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| On the Fast of the Ten Month, VIII.
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Sermon XIX.
On the Fast of the Ten Month,
VIII.
I. Self-restraint leads to higher
enjoyments.
When the Saviour would instruct His disciples
about the Advent of God’s Kingdom and
the end of the world’s times, and teach His whole Church, in the
person of the Apostles, He said, “Take heed lest haply your
hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and care of this
life719
.” And assuredly, dearly
beloved, we acknowledge that this precept applies more especially to
us, to whom undoubtedly the day denounced is near, even though
hidden. For the advent of which it behoves every man to prepare
himself, lest it find him given over to gluttony, or entangled in cares
of this life. For by daily experience, beloved, it is proved that
the mind’s edge is blunted by over-indulgence of the flesh, and
the heart’s vigour is dulled by excess of food, so that the
delights of eating are even opposed to the health of the body, unless
reasonable moderation withstand the temptation and the consideration of
future discomfort keep from the pleasure. For although the flesh
desires nothing without the soul, and receives its sensations from the
same source as it receives its motions also, yet it is the function of
the same soul to deny certain things to the body which is subject to
it, and by its inner judgment to restrain the outer parts from things
unseasonable, in order that it may be the oftener free from bodily
lusts, and have leisure for Divine wisdom in the palace of the mind,
where, away from all the noise of earthly cares, it may in silence
enjoy holy meditations and eternal delights. And, although this
is difficult to maintain in this life, yet the attempt can frequently
be renewed, in order that we may the oftener and longer be occupied
with spiritual rather than fleshly cares; and by our spending ever
greater portions of our time on higher cares, even our temporal actions
may end in gaining the incorruptible riches.
II. The teaching of the four yearly fasts
is that spiritual self-restraint is as necessary as
corporeal.
This profitable observance, dearly beloved, is
especially laid down for the fasts of the Church, which, in accordance
with the Holy Spirit’s teaching, are so distributed over the
whole year that the law of abstinence may be kept before us at all
times. Accordingly we keep the spring fast in Lent, the summer
fast at Whitsuntide, the autumn fast in the seventh month, and the
winter fast in this which is the tenth month, knowing that there is
nothing unconnected with the Divine commands, and that all the elements
serve the Word of God to our instruction, so
that from the very hinges on which the world turns, as if by four
gospels we learn unceasingly what to preach and what to do. For,
when the prophet says, “The heavens declare the glory of
God, and the firmament showeth His
handiwork: day unto day uttereth speech, and night showeth
knowledge720
,” what is
there by which the Truth does not speak to us? By day and by
night His voices are heard, and the beauty of the things made by the
workmanship of the One God ceases not to
instil the teachings of Reason into our hearts’ ears, so that
“the invisible things of God may be
perceived and seen through the things which are made,” and men
may serve the Creator of all, not His creatures721
| 721 Cf. Rom. i. 20
and 25. | . Since therefore all vices are
destroyed by self-restraint, and whatever avarice thirsts for, pride
strives for, luxury lusts after, is overcome by the solid force of this
virtue, who can fail to understand the aid which is given us by
fastings? for therein we are bidden to restrain ourselves, not only in
food, but also in all carnal desires. Otherwise it is lost labour
to endure hunger and yet not put away wrong wishes; to afflict oneself
by curtailing food, and yet not to flee from sinful thoughts.
That is a carnal, not a spiritual fast, where the body only is stinted,
and those things persisted in,
which are more harmful than all
delights. What profit is it to the soul to act outwardly as
mistress and inwardly to be a captive and a slave, to issue orders to
the limbs and to lose the right to her own liberty? That soul for
the most part (and deservedly) meets with rebellion in her servant,
which does not pay to God the service that is
due. When the body therefore fasts from food, let the mind fast
from vices, and pass judgment upon all earthly cares and desires
according to the law of its King
III. Thus fasting in mind as well as
body, and giving alms freely, we shall win God’s highest favour.
Let us remember that we owe love first to
God, secondly to our neighbour, and that all
our affections must be so regulated as not to draw us away from the
worship of God, or the benefiting our fellow
slave. But how shall we worship God
unless that which is pleasing to Him is also pleasing to us? For,
if our will is His will, our weakness will receive strength from Him,
from Whom the very will came; “for it is God,” as the Apostle says, “who worketh in us
both to will and to do for (His) good pleasure722
.” And so a man will not be
puffed up with pride, nor crushed with despair, if he uses the gifts
which God gave to His glory, and withholds his
inclinations from those things, which he knows will harm him. For
in abstaining from malicious envy, from luxurious and dissolute living,
from the perturbations of anger, from the lust after vengeance, he will
be made pure and holy by true fasting, and will be fed upon the
pleasures of incorruptible delights, and so he will know how, by the
spiritual use of his earthly riches, to transform them into heavenly
treasures, not by hoarding up for himself what he has received, but by
gaining a hundred-fold on what he gives. And hence we warn you,
beloved, in fatherly affection, to make this winter fast fruitful to
yourselves by bounteous alms, rejoicing that by you the Lord feeds and clothes His poor, to whom assuredly He
could have given the possessions which He has bestowed on you, had He
not in His unspeakable mercy wished to justify them for their patient
labour, and you for your works of love. Let us therefore fast on
Wednesday and Friday, and on Saturday keep vigil with the most blessed
Apostle Peter, and he will deign to assist with his own prayers our
supplications and fastings and alms which our Lord Jesus Christ presents, Who with the Father and the
Holy Ghost lives and reigns for ever and ever.
Amen.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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