Sermons to the People 355.1–355.7

This is what I am going to say, for which I wished and asked yesterday that you should gather in greater numbers today. We live here with you, and we live for your sake: and our intention and prayer is that we may live with you without end with Christ. Now I believe that our way of life is before your eyes; so that we too may perhaps dare to say, though in no way equal to him, what the apostle said, “Be imitators of me, as I also am of Christ.” And so I do not want anyone to find from us an occasion for living badly. “For we provide good things,” as the same apostle says, “not only before God but also before men.” For our own sake our conscience is enough for us; for your sake our reputation ought not to be polluted but to be powerful among you. Hold to what I have said, and distinguish. Conscience and reputation are two things. Conscience is for yourself, reputation for your neighbour. Whoever, trusting in his conscience, neglects his reputation is cruel, especially one placed in this position, of whom the apostle says, writing to his disciple, “Showing yourself an example of good works towards all.”

So as not to keep you long, especially since I speak sitting and you labour standing: you all know, or almost all, that we live in that house which is called the bishop's house in such a way that, as far as we can, we imitate those saints of whom the book of the Acts of the Apostles speaks: “No one called anything his own, but they had all things in common.” Since perhaps some of you are not such careful examiners of our life as to know this as I want you to know it, I tell you what it is that I have said briefly. I, whom by God's favour you see as your bishop, came to this city as a young man, as many of you know. I was looking for where to establish a monastery and live with my brothers. For I had left all hope of the world, and what I could have been I did not want to be; nor did I seek to be what I am. I chose to be cast down in the house of my God rather than to dwell in the tents of sinners. I separated myself from those who love the world; but I did not make myself equal to those who preside over peoples. Nor at the banquet of my Lord did I choose the higher place, but the lower and lowly one: and it pleased him to say to me, “Go up higher.” I feared the episcopate so much that, since my reputation had now begun to be of some weight among the servants of God, I would not go to any place where I knew there was no bishop. I was on my guard against this, and did what I could to be saved in a lowly place, lest I be endangered in a high one. But, as I said, a servant must not contradict his master. I came to this city to see a friend whom I thought I could gain for God, so that he might be with us in the monastery; feeling as it were secure, because the place had a bishop. I was seized, made a presbyter, and by this step came to the episcopate. I brought nothing; I came to this Church only with the clothes I wore at that time. And because I was planning this, to be in a monastery with brothers, the old man Valerius of blessed memory, having learned my purpose and will, gave me that garden in which the monastery now is. I began to gather brothers of good resolve, my equals, having nothing, as I had nothing, and imitating me: so that, as I had sold my slender little property and given it to the poor, so those too would do who wanted to be with me, so that we might live from what was common; and our great and most fruitful common estate would be God himself. I came to the episcopate: I saw that a bishop must show constant hospitality to all who come or pass through; if a bishop did not do this, he would be called inhuman. But if this custom were permitted in the monastery, it would be unseemly. And so I wanted to have with me in this bishop's house a monastery of clergy. Look how we live. No one in our community is permitted to have anything of his own: but perhaps some have. No one is permitted: if any have, they do what is not permitted. But I think well of my brothers, and always believing well I have refrained from this inquiry: because even to inquire into such things seemed to me like thinking badly. For I knew, and I know, that all who were living with me knew our resolve, knew the law of our life.

There came to us also the presbyter Januarius, who seemed to have spent his property by giving it away honourably, but he had not spent it. Some money remained to him, that is, silver, which he said was his daughter's. His daughter, by God's favour, is in the monastery of women, and of good hope. May the Lord guide her, so that she may fulfil what we hope of her, in his mercy, not in her father's merits. And because she was under age and could do nothing with her money (for though we saw the brightness of her profession, yet we feared the slipperiness of her age), it came about that the silver was kept as if for the girl, so that when she came of lawful age she might do with it what befitted a virgin of Christ, when she could best do it. While this was awaited, he began to draw near to death: and as though it were his own, swearing that it was his, not his daughter's, he made a will. A will, I say, was made by a presbyter, our companion, living with us, living from the Church, professing the common life; he made a will, he appointed heirs. O grief of that fellowship! O fruit born not of the tree that the Lord planted! But did he write the Church as heir? I do not want such gifts; I do not love the fruit of bitterness. I was seeking him for God; he had professed the fellowship; let him keep it, let him show it, let him have nothing, let him not make a will. Did he have something? Then let him not pretend to be our companion as one of God's poor. This is a great grief to me, brothers. I tell your Charity: because of this grief I have decided not to accept that inheritance for the Church. What he left, let it be his children's; let them do with it what they will. For it seems to me that if I accept it, I shall be his accomplice in this act, which displeases me and which I grieve over. I did not want this hidden from your Charity. His daughter is in the monastery of women; his son is in the monastery of men. He disinherited both: her with praise, him with a reproach, that is, with censure. But he has charged the Church not to let them receive those little shares which belong to the disinherited until they reach lawful age. The Church keeps this for them. Then he left a lawsuit between his children, over which I am labouring. The girl says: “It is mine; you know that my father always said this.” The boy says: “Let my father be believed, because dying he could not lie.” And what an evil this dispute is! But if these children are servants of God, we shall quickly end this lawsuit between them. I hear them as a father, and perhaps better than their father. I shall see what is right, as God wills, with a few faithful honourable brothers, by God's favour from your number, that is, from this people. I hear the case between them, and, as the Lord grants, I settle it.

Yet I ask you, let no one blame me because I do not want the Church to accept his inheritance. First, because I detest what he did; then, because it is my rule. Many praise what I am going to say, but some also blame it. To satisfy both is very difficult. You heard just now when the Gospel was read: “We sang to you, and you did not dance; we lamented, and you did not mourn. John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, He has a demon: the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, Look, a glutton, a drinker of wine, and a friend of tax collectors.” What am I to do among those who are ready to blame me and sink their teeth into me if I accept the inheritances of those who in anger disinherit their children? Again, what am I to do with those to whom I sing and who do not want to dance? Who say: “Look, this is why nobody gives anything to the Church of Hippo; look, this is why those who die do not make it their heir: because Bishop Augustine in his goodness”—for by praising they bite, they soothe with their lips, they fix their teeth—“gives everything away, does not accept.” I certainly accept; I declare that I accept good offerings, holy offerings. But if someone is angry with his son and at death disinherits him, would I not, if he were alive, appease him? Ought I not to reconcile his son to him? How, then, do I want him to have peace with his son, while I covet his inheritance? But certainly, if he does what I have often urged: he has one son, let him think of Christ as a second; he has two, let him think of Christ as a third; he has ten, let him make Christ the eleventh, and I accept. Because, then, I have done this in some cases, they now want to turn my goodness, or the recommendation of my reputation, into something else, so as to blame me in another way, for not wanting to accept the offerings of devout people. Let them consider how many things I have accepted. What need is there to list them? Look, I mention one: I accepted the inheritance of Julian's son. Why? Because he died without children.

I did not want to accept the inheritance of Boniface: not out of compassion, but out of fear. I did not want the Church of Christ to be a shipowner. There are indeed many who gain even from ships. Yet there would be one temptation: the ship would go and be wrecked; were we going to hand men over to torture, so that the sinking of the ship might be investigated according to custom, and those freed from the waves be tortured by the judge? But we would not hand them over. For in no way would it befit the Church to do this. Would it then pay the fiscal liability? But from what would it pay? We are not allowed to have a reserve fund. For it is not the part of a bishop to keep gold and turn back the hand of the beggar. Every day so many ask, so many groan, so many needy people appeal to us, that we leave more of them sad, because we do not have enough to give to all. So we have no reserve fund. Because of shipwreck, then, I did this by avoiding, not by giving. Let no one praise me for it, but let no one blame me either. Certainly when I gave to a son what his angry father took away at death, I did well. Let those praise who wish; let those who do not wish to praise spare me. What more, my brothers? Whoever wants to make the Church heir by disinheriting his son, let him look for someone else to accept it, not Augustine: or rather, by God's favour, may he find no one. How praiseworthy was the deed of the holy and venerable bishop Aurelius of Carthage, how he filled with the praises of God the mouths of all who know it! A certain man, since he had no children and did not hope for any, gave all his property to the Church, keeping the usufruct for himself. Children were born to him, and the bishop gave back, without the man expecting it, what he had given. The bishop had it in his power not to give it back; but by the law of the court, not by the law of heaven.

Your Charity should know too that I have told my brothers who live with me that whoever has anything should either sell it and give the proceeds away, or give it away and make it common property. He has the Church, through which God feeds us. And I have granted a delay until Epiphany, for the sake of those who have either not divided with their own brothers and have left what they have with their brothers, or have not yet done anything about their property because the lawful age was being awaited. Let them do with it what they wish, provided they are poor with me, waiting together for the mercy of God. But if they do not want this—those who perhaps do not want it—certainly I am the one who had decided, as you know, to ordain no cleric who did not want to stay with me; so that if he wanted to leave the resolve, I would rightly take his clerical office from him, because he would be deserting the promised and begun fellowship of a holy community. Look, in the sight of God and of you, I change my plan: those who want to have something of their own, for whom God and his Church are not enough, let them stay where they wish and where they can; I do not take their clerical office from them. I do not want to have hypocrites. For it is bad—who does not know it?—it is bad to fall from one's resolve; but it is worse to feign the resolve. Look, I say it, listen: whoever deserts the fellowship of the common life once undertaken, which is praised in the Acts of the Apostles, falls from his vow and falls from his holy profession. Let him look to a judge—but God, not me. I do not take his clerical office from him. I have set before his eyes how great the danger is: let him do what he wishes. For I know that if I wanted to degrade someone who does this, he would not lack patrons, he would not lack supporters both here and among bishops, who would say: “What wrong has he done? He cannot bear this life with you; he wants to stay outside the bishop's house and live from his own means; ought he to lose his clerical office for that?” I know how great an evil it is to profess something holy and not fulfil it. “Vow,” it says, “and pay to the Lord your God”; and, “It is better not to vow than to vow and not pay.” A virgin, even if she was never in a monastery, is still a consecrated virgin; she may not marry, although she is not compelled to be in a monastery. But if she began to be in a monastery and deserted it, and yet is a virgin, she has half fallen. So too a cleric has professed two things, both holiness and the clerical office: holiness inwardly; for the clerical office God has laid on his neck for the sake of his people, and it is more a burden than an honour to him: but who is wise and will understand these things? So he has professed holiness, he has professed the fellowship of living in common; he has professed “how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell in unity”: if he has fallen from this resolve and is a cleric staying outside, he too has half fallen. What is that to me? I do not judge him. If outside he keeps holiness, he has half fallen; but if inside he has kept up a pretence, he has wholly fallen. I do not want him to be under the necessity of pretending. I know how men love the clerical office: I take it from no one who does not want to live in common with me. Whoever wants to stay with me has God. If he is ready to be fed by God through his Church, to have nothing of his own, but either to give it to the poor or to put it into the common stock, let him stay with me. Whoever does not want this, let him have his freedom: but let him see whether he can have the eternity of happiness.

Let this suffice your Charity for now. What I shall have done with my brothers I will announce to you. For I hope for good things. All obey me willingly; and I shall not find any having anything, except by some necessity of religion, not by occasion of greed. So what I shall have done after Epiphany I will announce to your Charity, according to the Lord's will; and how I shall have ended the lawsuit between the two siblings, the children of the presbyter Januarius, I will not keep silent from you. I have said a great deal: pardon a talkative old age, but a timid weakness. I, as you see, have only lately grown old in years, but in bodily weakness I have long been an old man. Yet if what I have just said pleases God, he himself will give strength; I do not desert you. Pray for me, that as long as there is a soul in this body, and whatever strength is available, I may serve you in the word of God.