47. But, as I had begun to
say, whether the fruit an hundred-fold be virginity dedicated to
God, or whether we are to understand that interval of fruitfulness
in some other way, either such as we have made mention of, or such
as we have not made mention of; yet no one, as I suppose, will have
dared to prefer virginity to martyrdom, and no one will have
doubted that this latter gift is hidden, if trial to test it be
wanting. A virgin, therefore, hath a subject for thought, such as
may be of profit to her for the keeping of humility, that she
violate not that charity, which is above all gifts, without which
assuredly whatever other gifts she shall have had, whether few or
many, whether great or small, she is nothing. She hath, I say, a
subject for thought, that she be not puffed up, that she rival not;
forsooth that she so make profession that the virginal good is much
greater and better than the married good, as that yet she know not
whether this or that married woman be not already able to suffer
for Christ, but herself as yet unable, and she herein spared, that
her weakness is not put to the question by trial. “For God,”
saith the Apostle, “is faithful, Who will not suffer you to be
tried above what ye are able but will make with the trial a way
out, that ye may be able to bear it.”2197
Perhaps, therefore, those men or
women keeping a way of
married life praiseworthy in its
kind, are
already able, against an
enemy forcing to
unrighteousness, to
contend even by tearing in pieces of
bowels, and shedding of
blood;
but these men or
women, continent from childhood, and making
themselves
eunuchs for the sake of the
Kingdom of
Heaven, still are
not as yet able to
endure such, either for
righteousness, or for
chastity itself. For it is one thing, for
truth and an holy
purpose, not to consent unto one who would
persuade and flatter,
but another thing not to yield even to one who
tortures and
strikes. These
lie hid in the powers and
strength of
souls, by
trial they are unfolded, by actual essay they come forth. In order,
therefore, that each be not puffed up by reason of that, which he
sees clearly that he can do, let him humbly consider that he knows
not that there is perchance something more excellent which he
cannot do, but that some, who neither have nor profess that of
which he is lawfully self-conscious, are able to do this, which he
himself cannot do. Thus will be kept, not by feigned but by true
humility, “In honor preventing one another,”
2198
and, “esteeming each the other
higher than himself.”
2199
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