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| On Jealousy and Envy.
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Treatise
X.3641
| 3641
[This is numbered xii. in Oxford trans., and is assigned to
a.d. 256.] |
On Jealousy and Envy.
Argument.3642
—After Pointing Out that Jealousy or Envy is a Sin All the
More Heinous in Proportion as Its Wickedness is Hidden, and that Its
Origin is to Be Traced to the Devil, He Gives Illustrations of Envy
from the Old Testament, and Gathers, by Reference to Special Vices,
that Envy is the Root of All Wickedness. Therefore with Reason
Was Fraternal Hatred Forbidden Not in One Place Only, But by Christ and
His Apostles. Finally, Exhorting to the Love of One’s
Enemies by God’s Example, He Dissuades from the Sin of Envy, by
Urging the Rewards Set Before the Indulgence of Love.
1. To be jealous of what you see to be good,
and to be envious of those who are better than yourself, seems, beloved
brethren, in the eyes of some people to be a slight and petty wrong;
and, being thought trifling and of small account, it is not feared; not
being feared, it is contemned; being contemned, it is not easily
shunned: and it thus becomes a dark and hidden mischief, which,
as it is not perceived so as to be guarded against by the prudent,
secretly distresses incautious minds. But, moreover, the Lord
bade us be prudent, and charged us to watch with careful solicitude,
lest the adversary, who is always on the watch and always lying in
wait, should creep stealthily into our breast, and blow up a flame from
the sparks, magnifying small things into the greatest; and so, while
soothing the unguarded and careless with a milder air and a softer
breeze, should stir up storms and whirlwinds, and bring about the
destruction of faith and the shipwreck of salvation and of life.
Therefore, beloved brethren, we must be on our guard, and strive with
all our powers to repel, with solicitous and full watchfulness, the
enemy, raging and aiming his darts against every part of our body in
which we can be stricken and wounded, in accordance with what the
Apostle Peter, in his epistle, forewarns and teaches, saying, “Be
sober, and watch; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion,
goeth about seeking any one to devour.”3643
2. He goeth about every one of us; and even
as an enemy besieging those who are shut up (in a city), he examines
the walls, and tries whether there is any part of the walls3644
| 3644
According to some, “of our members.” | less firm and
less trustworthy, by entrance through which he may penetrate to the
inside. He presents to the eyes seductive forms and easy
pleasures, that he may destroy chastity by the sight. He tempts
the ears with harmonious music, that by the hearing of sweet sounds he
may relax and enervate Christian vigour.3645
| 3645
[The nude in art, the music of the opera, and sensual luxury of all
sorts, are here condemned. And compare Clem. Alex., vol. ii. p.
249, note 11, this series.] | He provokes the tongue by
reproaches; he instigates the hand by exasperating wrongs to the
wrecklessness of murder; to make the cheat, he presents dishonest
gains; to take captive the soul by money, he heaps together mischievous
hoards; he promises earthly honours, that he may deprive of heavenly
ones; he makes a show of false things, that he may steal away the true;
and when he cannot hiddenly deceive, he threatens plainly and openly,
holding forth the fear of turbulent persecution to vanquish God’s
servants—always restless, and always hostile, crafty in peace,
and fierce in persecution.
3. Wherefore, beloved brethren, against all the
devil’s deceiving snares or open threatenings, the mind ought to
stand arrayed and armed, ever
as ready to repel as the foe is ever ready to attack. And since
those darts of his which creep on us in concealment are more frequent,
and his more hidden and secret hurling of them is the more severely and
frequently effectual to our wounding, in proportion as it is the less
perceived, let us also be watchful to understand and repel these, among
which is the evil of jealousy and envy. And if any one closely
look into this, he will find that nothing should be more guarded
against by the Christian, nothing more carefully watched, than being
taken captive by envy and malice, that none, entangled in the blind
snares of a deceitful enemy, in that the brother is turned by envy to
hatred of his brother, should himself be unwittingly destroyed by his
own sword. That we may be able more fully to collect and more
plainly to perceive this, let us recur to its fount and origin.
Let us consider whence arises jealousy, and when and how it
begins. For so mischievous an evil will be more easily shunned by
us, if both the source and the magnitude of that same evil be
known.3646
| 3646
[Chrysostom, vol. iv. p. 473, ed. Migne. This close practical
preaching is a lesson to the younger clergy of our days.] |
4. From this source, even at the very
beginnings of the world, the devil was the first who both perished
(himself) and destroyed (others). He who3647
| 3647
Some add “long ago.” | was sustained in angelic majesty, he
who was accepted and beloved of God, when he beheld man made in the
image of God, broke forth into jealousy with malevolent envy—not
hurling down another by the instinct of his jealousy before he himself
was first hurled down by jealousy, captive before he takes captive,
ruined before he ruins others. While, at the instigation of
jealousy, he robs man of the grace of immortality conferred, he himself
has lost that which he had previously been. How great an evil is
that, beloved brethren, whereby an angel fell, whereby that lofty and
illustrious grandeur could be defrauded and overthrown, whereby he who
deceived was himself deceived! Thenceforth envy rages on the
earth, in that he who is about to perish by jealousy obeys the author
of his ruin, imitating the devil in his jealousy; as it is written,
“But through envy of the devil death entered into the
world.”3648
| 3648
Wisd. ii. 24. [So Lactantius,
Institutes, book ii. cap. ix. in vol. vii., this
series.] |
Therefore they who are on his side imitate him.3649
| 3649
[Chrysostom, vol. iv. p. 473, ed. Migne. This close practical
preaching is a lesson to the younger clergy of our days.] |
5. Hence, in fine, began the primal hatreds
of the new brotherhood, hence the abominable fratricides, in that the
unrighteous Cain is jealous of the righteous Abel, in that the wicked
persecutes the good with envy and jealousy. So far prevailed the
rage of envy to the consummation of that deed of wickedness, that
neither the love of his brother, nor the immensity of the crime, nor
the fear of God, nor the penalty of the sin, was considered.3650
| 3650
[Chrysostom, ut. supra.] | He was
unrighteously stricken who had been the first to show righteousness; he
endured hatred who had not known how to hate; he was impiously slain,
who, dying, did not resist. And that Esau was hostile to his
brother Jacob, arose from jealousy also. For because the latter
had received his father’s blessing, the former was inflamed to a
persecuting hatred by the brands of jealousy. And that Joseph was
sold by his brethren, the reason of their selling him proceeded from
envy. When in simplicity, and as a brother to brethren, he set
forth to them the prosperity which had been shown to him in visions,
their malevolent disposition broke forth into envy. Moreover,
that Saul the king hated David, so as to seek by often repeated
persecutions to kill him—innocent, merciful, gentle, patient in
meekness—what else was the provocation save the spur of
jealousy? Because, when Goliath was slain, and by the aid and
condescension of God so great an enemy was routed, the wondering people
burst forth with the suffrage of acclamation into praises of David,
Saul through jealousy conceived the rage of enmity and
persecution. And, not to go to the length of numbering each one,
let us observe the destruction of a people that perished once for
all.3651
| 3651
Variously “semel” or “simul.” | Did not the
Jews perish for this reason, that they chose rather to envy
Christ3652
than to believe
Him? Disparaging those great works which He did, they were
deceived by blinding jealousy, and could not open the eyes of their
heart to the knowledge of divine things.
6. Considering which things, beloved
brethren, let us with vigilance and courage fortify our hearts
dedicated to God against such a destructiveness of evil. Let the
death of others avail for our safety; let the punishment of the unwise
confer health upon the prudent. Moreover, there is no ground for
any one to suppose that evil of that kind is confined in one form, or
restrained within brief limits in a narrow boundary. The mischief
of jealousy, manifold and fruitful, extends widely. It is the
root of all evils, the fountain of disasters, the nursery of crimes,
the material of transgressions. Thence arises hatred, thence
proceeds animosity. Jealousy inflames avarice, in that one cannot
be content with what is his own, while he sees another more
wealthy. Jealousy stirs up ambition, when one sees another more
exalted in honours.3653
| 3653
Or, with some editors, “more increased in
honours.” [To be purged from a Christian’s heart like
a leprosy from the body. See Jeremy Taylor, sermon xix.,
Apples of Sodom. Quotation from Ælian, vol. i. p.
717.] | When jealousy darkens our
perceptions, and reduces the secret agencies of the mind under its command, the fear of God
is despised, the teaching of Christ is neglected, the day of judgment
is not anticipated. Pride inflates, cruelty embitters,
faithlessness prevaricates, impatience agitates, discord rages, anger
grows hot; nor can he who has become the subject of a foreign authority
any longer restrain or govern himself. By this the bond of the
Lord’s peace is broken; by this is violated brotherly charity; by
this truth is adulterated, unity is divided; men plunge into heresies
and schisms when priests are disparaged, when bishops are envied, when
a man complains that he himself was not rather ordained, or disdains to
suffer that another should be put over him.3654
| 3654
[The sin of Novatian and Arius. See p. 489, note 3,
supra.] | Hence the man who is haughty
through jealousy, and perverse through envy, kicks, hence he revolts,
in anger and malice the opponent, not of the man, but of the
honour.
7. But what a gnawing worm of the soul is
it, what a plague-spot of our thoughts, what a rust of the heart, to be
jealous of another, either in respect of his virtue or of his
happiness; that is, to hate in him either his own deservings or the
divine benefits—to turn the advantages of others into one’s
own mischief—to be tormented by the prosperity of illustrious
men—to make other people’s glory one’s own penalty,
and, as it were, to apply a sort of executioner to one’s own
breast, to bring the tormentors to one’s own thoughts and
feelings, that they may tear us with intestine pangs, and may smite the
secret recesses of the heart with the hoof of malevolence. To
such, no food is joyous, no drink can be cheerful. They are ever
sighing, and groaning, and grieving; and since envy is never put off by
the envious, the possessed heart is rent without intermission day and
night. Other ills have their limit; and whatever wrong is done,
is bounded by the completion of the crime. In the adulterer the
offence ceases when the violation is perpetrated; in the case of the
robber, the crime is at rest when the homicide is committed; and the
possession of the booty puts an end to the rapacity of the thief; and
the completed deception places a limit to the wrong of the cheat.
Jealousy has no limit; it is an evil continually enduring, and a sin
without end. In proportion as he who is envied has the advantage
of a greater success, in that proportion the envious man burns with the
fires of jealousy to an increased heat.3655
| 3655
[Another specimen of our author’s pithy condensations of thought
and extraordinary eloquence.] |
8. Hence the threatening countenance, the
lowering aspect, pallor in the face, trembling on the lips, gnashing of
the teeth, mad words, unbridled revilings, a hand prompt for the
violence of slaughter; even if for the time deprived of a sword, yet
armed with the hatred of an infuriate mind. And accordingly the
Holy Spirit says in the Psalms: “Be not jealous against him
who walketh prosperously in his way.”3656
And again: “The wicked
shall observe the righteous, and shall gnash upon him with his
teeth. But God shall laugh at him; for He seeth that his day is
coming.”3657
The
blessed Apostle Paul designates and points out these when he says,
“The poison of asps is under their lips, and their mouth is full
of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood,
destruction and misery are in their ways, who have not known the way of
peace; neither is the fear of God before their eyes.”3658
9. The mischief is much more trifling, and
the danger less, when the limbs are wounded with a sword. The
cure is easy where the wound is manifest; and when the medicament is
applied, the sore that3659
| 3659
Erasmus and others give this reading. Baluzius, Routh, and many
codices, omit “vulnus,” and thus read, “what is
seen.” | is seen is quickly brought to
health. The wounds of jealousy are hidden and secret; nor do they
admit the remedy of a healing cure, since they have shut themselves in
blind suffering within the lurking-places of the conscience.
Whoever you are that are envious and malignant, observe how crafty,
mischievous, and hateful you are to those whom you hate. Yet you
are the enemy of no one’s well-being more than your own.
Whoever he is whom you persecute with jealousy, can evade and escape
you. You cannot escape yourself.3660
| 3660
[“It punishes the delinquent in the very act.”
Jer. Taylor, ut supra, p. 492, also Anselm, Opp., i. 682,
ed. Migne.] | Wherever you may be, your
adversary is with you; your enemy is always in your own breast; your
mischief is shut up within; you are tied and bound with the links of
chains from which you cannot extricate yourself; you are captive under
the tyranny of jealousy; nor will any consolations help you. It
is a persistent evil to persecute a man who belongs to the grace of
God. It is a calamity without remedy to hate the
happy.
10. And therefore, beloved brethren, the
Lord, taking thought for this risk, that none should fall into the
snare of death through jealousy of his brother, when His disciples
asked Him which among them should be the greatest, said, “Who
soever shall be least among you all, the same shall be
great.”3661
He cut off
all envy by His reply.3662
| 3662
[And all ground for a supremacy among brethren was here
absolutely ejected from the Christian system. The last of the
canonical primates of Rome named himself Servus Servorum
Dei, to rebuke those who would make him “Universal
Bishop.”] | He plucked out and tore away every
cause and matter of gnawing envy. A disciple of Christ must not
be jealous, must not be envious. With us there can be no contest
for exaltation; from humility we grow to the highest
attainments; we have learnt in what way we may be pleasing. And
finally, the Apostle Paul, instructing and warning, that we who,
illuminated by the light of Christ, have escaped from the darkness of
the conversation of night, should walk in the deeds and works of light,
writes and says, “The night has passed over, and the day is
approaching: let us therefore cast away the works of darkness,
and let us put upon us the armour of light. Let us walk honestly,
as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in lusts and
wantonness, not in strifes and jealousy.”3663
If the darkness has departed from
your breast, if the night is scattered therefrom, if the gloom is
chased away, if the brightness of day has illuminated your senses, if
you have begun to be a man of light, do those things which are
Christ’s, because Christ is the Light and the Day.
11. Why do you rush into the darkness of
jealousy? why do you enfold yourself in the cloud of malice? why do you
quench all the light of peace and charity in the blindness of envy? why
do you return to the devil, whom you had renounced? why do you stand
like Cain? For that he who is jealous of his brother, and has him
in hatred, is bound by the guilt of homicide, the Apostle John declares
in his epistle, saying, “Whosoever hateth his brother is a
murderer; and ye know that no murderer hath life abiding in
him.”3664
And
again: “He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his
brother, is in darkness even until now, and walketh in darkness, and
knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his
eyes.”3665
Whosoever hates, says he, his brother, walketh in darkness, and knoweth
not whither he goeth. For he goeth unconsciously to Gehenna, in
ignorance and blindness; he is hurrying into punishment, departing,
that is, from the light of Christ, who warns and says, “I am the
light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in
darkness, but shall have the light of life.”3666
But he follows Christ who stands
in His precepts, who walks in the way of His teaching, who follows His
footsteps and His ways, who imitates that which Christ both did and
taught; in accordance with what Peter also exhorts and warns, saying,
“Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example that ye should
follow His steps.”3667
12. We ought to remember by what name Christ
calls His people, by what title He names His flock. He calls them
sheep, that their Christian innocence may be like that of sheep; He
calls them lambs, that their simplicity of mind may imitate the simple
nature of lambs. Why does the wolf lurk under the garb of sheep?
why does he who falsely asserts himself to be a Christian, dishonour
the flock of Christ? To put on the name of Christ, and not to go
in the way of Christ, what else is it but a mockery of the divine name,
but a desertion of the way of salvation; since He Himself teaches and
says that he shall come unto life who keeps His commandments, and that
he is wise who hears and does His words; that he, moreover, is called
the greatest doctor in the kingdom of heaven who thus does and
teaches;3668
that, then,
will be of advantage to the preacher what has been well and usefully
preached, if what is uttered by his mouth is fulfilled by deeds
following? But what did the Lord more frequently instil into His
disciples, what did He more charge to be guarded and observed among His
saving counsels and heavenly precepts, than that with the same love
wherewith He Himself loved the disciples, we also should love one
another? And in what manner does he keep either the peace or the
love of the Lord, who, when jealousy intrudes, can neither be peaceable
nor loving?
13. Thus also the Apostle Paul, when he was
urging the merits of peace and charity, and when he was strongly
asserting and teaching that neither faith nor alms, nor even the
passion itself of the confessor and the martyr,3669
| 3669
Or, according to ancient authority, “of confession and
martyrdom.” [Note this clear conception of the
root-principle of the true martyr, and compare Treatise xi.
infra.] | would avail him, unless he kept the
requirements of charity entire and inviolate, added, and said:
“Charity is magnanimous, charity is kind, charity envieth
not;”3670
teaching,
doubtless, and showing that whoever is magnanimous, and kind, and
averse from jealousy and rancour, such a one can maintain
charity. Moreover, in another place, when he was advising that
the man who has already become filled with the Holy Spirit, and a son
of God by heavenly birth, should observe nothing but spiritual and
divine things, he lays it down, and says: “And I indeed,
brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto
carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk,
not with meat:3671
| 3671 Or,
“I have given you milk to drink, not meat,” is read by
some. | for ye
were not able hitherto; moreover, neither now are ye able. For ye
are yet carnal: for whereas there are still among you jealousy,
and contention, and strifes, are ye not carnal, and walk as
men?”3672
14. Vices and carnal sins must be trampled down,
beloved brethren, and the corrupting plague of the earthly body must be
trodden under foot with spiritual vigour, lest, while we are turned
back again to the conversation of the old man, we be entangled in deadly snares, even as
the apostle, with foresight and wholesomeness, forewarned us of this
very thing, and said: “Therefore, brethren, let us not live
after the flesh; for if ye live after the flesh, ye shall begin to die;
but if ye, through the Spirit, mortify the deeds of the flesh, ye shall
live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the
sons of God.”3673
If we are the sons of God, if we
are already beginning to be His temples, if, having received the Holy
Spirit, we are living holily and spiritually, if we have raised our
eyes from earth to heaven, if we have lifted our hearts, filled with
God and Christ, to things above and divine, let us do nothing but what
is worthy of God and Christ, even as the apostle arouses and exhorts
us, saying: “If ye be risen with Christ, seek those things
which are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God;
occupy your minds with things that are above, not with things which are
upon the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ
in God. But when Christ, who is your life, shall appear, then
shall ye also appear with Him in glory.”3674
Let us, then, who in baptism
have both died and been buried in respect of the carnal sins of the old
man, who have risen again with Christ in the heavenly regeneration,
both think upon and do the things which are Christ’s, even as the
same apostle again teaches and counsels, saying: “The first
man is of the dust of the earth; the second man is from heaven.
Such as he is from the earth, such also are they who are from the earth
and such as He the heavenly is, such also are they who are
heavenly. As we have borne the image of him who is of the earth,
let us also bear the image of Him who is from heaven.”3675
But we
cannot bear the heavenly image, unless in that condition wherein we
have already begun to be, we show forth the likeness of
Christ.
15. For this is to change what you had been,
and to begin to be what you were not, that the divine birth might shine
forth in you, that the godly discipline might respond to God, the
Father, that in the honour and praise of living, God may be glorified
in man; as He Himself exhorts, and warns, and promises to those who
glorify Him a reward in their turn, saying, “Them that glorify me
I will glorify, and he who despiseth me shall be
despised.”3676
For
which glorification the Lord, forming and preparing us, and the Son of
God instilling3677
| 3677
“And engendering in the sons of God.”—Oxford ed. | the
likeness of God the Father, says in His Gospel: “Ye have
heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate
thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, and pray for
them which persecute you; that ye may be the children of your Father
which is in heaven, who maketh His sun to rise on the good and on the
evil, and sendeth rain upon the just and on the unjust.”3678
If it
is a source of joy and glory to men to have children like to
themselves—and it is more agreeable to have begotten an offspring
then when the remaining3679
progeny responds to the parent with
like lineaments—how much greater is the gladness in God the
Father, when any one is so spiritually born that in his acts and
praises the divine eminence of race3680
is announced! What a palm of
righteousness is it, what a crown to be such a one3681
| 3681 Or,
“that one should be such;” or, “that thou shouldst be
such.” | as that the Lord should not say of you,
“I have begotten and brought up children, but they have despised
me!”3682
Let
Christ rather applaud you, and invite you to the reward, saying,
“Come, ye blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom which is
prepared for you from the beginning of the world.”3683
16. The mind must be strengthened, beloved
brethren, by these meditations. By exercises of this kind it must
be confirmed against all the darts of the devil. Let there be the
divine reading in the hands,3684
| 3684
Pamelius, from four codices, reads, “Let there be the divine
reading before the eyes, good works in the hands.” | the Lord’s thoughts in the
mind; let constant prayer never cease at all; let saving labour
persevere. Let us be always busied in spiritual actions, that so
often as the enemy approaches, however often he may try to come near,
he may find the breast closed and armed against him. For a
Christian man’s crown is not only that which is received in the
time of persecution: peace3685
| 3685
[“Habet et pax coronas suas.” Comp. Milton,
Sonnet xi.] | also has its crowns, wherewith the
victors, from a varied and manifold engagement, are crowned, when their
adversary is prostrated and subdued. To have overcome lust is the
palm of continency. To have resisted against anger, against
injury, is the crown of patience. It is a triumph over avarice to
despise money. It is the praise of faith, by trust in the future,
to suffer the adversity of the world. And he who is not haughty
in prosperity, obtains glory for his humility; and he who is disposed
to the mercifulness of cherishing the poor, obtains the retribution of
a heavenly treasure; and he who knows not to be jealous, and who with
one heart and in meekness loves his brethren, is honoured with the
recompense of love and peace. In this course of virtues we daily
run; to these palms and crowns of justice we attain without
intermission of time.
17. To these rewards that you also may come who
had been possessed with jealousy and rancour, cast away all that malice wherewith
you were before held fast, and be reformed to the way of eternal life
in the footsteps of salvation. Tear out from your breast thorns
and thistles, that the Lord’s seed may enrich you with a fertile
produce, that the divine and spiritual cornfield may abound to the
plentifulness of a fruitful harvest. Cast out the poison of gall,
cast out the virus of discords. Let the mind which the
malice3686
| 3686
The Oxford translator gives “blackness;” the original is
“livor.” | of the
serpent had infected be purged; let all bitterness which had settled
within be softened by the sweetness of Christ. If you take both
meat and drink from the sacrament of the cross, let the wood which at
Mara3687
| 3687
Or “myrrh,” variously given in originals as
“myrrham” or “merrham.” | availed in a
figure for sweetening the taste, avail to you in reality for soothing
your softened breast; and you shall not strive for a medicine for your
increasing health. Be cured by that whereby you had been
wounded.3688
| 3688
[“Unde vulneratus fueras, inde curare.”
Lear, act ii. sc. 4.] | Love
those whom you previously had hated; favour those whom you envied with
unjust disparagements. Imitate good men, if you are able to
follow them; but if you are not able to follow them, at least rejoice
with them, and congratulate those who are better than you. Make
yourself a sharer3689
| 3689
“A fellow-heir,” according to Baluzius and Routh. | with
them in united love; make yourself their associate in the alliance of
charity and the bond of brotherhood. Your debts shall be remitted
to you when you yourself shall have forgiven. Your sacrifices
shall be received when you shall come in peace to God. Your
thoughts and deeds shall be directed from above, when you consider
those things which are divine and righteous, as it is written:
“Let the heart of a man consider righteous things, that his steps
may be directed by the Lord.”3690
18. And you have many things to
consider. Think of paradise, whither Cain does not
enter,3691
| 3691
“Return” is a more common reading. | who by jealousy
slew his brother. Think of the heavenly kingdom, to which the
Lord does not admit any but those who are of one heart and mind.
Consider that those alone can be called sons of God who are
peacemakers, who in heavenly3692
| 3692
Routh omits the word “heavenly,” on the authority of
fourteen codices. | birth and by the divine law are made
one, and respond to the likeness of God the Father and of Christ.
Consider that we are standing under the eyes of God, that we are
pursuing the course of our conversation and our life, with God Himself
looking on and judging, that we may then at length be able to attain to
the result of beholding Him, if we now delight Him who sees us, by our
actions, if we show ourselves worthy of His favour and indulgence; if
we, who are always to please Him in His kingdom, previously please Him
in the world.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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