Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| To Cæsarius, brother of Gregory.
PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP 
Letter
XXVI.1988
To Cæsarius, brother of
Gregory.1989
| 1989 Cæsarius
was the youngest brother of Gregory of Nazianzus. After a life
of distinguished service under Julian, Valens, and Valentinian, he
was led, shortly after the escape narrated in this letter, to retire
from the world. A work entitled Πύστεις, or
Quæstiones (sive Dialogi) de Rebus Divinus,
attributed to him, is of doubtful genuineness. Vide D.C.B.
s.v. The earthquake, from the effects of which
Cæsarius was preserved, took place on the tenth of October,
368. cf. Greg. Naz, Orat. x. |
Thanks to God for shewing
forth His wonderful power in your person, and for preserving you to
your country and to us your friends, from so terrible a death. It
remains for us not to be ungrateful, nor unworthy of so great a
kindness, but, to the best of our ability, to narrate the marvellous
works of God, to celebrate by deed the kindness which we have
experienced, and not return thanks by word only. We ought to
become in very deed what I, grounding my belief on the miracles wrought
in you, am persuaded that you now are. We exhort you still more
to serve God, ever increasing your fear more and more, and advancing on
to perfection, that we may be made wise stewards of our life, for which
the goodness of God has reserved us. For if it is a command to
all of us “to yield ourselves unto God as those that are alive
from the dead,”1990
how much more
strongly is not this commanded them who have been lifted up from the
gates of death? And this, I believe, would be best effected, did
we but desire ever to keep the same mind in which we were at the moment
of our perils. For, I ween, the vanity of our life came before
us, and we felt that all that belongs to man, exposed as it is to
vicissitudes, has about it nothing sure, nothing firm. We felt,
as was likely, repentance for the past; and we gave a promise for the
future, if we were saved, to serve God and give careful heed to
ourselves. If the imminent peril of death gave me any cause for
reflection, I think that you must have been moved by the same or nearly
the same thoughts. We are therefore bound to pay a binding debt,
at once joyous at God’s good gift to us, and, at the same time,
anxious about the future. I have ventured to make these
suggestions to you. It is yours to receive what I say well and
kindly, as you were wont to do when we talked together face to
face.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
