Augustine, Sermones 296-301 (Classis III, de Sanctis)

you, let this voice have sounded today for this purpose, that the thing which sounded well may bury that which sounded ill. Give your effort to this; let this sound out, let this be what we should preach, this what we preach. Let them come, let them be admitted in the customary way, those who have never yet been catholics. But if they were already catholics, and have been found slippery, found inconstant and weak, found faithless, do I then spare the faithless altogether? Perhaps those who were faithless will be faithful: let them too come, to be admitted to penance. And let them not flatter themselves that, in going back to the party of Donatus, they did penance. That penance was over a good thing: let this one be true penance over a bad thing. When they did penance in the party of Donatus, they repented of what they had done well: now let them act so that they repent of what they have done ill. Are you afraid, since they have been found faithless, that they may trample on what is holy? See, this fear of yours too is provided for: they are admitted to penance. They will be in penance; when they wish to be reconciled, with no one now compelling, no one terrifying them, since a catholic penitent no longer suffers the threats of the laws; he has begun to wish to be reconciled while no one was terrifying him; let his will at least then be believed. Suppose that he was compelled to be a catholic: he will be a penitent. Who compels him to seek the place of reconciliation, if not his own will? Now therefore let us admit weakness, so that afterwards we may put the will to the test.

Sermon 297. On the Feast of the Apostles Peter and Paul, 3.

Chapter I. — 1. The presumption of Peter. Fear from human weakness, love from divine grace. The blood of the Apostles has made today a feast day for us. The servants paid back what had been spent for them in the blood of the Lord. Blessed Peter, as we heard just now, is bidden to follow: and yet he was intending to go ahead, when he said to the Lord, I will lay down my life for You (John 13:37). He was displaying presumption; he did not know his own fear. He wanted to go before the One Whom he ought to follow. He desired a good thing, but he did not keep the order. How bitter death was, he felt by bitter fear, and he washed away the sin of bitter fear with bitter tears. Fear was questioned by a maidservant, love by the Lord. And what did fear answer, if not human trembling? What did love answer, if not a divine profession? For to love God is the gift of God. When the Lord was questioning Peter about love, He was demanding what He had given.

2. Peter is foretold to suffer what he will not want. What, though, did the Lord foretell to Peter, whence this day is a feast? "When you were younger," He says, "you girded yourself, and went where you wished: but when you have grown old, another will gird you, and carry you where you do not wish" (John 21:18). Where is "I will be with You even unto death" (Luke 22:33)? Where is "I will lay down my life for You"? See, you will be afraid, see, you will deny, see, you will weep; and He for Whom you feared to die will rise again, and you will be made firm. For what wonder is it that Peter was afraid before Christ rose again? See, now Christ has risen, now the reality of soul and flesh is manifest, now what is in the promise is confirmed

by example. The Lord is seen alive after the cross, after death, after the tomb. It is little that He is seen: He is touched, handled, proved. He spent forty days with the disciples, going in and going out, eating and drinking, not out of want but out of power; not out of necessity but out of charity: eating and drinking not by hungering nor by thirsting, but by teaching and showing. Proved true and truthful, He ascends into heaven, sends the Holy Spirit, fills those who believe and pray, sends out preachers. And yet after all these things another girds Peter, and carries him where he himself does not wish. What you wished when the Lord was foretelling, you should have wished then, when you had to follow.

Chapter II. — 3. The bitterness of death endured by the martyrs. Hence the martyrs' crown is the more illustrious. Thorns trodden down by feet of rock. Another girds you, and carries you where you do not wish. The Lord consoles [us] about this, transfiguring our weakness into Himself and saying: My soul is sorrowful even unto death (Matt. 26:38). Hence the martyrs are great, because they trampled on the sweetness of this world: hence the martyrs are great, because they endured the most harsh severity of a bitter death. For if it is easy to bear death, what great thing did the martyrs endure for the death of the Lord? Whence are they great, whence exalted, whence crowned far more gloriously than other men? Whence is it, as the faithful know, that the martyrs, set apart from the dead, are recited in their own place; and prayer is not made for them, but the Church is commended to their prayers? Whence this, unless because death, which they chose to undergo for the Lord's confession rather than deny Christ, is certainly bitter? Certainly nature shrinks from death. Look at every kind of living creature: you will find none that does not wish to live, that does not fear to perish. The human race has this feeling. Death is hard: but not, I say, because death is hard, must life therefore be denied. Peter too, as an old man, did not wish to die. He did not indeed wish to die, but he preferred to follow Christ. He preferred following Christ to not dying. If there had been a broad way by which he might follow Christ without death, who would doubt that he would have seized on it, would have chosen it? But there was no way by which to follow Christ where he wished to go, except by the way that he did not wish to suffer. Thus by that severity of death, as the rams passed over, the sheep followed. The holy Apostles are the rams of the sheep. Harsh is the way of death, full of thorns: but those thorns, as the Rock and Peter passed over, were trodden down by feet of rock.

Chapter III. — 4. Whose love of life is praised. We do not reproach, we do not accuse, even if this life is loved. Yet let this life be loved in such a way that there is no sinning in the love of it. Let life be loved, but let life be chosen. I question the lovers of life, and I say: Who is the man who wants life? Even silent, you all answer: Who is the man who does not want life? I add what the Psalm added: Who is the man who wants life, and loves to see good days? The answer is: For who is the man who does not want life, and who does not love to see good days? If then you wish to come to life and to see good days, since that is the reward, attend to the work of this reward: Restrain your tongue from evil. This follows in the Psalm: Who is the man who wants life, and loves to see good days?

He adds: Keep your tongue from evil, and let your lips not speak deceit: turn away from evil, and do good (Ps. 33:13–15). Now say, I will. I was asking, Do you want life? You were answering, I do. I was asking, Do you want to see good days? You were answering, I do. Restrain your tongue from evil. Now say, I will. Turn away from evil, and do good. Say, I will. But if you want this, seek the work, and you are running to the reward.

Chapter IV. — 5. The crown is rendered to Paul as due, because grace that was not due went before. Consider the apostle Paul, since today is his feast day too. Both led a life in concord, both shed their blood in fellowship, both received the heavenly crown, both consecrated this present day. Consider, then, the apostle Paul; recall the words which we heard a little while ago, when his Epistle was being read. "I," he says, "am already being offered up, and the time of my release is at hand. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith. For the rest," he says, "there remains for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the just judge, will render to me on that day" (2 Tim. 4:6–8). For He will not deny what is due, Who gave what was not due. The just judge will render the crown, He will render it: for He has someone to whom to render it. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith: to these merits He will render the crown; and He will not deny what is due, as I said, Who gave what was not due. What is it that He gave which was not due? I who was formerly a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and insolent. What, then, did He give which was not due? Let us hear the man himself confessing, and by his confession praising the giver of grace concerning his own life. Formerly, he says, I was a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and insolent. Was it due to you, then, that you should be an apostle? What was due to a blasphemer and persecutor and insolent man? What, but eternal damnation? And in place of eternal damnation what did he receive? I obtained mercy, because I acted in ignorance, in unbelief (1 Tim. 1:13). This is the mercy which God gave, not being due. Hear something else from the same man, saying in another place: I am not worthy, he says, to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God. I see, then, Apostle, that you were not worthy. Whence did this come to you, that you should be worthy? Why, then, are you what you are not worthy to be? Hear: But by the grace of God I have obtained to be what I am. By my own punishment I was what I was: by the grace of God I am what I am. By the grace of God, he says, I am what I am: and His grace in me was not void; but I laboured more than all of them. Have you, then, repaid the grace of God? Have you received, and paid back? Consider what you have said. I do consider, he says. Yet not I, but the grace of God with me (1 Cor. 15:9–10). Shall the just God, then, deny the due crown to this toiling Apostle, fighting the good contest, finishing the course, keeping the faith, to whom He gave grace that was not due?

6. God's gifts are our merits. We conquer through Him Who loved us. But to what will He render the due crown, O Paul, small and great, to what will He render it? Assuredly to your merits. You have fought the good fight, you have finished the course, you have kept the faith: He will render the due crown to these

your merits. But that your crown may be rendered to you, your merits are gifts of God. Behold, you have fought the good fight, you have finished the course. For you saw another law in your members, warring against the law of your mind, and leading you captive in the law of sin, which is in your members: whence [came it] to you to conquer, unless from what follows? Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord (Rom. 7:23–25). See whence you fought, see whence you laboured, see whence you did not fail, see whence you conquered. Look at the fighter: 'Who will separate us from the charity of Christ? Tribulation? or distress? or famine? or persecution? or nakedness? or the sword? As it is written, For Thy sake we are put to death all the day, we are counted as sheep for slaughter.' Behold weakness, toil, misery, dangers, temptations. Whence the victory of those who contend? Hear what follows: But in all these things we overcome through Him Who loved us (Rom. 8:35–37). You have finished the course: with whom leading, with whom ruling, with whom helping? What do you say here? I have finished the course, he says; but it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God Who shows mercy (Rom. 9:16). You have kept the faith, it is true. First, what faith? One which you gave yourself? Is what you said false, According as God has apportioned to each one the measure of faith (Rom. 12:3)? Do you not address certain fellow contestants of yours, labouring and running with you in the stadium of this life, to whom you say, For to you it has been given for Christ? What has been given? Not only that you believe in Him, but also that you suffer for Him (Phil. 1:29). Behold, both have been given, both to believe and to suffer for Christ.

Chapter V. — 7. It is God's [part] to guard His gifts in us. But perhaps someone says: I received faith indeed, but I guarded it. You perhaps say this, foolish one, whoever you are who hear these things: I received faith, but I guarded it. Our Paul does not say this, I guarded it. For he looks to: Unless the Lord has guarded the city, he has laboured in vain who guards it (Ps. 126:1). Labour, guard; but it is good that you be guarded. For you are not sufficient to guard yourself. If you are deserted, you will drowse and sleep. But He neither drowses nor sleeps Who guards Israel (Ps. 120:4).

8. Let life be loved, but a good one. Men want all things to be good except their own soul. We love life, then, and we in no way doubt that we love life; nor could we at all deny that we love life. Therefore let us choose life, if we love life. What do we choose? Life. First, a good one here; after this, an eternal one. First a good one here, but not yet a blessed one. Let a good one be lived now, for which a blessed one is reserved afterwards. A good life is the work; a blessed one is the reward. Live a good one, and you will receive a blessed one. What is more just, what more orderly? Where are you, lover of life? Choose a good one. If you wanted a wife, you would want only a good one: you love life, and do you choose a bad one? Tell me what you would want bad. Whatever you want, whatever you love, you want good. You certainly do not want a bad beast of burden, nor a bad servant, nor a bad garment, nor a bad country house, nor a bad house, nor a bad wife, nor bad children. You seek all things good: be good, you who seek. How have you

offended yourself, that among all the good things you want, you alone want to be bad? Your country house is dear to you, your wife, your clothing, and, to come down to the very last, your boot; and has your soul become cheap to you? Certainly this life is full of toils, of hardships, temptations, miseries, sorrows, fears; this life is full: certainly it is manifest that it is full of all these evils. And yet, full of all evils as it is, if someone were to give it to us as eternal just so, such as it is, what great thanks would we give, so as to be always wretched? Not such does He promise, not any man whatever, but the true God. The true Truth promises life, not only eternal, but also blessed; where there is no trouble, no toil, no fear, no sorrow. There is full and entire, certain security. Life under God, life with God, life from God, life which is God Himself. Such an eternal life is promised to us: and is this temporal one, this one, that is, the wretched and toilsome one, preferred to it? Is it preferred, I say, or not? It is preferred when you are willing to commit murder so as not to die. For you fear that your slave may kill you, and you kill the slave. You fear that your wife may kill you, of whom perhaps you suspect something false; and you, having put away your wife, lust after an adulterous marriage with another. See, by loving life you have lost life: you have preferred the temporal to the eternal life, the wretched to the blessed. And what have you found? Perhaps while you are preserving your life, you breathe your last against your will. When you are to depart hence, you do not know. With what face do you go out to Christ? With what face do you refuse punishment? I do not say, With what face do you demand a reward? You will be condemned in eternal death, you who choose the temporal life, by the choice of which you despise the everlasting one.

Chapter VI. — 9. The blessed life is not to be sought here. We make the days evil. Evil comes to man only from man. A man freed from evil, that is, from himself, cannot be harmed by anyone. But you do not hear the counsel. You seek life, you seek good days. What you seek is good, but it is not here. This precious stone has its own region; it is not produced here. However much you toil in digging, you will not find here what is not here. But do what is commanded, and what you love will be rendered to you. For see, however long this life may be, will you find good days here? Notice what he added: Life and good days: lest there be life, and it be wretched on account of evil days. Evil days abound here: but it is not that sun which makes the days evil, which runs from the east, coming to the west, and going forth again on the next day: but, brethren, we make the days evil. If we lived well all our days, we would have good days even here. For whence comes evil to man, if not from man? Count up how much men suffer from without. The things that are not seen to be done by men are very few. Evils abound for man from man. Thefts from man; a man has suffered adultery in his wife from man; his slave has been led astray from him by man; he has been kept in the dark by man, proscribed by man, overpowered by man, led captive by man. Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man (Ps. 139:2). Now you, whoever you are who hear this, think only of the enemy whom you endure as an evil neighbour, a powerful one, a partner, a fellow citizen. Perhaps you think of a robber when you hear, Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man; and so you pray, when you pray, that God may deliver you from

the evil man, this one or that one, your enemy. Do not you be evil to yourself. Hear me: may God free you from yourself. For when God by His grace and mercy makes you good from evil, from what does He make you good, from what does He free you, if not from yourself, the evil man? Absolutely, my brothers, this is true, this is certain, this is fixed: if God has freed you from yourself, the evil man, no other evil man, whoever he may be, will harm you.

Chapter VII. — 10. Paul freed from the evil man, himself. I shall put forward an example to the point, from the apostle Paul himself, the day of whose passion we are celebrating. He was a persecutor, a blasphemer, insolent. He was an evil man; he was himself his own punishment. Moreover, when he was panting for slaughter and thirsting for the blood of Christians, he who was to shed his own, holding letters from the chief priests so that whomever he found at Damascus as followers of the Christian life he might bring back bound to be punished, taking the way of cruelty, ignorant of that of piety, he heard from above the voice of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself saying from heaven: Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me? It is hard for you to kick against the goad (Acts 9:4–5). Struck by this voice, the persecutor was laid low, and the preacher was raised up: he was blinded in the flesh so that he might see in the heart; he was enlightened in the flesh so that he might preach from the heart. How does it seem, brothers? Saul was freed from the evil man: from whom, if not from Saul himself? Therefore, since he was freed from the evil man, himself, what did another evil man do to him? The words are the apostle Peter's: And who will harm you, if you are lovers of good (1 Pet. 3:13)? An evil man persecuted, an evil man stoned, an evil man beat with rods: at the last an evil man seized, bound, dragged, killed. As many evils as that man added, so many goods did God prepare. Whatever he suffered was not the torment of punishment but the occasion of a crown. See what it is to be freed from the evil man, that is, from oneself. Who, he says, will harm you, if you are lovers of good?

Chapter VIII. — 11. The evil do not harm a man freed from himself, the evil one. How the feasts of the saints are to be celebrated. But see, evil men do harm. So much they did to you, O Paul. Paul answers you: What was needed was that I should be freed from the evil man, that is, from myself. For the rest, what do these evil men do to me? "The sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, which will be revealed in us (Rom. 8:18). For that which is light in our tribulation works for us, beyond belief, an eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things that are seen. For the things that are seen are temporal; but the things that are not seen are eternal" (2 Cor. 4:17–18). Truly you were freed from the evil man, that is, from yourself, so that the other evil men would not hurt you but rather profit you. Therefore, dearest ones, let us so celebrate the feast day of the saints, who strove against sin even unto blood and, with their Lord granting and helping, conquered, that we love [them]; let us so love that we imitate [them]: