Homilies on First Corinthians 4 part 2/2

And even as from a child's mouth much spittle gushing out often defiles both food and drink,

so also the words which flow from the mouth of the Greeks are vain and unclean;

and even if you give them necessary nourishment, they grieve those who provide it by continual blasphemies, and require to be carried about.

Children again, when they see a robber coming in and carrying off the things within, not only do not resist him, but even smile upon the plotter;

but if you take away their little basket or their rattles, or any other of their playthings, they are grievously distressed and vexed, they are convulsed and kick the ground.

So indeed do the Greeks also: when they see the devil stealing away all their patrimony and that which holds their life together, they laugh, running to him as to a friend;

but if one take away a possession, or wealth, or any such childish thing, they lament, they are convulsed;

and even as children are stripped naked without shame and do not blush, so also the Greeks, wallowing with fornicators and adulterers, and stripping bare the laws of nature, and introducing lawless unions, are not turned back.

You have applauded loudly and praised;

but along with the applause take earnest care that these things be not said of you also.

Wherefore I exhort you all to become men;

for when we ourselves are children, how shall we teach those to be men? how shall we restrain them from childish folly? Let us therefore become men, that we may attain unto the measure of the stature appointed by Christ, and may obtain the good things to come, by grace and lovingkindness, and so forth.