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1. The Lord says, as you have just been hearing, "He that hateth
me, hateth my Father also:" and yet He had said a little before,
"These things will they do unto you, because they know not Him that
sent me." A question therefore arises that cannot be overlooked, how
they can hate one whom they know not? For if it is not God as He
really is, but something else, I know not what, that they suspect or
believe Him to be, and hate this; then assuredly it is not God
Himself that they hate, but the thing they conceive in their own
erroneous suspicion or baseless credulity; and if they think of Him as
He really is, how can they be said to know Him not? It may be the
case, indeed, with regard to men, that we frequently love those whom
we have never seen; and in this way it can, on the other hand, be
none the less impossible that we should hate those whom we have never
seen. The report, for instance, whether good or bad, about some
preacher, leads us not improperly to love or to hate the unknown. But
if the report is truthful, how can one, of whom we have got such true
accounts, be spoken of as unknown? Is it because we have not seen his
face? And yet, though he himself does not see it, he can be known to
no one better than to himself. The knowledge of any one, therefore,
is not conveyed to us in his bodily countenance, but only lies open to
our apprehension when his life and character are revealed. Otherwise
no one would be able to know himself, because unable to see his own
face. But surely he knows himself more certainly than he is known to
others, inasmuch as by inward inspection he can the more certainly see
what he is conscious of, what he desires, what he is living for; and
it is when these are likewise laid open to us, that he becomes truly
known to ourselves. And as these, accordingly, are commonly brought
to us regarding the absent, or even the dead, either by hearsay or
correspondence, it thus comes about that people whom we have never seen
by face (and yet of whom we are not entirely ignorant), we frequently
either hate or love.
2. But in such cases our credulity is frequently at fault; for
sometimes even history, and still more ordinary report, turns out to
be false. Yet, it ought to be our concern, in order not to be misled
by an injurious opinion, seeing we cannot search into the consciences
of men, to have a true and certain sentiment about things themselves.
I mean, that in regard to this or that man, if we know not whether he
is immodest or modest, we should at all events hate immodesty and love
modesty: and if in regard to some one or other we know not whether he
is unjust or just, we should at any rate love justice and abhor
injustice; not such things as we erroneously fancy to ourselves, but
such as we believingly perceive according to God's truth, the one to
be desired, the other to be shunned; so that, when in regard to
things themselves we do desire what ought to be desired, and utterly
avoid what ought to be avoided, we may find pardon for the mistaken
feelings which we at times, yea, at all times, entertain regarding
the actual state of others which is hidden from our eyes. For this,
I think, has to do with human temptation, without which we cannot
pass through this life, so that the apostle said, "No temptation
should befall you but such as is common to man." For what is so
common to man as inability to inspect the heart of man; and therefore,
instead of scrutinizing its inmost recesses, to suspect for the most,
part something very different from what is going on therein? And
although in these dark regions of human realities, that is, of other
people's inward thoughts, we cannot clear up our suspicions, because
we are only men, yet we ought to restrain our judgments, that is, all
definite and fixed opinions, and not judge anything before the time,
until the Lord come, and bring to light the hidden things of
darkness, and make manifest the counsels of the hearts; and then shall
every man have praise of God. When, therefore, we are falling into
no error in regard to the thing itself, so that there is an accordance
with right in our reprobation of vice and approbation of virtue;
surely, if a mistake is committed in connection with individuals, a
temptation so characteristic of man is within the scope of forgiveness.
3. But amid all these darknesses of human hearts, it happens as a
thing much to be wondered at and mourned over, that one, whom we
account unjust, and who nevertheless is just, and in whom, without
knowing it, we love justice, we sometimes avoid, and turn away from,
and hinder from approaching us, and refuse to have life and living in
common with him; and, if necessity compel the infliction of
discipline, whether to save others from harm or bring the person
himself back to rectitude, we even pursue him with a salutary
harshness; and so afflict a good man as if he were wicked, and one
whom unknowingly we love. This takes place if one, for example's
sake, who is modest is believed by us to be the opposite. For,
beyond doubt, if I love a modest person, he is himself the very
object that I love; and therefore I love the man himself, and know
it not. And if I hate an immodest person, it is on that account,
not him that I hate: for he is not the thing that I hate; and yet to
that object of my love, with whom my heart makes continual abode in the
love of modesty, I am ignorantly doing an injury, erring as I do,
not in the distinction I make between virtue and vice, but in the
thick darkness of the human heart. Accordingly, as it may so happen
that a good man may unknowingly hate a good man, or rather loves him
without knowing it (for the man himself he loves in loving that which
is good; for what the other is, is the very thing that he loves);
and without knowing it, hates not the man himself, but that which he
supposes him to be: so may it also be the case that an unjust man hates
a just man, and, while he opines that he loves one who is unjust like
himself, unknowingly loves the just man; and yet so long as he
believes him to be unjust, he loves not the man himself, but that
which he imagines him to be. And as it is with another man, so is it
also with God. For, to conclude, had the Jews been asked if they
loved God, what other answer would they have given but that they did
love Him, and that not with any intentional falsehood, but because
erroneously fancying that they did so? For how could they love the
Father of the truth, who were filled with hatred to the truth itself?
For they do not wish their own conduct to be condemned, and it is the
truth's task to condemn such conduct; and thus they hated the truth as
much as they hated their own punishment, which the truth awards to
such. But they know not that to be the truth which lays its
condemnation on such as they: therefore they hate that which they know
not; and hating it, they certainly cannot but also hate Him of whom
it is born. And in this way, because they know not the truth, by
whose judgment they are condemned, as that which is born of God the
Father; of a surety also they both know not, and hate [the Father]
Himself. Miserable men! who, because wishing to be wicked, deny
that to be the truth whereby the wicked are condemned. For they refuse
to own that to be what it is, when they ought themselves to refuse to
be what they are; in order that, while it remains the same, they may
be changed, lest by its judgment they fall into condemnation.
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