12. “But,” thou wilt say,
“we more easily penetrate their concealment if we pretend to be
ourselves what they are.” If this were lawful or expedient,
Christ might have instructed his sheep that they should come clad
in wolves’ clothing to the wolves, and by the cheat of this
artifice discover them: which He hath not said, no, not when He
foretold that He would send them forth in the midst of wolves.2396
But thou
wilt say: “They needed not at that time to have inquisition made
for them, being most manifest
wolves; but their
bite and savageness
were to be
endured.” What, when foretelling later times, He said
that ravening
wolves would come in
sheep’s
clothing? Was there
not
room there to give this
advice and say, And do ye, that ye may
find them out, assume
wolves’
clothing, but within be ye
sheep
still? Not this saith He: but when he had said, “Many will come
to you in
sheep’s
clothing, but within are ravening
wolves;”
2397
He went on
to say, not, By your
lies, but, “By their fruits ye shall know
them.” By
truth must we
beware of, by
truth must we take, by
truth must we
kill,
lies. Be it
far from us, that the blasphemies
of the ignorant we by wittingly blaspheming should overcome:
far
from us, that the evils of
deceitful men we by imitating should
guard against. For how shall we
guard against them if in order to
guard against them we shall have them? For if in order that he may
be caught who blasphemes unwittingly, I shall blaspheme wittingly,
worse is the thing I do than that which I catch. If in order that
he may be found who denies Christ unwittingly, I shall deny Him
wittingly, to his undoing will he follow me whom I shall so find,
since in order that I may find him out, I first am
undone.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
