Sermon LXII — Historical footnotes

8. Let us away then with vain and evil excuses, and come we to the supper by which we may be made fat within. Let not the puffing up of pride keep us back, let it not lift us up, nor unlawful curiosity scare us, and turn us away from God; let not the pleasure of the flesh hinder us from the pleasure of the heart. Let us come, and be filled. And who came but the beggars, the “maimed,” the “halt,” the “blind”? But there came not thither the rich, and the whole, who walked, as they thought, well, and saw acutely; who had great confidence in themselves, and were therefore in the more desperate case, in proportion as they were more proud. Let the beggars come, for He inviteth them, “who, though He was rich, for our sakes became poor, that we beggars through His poverty might be enriched.” Let the maimed come, “for they that are whole need not a physician, but they that are in evil case.” Let the halt come who may say to Him, “Set in order my steps in Thy paths.” Let the blind come who may say, “Enlighten mine eyes, that I may never sleep in death.” Such as these came at the hour, when those who had been first invited, had been rejected for their own excuses: they came at the hour, they entered in from the streets and lanes of the city. And the servant “who had been sent,” brought answer, “Lord, it is done as Thou hast commanded, and yet there is room.” “Go out,” saith He, “into the highways and hedges, and compel those whom thou shalt find to come in.” Whom thou shalt find wait not till they choose to come, compel them to come in. I have prepared a great supper, a great house, I cannot suffer any place to be vacant in it. The Gentiles came from the streets and lanes: let the heretics come from the hedges, here they shall find peace. For those who make hedges, their object is to make divisions. Let them be drawn away from the hedges, let them be plucked up from among the thorns. They have stuck fast in the hedges, they are unwilling to be compelled. Let us come in, they say, of our own good will. This is not the Lord’s order, “Compel them,” saith he, “to come in.” Let compulsion be found outside, the will arise within.

6. “The third said, I have married a wife.” This is the pleasure of the flesh, which is a hindrance to many: and I would that it were so only without, and not within! There are men who say, “There is no happiness for a man, if he have not the pleasures of the flesh.” These are they whom the Apostle censures, saying, “‘Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we shall die.’ Who hath risen to this life from the other? Who hath ever told us what goes on there? We take away with us, what in the time present makes our happiness.” He that speaks thus, “has married a wife,” attaches himself to the flesh, places his delight in the pleasures of the flesh, excuses himself from the supper; let him look well to it that he die not by an inward famine. Attend to John, the holy Apostle and Evangelist; “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.” O ye who come to the Supper of the Lord, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.” He did not say, “Have not;” but, “Love not.” Thou hast had, possessed, loved. The love of earthly things, is the bird-lime of the spirit’s wings. Lo, thou hast desired, thou hast stuck fast. “Who will give thee wings as of a dove?” When wilt thou fly, whither thou mayest in deed, seeing thou hast perversely wished to rest here, where thou hast to thy hurt stuck fast? “Love not the world,” is the divine trumpet. By the voice of this trumpet unceasingly is it proclaimed to the compass of the earth, and to the whole world, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. Whosoever loveth the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, is the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the ambition of life.” He begins at the last with which the Gospel ends. He begins at that, at which the Gospel made an end. “The lust of the flesh, I have married a wife. The lust of the eyes, I have bought five pairs of oxen. The ambition of life, I have bought a farm.”

Delivered in the basilica Restituta.