely clear, because many, even those free from this kind of harassment, deliberate about these things from grief alone. This, therefore, drive out and utterly eliminate from your mind, and he will have no strength henceforth for him, not only to persuade you of these things, but not even to suggest them. For indeed, just as those who dig through walls, in the time of night, with the light extinguished, can both steal wealth and slay the masters of these things with great ease…

so also this one, having poured out dejection instead of night and darkness, attempts to steal away all those reasonings that might be for our protection, in order that, having taken the soul desolate and destitute, he may pierce it with countless wounds. But when anyone has dispelled this darkness with hope in God, and has taken refuge in the Sun of righteousness, and hastens to place those rays within his own soul, he will transfer the tumult from his own reasonings onto the robber. For indeed, those who perpetrate such things, ^A when someone convicts them and shows the light, they tremble, they become dizzy, they are disturbed. And how, you say, could one be delivered from this pain, without first being delivered from the demon that stirs it up? It is not the demon who moves the dejection, but rather that which makes the demon strong and suggests evil reasonings. And the blessed Paul would bear witness to us in this matter; for he was not fearing any demon, but the excess of this [dejection] when he wrote to the Corinthians to spare the one who had offended, lest such a one be swallowed up by the excessive grief. But if you wish, let us for the moment assume in our argument that the demon is pressing down, and the dejection has been banished from your soul: what harm will there be henceforth? What could he, by himself, being small or great, do to injure us? Yet that [dejection], even if he himself were not present, would work many terrible things. And we shall find that the greater number of those who have fastened the noose, or have perished by the sword, or have been choked in rivers, or have destroyed themselves in some other way, were pushed by dejection to these violent deaths. And if some of those who are demon-possessed were among these [victims], yet even their destruction is not to be reckoned to the demon, but to the tyranny and violence of the dejection. And how is it possible, you say, not to be dejected? If, having departed from the opinion of the many concerning this matter, you think on things above. For now, since the matter is considered terrible by the many, it seems so to you as well; but if you should wish, having been delivered from vain and misguided prejudice, to look at it carefully by itself, you will find it contains no cause for dejection, as has already been often demonstrated to us. And concerning your contemporaries (for I think that, seeing their cheerfulness and their boldness towards your brethren, you are confounded and cast down), I would say this: that if, while they were living in temperance and modesty and the rest of the philosophy of life, you were spending all your time in brothels and dice and revelries, the excuse for dejection would have some ground. But if you are still walking the very same path as they, what is it that grieves you? For I, if my speech were towards some other of those who are easily elated, I would have kept silence on these things that I am about to say to you; but since I have great confidence that, even if someone should praise and admire you with ten thousand praises, you will never cease from being moderate, but will remain even so in the lowest [place], ranking yourself among the last, I will say everything without holding anything back. For I hear that your progress in piety has become so great that your rivalry is no longer with those youths, but with the great and admirable men. For they say that you fall short of them in nothing, not in the account of fasting—(for how could you, being nourished only on water and bread, and that every other day?)—nor in the time of the all-night vigils, but in the same way as they, one after another, you pass many sleepless nights. And regarding your conduct during the day, they say that you have already eclipsed many of them. For I hear those coming from there relating that all your time is consumed in prayers and tears; and just as those who practice silence, or who have shut themselves up alone in a small chamber, speak nothing to anyone, so they say you continue to live even while moving about in such a crowd. And they have shuddered while recounting the contrition of your heart, and your dryness, ^B and the pain, and many have been touched here by the report of your condition; "He does not look at," he says, "any of those who enter there, nor does he relax himself from the continuous toils; we have often feared lest he should blind his eyes with the wailings, lest he should strike his brain with the intensity of the lack of sleep and the unyielding and continuous zeal for reading."

2. Therefore, these things grieve and disturb you—that you have so surpassed your contemporaries, that while having a fierce and shameless antagonist, you have by a great measure outstripped those who run with you. Was I not saying with reason that this dejection is only prejudice, and when examined, provides us with many grounds for cheerfulness? For what advantage, tell me, is there in not being demon-possessed, when one’s life is neglected? And what harm is there in being demon-possessed, when the matters of one's conduct happen to be carefully ordered and well established? But perhaps you are ashamed and you blush when he casts you down in the presence of some people? But this happens to you again from the same presupposition—that you have entrusted the matter to the opinion of the many, and never to reason. For falling is not this thing which you say you suffer, but rather the falling into sin; it is appropriate to be ashamed and to suffer pain at this fall. But now, we are cast down over matters that contain no shame, yet those things that are truly shameful and full of much laughter and final punishment—seeing these things, we consider that we suffer no harm. But while the soul is falling every day under the operation of sins, there is no one who mourns; but if ever this body of yours suffers something, it seems to be terrible and unbearable. Is this not what it means to be demon-possessed, to have the soul so disposed and to be mistaken in the judgment of things? For if you were suffering this through drunkenness, it would be necessary to be cast down and to be dejected, for the crime would be of one's own choice; but if the matter is of another's violence, one should be ashamed not for the one being harassed, nor for the one enduring the violence, but for the one doing it. For if, in the market, when a fight has occurred, one pushed the other and cast him down, we all blame the one who cast down, not the one who fell. It is good to blush, but only when we do some of those things that bring punishment to us before Him who will judge us at the coming age. But as long as we are conscious of nothing of the sort in ourselves, for what cause do we hide our faces? For if someone, having taken you alone, were simply beating you and having nothing of which to accuse you, or again were casting you down to the ground, and you, having endured everything with gentleness, departed, it would not be a matter of shame, but of philosophy and the greatest praises.

And what could be more irrational than this contradiction? For if, rising from that fall, you were led to do or to say any base thing, I myself would not forbid you to lament and grieve over these things; but if you endure everything with thanksgiving, and immediately turn yourself to prayer, what is it that could bring you shame or confusion? Yet perhaps the reproaches cast upon us by others are judged to be grievous and painful things.

Quinam vere daemoniaci

III. That if you wish to know who are truly worthy of confusion and reproach

IV. And concerning the father and your fear

I have no certain word to say about these matters on my own account, nor can I declare what is to come; but this I know clearly, and I ask that you yourself be persuaded of this, that whichever of these may come to pass, it will be for our benefit; and if you are so disposed, you will quickly beat back the climax, as you call it, of these evils. ^A Furthermore, one must consider this: that the time for rewards and crowns is the age to come, while the time for struggles and sweats is the present. The blessed Paul, wishing to make this evident to us, said: "So I run, not as uncertainly; so I fight, not as one beating the air: but I chastise my body and bring it into subjection, lest perhaps when I have preached to others I myself should become a castaway" (1 Cor. 9: 26, 27). But when he had arrived at the end of his struggle, he at length uttered that blessed voice: "I have fought the good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: as to the rest, there is laid up for me a crown of justice" (2 Tim. 4: 7), showing that our whole life must be lived in struggle and labor if we are to enjoy the eternal rest and those myriad good things. If anyone, being slothful, should wish to enjoy the pleasures here as well as the rewards laid up for those who labor there, he is deluding and deceiving himself. For just as among athletes, one who seeks comfort during the time of the contests brings shame and disgrace upon himself for all time, while one who courageously endures every labor in the stadium enjoys crowns and glory and praise, both during the contests themselves and after they are resolved, from the spectators: so it is also for us. He who makes the time of labor a time of ease, when it is the time for that ageless rest, will then weep and gnash his teeth and will suffer the ultimate torments; but he who courageously endures afflictions here will be bright and glorious both here and there, with glory that is immortal and true. For if in worldly affairs one who confuses the timing of events will fall short of all that lies before him and will cover himself with myriad misfortunes, much more will he who does not know the order of times suffer this in spiritual matters. Christ said: "In the world you shall have distress" (John 16: 33). The blessed Paul says: "And all who desire to live piously in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" (2 Tim. 3: 12), not speaking only of persecutions from men, but also of the stratagems of the demons. Job said: "The life of man upon the earth is a trial" (Job 7: 1). Why then are you troubled while being afflicted during the time of trial? ^B For then we should have had cause to grieve, if we were making the time which Christ foretold for distress, a time of luxury and rest; if, when we were commanded to struggle and labor, we had become relaxed; if we were walking the broad road, when He commanded us to walk the narrow one. For so it would have been necessary for us to be punished in those ages to come. What then, you say, would you say to those who walk with breadth even here, and are to rest there? And who is this? For I am persuaded by the word of Christ alone, the one who says, "Narrow and strait is the way that leadeth to life" (Matt. 7: 14); and that it is impossible to walk in width through the strait way is surely evident to everyone. For where in outside contests no one has bound on a crown without sweats, and this while having antagonists who are of the same nature, where hostile powers rise up against us, how is it possible to prevail without distress and straitness against the madness of these?

5. But why for so long do we examine these things by reasonings, when it was possible to take refuge in the blessed and noble athletes who lived in former times? Examine all those renowned at that time, and you will see that all of them had boldness before God because of their afflictions. And if you will, let us come to the first child of the first-created, the lamb of Christ, Abel, who had done no wrong, yet endured the most terrible of things. For we pay the penalties for sins, the trials; but that righteous man was punished for no other reason than that he was righteous. And as long as he did not show anything great, his brother knew him; but when he shone forth from his sacrifice, he did not even acknowledge the nature itself, being blinded by envy. Wherefore do you know if even now the same cause excited the devil, and the brightness of your life called him forth to this combat? But if you laugh at these words of mine, I praise your humility, but I will not cease to be so disposed. For if he, by offering fat, was so approved, he who offered not anything external, but his whole self to God, would much more provoke the enemy against himself. But God allowed him to attack; for not even then did He prevent the murder from happening, but He allowed the righteous man to fall into the hands of the murderer, and did not rescue the one who was being destroyed for His sake and for the honor due to Him; for He did not wish that He be deprived of his crowns; for this reason He let him run until the end. And what kind of punishment is death? he says. Would that I had endured this penalty now. These things you say, my beloved, now, but before all this, the matter seemed most difficult, and more pitiable than any punishment. Wherefore also in the law of Moses those who had done the greatest wrongs, and such as were worse than pardon, underwent this punishment. And among outside lawgivers even now all who are convicted of the most shameful evils are punished in no other way; but nevertheless the righteous man suffered the same things as the lawless, or rather even much more severe, inasmuch as he received the blow from a brotherly hand. But what of Noah? For he too was righteous and perfect, and while all were corrupted, he alone pleased God, all the others having offended Him. He endured myriads of afflictions, many and evil. For he did not die immediately like that other, nor did he suffer this, which seems light to you, but he endured a long life, for so many years being burdened by heavy weight, and throughout being in no better condition. And this I will immediately make manifest to you, having first said this. For a whole year this man inhabited a prison, a strange and fearful prison. For I will pass over the multitude of beasts and reptiles with whom he lived for so long a time in such...

^A straitened circumstances; what do you imagine his spirit endured amidst such roaring of thunder and storms? For the lower abyss was being rent asunder, while the upper was being discharged with immense force, even while he sat within, alone with his children. And although he trusted in the end, strictly speaking, he was almost dead from fear at the vehemence of what was happening. For if we, who possess homes built securely on the earth and inhabit cities, when we see rain descending even a little more violently than usual, collapse and are constrained by fear, what must he be estimated to have suffered, when he was alone inside, and was considering that horrific abyss and the various kinds of creatures that were being suffocated? Finally, to see a single city, or even a home, swallowed up by a flood and covered by waves is enough to induce the greatest terror in the soul; but when the entire world suffered this, it is impossible to say what the state of mind of that man was, as he was carried around in the midst of the waves. He therefore spent that whole year in such fear.

When, however, the deluge finally ceased, the agitation subsided little by little, but his sorrow increased; and another storm, no less than the former, welcomed him as he emerged from the ark, when he looked upon that horrifying solitude, that violent death, and the bodies of those killed, mixed with silt and mud, and all men together, and beasts, and the other less noble kinds of living creatures, buried in one single miserable tomb. For even though they who had suffered such things were exceedingly sinful, yet Noe was human, and he could not but pity his fellow men. For Ezechiel himself, though being righteous and knowing the Israelites to be most wicked of all, yet when he saw them being slaughtered and falling, suffered this same thing and wept, even though God had before revealed all their impiety to him and had set it before his very eyes to be looked upon, so that when he saw them being punished, he might endure that calamity with fortitude. But yet, although he had been prepared with such ^B consolation of foreknowledge, he was nevertheless so tormented by their disasters, and in his collapse he cried out: "Woe is me, Lord, are you destroying the remnants of Israel?" (Ezech. 9, 8)—and he did not suffer this only once, but a second time when he saw Jechonias slain. And so, although Noe knew that their crimes were countless, he was not stronger than Ezechiel or Moses; for he too often suffered the same as the prophet. Seeing the Hebrews sinning, he felt pity for them most of all when they were about to be punished, and he was more tormented than those who were being punished. But in the time of Noe the calamity was far heavier; for such a death was brought upon them alone.

Therefore, when he was being pressed by so many evils—solitude, the misery of his own race, the multitude of the perishing, the manner of death, the desolation of the whole earth—and when sorrow was increasing on every side, which shook him most violently, the insult of his son was added, a thing indeed intolerable, of unbelievable shame and grief. For as the reproaches of friends are more grievous than those of enemies, so injuries received from children are even more intolerable than those. For when he saw him whom he had begotten, whom he had nurtured, whom he had schooled, for whose sake he had endured so many labors and pains and cares, treating him more insultingly than the others, he could not bear the pain of soul. For insult is indeed intolerable to a free man, both in itself, and if it should come from one's own children, it turns into a stupor of the soul, ^C as being most atrocious. I would have you consider not only that crime, but from it itself conjecture how insultingly he had held his father in the entire time before. For he who still had the terror of such a disaster present, and had lately emerged from that prison, and was seeing the calamity of the whole world, and yet had not been improved even then, but was subjecting him whom he least of all should have to insults, not having become better either by the death of infinite mortals, nor by solitude, nor by the anger of God, nor by any other of those things which had then happened—what kind of man was he before the flood, when he had many who would encourage him to vice? For then, truly, then that righteous man endured more troublesome waves than were those which occurred later in the flood, both on account of his son and on account of all the others. For in the deluge, only the multitude of the waters was narrowing him, but before the deluge he was being compressed on all sides by an abyss of wickedness, and was being struck more vehemently than by waves by the plots of the wickedest men. For, left alone in such a multitude of wicked and flagitious men, even if he suffered nothing else, he nevertheless endured very many mockeries and sneers nearly every day—and this, if not before, then most especially when he was speaking to them about the ark and the future disasters. But what power this has to disturb souls, Jeremiah, who was sanctified from his mother's womb, testifies, who on this account was intending to abandon prophecy itself. "For I said," he says "I will not prophesy" (Jer. 20, 9). Furthermore, this alone, that there was no one with a soul like his, and no one conforming to his own morals—how much boredom, how much sorrow do you imagine he had poured upon him? And he was not tormented for that reason only, but from pity for them he suffered countless tortures. For righteous men do not mourn only when they see the wicked dying, but also when they see them sinning; indeed, they are tormented by this much more than by that, which can be perceived most easily from the prophets. For one of them lamenting bitterly says: "Woe is me, my soul, because the godly man has perished from the earth, and there is no one among men who does what is right" (Mich. 7, 2). Another was speaking to God: "Why have you showed me labors and sorrows to look upon?" (Habac. 1, 3). And concerning those who were being oppressed by injuries, condoling too much, he ^D lamented saying: "You will make men like the fish of the sea, not having a leader" (Ibid. 1, 14). But if those things were happening then, when laws had been established, and princes, and courts, and priests, and prophets, and punishments, consider with what magnitude of impudence all crimes were committed under Noe, when these things did not yet restrain men. And under the prophets, indeed, life was not very long-lived, but was terminated in seventy or eighty years; then...

how many difficulties was he compelled to undergo, when he was journeying on such a long road, and yet striving not to turn aside even a little in such a great distance, although there were many obstacles in between? And why do I say many? Indeed, the whole road was entirely like that, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the earth, filled with precipices and thorns and wild beasts and drought and pestilence and cold and villains! For it was easier to travel a beaten path in the height of the night at all times than the way of virtue in those days; so many were they who were striving to turn his steps aside. For when it is permitted to everyone to do whatever they wish, and one man alone is walking the opposite way to them, how will he be able to arrive at the end with everyone pushing him back and driving him off? That there is difficulty in succeeding while being among many, is shown by those who have occupied this present life, who, by the grace of God, can see a prosperous life scattered everywhere, when there is also no small amount of concord and mutual affection toward one another. But at that time there was nothing of these things; rather, everyone was disposed toward him more savagely than wild beasts. Is there anything more miserable than this life? I, for my part, had promised to show that he was not in any better condition than those who are always bearing burdens and never catching their breath; but the argument has done much more: it has exposed to us that he was not only in no better condition, but in one much more burdensome than theirs. Many think, then, that Abraham spent his whole time in contentment, whence they are accustomed to compare him to those who are prosperous and flourishing in every way. Come then, let us examine what happened to him. For to me this man [is far more wretched] than Noe and than Abel—or rather, I shall say nothing until the examination of the facts delivers the verdict for us. Now, the things in Persia, and whatever sorrowful [events] befell him up to his seventieth year, no one could know clearly. For neither did the blessed [189] Moses write for us the history of that time, but leaving out that whole age, he has made the beginning of his narrative from the things after that. But that it is likely that he himself suffered the same things as Noe, desiring to be pious alone amidst so many ungodly and barbarian men, this is no longer unclear, in the same way as it is to others, but even very foolish men would easily conjecture it. But let these things be passed over now; let us make the beginning of our discussion from his migration, having first examined this: how far the land of the Chaldeans is distant from Palestine, or what sort was the construction of the roads, how the matters of social intercourse with one another were situated for men, [and] what was the manner of their government. For let it not be thought that because that righteous man obeyed easily, the matter is easy now, nor because Moses narrated the event quickly and in a short space, should you think that the work is to be measured by the brevity of the words; for to say and to narrate these things is easy, but to do them is not equally easy, but is even very difficult. The length of the road, then, and what the distance between these places is, many of those who have traveled from there to us could say, if there are any; we, however, having had no contact with any of them, but having met some who arrived in the outer country, and having asked them how much [time] they were compelled to travel, we heard that it was a count of thirty-five days; and he said that he did not know Babylon, but had heard from those who had been there that there is another road from there equal to that one. And the distance was as significant then as it is now; but the construction of the roads is not still set up then as it is now. For now it is divided by constant stations and cities and fields, and one traveling would encounter many wayfarers, which is no less a [matter] of safety than the station and city and field. Moreover, the governors of the cities from the territory select men [who are] excelling the others in bodily magnitude and strength, and able to suffice with the javelin and sling just as much as the archers with arrows and the heavy-armed soldiers with spears; having organized these and set commanders over them, they occupied them with no other thing, but only entrusted them with the guardianship of the roads. And along with these, they devised another security even more accurate than these. For having built dwellings at the distance of a thousand paces along the road, they stationed night guards for them, making their wakefulness and leisure the greatest hindrance to the incursions of the villains. But at that time none of these existed; no constant fields, no cities, no stations, no lodging-place, no seeing a fellow-traveler quickly, no, not any other of these things; for I pass over now the roughness of the path and the inequality of the climes—although they are sufficient, had those [security measures] not been present, to distress travelers sufficiently. And they would bear witness to me who use teams and beasts of burden, and who do not even so dare to step upon the accustomed road unless first they have paved it with stones, and by filling in the chasms from the gullies, have made it level. But then it was more deserted than the uninhabited regions, more difficult than the mountains, and more dangerous than the pits and precipices. And I have not yet spoken of what is the most difficult of all: how the matters of social intercourse were situated, which provided them with much more and greater troubles than the road, with all people divided by nations, or rather, by city. For it was not as it is now, that one authority is extended over the greater part of the inhabited world, and all obey one man, and are governed by the same laws—it was not so then; but as one body cut into many parts, so the race of men was torn asunder, and the righteous man was compelled to exchange enemies for enemies, before escaping the former, always falling into others, at one time there being a multiplicity of rulers, at another time anarchy. What then is more difficult than this life? For he was not only fearing and trembling for himself, but also for his father and wife and for his nephew. And the concern for his servants was not small—even if they happened to be on his own [land], let alone when they were on foreign [land], they were compelled to be at all times. And if he had known clearly where the [end of] his wandering would be established, the weight of his cares would not have been so unbearable; but now, having heard simply and indefinitely, "the land," not this or that [land], but "which I will show thee,"

VI. He brings forward the example of Abraham

he turned it over in his mind, and received great tumults in his soul, being unable to steady his thought anywhere, but forced to suspect many things and to be troubled with cares. For it is credible that he expected to set forth to the very ends of the earth and to the Ocean itself. And so, although he did not travel over the whole earth, he nevertheless shouldered the care of completing this journey. For he was not so prepared in his mind as if he were traveling only as far as Palestine, but as if he were to follow the command everywhere, even if he were ordered to traverse the entire world, and even to access islands beyond the inhabited lands. But if he were persuaded to hope for the contrary of the indefinite command, that again was most painful. For he who is about to endure something grievous bears it much more lightly if he knows openly what he must undergo and for what he must prepare himself, rather than if he is tossed by ambiguous thoughts, expecting now happy [outcomes] and now sad ones, and able to trust in neither of these, since both can be held as equally uncertain.

^B Before he had arrived in the promised land; but when at last he had come into Palestine, and hoped that he would now find rest, then a greater tempest beset him in the harbor. There is, however, no small reason for sorrow in this, or rather, it is the most unbearable of all, when one, thinking himself delivered from adversities and having arrived at the very end, freed from all care and thought, is compelled to experience the beginning of another [set of] evils. For he who is still prepared to bear adversities will receive those things when they are brought upon him with a more equal mind; but if, once the thoughts of his cares have been laid aside, something of this kind happens, he is troubled from two sides, and is easily overcome, both because the matter is unexpected and because he has laid aside all his care and preparation. What, then, was this tempest? A famine so severe had occupied Palestine that he was compelled to rise immediately from there and journey into Egypt. ^C When he had arrived there, as if he were about to find an end to his evils, another calamity, more bitter than the famine, seized him, so that he was in danger regarding the sum of his circumstances, and was reduced to such fear that he chose, as the most grievous of all things, to expose his wife to another's lust, compelled by fear. For he fell into such necessity at that time that he even used simulation: what could be said that is more miserable? For with what mind do you think he was when he was compelled to advise his wife thus, and to say: "I know that thou art a woman of fair countenance. Therefore, when the Egyptians see thee, they will say, 'She is his wife,' and they will kill me, but they will keep thee. Say, therefore, 'I am his sister,' that it may be well with me for thy sake, and my soul may live because of thee" (Gen. 12:11, 13)? He used these words, who had dismissed everything for the sake of God—his country, his home, his friends, his relatives, and all other domestic things; who had endured such hardship and such a labor for so long a time on the journey: ^D and yet he spoke nothing of this kind, such as: "Has God abandoned and averted Himself, and excluded me from His care and providence?" Rather, he bore all things bravely and faithfully; and he who, above all, should have been enraged when his wife was subjected to violence and taunts, did everything so that the taunt would not become manifest. Now, what kind of sadness and pain this is cannot be explained in speech: all who have married wives and have ever fallen into the suspicion of jealousy know it. But also Solomon bears witness to what this passion is, saying: "For the fury of a husband is full of jealousy; he will not spare in the day of judgment, nor will he settle enmity for any price, nor will he be reconciled by many gifts" (Prov. 6:34-35). And again: "Love is strong as death, jealousy is hard as hell" (Cant. 8:6).

VII. Quot adversa tulerit Abraham.

^A Meanwhile, when these sad things also had received an end, other adversities were born again, and war succeeded to the famine. I omit now the quarrels and disputes of the herdsmen, the separation from his brother's son; although these too, if they are examined with the others, could bring on no mediocre sorrow. For when he who had been saved by him, and had obtained such great commodities through him, who should have yielded to him in all things and should have honored his herdsmen—when this one, the option having been proposed, chose the more fertile region for himself, leaving the uncultivated and more desert [part] for him; who, I pray, would easily bear, I do not say detriment, but injury, when he saw that he who had honored him was treated in a way that was not honorable, and that he received the lesser part? That is indeed considered heavier than any detriment; but I pass over all these things: for our discourse is about the patriarch, not about any man whatsoever.

^B That he should lead his soldiers against enemies elated by victory, he who had not been present at the beginning of the war, when both sides were still intact, but [only] when the enemies had already obtained victory, when no one could bear them, but some had been killed here and there, others had given themselves to hiding places and flight, and the rest had been led into slavery. But yet nothing of these things induced him to remain at home, but, struck by vehement sorrow, he set out, and was himself to be a participant in that same calamity, and to expose himself without doubt to death. For to wish to fight, with his three hundred servants or a few more, against a most numerous enemy was surely nothing other than to expose himself to captivity, to torture, and to the bitterest death. ^C He set out, therefore, so that he too might experience barbarian ferocity. But saved by the clemency of God, having routed the enemies, and having returned in possession of the spoils and his kinsman, he was compelled to weep again for his own inconveniences, since because of the lack of children he was leaving no successor to his inheritance. For do not think, when you hear him complain and say to God, "What wilt Thou give me? I am going childless" (Gen. 15:2), that this was a recent and new vexation for him: for this care and solicitude had entered the house of that just man along with his bride, or rather, even before the entry of the bride herself. For we are all accustomed, when we begin to think about a wife, to be tempted even then by all the cares of the thing itself,

when the marriage has taken place, if the first year or the second or even the third passes without children, the sense of despondency intensifies, and the hopes for better things become weaker; and when a further period of time has elapsed, those hopes depart altogether, and this one [despondency] takes hold of the soul, casting a shadow over all the most pleasant things and allowing one to perceive nothing at all. So that even if none of these many grievous things had happened to him, but everything had gone according to his mind, the despondency of childlessness, attending all that occurred, was enough to cast a shadow over all joy and to cast it down. ^A For the promise of God was made in extreme old age, when the things of nature had been despaired of; but he continued all the time before that in such great pain and toil, and the more he saw his wealth increasing, the more he grieved, with no one to succeed him in it. For what do you think he suffered when he heard: *Your seed shall be a sojourner in a land not their own, and they shall enslave them, and they shall afflict and humble them for four hundred years* (Gen. 15:13)? And his wife, now ordering him to take her own handmaid, now, since he had taken her, finding fault and blaming him, and calling upon God against him, and compelling him to cast out the one who had shared his bed and was going to bear him a child—who would not be cast into the ultimate despondency by this? For if these things seem small to anyone now, considering that whole houses have been overturned on account of them, let him marvel at the righteous man. For even if he bore them bravely on account of his fear of God, he was nevertheless a man, and he was bitten and pained by all these things. ^B The handmaid of the master returns again to the house, and she bears the bastard to him, and Abraham becomes a father after that long time; and the matter had some pleasure, but a greater despondency. For the bastard reminded him of the legitimate one, and created an even greater longing for the matter. For he thought that the saying, *This one shall not be your heir, but he who shall come forth from you* (Ibid. 4), had been spoken concerning Ishmael; for truly nothing had yet been said concerning Sarah. But since he eventually received a clearer promise concerning Isaac, and a time was set for the birth, before he could again be gladdened by these hopes, the calamities of the Sodomites cast a great mist of despondency upon him. For that the matter disturbed the righteous man not as a casual event, is evident to everyone, of course, from his very words and the supplication which he offered to God for them; but when he saw that most terrible fire descend, and everything suddenly turned to dust and ashes, he was no longer even in himself. For if we, seeing houses burning from afar, are distraught and collapse from despondency and fear, what must he have suffered, seeing entire cities and regions—not with an ordinary conflagration, but with a strange and fearful one—burning along with their inhabitants? Does it not seem to you that the sufferings of the righteous man imitate the continuous succession of waves in the sea? For just as there, even before the former have vanished, the second ones are crowned, so it happened throughout the life of this righteous man. For while the evils in Sodom were still at their peak, the king of Gerar attempted to dare the same things against Sarah that Pharaoh had; and again the woman was compelled to act out that pitiful pretense, and the outrage would have gone into effect, had God not hindered it again. ^C When the child and the wife and the whole household were rejoicing at the birth of the child, the righteous man alone was forced to be in pain and to be despondent in the midst of such pleasure, being compelled to cast out the concubine along with the child. For even if Ishmael was a bastard and from a handmaid, yet the tyranny of nature was no less than from being unworthy, nor did the lack of noble birth make the compulsion of paternal affection weaker; and this can be learned from the Book itself. For the firm and courageous man, he who was willing to slaughter his only-begotten with his own hands, he grieved when his wife ordered him to do these things, and he would not have yielded nor been persuaded by Sarah—even though she had more boldness then—and saying these things to him, had not the fear of God greatly bowed him. So when you hear that he sent him away upon God’s commandment, do not think that his pangs were [194] relieved (for that was impossible), but marvel at his intense obedience, that, being bowed by sympathy, he did not contradict God, but sent away the child with his mother, not even knowing where he would go, and he endured and suffered in pain; for he was not superior to nature.

9. On the sacrifice of Isaac.

^A will provide for Himself a lamb for a holocaust, my son. With what great compassion do you think those words were filled? He held himself in, and repressed the force of his grief, and he performed all these things with such readiness as they might do who were restrained by no such impediments. Meanwhile, having immolated his son (for he had truly immolated him by his devotion), he received him again, safe and sound, restored to his mother: whom she, receiving, before she could enjoy her sweet son to the full, departed from this life; this was the greatest grief for that righteous man. For although they had lived together for a long time, nothing could persuade him to bear that fall any more lightly; nay, this very thing consigned him to even greater grief. For we are accustomed to yearn, above all others and with the most intense desire, for those who have lived with us for a very long time and who have given us the greatest proofs of their virtue and friendship. And that these things are so, the patriarch himself indicates to us, who pursued her with weeping and lamentation. Who now could recount the remaining anxieties which he undertook for his son, for the man's wife, for his brothers, and all the rest? ^B Whosoever should wish to consider these things with precision will perceive the life of this righteous man to be far more laborious and burdened with cares than that of him whom we pointed out a little earlier. For the Scripture, recounting only the most important matters, left all the rest for us to examine—things that are likely to happen daily at home, where there is a multitude of servants, a husband, a wife, and children, and the care and solicitude for many affairs. "Quite so," you will say, "but for him the consolation in each of these adversities was that he was suffering all these things for God's sake." Therefore, that same thing will also console you. For surely no one except God has permitted this trial to be brought upon you. For if not even the most wicked demons dared to attack the swine (Matt. 8.30 seqq.) unless He had first permitted it, much less would they touch a precious soul. Therefore, just as it brought much reward to that man that he bore all things bravely and with thanksgiving, so it will produce the same for you, if only you do not bear it grievously and indignantly, but give thanks in all things to the most merciful God. For the blessed Job also suffered what he suffered by God's permission; ^C yet he was not granted crowns for that reason only, because he suffered, but because he stood strong and inviolable against all adversities; and we all admire him, not because he was deprived of everything by the devil, but because among all these things he did not sin, not even with his lips. I have made mention of Job; I would indeed wish to pursue the long lamentations of that man and the vehemence of his sufferings; but lest I be too prolix, I return to Isaac. Furthermore, if you wish to learn all things about him more diligently, taking the book itself in your hands, look into the most profound abyss of that man's calamities, and you will find there the greatest consolation. For by as much as that righteous man is better than we are, by so much the greater force he had to overcome, and by so much the more vehemently was that most wicked one then stirred up against him. However, right actions are estimated not so much by the number of trials as by the strength of the things done. Therefore, even if this struggle is lower, it can deduct nothing from your crowns; ^D for he who offered two talents brought back nothing less than he who had offered five. Why so? Because, even if the yield was not the same, the readiness was the same. Wherefore both obtained the same honor, hearing: Enter into the joy of your Lord (Matt. 25.21). What then of Isaac? He was not, indeed, compelled to undergo that longest pilgrimage by his father's example and to abandon his own land; but he himself did plainly endure the greatest of all evils, to wit, the fear of passing on without descendants. But after he was freed from that fear by prayer, another, far greater fear immediately succeeded him. For the fear of infertility in a spouse is not the same as trembling for the very root itself. For he was so torn by the pangs of childbirth that life was for him more bitter than any death. And you may hear her saying this very thing: If it was to be so with me, why should I live (Gen. 25.22)? He also experienced famine, though he did not descend into Egypt as his father did; but what the other truly endured in Egypt, he too was in danger of suffering—namely, to lose his wife. And the neighbors all revered the father, but this man they harassed no differently than an enemy and a foe, and they did not allow him to enjoy his own labors; nay, when they hemmed him in with pressures on all sides, they freely enjoyed his labors themselves. And yet, when he had finally obtained them as friends, and saw his sons grown, then surely, then when he hoped he would find the greatest consolation and have the best caretakers of his old age, he fell into the greatest grief. For first, the greater son took for himself a wife of a foreign nation against his father's wish, and by that very fact that he had introduced strife and war into the house, he affected him with a force of grief that was supreme and incredible. For those women afflicted the parents with countless evils, which the Scripture, avoiding, indicated in one word when it said: They were a bitterness of spirit to Isaac and Rebecca (Id. 26.35); and it left that saying to be understood by those who have homes and children already married. For they know, more than any others, how great an evil it is and how great the detriment if a mother-in-law and a daughter-in-law quarrel, and most especially when both inhabit the same house. This, however, was a constant hardship for them. Added to these was a more grievous trouble for them, to wit, blindness, which only they know who suffer it. Furthermore, while he was blessing his sons, contrary to what he [intended], through the craft and artifice of his mother, he blessed the younger instead of the elder: in which matter he was so pained that he cried out more bitterly than he who had suffered, and excused his ignorance, that he had not knowingly defrauded him of the blessing, but had been circumvented. All these things betrayed the tragedy of the scene, and foreshadowed the story of the Theban youths. For here, too, the elder son, scorning the old age and blindness of his father, drove his younger brother from the house. And if he did not kill him, his mother's wisdom prevented it; for he had threatened murder and was lying in wait for the death of his father. Which, when the cautious mother had learned and reported to the father, she snatched him from his hands; and he—

^A for he was someone who felt kindly towards himself—forced them to commit him to flight, but kept the one who made his life bitter and unbearable (for Rebekah herself says as much) with them continually. Since, therefore, he had fled—he who had been raised in the house for all that time (for he was guileless while living in the house) and had for the most part remained at home with his mother—how great, one may imagine, was the sorrow Rebekah felt, and the lamentations she made, remembering her child at every moment, and seeing her husband in a state no better than the dead, both because of his age and because of his sickness! And with how much mourning, one may imagine, was the old man filled, together with his household, being forced to lament his wife’s calamities! But when she was about to die, what indeed did he not say, what did he not utter, which was sufficient to melt even stone, not seeing his child standing by and weeping, and wiping ^B his eyes, and stopping his mouth, and shrouding him, and attending to all the other things—things which seem to parents more bitter than death itself? And Isaac, seeing her breathing her last in this way, what kind of soul must one think he possessed both then and after her passing?

11. Jacob, how he was afflicted. — Such a man has been shown to us as one who seems to be more cheerful than many others. But the life of Jacob is enough, even without examination, to show this—the very confession of Jacob himself; for, when conversing with Pharaoh at that time, he said: *My days are few and evil, and they have not reached the days of my fathers* (Gen. 47:9); that is, I have lived a shorter and more wretched life. And even without his confession, his calamities are so conspicuous that not even many of the common people are unaware of them. For his grandfather, even if he did perform a long migration, ^C did so at God’s command, which brought him the greatest consolation; but this man, fleeing a brother who was lying in wait and murdering him—and whereas that one never lamented for the provision of his necessities, this one considered it a desirable and wished-for thing only to possess clothing and bread. Yet having been saved, and freed from the evils of his journey, and having come to his own kinsmen, he was forced into slavery, he who had been raised in such great abundance. And you know that everywhere slavery is bitter; but when someone is forced to endure the lot of a servant among those of equal standing, and that too without ever having had experience of the matter, but having spent his entire early life in freedom and luxury, the hardship becomes unbearable. Nevertheless, he bore everything nobly. And you hear him describing his labors in shepherding, and saying: *I paid back from my own pocket the thefts of the day and the thefts of the night; I became one scorched by the heat of the day and by the frost of the night, and sleep departed from my eyes* (Gen. 31:39-41). These things he suffered, he who had lived a guileless life, who had stayed in the house at all times, and after so many travails, and losses, and that great length of time, he endured that bitter deception ^D regarding his wife. For if he had not served the seven years, if he had not suffered all that he lamented to his father-in-law, if he had not loved the girl—just the act of being betrothed to the better one and having the inferior one given instead of her, what great despondency, what great turmoil, what great indignity did it offer to that blessed man at that time! Another person, indeed, if there were one, would not have easily borne the indignity, but would have overturned the entire house of his in-laws by killing himself along with them, or by destroying them in some other way; but since Jacob was free from malice and long-suffering, he did not do this, nor did he even consider it at all. But having been ordered to serve another seven years, he obeyed readily; so mild and gentle was he. But if the love of the girl took part in the gentleness of his character, again you tell me of the excess of his despondency. For consider what pain he endured, when he was deprived of her whom he so loved, and while expecting to have her inside, he was driven off by another delay of seven years, and the cold, and the heat, and the sleeplessness, and the continuous losses. And having taken her later, and living a wretched and laborious life with his father-in-law, he was envied even so, and endured a second deception regarding his wages, as he himself convicted him, saying: *You cheated me with ten lambs* (Gen. 31:41). But once with the father-in-law, the brothers of the wives became even more like wild beasts toward him. And the hardest thing of all was that the beloved one, for whose sake he chose to serve for two periods of seven years, was suffocating from despondency, seeing her sister bearing children while she herself did not even have the hope of the matter; and she was carried away at that time into such an ecstasy by despondency that she accused and blamed her husband, and threatened death upon herself if she did not bear children: *Give me children,* she says, *and if not, I shall die* (Gen. 30:1). What then could possibly cheer him, with the one so desired lamenting such things, and her brothers lying in wait for him and doing everything possible so that he might come to extreme poverty? And if things handed over to wives without sweat, when they are taken away, bring great despondency, how could he who was in danger over things acquired by his own labors bear this loss calmly? Having perceived, therefore, that they held him in suspicion and were looking askance at him, he departed secretly like a fugitive; what could there be more pitiful? For having traveled from his own land and from a foreign one with fears and dangers, he was forced to fall again into the same pitfalls. For he had fled from his brother and came to his father-in-law, and being driven by him in turn, he was forced to fall upon his brother; and he endured that prophetic saying which Amos mentions concerning the day of the Lord: *As if a man should flee from the face of a lion, and a bear should fall upon him, and he should leap into his house, and lean his hand against the wall, and the serpent should bite him* (Amos 5:19). But what need is there to speak of the trembling he endured when caught by Laban, the afflictions during the journey, with so many herds and children following him? But since he was about to see his brother’s sight, did he not suffer the same thing as those who see the head of the Gorgon fashioned by the poets? Was he not, as one going to his death, arranging everything in this way? Hear his words, and learn of the flame stored up in his soul: *Deliver me,* he says, *O God, from the hand of Esau my brother, for I fear him, lest he should come and strike me and the mother with the children. But you said to me, I will do you good* (Gen. 32:11-12). How much cheerfulness would not this fear have cast out, even if he had spent all the time before in joy? Now

however, his entire life, from the day he was to receive the blessing, was woven through with various calamities and treacheries, so that he was almost dead with fear. Indeed, such great dread had seized him at that time that, after his meeting with his brother, however unexpectedly kindly and humanely he had dealt with him, he could not even then find confidence or put aside his anxiety. Finally, when Esau entreated him to let him travel with him, hoping to be freed from him no differently than from some wild beast, he begged him to depart, saying: "You know, my lord, that the infants are tender, and the sheep and cows with young are with me; if I should drive them hard, all the flocks will die in one day. Let my lord go on before his servant, and I will be strengthened on the way, according to the slowness of the journey that is before me and according to the feet of my children, until I come to my lord in Seir" (Gen. 33:13-14). And breathing a little from those dangers, he fell into another far greater fear.

The theft of the daughter, Dinah

The son of the most beloved wife

^A and his children were gradually diminishing for him, he endured all things by the excess of his greater troubles; for a greater despondency held him concerning these than concerning Joseph. For that calamity which has no expectation of correction, even if it brings us sharp despondencies, nevertheless quickly casts them out, by throwing the mind into despair; but that which is still suspended does not allow the soul to rest, always straining and renewing our agony by the uncertainty of what is to come. And one might learn this well from the blessed David, who, while his child was still alive, mourned, but once he had died, he released himself from his mourning. And when his attendants were perplexed concerning this, and asked him the cause, he spoke this reasoning, which I speak now. ^B With good reason, therefore, he too feared and trembled more for these. But the desirable sight and the seeing of Joseph provided him with cheerfulness later. And what was the profit? For just as limbs scorched by a vehement fire, even if one should cool them ten thousand times, gain nothing; so also his soul, having become full of pain, and having been scorched by that flame of despondency, there was nothing sufficient to restore it, and especially when it is not likely that his perception was clear; which Barzillai also, excusing himself to David, said: "How many are the days of the years of my life that I should go up with the king to Jerusalem? I am eighty years old today. Will I discern between good and evil? Will thy servant taste what he eats or what he drinks? Or will I hear the voice of singing men or singing women? And why should thy servant become a burden to my lord the king?" (2 Sam. 19:34-35). But why is it necessary to conjecture these things from others, when it is possible to hear from the sufferer himself? For after seeing his son, he says, when asked by Pharaoh concerning the life of his days: "Small and evil are my days, and they have not reached the days of my fathers" (Gen. 47:9); to such an extent did he always carry within him the memory of what had happened, with his soul so flourishing in recollection.

12. But as for this famous and glorious son, Joseph, what did he not conceal by his calamities? ^C For his father had only one brother who conspired against him, but this one had many more; and the former was nourished for all his early life in abundance and much ease, but the latter, while still a boy, was forced to bear the miseries of travel in a foreign land. And for Jacob, his mother was present to lighten the conspiracy; but this one, while still young, and when he most needed his mother, was at that time left in a desert of this help. Besides these, Esau only troubled Jacob until the threat; but these men even brought the conspiracy to the deed, and before the conspiracy they continued to envy and slander him; what could be more grievous than to have those who live with you always as enemies? For they brought a wicked report against him, and seeing that his father loved him more than his other sons, they hated him, and could not speak any peaceful word to him. For neither the being under the merchants, nor the being under the eunuch, could I say was such a great evil; for they used him with much more humanity than his brothers. But yet, not even so did the winter of his calamities become milder; for a more vehement storm having fallen, it plunged him down again. Perhaps someone thinks I shall speak of the conspiracy of the mistress; but I shall speak of another more grievous than this. For it is terrible, truly ^D terrible, both to be slandered for such things, and to be condemned, and to dwell in prison for so long a time—a free and noble boy, and inexperienced in such a necessity; but I think the winter from his age was much heavier than all these. For if, being troubled by no desire, he had spurned her love, I would not greatly praise or admire the man, considering [his obedience] to Christ. For He says that not those who are castrated by nature, but those who make themselves eunuchs are deemed worthy of the kingdom of heaven; if this were not the case, what kind of victory would he have won? Against whom would he have bound on a crown? Whom would he have conquered to be heralded as victor, with no one there struggling with him and attempting to cast him down? For we do not praise those who do not mingle with irrational animals for the sake of temperance, because the desire for that union does not even lie within their nature. If, therefore, that fire did not trouble that blessed man at that time, why do we admire him for temperance? But if, when the flame is raised more vehemently than at any other time (for he was then passing his twentieth year), and when the tyranny is unbearable and no one is increasing it, at that time the incontinent woman set upon the youth, adding to the flame as much strength from her own incantations and adornments as it had from nature—how could anyone describe the winter of his soul, and the tumult and the agony, with nature and age disturbing him from within, and the devices of the Egyptian woman attacking from without, and this not just for a day or two, but for a long time? For I believe he was trembling then not only for himself, but was also grieving for her, as she was rushing to come to such a precipice; and this is clear to us from what he replies to her with much gentleness. For it was possible, if he wished, to have spoken to her even more insultingly and boldly; for she would easily have endured all things because of her love; but he neither spoke nor thought anything of the kind, but having stirred up pious reasonings, and through which he thought only to turn her back, he added nothing more. For "Behold," he says, "my master knows nothing because of me in his house, and all things that are his he has given into my hand, and there is nothing in this house that is greater than I, nor has anything been kept back from me except you, because you are his wife; and how shall I do this evil thing, and sin before God?" (Gen. 39:8-9). And after such gentleness and demonstration of temperance, he was slandered—and God permitted it. He was bound, and not even so did he expose the conspiracy and the unjust slander of the woman; for He wished both to have many rewards for him and to have his crowns be more glorious, and for this reason, even with the king's servants having been released, he himself still remained inside. But do not—I pray you—speak to me of the kindness of the jailer, but examine his own words, and you shall see the pain of his

dismissed he himself remained confined. ^A I do not want you to object to me the clemency of the jailer, but rather that you examine his words more carefully, and you will discern the anguish of his soul. For when he had interpreted the dream, he said to the king’s cup-bearer: *But remember me by yourself, when it goes well with you, and you will show mercy upon me, and you will suggest it to Pharaoh concerning me, and you will lead me out of this prison, because I was taken by theft from the land of the Hebrews: and here I have done nothing, but they cast me, innocent, into the house of this pit* (Gen. 40. 14. 15). For although he bore the confines of the prison easily, to live with such men—for instance, violators of graves, thieves, parricides, adulterers, murderers (for the dwelling was full of these and such as these)—was more burdensome and grievous to him. And not this alone, but because he saw very many, in vain and to no purpose, being tormented and consumed there. But nevertheless, that which you yourself complain of just now, the servant indeed was rescued from his chains, yet the free man persisted in his misery. But if anyone should make mention of a kingdom, he will again bring into the middle for me a swarm of cares, of vigils, and the difficulties of a thousand business affairs ^B which, for those who love a quiet life, free from cares, are not excessively pleasant. Furthermore, if anything joyful happened to those saints, it was surely not surprising, since the heavenly kingdom was not yet plain and manifest, nor the promise of future goods clear; but now, when such an abundance of goods is set before us, and the matter is manifest to all, will anyone, I beseech you, dare to grieve if he does not enjoy pleasant things in this present life, or will he ever consider anything in this life sweet if he knows those others? And what can be expressed as more abject than this state of mind, if, hoping that he will migrate in a little while to heaven, he seeks the rest and prosperity of this world, which is no better than a shadow? *Vanity of vanities,* he says, *and all is vanity* (Eccl. 1. 2). And if he, who had experienced the pleasures of the present life more than other men, brought forth this judgment against them, much more does it befit us to be so affected and to feel this way, we who have nothing in common with the earth, and to whom it is commanded to be enrolled in the city above and to transfer our whole mind thither.

OF THE SAME TO STAGYRIUS CONCERNING SADNESS. BOOK THREE

^C Sufficient, indeed, were those things which have been said to extinguish the flame of sadness and to persuade one to be of a better and more tranquil spirit; but in order that the consolation might be fuller, I decided to append this book as well, asking this from you first: tell me, I pray, if someone were to call you to an earthly kingdom, and before your entrance into that city, or before you received the crown, it were necessary to lodge in a stable, where there was an abundance of refuse and smoke, the tumult of travelers, the disturbance of robbers, and the utmost pressure and anxiety, would you turn your thoughts toward those sad things, or would you not rather despise them all as if they were nothing? How, therefore, would it not be absurd that a man about to possess earthly things should, uplifted by the hope of a kingdom, not be contracted by any of those adverse things which happen in the meantime, yet a man called to the heavens, at every individual case of sadness that happens in the inn, should collapse and be perturbed? For the state of this present life is in no way better than an inn or the dwelling of a stable; and when the saints desired to indicate this to us, they called themselves guests and pilgrims, instructing us by these words to deride both the joyful and the sad things of the present age, and, removed as far as possible from the earth, to long for heavenly things with our whole soul, and to transfer our entire thought to them.

He brings forth the example of Joseph.

Come, therefore, let us come to the saints, passing our discourse from Joseph to Moses. For he, the meekest of all who dwelt on the earth, is born with his own people oppressed by the force of most harsh servitude, but alienated from his parents, and ignorant of by whom he was begotten, he is educated for his whole previous age by barbarian men: what could be more grievous to a Hebrew, endued with singular prudence, even if he were thought to be the son of a king a thousand times over? Yet he was not tormented by this alone at that time, but because he saw his own nation oppressed by extreme catastrophes. For he who could not bear even to live without their salvation, nor to be enrolled in the book of God, how could he have enjoyed the goods of the royal court and the kingdom, when he saw all his people tossed by such a tempest? For if we—arising after so many centuries and having no cause of this kind for compassion for the Jews—feel such great compassion for the slaughtered infants, what did that blessed man not suffer, who, bound to his own nation by such singular affection, perceived their very slaughters with his own eyes, and was forced besides to honor with the title of parents those who were inflicting such great evils upon them? I believe that he himself mourned those wretched infants then more than the parents themselves did: which is clear from the very things he did afterwards. For when he could neither persuade nor force the one who was thought to be his father to remove the feral and tyrannical decree, he himself wished to be a sharer in the common evils. Nor is this what I admire so much now, but I am exceedingly stunned by it, inferring from that slaughter what a flame of sadness he had nurtured in time past. For he who, from the great force of grief, later burst forth into homicide, shows from that act what the pain of his soul had been beforehand. For he would not have avenged them with such vehemence, if he had not been more consumed by their evils than their own parents. What then, since he avenged and calmed his soul a little ^D from that sadness, was he able to completely

^A forget that consolation which came from the act of vengeance? The second day, in fact, had not yet arrived, when another sadness, far more grievous than the former, came to seize that blessed man, and such fear that it drove him out of all Egypt. It is a dreadful thing to hear oneself spoken ill of by anyone at all, but when the one doing this is among those who have been benefited, and he reproachfully brings up the very favors done for him—[the text says]: "Do you wish to kill me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?" (Exod. 2. 14)—at that moment, then, the insult becomes unbearable, and it could very well cause the one insulted to choke; so much does it bring upon him anger along with despondency. ^B And in the case of Moses, a third thing was added to these: the fear of the king, which so mastered the soul of the righteous man that it cast him out of the entire land. Thus, the son of the king becomes a fugitive; so if anyone praises him because of his upbringing in the royal palace, he should now remember that abundance, and he will see that it became for the righteous man the cause of ten thousand despondencies and difficulties. For it is not the same to have been raised in a private home and to have endured many labors and many long periods of wandering and suffering in a foreign land, as it is to have endured the evils of a strange country after never having come to the briefest trial of these things, but having spent all his time in luxury—and then to suffer this very thing; for he will feel the flight to be far more painful than the other, if it ever happens that he is forced into such a necessity, which is what happened to him then. And having become a fugitive, he is lodged with an idolatrous man of another race; and this too is no small reason for despondency, to be a guest for so long a time among one who is devoted to demons. ^C And having been entrusted with the care of that man’s flocks, he thus spent forty years. But if to anyone this does not seem to be a terrible thing, let us examine not those who are traveling and hiding out of fear and dread, but those who are willingly separated from their homes for a short while, how they pine, how they are distressed, and how many good things they count as the cost of their return. But when there is also fear and a miserable life, and these heavy and burdensome things to bear appear lighter than the sweetest return, observe for me the complexity of his misfortune. For do not simply hear the word "he pastured," but remember now the words of Jacob, which he lamented to his kinsman, saying: "I was paying out from my own pocket the thefts of the day and the thefts of the night; I was consumed by the heat during the day, and by the frost at night, and sleep departed from my eyes." (Gen. 31. 39-40). For it is likely that all these things were happening to him, for more years and with greater intensity, inasmuch as the country was more desolate than Mesopotamia. And if Moses had not lamented these things—for even that blessed man would not have spoken, if he had not been placed in a great necessity of the matter, and had been forced to these words by the ingratitude of his kinsman. ^D Alien lands are of themselves sufficient to humble a man who is only traveling because of need. "For as a bird," he says, "when it flies from its nest, so is a man enslaved when he is estranged from his own places." (Prov. 27. 8). At that time, moreover, he could not even be secure regarding his own safety, but like some servant who has run away from a cruel master, he trembles at all times and fears that he might be captured; so also the blessed Moses lived in continual fear; and it is evident from the fact that even when God commanded him to depart after so long a time, he shies away and hesitates, even after having heard that "those who are seeking your soul are dead." (Exod. 4. 19).

2. But after he was eventually persuaded and departed, and was forced to leave his wife and children behind, he returned to Egypt, only to face again accusations and curses from those who were being benefited by him. For he was saying: "Why, Moses and Aaron, do you turn the people from their works? Go each of you to his work." (Exod. 5. 4). But the Israelites say: "May God see you and judge you, because you have made our odor to be detestable before Pharaoh and before his servants, to give a sword into their hands to kill us." (Ibid. v. 21). These things were indeed grievous and burdensome, but that which was most heavy of all was that, having gone in and promised ten thousand good things—freedom, the removal of the pressing evils—he appeared to be a deceiver. For not only was the weight of the pressing slavery not eased for them, but it was intensified to something more harsh, and he who was expected to be the liberator of the whole nation, and who had promised this, appeared to be the cause of their tortures and beatings, and a conspirator and a destroyer. Who would not have been easily swallowed up by despondency, having promised a release from such great evils, only to see, after that promise, the addition of others even more grievous? He was despondent, indeed, as it is natural for one hearing and seeing these things to be despondent, but he was not led astray by the passion, but remained unshaken, even though these things did not turn out according to his promises, but were even in conflict with them. And having approached God and discussed these things, and having lamented much—for he said, as it is written: "Lord, why did you afflict your people, and why did you send me? And from the time I have entered in to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has afflicted this people, and you have not rescued your people." (Ibid. v. 23). Having lamented these things, then, and having heard again the very same things as he had before, he reports them to the Israelites again, but they do not accept them because their souls are held fast by weariness and despondency. "For they did not listen to Moses," it says, "because of their despondency and their harsh labors." (Exod. 6. 9). And this also wounded him not as a chance matter. And as this happened regarding the signs, and he was often mocked by Pharaoh and yet bore even this mockery nobly, having been delivered from Egypt and encouraged with the Jews finally, before he could breathe fully, he was seized by a fear prior to the first one, or rather, [a fear] far greater than the first. For not even three full days had passed, and they saw all the barbarians standing near them with their weapons, and they were suffering the same as if some runaways in a foreign land had suddenly fallen into the eyes of their masters; or as if, just as these people themselves perhaps at some time having indulged in pleasant dreams, and having imagined this deliverance, then upon waking up found themselves back in Egypt and in the same evils. Or rather, I do not know what one would say they considered a dream: those three days of deliverance, or that present sight that was chilling and fearful; so thick was the mist of despondency cast upon the eyes of all. And Moses

^A was enshrouded in much greater darkness. For he feared not only the Egyptians, as did the rest, but the Israelites themselves along with them; for both groups were about to attack him as a deceiver and a charlatan—the Egyptians indeed mocking and trampling upon him, the Israelites stung with pain and consumed by despondency. But what need have I to gather by conjecture the griefs and straits of the man, when we can understand his entire pain from that very voice sent down from above? For to him who was silent and did not dare to open his lips, God said: "Why do you cry to me?" ^B And when this fear was resolved, new tribulations were again added. For throughout all that journey, those who were governed by him and enjoyed through him countless goods, treated him more cruelly and inhumanly than Pharaoh himself and the Egyptians had done. And first of all, they pressed upon him vehemently, suffocating him and demanding Egyptian flesh, and ungratefully loathing their present state, and longing for the past: which was surely the most grievous thing of all. For what could he suffer more bitter than to have been appointed leader of mad and insane men? And yet that blessed man bore all things bravely; and if he had not loved them with the greatest affection, it would have been a tolerable evil to suffer only for his own injuries; but since he was affected toward them no differently than a father, he was compelled by this affection to undergo another distress, namely, that concerning their perversity and wickedness. For he was not so tormented by the insults as by the fact that they themselves were insulting. ^C It had been truly grievous even before the miraculous provision of food that they were ungrateful; but they showed their wickedness even in the midst of miracles, their iniquity and unbridled lust, which they brought forth as they gathered manna; and when they had proceeded but a little way, they murmured again, and again complained ungratefully against the benefits of God. And when they sinned daily, one by one, that blessed man mourned, more sorrowful than they. For when they made the calf, they indeed played and acted wantonly, but Moses, mourning and affected by sadness, was calling down upon himself that terrible curse, and nothing at all could persuade him to abstain from his affection of pity. ^D Seeing therefore those so beloved ever progressing toward worse things, with how much pain, with what tears, do you suppose he was constantly overwhelmed? For if one who has only one son cannot live without pain when he notices him ever prone to vices, even if he himself be more wicked than all; then he who had placed so many thousands of men in the rank of sons—nay, who loved them more than sons (for no father, like him, wishes to perish together with his son, especially when he has committed no sin)—he, I say, who had so many sons, who averted evil and zealously loved good, what must he be thought to have suffered when he beheld them all, as if by some agreement, rushing toward the precipices of vice? For he would never have cast down the tablets from his hands and shattered them had he not been enshrouded in darkness and his soul obscured by an inner sense of grief. But that disaster was quickly settled by him. By what remedy, I ask? For even if the wound had been healed by that kind of cure, he himself was still always in tears. For almost no one would be so stony as not to suffer when seeing brothers and kinsmen slaughtered by their own, and that slaughter progressing to the number of twenty-three thousand. For when we ourselves detect that our children have sinned in something, we subject them indeed to torments and lashes; but we do not do this without pain, nor are we less afflicted than those who suffer.

Since, therefore, a great mourning had occupied both him and the camp, another anxiety was again added. For God threatened that He would no longer spare them, but would abandon them and give their care to an angel. That indeed appeared to Moses the most bitter of all. For hear what he said to God: "If you yourself do not go with us, do not lead us away from here" (Exod. 33.15). Do you see how fears ever succeeded fears, and sorrows sorrows? Nor did the adversities stop even here; but when he had persuaded God of this also, and He had assented more mercifully, and had granted the favor, he was afflicted again by other sorrows. ^A Provoking God again—who was now propitious—they exposed themselves to the greatest calamities: for after that lamentable slaughter, they offended God again in such a way that they provoked against themselves that fire which would have consumed and destroyed almost everyone, had He not exercised the greatest clemency toward them. Moses, however, was always tormented by a double sadness: that he saw them perishing and yet unwilling to be corrected, and that he saw nothing gained from the downfall of those who were perishing. For that disaster had not yet reached its end when those who had remained, mindful of onions, took ill the food given to them, saying: "Who shall feed us with flesh? We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt, and the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. Now, however, our soul drieth away, and our eyes behold nothing but manna" (Num. 11.4-6). Here Moses could no longer bear the ungrateful, nay, rather, overcome by grief, he rejects their rule, and prefers to die rather than live in such bitterness. ^B Hear finally his words: "And he said," it says, "Moses to God: Why hast thou afflicted thy servant, and why have I not found grace before thee, that thou shouldst lay the burden of all this people upon me? Have I received all this people in my womb, or have I begotten them, that thou sayest to me, Take them in thy bosom, as a nurse the sucking child, unto the land which thou didst swear to their fathers? Whence should I have flesh, that I may give to all this people, for they weep against me saying: Give us flesh that we may eat? I shall not be able to bear this people alone, for this word is heavy for me. But if thou dost not do this to me, I beseech thee, kill me, if I have found grace before thee" (Num. 11.11-15). Those things were spoken by him who had said: "But now if thou wilt forgive them their sin, forgive: but if not, strike me out of the book which thou hast written" (Exod. 32.32): to such a degree ^C was he overwhelmed by grief and ^D constantly vexed by the things done by the children. For even after the

^A events recorded, it is evident from what he did thereafter that he never ceased in his sympathy for them. For since, after they attempted to kill the spies, they even cast stones at him, he escaped their hands and turned again to supplication on their behalf, and besought God to be merciful to those who wished to kill him: to such a degree did the bond of natural affection lie upon him. Consequently, when the spies had died and the mourning was at its height, before time had even passed, they were again weaving threads of sorrow for him; first, by not enduring his prohibition against fighting, and second, by being cut down by the Amalekites. And even before this war, they had been sufficiently ravaged by cholera and gluttony. For he says that He slew them in great numbers, while their food was yet in their mouths (Ps. 77. 30). ^B Having witnessed that great slaughter as well, and while the distress over it had not yet ceased, he was set upon by another grief, and was reduced to such a necessity that he wished, for the sake of these beloved and dearest ones, to end his life through some strange and extraordinary death. In this way, some were suddenly burned by fire, and others were swallowed up by a chasm in the earth; and these were not a few in number, but more than fifteen thousand men suffered these things.

After this had happened, how was it likely that their relatives and friends would be disposed toward Moses? And how [would] Moses himself [be], seeing both the children orphaned and the wives made widows by this disaster, and his own sister and brother having departed life, and his own sons having been burned because of some transgression? Each of these things was sufficient to crush a soul that had suffered nothing, let alone one already wrought by so many evils. ^C When they took the Canaanite and were forced to circle a long path, the Jews grumbled again, and again they were perishing—not by disease as before, nor by fire and chasm as formerly, but by the bites of venomous serpents, which would have destroyed them all had not Moses approached again and besought God. Since they were delivered from this destruction and escaped the curses of the soothsayer, they again cast themselves down from the most grievous precipices, and after the blessings of Balaam, or rather of God (for the words were not of his own choosing, but of the power moving him), they committed fornication with the daughters of the foreigners and were initiated into Beelphegor. Moses, seeing such shame and mockery, again ordered them to cut one another down, saying: "Slay each one his neighbor who has been initiated into Beelphegor" (Num. 25. 5); just as if, in the case of some wound that has taken many incisions and cauterizations but has in no way been made better by this, ^D one were to order it to be cut and burned again.

But when you hear of these difficulties, do not think that only these things happened; for I have omitted not a few of those recorded, such as the wars, the oppositions of the enemies, the long journeys, the insult from his sister, and the punishment for which that most meek Moses felt the most pain. Yet, even if one gathered everything with precision, what is written is not even a ten-thousandth part of what happened. For if one who is in charge of a few servants in a house has countless occasions for provocation and grief; 478 what kinds of troubles was he forced to face daily, being compelled to oversee so many tens of thousands for forty years, and in a desert where there was neither air nor water? What concerns, what anxieties, both for the living and for the dead! For he saw all those he led out die, except for two men alone, and he was not deemed worthy to lead those born from them into the land of promise; but he saw it from the summit of Mount Nabau, and was well instructed as to its nature, yet he was not permitted to enjoy it with the remaining Israelites, but remained outside and died; about which he himself lamented to the Israelites, saying: "And the Lord God was angry with me because of the things said by you, and swore that I should not cross this Jordan, and that I should not enter the land which the Lord thy God gives thee in inheritance. For I die in this land, and I do not cross this Jordan; but you shall cross, and shall inherit this good land" (Deut. 4. 21, 22). And the most terrible thing of all was that he brought him down to Hades with grief; for he forelearned the evils that were to seize the Jews—the idolatry, the captivity, the untold disasters—so that his soul was worn down not only by things he saw and things that had happened, but also by things that had not yet come to pass. For beginning to suffer and be anxious from his earliest age, he ended his life with the same distress.

5. *Joshua the successor of Moses and he too afflicted.*—But his successor Joshua shared in all the grievous things with him, so to speak; and if he escaped some things because of his youth, he made up for this after his death. For not only when Moses lived did he tear his garments and sprinkle dust upon his head, but also when he had died he was again cast into the same, or rather into a greater, necessity: not for a short time, but for the whole day lying prostrate on the ground. Hear also his words and his wailings: "And Joshua," he says, "rent his garments and fell upon his face on the ground before the Lord until evening, he and the elders of Israel, and they cast dust upon their heads; and Joshua said: 'I beseech Thee, O Lord, why has Thy servant brought this people across this Jordan, to give it to the Amorite to destroy us? If we had only remained and dwelt by the Jordan. And what shall I say, since Israel has turned his back before his enemy? And the Canaanite and all the inhabitants of the land shall hear it and shall encompass us and shall blot us out from the earth'" (Josue 7. 6–9). Having heard these things, God revealed to him the cause of the defeat; and having learned it, he destroyed all of them utterly, not the sinner alone, but also his relatives and kin, and the multitude of his herds, which moved his soul not as a casual matter. For if we, seeing strangers being punished, cannot endure even to look, what would he not have suffered, surrounding his own kinsmen and fellow soldiers with such evils? What then of the trickery of the Gibeonites and the suspicion that arose against those who dwelled beyond the Jordan? What of the multitude of other...

afflictions of the people that followed after? I do not deem it necessary to recount these, for it is not our present purpose to enumerate the tribulations of individuals, but only of those who were exceedingly pleasing to God.

^A 5. Therefore, it seems, let us pass over Eli, for he also offended God through the wickedness of his children, or rather, through his own negligence. For he was not punished because he had wicked children, but because he had spared them rebuke beyond what was due, and when the laws of God were being violated, he did not punish them severely. Being conscious of this himself, after those great threats he said: "The Lord himself will do what is good in his sight" (1 Kings 3:18). Having omitted him, therefore, let us come to Samuel. From his childhood he was reared in the temple, and he was always dear and highly pleasing to God, and he displayed such proofs of virtue from his earliest age that even before he attained to man's estate he was numbered among the wonderful prophets, and this at ^B a time when such things seemed to have vanished entirely. For, it says, "there was no vision discernable, and the word was precious" (1 Kings 3:1). This Samuel, then, who was born after many tears, was first of all so confused and troubled when he beheld his master brought to that miserable death, as befitted a grateful and affectionate disciple. After this, he was compelled to weep over the Jewish calamities. Furthermore, his own sons, being iniquitous and wicked, and having arrived at the height of wickedness, afflicted him with this very grief, and because they could not be heirs of the honor granted to him. This grief was succeeded—or rather, did not even wait for the former to cease, but was added to it—by the most unjust petition of the Israelites. In this matter he was so broken that he stood in need of great consolation. Hear, therefore, what God said to him: "They have not rejected you, but me" (1 Kings 8:7). Nevertheless, even after these things, he was so disposed toward them as to say: "But far be it from me to sin in ceasing to pray for you" (1 Kings 12:23). Thus, seeing those whom he so loved being oppressed ^C by Him—or rather, by their own evil-doing and their stumbling in wars, and having provoked God—what pleasure could he have felt? What time could he have passed without grief and tears? And when he had established Saul as king, alternating and constant groans were added to him. For when that man offered sacrifice contrary to the will of God, and when, having defeated the Amalekites, he spared their king contrary to the command of God, he was so struck in spirit that from that time on he no longer saw the man, but wept and lamented for him until his last day, at which time he was even rebuked by God for the vehemence of his grief. "How long," He says, "do you mourn for Saul, and I have rejected him?" (1 Kings 16:1). And if he mourned for these things, in what state of mind are we to think he was when he slaughtered so many priests without cause? When he set out a second time to kill the man who had benefited him with many favors and had offered him no injury? When he saw him naked, prophesying and falling? When he heard David complaining much against him in their familiar meeting?

^D 6. Since I have made mention of David, I do not know what I should do—whether to bring into the middle of this the long and intense lamentations written in the Psalms, or to allow you to ponder these in your leisure and explain his calamities myself. He indeed suffered many things while he was pasturing his flocks, struggling against the inclemency of the air and the brutality of wild beasts. We can notice the former from what Jacob said, and the latter from what he himself told Saul regarding the lion and the bear. But after he left that pastoral life and undertook the affairs of war as an untimely soldier, I omit the envy of his brothers, although that was a most troublesome matter; for when he had attained that most brilliant and marvelous victory, he found in Saul a more vehement enemy than the fallen Goliath, even though he had been benefited by him. For he did not war against him openly, but assuming the mask of one who loved him, and pretending to care for his honor and dignity, he was thus affected toward him in the manner of an enemy. Furthermore, how great an evil it is to receive evil in return for good, hear the blessed prophet lamenting constantly and bearing it with difficulty, saying: "If they return evil to me for good" (Jer. 18:20). Truly, even if no other evil were present, that alone was most troublesome, that the commander of the army should see himself suspected by the king, who looked upon him with grim eyes. What do I say, commander of the army to a king? For if we suffer this very thing from servants, we bear it indignantly; and when they seek our life with hatred and guile, what life could be more bitter? Yet he bore all things and tolerated them, and stood by him who intended to slay him, and waged his wars. But after he withdrew and removed himself from the cares of war, by the very fact that he had removed himself to a distance and had established open enmity, he had a little more confidence; yet when he was compelled to fight against such forces with four hundred men, he was held by a greater fear than before. For consider in what state of mind was he—who possessed neither cities, nor fortifications, nor allies, nor resources—when he was compelled to fight against such a multitude, and could find nowhere to flee except to deserts and caves. For when he had taken the city called Ceila (1 Kings 23:1), he immediately retreated from it, admonished by the priest's response that if he continued to stay there, God would not rescue him from the hands of Saul. But that same priest was he who had escaped the hands of Saul and had announced the most sorrowful slaughter which had occurred in Nob to the king, when he also broke into that most bitter cry: "For I am guilty of all the souls of the house of thy father" (1 Kings 22:22). And so, to be with him was constantly nothing other than a reminder of that lamentation. For when he looked upon him, he always remembered the slaughter of the priests. Furthermore, regarding the slaughter itself...

^A attributing the cause to himself, he led a life more miserable than any condemned man. For even if nothing else were troubling him, it was enough to wound his soul and to tear it apart to consider himself the slayer of so many priests. Wounded by this thought, which gnawed at his soul by night and by day more than a moth, he subsequently received other continuous and successive wounds. For when Nabal insulted him through his servants, and called him a runaway, a fugitive, and an ungrateful slave, he did not bear those words without pain; and when he went to the foreigners, feigning madness, and fell down, and rolling his eyes and letting a great deal of foam pour from his mouth, he was consumed more than those who are truly demon-possessed, considering into what necessity he had brought himself, though he had been treated kindly so many times. But since he had rested a little, having come to the enemy, it was necessary for him to march against their enemies; but the satraps, being jealous of him and wishing to slander him to the king, cast him out from the army as useless to them and as one who would be a plotter and a traitor. "For the satraps of the foreigners were angry at him," it says, "and they say to him: Turn the man back, and let him return to the place where you stationed him there, and let him not come with us into war, and let him not become a plotter against the camp. And in what shall he be reconciled to his master? Is it not with the heads of those men?" And he, struck by these words, withdrew with much insult and despondency. ^B And having come home, he found such great evils that he nearly suffocated from grief. For the terrible things that had happened at that time were indeed enough, even if they had been premeditated, to darken his soul; but with the unexpected and unforeseen added, they appeared twice as great as they were, and were no longer bearable. For he went home as if to find rest, and thinking that he would find consolation for that despondency in his children and wives; but having arrived suddenly, he heard that they were in slavery among the enemies, and he saw fire and smoke and blood and corpses, and before he could lament these and weep for the captivity, those dwelling in the city fell upon him more cruelly than wild beasts, each seeking to find consolation for their own personal evils from his head. And just as when opposing winds fall upon the sea, a great and wild storm arises from that conflict; so too then, with despondency and fear tearing apart the soul of the righteous man, there was a great surge and confusion, as these passions kept constantly overcoming and being overcome. And having been able to escape these evils, and to recover his wives, and all the captives, before he could again perceive that victory, he is struck by a bitter message, regarding the slaughter of Jonathan, which cast down his soul as can be learned from the laments: "For it fell upon me," he says, "your love, as the love of women" (2 Reg. 1. 26). And why do I speak of the laments? For the one who wept so much for the father of that man, his own enemy and plotter and one who desired his destruction ten thousand times, what would he have suffered for the one who stood by him in those dangers and often rescued him from the father’s plotting, and shared secrets ^C and made pacts for many things with him, to learn that this man, when he was able to render to him the rewards for those good deeds, had been snatched from life?

8. While this passion was still flourishing, the leader casts him again into another despondency—the one who had promised to yield all his army to him with complete ease—having snatched this man away before the promise, and having destroyed him by treachery. For he grieved at that slaughter so much that even then he cursed Joab, and at the time of his death commanded his own son to exact from him this penalty for the murders. And the words, which he lamented calling him to mind, are sufficient to set before us the passion of his soul: "For the king," he says, "raised his voice, and wept over the tomb of Abner, and said: If Abner dies according to the death of Nabal, your hands were not bound, nor your feet in fetters, nor did you approach as one who falls before a son of iniquity" (2 Reg. 3. 33-34). What then after this? Mephibosheth is murdered, and with the grief that came to him on this account (for he grieved again at this, as even to kill those who had murdered him) the added opposition of the lame and the crippled disturbed him greatly. Having mastered these and other enemies, he brings up the ark with much joy; but while it was still being brought up, and everyone was rejoicing, in the midst of the gladness a thing occurred which darkened everyone's pleasure, and cast into great despondency and fear the soul of the king. For the one who wished to steady the tottering ark, Uzzah, the wrath of God struck down immediately and made a corpse, and this fear so shook David’s soul for a long time, that he did not dare to bring the ark to himself before learning how he should conduct himself toward Obed-Edom, who received it then. After this, when the king of the Ammonites died, doing the action of a kind and humane man, he sent to console his son, and to persuade him to bear his father's death gently; but the other, instead of this honor, having insulted those who had gone, sent them away in such a manner to the king. Does this seem a small thing to you to strike and cast down a soul? Does not that war show this, which was caused by nothing else, and was extended to such violence, that it surrounded him with countless evils? These things, then, are sufficient, even if one were to mix into them ten thousand pleasures, to classify his life among the lives of the suffering; but now, the things that followed are such that these were not even the beginning of his truly mournful troubles. For the passions of this king surpassed every fable and every tragedy; so bizarre and successive were the terrible things that fell upon his house, with evils always being eager to heal an evil. For see: Amnon lusted after his own sister; having lusted, he insulted her, having insulted her he hated her, and he made the insult and the defilement public, immediately commanding one of his servants to cast her out against her will ^D

and to send her forth through the marketplace screaming and lamenting. When Absalom learned the truth of this, he invited all his brothers to a banquet; among them was that ravisher of his sister, and as he was eating and drinking with the rest, he had him slaughtered by his servants. Then someone arose from there, and without knowing the full order of what had happened because of the tumult, he announced to the king that all his sons were dead. Then he sat mourning for the slaughter of his children, which had not even occurred. After he learned the true state of affairs, he did indeed threaten his son with death; but when he had fled and lived for three years in a foreign land, the king remained angry during all that time; and not even then would he have summoned him, had not the wisdom of his general swayed him. ^A Yet when he was summoned, even then the flame of his sorrow was not extinguished, but he kept him from his sight for another two years, and only after so long a time did he at last, upon the entreaties of the general, deem him worthy of his presence. But he, indignant at the memory of these things, or by other means aiming at tyranny, rose up against his father, and recalled him back to the flights and wanderings he had endured under Saul; indeed, this flight was far more distressing to him than the former. For in the former instance, he was a leader when he endured such things; but now, after he had reigned for many years and had overcome almost all his enemies, he was compelled to wander and become a fugitive; and the one who was driving him to flight was not some stranger or enemy, but one who had gone forth from his own womb, just as he himself lamented while weeping. ^B For he was at the prime of his life when those former things happened, and he was able to bear everything bravely; but now, after that time had passed—when he ought to have had that wicked one as the comfort of his old age—at that time most of all he felt him to be treacherous and most hostile to himself. The king went forth with a few men, barefooted, hiding himself for shame and shedding tears. For that war was to him not only a matter of calamity, but of confusion as well. For the impious son acted toward the blessed one more insultingly than Saul, so much so that he violated his father’s concubines, and this not in secret, but on the roof of the house ^C in the sight of all, so that he overturned the laws of nature and the customs of the marriage bed through the excessive madness which he bore toward his father; and, drunk with folly, even before the war had finished, as if he had already been victorious and had taken his adversaries captive, he dared such things and made them manifest. Thus, when Siba found him sad and fearful, he troubled him yet more, slandering his master and asserting that he had tyrannical designs. Ungrateful, he splattered him with countless reproaches, mixing stones with his words: "Go out," he said, "you man of blood, and man of wickedness! The Lord has returned upon you all the blood of the house of Saul, because you have reigned in his stead, and the Lord has given the kingdom into the hand of Absalom your son, and has shown you your malice, because you are a man of blood" (2 Reg. 16:7-8). Hearing these things and enduring them, he withered away, which is clearly proven by his own lamentations, yet he dared to do nothing further; but when he had said, "Let him alone to curse me; for the Lord has said to him, so that He may see my humility, and the Lord may return to me good for this man's cursing" (2 Reg. 16:10-12), he permitted him to depart from him alive. He himself, however, awaited the arrival of Chusi, and anxious and trembling, he awaited the outcome of the matter. ^D When these things too were announced, war was readied—a war more insolent than any that ever occurred, more like an enigma than a reality. For him who had been the cause of all these evils, and had provided the whole substance of that war—with his death all their adversities were ended—him, I say, he commended to his generals with all foresight and care, constantly repeating to them: "Spare," he said, "my son Absalom" (Id. 18:5). What is worse than this hesitation and ambiguity? What is more miserable than this difficulty? He was compelled to undertake a war in which it was equally distressing for him to win or to be defeated. For he did not wish to be overcome, having sent out such great forces, nor again to win, since he forbade the author of the war to be killed. Yet once the war was distinguished, and the end which God willed was achieved, and that parricide was slain, while all the others were acting in joy and gladness, the king alone mourned and wept, shutting himself away and calling upon his departed son, and bearing it heavily that he had not fallen in his stead. "For who," he said, "will grant me to die for you, Absalom, my son?" (Id. v. 33). What has ever been heard more perplexing than this calamity? When he had killed his brother, he was seeking to kill him; but when he was borne madly against himself, then he spared his son. Nor would he have ceased from weeping for the dead, had not Joab entered and argued the indignation of the matter, and by speaking more vehemently, raised him up and persuaded him to receive the army with a fitting demeanor. Not even then did his disasters find an end, but first the soldiers became divided and fell into sedition against one another; and then, after they had barely ceased through the greatest of flatteries, returning again they cleaved to Seba, and another war began to be stirred up while the remains of the former still persisted. Disturbed by these things, David gathered his forces and sent them out with his generals; but Joab, even after victory was achieved in this war, did not permit the pleasure of victory to be felt without sorrow. For the leader who had been appointed alongside him, who had subjected all the people to David—innocent and who had in nothing harmed him—him he slew, agitated by the goads of envy. This matter was so grave and burdensome to the king that, while dying, he gave orders for the blood of Amessa to be avenged. But what is far weightier is that, being so affected, he did not even dare to state the cause of his sorrow, because he had already struggled against countless misfortunes. For after the tumult of wars, a famine took hold of the entire region, and when he sought the resolution of that evil, he was compelled to deliver the sons of Saul to death. For indeed this heavenly oracle commanded it: "Touching Saul," it said, "and his house, there is this injustice, because he put the Gibeonites to death" (Id. 21:1). If one recalls how much he wept for the death of Saul, he will note what he also suffered then, when he delivered the sons to the Gibeonites. Yet even these things he endured, and further calamities proceeded. For after the famine, a plague immediately arose, and there fell in half a day seventy thousand men, when he spoke those pitiable words

^A king. For when he had seen the angel holding a drawn sword, he said: "Behold, I, the shepherd, have sinned, and I, the shepherd, have done evil; as for these, the flock, what have they done? Let thy hand be upon me and upon my father’s house" (2 Reg. 24. 17). It is not possible for us to recount all his despondencies with precision, for they are not all written down; but from his laments and wailings it is possible to conjecture the magnitude of those omitted, and how the righteous man never ceased to beat his breast and grieve. For what does he say? "The days of our years in them are seventy years; but if in strength, eighty years, and the greater part of them is labor and pain" (Ps. 89. 10). If you should say that he condemned only this common life, and not his own alone, you grant something greater than I myself wish to say, and you relieve me of many words, for he himself confesses that it is not possible to find a life not only his, but even that of any other man, which does not have many more hardships than pleasant things. For indeed, just as you yourself rightly said, not only considering his own, but also those of others, he brought forth this judgment, ^B speaking the same things as the patriarch, but with greater vehemence; for what the latter said in part, the former later pronounced in general terms. For the one said, "My days are few and evil" (Gen. 47. 9); but this man said, "The days of our years in them are seventy years"—meaning for all men—"and the greater part of them is labor and pain."

10. But these things, as I said, I leave for you to go through carefully at your leisure; I for my part will come to the remaining prophets. Although they have nowhere left us their life written down, yet, falling into such distress through the magnitude of the evils that beset them, I think I shall be able to show from a single step that their whole life was sorrowful. And first, what was common to them all: being racked, scourged, sawn asunder, stoned, imprisoned, putting to death by the sword, going about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, afflicted, tormented, they spent their whole life (Heb. 11. 37). And after this, they had another addition to their despondency even more grievous than this: seeing the wickedness of those who inflicted these things upon them advancing, at which they were bitten more than by their own afflictions. ^C And one said: "Cursing and lying and theft and adultery and murder are poured out upon the earth, and blood mingles with blood" (Osee 4. 2), showing us the boldness, the complexity, and the abundance of wickedness. Another cried out again: "Woe is me! For I am become as one gathering stubble in the harvest, and as a gleaning in the vintage, while no cluster exists" (Mich. 7. 1), mourning through these words the scarcity of good men. Others again lamented other such things. The goatherd did not lament only their evils, but mourned their calamities more than his own temptations, and implored God, saying: "Be propitious, O Lord; who shall raise up Jacob, for he is small in number? Repent, O Lord, concerning this." And not even thus does he obtain his intercession; for He said: "And it shall not be, says the Lord." But Isaiah, having heard that the whole earth would be desolate, did not even wish to be consoled, but lamented continuously and said: "Let me alone, I shall weep bitterly; do not insist on consoling me" (Isai. 22. 4). For the manner of death surpasses every calamity. And as for the laments of Jeremiah, both those composed privately and those scattered throughout the prophecy, both those on behalf of the city and those on his own behalf, who will be able to go through them without tears? ^D For at one time he said: "Who will give to my head water, and to my eyes a fountain of tears? And I will weep for this people day and night" (Jer. 9. 1); and now: "Who will give me in the desert an ultimate lodging, and I will leave this people and go away from them? For all are adulterers" (Ibid. v. 2). And at times, complaining, he cried out: "Woe is me, mother! For what did you bear me—a man judged and judging the whole earth?" At other times he even cursed the day of his birth, saying: "Cursed be the day in which I was born in it" (Ibid. 20. 14). But the pit of the cistern, and the distresses of the bonds, and the scourges, and the plots, and the constant mockery so affected him that he finally despaired. But what when the city was taken—did he obtain any providence or honor from the barbarians? Did he perceive any of these? At that time he wrote bitter laments, mourning those who had departed; but he saw evils no less than the past ones, since those who were left behind from the war provoked God. For having promised that they would obey Him in all things and gainsay nothing, they went down to Egypt again, though the oracle said the opposite, and they took the prophet down with themselves, and through their own ingratitude forced him to proclaim to them things more grievous than the former.

But what of Ezekiel? What of Daniel? Did they not pass their whole time in captivity? And the one was punished by hunger and thirst on behalf of others' evils, and when his wife departed, he was ordered to bear such a calamity without tears—and what could be more burdensome than not being allowed even to mourn one's own evils? For I pass over now being forced to eat his own bread on dung, and to lie on one side for one hundred and ninety days, and how many other such things he was commanded to endure (Ezech. 4. 12). For even if none of those painful things had happened to him—either those omitted by me or spoken of now—to be in the midst of enemies and barbarians and unclean men, being righteous and pure, was more burdensome than every punishment. But Daniel seemed to enjoy much honor, and not to live as in captivity, moving about in the royal palaces and being in positions of power; but if anyone should hear his prayer and study his fasting, and the changing of his face, and his constant intercessions, and realize well on behalf of whom he did these things, he will know most of all that this man was in pains and despondencies. For not only present evils troubled him, but also those to come, which, not yet having come to pass, he was vouchsafed to learn with prophetic eyes; and seeing the Jews not yet freed from their former slavery, he was forced to foresee another captivity for them, and the city not yet built, this being taken...

and the temple polluted with sacrifices and laid waste, and all reverence cast down: for this cause he mourned and wept, saying, "To us is the confusion of face, and to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against thee, O Lord" (Dan. ix. 8; Baruch i. 15, 16).

^A But I know not how I had almost overlooked, among the prophets, that heavenly soul which sojourned on earth in such a way that it was always in heaven; for he had nothing earthly save his mantle. What then of this great and admirable man, if one must call him a man (3 Kings xix)? For after that immense boldness which he had used against Achab, after that calling down of fire from heaven, after the slaughter of the priests, after he had shut and opened heaven, at whatever time he wished, and after such and so great achievements and signs of his confidence, he was held so greatly by the weight of sadness that he spoke these words: "Take my soul from me; for I am not better than my fathers" (Ibid. v. 4). This he said, who even to this day is not yet dead. And not this alone, but he went forth into the desert and fell asleep, crushed and exhausted by the burden of his grief and sorrow. Moreover, his disciple not only received a double portion of his master’s spirit, but also far greater pressures (4 Kings ii). Finally, the blessed Paul, setting these men before us a little while ago, and enumerating their afflictions, said: "Of whom the world was not worthy" (Heb. xi. 38). Very opportunely have we now made mention of Paul; for who, if viewed by himself alone, could suffice to bring consolation, and yet, coming after others, whose grief and sorrow should he not make to vanish? His hunger, thirst, nakedness, shipwrecks, wanderings ^B in the deserts, fears, dangers, plots, prisons, stripes, watchings, and the countless deaths which he endured for the sake of preaching, I do not even think worth recounting. For although these things brought him pressures, they were not, however, without a certain pleasure. But indeed, when all the Asiatics turned away from him, when the Galatians were perverted—a whole nation, and one previously acceptable—when the Corinthians rent their own church into many parts, and by their flatteries led the most terrible fornicator to lose even the sense of shame, what do you think he suffered, what darkness do you suppose was poured over his soul? But why do we collect these things by conjecture, when we may hear his own words? For writing to the Corinthians he said: "For out of much tribulation and anguish of heart I wrote to you with many tears" (2 Cor. ii. 4). And again: "Lest perhaps when I come, God humble me, and I bewail many of those who sinned before and have not done penance" (Ibid. xiii. 21). To the Galatians he says: "My little children, of whom I am in labor again, until Christ be formed in you" (Gal. iv. 19). And writing to his disciple about the Asiatics, he complains and groans. Nor did these things alone at that time affect him with sorrow; but the thorn that was given to him so vexed and afflicted him that he often besought God for its removal—for what he says there, "thrice," signifies "often" (2 Cor. xii. 8).

^C But when could he ever breathe, who also mourned the absence of a brother? "For," he says, "from the time I did not find Titus my brother, I had no rest" (2 Cor. ii. 13). In the sickness of another, he suffered the same thing: "For God had mercy on him," he writes to the Philippians concerning Epaphroditus, "and not on him only, but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow" (Phil. ii. 27). And grieving deeply over those who were deceivers and resisted him, he writes to Timothy, saying: "Alexander the coppersmith hath done me much evil; the Lord will render to him according to his works" (2 Tim. iv. 14). What brief respite, then, could such a man have from sorrow and pain? For not only the things mentioned were able to besiege his soul, but also others which provided him with constant grief. And these, again, he revealed himself, when he says: "Besides those things which are without, my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is scandalized, and I am not on fire?" (2 Cor. xi. 28, 29). If he then was burning because others were scandalized, surely that burning could not be extinguished from his soul. For there were never wanting those who were scandalized, and who ministered fuel to his fire. For if cities and nations were often entirely brought to ruin, much more was it necessary that one or another who suffered these things should be found, since there were so many churches throughout the world. Let us grant, if you will, that no one was scandalized, that no one was ever separated from him, and that no other such sad things had happened to him: not even so would we be able to find him free from sorrow. In this matter, again, no witness ^D more suitable occurs than the one who suffered. For what does he say? "I wished myself to be an anathema from Christ, for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites" (Rom. ix. 3). What he says, however, is this: It were more desirable for me to fall into hell than to see the Israelites faithless and incredulous; for this is what "I wished to be an anathema" means. Yet he who chose the torment of hell, in order that he might be able to lead all the Jews to the faith, it is evident surely that, not having obtained his wish, he was more grievously afflicted than those who are tormented in hell, since he desired this even more than that.

On the comparison of Stagirius's grief with that of the ancients

think that all others are likewise affected; for the taking away of these things has led many into madness and utter ruin. A noble soul, indeed, can be cast down by neither of these things; but a weak soul, and one more accustomed to the life of the world, is stung by the latter more than by the former. Why so? Because it is not the same thing to fear hunger always as it is to be distressed for some few days by this disease. For in the latter case, the violence is all in a brief space of time, just as in the case of a fever, or a rigor, or some other visitation that attacks, and it occupies a much smaller duration than this. But if it does overcome by its severity, I could show you many who are feverish who are much more distraught than those possessed by a demon, when they are held fast by that fire. Since, however, the fear of poverty—of the lack of necessities—is like a constant, bitter siege, it sits by and consumes the soul of the impoverished. And why do I speak of poverty? For if we were to wish to recount all the calamities of men, not only we, but perhaps even you yourself will laugh at your own laments and wailings. For it is impossible for us to tell all, or even a thousandth part of them; for we neither know them, and even if we did, all time would not suffice us for the narration. But having selected a few from many, I shall provide you from these the ability to infer even those not mentioned. For remember that most dear old man, Demophilus, I mean, he of the great and illustrious house. He has already ^A spent fifteen years since he became no better than the dead at doing anything, except insofar as he trembles constantly, and speaks, and has a clear perception of his own evils; he lives in utter poverty, and has one young man to serve him, a good one and devoted to his master, yet not able to comfort that calamity; for he can neither provide against poverty, nor stop the tremor of his paralysis, but only put a morsel into the master's mouth (for his hands are not sufficient even to help him with this, and he might be able to bring a cup, and wipe away his slaver, but he can contribute nothing further than these things. But this man has spent fifteen years suffering ^B in this way, as I said; but I think of the one who has wasted thirty-eight years in this affliction. And do you also consider with these the Bithynian, Aristoxenus; for to him the body is not dissolved as it is to that old man, but a disease lies upon him much more grievous than that paralysis. For through the groin certain spasms and pains more bitter than any tormenting, sometimes piercing worse than spits, sometimes gnawing more fiercely than fire, and troubling him every day and night, bestow upon those who do not know the affliction the opinion that he is mad; so greatly do they twist his pupils, so greatly do they strangle his hands and feet, and leave him speechless. And his cries and wailings (for he often cries out after that speechlessness) surpass the lamentations of women in labor, and often those who live far away, having sick people of their own and being troubled by much sleeplessness, have sent, complaining on behalf of those who are suffering, as if they were made worse by the voice of the one ^C thus affected. But this happens to him not at long intervals, but often in the day, and often in the night, and this is now the sixth year since he was handed over to this wicked scourge, and neither is a servant present to attend to him, nor a physician to comfort him, in part because of his poverty, and in part because their craft has been proved vain by the affliction; for many physicians have labored for him (for he happened to have much wealth before this) and profited nothing. And what is more terrible, not even one of his friends is willing to see him now, but all—even those who were once much benefited by him—have abandoned him. And if anyone should ever enter, he immediately fled; so greatly is the room filled with stench, because there is no one to care for him. For one maidservant alone sits beside him, providing only as much service as it is reasonable for a woman to be able to do, being alone and supporting herself by the work of her hands. How much more grievous, then, are his evils than those of demons! For even if nothing of these afflicted him, what would he not suffer, ^D thinking of the long time he has lain on his bed, the great expense that has cast him into utter poverty, the contempt of friends, the desertion of his attendants, the not knowing if these terrible things will ever stop—which is what you are always lamenting—or rather, the being exactly convinced that they will never stop while he is still alive and breathing? For the heightening of the disease and the fact that it progresses to the worse for him every day says this. 13. But that I may not appear to weary my hearers by enumerating one by one those who have been so unfortunate, go to the one entrusted with the care of the hospice, and command him to introduce you to those who lie there, that you may see every root of sufferings, and strange ways of diseases, and all kinds of grounds for despondency. Having come from there to the prison, and having observed everything in that place, walk to the forecourts of the baths, where some lie, using only cypress and reeds instead of clothing and homes, naked, besieged by cold and disease and hunger continuously, comforting the passers-by only by their breathing and the trembling of their bodies and the clatter of their gnashing teeth, and being unable either to let out a voice or to stretch out their hands, because they are already so wasted away by such evils. But do not even stop at these, but also go out to the lodging of the poor before the city, and then you will see well that the despondency which you think now grips you is a calm harbor. For what could one say of the men being consumed little by little by elephantiasis, or the women being eaten away by cancer? For both these diseases are long and incurable; and one of them even drives those who have it from the city, and it is not lawful for them to share in the bath, or the market, or any other thing within. And this is not the only terrible thing, but that they cannot even have confidence regarding the abundance of their necessities. And what of those often condemned to live in the mines in vain and for nothing? For all these are suffering things much greater than those tormented by a demon.

^A If, however, you do not believe it, there is nothing to wonder at. For we are not accustomed to judge both our own and others' ills by the same standard: for the latter we learn by word and sight alone, but the former by experience and sense, combined with pity for ourselves. Therefore, we think them more intolerable than the others, even if they are light and bearable. But if someone, having been freed from all these, were to examine their nature more carefully and observe those who have fallen into them, he would certainly deliver an impartial judgment to us regarding such matters.

But perhaps you will say, "All those passions revolve around the body alone, but this plague touches the soul itself, and is worse than all of them." But precisely by this fact we shall discover it to be lighter than all of them. For it does not corrupt the body as those do, but only disturbs the soul for a short time; furthermore, those very diseases which we have just enumerated, since they are born in the flesh, do not stop at the body but transmit the whole plague to the soul, torturing it continually and corrupting it through the stings of pain and the intensity of sorrow. As it says, "Just as vinegar is not fit for a wound, so also a passion introduced into the body disturbs the heart" [Prov. 25:20]. Therefore, do not say that these arise solely from the body, but rather show this: how it does not send all the plague and corruption to the soul. ^B Indeed, even a plague, though it is not born from bodies, corrupts and ruins bodies, and the venom of snakes, though it comes forth from them, ruins us as well; thus it is to be understood in the case of these diseases, which, being born from the body, infuse the poisons of their malice into our soul. For the intensity of sorrow is more powerful for harm than any demonic possession. For even the demon, whomsoever he overcomes, overcomes him through sorrow; if you remove this, no one could be harmed by the demon at all.

And how, you will say, is it possible to be free from sorrow? I, in turn, will ask you, what is the cause that it is not permitted to be free from sorrow? For if you had committed adultery, or murder, or some such crime which would exclude you from the kingdom of heaven, you would rightly grieve and mourn, and no one would prohibit you; but if by the grace of God you are most far removed from all these, why do you needlessly tear yourself to pieces?

^C God also implanted sorrow into the nature of mortals, not so that we might use it pointlessly and untimely in contrary matters, nor that we might destroy ourselves, but that we might obtain the greatest advantages from it. How, indeed, are we to obtain them? If we take it up at the right time. But the time for sorrow is not when we suffer some adversity, but when we act evilly. Yet we invert the order and have changed the times, we who, while committing countless evils, are not contracted by sorrow even for a moment; but if we suffer some evil from anyone, we immediately collapse, hesitate, and hasten to be freed and to depart from life. Therefore, this thing seems cumbersome and heavy, just as anger and desire. For these also were brought in by those who did not use them correctly or opportunely. And the same thing happens as with medicines which are provided by physicians: ^D for if those too are applied not in their own order and time, or not for the diseases for which they were prepared, but for others, they not only do not free the infirm from their languor, but rather aggravate their infirmity; so indeed also does sorrow, and quite deservedly. For since it is an austere and corrosive medicine, and, so to speak, a purgation of the vices that are in us, if it is applied to an idle and delicate mind, weighed down by a great burden of sins, it will bring it the greatest utility; but if it is applied to a mind that is struggling, competing, exercised by labors, burdened by cares, and having suffered much, besides the fact that it does not help, it harms it greatly, making it weaker and easily assailable. Therefore, to those standing firm and fighting fiercely, Paul, when writing, said: "Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice" [Phil. 4:4]. Furthermore, to those who are dissipated and possess a great tumor, he says: "And you are inflated; and have you not rather mourned?" [1 Cor. 5:2]. And so, indeed, he who is fattened by the abundance of his sins should be attenuated and dried up by this medicine; but he who is in a good condition, and maintains himself in a decent state, what is the cause why he should corrupt his good health through sorrow? It is so sharp and effective that, even for those needing it, if it lingers for more time than is necessary, it is the cause of the greatest evils. And the blessed Paul, fearing this, quickly ordered it to be removed after he had done what was his part, and added the cause: "Lest perhaps," he says, "such a one be absorbed by overmuch sorrow" [2 Cor. 2:7].

Moreover, if excessive sorrow, rushing in, has often ruined even those to whom it was necessary, what will it do to those who, when they do not need it, voluntarily fetch it for themselves? "Yes, indeed," you will say, "I know this myself; but how I am to exclude it, and remove it from my soul, I do not know." And whose difficulty is this, my dearest friend? For if it were some desire, or the insane love of bodies, or the tyranny of vainglory, a vice truly most difficult to overcome, or some perturbation of this kind, you would rightly be solicitous about liberation from such things. For it is not impossible, though very difficult, for those who have been captured by these to escape those nets. Why is that? Because pleasure cooperates with them and helps them. [index: entries preserved] That is the thing which, once they are captured, attaches many ropes to them, and this is the first thing that is full of difficulty: to persuade a mind so ensnared that it truly and thoroughly wants and desires to be freed from these knots; and it becomes very similar to someone who, about to get rid of a scab and itch, delights in his disease, and casts himself into that very same thing. Furthermore, to escaping sorrow, it contributes not a little if we admit it only reluctantly for the time being. For he who is burdened by something will strive to quickly shake it off. What then, if someone strives to cast it from himself, and cannot? Let him not remit his effort, and he will quickly be able to. For consider that a Christian, if ever he is sorrowful, has only two just causes for sorrow: either when he himself or when his neighbor offends God; when indeed your present sorrow has none of these reasons as its root, in vain do you...

distress yourself. And whence, you say, is it clear that we are not paying this penalty for our offenses? Most of all it is clear, yet for the present I do not insist on this. But let it be, if you wish, not unclear as you said, but even very clear that this is a retribution for sins: why therefore do you sorrow, tell me? Or rather, is it not a cause for joy that one’s sins are wiped away here, so as not to be condemned with the world? For he who sorrows ought to sorrow not because he is chastised, but because by sinning he provokes God; for sins alienate God from us and make Him an enemy, whereas the pains of chastisement reconcile Him to us and prepare Him to be merciful and near. That this toil and struggle is not a retribution for sins, but an occasion for crowns and prizes, is clear from this. For if you had passed your former life foully and dissolutely, and in such a state had transferred yourself to the manner of life of monks, there would have been a place for such a suspicion. For if God brings punishments for this reason, that He might turn to repentance those who are unyielding, once repentance has been shown, the penalty would henceforth be superfluous for this purpose. For God is so far from wishing to punish us that even when we often do things worthy of punishment and have need of much conversion, He corrects us solely by threatening and fearful words. And this you can see both in the case of Israel and in the case of the city of the Ninevites. For not only did He not bring the punishment when they had shown repentance, but He even immediately dissolved the threat. For He desires much more than we do that we suffer no evil, and no one would spare himself as God spares us all. Since then He who frightens those who have sinned often by His words, without punishing them, and who releases those who have repented from even this distress, has not only not spared you—who have shown such piety and virtue—from the threat, but further delivered you to the punishment that comes through deeds; how could anyone believe this? But if, as I said, your life before this had been corrupt and wicked, it would have been possible for one to fall into such a thought; but now, when the former was less than the present, and was itself orderly and full of much gravity, so that this is manifest to us from every side, that these struggles are for crowns and a greater occasion. Therefore, as I said, it is necessary to stir up these and such-like considerations, and it is necessary with these—or rather, even before these—to dispel this darkness with prayers and supplications. For the blessed David, that wonderful and great man, used these remedies continually, and thus warded off the many pains of his tribulations, now praying and saying: *The tribulations of my heart were multiplied; from my necessities deliver me* (Ps. 24:17); and now stirring up pious considerations: *Why art thou sorrowful, O my soul, and why dost thou trouble me? Hope in God, for I will confess to Him* (Ps. 41:5). And again, turning from considerations to prayers: *Give me rest, he says, that I may be refreshed before I go and be no more* (Ps. 38:14); and from prayers to considerations: *For what have I in heaven, and what have I desired of Thee upon earth?* (Ps. 72:25). Thus also Job, against the woman who suggested the satanic words, fought back with considerations and rebuked her, saying: *Why hast thou spoken as one of the foolish women? If we have received good things from the hand of the Lord, shall we not endure the evil things?* (Job 2:10). But towards God he used supplications. And the blessed Paul also aided both these who are in tribulations and temptations, now saying: *If you are without discipline, then you are bastards and not sons; for what son is there whom a father does not discipline?* (Heb. 12:7-8)? And again, praying, *God is faithful, he says, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able* (1 Cor. 10:13); and again, *If it is a righteous thing with God to repay tribulation to them that trouble you, and to you who are troubled, rest* (2 Thess. 1:6-7). If, therefore, you also wish to use these weapons, and fortify yourself well on every side—walling off the inroad of despondency with considerations, and by prayers, both your own and others', making this a strong bulwark—you will quickly perceive the fruits of discipline. For you will gain not only this, to bear the present things courageously, but having been well exercised by them, you will thereafter be invulnerable to all the sorrows of this life. ^A And the

Concerning those who have subintroduced women.

MONITUM