CHAPTER XX

THE SUFFERINGS OF THE SAINTS, AND THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD

The Value of Saintly Example

Deac. I am as fully persuaded of the truth as if I had been on the spot myself. The best proof of my acceptance of your narrative is the attention I have paid to it. While I have the recollection of it still ringing in my ears, I shall possibly commit it to writing in ink, upon a prime piece of parchment, as a memorial to our own generation, and for the benefit of those who aspire to the episcopate; so that they may either be such as was the holy John, or such as you, who have emulated the way of the martyrs on behalf of the truth, or else may give up trying to bear a burden beyond their strength, and be content with the unadventurous life of the layman.

When experienced pilots are available, it is better to pay one’s fare, and get safely to port as a passenger, than to take the pilot’s place oneself, and lose vessel and cargo together by shipwreck. You have given us an account of the career of the blessed John; of the strict ordering of his life, of his splendid work in the Churches of Antioch and Constantinople, of his advancement, of the plots formed against him, and of all his bitter trials, laboriously brought upon him by illdisposed persons in carrying out these plots. You have told us, too, about Porphyrius, and the eunuch of Ephesus. Now tell us the rest. Who died in prison? Which of those in communion with John were banished? It is but common justice that we should hold such men in memory, to encourage the living. In things which belong to earthly life, servants who for their masters’ sake suffer imprisonment, or blows, or torture, are rewarded by them with kindness and emancipation; how much more do those deserve honour and good-will from the Church who suffer for the sake of Christ? The apostle says of them, “As prisoners with the prisoners, evil entreated with those that are evil entreated, as being yourselves in the body.” For “right dear in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.”

The Sufferings of Chrysostom’s Adherents

Bish. Excellently spoken. Listen then. At first, a rumour was circulated that the bishops had been thrown into the sea; but the true account shows that they were sent into banishment beyond the boundaries of their native provinces, into barbarian climes, where they are still kept under the guard of the police. A deacon who had been their fellow-traveller told us on his arrival that Cyriacus was at Palmyra, the frontier fort of Persia, eighty miles further inland from Emesa, that Eulysius of Bostra in Arabia was about three days’ march away at a fort called Misphas, near the land of the Saracens; Palladius was under guard in the neighbourhood of the Blemmyans, a tribe of Ethiopians, at a place called Syene; Demetrius was far inland at Oasis—the one in the neighbourhood of the Mazici (there are other Oases)—and that Serapion, accused of countless unproved charges, sustained personal injuries from his savage judges (who went so far, it is said, as to draw his teeth), and was then banished to his own native country.

Hilarius, a holy man, advanced in years, was transported to the innermost Pontus, after being beaten, not by the judge, but by the clergy; a man who for eighteen years had not tasted bread, but lived on nothing but herbs and boiled wheat. Antonius went into voluntary exile among the caves of Palestine; Timotheus of Maroneia, and John of Lydia, are said to be in Macedonia; Rhodon of Asia made his way to Mitylene; Gregory of Lydia is said to be in Phrygia; Brisson, brother of Palladius, of his own free will left his Church, and is living on his own little farm, working the land with his own hands. Lampetius, they say, is being maintained in some place in Lydia, by one Eleutherus, and devoting himself to reading; Eugenius is in his own native country; Elpidius, the great Bishop of Laodicea, and Pappus, have spent three whole years without coming down the house-stairs, in their devotion to prayer. Heracleides of Ephesus has been confined for these four years in the prison of Nicomedeia.

As to the rest of the bishops in communion with John, some lost heart altogether, and communicated with Atticus, and were transferred to other Churches, in Thrace; others are lost to sight. Anatolius is said to be in Gaul.

To turn now to the priests; some were banished to Arabia and Palestine; Tigrius to Mesopotamia. Philip escaped to Pontus, and died; Theophilus is living in Paphlagonia; John, son of Aethrius, founded a monastery in Cæsarea; Stephanus was banished to Arabia, but was taken by the Isaurians out of the hands of the guard, and allowed to go up to the Taurus district. Salustius is said to be in Crete. I understand that Philip the anchorite, priest in charge of the school, is lying sick in Campania. Sophronius the deacon is in prison in the Thebaid; Paul the deacon, the assistant steward, is said to be in Africa; another Paul, deacon of the Church of the Resurrection, is in Jerusalem. Helladius, the presbyter of the palace, is living on his own little farm in Bithynia. A large number are in hiding in Constantinople, others have gone to their own native countries. Silvanus the holy bishop is in Troas, supporting himself by fishing; Stephanus the ascetic was flogged at Constantinople, and thrown into prison for ten months, simply for having brought the letters from the Church of Rome. He was offered his freedom, on condition of communicating [with Atticus], and on his refusal had the skin most cruelly torn from his ribs and breast; I myself have seen the marks. However, in the gracious care of Christ his life was preserved, possibly for struggles yet to come, and after ten months of medical treatment he was banished to Pelusium.

A soldier named Provincialus, of the Imperial guard, accused of being a lover of John, was first flogged repeatedly and tortured unmercifully, and then banished to Petræ. A servant of Elpidius the priest accepted a bribe, they say, of fifty pieces of money, to kill the holy John by treachery, but was caught in the attempt with three swords upon his person, and injured seven of his captors one after the other. Four of them were at once buried, and three were under treatment for a long time before they recovered; yet the murderer was acquitted. The blessed Eutropius, undefiled of women, a singer, was terribly flogged, and the skin torn from his ribs and forehead; his eyebrows were torn off, and finally his ribs were laid bare on both sides, and burning oil-lamps placed against the bones, until he expired upon the rack, and was buried at midnight by the priestly perpetrators of the crime. But God bore witness to his death, by a vision of singers, in token of its likeness to the passion of the Saviour.

The deacon who came back to us from the bishops reported that the prefect’s officers in charge of them treated them so badly, in accordance with instructions received from some source or other, that they prayed for death and release from life.

They robbed the bishops of every penny they had for the expenses of the journey, and divided it among themselves; they set them on bare-boned asses, and made a two days’ journey into one, going on till late at night, and starting off before it was light in the morning, until their stomachs could not keep down even the meagre food allowed them. They never lost an opportunity of insulting them with foul and disgraceful language. They carried off the servant of Palladius, and compelled him to surrender his ledger. One of those in charge, who had cruelly ill-treated Demetrius, so as to reach Zibyne late in the evening, was racked with pain from head to foot, and died in agony; inspired men recognized this as the punishment for his cruelty. Palladius had told him before, as a fellow-soldier who returned informed us, that “Thou shalt not make another journey, but shalt die in misery.” They would not allow them to go near a church, but lodged either in inns, where there were numbers of prostitutes, or in the synagogues of Samaritans or Jews, mostly from Tarsus; where their distress suggested to them a new thought, which had not occurred to them before. Said one of the bishops: “Why should we trouble about our lodgings? Does it lie with us where to stay, so that we can be responsible, as if we misbehaved ourselves of our own choice? Do you not know, that by all this that has happened, and will happen, God is being glorified in all things? How many of these prostitutes, who have forgotten God, or never had the knowledge of Him, have been brought by the sight of us in this condition to the fear and thought of God, and so perhaps been turned to better things, or at least been kept from plunging into worse? It is no small thing, to a reasonable soul, in a time of suffering, to have even a little respite; we must regard it as a stimulus to self-control. Paul the seer, who himself suffered like us, says: ‘We are a sweet savour of Christ among them that are being saved and among them that are perishing, because we have been made a spectacle to angels and to men.’ ”

The local bishops in communion with Theophilus all over the East went so far in their savage cruelty, that some of them, so far from showing ordinary humanity, actually bribed the officers to get them out of the cities more speedily. The chief offenders in this respect were the Bishops of Tarsus and Antioch, Eulogius, Bishop of Cæsarea in Palestine, and especially the Bishop of Ancyra, and Ammonius, Bishop of Pelusium, who made the soldiers in charge of them still more savage against them by bribes or by threats, urging them not even to allow those of the laity who wished to do so to give them hospitality.

History Repeats Itself

On similar grounds the blessed John, writing to Gaius, in his Catholic epistles, condemns a certain bishop, but commends the hospitality of Gaius, and exhorts him not to imitate wicked bishops. The words are these: “Unto Gaius the beloved, whom I love in truth. Beloved, I pray that in all things thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth. For I rejoiced greatly, when some came and declared to me, that thou walkest in truth, and wherein thou didst refresh the saints. I have no greater joy than this.” And after this he adds, “I wrote unto the Church; but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the pre-eminence among them, receiveth us not, prating against us with wicked words; and not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and them that would he forbiddeth, and casteth them out of the Church.” A little later he gives him the advice, “Beloved, imitate not that which is evil; for he that doeth good is of God; he that doeth evil hath not seen God.”

I have quoted this whole passage, relating to the wickedness of by-gone days, to pourtray the mind of the Diotrephes’ of to-day.

But (my friend) praised and admired the bishops of the second Cappadocia, for their deep sympathy, even to tears, with the banished bishops; especially the most gentle Theodorus of Tyana, and Bosphorus of Coloneia, a bishop of forty-eight years’ standing, and Serapion of Ostracine, who has held the episcopal office for forty-five years.

The Problem of the Prosperity of the Wicked

Long was Theodorus speechless with distress, and at last said—

Deac. What shall we say to all this, father? Can it be that it is the last hour, and the falling away of which Paul speaks is being ushered in by these events, “that the son of perdition, who opposeth, may be revealed”? The thought of the wicked prospering, and succeeding in their aims, and going on for so long, and having such power, while the good are being persecuted and pillaged, fills me with dread that this person is near at hand.

The Last Hour

Bish. Very certainly, most intelligent sir, the end is near; as we read, “Little children, it is the last hour;” and “The master of the house went out about the eleventh hour to hire labourers into his vineyard.” The last hour is the twelfth; and if the apostle spoke of the last hour four hundred years ago, much more, by all showing, is it the last hour now.

The Test of Suffering

Again, we have to remember that from the first these things have occurred by the permission of the Lord, for the training of the saints; the devil desires to have them, as the word of the Saviour says, “Simon, Simon, Satan asked to have you, that he might sift you as wheat; but I made supplication for thee, that thy faith fail not.” Assuredly the Lord did not pray for Simon alone, but for all who have Peter’s faith; the sieve can only mean, the circle of earth filled with pleasures and pains, which form, so to speak, holes through which earthly people fall down to hell, separated as dust from nourishing grain by the perforations.

Some pass through the hole of gluttony—those “whose god is their belly”; some through that of love of pleasure, those of whom the prophet speaks, who were “led astray by the spirit of fornication”; for “neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor abusers of themselves, shall inherit the kingdom of God.” Others pass through the hole of covetousness—those who have espoused the bride of idolatry; others through that of anger and passion—those who loved bestial darkness, of whom John says, “He that hateth his brother is in darkness until now,” for “Anger,” says the author of Proverbs, “destroys even the prudent;” others through accidie and forgetfulness, because they do not persevere in sleepless remembrance; whose address to God is, “My heart slept through weariness.” “Woe unto you,” the word warns them, “who have lost patience, and what will ye do when the Lord shall visit you?” Others pass through the hole of senseless ostentation; of whom the Psalmist declares, “For God hath scattered the bones of the men-pleasers;” others, again, through that of false pretension or pride, which is arrogance. It is these whom the prophet rebukes as deserters—“The proud have transgressed exceedingly, yet have I not swerved from thy law.”

Each of these vices is followed by others, worse than itself; pride by envy, covetousness by hatred, and stinginess and lying, passion by anger or revengefulness, insolence, and envyings; fornication by forgetfulness, deadness of conscience,1 idleness, indifference, unprofitable loss of sleep; vainglory by meddlesomeness, acts of bribery, idle fancies, hypocrisy, respect of persons, deceits; pride by foolish ideas, pitilessness, impiety, folly; and so on. I need not over-weight my argument by giving further illustrations, as what I have said is perfectly clear.

Righteousness Revealed through Trials

To each of these vices God has appointed its contrary virtue; for instance, self-control is opposed to lust, temperance to greediness, justice to covetousness, gentleness to anger, joy to sorrow, mindfulness to forgetfulness, patience to accidie, good sense to folly, courage to cowardice, humility to vainglory, and so on; and to all, holy scripture. Only to pride has He not given its contrary virtue, because of its exceeding viciousness, but has reserved Himself as its contrary, as He said, “God resisteth the proud.” So, too, the prophet prays, “Lift up thine hand against their pride, even to the end,” and again, “Render to the proud their desert.” And just as the tree is known by its fruit (as the Lord says, “By their fruits ye shall know them”), so is each man, whether he be a saint in fact, or only in name.

Scriptural Illustrations

This is why the happiness of the wicked is always long-continued; because God bears long with them. This is always His property; He has told us to expect it, in the part played by the afflicted saints in times past, as an encouragement to us who suffer to-day. Look first at Job, the son of patience; what says he, after much suffering? Mark it well. “As for me, is my reproof of men?” he points to his blamelessness. “Why should I not be impatient? Look unto me, and be astonished, and lay your hand upon your mouth. For if I remember, I am troubled, and pains take hold of my flesh. Wherefore do the wicked live, and become old in riches? Their seed is according to their desire, and their children are before their eyes; their houses prosper, nowhere is fear; the rod of the Lord is not upon them. Their cow casts not her calf; she is preserved from heat; she is with young, and faileth not. They abide as sheep for ever. Their children play, taking the psaltery and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the psalm, they fulfil their life in good things, and they sleep in the rest of Hades. Yet he saith unto God, Depart from me, I desire not to know thy ways.”

David the forbearing, the singer of the divine judgments, uses similar language: “I will sing to thee of mercy and judgment, O Lord.” “How good is God to Israel, even unto them that are pure in heart. But my feet were almost shaken; my steps had well-nigh slipped.” Why? “For I was stirred at the lawless, when I saw the peace of sinners.” And in another passage he inveighs against their wealth, as follows: “Their oxen are fat, their sheep bring forth abundantly, abounding in their streets; their garners are full, affording store from this unto that; their daughters are beautiful, adorned in the likeness of a temple.” And he adds, in astonishment at the harmony and peace which they enjoy, “There is no outcry in their streets, nor falling of a fence in their houses.” Then he attacks the corrupted opinions of the common herd of men, saying, “They counted as blessed the people who have these things.” And he adds, “Blessed is the people whose helper is the Lord God of Jacob.”

I must not end my quotations here, or I shall imperil my argument for want of completeness. Hear what Habakkuk says, as he seems to beat his breast in his distress at the same problem: “O Lord, how long shall I cry, suffering wrongfully, and thou wilt not hear?” He calls the wrongs of his neighbour his own; and in his love for his brethren he adds, “I will cry unto thee, and thou wilt not save. Why didst thou show me iniquity, and that I should look upon labours that lead to hardship and impiety? Judgment is against me, and the judge taketh reward. Therefore is the law perverted, and judgment goeth not forth, unto the end; for the wicked doth oppress the righteous.”

In the same spirit Jeremiah, the most sympathetic of the saints, perplexed beyond all other men, cries, “Righteous art thou, O Lord, when I shall plead with thee; yet will I speak judgments unto thee, O Lord. Why doth the way of the wicked prosper? All they that set at nought are at ease; thou didst plant them, and they took root” (this is instead of saying, “they spend their days in profligacy”); “and they bore fruit” (certainly not of the spirit). “Thou art near their mouth, and far from their reins.” The prophet Sophonias the wise has a passage to exactly the same effect. He is reproaching men for slandering their neighbours, finding fault with the providence of God, and calling the saints unhappy. “You,” he says in the person of the Lord, “made your words stout against me, saith the Lord. And ye said, Wherein did we speak against thee? Ye said, He is vain who serveth God; and what profit, that we kept his charges, and that we walked as suppliants before the Lord Almighty? And now we call strangers happy, and all that work lawless things are built up, and they resisted God, and are delivered. These things spake they that feared the Lord, each one to his neighbour.”

Paul, the preacher of piety, adds his testimony to the same truth: “But evil men and impostors shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived.” Then he points out the low esteem in which the saints are held: “For I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last of all, as men doomed to death; for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men. For even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and have no certain dwelling-place, and labour, working with our own hands” (a description of his bodily sufferings); “being reviled, we bless, being persecuted, we endure, being defamed, we entreat, we are made as the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things even until now.” The good and just God spreads the world before us, for certain ineffable reasons, like a racecourse; and has given us free will, that we may deal with circumstances according to our own choice, and pay the just penalty for our deeds. As the law says, “I have set before thy face, death and life, choose what thou wilt.” Why He set it so, it is not for us to say in this present life; the fact remains, that He has so set it. It would not have been wise for us to be created impeccable, with no struggles before us, and minds not established in righteousness. Impeccability is the attribute of the eternal Godhead alone.

Deac. You have met our difficulty admirably and wisely, father; you have given eyes to the souls of our friends here, who have found this matter a continual perplexity, arising partly from their lack of acquaintance with scripture, partly from the very fact that the Church is throughout the ages appointed as a training school. She points to her victors, men and women alike, as not having eaten of the flesh of Christ in times past without paying a price. Yet the disorders among you, and the break-up of the Church, cause us distress.

The Blessedness of Truth Countervails all Suffering

Bish. You astonish me, most honoured of men. You almost unreservedly admit the beneficial results of suffering, and then turn round and say something to the contrary effect. You call us blessed, as victors, and yet you call us miserable, as banished men, because we have been deprived of our Church buildings. You seem to me to be in the same state of mind as the rustic spectators at the Olympic games, who gape with delight at the prizes, but shed tears of pity at the blows exchanged between the combatants. To my mind, it is better to hasten away to ravines, and thickets, and seas, in company with the truth, than to be burdened with falsehood, while enjoying high honour for what is in this life considered prosperity. For if I possess truth, I shall possess all things, for all things are her servants; if I have made falsehood my own, I do not possess even myself, as I am not hers. But if I possess truth, I do not wish to possess her merely as a mistress, or a servant, or a neighbour, but as a sister; nay, if it be possible, as a bride, whose sweetness I may enjoy and presently inherit as my very own wife. For she is the sister of the absolute truth, whose son-in-law the good man is. For he that bears this seal becomes young a second time, grows not old, and fades not away; he has zeal fiercer than fire, words sharper than swords, life freer than an eagle’s; he devotes himself untiringly to meditation upon the scriptures, as to a house-mother; he never ceases to blossom with gladness, he is not overcome by fear, he holds up his head undaunted, he dances in his holy enthusiasm, he hates no man, he pities those who misuse life, he calls blessed those who mind their own business in contentment, he sorrows with the sorrow of the spirit at the careless lives of priests, of whom the apostle said, “Grieve not the Holy Spirit, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption,” He it is that grieves the Spirit, who turns his back upon Him in carelessness.

And at last (there is much that I must pass by) in his out-spokenness he dies; he has given pain to none, save to the demons, and to those who are like them. His time has been more than enough; he did not higgle away his days in evil doings. He doubled the money that was given to him, he forwarded interest, of good works, in a short time he fulfilled long years; he makes no will disposing of his property, for by his life and thought he wrestled with it, and gravelled it. Did Death knock at the door of his frail flesh? Before he sees him outside, he cries, Let us go hence, and sings, “Woe is me, that my sojourn has been so long;” and were it not for the Master Who sent him on his mission, he would have served him with a summons, and sued him at law, for coming too late. Well content is he, when at last he is set free from the frail flesh, with its manifold ailments, as if he were leaving a ruinous hostel, threatening to fall; he pricked up his ears at the voice of Him Who says, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” confident of hearing the rest as well.

Take this torrent of words as a proof of my contention; “for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.”

The Misery of Falsehood

But he who dwells with falsehood has a disturbed life; one moment in boundless delight at an addition to his wealth, or to his poor little reputation, or at the friendship of a wretched harlot, or at the misfortunes of his enemies; the next, sick to death with sorrow, dreaming of changes and uncertainties. He passes restless or sleepless nights, he imagines plots made against him by his closest friends, he has no confidence even in himself, and distrusts all men, as liars. Such is he; cowardly as a hare, bold as a pig, deceitful as a chameleon, unreliable as a partridge, pitiless as a wolf, untameable as a mouse; his own enemy, unceasingly jealous, inevitably punishing himself, though he does not know it; for he who is always planning evil against another, first brings evil upon himself.

Did Death prick his skin? He gives away everything, to gain a little respite, so precious is his life to him; the time given him he higgled away to no profit, so far from doubling his penny he did not even keep it safe. He trembles continually, like a leaf, in his dread of the approach of old age; he is troubled with the silly ideas of old men, he fears death as a god; for to him the visible world is God. And what then? He turns pale, he shivers with fright, he is in an agony of distress; he anticipates the judgment of God, and inflicts punishment upon himself. His conscience torments him without mercy, and reminds him of his evil doings one by one, till his sufferings are more terrible than those of criminals under the lash. He grovels like a slave to those in office for the moment, and flatters the world to his disgrace; instead of One Lord he has ten thousand masters, to save himself from being the servant of the truth. He does all he can to get himself feared, yet he himself fears every one.

The Decision of the Church of Rome

I will say no more; I have done all I can. If any one can speak more truthfully or elegantly, and put my nothingness right, I will gladly welcome him as a corrector of error and a lover of the brethren, and give thanks to the Saviour for all things. Now do you in return give me an account of the decision of the western synod, and set the seal upon my words, if they commended themselves to you as being of any value. So the narrator ceased, and Theodorus said—

Deac. The Lord grant to you who have given us this narrative, to find mercy in that day, for your refusal to hold communion with such people, and for the clear account you have given us. And may the Lord remember every sacrifice of John, because he surrendered not his out-spokenness, even unto death. The decision of the Church of Rome was, under no circumstances to communicate with the eastern bishops, especially with Theophilus, until the Lord grants the opportunity for an ecumenical synod, to heal the putrefied limbs of the men guilty of these crimes. For though the blessed John has fallen asleep, yet the truth is awake, and for the truth search will be made.

Chrysostom’s Enemies Interrogated

As for those that have committed these offences in the Church, gladly would I meet them face to face, and ask them, Where is your priesthood? Where is the holiness required of you? Where is the gentleness and unselfishness of the Christian character? Where are the commandments of the Saviour—“If thou art offering thy gift, and rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, go thy way, first be reconciled to thy brother, and so offer thy gift”? Where is that saying, “If any man smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also”? Where is your meditation upon the scriptures? What of the verse, “Behold, what is beautiful, and what is pleasant, but for brethren to dwell together in unity”? Or, “Let brothers be helpful in times of necessity”? Why have you perverted by your actions the words, “A brother helped by a brother, is as a strong city”? A brother falsely accused, or robbed, by a brother, is like a city distressed and defenceless. Why in the world then did you, who are wretched, nay, wretched to the third degree, try to carry through this project of yours, as if no reconciliation were possible? On what principle did you let your murderous rage against John run its course, as if he were your enemy? And how has it come to you, to be so savage towards one another? Why did you let the world see such an extraordinary change in you, from gentleness to ungentleness and savagery? I am amazed, indeed, I am overwhelmed with amazement at your perversion; as I see everything thrown into this hopeless state of confusion.

And why have you so far exalted yourselves in your daring, as to insult this suckling, nursing mother, this teeming womb, the Church of God, and hack her in pieces? In you is fulfilled the prophet’s words, “Because they did pursue their brother with the sword, and brought to destruction the womb upon the earth.” With this womb the divine and saving Word combined, to sow and to plant you and John alike, for good and profitable works without number. What has happened to you that instead of helping one another to do your duty, you have made up your mind that you will not keep quiet, and live at peace, even in the future? You were created for mutual service; why did you mishandle the grace of God, and instead of lightening other men’s burdens, actually thrust them away from you, and cut them off from their own kindred? while the prophet cries to you, “Have we not all one Father? Did not One God create us?”

The Real Law-Breakers

But you will tell me that John sinned against the law. What law? The law which you trod underfoot, and shivered into fragments by your wickedness. Where, then, is the law of nature, which bids us to right wrongs with gentleness? Why, pray, do you abuse even the law which holds between enemies, and persecute them, and carry out these schemes which you devise against them, schemes bearing all the marks of hostility? How much better would it have been, to live in harmony with them, and to share their life; to join with one another in counsels for the common good, unto rendering of thanks and well-pleasing of the Father of you all? Harmony in their enjoyment of blessings is one of the virtues of children; and this is specially acceptable to their parents, who look for nothing else from their offspring, save this. And be assured that there is no other bond of friendship and goodwill, but to be in earnest, and to do everything as it is well-pleasing to the Father, to Him Who is the source of our being, of our sustenance, of our preservation.

The Divine Vengeance in Store

But you have despised Him as a fool, and kindled wars within the Church, as the prophet said, “They established madness in the Lord’s house;” instead of spurring and urging one another forward. More, you have carried on truceless wars among one another, contrary to the mind and purpose of the Father. I will go further, and say, that the thing sorely maddens, and stirs to wrath, even God Himself, and all who draw nigh to Him—His sons, your brethren—and suffers Him not to hold His peace. For He is not neglectful, or unmindful of the welfare of His children.

Therefore is He wroth at your folly, and at your tyrannical oppression of those whom you wrong; and therefore He judges it not right to pass you over without punishing you, as indeed He has begun to do. For this would not be becoming in Him, nor would it be without peril to you; your complaint is intolerable, and needs more than ordinary treatment. He sees you actually the worse for bruises, and weals without number, the result of your chastisement. Yes, a cloud of senseless and most obdurate wrong rests upon you, your brothers, your kinsfolk, and your households, even your allies, those who share with you bed and board, those who are bound to you by the closest ties of blood—all these relationships you have perverted into the bitterest hatred; insomuch that they are expelled from their own countries and from their family hearths, and wander far away, without a city or a home to dwell in. Further yet, you have made them exiles, so far as it was in your power, and that, not with a limit of time fixed for their exile, but for ever, so far as it lay with you; so savage were you, so desperately thrown off your balance.

Chrysostom the Blessed

This is what you have gained by your victory over them, and the blessed John; by fanning your spiteful enmity, and letting your tongue run wild against him, like a sharpened sword. Instead of profitable instruction, you nurse your ill-temper, and pour out upon the Church your false accusations, defiling the ears of those who hear them; accusations against men to whom the Lord in mercy and loving-kindness will give according to their works. But for you, O blessed John, with what words shall I weave you an unfading crown? I need not fear to praise you now, as you have passed from the field of combat, the fiercest waves of struggle breasted. Shall they be the words of the law of Moses, which he used in the blessing of Joseph the strenuous, and Levi the contemplative, the priest? For in you I see both of these. “Blessed of the Lord be his land, and from the mountains of heaven, and dew, and abysses of springs beneath, and in the time of fruits, the turnings of the sun and the comings together of the months, from the heads of the mountains which are from the beginning, and from the heads of the everlasting hills; they shall be on the head of Joseph” (and every man who shall be as Joseph) “and upon the head of the brethren whom he ruled, glorified among his brethren as the first-born. The beauty of a bull are his horns, his horns are the horns of an unicorn; with them he shall push the nation, even unto the end of the earth.”

And to Levi he said (and to whosoever imitates him), “Give to Levi his signs, and his truth to the holy man, whom they tried in trial, and reviled at the water of contradiction. Who saith to his father and mother, I have not seen thee, neither did he acknowledge his brethren, he observed thine oracles, and kept thy covenant; he showed thy judgments to Jacob, and thy law to Israel. He shall ever place incense upon thine altar upon thy feast day. Bless, Lord, his strength, and accept the works of his hands; smite the eyebrow of the enemies that rise up against him, and let them that hate him rise not up again.” And I would weave with these one word more: “Let them that love him, O Jesus Christ, be not ashamed; for Thine is the power for ever. Amen.”

Bish. This is the constant effort of your understanding mind, Theodorus, seeker of noble thoughts, to bring forth from the treasure of your mind, as the Saviour said, “Things new and old;” things old, the lessons of human wisdom; things new, the oracles of the Holy Spirit. From these treasures you have given its due to each side of his character. It was worthy of your sound judgment to express yourself in language so well suited to the offences committed, and to weave from the blessing of Moses the crown John deserves; who served as a priest without thought of self, and in his extraordinary righteousness did indeed know not father or mother, or ties of blood, but only those who love, and practise, the word of God. But those who in our time profess to be bishops, have run their muddy breed aground upon money-getting, and military operations, and high position; transgressing the law which says, “The priests shall not give their sons to be rulers, and them that run beside the king,” while they waste the things of the spirit upon plots, and vexations, and imprisonments, and banishments, drinking madness undiluted, thinking by these methods to dishonour the friends of virtue.

The Curse of Ambition

Of them the Saviour said, “The days shall come, in which they who kill you will think that they do God service.” I take it that He did not speak of Gentiles, for then He would have said “gods,” as they profess not one, but many, gods; when He made mention of the One and Only God, He pointed to those who are now despoiling us, under pretence of benefit to the Church. They hide their own depravity and jealousy, representing themselves in words as concerned for the welfare of the Church which they have ruinéd by their deeds. But however clever they are, the outcome of events will prove them to have been underlings of him who boasted, “I shall never be shaken from generation to generation, without evil.” For the serpent, the deviser of lawlessness and cultivator of the vilest covetousness, as he could devise no more novel form of heresy, goaded those in authority in the Church to mutual destruction, to satisfy their craving for high position, and the highest position of all; for the sake of these they rent the Church in twain.

The Satanic Work of Chrysostom’s Enemies

For if the harmony of God the Spirit had existed among the bishops, and John deserved deprivation from his office, whether for causing wrong-doing, or as being unworthy of the priesthood, or, as Theophilus maintains, as being guilty of pride; the all-powerful wisdom of God was well able to debar him from the exercise of the priesthood by constitutional restraints, or devise means by which he could be expelled without all this confusion and lamentation, whether by death, or by paralysis, or by loss of voice—as we know some of those who have thrown themselves against him have suffered, and others will suffer. But seeing that the steps taken against him were unworthy of the Saviour—he was not deposed, but exiled—it is abundantly clear that it was the work of the devil, whose kingdom was being destroyed by John’s teaching. I know that John deservedly deposed from their office six persons, of whom I spoke earlier, for buying the dignity of the priesthood. Who wept then? Whose nose bled? What spider’s web was broken? Who left his home? Who was fined a farthing? Who in the whole of Asia—vagabond, mob orator, farm-labourer, cobbler, or plebeian—was not glad at what had been done to vindicate the sacred laws? “How,” each cried, “are thy works magnified, O Lord? In wisdom didst thou do them all.” For where God is at work, all is done in wisdom; where the malevolent demon, everything is correspondently done in unwisdom. And upon unwisdom follow monstrous evils—envyings, murders, strife, emulations, evil tempers, quarrels, discord, noise, conspiracies of ignorant men, hot-headed actions of men in authority, crucifixions, tortures, burnings, streams of blood, intolerable fines, stakes, breaches of the divine ordinances, contempt of law, rejection of self-control, world-wide schism, watch set upon land and sea, engines employed on shipboard, on horseback, on foot, to hinder those who travel for the truth’s sake.

God had not Forgotten

How then can they dare to say, John was expelled in the dispensation of God? I ask those who use such words, Was the all-powerful wisdom of God, as I said, without resource to stop John, if he was unworthy, by unseen power? Or to persuade those who disagreed with him, patiently to bear with his action, without all this exercise of force by the magistrates? For if God is the same God Who worked with Moses for the freedom and obedience of Israel, when Pharaoh openly cried, “I know not God, and I will not let the people go,” how, in dealing with John, did He need the help of earthly magistrates? He had grown old, I suppose, or weak, or resourceless. And was He Who brought to light the adulteries of some, the unnatural crimes of others, and again the impostures of others, now without resource to convict John? Or again, He Who made the tongue of a man to swell with constriction, until he had to make his confession in writing, and allowed another to meet with his death from a sudden seizure; He Who tormented another with a brood of worms, as he lay speechless upon his bed for nearly a whole year, or laid upon another unspeakable horrors from chronic gout, or burnt the legs of another, because He so willed; or Who prematurely snatched away another, whom every one knows, by a nauseating death; was He too weak, as you assert, in the case of John, if he was a sacrilegious man, to do any of these things, but was in need of so and so, before He could expel John in disgrace, and thereby add to His glory?

God will Recompense

No. They deceive themselves, in their ignorance of the command of the word of God. For he cannot properly be called sacrilegious, who distributed to the poor gold, and silver, and fabrics of silk, the food of moths; but he who for money and reputation and the pleasures of the table sells the teachings and ordinances of the Saviour; and after him, he who ruins a holy man, adorned by his life and words, through whom, as by a chalice or a piece of plate, the Saviour oft gave the drink of the word, the diet of their salvation, to those who love the word of God. No, let them be called sacrilegious, who have sacrilegiously robbed the apostolic Church, and deprived her of such teachers, and who sell ordinations for money; whom divine justice will pursue, to correct their wickedness. For if those who corrupted the law of Moses were for their wanton heedlessness driven out of the temple by the Saviour with a scourge, a scourge of cords, because they were selling doves within it; what punishment shall they have, who higgle the priesthood of the New Testament, except to be shattered by the Chief Shepherd with His rod of iron? As the apostle says, “A man that hath set at nought Moses’ law dieth without compassion on the word of two or three witnesses. Of how much sorer punishment, think ye, shall he be judged worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite to the spirit of grace? For we know him who saith, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

May God, Who glorified this holy man, this saintly shepherd, this lamp of righteousness, grant to us to find part and lot with him, in His awful day of righteous judgment; to Whom belongs glory, honour, majesty, and magnificence, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto all ages. Amen.