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| Peter Inexorable.
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Chapter
XXXVII.—Peter Inexorable.
Then said Peter:801
| 801 [In Homily XIII. 12
the Apostle is represented as thus deferring the baptism; but a longer
discourse on chastity (chaps. 13–21) is given, assigned to the
evening of that day.—R.] |
“Let not the wicked one prevail against us, taking occasion from
a mother’s love; but let you, and me with you, fast this day
along with her, and to-morrow she shall be baptized: for it is
not right that the precepts of truth be relaxed and weakened in favour
of any person or friendship. Let us not shrink, then, from
suffering along with her, for it is a sin to transgress any
commandment. But let us teach our bodily senses, which are
without us, to be in subjection to our inner senses; and not compel our
inner senses, which savour the things that be of God, to follow the
outer senses, which savour the things that be of the flesh. For
to this end also the Lord commanded, saying: ‘Whosoever
shall look upon a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with
her already in his heart.’ And to this He added:
‘If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from
thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members perish, rather
than thy whole body be cast into hell-fire.’802
He does not say, has offended
thee, that you should then cast away the cause of sin after you
have sinned; but if it offend you, that is, that before you sin
you should cut off the cause of the sin that provokes and irritates
you. But let none of you think, brethren, that the Lord commended
the cutting off of the members. His meaning is, that the purpose
should be cut off, not the members, and the causes which allure to sin,
in order that our thought, borne up on the chariot of sight, may push
towards the love of God, supported by the bodily senses;803
| 803 Here a
marginal reading is followed. The reading of the text is:
“In order that our thought, borne on the chariot of
contemplation, may hasten on, invisible to the bodily senses, towards
the love of God.” But the translation of aspectus by
“contemplation” is doubtful. | and not give loose reins to the eyes of
the flesh as to wanton horses, eager to turn their running outside the
way of the commandments, but may subject the bodily sight to the
judgment of the mind, and not suffer those eyes of ours, which God
intended to be viewers and witnesses of His work, to become panders of
evil desire. And therefore let the bodily senses as well as the
internal thought be subject to the law of God, and let them serve His
will, whose work they acknowledge themselves to
be.”
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