I. Progress and Improvement Always Possible.
II. Satan Seeks to Subtly His Numerous Lasses by Fresh Gains.
III. The Twofold Nature of Christ Shown at the Temptation.
IV. The Fast Should Not End with Abstinence Front Food, But Lead to
Good Deeds.
V. And Still Further It Should Lead to Personal Amendment and Domestic
Harmony.
I. Progress and Improvement Always Possible.
Although, dearly-beloved, as the Easter festival approaches, the very
recurrence of the season points out to us the Lenten fast, yet our words
also must add their exhortations which, the Lord helping us, may be not
useless to the active nor irksome to the devout. For since the idea of
these days demands the increase of all our religious performances, there
is no one, I am sure, that does not feel glad at being incited to good
works. For though our nature which, so long as we are mortal, will be changeable,
is advancing to the highest pursuits of virtue, yet always has the possibility
of filling back, so has it always the possibility of advancing. And this
is the true justness of the perfect that they should never assume themselves
to be perfect, lest flagging in the purpose of their yet unfinished journey,they
should fall into the danger of failure, through giving up the desire for
progress.
And, therefore, because none of us, dearly beloved, is so perfect and
holy as not to be able to be more perfect and more holy, let us all together,
without difference of rank, without distinction of desert, with pious eagerness
pursue our race from what we have attained to what we yet aspire to, and
make some needful additions to our regular devotions. For he that is not
more attentive than usual to religion in these days, is shown at other
times to be not attentive enough.
II. Satan Seeks to Subtly His Numerous Lasses by Fresh Gains.
Hence the reading of the Apostle's proclamation has sounded opportunely
in our ears, saying, "Behold now is the accepted time, behold now is the
day of salvation1 ." For what is more accepted than this time, what more
suitable to salvation than these days, in which war is proclaimed against
vices and progress is made in all virtues? Thou hadst indeed always to
keep watch, O Christian soul, against the enemy of thy salvation, lest
any spot should be exposed to the tempter's snares: but now greater wariness
and keener prudence must be employed by thee when that same foe of thine
rages with fiercer hatred. For now in all the world the power of his ancient
sway is taken from him, and the countless vessels of captivity are rescued
from his grasp. The people of all nations and of all tongues are breaking
away from their cruel plunderer, and now no race of men is found that does
not struggle against the tyrant's laws, while through all the borders of
the earth many thousands of thousands are being prepared to be reborn in
Christ2 : and as the birth of a new creature draws near, spiritual wickedness
is being driven out by those who were possessed by it. The blasphemous
fury of the despoiled foe frets, therefore, and seeks new gains because
it has lost its ancient right. Unwearied and ever wakeful, he snatches
at any sheep he finds straying carelessIy from the sacred folds, intent
on leading them over the steeps of treasure anti down the slopes of luxury
into the abodes of death. And so he inflames their wrath, feeds their hatreds,
whets their desires, mocks at their continence, arouses their gluttony.
III. The Twofold Nature of Christ Shown at the Temptation.
For whom would he not dare to try, who did not keep from his treacherous
attempts even on our Lord Jesus Christ? For, as the story of the Gospel
has disclosed3 , when our Saviour, Who was true God, that He might show
Himself true Man also, and banish all wicked and erroneous opinions, after
the fast of 40 days and nights, had experienced the hunger of human weakness,
the devil, rejoicing at having found in Him a sign of possible and mortal
nature, in order to test the power which he feared, said, "If Thou art
the Son of God, command that these stones become bread4 ." Doubtless the
Almighty could do this, and it was easy that at the Creator's command a
creature of any kind should change into the form that it was commanded:
just as whenHe willed it, in the marriage feast, Hechanged the water into
wine: but here it better agreed with His purposes of salvation that His
haughty foe's cunning should be vanquished by the Lord, not in the power
of His Godhead, but by the mystery of His humiliation. At length, when
the devil had been put to flight and the tempter baffled in all his arts,
angels came to the Lord and ministered to Him, that He being true Man and
true God, His Manhood might be unsullied by those crafty questions, and
His Godhead displayed by those holy ministrations. And so let the sons
and disciples of the devil be confounded, who, being filled with the poison
of vipers, deceive the simple, denying in Christ the presence of both true
natures, whilst they rob either His Godhead of Manhood, or His Manhood
of Godhead, although both falsehoods are destroyed by a twofold and simultaneous
proof: for by His bodily hunger His perfect Manhood was shown, and by the
attendant angels His perfect Godhead.
IV. The Fast Should Not End with Abstinence Front Food, But Lead
to Good Deeds.
Therefore, dearly-beloved, seeing that, as we are taught by our Redeemer's
precept, "man lives not in bread alone, but in every word of God5 ," and
it is right that Christian people, whatever the amount of their abstinence,
should rather desire to satisfy themselves with the "Word of God" than
with bodily food, let us with ready devotion and eager faith enter upon
the celebration of the solemn fast, not with barren abstinence flora food,
which is often imposed on us by weakliness of body, or the disease of avarice,
but in bountiful benevolence: that in truth we may be of those of whom
the very Truth speaks, "blessed are they which hunger and thirst after
righteousness, for they shall be filled6 ." Let works of piety, therefore,
be our delight, and let us be filled with those kinds of food which feed
us for eternity. Let us rejoice in the replenishment of the poor, whom
our bounty has satisfied. Let us delight in the clothing of those whose
nakedness we have covered with needful raiment. Let our humaneness be felt
by the sick in their illnesses, by the weakly in their infirmities, by
the exiles in their hardships, by the orphans in their destitution, and
by solitary widows in their sadness: in the helping of whom there is no
one that cannot carry out some amount of benevolence. For no one's income
is small, whose heart is big: and the measure of one's mercy and goodness
does not depend on the size of one's means. Wealth of goodwill is never
rightly lacking, even in a slender purse. Doubtless the expenditure of
the rich isgreater, and that of the poor smaller, but there is no difference
in the fruit of their works, where the purpose of the workers is the same.
V. And Still Further It Should Lead to Personal Amendment and Domestic
Harmony.
But, beloved, in this opportunity for the virtues' exercise there are
also other notablecrowns, to be won by no dispersing abroad of granaries,
by no disbursement of money, if wantonness is repelled, if drunkenness
is abandoned, and the lusts of the flesh tamed by the laws of chastity:
if hatreds pass into affection, if enmities be turned into peace, if meekness
extinguishes wrath, if gentleness forgives wrongs, if in fine the conduct
of master and of slaves is so well ordered that the rule of the one is
milder, and the discipline of the other is more complete. It is by such
observances then, dearly-beloved, that God's mercy will be gained, the
charge of sin wiped out, and the adorable Easter festival devoutly kept.
And this the pious Emperors of the Roman world have long guarded with holy
observance; for in honour of the Lord's Passion and Resurrection they bend
their lofty power, and relaxing the severity of their decrees set free
many of their prisoners: so that on the clays when the world is saved by
the Divine mercy, their clemency, which is modelled on the Heavenly goodness,
may be zealously followed by us. Let Christian peoples then imitate their
princes, and be incited to forbearance in their homes by these royal examples.
For it is not right that private laws should be severer than public. Let
faults be forgiven, let bonds be loosed offences wiped out, designs of
vengeance fall through, that the holy festival through the Divine and human
grace may find all happy, all innocent: through our Lord Jesus Christ Who
with the Father and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth God for endless
ages of ages. Amen.
1 2 Cor. vi. 2 from the Epistle for the First Sunday in
Lent: cf. Serm. XXXVI. I, n. 7.
2 Viz. by baptism at the Easter festival.
3 Ut evangelica patefecit historia, cf. Serm. XXXIX.
3, n. 8.
4 S. Matt. iv. 3.
5 Ib. iv. 4, quoted from Deut. viii. 3.
6 S. Matt. v. 6.
