On Virgins 1.9–1.12

Take wings, then, virgin, but the wings of the spirit, so that you may fly above vices, if you desire to reach Christ. He dwells on high and looks on lowly things; and his appearance is like a cedar of Lebanon, which thrusts its foliage into the clouds and its root into the earth. For its beginning is from heaven, its lower parts on earth, and it puts forth fruit close to heaven. Search carefully for so good a flower, in case you may find it in the valley of your heart; for it is often breathed in by the lowly. It loves to grow in gardens, where Susanna found it while she walked, ready to die rather than be violated. And what the gardens are he himself shows, saying: “A garden enclosed is my sister, my bride, a garden enclosed, a fountain sealed”; because in gardens of this kind, with the image of God impressed by seals, the water of the pure fountain shines, lest its streams be stirred up, spattered with mud from the wallowing places of spiritual beasts. Hence that modesty, fenced by the Spirit as by a wall, is shut in, lest it lie open to plunder. And so, like a garden inaccessible to thieves, it breathes of the vine, is fragrant with the olive, gleams with the rose; so that in the vine religion, in the olive peace, in the rose the modesty of consecrated virginity may grow. This is the fragrance the patriarch Jacob breathed when he deserved to hear: “See, the fragrance of my son is like the fragrance of a full field.” For though the field of the holy patriarch was full of almost all fruits, that field produced crops by a greater labor of virtue, this one flowers. Gird yourself, then, virgin, and if you want such a garden to breathe for you, close it in with the precepts of the prophets: “Set a guard on your mouth, and a door around your lips”; so that you too may be able to say: “As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my kinsman among the sons. In his shade I longed and sat, and his fruit was sweet in my throat. I found him whom my soul loved; I held him, and I will not let him go. My kinsman has gone down into his garden to eat the fruit of his apples. Come, my kinsman, let us go out into the field. Set me as a seal upon your heart, and as a signet upon your arm. My kinsman is white and ruddy.” For it is fitting, virgin, that you should know fully him whom you love, and recognize in him the whole mystery both of the unbegotten divinity and of the body he assumed. White, rightly, because he is the radiance of the Father; ruddy, because he is the offspring of a virgin. The color of each nature shines and glows in him. But remember that in him the marks of the divinity are older than the mysteries of the body; for he did not begin from a virgin, but he who already was came into a virgin. He who was stripped by the soldiers, who was wounded by the lance, that he might heal us with the blood of his sacred wound, will surely answer you (for he is gentle and lowly in heart, kindly in look): “Arise, north wind, and come, south wind; blow upon my garden, and let my spices flow.” For from all parts of the world the fragrance of consecrated religion has spread, and the limbs of the beloved virgin have breathed it out. “You are beautiful, my near one, as good report; lovely as Jerusalem.” So it is not the beauty of a perishable body, which will die either by sickness or by old age, but the good report of merits, subject to no chance and never to die, that is the beauty of virgins. And since you are worthy to be compared no longer with human beings but with heavenly beings, whose life you live on earth, receive from the Lord the precepts you are to keep. “Set me,” he says, “as a seal upon your heart, and as a signet upon your arm,” so that the proofs of your prudence and your deeds may be brought out the more clearly marked, in which Christ, the figure of God, may shine forth, who, matching the full compass of the Father’s nature, has expressed the whole of the divinity he received from the Father. Hence the apostle Paul too says that we have been sealed in the Spirit; for we have the image of the Father in the Son, and the seal of the Son in the Spirit. Sealed by this Trinity, let us take more careful heed, lest levity of conduct or the fraud of any adultery break the seal on the pledge we have received in our hearts. But let fear depart from the sacred virgins, to whom the Church first gives such protection; anxious for the welfare of her tender offspring, she herself, like a wall, rises with breasts abounding like towers, until, the onset of the enemy’s siege broken, she wins peace for her vigorous youth by the protection of a mother’s strength. Hence the prophet too says: “Let there be peace in your strength, and abundance in your towers.” Then the Lord of peace himself, after he has embraced with stronger arms the vineyards entrusted to him and seen his shoots putting forth buds, with a countenance that watches over them tempers the breezes for the young fruit, as he himself testifies, saying: “My vineyard is before me; a thousand for Solomon, and two hundred for those who keep its fruit.” Above he says: “Sixty mighty men round about its shoots,” armed with drawn swords and trained in the disciplines of war; here, a thousand two hundred. The number has grown where the fruit has grown; for the holier each one is, the better guarded. So the prophet Elisha showed that the armies of angels were present to protect him; so Joshua son of Nun recognized the captain of the heavenly host. Those, then, who can also fight for us can guard the fruit in us. But you, holy virgins, have a special protection, you who with untouched modesty keep the Lord’s sacred bed. Nor is it any wonder if angels fight for you who fight with the conduct of angels. Virginal chastity merits the protection of those whose life it merits. And why should I pursue the praise of chastity at greater length? Chastity has made even angels. He who has kept it is an angel; he who has lost it, a devil. From this religion too has taken its name. She is a virgin who marries God; a harlot, who makes gods. And what shall I say of the resurrection, whose rewards you already hold? “But in the resurrection they will neither marry nor take wives, but will be like the angels,” he says, “in heaven.” What is promised to us is present to you, and the enjoyment of our hopes is with you. You are of this world, and you are not in this world. The age has been able to have you, but not to hold you. And how glorious, that angels for their incontinence fell from heaven into the world, and virgins for their chastity have passed from the world into heaven! Blessed virgins, whom no allurement of bodies entices, no flood of pleasures hurls down! Frugal food and abstemious drink teach them not to know vices, by teaching them not to know the causes of vices. The cause of sinning has often deceived even the righteous. Hence the people of God, after it sat down to eat and drink, denied God. Hence Lot did not know of his daughters’ lying with him, and yet bore it. Hence the sons of Noah once covered their father’s nakedness with backward steps: what the wanton one saw, the modest one blushed at, the dutiful one covered, fearing to offend if he too looked. How great is the power of wine, that wine stripped him whom the flood did not!

What else? How great a happiness it is that no desire of possessing inflames you! The poor man asks for what you have; he does not demand what you have not. The fruit of your labor is a treasury for the needy, and two small coins, if they are all one has, are the giver’s whole fortune. Hear, then, sister, from how much you are spared. For what you ought to guard against it is neither for me to teach nor for you to learn; for the practice of perfect virtue does not need instruction but gives it. You see how she who dresses herself to please walks along like the floats in a procession, drawing everyone’s looks and faces to herself, and the uglier for her very effort to please; for she displeases the people before she pleases a husband. But in you the casting aside of the care for adornment is more becoming, and the very fact that you do not adorn yourselves is an adornment. Look at the ears torn by wounds, and pity the burden on the bowed neck. Differences of metal bring no relief to punishments. Here a chain binds the neck, there a fetter encloses the foot. It makes no difference whether the body is loaded with gold or with iron. Either way the neck is weighed down, either way the step is burdened. The cost is no help; except that you women tremble lest your punishment be lost to you. What difference does it make whether another’s sentence condemns you or your own? In this you are even more wretched than those condemned by public law, that they wish to be freed from their chains, you to be bound. And how wretched is that condition, that a girl about to marry is put up for bidding like a slave for sale, so that he who wins with his price buys her! Yet slaves are sold more tolerably, for they often choose their masters; if a virgin chooses, it is a crime; if she does not choose, an insult. Though she be beautiful and comely, she both fears and desires to be seen: she desires it, so as to sell herself more dearly; she fears lest the very fact of being seen be unbecoming. And what mockeries of hopes there are, and anxious fears about how the suitors will turn out: lest a poor man deceive her, a rich one disdain her, a handsome one laugh at her, a noble one despise her!

Someone will say: “Every day you sing us the praises of virgins.” What am I to do, who sing the same things every day and achieve nothing? But it is not my fault. Indeed, virgins come to be consecrated from the district of Placentia, they come from that of Bononia, they come from Mauritania, to receive the veil here. You see a remarkable thing. I preach here, and persuade elsewhere. If that is so, let us preach elsewhere, so as to persuade you. What of the fact that those who do not hear me follow, and those who hear me do not follow? For I have known very many virgins who wished it and were forbidden even to come forward by their mothers, and, what is more serious, by widows, with whom I am now speaking. Surely, if your daughters wished to love a man, they could by law choose whom they wished. Are those who may choose a man not permitted to choose God? See how sweet is the fruit of chastity, which has taken root even in barbarian hearts. Virgins brought here from the farthest parts of Mauritania, on this side and beyond, long to be consecrated here; and though all their families are in chains, chastity does not know how to be a captive. She who mourns the wrong of servitude professes the eternal kingdom. And what shall I say of the virgins of Bononia, a fruitful host of chastity, who, renouncing worldly delights, dwell in the sanctuary of virginity? Without the companionship of the other sex, advanced by the companionship of chastity to the number of twenty and to the hundredfold fruit, they have left the shelter of their parents and press on into the tents of Christ, untiring soldiers of chastity. Now they resound with spiritual songs, now they earn their living by labor, and seek with their hands the means for generosity as well. And if they have caught the scent of a virgin to be tracked down (for beyond others they scout and search out the quarry of chastity), they pursue the hidden prey on every track of their care to its very lair; or if the flight of one freer than the rest has appeared, you would see them all rise on every wing, beat their feathers, flash with applause, so as to surround her as she flies with a chaste chorus of modesty, until, delighted by the company that meets her and forgetful of her father’s house, she comes into the nets of modesty and the enclosure of chastity.

It is good, then, if the zeal of parents breathes on a virgin like breezes of modesty; but it is more glorious if the fire of tender age, even without the old fuel, catches of its own accord into the flame of chastity. Parents will refuse a dowry; but you have a rich bridegroom, and, content with his treasure, you will not look for the profits of a father’s inheritance. How far chaste poverty surpasses the gains of a dowry! And yet whom have you ever heard of who was exiled from her lawful inheritance for her devotion to integrity? Parents object, but they want to be overcome. They resist at first, because they are afraid to believe; they are often indignant, so that you may learn to conquer; they threaten disinheritance, to test whether you can be without fear of worldly loss; they coax with sought-out allurements, to see whether the blandishment of various pleasures can soften you. You are being trained, virgin, while you are being pressed. And these are the first contests that the anxious wishes of parents set before you. Conquer first, girl, your filial affection. If you conquer your home, you conquer the world. But suppose that loss of patrimony awaits you: do not the future kingdoms of heaven make up for the expense of perishable and fragile means? Indeed, if we believe the heavenly words, “There is no one who has left home, or parents, or brothers, or wife, or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive seven times as much in this time; and in the age to come he will possess eternal life.” Entrust your faith to God, you who entrust your money to a man; lend to Christ. The good guardian of the hope deposited with him repays the talent of your faith with multiplied interest. Truth does not deceive, justice does not defraud, virtue does not mislead. If you do not believe the oracle, at least believe examples. Within my memory a girl, once noble in the world, now nobler with God, when she was being pressed to marry by her parents and kinsfolk, took refuge at the holy altar. For where is a virgin better than where the sacrifice of virginity is offered? Nor was this the limit of her daring. She stood at the altar, an offering of modesty, a victim of chastity, now placing the priest’s right hand on her head and asking for prayer, now, impatient of the just delay, putting the top of her head beneath the altar. “Will a veil cover me better,” she said, “than the altar, which sanctifies the veils themselves? Such a bridal veil is more fitting, on which Christ, the head of all, is consecrated every day. What are you doing, kinsfolk? Why do you still trouble my mind with seeking a marriage? I have long since made provision. Do you offer me a bridegroom? I have found a better. Heap up his riches as you will, boast of his nobility, proclaim his power: I have one to whom no one may compare himself, rich in the world, powerful in rule, noble in heaven. If you have such a one, I do not refuse the choice; if you do not find one, you are not providing for me, parents, but begrudging me.” While the others were silent, one said rather abruptly: “What if your father were alive? Would he allow you to remain unmarried?” Then she, with greater devotion and more restrained respect: “And perhaps that is why he died, so that no one could put a hindrance in my way.” That answer, concerning her father but a prophecy concerning himself, he proved true by his own early death. So the rest, each fearing the same for himself, began to favor what they had sought to hinder; and her virginity brought no loss of the property due to her, but also received the reward of integrity. You have, girls, the reward of devotion; parents, beware the example of offense.