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FURTHER also that recompense of reward, t wherein the Lord promises an
hundredfold in this life to those whose renunciation is perfect, and says:
"And everyone that hath left house or brethren or sisters or father or
mother or wife or children or lands for My name's sake, shall receive an
hundredfold in the resent time and shall inherit eternal life," is
rightly and truly taken m the same sense without any disturbance of faith.
For many taking occasion by this saying, insist with crass intelligence
that these things will be given carnally in the millennium, though they
must certainly admit that age, which they say will be after the
resurrection cannot possibly be understood as present. It is then more
credible and much clearer that one, who at the persuasion of Christ has
made light of any worldly affections or goods, receives from the brethren
and partners of his life, who are joined to him by a spiritual tie, even in
this life a love which is an hundred times better: since it is certain that
among parents and children and brothers, wives and relations, where either
the tie is merely formed by intercourse, or the bond of union by the claims
of relationship, the love is tolerably short lived and easily broken.
Finally even good and duteous children when they have grown up, are
sometimes shut out by their parents from their homes and property, and
sometimes for a really good reason the tie of matrimony is severed, and a
quarrelsome division destroys the property of brothers. Monks alone
maintain a lasting union in intimacy, and possess all things in common, as
they hold that everything that belongs to their brethren is their own, and
that everything which is their own is their brethren's. If then the grace
of our love is compared to those affections where the bond of union is a
carnal love, certainly it is an hundred times sweeter and finer. There will
indeed also be gained from conjugal continence a pleasure that is an
hundred times greater than that which arises from the union of the sexes.
And instead of that joy, which a man experiences from the possession of a
single field of house, he will enjoy a delight in riches a hundred times
greater, if he passes over to the adoption of sons of God, and possesses as
his own all things which belong to the eternal Father, and asserts in heart
and soul after the fashion of that true Son: "All things that the Father
hath are mine;" and if no longer tried by that criminal anxiety in
distractions and cares, but free from care and glad at heart he succeeds
everywhere to his own, hearing daily the announcement made to him by the
Apostle: "For all things are yours, whether the world, or things present,
or things to come;" and by Solomon: "The faithful man has a whole world of
riches." You have then that recompense of an hundredfold brought out by
the greatness of the value, and the difference of the character that cannot
be estimated. For if for a fixed weight of brass or iron or some still
commoner metal, one had given in exchange the same weight only in gold, he
would appear to have given much more than an hundredfold. And so when for
the scorn of delights and earthly affections there is made a recompense of
spiritual joy and the gladness of a most precious love, even if the actual
amount be the same, yet it is an hundred times better and grander. And to
make this plainer by frequent repetition: I used formerly to have a wife in
the lustful passion of desire: I now have one in honourable sanctification
and the true love of Christ. The woman is but one, but the value of the
love has increased an hundredfold. But if instead of distrusting anger and
wrath you have regard to constant gentleness and patience, instead of the
stress of anxiety and trouble, peace and freedom from care, instead of the
fruitless and criminal vexation of this world the salutary fruits of
sorrow, instead of the vanity of temporal joy the richness of spiritual
delights, you will see in the change of these feelings a recompense of an
hundredfold. And if we compare with the short-lived and fleeting pleasure
of each sin the benefits of the opposite virtues the increased delights
will prove that these are an hundred times better. For in counting on your
fingers you transfer the number of an hundred from the left hand to the
right and though you seem to keep the same arrangement of the fingers yet
there is a great increase in the amount of the quantity. For the result
will be that we who seemed to bear the form of the goats on the left hand,
will be removed and gain the reward of the sheep on the right hand. Now let
us pass on to consider the nature of those things which Christ gives back
to us in this world for our scorn of worldly advantages, more particularly
according to the Gospel of Mark who says: "There is no man who hath left
house or brethren or sisters or mother or children or lands for My sake and
the gospel's sake, who shall not receive an hundred times as much now in
this time: houses and brethren and sisters and mothers and children and
lands, with persecutions, and in the world to come life eternal." For he
who for the sake of Christ's name disregards the love of a single father or
mother or child, and gives himself over to the purest love of all who serve
Christ, will receive an hundred times the amount of brethren and kinsfolk;
since instead of but one he will begin to have so many fathers and brethren
bound to him by a still more fervent and admirable affection. He also will
be enriched with an increased possession of lands, who has given up a
single house for the love of Christ, and possesses countless homes in
monasteries as his own, to whatever part of the world he may retire, as to
his own house. For how can he fail to receive an hundredfold, and, if it is
not wrong to add somewhat to our Lord's words, more than an hundredfold,
who gives up the faithless and compulsory service of ten or twenty slaves
and relies on the spontaneous attendance of so many noble and free born
men? And that this is so you could prove by your own experience, as since
you have each left but one father and mother and home, you have gained
without any effort or care, in any part of the world to which you have
come, countless fathers and mothers and brethren, as well as houses and
lands and most faithful servants, who receive you as their masters, and
welcome, and respect, and take care of you with the utmost attention. But,
I say that deservedly and confidently will the saints enjoy this service,
if they have first submitted themselves and everything they have by a
voluntary offering for the service of the brethren. For, as the Lord says,
they will freely receive back that which they themselves have bestowed on
others. But if a man has not first offered this with true humility to his
companions, how can he calmly endure to have it offered to him by others,
when he knows that he is burdened rather than helped by their services,
because he prefers to receive attention from the brethren rather than to
give it to them? But all these things he will receive not with careless
slackness and a lazy delight, but, in accordance with the Lord's word,
"with persecutions," i.e., with the pressure of this world, and terrible
distress from his passions, because, as the wise man testifies: "He who is
easy going and without trouble shall come to want." For not the
slothful, or the careless, or the delicate, or the tender take the kingdom
of heaven by force, but the violent. Who then are the violent? Surely they
are those who show a splendid violence not to others, but to their own
soul, who by a laudable force deprive it of all delights m things present,
and are declared by the Lord's mouth to be splendid plunderers, and by
rapine of this kind, violently seize upon the kingdom of heaven. For, as
the Lord says, "The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence and the violent
take it by force." Those are certainly worthy of praise as violent, who
do violence to their own destruction, for, "A man," as it is written, "that
is in sorrow laboureth for himself and does violence to his own
destruction." For our destruction is delight in this present life, and
to speak more definitely, the performance of our own likes and desires, as,
if a man withdraws these from his soul and mortifies them, he straightway
does glorious and valuable violence to his own destruction, provided that
he refuses to it the pleasantest of its wishes which the Divine word often
rebukes by the prophet, saying: "For in the days of your fast your own will
is found;" and again: "If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, to do
thy will on My holy day, and glorify him, while thou dost not thy own ways,
and thy own will is not found, to speak a word." And the great blessedness
that is promised to him is at once added by the prophet. "Then," he says,
"shalt thou be delighted in the Lord, and I will lift thee up above the
high places of the earth, and will feed thee with the inheritance of Jacob
thy father. For the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." And therefore our
Lord and Saviour, to give us an example of giving up our own wills, says:
"I came not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me;" and
again: "Not as I will, but as Thou wilt." And this good quality those
men in particular show who live in the coenobia and are governed by the
rule of the Elders, who do nothing of their own choice, but their will
depends upon the will of the Abbot. Finally to bring this discussion to a
close, I ask you, do not those who faithfully serve Christ, most clearly
receive grace an hundredfold in this, while for His name's sake they are
honoured by the greatest princes, and though they do not look for the
praise of men, yet become venerated in the trials of persecution whose
humble condition would perhaps have been looked down upon even by common
folk, either because of their obscure birth, or because of their condition
as slaves, if they had continued in their life in the world? But because of
the service of Christ no one will venture to raise a calumny against their
state of nobility, or to fling in their teeth the obscurity of their
origin. Nay rather, through the very opprobrium of a humble condition by
which others are shamed and confounded, the servants of Christ are more
splendidly ennobled, as we can clearly show by the case of Abbot John who
lives in the desert which borders on the town of Lycus. For he sprang from
obscure parents, but owing to the name of Christ has become so well known
to almost all mankind that the very lords of creation, who hold the reins
of this world and of empire, and are a terror to all powers and kings,
venerate him as their lord, and from distant countries seek his advice, and
entrust to his prayers and merits the crown of their empire, and the state
of safety, and the fortunes of war.
In such terms the blessed Abraham discoursed on the origin of and
remedy for our illusion, and exposed to our eyes the crafty thoughts which
the devil had originated and suggested, and kindled in us the desire of
true mortification, wherewith we hope that many also may be inflamed, even
though all these things have been written in a somewhat simple style. For
though the dying embers of our words cover up the glowing thoughts of the
greatest fathers, yet we hope that in the case of very many who try to
remove the embers of our words and to fan into a flame the hidden thoughts,
their coldness will be turned into heat. But, O holy brethren, I have not
indeed been so puffed up by the spirit of presumption as to give forth to
you this fire (which the Lord came to send upon the earth, and which He
eagerly longs to kindle) in order that by the application of this warmth
I might set on fire your purpose which is already at a white heat, but in
order that your authority with your children might be greater, if in
addition the precepts of the greatest and most ancient fathers support what
you are teaching not by the dead sound of words but by your living example.
It only remains that I who have been till now tossed about by a most
dangerous tempest, should be wafted to the safe harbour of silence by the
spiritual gales of your prayers.
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