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| A time to flee and a time to stay.
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17. A time to flee and a time to
stay.
And if ever in their flight they came unto those
that sought after them, they did not do so without reason: but when the
Spirit spoke unto them, then as righteous men they went and met their
enemies; by which they also shewed their obedience and zeal towards
God. Such was the conduct of Elijah, when, being commanded by the
Spirit, he shewed himself unto Ahab1467
; and of
Micaiah the prophet when he came to the same Ahab; and of the prophet
who cried against the altar in Samaria, and rebuked Rehoboam1468
; and of Paul when he appealed unto
Cæsar. It was not certainly through cowardice that they fled: God
forbid. The flight to which they submitted was rather a conflict and
war against death. For with wise caution they guarded against these two
things; either that they should offer themselves up without reason (for
this would have been to kill themselves, and to become guilty of death,
and to transgress the saying of the Lord, ‘What God hath joined
let not man put asunder1469
’), or that
they should willingly subject themselves to the reproach of negligence,
as if they were unmoved by the tribulations which they met with in
their flight, and which brought with them sufferings greater and more
terrible than death. For he that dies, ceases to suffer; but he that
flies, while he expects daily the assaults of his enemies, esteems
death lighter. They therefore whose course was consummated in their
flight did not perish dishonourably, but attained as well as others the
glory of martyrdom. Therefore it is that Job was accounted a man of
mighty fortitude, because he endured to live under so many and such
severe sufferings, of which he would have had no sense, had he come to
his end. Wherefore the blessed Fathers thus regulated their conduct
also; they shewed no cowardice in fleeing from the persecutor, but
rather manifested their fortitude of soul in shutting themselves up in
close and dark places, and living a hard life. Yet did they not desire
to avoid the time of death when it arrived; for their concern was
neither to shrink from it when it came, nor to forestall the sentence
determined by Providence, nor to resist His dispensation, for which
they knew themselves to be preserved; lest by acting hastily, they
should become to themselves the cause of terror: for thus it is
written, ‘He that is hasty, with his lips, shall bring terror
upon himself1470
.’E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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