15. For this is to change what you had been, and to begin to be what you were not, that the divine birth might shine forth in you, that the godly discipline might respond to God, the Father, that in the honour and praise of living, God may be glorified in man; as He Himself exhorts, and warns, and promises to those who glorify Him a reward in their turn, saying, "Them that glorify me I will glorify, and he who despiseth me shall be despised." [3676] For which glorification the Lord, forming and preparing us, and the Son of God instilling [3677] the likeness of God the Father, says in His Gospel: "Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, and pray for them which persecute you; that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven, who maketh His sun to rise on the good and on the evil, and sendeth rain upon the just and on the unjust." [3678] If it is a source of joy and glory to men to have children like to themselves--and it is more agreeable to have begotten an offspring then when the remaining [3679] progeny responds to the parent with like lineaments--how much greater is the gladness in God the Father, when any one is so spiritually born that in his acts and praises the divine eminence of race [3680] is announced! What a palm of righteousness is it, what a crown to be such a one [3681] as that the Lord should not say of you, "I have begotten and brought up children, but they have despised me!" [3682] Let Christ rather applaud you, and invite you to the reward, saying, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom which is prepared for you from the beginning of the world." [3683]
16. The mind must be strengthened, beloved brethren, by these meditations. By exercises of this kind it must be confirmed against all the darts of the devil. Let there be the divine reading in the hands, [3684] the Lord's thoughts in the mind; let constant prayer never cease at all; let saving labour persevere. Let us be always busied in spiritual actions, that so often as the enemy approaches, however often he may try to come near, he may find the breast closed and armed against him. For a Christian man's crown is not only that which is received in the time of persecution: peace [3685] also has its crowns, wherewith the victors, from a varied and manifold engagement, are crowned, when their adversary is prostrated and subdued. To have overcome lust is the palm of continency. To have resisted against anger, against injury, is the crown of patience. It is a triumph over avarice to despise money. It is the praise of faith, by trust in the future, to suffer the adversity of the world. And he who is not haughty in prosperity, obtains glory for his humility; and he who is disposed to the mercifulness of cherishing the poor, obtains the retribution of a heavenly treasure; and he who knows not to be jealous, and who with one heart and in meekness loves his brethren, is honoured with the recompense of love and peace. In this course of virtues we daily run; to these palms and crowns of justice we attain without intermission of time.
17. To these rewards that you also may come who had been possessed with jealousy and rancour, cast away all that malice wherewith you were before held fast, and be reformed to the way of eternal life in the footsteps of salvation. Tear out from your breast thorns and thistles, that the Lord's seed may enrich you with a fertile produce, that the divine and spiritual cornfield may abound to the plentifulness of a fruitful harvest. Cast out the poison of gall, cast out the virus of discords. Let the mind which the malice [3686] of the serpent had infected be purged; let all bitterness which had settled within be softened by the sweetness of Christ. If you take both meat and drink from the sacrament of the cross, let the wood which at Mara [3687] availed in a figure for sweetening the taste, avail to you in reality for soothing your softened breast; and you shall not strive for a medicine for your increasing health. Be cured by that whereby you had been wounded. [3688] Love those whom you previously had hated; favour those whom you envied with unjust disparagements. Imitate good men, if you are able to follow them; but if you are not able to follow them, at least rejoice with them, and congratulate those who are better than you. Make yourself a sharer [3689] with them in united love; make yourself their associate in the alliance of charity and the bond of brotherhood. Your debts shall be remitted to you when you yourself shall have forgiven. Your sacrifices shall be received when you shall come in peace to God. Your thoughts and deeds shall be directed from above, when you consider those things which are divine and righteous, as it is written: "Let the heart of a man consider righteous things, that his steps may be directed by the Lord." [3690]
18. And you have many things to consider. Think of paradise, whither Cain does not enter, [3691] who by jealousy slew his brother. Think of the heavenly kingdom, to which the Lord does not admit any but those who are of one heart and mind. Consider that those alone can be called sons of God who are peacemakers, who in heavenly [3692] birth and by the divine law are made one, and respond to the likeness of God the Father and of Christ. Consider that we are standing under the eyes of God, that we are pursuing the course of our conversation and our life, with God Himself looking on and judging, that we may then at length be able to attain to the result of beholding Him, if we now delight Him who sees us, by our actions, if we show ourselves worthy of His favour and indulgence; if we, who are always to please Him in His kingdom, previously please Him in the world.
[3641] [This is numbered xii. in Oxford trans., and is assigned to a.d. 256.]
[3642] The deacon Pontius thus briefly suggests the purpose of this treatise in his Life of Cyprian: "Who was there to restrain the ill blood arising from the envenomed malignity of envy with the sweetness of a wholesome remedy?"
[3643] 1 Pet. v. 8.
[3644] According to some, "of our members."
[3645] [The nude in art, the music of the opera, and sensual luxury of all sorts, are here condemned. And compare Clem. Alex., vol. ii. p. 249, note 11, this series.]
[3646] [Chrysostom, vol. iv. p. 473, ed. Migne. This close practical preaching is a lesson to the younger clergy of our days.]
[3647] Some add "long ago."
[3648] Wisd. ii. 24. [So Lactantius, Institutes, book ii. cap. ix. in vol. vii., this series.]
[3649] [Chrysostom, vol. iv. p. 473, ed. Migne. This close practical preaching is a lesson to the younger clergy of our days.]
[3650] [Chrysostom, ut. supra.]
[3651] Variously "semel" or "simul."
[3652] [Matt. xxvi. 18.]
[3653] Or, with some editors, "more increased in honours." [To be purged from a Christian's heart like a leprosy from the body. See Jeremy Taylor, sermon xix., Apples of Sodom. Quotation from Ælian, vol. i. p. 717.]
[3654] [The sin of Novatian and Arius. See p. 489, note 3, supra.]
[3655] [Another specimen of our author's pithy condensations of thought and extraordinary eloquence.]
[3656] Ps. xxxvii. 7.
[3657] Ps. xxxvii. 12, 13.
[3658] Rom. iii. 13-18.
[3659] Erasmus and others give this reading. Baluzius, Routh, and many codices, omit "vulnus," and thus read, "what is seen."
[3660] ["It punishes the delinquent in the very act." Jer. Taylor, ut supra, p. 492, also Anselm, Opp., i. 682, ed. Migne.]
[3661] Luke ix. 48. [Elucidation IX.]
[3662] [And all ground for a supremacy among brethren was here absolutely ejected from the Christian system. The last of the canonical primates of Rome named himself Servus Servorum Dei, to rebuke those who would make him "Universal Bishop."]
[3663] Rom. xiii. 12, 13.
[3664] 1 John iii. 15.
[3665] 1 John ii. 9-11.
[3666] John viii. 12.
[3667] 1 Pet. ii. 21.
[3668] [Matt. v. 19.]
[3669] Or, according to ancient authority, "of confession and martyrdom." [Note this clear conception of the root-principle of the true martyr, and compare Treatise xi. infra.]
[3670] 1 Cor. xiii. 4.
[3671] Or, "I have given you milk to drink, not meat," is read by some.
[3672] 1 Cor. iii. 1-3.
[3673] Rom. viii. 12-14.
[3674] Col. iii. 1-4.
[3675] 1 Cor. xv. 47-49.
[3676] 1 Sam. ii. 30.
[3677] "And engendering in the sons of God."--Oxford ed.
[3678] Matt. v. 43-45.
[3679] Or, "successive."
[3680] "Generositas."
[3681] Or, "that one should be such;" or, "that thou shouldst be such."
[3682] Isa. i. 2.
[3683] Matt. xxv. 34.
[3684] Pamelius, from four codices, reads, "Let there be the divine reading before the eyes, good works in the hands."
[3685] ["Habet et pax coronas suas." Comp. Milton, Sonnet xi.]
[3686] The Oxford translator gives "blackness;" the original is "livor."
[3687] Or "myrrh," variously given in originals as "myrrham" or "merrham."
[3688] ["Unde vulneratus fueras, inde curare." Lear, act ii. sc. 4.]
[3689] "A fellow-heir," according to Baluzius and Routh.
[3690] Prov. xv. 1, LXX.
[3691] "Return" is a more common reading.
[3692] Routh omits the word "heavenly," on the authority of fourteen codices.
Treatise XI. [3693]
Exhortation to Martyrdom, Addressed to Fortunatus.