Sermons to the People 282.1–284.6

We are celebrating today the feast day of two holy martyrs, who not only excelled in outstanding virtues in their suffering but also, for so great a labor of piety, marked by their own names their reward and that of their other companions. For Perpetua and Felicity are the names of two, but the reward is that of all. For not all the martyrs would labor bravely for a time in the contest of suffering and confession except to rejoice in perpetual felicity. By the governance of divine providence, therefore, these two had to be not only martyrs but also, as happened, the most closely joined companions, so that they might mark a single day of their glory and hand down to posterity a common solemnity to be celebrated. For as by the example of a most glorious contest they exhort us to imitate them, so by their names they testify that we shall receive an inseparable gift. Let them hold each other, bind each other together. We do not hope for the one without the other. For perpetuity is of no use if there is no felicity, and felicity fails if it is not perpetual. Let these few words about the names of the martyrs to whom the day is consecrated suffice for the time.

As for the women whose names these are, as we heard when their passion was read, and as we know it has been handed down to memory, these women of such great virtues and merits were not only females but also married women. One of them was also a mother, so that to the weakness of their sex there was added a more impatient affection; so that the enemy, assailing them in every way as if they were unable to bear the hard and cruel burdens of persecution, believed they would at once give way to him and soon be his. But they, with the most cautious and strongest firmness of the inner man, blunted all his snares and broke his assaults.

In this company of outstanding glory there were also male martyrs; on that very same day very brave men too conquered by suffering; and yet they did not mark that same day with their names. This was not done because the women were preferred to the men in dignity of character, but because both womanly weakness overcame the ancient enemy with a greater miracle, and manly strength contended for perpetual felicity.

Let us so admire the fortitude of the holy martyrs in their suffering as to proclaim the grace of the Lord. For they did not wish to be praised in themselves, but in him to whom it is said, “In the Lord my soul shall be praised.” Those who understand this are not proud: they ask with trembling, they receive with joy; they persevere, and no longer lose. For because they are not proud, they are meek. And so, when he had said, “In the Lord my soul shall be praised,” he added, “Let the meek hear and be glad.” What would weak flesh be, what worm and rottenness, unless what we sang were true: “My soul shall be subject to God, for from him is my patience”? For in that the martyrs endured all evils for the faith, their virtue is called patience. For there are two things that either entice or drive people into sins: pleasure or pain. Pleasure entices, pain drives. Against pleasures continence is necessary; against pains, patience. For in this way the human mind is prompted to sin: sometimes it is said, “Do this, and you will have this”; sometimes, “Do this, so that you may not suffer this.” A promise goes before pleasure, a threat before pain. So people sin in order to have pleasure or not to suffer pain. Therefore God, against these two, of which one lies in a flattering promise and the other in a terrifying threat, has deigned both to promise and to terrify: to promise the kingdom of heaven, to terrify with the punishments of hell. Pleasure is sweet, but God is sweeter. Temporal pain is bad, but eternal fire is worse. You have something to love instead of the loves of the world, or rather instead of unclean loves. You have something to fear instead of the terrors of the world.

But it is little to be warned unless you obtain help. The present psalm which we sang, then, taught us that our patience against pains is from God. Where do we find that our continence too, which is necessary against pleasures, is from him? You have the clearest testimony: “And when I knew,” he says, “that no one can be continent unless God gives it; and this too was a point of wisdom, to know whose gift this was.” So if you have something from God and do not know from whom you have it, you will not be rewarded, because you remain ungrateful. If you do not know from whom you have it, you do not give thanks; by not giving thanks you lose even what you have. “For to him who has, it will be given.” What is it to have fully? To know from where you have it. “But from him who does not have,” that is, who does not know from where he has it, “even what he has will be taken away.” Finally, as the same writer says, “This too was a point of wisdom, to know whose gift this was.” So too the apostle Paul says, when he commends to us the grace of God in the Holy Spirit:

“But we have received not the spirit of this world, but the Spirit who is from God.” And as if he were asked, “By what do you distinguish?” he added next: “that we may know the things that have been given us by God.” The Spirit of God, then, is the Spirit of love; the spirit of this world is the spirit of pride. Those who have the spirit of this world are proud and ungrateful to God. Many have his gifts but do not worship him from whom they have them; therefore they are unhappy. Sometimes one has greater gifts, another lesser: for example, understanding, memory. They are gifts of God. Sometimes you find a very sharp man, with a memory to astonish, beyond belief; you find another of small understanding, with a memory that does not hold well, endowed with little of both; but the first proud, the second humble; the second giving thanks to God for small things, the first attributing great things to himself. Incomparably better is the one who gives thanks to God for a little than the one who exalts himself over much. For him who gives thanks for a little God admits to much; but he who does not give thanks for great things loses even what he has. “For to him who has, it will be given; but from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken away.” How does he not have, if he has? He who does not know from where he has it, has without having. For God takes away what is his, and the man’s own iniquity remains with him. So no one is continent unless God gives it. You have a gift against pleasures: “Because this too,” he says, “was a point of wisdom, to know whose gift this was: no one is continent unless God gives it.” You have a gift against pains: “Because from him,” he says, “is my patience.” “Therefore hope in him, all the assembly of the people.” Hope in him; do not trust in your own strength. Confess to him your evils; hope from him for your goods. Without his help you will be nothing, however proud you may have been. So, that you may be able to be humble, “pour out your hearts before him.” And so that you may not remain badly in yourselves, say what follows: “God is our helper.”

This helper the blessed martyr had, so that he might conquer, the martyr whom we admire, whose solemnity we celebrate today. Without him he would not have conquered. And even if he had conquered pains, he would not have conquered the devil. For sometimes those who have been conquered by the devil conquer pains, having not patience but hardness. That helper, then, was present, to give him true faith, to make his cause good for him, and for a good cause to give him patience. For there is patience only when a good cause goes before. For no one but God gives faith itself either. The apostle briefly commended both: that the cause for which we suffer and the patience by which we bear evils are from God for us. For, exhorting martyrs, he says: “For to you it has been given on behalf of Christ.” See the good cause: because it is on behalf of Christ; not for sacrilege against Christ, for heresy and schism against Christ. For Christ says, “Whoever does not gather with me scatters.” So, “To you,” he says, “it has been given on behalf of Christ, not only to believe in him but also to suffer for him.” This is true patience. Let us love this patience, then; let us hold to it; and if we do not yet have it, let us ask for it; and rightly we sing, “My soul shall be subject to God, for from him is my patience.”

Today, by God’s favor, the time has dawned for paying our debt. Since the debtors are devoted, then, why are the creditors in an uproar? If we have the minds of all at rest, what we pay can reach all. A sermon is owed on the passion and glory of the holy martyrs. Since they suffered most gloriously, then, they enjoin patience on us. They endured raging crowds; let us have peoples who are quiet, because we have seen them believing. The constancy of the martyrs is to be praised; but what eloquence is enough to praise it? When can I fulfill by speaking what has already been done in your hearts by believing? But from where comes so great a gift of patience? From where, if not from where every best giving comes? From where the best giving, if not from where the perfect gift comes? For so it is written there too: “But patience has a perfect work.” “Every best giving,” he says, “and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change nor shadow of a moment.” From the unchangeable fountain patience comes down to changeable human minds, to make them too unchangeable. From where does a human being have the power to please God, if not from God? From where a good life, if not from the fountain of life? From where enlightenment, if not from the eternal light? “For with you,” he says, “is the fountain of life.” “With you,” he says: I did not want to say “from me”; for if I say “from me,” I go away from you. With you, then, is the fountain of life. “In your light,” not in ours: “in your light we shall see light.” So, “Come to him and be enlightened.” He is the fountain of life: come near, drink, and live. He is light: come near, take, and see. If he does not flow in, you will be dry.

From here, then, our martyrs drank, from here: and, made drunk from here, they did not recognize their own. For how many holy martyrs do we suppose, as their passion drew near, were tempted by the coaxing of their own people, who tried to call them back to the temporal, vain, and fleeting sweetness of this life? But they, who had drunk thirsting from the fountain that is with God and were drunk, belched forth Christ by confessing him; they paid no attention to, they did not recognize, their own carnal relatives, drunk with the wine of error, loving them badly and calling them back from life by persuasion. The mother of Marian was not one of those: not one of those who give bad advice, who coax in a carnal way, who deceive by loving. The mother of holy Marian was not one of those. She bore no empty name; not in vain was she called Mary. She was a woman indeed, not a virgin, not untouched and with child by the Holy Spirit, but still chaste with her husband; she had borne such a pledge as she led on to a most glorious passion by her exhortations rather than calling him back from it by evil coaxing. O holy Mary, you too, unequal indeed in merit but equal in desire! Happy you too! She bore the prince of martyrs; you bore a martyr of the prince. She bore the Judge of all; you bore a witness of the Judge. Happy the birth, happier the affection. When you bore him, you groaned; when you lost him, you exulted. What is this: when you bore him, you groaned; you exulted when you lost him? Not without reason, unless because you did not lose him. Where there was no grief, there was faith. Spiritual faith had shut carnal grief out of the heart. You saw that you were not losing your son but sending him on ahead: all that you rejoiced in, you wished to follow.

We marvel at these things, we praise these things, we love these things. O blessed martyrs, from where do you have these things? I know you have human hearts: from where do you have these divine things? I say, “From God”: who is there who says, “From yourselves”? Who is there who, by praising you wrongly, envies you? Does someone or other say these things are from you? Answer him: “In the Lord my soul shall be praised.” Does someone or other say these things are from you? Answer him, if you are meek, answer: “In the Lord my soul shall be praised.” Answer this too among the people of God: “Let the meek hear and be glad.” Does someone or other say these things are from you? Answer him: “A man cannot receive anything unless it has been given him from above.” For to us and to you the Lord Jesus says, “Without me you can do nothing.” “Without me,” he says, “you can do nothing”: it was said to you too. Recognize the words of the one who feeds you; beware the flattery of those who would deceive you. This pride, impious, unjust, ungrateful, I know displeases you. Holy martyrs, you suffered for Christ; but what you suffered profited you, not Christ. What would you lack, had it not been given to you? Drive away from your ears these poisons of the enemy serpent. It is the tongue that said, “You will be like gods.” Ungrateful free choice threw man down headlong; let freed choice now say to the Lord, “O Lord, the patience of Israel.” Why are you proud, unbeliever? Do you praise the patience of the martyrs as though they could be patient of themselves? Listen rather to the apostle, the teacher of the Gentiles, not the deceiver of unbelievers. Surely you praise patience for Christ in the martyrs, and do you ascribe it to them? Listen rather to the apostle addressing martyrs and calming human hearts. Listen, I say, to him saying, “For to you it has been given on behalf of Christ.” Listen to piety exhorting, not flattery deceiving: “To you,” he says, “it has been given.” It has been given: listen: “To you it has been given on behalf of Christ, not only to believe in him but also to suffer for him.” “To you it has been given”: what can be added to this statement? “To you it has been given”: recognize the gift, so that you do not lose what you claim for yourself. “To you,” he says, “it has been given on behalf of Christ”: what on behalf of Christ, if not to suffer? If you do not suspect it, hear what follows: “not only to believe in him”—for this too has been given—but not this alone has been given: “but also to suffer for him”—and this too has been given. Let the martyr turn his back on the unbelieving and ungrateful flatterer; let him turn his face to the most kind giver, and credit his very passion to God, not as though he had offered this to God from his own, but let him say rather, “In the Lord my soul shall be praised; let the meek hear and be glad.” And when you say to him, “What is this, ‘In the Lord my soul shall be praised’? Is it in you, then, that it is praised?” he replies, “Shall not my soul be subject to God? For from him is my patience.” Why then “mine”? I opened my lap and gladly received it: from him, it is mine. Both from him and mine; and because it is from him, therefore all the more safely mine. It is mine, but I do not have it from myself. So that I may have my gift, I acknowledge God the giver. For if I do not acknowledge God the giver, God takes away his good, and there remains my evil, through my own choice.

The faithful Scripture says: “God made man upright, and they themselves sought out many thoughts.” “God made man upright,” it says, “and they themselves”: from where “themselves,” if not through free choice? “And they themselves sought out many thoughts.” It had said he was made upright, and yet it did not say, “and they sought out crooked thoughts,” because it had said “upright,” or “wicked thoughts”; but it said “many.” Because of this multitude, “the body that is corrupted weighs down the soul, and the earthly dwelling presses down the mind that thinks many things.” May God free us from this multitude of human thoughts, and free us by the One, so that in him we may be one out of a multitude. May he melt us together in the fire of love, so that with one heart we may follow the One, lest we fall from the One into many, and be scattered among many, having left the One. For it was of this One that the apostle was speaking when he said, “Brothers, I do not consider that I have laid hold of it.” What then? “But one thing.” What one thing? “Forgetting what lies behind, stretching out to what lies ahead, I follow.” I follow one thing; “one thing,” he says, “I follow,” but “I do not consider that I have laid hold of it,” because the body that is corrupted presses down the mind that thinks many things. See where the martyrs were going: when they were on fire, they did not care about much noise, because they loved one thing. See the desire of the martyrs: “One thing,” he says, “I have asked of the Lord.” “One thing I have asked”: farewell, he says, I bid to the worldly multitude. “One thing I have asked”: surely one blessedness, one happiness, one true, not many false. “One thing,” he says, “I have asked of the Lord; this will I seek.” What is this one thing? “That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.” For what purpose? “That I may contemplate the delight of the Lord.” When the holy martyrs thought of that delight, then all evil, bitter, and harsh things grew cheap to them. There was delight against delight; there was delight against pain. That delight fought against both, against the raging world and against the coaxing world. It answered the world: Why do you coax? What I love is sweeter than what you promise. I hear God saying to me, or rather the holy Scripture: “How great is the multitude of your sweetness, O Lord, which you have hidden for those who fear you!” See again a good multitude, because it is not at variance but in the One.

It is not surprising, then, my brothers: you know at what point the martyrs are named in the recital? The Church does not pray for them. For rightly the Church prays for the other departed who sleep; for the martyrs it does not pray, but rather commends itself to their prayers. For they strove against sin to the point of blood. They fulfilled what is written: “Strive for the truth until death.” They despised the world’s promises; but that is little: for it is little to despise death, little to endure harsh things; where the contest goes as far as blood, there is the most glorious and full victory. For the first temptations put to our Lord, the prince of the martyrs, were enticements: “Tell these stones to become bread.” “I will give you all these kingdoms.” “Let us see whether the angels hold you up, for it is written, lest you strike your foot against a stone.” These are the pleasant things of the world: in the bread, the desire of the flesh; in the promise of kingdoms, the ambition of the world; in the curiosity of the temptation, the desire of the eyes. All these are from the world; but they coax, they do not rage. Attend to the captain of the martyrs, setting before us the contests of his examples and mercifully helping those who contend. Why did he allow himself to be tempted, except to teach you to resist the tempter? The world promises carnal pleasure: answer it, God is more delightful. The world promises honors and worldly heights: answer it, the kingdom of God is higher than all. The world promises superfluous or damnable curiosities: answer it, the truth of God alone does not err. When the Lord had been tempted with this threefold temptation—since in all the allurements of this world there are three things, either pleasure, or curiosity, or pride—what does the evangelist say? “After the devil had finished every temptation”: every one, but every one that belongs to allurements. There remained another temptation, in harsh and hard things, in cruel, atrocious, and pitiless things; there remained another temptation. Knowing this, what had been completed and what remained, the evangelist says: “After the devil had completed every temptation, he departed from him for a time.” He departed from him, that is, the serpent lying in wait: he will come back roaring as a lion; but he will be conquered by him who tramples on the lion and the dragon. He will return: he will enter into Judas; he will make him the betrayer of his master. He will bring the Jews, no longer flattering but raging: possessing his vessels, he will cry out by the tongues of all, “Crucify, crucify.” Why do we marvel at Christ as victor there? He was God almighty.

The apostle Peter says: “He suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow his footsteps.” It was fitting for him to suffer, and by suffering he taught you. A word was too little unless an example were added. And how did he teach, brothers? He was hanging on the cross, the Jews were raging; he hung on harsh nails, but did not lose his gentleness. They raged, they barked around him, they insulted him as he hung; as if, with one supreme physician set in the middle, madmen raged on every side. He hung there, and he healed. “Father,” he said, “forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” He asked, and yet he hung: he did not come down, because from his own blood he was making medicine for the madmen. In the end, because these were the words of the Lord asking and likewise of him mercifully granting—since he asked the Father and granted together with the Father—because those words could not be poured out in vain, after his resurrection he healed those whom, while hanging, he had borne in their utter madness. He ascended into heaven, he sent the Holy Spirit; nor did he show himself to them after the resurrection, but only to his faithful disciples, lest he should seem to have wished to insult those who killed him. For it was more important to teach friends humility than to reproach enemies with the truth. He rose again: he did more than they demanded, not believing but insulting and saying, “If he is the Son of God, let him come down from the cross.” And he who would not come down from the wood rose from the tomb. He ascended into heaven, from there he sent the Holy Spirit: he filled the disciples, set the fearful upright, made them confident. Peter’s trembling was suddenly turned into the courage of a preacher. From where did a man get this? Look for Peter presuming, and you find Peter denying; look for God helping, and you find Peter preaching. Weakness trembled for an hour, that presumption might be overcome, not that piety might be destroyed. He fills him with his Spirit and makes him a most courageous preacher, to whom, when he presumed, he had foretold, “You will deny me three times.” For he had presumed on his own strength, not on the gift of God, but on free choice. For he had said, “I will be with you even to death.” He had said in his abundance, “I shall not be moved forever.” But he who in his will had given strength to his beauty turned away his face, and he was troubled. “The Lord,” it says, “turned away his face”: he showed Peter to Peter; but afterward he looked back on him and established Peter on the rock. Let us imitate, then, my brothers, as far as we can, the example of the passion in the Lord. We shall be able to fulfill it if we ask help from him, not going ahead of him, as Peter did when presuming, but following and praying, as Peter did when advancing. For when Peter had denied three times, attend to what the evangelist says: “And the Lord looked at him, and Peter remembered.” What does “looked at him” mean? The Lord did not look at him with his bodily face as if to remind him. It is not so: read the Gospel. The Lord was being judged in the inner part of the house; Peter was being tested in the courtyard. So the Lord looked at him, not with the body but with majesty; not with the gaze of the eyes of flesh but with the highest mercy. He who had turned away his face looked at him, and he was set free. The presumer would have perished, then, had the Redeemer not looked back. And see: washed by his tears, rebuked and rescued, Peter preaches. He preaches who had denied; those who had gone astray believe. That medicine of the Lord’s blood is effective in madmen. Believing, they drink what they shed in their raging. But, someone says, it is a great thing for me to imitate the Lord. By the grace of the Lord, imitate a fellow servant: imitate Stephen, imitate Marian and James. They were men, they were fellow servants; born as you were, but crowned by him who was not born as they were.