But if, in order that grace may be true — that is, gratuitous — it finds nothing in man to which it may be owed by merit (which is well understood also in that which is said: For nothing you will save them), then assuredly it itself gives the merits, it is not given for merits. It therefore precedes even faith, from which all good works begin; for the just man, as it is written, lives by faith. Moreover, grace not only helps the just man, but also justifies the impious. And therefore, even when it helps the just man and seems to be rendered to his merits, it does not thereby cease to be grace, since it helps that very thing which it itself bestowed. On account of this grace, therefore, which precedes all human good merits, not only was Christ slain by the impious, but he also died for the impious.
And before he died, he chose not indeed just men, but men to be justified, as apostles, to whom he said: I have chosen you out of the world. For to those to whom he said: You are not of the world, and, lest they should think they had never been of the world, he soon added: But I have chosen you out of the world — assuredly, that they might not be of the world was conferred upon them by his election of them. Wherefore, if they were chosen through their own justice, and not through his grace, they would not have been chosen out of the world, since they would no longer be of the world if they were already just. Then, they were chosen for this reason, because they were already just; they themselves had first chosen the Lord. For who can be just, except by choosing justice?
But Christ is the end of the law unto justice to everyone who believes — he who was made for us wisdom from God, and justice, and sanctification, and redemption, so that, as it is written, he who glories may glory in the Lord. He therefore is our justice. Whence also the ancient just men, before the incarnation of the Word, were justified in this faith of Christ and in this true justice which Christ is to us, believing that to be future which we believe to have been done; and they too, by grace, were saved through faith — not of themselves, but by the gift of God, not of works, lest perchance they should be exalted. For their good works did not precede the mercy of God, but followed it. For they themselves heard, they themselves wrote, long before Christ had come in the flesh:
I will have mercy on whom I have had mercy, and I will show mercy to whom I have been merciful. From which words of God the apostle Paul, so long afterward, would say: Therefore it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who has mercy. Their voice too it is, long before Christ had come in the flesh: My God, his mercy will go before me. But how could they be strangers to the faith of Christ, by whose charity Christ was foretold even to us — without whose faith no mortal ever was, or is, or ever at any time could be just? If therefore the apostles were chosen by Christ as already just, they would first have chosen him, that they might be able to be chosen as just, since without him they could not be just. But it was not so done; for he himself says to them:
You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you. Whence the apostle John says: Not that we loved God, but that he himself loved us. Since this is so, what is man, using in this life his own will, before he chooses and loves God, but unjust and impious? What, I say, is man, a creature straying from his Creator, unless his Creator be mindful of him and choose him freely and love him freely? For he himself cannot choose or love, unless he first, being chosen and beloved, be healed — he who by a blindness that ought to be chosen does not discern, and by a languor that ought to be loved loathes. But perhaps someone will say: How does God first choose and love the wicked, that he may justify them, when it is written: You hate, O Lord, all who work iniquity?
How do we suppose it to be, save in a wondrous and unspeakable way? And yet we are not even able to conceive that a good physician both hates and loves a sick man: he hates him, that is, because he is sick, the very man he loves in order that he may drive out the sickness. Let these things be said on behalf of charity, without which there can be in us no true patience, since in the good it is the charity of God that bears all things, just as in the wicked it is the cupidity of the world. But this charity is in us through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. Whence, from Him from whom charity comes to us, from Him also comes patience. But the cupidity of the world, when it patiently endures the burdens of any calamity whatsoever, glories in the strength of its own will as though in the stupor of disease, not in the vigour of health. Insane is such glorying;
it belongs not to patience but to madness. That will seems the more patient of bitter evils the more greedy it is of temporal goods, because the more empty it is of eternal ones. But if the unclean and diabolical spirit stirs it up and inflames it with deceitful visions and persuasions, and, joined to it by malignant conspiracy, renders a man's will either demented through error or burning with the desire of some worldly delight, so that it marvellously endures whatever things seem intolerable — yet not for that reason can an evil will exist without the instigation of another unclean spirit, in the way that a good will cannot exist without the help of the Holy Spirit.
For that an evil will can exist even without any spirit either seducing or inciting it is sufficiently shown in the devil himself, who is found to have been made a devil by his own will, through no other devil. And so an evil will, whether it be carried away by cupidity, or recalled by fear, or diffused by gladness, or contracted by sorrow, and in all these perturbations of soul despises and endures whatever things are heavier for others or at another time — such a will can also, without the instigation of another spirit, seduce itself and, falling away from the higher to the lower, by however much the more pleasant it shall have deemed
what it craves to obtain, or fears to lose, or rejoices to have gained, or grieves to have lost, so much the more tolerably does it bear that thing for the sake of which the suffering is less to it than the enjoyment of that other. For whatever that thing be, it is from the creature, whose mark is will. For in a certain manner, by a familiar contact and connection, the beloved creature lies near to the loving creature for the experiencing of its sweetness. But the delight of the Creator, of which it is written, 'And thou shalt make them drink of the torrent of thy pleasure,' is of a far different kind; for it is not, as we are, a creature. Unless, therefore, love of Him be given to us from thence, there is no source whence it can be in us. And through this, a good will, by which God is loved, cannot be in a man save in one in whom God works even the willing.
This good will, then — that is, a will faithfully subject to God, a will kindled by the holiness of heavenly ardour, a will that loves God and its neighbour for God's sake — whether by love, of which the apostle Peter answers, 'Lord, thou knowest that I love thee'; or by fear, of which the apostle Paul says, 'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling'; or by joy, of which he says, 'rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation'; or by sorrow, such as he says he had, a great sorrow for his brethren — whatever bitter and harsh things it endures, it is the charity of God, which bears all things, which is not poured out in our hearts save through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
Whence, with no wavering of piety, just as the charity of those who love in holiness, so also the patience of those who endure in godliness is the gift of God. For the divine Scripture neither deceives nor is deceived, which has testimonies of this matter not only in the ancient books — when it is said to God, 'Thou art my patience,' and, 'From Him is my patience,' and where another prophet says that we receive the spirit of fortitude — but also in the apostolic writings it is read, 'For unto you it is given for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake.' Let no one, therefore, be lifted up in mind as over something of his own, when he hears that it is given to him.
But if anyone who does not have that charity which pertains to the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace, whereby the catholic Church, gathered together, is joined as one — being set in some schism — in order not to deny Christ, suffers tribulations, straits, hunger, nakedness, persecution, dangers, prisons, chains, torments, the sword, or flames, or beasts, or the cross itself, for fear of hell and eternal fire: these things are in no way to be blamed; nay rather, even here patience is to be praised.
For we shall not be able to say that it would have been better for him, by denying Christ, to suffer none of those things which he suffered by confessing Him; but it is rather to be reckoned that his judgment will perhaps be more tolerable than if by denying Christ he had escaped all those things. So that what the apostle says, 'If I deliver my body to be burned, but have not charity, it profiteth me nothing,' is to be understood to profit him nothing for the obtaining of the kingdom of heaven, not for the undergoing of a more tolerable punishment at the last judgment. But it may deservedly be asked whether this patience too is the gift of God, or is to be attributed to the powers of the human will, whereby a man separated from the Church, not for the error
of him who separated him, but for the truth of the sacrament or of the word, which remained with him — suffers temporal punishments through fear of eternal punishments. For care must be taken, lest perchance, if we should call this patience the gift of God, those in whom it exists be also believed to pertain to the kingdom of God; but if we should deny that it is the gift of God, we should be compelled to confess that without the help and bounty of God there can be in the will of man something good. For this too is not un-good, that a man should believe himself to be about to be punished with eternal punishment if he shall have denied Christ, and that for this faith, of whatever kind, he should endure any punishment and despise the merely human.
Accordingly, just as it is not to be denied that this too is the gift of God, so it is to be understood that there are other gifts of God belonging to the children of that Jerusalem which is above, free, our mother. For these are, in a certain manner, hereditary gifts, in which we are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ; but there are others which even the children of the concubines can receive, to whom the carnal Jews and schismatics or heretics are compared. For although it is written, 'Cast out the bondwoman and her son; for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with my son Isaac,' and God said to Abraham, 'In Isaac shall thy seed be called,' which the apostle so interpreted as to say:
that is, 'It is not the children of the flesh that are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted for the seed' — so that we might understand that the seed of Abraham according to Isaac, on account of Christ, pertains to the children of God, who are the body and members of Christ, that is, the one, true, genuine, catholic Church of God, holding the godly faith, not that which works through elation or fear, but that which works through love. Yet even to the children of the concubines, when Abraham dismissed them from his son Isaac, he bestowed certain gifts, that they might not be left utterly empty, though not so as to be kept as heirs. For thus we read: 'And Abraham gave all his substance to Isaac his son; but to the sons of his concubines Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away from Isaac his son.'
If, therefore, we are children of the free Jerusalem, let us understand that the gifts of the disinherited are one thing, the gifts of the heirs another. For these are the heirs to whom it is said, 'For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again unto fear, but ye have received the Spirit of adoption of sons, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.' Let us then cry with the spirit of charity; and until we come to that inheritance in which we may abide for ever, let us be patient with a liberal love, not with a servile fear; let us cry so long as we are poor, until we be enriched with that inheritance. For thence we have received great pledges, in that Christ became poor for our enriching; and when He was exalted to the heavenly riches, the Holy Spirit was sent, who should breathe holy desires into our hearts.
Of these poor who as yet believe but do not yet behold, who as yet hope but do not yet hold, who as yet sigh with desire but do not yet reign in felicity, who as yet hunger and thirst but are not yet satisfied — of these poor, then, the patience shall not perish for ever: not because there too shall be patience, where there will be nothing to be endured, but 'it shall not perish' is said because it will not be fruitless. For it shall have an eternal fruit; therefore it shall not perish for ever. For whoever labours in vain, when the hope for which he laboured has deceived him, deservedly says, 'I have lost so much labour'; but whoever has arrived at the things promised for his labour, rejoicing says, 'I have not lost my labour.'
It is said, therefore, that labour has not perished, not because it remains perpetual, but because it was not poured out in vain. So too the patience of the poor of Christ — but of those who are to be enriched as heirs of Christ — shall not perish for ever: not because there too we shall be bidden to bear patiently, but because for those things which here we have patiently endured, we shall fully enjoy eternal blessedness. He who bestows temporal patience upon the will shall not set an end to everlasting felicity, because both the gift bestowed and the giving are granted to charity. Amen.