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| Chapter V. A comparison with a man who is trying to hit a mark.
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Chapter V.
A comparison with a man who is trying to hit a mark.
As those, whose business
it is to use weapons of war, whenever they want to show their skill in
their art before a king of this world, try to shoot their arrows or
darts into certain small targets which have the prizes painted on them;
for they know that they cannot in any other way than by the line of
their aim secure the end and the prize they hope for, which they will
only then enjoy when they have been able to hit the mark set before
them; but if it happens to be withdrawn from their sight, however much
in their want of skill their aim may vainly deviate from the straight
path, yet they cannot perceive that they have strayed from the
direction of the intended straight line because they have no distinct
mark to prove the skilfulness of their aim, or to show up its badness:
and therefore while they shoot their missiles idly into space, they
cannot see how they have gone wrong or how utterly at fault they are,
since no mark is their accuser, showing how far they have gone astray
from the right direction; nor can an unsteady look help them to correct
and restore the straight line enjoined on them. So then the end indeed
which we have set before us is, as the Apostle says, eternal life, as
he declares, “having indeed your fruit unto holiness, and the end
eternal life;”1088
but the
immediate goal is purity of heart, which he not unfairly terms
“sanctification,” without which the afore-mentioned end
cannot be gained; as if he had said in other words, having your
immediate goal in purity of heart, but the end
life eternal. Of which goal the same blessed
Apostle teaches us, and significantly uses the very term, i.e.,
σκοπός, saying as
follows, “Forgetting those things which are behind and reaching
forward to those that are before, I press toward the mark, for the
prize of the high calling of the Lord:”1089
which is more clearly put in Greek κατὰ σκοπὸν
διώκω, i.e., “I press toward the
mark,” as if he said, “With this aim, with which I forget
those things that are behind, i.e., the faults of earlier life, I
strive to reach as the end the heavenly prize.” Whatever then can
help to guide us to this object; viz., purity of heart, we must follow
with all our might, but whatever hinders us from it, we must shun as a
dangerous and hurtful thing. For, for this we do and endure all things,
for this we make light of our kinsfolk, our country, honours, riches,
the delights of this world, and all kinds of pleasures, namely in order
that we may retain a lasting purity of heart. And so when this object
is set before us, we shall always direct our actions and thoughts
straight towards the attainment of it; for if it be not constantly
fixed before our eyes, it will not only make all our toils vain and
useless, and force them to be endured to no purpose and without any
reward, but it will also excite all kinds of thoughts opposed to one
another. For the mind, which has no fixed point to which it may return,
and on which it may chiefly fasten, is sure to rove about from hour to
hour and minute to minute in all sorts of wandering thoughts, and from
those things which come to it from outside, to be constantly changed
into that state which first offers itself to it.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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