But wise men, philosophers, and private judges, take in the accounts of accidental moments and incidences to the action," said Cicero o. But, 3. God's judgment is otherwise yet; for he alone can tell the affection, and all that which had secret influence into the event: and therefore he can judge by what is secret, by the purpose and heart, which is indeed the only way of doing exact justice. From hence it follows, that what ought not to dissolve the friendship of man, may yet justly dissolve our friendship with God, for he takes other measures than men may or can. 16. IV. Because offences against God may be avoided; but it is not so in our intercourses with men; for God hath told us plainly what is our duty, what he expects, what will please, and what will displease him: but men are often governed by chance; and that which pleases them to-day, shall provoke them to-morrow; and the next day you shall be their enemy, for that for which, three days ago, they paid you thanks. 17. V. If men exact little things, it becomes their own case; for we sin against our brother and need his pardon; and therefore Hanc veniam petimusque damusque vicissim; We give and ask pardon; Det ille veniam facilè, cui veniâ est opus : But we never found iniquity in God, or injustice in the Most High, and therefore he that is innocent may throw a stone at the criminal. 18. VI. God hath in the smallest instance left us without excuse; for he hath often warned us of small offences. He hath told us their danger. He that despiseth little things, shall perish by little and little.He hath told us, they asperse us with a mighty guilt; for he that offends in one commandment, is guilty of all.' He hath told us, that we are not certainly excused, though our conscience do not manifestly accuse us; for so St. Paul; "I am not hereby justified, for God is greater than my conscience." He hath threatened loss of heaven to him that is guilty of the breach of one, xav axiorwv, "though of the least of these commandments" (TOUTWV, these' which Christ hath reckoned in his sermon, where fetters are laid upon thoughts and words), o Offic. lib. 3. "shall be called the least in the kingdom," that is, he shall be quite shut out for minimus' here is as much as nullus;' 'minimus vocabitur,' that is minimi æstimabitur,' he shall not be esteemed at all' in the accounts of doomsday mercy, ἐν τῇ μετὰ τὴν ἀνάστασιν ἀποκαταστάσει, ἐν ᾗ γίνεται κολαζο μένων τε καὶ δοξαζομένων ἡ διαίρεσις, in the accounts of the doomsday book, "where there shall be a discerning of them who shall be glorified, from them that are to be punished "." And this, which is one of the severest periods of Holy Scripture, can by no arts be turned aside from concluding fully in this question. Bellarmine says it means only to condemn those, who by false doctrines corrupt these severe precepts, and teach men as the Pharisees did of old; not all those who break them themselves, if they teach others to keep them. "He that breaks one of these, and shall teach men so to do;" so are the words of Christ. But it is a known thing that xxi is oftentimes used for; "He that breaks one of these, or shall teach others." The words were spoken to the persons of the apostles, who were to teach these doctrines xar' iniraow exactly as Christ preached them;' but without peradventure they were also intended to all the church and the following words, and the whole analogy of the adjoined discourse, make it clear to every observing reader; and the words plainly say this, 'He that shall break one of these least commandments,' and 'He that shall teach men so, each of them shall be called the least in the kingdom.' -But, 2. Why did our blessed Lord so severely threaten those that should teach others to break any of these severe commandments by false interpretation, but only because it was so necessary for all to keep them in the true sense, and so fearful a thing to any to break them? 3. Those who preach severe doctrines to others, and touch them not with one of their fingers, are guilty of that which Christ reproved in the Pharisees; and themselves shall be castaways, while they preach to others: so that the breaking it by disobedience is damnable, as well as the breaking it by false interpretation: Odi homines ignavâ operâ, philosophâ sententiâ, Qui sibi semitam non sapiunt, alteri monstrant viam ". Indeed it is intolerable to teach men to be vicious; but it is 4 De amiss. grat. cap. 12. sect. Restat ultim. a hateful baseness to shew others that way which ourselves refuse to walk in. Whatever therefore may not be allowed to be taught, may not also be done; for the people are not to be taught evil, because they must not do evil; but may the teachers do what they may not teach, and what the people may not do, or is not the same punishment to them both? 4. Now upon these grounds, this very gloss which Bellarmine gives, being a false interpretation of these words of Christ (which are a summary of his whole sermon, and as it were the sanction and establishment of the former and following periods into laws), must needs be of infinite danger to the inventor and followers of it: for this gloss gives leave to men to break the least of these commandments, " some way or other (if they do not teach others so to do)" without being affrighted with the fears of hell; but in the meanwhile this gloss teaches, or gives leave to others to break them, but allows no false interpretation of them but its own. 5. But then it is worse with them who teach others so to do,' and command all men to teach so; and if the Roman doctors who teach that some breach of these commandments is not of its own nature, and by the divine threatenings, exclusive of the transgressors from the kingdom of God,-be not in some sense a teaching men so to do, then nothing is for when God said to Adam, "That day thou eatest of the forbidden fruit, thou shalt die;" the tempter said, "Nay, but ye shall not die ;" and so was author to Adam of committing his sin. So when our blessed Saviour hath told us, that to break one of these least commandments is exclusive of us from heaven, they that say, that not every solution or breaking of them is exclusive from heaven (which are the words of Bellarmine, and the doctrine of the Roman church), must even by the consequence of this very gloss of his, fall under the danger of Sidovres, of the false teachers, or the breakers of them by false interpretation. However, fearful is the malediction even to the breakers of the least: ἐλάχιστος κληθήσεται, that is, ἐν τῇ ἀναστάσει ἔσχατος καὶ ἀπεῤῥιμμένος εἰς γεένναν (that I may use the words of Theophylact), "He shall be last in the resurrection, and shall be thrown into hell :" for that is the meaning of "least in the kingdom of heaven :" "et fortasse ideo non erit in regno cœlorum, ubi nisi magni esse non possunt," said St. Austin; least' is none at all;'"for into heaven none can enter, but they which are great in God's account." 19. VII. Lastly, God hath given us the perpetual assistances of his Spirit, the presence of his grace, the ministry of his word, the fear of judgments, the endearment of his mercies, the admonition of friends, the severity of preachers, the aid of books, the apprehension of death, the sense of our daily dangers, our continual necessities, and the recollection of our prayers, and above all, he hath promised heaven to the obedient, which is a state of blessings so great and infinite, as upon the account of them, it is infinitely reasonable, and just, if he shall exact of us every sin, that is, every thing which we can avoid. 20. Upon this account it is, that although wise and prudent men do not despise the continual endearments of an old friend, yet, in many cases, God may and doth; and from the rules and proper measures of human friendship, to argue up to a presumption of God's easiness in not exacting our duty, is a fallacious proceeding, but it will deceive nobody but ourselves. 21. I. Every sin is directly against God's law; and therefore is damnable and deadly in the accounts of the divine justice, one as well, though not so grievously, as another. For though sins be differenced by greater and less, yet their proportion to punishment is not differenced by temporal and eternal, but by greater and less in that kind which God hath threatened. So Origen ". "Unusquisque, pro qualitate et quantitate peccati, diversam mulctæ sententiam expendit. Si parum est quod peccas, ferieris damno minuti, ut Lucas scripsit,-ut verò Matthæus, quadrantis. Veruntamen necesse est hoc ipsum, quod exstitisti debitor, solvere. Non enim inde exibis, nisi et minima quæque persolveris:" Every one, according to the quantity and quality of his sin, must pay his fine;" but till he hath paid he shall not be loosed from those fearful prisons; that is, he shall never be loosed, if he agree not before he comes thither. The smallest offence is a sin, and therefore it is avouía, transgression of the law,' a violation of that band by which our obedience unites us unto God. And this the Holy Scripture signifies unto us in various expressions. For though the several words are variously used in sacred and profane writers, yet all of them signify that even the smallest sin is a preva 66 s Homil. 35. 12, Lucam. . rication of the holy laws ; τῆς ἐντολῆς παράβασις, so Damascent calls sin; which we render well by transgression:' and even those words which in distinction signify a small offence, yet they also signify the same with the greater words, to shew that they all have the same formality, and do the same displeasure, or at least that by the difference of the words, no difference of their natures can be regularly observed. Sins against God only are by Phavorinus called ἁμαρτίαι. Εξή μαρτε εἰς Θεόν, ἐξύβρισεν εἰς ἀνθρώπους ; and the same word is also used for sin against our neighbours ; ἐὰν ἁμαρτησῃ εἰς è adeλpós, if thy brother sin against thee,' that is, do thee injury; and this is properly adixía injustice;' but Demosthenes" distinguishes injustice from sin, adíxía from ȧuapria, by voluntary and involuntary: ἀδικεῖ τις ἑκὼν· ἐξήμαρτε τις ἄκων. "He that does wrong willingly, is unjust; he that does it unwillingly, is a sinner.' 22. The same indistinction is observable in the other words of Scripture; aрάптшμя is by St. Jerome used for the beginnings of sin; "Cum cogitatio tacita subrepit, et ex aliquâ parte conniventibus nobis, nec dum tamen nos impulit ad ruinam;" when a sudden thought invades us without our advertency and observation, and hath not brought forth death as yet; and yet that death is appendant to whatsoever it be that can be signified by napárтwua, we may observe, because the sin of Adam * that called death upon all the world, is called пαρánτwμa; and of the Ephesian Gentiles St. Paul said they had been dead παραπτώμασι καὶ ἁμαρτίαις, “ in trespasses and sins:" and therefore it cannot hence be inferred that such little obliquities, or beginnings of greater sins, are only πapà tǹv vóμov, besides the law,' not against it, for it is (at least the word hinders not but it may be) of the same kind of malignity as was the sin of Adam: and therefore St. Austin renders the word пαράятwμa delictum' or ‘offence,' and so do our Bibles. And the same also is the case of aμapTía, which is attributed even to concupiscence or the beginnings of mischief, by St. Paul and by St. Jerome': but the same is used for the consummation of concupiscence in the matter of uncleanness by St. James; lust when it hath con a t Пagálaris. lib. 4. de orthod. fide, cap. 23. u Orat. περὶ στεφάνου. y Eph. ii. 1. 7 Lib. 3. quæst. super Levit. q. 20. a Rom. vii. 5. b In cap. 2. Ephes. Jam. i. 17. Vide Com. DD. in Titum verb. ȧriyxλntos. |