Even before the things to come, He gives thee here thy recompense, and bestows the prize already, making the saying acceptable, both hereby, and by setting Himself forward as an example. For, "Of what art thou afraid?" saith He, "lest thou shouldest be a loser by thy low estate? Look to me, and to all that is mine; learn of me, and then shalt thou know distinctly how great thy blessing." Seest thou how in all ways He is leading them to humility? By His own doings: "Learn of me, for I am meek." By what themselves are to gain; for, "Ye shall find," saith He," rest unto your souls." By what He bestows on them; for, "I too will refresh you," saith He. By rendering it light; "For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." So likewise doth Paul, saying, "For the present light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." [1636]
And how, some one may say, is the burden light, when He saith, "Except one hate father and mother;" and, "Whosoever taketh not up his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me:" and, "Whosoever forsaketh not all that he hath, cannot be my disciple:" [1637] when He commands even to give up our very life? [1638] Let Paul teach thee, saying, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? [1639] " And that, "The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us." [1640] Let those teach thee, who return from the council of the Jews after plenty of stripes, and "rejoice that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for the name of Christ." [1641] And if thou art still afraid and tremblest at hearing of the yoke and the burden, the fear comes not of the nature of the thing, but of thy remissness; since if thou art prepared, and in earnest, all will be easy to thee and light. Since for this cause Christ also, to signify that we too must needs labor ourselves, did not mention the gracious things only, and then hold His peace, nor the painful things only, but set down both. Thus He both spake of "a yoke," and called it "easy;" both named a burden, and added that it was "light;" that thou shouldest neither flee from them as toilsome, nor despise them as over easy.
But if even after all this, virtue seem to thee an irksome thing, consider that vice is more irksome. And this very thing He was intimating, in that He said not first, "Take my yoke upon you," but before that, "Come, ye that labor and are heavy laden;" implying that sin too hath labor, and a burden that is heavy and hard to bear. For He said not only, "Ye that labor," but also, "that are heavy laden." This the prophet too was speaking of, when in that description of her nature, "As an heavy burden they weighed heavy upon me." [1642] And Zacharias too, describing her, saith she is "A talent of lead." [1643]
And this moreover experience itself proves. For nothing so weighs upon the soul, and presses it down, as consciousness of sin; nothing so much gives it wings, and raises it on high, as the attainment of righteousness and virtue.
And mark it: what is more grievous, I pray thee, than to have no possessions? to turn the cheek, and when smitten not to smite again? to die by a violent death? Yet nevertheless, if we practise self-command, all these things are light and easy, and pleasurable.
But be not disturbed; rather let us take up each of these, and inquire about it accurately; and if ye will, that first which many count most painful. Which then of the two, tell me, is grievous and burdensome, to be in care for one belly, or to be anxious about ten thousand? To be clothed with one outer garment, and seek for nothing more; or having many in one's house, to bemoan one's self every day and night in fear, in trembling, about the preservation of them, grieved, and ready to choke about the loss of them; lest one should be moth-eaten, lest a servant purloin and go off with them?
4. But whatever I may say, my speech will present no such proof as the actual trial. Wherefore I would there were present here with us some one of those who have attained unto that summit of self-restraint, and then you would know assuredly the delight thereof; and that none of those that are enamored of voluntary poverty would accept wealth, though ten thousand were to offer it.
But would these, say you, ever consent to become poor, and to cast away the anxieties which they have? And what of that? This is but a proof of their madness and grievous disease, not of anything very pleasurable in the thing. And this even themselves would testify to us, who are daily lamenting over these their anxieties, and accounting their life to be not worth living. But not so those others; rather they laugh, leap for joy, and the wearers of the diadem do not so glory, as they do in their poverty.
Again, to turn the cheek is, to him that gives heed, a less grievous thing than to smite another; for from this the contest hath beginning, in that termination: and whereas by the former thou hast kindled the other's pile too, by the latter thou hast quenched even thine own flames. But that not to be burnt is a pleasanter thing than to be burnt, is surely plain to every man. And if this hold in regard of bodies, much more in a soul.
And whether is lighter, to contend, or to be crowned? to fight, or to have the prize? and to endure waves, or to run into harbor? Therefore also, to die is better than to live. For the one withdraws us from waves and dangers, while the other adds unto them, and makes a man subject to numberless plots and distresses, which have made life not worth living in thine account.
And if thou disbelievest our sayings, hearken to them that have seen the countenances of the martyrs in the time of their conflicts, how when scourged and flayed, they were exceeding joyful and glad, and when exposed upon hot irons, rejoiced, and were glad of heart, more than such as lie upon a bed of roses. Wherefore Paul also said, when he was at the point of departing hence, and closing his life by a violent death, "I joy, and rejoice with you all; for the same cause also do ye joy, and rejoice with me." [1644] Seest thou with what exceeding strength of language he invites the whole world to partake in his gladness? So great a good did he know his departure hence to be, so desirable, and lovely, and worthy of prayer, that formidable thing, death.
5. But that virtue's yoke is sweet and light, is manifest many other ways also; but to conclude, if you please, let us look also at the burdens of sin. Let us then bring forward the covetous, the retailers and second-hand dealers in shameless bargains. What now could be a heavier burden than such transactions? how many sorrows, how many anxieties, how many disappointments, how many dangers, how many plots and wars, daily spring up from these gains? how many troubles and disturbances? For as one can never see the sea without waves, so neither such a soul without anxiety, and despondency, and fear, and disturbance; yea, the second overtakes the first, and again others come up, and when these are not yet ceased, others come to a head.
Or wouldest thou see the souls of the revilers, and of the passionate? Why, what is worse than this torture? what, than the wounds they have within? what, than the furnace that is continually burning, and the flame that is never quenched?
Or of the sensual, and of such as cleave unto this present life? Why, what more grievous than this bondage? They live the life of Cain, dwelling in continual trembling and fear at every death that happens; the kinsmen of the dead mourn not so much, as these do for their own end.
What again fuller of turmoil, and more frantic, than such as are puffed up with pride? "For learn," saith He, "of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Because long-suffering is the mother of all good things.
Fear thou not therefore, neither start away from the yoke that lightens thee of all these things, but put thyself under it with all forwardness, and then thou shalt know well the pleasure thereof. For it doth not at all bruise thy neck, but is put on thee for good order's sake only, and to persuade thee to walk seemly, and to lead thee unto the royal road, and to deliver thee from the precipices on either side, and to make thee walk with ease in the narrow way.
Since then so great are its benefits, so great its security, so great its gladness, let us with all our soul, with all our diligence, draw this yoke; that we may both here "find rest unto our souls," and attain unto the good things to come, by the grace and love towards man of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and might, now and ever, and world without end. Amen.
[1606] [A.V., "I thank thee," so R.V., with margin, "Or, praise." The Oxford translator gives the exact sense of the Greek verb, but below reverts to the rendering "thank," in accordance with the explanation of Chrysostom.--R.]
[1607] [R.V., "Yea, Father, for (or, that) so it was well-pleasing in thy sight." Comp. the explanation in the Homily.--R.]
[1608] Matt. xi. 7-11.
[1609] Matt. xi. 12.
[1610] Matt. vi. 13.
[1611] Matt. vi. 14-19.
[1612] Matt. xi. 20-24.
[1613] Rom. vi. 17. [R.V., "that form of teaching whereunto ye were delivered." The A.V. renders the passage incorrectly: there being no doubt as to the Greek text. The R.V. also brings out the thought which the Homily indicates.--R.]
[1614] 1 Cor. iii. 18.
[1615] Matt. vii. 6.
[1616] proegomenon. In the same sense in which Hooker says, "He willeth positively that which Himself worketh; He willeth by permission that which His creatures do." E. P. v. App. No. 1, p. 714, cf. in Walton's Life, p. 29. "That in God there were two wills, an antecedent and a consequent will; His first will, that all mankind should be saved; His second, that those only should be saved, who lived answerable to that degree of grace which He had offered."
[1617] Rom. x. 3.
[1618] ["would;" but the whole clause has been freely paraphrased.--R.]
[1619] Luke x. 21.
[1620] Rom. i. 28.
[1621] 2 Cor. iv. 4. ["This passage is irrelevant, since it speaks of "the god of this world."--R.]
[1622] [See above, and note 1, p. 250.--R.]
[1623] Matt. xi. 27.
[1624] Luke x. 22.
[1625] boletai. [R.V., "willeth."]
[1626] Matt. xi. 27.
[1627] John xiv. 6.
[1628] epstatai.
[1629] That is, that none but the Father has full knowledge of Him.
[1630] Tertull. adv. Marc. i. 8. "The Marcionites bring forward a new God, as if we were ashamed of the ancient One....I hear them talk of a new God, in the old world and in the old age, and under that ancient God, unknown and unheard of." [Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. iii. p. 276.] It seems to have been common to all the Oriental sects, to speak of the Supreme God as utterly unknown until the Christian dispensation began.
[1631] 1 Cor. xiii. 9.
[1632] Matt. xi. 28.
[1633] Matt. xi. 29, 30.
[1634] Matt. vii. 13.
[1635] Matt. v. 3.
[1636] 2 Cor. iv. 17.
[1637] Luke xiv. 26, 27, 33; Matt. x. 37, 38.
[1638] Matt. xvi. 25.
[1639] Rom. viii. 35.
[1640] Rom. viii. 18.
[1641] Acts v. 41.
[1642] Ps. xxxviii. 4.
[1643] Zech. v. 7, 8.
[1644] Phil. ii. 17, 18. [R.V., "and in the same manner also," etc.]