13. That you, the leader of the patrician order, first set the example of turning monk should not be to you an occasion of boasting but rather one of humility, knowing as you do that the Son of God became the Son of man. However low you may abase yourself, you cannot be more lowly than Christ. Even supposing that you walk barefooted, that you dress in sombre garb, that you rank yourself with the poor, that you condescend to enter the tenements of the needy, that you are eyes to the blind, hands to the weak, feet to the lame, that you carry water and hew wood and make fires--even supposing that you do all this, where are the chains, the buffets, the spittings, the scourgings, the gibbet, the death which the Lord endured? And even when you have done all the things I have mentioned, you are still surpassed by your sister Eustochium as well as by Paula: for considering the weakness of their sex they have done more work relatively if less absolutely, than you. I myself was not at Rome but in the desert--would that I had continued there--at the time when your father-in-law Toxotius was still alive and his daughters were still given up to the world. But I have heard that they were too dainty to walk in the muddy streets, that they were carried about in the arms of eunuchs, that they disliked crossing uneven ground, that they found a silk dress a burthen and felt sunshine too scorching. But now, squalid and sombre in their dress, they are positive heroines in comparison with what they used to be. They trim lamps, light fires, sweep floors, clean vegetables, put heads of cabbage in the pot to boil, lay tables, hand cups, help dishes and run to and fro to wait on others. And yet there is no lack of virgins under the same roof with them. Is it then that they have no servants upon whom they can lay these duties? Surely not. They are unwilling that others should surpass them in physical toil whom they themselves surpass in rigour of mind. I say all this not because I doubt your mental ardour but that I may quicken the pace at which you are running, and in the heat of battle may add warmth to your warmth.
14. I for my part am building in this province a monastery and a hospice close by; so that, if Joseph and Mary chance to come to Bethlehem, they may not fail to find shelter and welcome. Indeed, the number of monks who flock here from all quarters of the world is so overwhelming that I can neither desist from my enterprise nor bear so great a burthen. The warning of the gospel has been all but fulfilled in me, for I did not sufficiently count the cost of the tower I was about to build; [1995] accordingly I have been constrained to send my brother Paulinian [1996] to Italy to sell some ruinous villas which have escaped the hands of the barbarians, and also the property inherited from our common parents. For I am loth, now that I have begun it, to give up ministering to the saints, lest I incur the ridicule of carping and envious persons.
15. Now that I have come to the conclusion of my letter I recall my metaphor of the four-horse team, and recollect that Blæsilla would have made a fifth had she been spared to share your resolve. I had almost forgotten to mention her, the first of you all to go to meet the Lord. You who once were five I now see to be two and three. Blæsilla and her sister Paulina rest in sweet sleep: you with the two others on either side of you will fly upward to Christ more easily.
[1917] Virgil, Æn. iv. 367.
[1918] Quoted from a poet in the Latin Anthology.
[1919] Matt. xiii. 8.
[1920] Paula and her two daughters, Paulina and Eustochium.
[1921] Ezek. x. 8-22.
[1922] Hab. iii. 8, LXX.
[1923] Cf. Wisdom viii. 7.
[1924] 1 Cor. i. 24.
[1925] Heb. xiii. 4.
[1926] i.e., continence in marriage.
[1927] Virg. A. i. 494.
[1928] Gen. xxxv. 16.
[1929] The respective meanings of Benoni and Benjamin.
[1930] Gen. i. 28.
[1931] 1 Sam. iv. 19-22.
[1932] Ichabod means there is no glory'; glory being (apparently) a synonym for the ark.
[1933] 1 Cor. i. 26.
[1934] Matt. xiii. 31.
[1935] Matt. xiii. 33.
[1936] Isa. liv. 1.
[1937] Virg. A. vi. 625, 627.
[1938] Ecclus. iii. 30.
[1939] Viz. the treatise entitled Of Work and Alms.
[1940] Dan. iv. 27.
[1941] Ecclus. iv. 25. Est confusio adducens peccatum: et est confusio adducens gloriam et gratiam, Vulg. Jerome probably quotes from memory. A.V. follows the Greek and the Vulg.
[1942] Gal. i. 10.
[1943] Cf. Jer. i. 18; Ezek. iii. 8, 9.
[1944] Cf. Luke xiv. 11.
[1945] 1 Sam. ii. 30.
[1946] Cf. the remark of Æneas Silvius that "men should be given to places not places, to men."
[1947] Palma, i.e. tunica palmata.
[1948] Cf. Matt. xix. 29.
[1949] Gen. xxvi. 12.
[1950] Gen. xxii.
[1951] Matt. xix. 21.
[1952] Matt. xix. 12.
[1953] Rom. ix. 16.
[1954] Acts v.
[1955] 1 Cor. ix. 9.
[1956] 1 Tim. v. 18.
[1957] 1 Cor. ix. 13.
[1958] 1 Tim. vi. 8.
[1959] Cf. Letter LVIII. § 2.
[1960] Matt. xiii. 44.
[1961] Matt. xiii. 45.
[1962] Cf. Deut. xxi. 11, 12.
[1963] Jer. ii. 22.
[1964] Cant. ii. 6. A.V. his' for her.'
[1965] Jerome is thinking of Ruth.
[1966] 1 Cor. i. 30; Heb. xii. 14.
[1967] Ps. lxxiii. 26.
[1968] Quintilian.
[1969] What was the mistake? Did the orator say, "Well enough if fast enough"? The text seems obscure.
[1970] Fabius Pietor.
[1971] Cf. Letter XLVI. § 12.
[1972] Cant. iii. 1.
[1973] Cant. v. 2.
[1974] Cf. Cant. i. 7, ii. 5, v. 2.
[1975] Ps. lxviii. 13.
[1976] Isa. vii. 14, 15.
[1977] Ps. lxviii. 14, Vulg. (acc. to some mss.). Intermedios cleros--the lot or inheritance--with an allusion perhaps to the word clergy formed from clerus.
[1978] Perhaps an allusion to Isa. viii. 1. Mahershalal-hash-baz, Spoil speedeth, prey hasteth.'
[1979] i.e. the oak of Mamre under which he entertained the three angels (Gen. xviii. 1-8).
[1980] Virg. Æn. vii. 112-129.
[1981] Beth-lehem means house of bread.'
[1982] v. § 14 below.
[1983] Gen. xiii. 5-11.
[1984] The letter U. Cf. Pers. iii. 56, 57 and Conington's note.
[1985] Gen. xxiii. 19.
[1986] i.e. Kirjathsepher close to Hebron (Josh. xv. 13-15) where Sarah was buried.
[1987] Cf. Jos. xv. 14.
[1988] An allusion to the name of Abraham's heir, Isaac or laughter' (Gen. xxi. 3, 6).
[1989] Gen. xiv. 13-16.
[1990] Rom. xii. 1.
[1991] Matt. xx. 28.
[1992] Job ii. 4, 5.
[1993] Luke xix. 2-9.
[1994] Gen. iv. 7, LXX.
[1995] Luke xiv. 28.
[1996] See Letter LXI. § 31.