Augustine of Hippo

"For You, Lord, art good and gracious" [Psalm 86:5]....Even prayers are often hindered by vain thoughts, so that the heart scarcely remains fixed on God: and it would hold itself so as to be fixed, and somehow flees from itself, and finds no frames in which it can enclose itself, no bars by which it may keep in its flights and wandering movements, and stand still to be made glad by its God. Scarcely does one such prayer occur among many. Each one might say that this happened to him, but that it happened not to others, if we did not find in the holy Scripture David praying in a certain place, and saying, "Since I have found my heart, O Lord, so that I might pray unto You." [2 Samuel 7:27] He said that he had found his heart, as if it were wont to flee from him, and he to follow it like a fugitive, and not be able to catch it, and to cry to God, "For my heart has deserted me." Therefore, my brethren, thinking over what he says here, I think I see what he means by "gracious." I seem to feel that for this reason he calls God gracious, because He bears with those failings of ours, and yet expects prayer from us, in order to make us perfect: and when we have given it to Him, He receives it gratefully, and listens to it, and remembers not those many prayers which we pour out unthinkingly, and accepts the one which we can scarcely find. For what man is there, my brethren, who, on being addressed by his friend, when he wishes to answer his address, sees his friend turn away from him and speak to another, who is there who would bear this? Or if you appeal to a judge, and set him up to hear you, and all at once, while you are speaking to him, pass from him, and begin to converse with your friend, who would endure this? Yet God endures the hearts of so many persons who pray and think of different things....What then? Must we despair of mankind, and say that every man is already condemned into whose prayers any wandering thoughts have crept and interrupted them? If we say this, my brethren, I know not what hope remains. Therefore because there is some hope before God, because His mercy is great, let us say unto Him, "For unto You, O Lord, have I lifted up my soul." And how have I lifted it up? As I could, as You gave me strength, as I could catch it when it fled away....From infirmity I sink: heal me, and I shall stand: strengthen me, and I shall be strong. But until You do this, You bear with me: "For You, Lord, are good and gracious, and of great mercy." That is, not only "of mercy," but "of great mercy:" for as our iniquity abounds, so also abounds Your mercy. "Unto all that call upon You." What is it then which Scripture says in many places: "They shall call, and I will not hear them"? [Proverbs 1:28] Yet surely You are merciful to all that call upon You; but that some call, yet call not upon Him, of whom it is said, "They have not called upon God." They call, but not on God. You call upon whatever you love: you call upon whatever you call unto yourself, whatever you wish to come unto you. Therefore if you call upon God for this reason, in order that money may come unto you, that an inheritance may come unto you, that worldly rank may come unto you, you call upon those things which you desire may come unto you: but you make God the helper of your desires, not the listener to your needs. God is good, if He gives what you wish? What if you wish ill, will He not then be more merciful by not giving? Then, if He gives not, then is God nothing to you; and you say, How much I have prayed, how often I have prayed, and have not been heard! Why, what did you ask? Perhaps that your enemy might die. What if he at the same time were praying for your death? He who created you, created him also: you are a man, he too is a man; but God is the Judge: He hears both, and He grants their prayer to neither. You are sad, because you were not heard when praying against him; be glad, because his prayer was not heard against you. But you say, I did not ask for this; I asked not for the death of my enemy, but for the life of my child; what ill did I ask? You asked no ill, as you thought. What if "he was taken away, lest wickedness should alter his understanding." [Wisdom 4:11] But he was a sinner, you say, and therefore I wished him to live, that he might be corrected. You wished him to live, that he might become better; what if God knew, that if he lived he would become worse?...If, therefore, you call on God as God, be confident you shall be heard: you have part in that verse: "And of great mercy unto all that call upon You."...

"In the day of my trouble I have cried unto You, for You have heard me" [Psalm 86:7]. A little before he had said, All the day have I cried, all the day have I been troubled. Let no Christian then say that there is any day in which he is not troubled. By "all the day" we have understood the whole of time. What then, is there trouble even when it is well with us? Even so, trouble. How is there trouble? Because "as long as we are in the body we are absent from the Lord." [2 Corinthians 5:6] Let what will abound here, we are not yet in that country whither we are hastening to return. He to whom foreign travel is sweet, loves not his country: if his country is sweet, travel is bitter; if travel is bitter, all the day there is trouble. When is there not trouble? When there is joy in one's country. "At Your right hand are delights for evermore." "You shall fill me with joy," he says, "with Your countenance: that I may see the delight of the Lord." There toil and groaning shall pass away: there shall be not prayer but praise; there Alleluia, there Amen, the voice in concord with Angels; there vision without failing and love without weariness. So long therefore as we are not there, you see that we are not in that which is good. But do all things abound? If all things abound, see if you are assured that all things perish not. But I have what I had not: more money has come to me which I had not before. Perhaps more fear too has come, which you had not before: perhaps you were so much the more secure as you were the poorer. In fine, be it that you have wealth, that you have redundance of this world's affluence, that you have assurance given you that all this shall not perish; besides this, that God say unto you, You shall remain for ever in these things, they shall be for ever with you, but My face you shall not see. Let none ask counsel of the flesh: ask ye counsel of the Spirit: let your heart answer you; let hope, faith, charity, which has begun to be in you, answer. If then we were to receive assurance that we should always be in affluence of worldly goods, and if God were to say to us, My face you shall not see, would ye rejoice in these goods? Some one might perhaps choose to rejoice, and say, These things abound unto me, it is well with me, I ask no more. He has not yet begun to be a lover of God: he has not yet begun to sigh like one far from home. Far be it, far be it from us: let them retire, all those seductions: let them retire, those false blandishments: let them be gone, those words which they say daily unto us, "Where is your God?" Let us pour out our soul over us, let us confess in tears, let us groan in confession, let us sigh in misery. Whatever is present with us besides our God, is not sweet: we would not have all things that He has given, if He gives not Himself who gave all things.

"Among the gods there is none like You, O Lord" [Psalm 86:8]. What did he say? "Among the gods," etc. Let the Pagans make for themselves what gods they will; let them bring workmen in silver and in gold, furbishers, sculptors; let them make gods. What kind of gods? Having eyes, and seeing not; and the other things which the Psalm mentions in what follows. But we do not worship these, he says; we do not worship them, these are symbols. What then do ye worship? Something else that is worse: for the gods of the gentiles are devils. What then? Neither, say they, do we worship devils. You have certainly nothing else in your temples, nothing else inspires your prophets than a devil. But what do ye say? We worship Angels, we have Angels as gods. You know not altogether what Angels are. Angels worship the one God, and favour not men who wish to worship Angels and not God. For we find Angels of high rank forbidding men to adore them, and commanding them to adore the true God. [Revelation 19:10] But when they say Angels, suppose they mean men, since it is said, "I have said, You are Gods, and all the children of the Most Highest." Whatever man thinks to the contrary, that which was made is not like Him who made it. Except God, whatever else there is in the universe was made by God. What a difference there is between Him who made, and that which was made, who can worthily imagine? Therefore this man said, "there is none like You, O Lord: there is not one that can do as you do." But how much God is unlike them he said not, because it cannot be said. Let your Charity attend: God is ineffable: we more easily say what He is not than what He is. You think of the earth; this is not God: you think of the sea; this is not God: of all things which are in the earth, men and animals; this is not God: of all things which are in the sea, which fly through the air; this is not God: whatever shines in the sky, the stars, sun and moon; this is not God: the heaven itself; this is not God: think of the Angels, Virtues, Powers, Archangels, Thrones, Seats, Principalities; this is not God. What is He then? I could only tell you, what He is not. Askest thou what He is? What "the eye has not seen, nor the ear heard, nor has risen up into the heart of man." [1 Corinthians 2:9] ...

"For You are great, and doing wondrous things: You alone are the great God" [Psalm 86:10]. Let no man call himself great. Some were to be who would call themselves great: against these it is said, "You alone are the great God." For what great thing is ascribed to God, when it is said that He alone is the great God? Who knows not that He is the great God? But because there were to be some who would call themselves great and make God little, against these it is said, "You alone are the great God." For what You say is fulfilled, not what those say who call themselves great. What has God said by His Spirit? "All nations." What says he, whoever he is, who calls himself great? "Far from it: God is not worshipped in all nations: all nations have perished, Africa alone remains." This you say, who callest yourself great: another thing He says who alone is the great God. What says He, who alone is the great God? "All nations." I see what the only great God has said: let man be silent, who is falsely great; great only in appearance, because he disdains to be small. Who disdains to be small? He who says this. Whoever will be great among you, said the Lord, shall be your servant. [Matthew 20:26] If that man had wished to be the servant of his brethren, he would not have separated them from their mother: but when he wishes to be great, and wishes not to be small, as would be for his welfare, God, who resists the proud, and gives grace to the humble, [James 4:6] because He alone is great, fulfills all things which He predicted, and contradicts those who blaspheme. For such persons blaspheme against Christ, who say that the Church has perished from the whole world, and is left only in Africa. If you were to say to him, You will lose your villa, he would perhaps scarcely keep from laying his hand upon you: and yet he says, that Christ has lost His inheritance, redeemed by His own Blood! See now what a wrong he does, my brethren. The Scripture says, "In a wide nation is the king's honour; but in the domination of the people is the affliction of a prince." [Proverbs 14:28] This wrong then thou dost unto Christ, to say that His people is diminished to that small number. Was it for this you were born, for this you call yourself a Christian, that you may grudge Christ His glory, whose sign you say that you bear on your forehead, and hast lost out of your heart? In a wide nation is the king's honour: acknowledge your King: give Him glory, give Him a wide nation. What wide nation shall I give Him, do you say? Choose not to give Him from your own heart, and you will give aright. Whence am I to give? You will say. Lo, give from hence: "All nations that You have made shall come and worship before You, O Lord." Say this, confess this, and you have given a wide nation: for all nations in One are one: this is very oneness. For as there is a Church and Churches, and those are Churches which also are a Church, so that is a nation which was nations: formerly nations, many nations, now one nation. Why one nation? Because one faith, one hope, one charity, one expectation. Lastly, why not one nation, if one country? Our country is heavenly, our country is Jerusalem: whoever is not a citizen of it, belongs not to that nation: but whoever is a citizen of it is in that one nation of God. And this nation, from the east to the west, from the north and the sea, is extended through the four quarters of the whole world. This God says: From the east and west, from the north and the sea, give glory to God. This He foretold, this He fulfilled, who alone is great. Let him therefore who would not be little cease from saying this against Him who alone is great: for there cannot be two great, God and Donatus.

"Lead me, O Lord, in Your way, and I will walk in Your truth" [Psalm 86:11]. Your way, Your truth, Your life, is Christ. Therefore belongs the Body to Him, and the Body is of Him. I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. [John 14:6] "Lead me, O Lord, in Your way." In what way? "And I will walk in Your truth." It is one thing to lead to the way, another to guide in the way. Behold man everywhere poor, everywhere in need of help. Those who are beside the way are not Christians, or not yet Catholics: let them be guided to the way: but when they have been brought to the way and made Catholics in Christ, they must be guided by Him in the way itself, lest they fall. Now assuredly they walk in the way. "Lead me, O Lord, in Your way:" surely I am now in Your way, lead me there. "And I will walk in Your truth:" while You lead I shall not err: if Thou let me go, I shall err. Pray then that He let you not go, but lead you even to the end. How does He lead you? By always admonishing, always giving you His hand. And the arm of the Lord, to whom is it revealed? [Isaiah 53:1] For in giving His Christ He gives His hand: in giving His hand, He gives His Christ. He leads to the way, in leading to His Christ: He leads in the way, by leading in His Christ, and Christ is truth. "Lead me," therefore, "O Lord, in Your way, and I will walk in Your truth:" in Him verily who said, "I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life." [John 14:6] For Thou who leadest in the way and the truth, whither leadest Thou, but unto life? In Him then, unto Him You lead.

"I will confess unto You, O Lord my God, in my whole heart, and I will glorify Your name for ever" [Psalm 86:12]: "for great is Your mercy toward me, and You have delivered my soul from the nethermost hell" [Psalm 86:13]. Do not be angry, brethren, if I do not explain what I have said as though I were certain. For I am a man, and as much as is granted to me concerning the sacred Scriptures, so much I venture to speak: nothing of myself. Hades I have not yet seen, nor have you: and there will be perhaps another way for us, and not through Hades. These things are uncertain. But because Scripture, which cannot be gainsaid, says, "You have delivered my soul from the nether-most hell," we understand that there are as it were two hells, an upper one and a lower one: for how can there be a lower hell, unless because there is also an upper? The one would not be called lower, except by comparison with that upper part. It appears then, my brethren, that there is some heavenly abode of Angels: there is there a life of ineffable joys, there immortality and incorruption, there all things abiding according to the gift and grace of God. That part of the creation is above. If then that is above, but this earthly part, where is flesh and blood, where is corruptibleness, where is nativity and mortality, departure and succession, changeableness and inconstancy, where are fears, desires, horrors, uncertain joys, frail hope, perishable existence; I suppose that all this part cannot be compared with that heaven of which I was just now speaking; if then this part cannot be compared with that, the one is above, the other below. And whither do we go after death, unless there is a depth deeper than this depth in which we are in the flesh and in this mortal state? For "the body is dead," says the Apostle, "because of sin." [Romans 8:10] Therefore even here are the dead; that you may not wonder because it is called infernum, if it abounds with the dead. For he says not, the body is about to die: but, "the body is dead." Even now surely our body has life: and yet compared with that body which is to be like the bodies of Angels, the body of man is found to be dead, although still having life. But again, from this infernum, that is from this part of Hades, there is another lower, whither the dead go: from whence God would rescue our souls, even sending there His own Son. For it was on account of these two hells, my brethren, that the Son of God was sent, on all sides setting free. To this hell he was sent by being born, to that by dying. Therefore it is His voice in that Psalm, not according to any man's conjecture, but an Apostle explaining, when he says, "For You will not leave my soul in hell." Therefore it is here also either His voice, "You have delivered my soul from the nethermost hell:" or our voice by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself: for on this account He came even unto hell, that we might not remain in hell.

"O God, the transgressors of the law have arisen up against me" [Psalm 86:14]. Whom calls he transgressors of the law? Not the Pagans, who have not received the law: for no one transgresses that which he has not received; the Apostle says clearly, "For where there is no law, there is no prevarication." [Romans 4:15] Transgressors of the law he calls "prevaricators." Whom then do we understand, brethren? If we take this word from our Lord Himself, the transgressors of the law were the Jews....They did not keep the law, and accused Christ as if He transgressed the law. And we know what the Lord suffered. Do you think His Body suffers no such thing now? How can this be? "If they called the Master of the house Beelzebub, how much more those of his household? The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord." The body also suffers transgressors of the law, and they rise up against the Body of Christ. Who are the transgressors of the law? Do the Jews perchance dare to rise up against Christ? No: for it is not they that cause us much trouble. For they have not yet believed: they have not yet owned their salvation. Against the Body of Christ bad Christians rise up, from whom the Body of Christ daily suffers trouble. All schisms, all heresies, all within who live wickedly and engraft their own character on those who live well, and draw them over to their own side, and with evil communications corrupt good manners; these persons "transgressing the law rose up against Me." [1 Corinthians 15:33] Let every pious soul speak, let every Christian soul speak. That one which suffers not this, let it not speak. But if it is a Christian soul, it knows that it suffers evils: if it owns in itself its own sufferings, let it own herein its own voice; but if it is without suffering, let it also be without the voice; but that it may not be without suffering, let it walk along the narrow way, [Matthew 7:14] and begin to live godly in Christ: it must of necessity suffer this persecution. For "all," says the Apostle, "who will live godly in Christ, suffer persecution." [2 Timothy 3:12]

"And the synagogue of the powerful have sought after My soul." The synagogue of the powerful is the congregation of the proud. The synagogue of the powerful rose up against the Head, that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, crying and saying with one mouth, Crucify Him, crucify Him: [John 19:6] of whom it is said, "The sons of men, their teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword." They did not strike, but cried: by crying they struck, by crying they crucified Him. The will of those who cried was fulfilled, when the Lord was crucified: "And they did not place You before their eyes." How did they not place Him before them? They did not know Him God. They should have spared him as Man: what they saw, according to this they should have walked. Suppose that He was not God, He was man: was He therefore to be slain? Spare Him a man, and own Him God.

If therefore You are "true," "Look upon me, and have mercy upon me: give power unto Your servant." Because You are "true," "give power unto Your servant" [Psalm 86:16]. Let the time of patience pass away, the time of judgment come. How, "give power"? The Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment unto the Son. [John 5:22] He rising again will come even to earth Himself to judge: He will appear terrible who appeared despicable. He will show His power, who showed His patience; on the Cross was patience; in the judgment will be power. For He will appear as Man judging, but in glory: because "as you saw Him go," said the Angels, "so He will come." [Acts 1:11] His very form shall come to judgment; therefore the ungodly also shall see Him: for they shall not see the form of God. For blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. [Matthew 5:8] ...In the vision of the Father there is also the vision of the Son: and in the vision of the Son there is also the vision of the Father. Therefore He adds a consequence, and says: "Do you not know that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me?" [John 14:10] that is, both in Me seen the Father is seen, and in the Father seen the Son too is seen. The vision of the Father and the Son cannot be separated: where nature and substance is not separated, there vision cannot be separated. For that you may know that the heart ought to be made ready for that place, to see the Divinity of the Father and Son and Holy Spirit, in which though not seen we believe, and by believing cleanse the heart that there may be able to be sight: the Lord Himself says in another place, "He that has My commands and keeps them, he it is that loves Me: and he that loves Me shall be loved by My Father: and I will love him, and will manifest Myself unto him." [John 14:21] Did they not see Him, with whom He was talking? They both saw Him, and did not see Him? They saw something, they believed something: they saw Man, they believed in God. But in the Judgment they shall see the same Lord Jesus Christ as Man, together with the wicked: after the Judgment, they shall see God, apart from the wicked.

"Show me a sign for good" [Psalm 86:17]. What sign, but that of the Resurrection? The Lord says: "This wicked and provoking generation seeks after a sign; and there shall no sign be given it, but the sign of the Prophet Jonah." [Matthew 12:39] Therefore in our Head a sign has been shown already for good; each one of us also may say, "Show me a sign for good:" because at the last trumpet, at the coming of the Lord, both "the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." [1 Corinthians 15:52] This will be a sign for good. "That they who hate me may see it, and be ashamed." In the judgment they shall be ashamed unto their destruction, who will not now be ashamed unto their healing. Now therefore let them be ashamed: let them accuse their own ways, let them keep the good way: because none of us lives without being ashamed, unless he first be ashamed and live anew. Now God grants them the approach of a healthy shame, if they despise not the medicine of confession: but if they will not now be ashamed, then they shall be ashamed, when "their iniquities shall convince them to their face." How shall they be ashamed? When they shall say, "These are they whom we had sometimes in derision, and a parable of reproach. We fools counted their life madness: how are they numbered among the children of God! What has pride profited us?" Then shall they say this: let them say it now, and they say it to their health. For let each one turn humbly to God, and now say, What has my pride profited me? And hear from the Apostle, "For what glory had ye in those things of which you are now ashamed?" [Romans 6:21] You see that there is even now a wholesome shame while there is a place of penitence: but then one which will be late, useless, fruitless....

"Her foundations are upon the holy hills" [Psalm 87:1]. The Psalm had as yet said nothing of the city: it begins thus, and says, "Her foundations are upon the holy hills." Whose? There can be no doubt that foundations, especially among the hills, belong to some city. Thus filled with the Holy Spirit, and with many thoughts of love and longing for that city, as if after long internal meditation, that citizen bursts out, "Her foundations are upon the holy hills;" as if he had already said something concerning it. And how could he have said nothing on a subject, respecting which in his heart he had never been silent? For how could "her foundations" have been written, of which nothing had been said before? But, as I said, after long and silent travailing in contemplation of that city in his mind, crying to God, he bursts out into the ears of men thus: "Her foundations are upon the holy hills." And, supposing persons who heard to enquire of what city he spoke he adds, "the Lord loves the gates of Sion." Behold, then, a city whose foundations are upon the holy hills, a city called Sion, whose gates the Lord loves, as he adds, "above all the dwellings of Jacob." But what does this mean, "her foundations on the holy hills"? What are the holy hills upon which this city is built? Another citizen tells us this more explicitly, the Apostle Paul: of this was the Prophet a citizen, of this the Apostle citizen: and they spoke to exhort the other citizens. But how are these, I mean the Prophets and Apostles, citizens? Perhaps in this sense; that they are themselves the hills, upon which are the foundations of this city, whose gates the Lord loves. Let then another citizen state this clearly, that I may not seem to guess. Speaking to the Gentiles, and telling them how they were returning, and being, as it were, framed together into the holy structure, "built," he says, "upon the foundations of the Apostles and Prophets:" and because neither the Apostles nor Prophets, upon whom the foundations of that city rest, could stand by their own power, he adds, "Jesus Christ Himself being the head comer stone." [Ephesians 2:20] That the Gentiles, therefore, might not think they had no relation to Sion: for Sion was a certain city of this world, which bore a typical resemblance as a shadow to that Sion of which he presently speaks, that Heavenly Jerusalem, of which the Apostle says, "which is the mother of us all;" [Galatians 4:26] they might not be said to bear no relation to Sion, on the ground that they did not belong to the Jewish people, he addresses them thus: "Now therefore you are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God, and are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets." [Ephesians 2:19-20] You see the structure of so great a city: yet whereon does all that edifice repose, where does it rest, that it may never fall? "Jesus Christ Himself," he says, "being the head corner stone."

"The Lord loves the gates of Sion more than all the dwellings of Jacob" [Psalm 87:2]. I have made the foregoing remarks, that you may not imagine the gates are one thing, the foundations another. Why are the Apostles and Prophets foundations? Because their authority is the support of our weakness. Why are they gates? Because through them we enter the kingdom of God: for they proclaim it to us: and while we enter by their means, we enter also through Christ, Himself being the Gate. And twelve gates of Jerusalem are spoken of, [Revelation 21:12] and the one gate is Christ, and the twelve gates are Christ for Christ dwells in the twelve gates, hence was twelve the number of the Apostles. There is a deep mystery in this number of twelve: "You shall sit," says our Saviour, "on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." [Matthew 19:28] If there are twelve thrones there, there will be no room for the judgment-seat of Paul, the thirteenth Apostle, though he says that he shall judge not men only, but even Angels; which, but the fallen Angels? "Do you not know, that we shall judge Angels," [1 Corinthians 6:3] he writes. The world would answer, Why do you boast that you shall be a judge? Where will be your throne? Our Lord spoke of twelve thrones for the twelve Apostles: one, Judas, fell, and his place being supplied by Matthias, the number of twelve thrones was made up: [Acts 1:15-26] first, then, discover room for your judgment-seat; then threaten that you will judge. Let us, therefore, reflect upon the meaning of the twelve thrones. The expression is typical of a sort of universality, as the Church was destined to prevail throughout the whole world: whence this edifice is styled a building together into Christ: and because judges come from all quarters, the twelve thrones are spoken of, just as the twelve gates, from the entering in from all sides into that city. Not only therefore have those twelve, and the Apostle Paul, a claim to the twelve thrones, but, from the universal signification, all who are to sit in judgment: in the same manner as all who enter the city, enter by one or the other of the twelve gates. There are four quarters of the globe: East, West, North, and South: and they are constantly alluded to in the Scriptures. From all those four winds; our Lord declares in the Gospel that He will call his sheep "from the four winds;" [Mark 13:27] therefore from all those four winds is the Church called. And how called? On every side it is called in the Trinity: no otherwise is it called than by Baptism in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost: four then being thrice taken, twelve are found. Knock, therefore, with all your hearts at these gates: and let Christ cry within you: "Open me the gates of righteousness." For He went before us the Head: He follows Himself in His Body....

"Very excellent things are said of you, thou city of God" [Psalm 87:3]. He was, as it were, contemplating that city of Jerusalem on earth: for consider what city he alludes to, of which certain very excellent things are spoken. Now the earthly city has been destroyed: after suffering the enemy's rage, it fell to the earth; it is no longer what it was: it exhibited the emblem, and the shadow has passed away. Whence then are "very excellent things spoken of you, thou city of God"? Listen whence: "I will think upon Rahab and Babylon, with them that know Me" [Psalm 87:4]. In that city, the Prophet, in the person of God, says, "I will think upon Rahab and Babylon." Rahab belongs not to the Jewish people; Babylon belongs not to the Jewish people; as is clear from the next verse: "For the Philistines also, and Tyre, with the Ethiopians, were there." Deservedly then, "very excellent things are spoken of you, thou city of God:" for not only is the Jewish nation, born of the flesh of Abraham, included therein, but all nations also, some of which are named that all may be understood. "I will think," he says, "upon Rahab:" who is that harlot? That harlot in Jericho, who received the spies and conducted them out of the city by a different road: who trusted beforehand in the promise, who feared God, who was told to hang out of the window a line of scarlet thread, that is, to bear upon her forehead the sign of the blood of Christ. She was saved there, and thus represented the Church of the Gentiles: whence our Lord said to the haughty Pharisees, "Verily I say unto you, that the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you." [Matthew 21:31] They go before, because they do violence: they push their way by faith, and to faith a way is made, nor can any resist, since they who are violent take it by force. For it is written, "The kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force." [Matthew 11:12] Such was the conduct of the robber, more courageous on the cross than in the place of ambush. "I will think upon Rahab and Babylon." By Babylon is meant the city of this world: as there is one holy city, Jerusalem; one unholy, Babylon: all the unholy belong to Babylon, even as all the holy to Jerusalem. But he slides from Babylon to Jerusalem. How, but by Him who justifies the ungodly: Jerusalem is the city of the saints; Babylon of the wicked: but He comes who justifies the ungodly: since it is said, "I will think" not only "upon Rahab," but "upon Babylon," but with whom? "with them that know Me."...

Listen now to a deep mystery. Rahab is there through Him, through whom also is Babylon, now no longer Babylon, but beginning to be Jerusalem. The daughter is divided against her mother, and will be among the members of that queen to whom is said, "Forget your own people, and your father's house, so shall the king have pleasure in your beauty." For how could Babylon aspire to Jerusalem? How could Rahab reach those foundations? How could the Philistines, or Tyre, or the people of the Ethiopians? Listen to this verse, "Sion, my mother, a man shall say." There is then a man who says this: through whom all those I have mentioned make their approach. Who is this man? It tells if we hear, if we understand. It follows, as if a question had been raised, through whose aid Rahab, Babylon, the Philistines, Tyre, and the Morians, gained an entrance. Behold, through whom they come; "Sion, my mother, a man shall say; and a man was born in her, and Himself the Most High has founded her" [Psalm 87:5]. What, my brethren, can be clearer? Truly, because "very excellent things are spoken of you, thou city of God." Lo, "Sion, O mother, a man shall say." What man? "He who was born in her." It is then the man who was born in her, and He Himself has founded her. Yet how can He be born in the city which He Himself founded? It had already been founded, that therein He might be born. Understand it thus, if you can. "Mother Sion, he shall say;" but it is "a man" that "shall say, Mother Sion; yea, a man was born in her:" and yet "he has founded her" (not a man, but), "the Most High." As He created a mother of whom He would be born, so He founded a city in which He would be born. What hope is ours, brethren! On our behalf the Most High, who founded the city, addresses that city as a mother: and "He was born in her, and the Most High has founded her."

As though it were said, How do ye know this? All of us have sung these Psalms: and Christ, Man for our sake, God before us, sings within us all. But is this much to say, "before us," of Him who was before heaven and earth and time? He then, born for our sakes a man, in that city, also founded her when He was the Most High. Yet how are we assured of this? "The Lord shall rehearse it when He writes up the people" [Psalm 87:6], as the following verse has it. "The Lord shall declare, when He writes up the people, and their princes." What princes? "Those who were born in her;" those princes who, born within her walls, became therein princes: for before they could become princes in her, God chose the despised things of the world to confound the strong. Was the fisherman, the publican, a prince? They were indeed princes: but because they became such in her. Princes of what kind were they? Princes come from Babylon, believing monarchs of this world, came to the city of Rome, as to the head of Babylon: they went not to the temple of the Emperor, but to the tomb of the Fisherman. Whence indeed did they rank as princes? "God chose the weak things of the world to confound the strong, and the foolish things He has chosen, and things which are not as though they were, that things which are may be brought to nought." [1 Corinthians 1:26-27] This He does who "from the ground raises the helpless, and from the dunghill exalts the poor." For what purpose? "That He may set him with the princes, even with the princes of His people." This is a mighty deed, a deep source of pleasure and exultation. Orators came later into that city, but they could never have done so, had not fishermen preceded them. These things are glorious indeed, but where could they take place, but in that city of God, of whom very excellent things are spoken?

So thus, after drawing together and mingling every source of joyous exultation, how does he conclude? "The dwelling as of all that shall be made joyous is in You" [Psalm 87:7]. As if all made joyous, all rejoicing, shall dwell in that city. Amid our journeyings here we suffer bruises: our last home shall be the home of joy alone. Toil and groans shall perish: prayers pass away, hymns of praise succeed. There shall be the dwelling of the happy; no longer shall there be the groans of those that long, but the gladness of those who enjoy. For He will be present for whom we sigh: we shall be like Him, as we shall see Him as He is: [1 John 3:2] there it will be our whole task to praise and enjoy the presence of God: and what beyond shall we ask for, when He alone satisfies us, by whom all things were made? We shall dwell and be dwelt in; and shall be subject to Him, that God may be all in all. [1 Corinthians 15:28] "Blessed," then, "are they that dwell in Your house." How blessed? Blessed in their gold, and silver, their numerous slaves, and multiplied offspring? "Blessed are they that dwell in Your house: for ever and ever they will be praising You." Blessed in that sole labour which is rest! Let this then be the one and only object of our desire, my brethren, when we shall have reached this pass. Let, us prepare ourselves to rejoice in God: to praise Him. The good works which conduct us there, will not be needed there. I described, as far as I could, only yesterday, our condition there: works of charity there will be none, where there will be no misery: you shall not find one in want, one naked, no one will meet you tormented with thirst, there will be no stranger, no sick to visit, no dead to bury, no disputants to set at peace. What then will you find to do? Shall we plant new vines, plough, traffic, make voyages, to support the necessities of the body? Deep quiet shall be there; all toilsome work, that necessity demands, will cease: the necessity being dead, its works will perish too. What then will be our state? As far as possible, the tongue of a man thus told us. "As it were, the dwelling of all who shall be made perfect is in You." Why does he say, "as it were"? Because there shall be such joy there as we know not here. Many pleasures do I behold here, and many rejoice in this world, some in one thing, others in another; but there is nothing to compare with that delight, but it shall be "as it were" being made joyful. For if I say joyfulness, men at once think of such joyfulness as men use to have in wine, in feasting, in avarice, and in the world's distinctions. For men are elated by these things, and mad with a kind of joy: but "there is no joy, says the Lord, unto the wicked." [Isaiah 48:22] There is a sort of joyfulness which the ear of man has not heard, nor his eye seen, nor has it entered into his heart to conceive. [1 Corinthians 2:9] "As it were, the dwelling of all who shall be made joyful is in You." Let us prepare for other delights: for a kind of shadow is what we find here, not the reality: that we may not expect to enjoy such things there as here we delight in: otherwise our self-denial will be avarice. Some persons, when invited to a rich banquet, where there are many and costly dishes yet to come on, abstain from breaking their fast: if you ask the reason, they tell you that they are fasting: which is indeed a great work, a Christian work. Yet be not hasty in praising them: examine their motives: it is their belly, not religion, that they are consulting. That their appetite may not be palled by ordinary dishes, they abstain till more delicate food is set before them. This fast then is for the gullet's sake. Fasting is undoubtedly important: it fights against the belly and the palate; but sometimes it fights for them. Thus, my brethren, if you imagine that we shall find any such pleasures in that country to which the heavenly trumpet urges us on, and on that account abstain from present enjoyments, that you may receive the like more plentifully there, you imitate those I have described, who fast only for greater feasting, and abstain only for greater indulgence. Do not ye like this: prepare yourselves for a certain ineffable delight: cleanse your hearts from all earthly and secular affections. We shall see something, the sight of which will make us blessed: and that alone will suffice for us. What then? Shall we not eat? Yes: we shall eat: but that shall be our food, which will ever refresh, and never fail. "In You is the dwelling of all who shall be, as it were, made joyful." He has already told us how we shall be made joyful. "Blessed are they that dwell in your house: for ever and ever they will be praising You." Let us praise the Lord as far as we are able, but with mingled lamentations: for while we praise we long for Him, and as yet have Him not. When we have, all our sorrows will be taken from us, and nothing will remain but praise, unmixed and everlasting. Now let us pray.