In Praise of the Saints

With what veneration shall I now embrace you, blessed Ambrose? With what love shall I kiss you, Theodulus? With what inner arms shall I bind you, Eustachius, to my heart? With what reverence of a renewed mind, Cario, with what admiration shall I look up to you? I truly do not know, I do not know what I might repay for such great merits. There is but one thing that can answer your benefits: if you ask from the holy Apostles and Martyrs what is owed to us, that those whom you wished to be with us may not be lacking to you. To you also, most beloved brother Aelianus, I give thanks for your assiduous care, and also for your expectation. But for your labor and service the Apostles and Martyrs have already paid the reward; they have long been with you. Give, then, give—why do you delay? Hold out the temples of the Saints. It is fitting to act, not fitting to speak.

For if the hem of the Savior's garment, lightly touched, brought healing, without doubt the dwelling-places of His passions, embraced, will bring healing. To this is added, that this labor feels no fatigue. We have long borne our Apostles and Martyrs in faith. Twice the Saints come to the city of Rouen: long ago they entered our breast; now they visit the Church of the City. Behold, every age pours itself out into your service, one striving to outdo another in zeal of religion. Hence priests and deacons and every minister known to you by daily service comes running. The homage of those already known is more pleasing: for it does not begin to love, but acquires an increase of love.

To this is added, that a service known and long-tried merits more from the Lord. The increase of pay is an increase of fear. For he fears more who has something to lose by giving offense. Such, then, such a soldier, tried by time in your service, drained of vices, approved by labor and vigils, comes forward. Such a one, I say, hastens to minister, who turns labor into desire, who knows not the name of fortune, who measures this life not by its present brevity, but by the felicity of eternity. Such, finally, is his habit of mind, that he thinks himself enriched with vast interest as often as his hands are laden with the relics of the Saints. Hence the company of Monks, refined by fasting, is thickened; hence the loud gladness of innocent boys resounds. Hence the choir of devoted and undefiled virgins bears the standard of the cross. Hence a crowd of the continent and of widows, worthy indeed of such service, throngs together.

Their life is the more splendid, the harder the condition of their human lot has been. For it is a hard battle to resist a known pleasure. If you do not know it, the very nature of ignorance defends you. If you know it, the very knowledge assails you with desire. In one, the chill of a dead husband has quenched the fire, and a sad tomb embraces all her desire. In another, a surviving husband preserves love, touched by the promise of eternity. In unequal lot there is equal palm of virtue. The one, while the marriage remained, condemned union with horror and shame; the other, once her husband was dead, commended it to the grave. Nor undeservedly is there so great zeal of religion. For where there is no thought of pleasures, there is the dwelling-place of chastity. A good conscience gladly obeys the saints. For it makes no difference whether rumor tears at one, or the silent injury of thought vexes one. The show of modesty, and abstinence, is the constancy of one who is obedient.

Here no garment vomits the glow of Tyrian purple, nor do the waves of rustling silk ripple with the art of one walking; no pearl, no circlet of gold is known. For human things grow vile, where divine things are weighed. As the Apostle teaches: "All these things I have counted as dung, that I might gain Christ." They walk gleaming, blazing with the drunkenness of chastity. They walk adorned with the gifts of divine ornaments. Their breasts are stocked with the riches of the Psalms. There is no night of vigils in which such a jewel does not sparkle. There is no place of religion in which such an ornament does not shine; the joy of the saints is the throng of the chaste. The provocation to the powers is the crowd of widows and of the continent. Hence the tears of the aged, and joys mixed together, are poured out; hence the vows of mothers; the joy touches also the hearts of infants; hence, finally, one single affection of the whole people is directed toward your majesty.

Have mercy, then, have mercy; you have grounds for forgiveness. We confess God the Father; we confess God the Son, we confess the Holy Spirit as God. We confess that the three are one. I have said one; because from the one, just as the Son is from the Father, so the Father is in the Son; the Holy Spirit indeed is from the Father and the Son. So too the Father and the Son are in the Holy Spirit. One Godhead, one substance, because one principle, and one everlastingness, whether before all things, or through whom all things exist, true God from true God; because as one is from another, so one is in another, living from the living, perfect from the perfect, light from light, and light in light. Thus the Godhead of this Trinity, remaining from one and in one. The Father is Father, the Son is Son, the Spirit is Spirit.

Three in names, three of one principle, three of one perfection, three of one Godhead, three of one light, three of one power, three of one operation, three of one substance, three of one everlastingness, because as the three are from one, so is the unity in the three. Thus we confess, because thus we believe, an undivided Trinity, before which nothing can be imagined or conceived by the mind: through which are all things visible and invisible, whether Thrones, or Dominations, or Principalities, or Powers. All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made, who for the salvation of the human race, descending from on high, was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, put on man, suffered, was crucified, was buried, on the third day rose again from the dead, ascended into heaven, sits at the right hand of God the Father, whence he will come to judge the living and the dead.

And in the Holy Spirit, because he himself confirmed this sacrament among the Apostles, saying: "When I shall ascend to my Father, and to your Father, I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, that he may be with you forever, the Spirit of truth; whom this world cannot receive, because it does not see him, nor know him. But you know him, because he dwells with you, and is with you". And elsewhere: "When they set you before the powers of this world, be not anxious what you shall speak; the Spirit of your Father will speak in you". In this unity we confess the lights of your venerable passions. In the Gospel we read, that you are the lights of the world. This we proclaim in dangers, this in gladness.

May this confession profit sinners, because he obtained it who asked, as the Lord says in the Gospel: For when the thief, hanging on the gibbet, asked him to remember him, the Savior said: "Amen I say to you, today you shall be with me in Paradise." Let no one scrutinize our sins; we beg forgiveness.

Come now, most beloved brothers, let us pour forth to the most holy relics words of the psalms tempered with honey and milk. Let sobriety, inebriated with vigils and fasts, beg the washing away of sins. Let us incline toward us the favor of the saints, while their arrival is still warm. Their dwellings indeed are heavenly, but let us pray as guests. It is sometimes profitable to feign not to know what you do know. Let them themselves keep their own secret. Those who guard the mysteries and do not seek out secrets more easily obtain their prayer. You too, sacred and inviolate virgins, sing psalms, sing psalms, and with dances strike the paths by which one ascends to heaven. Those, I say, who indeed rejoice in the bright light of Paradise, troubled by no clouds; tread upon them with your feet, wear them out with your leaping.

But lest anyone should complain of error, the mercy of the Savior has added other leaders for us. For what else, most dear ones, is a Martyr but an imitator of Christ? A tamer of raging desire? A trampler of ambition, and a suitor of death, a despiser of riches, a suppressor of wantonness, a persecutor of intemperance? From whom avarice never snatched away the scepter of prudence, nor did the desire of being avenged. Through these steps of virtue the Savior ascended whence he had descended, the Apostle teaching: He who descended, the same is he who ascended above all the heavens. Through these, moreover, he lifted up with himself those whom he foreordained, saying: Father, those whom thou hast given me, I will that where I am, they also may be with me. Prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance is the heavenly way. This the Savior opened, saying: I am the way and the truth.

This the merchant of heavenly pearls and of eternity wore smooth with his tread: this the prophets show to Christian wayfarers: this the Apostles frequented: this neither cold binds nor heat burns. It is provided in the psalms, the sun shall not burn thee by day nor the moon by night. Wherefore let us pray, most dear ones, let us pray, that if the mass of our sins forbids us to ascend, we may at least warm with closer kisses the footprints of those who ascend. These are the ones to be venerated, these are the saints, who brought death upon death. As we read: He who believes in me, though he die, yet shall live.

O how precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints, to whom the threatening persecutor granted more; the torturer shuddered, the one subjected to the torture laughed, the striker trembled, and the one about to die aided the trembling right hand of his executioner; the beast was unwilling, though provoked by the one thrown to it—not because nature had lost the power of bodily punishment, but because the Savior, the president of so great a contest, brandishing the palm, held forth the victory of immortality. Although these things are so, yet in that passion their bodies endured the contest of their members along with you. Therefore, prostrate on the ground, and watering the soil with tears, let us cry out with one voice, that you, who always possess the consecrated relics, may cleanse our bodies. Nor will our offering seem base to you, venerable ones. It is a worthy dwelling that is inhabited by so many victors.

Here you will find John the Baptist, him, I say, who stood bloodied in the common arena, but ascended crowned to heaven, whom the Lord himself declares greater among those born of women. Here Andrew, here Thomas, here Gervasius, here Protasius, here Agricola, here Euphemia, who once, her mind scorched, did not grow pale as a virgin under the executioner. In short, so great here is the multitude of heavenly citizens, that at the coming of your majesty another place would have had to be sought for us, were it not that your secret union and the unity of power join you together. These are your precepts: charity does not envy, does not seek those things which are its own. Whence I do not doubt that, according to human reckoning, the injury of a viler place touches you. Men reckon these things too narrowly. Divinity rejects rank, and is not bounded by place or time. Of unity there is no subjection.

Nor is it strange, if nothing is difficult for you in earthly substance, for whom all is common in the light of the spirit. Yet greater will be the glory of your powers, if you defend the laboring, if you protect those lying beneath their enemies. Let arms shield whom they will; your ranks, your standards, will guard us. There is no enemy, if you grant pardon for sins. From your hands the reins of our life are held. Remit our offenses, and no wars will trouble us. But why do I, poor Victricius, your worshiper, fear concerning the quality of this place? From you, to you, you have come; here you will find those whom you left ministering around the altars of the Lord Jesus Christ; with outstretched arms John the Baptist awaits you. You Thomas, you Andrew, Luke, and the rest of the heavenly multitude call you with equal longing into their bosom. No new host will receive you. These are they with whom you wage war in heaven.

Yet the rejoicing will be peculiar, if those who are joined in spiritual splendor are also joined with the relics.

For indeed we gather, on the suggestion of Scripture, that there is one mass of corporeity. For who is so brutish in nature, or so devoid of reason, as could be found to deny that woman took her beginning from the sides of man? From which this emerges, that we understand the beginnings of flesh to have been taken from flesh. And that nature itself was such, that if anyone diligently applies his mind, and inquires, as it were, into the genus of the race, he will find that Adam was made into a genus out of a species. For it cannot but be a genus, from whose matter and molding, spread abroad, the offspring of the whole human body has grown up. Therefore, most holy brothers, this we ought first to know, that men differ among themselves not by nature, but by place and time and deed and thought. For diversity is foreign to unity. Unity is diffused far and wide without loss to itself.

But if the eyes of reason have discerned that there is one body of all men, it follows that, in those living in Christ and in the Church, by equal reasoning we should believe there to be, by the benefit of adoption, one substance of flesh, and blood, and spirit. The beginning of the new law is the washing away of past sins. But the Savior, though he was of the former, yet came as the sponsor of the better testament. It is necessary, therefore, that there be one virtue in those in whom there is one perfection of the sacraments. For the Apostle says: You are the body of Christ, and members, and the Spirit of God dwells in you.

Since, therefore, we are confirmed by the teaching of Scripture that we can be joined to the divine Spirit by the sacrament of Baptism, and by the same reasoning we say that our bodies also are bound with the members of the Son by the glue of persevering confession, and nothing of unity perishes through grace, what doubt is there that our Apostles and Martyrs too have merited a perfect and absolute concord?

For since the Spirit is of God, and God the Son is Christ, who by equal power dispels the notion of an injurious subjection, who by the venerable triumph of his members left no room for death, who refuses the name of singularity, who feels neither end nor beginning in any of his parts—while the Apostles and saints, both through the sanction of the spiritual mystery, and through the victim of the body, and through the reckoning and sacrifice of blood in the passion, ascend to the throne of the Redeemer, he himself saying in the Gospel: When the Son shall sit on the throne of his glory, you also shall sit upon twelve seats, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And again: Whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven; and whom you shall bind, he shall be held bound. It remains, therefore, that they be wholly with the whole Savior. For to those to whom nothing is unlike in profession, to these all is common in the truth of the Deity.

Through justice, moreover, they become companions of the Savior, through prudence his rivals, through the use of limbs concorporeal, through blood consanguineous, through the consummation of the sacrifice they become partners in the eternity of the cross. For it is written: I ascend to my Father and to your Father. If therefore the Father is common, the sons too are common; if the sons are common, the inheritance is common; if the inheritance is common, eternity is common. But the saints, being endowed with immortality through victory, it remains that the authority of wills be not divided, but one. The Lord himself pursuing this before the Father: Father, sanctify them in truth, thy word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. And for them I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth; I pray not only for these, but also for those who shall believe in me through their word.

That all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us, that this world may believe that thou hast sent me, and I send them. The glory which thou hast given me, I have given them, that they may be one, as we are one. I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one, that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me. For the saving empire is snatched away by the worthy, whoever shall have lifted up the ensign of holy confession.

One immortality, beloved, is that which, without any conception of frailty, is everlasting. Another is that which is granted by bounty. We, however, cannot deny the immortality bestowed upon the Apostles and Martyrs. But this we assume, that after divinity has been attained, there is nothing that separates the Trinity from the offering of the saints; since the very Truth of the Trinity brought them forth. For it is necessary to confess that the nature of God is full and perfect. Otherwise it becomes an injury, if we deny it, the Lord saying: Whoever denies me and my words before men, him will I also deny before my Father and his Angels. To this it is added, that fullness receives nothing beyond itself. But blood, after martyrdom, is set aglow with the reward of divinity. Let the injury of distinction, therefore, cease, since the coupling of splendor is the same. I go, he says, to my Father and to your Father.

You see, then, most loving ones, that this which belongs to the Father and the Son by the property of nature, belongs to the Saints by the unity of the gift received. God is diffused far and wide, and lends his light without loss to himself. In whatever part he is, he is wholly there, whole in sense, whole in sight, whole in mind of himself. He cannot, therefore, fail to be perfect in the Apostles, who is perfect in the whole. Perhaps here someone may exclaim and say, Is the martyr, then, this same thing as the first virtue, and the absolute and ineffable substance of the Godhead? I say it is the same by benefit, not by property; by adoption, not by nature. And so it comes about that, when the great day arrives, he who has received the kingdom will not seem to have gained, nor he who gave it to have lost. It is the part of a merciful and good arbiter to declare beforehand what you should beware of.

Behold, they show us, as by a light set before us from their own relics, the path of truth. They teach reverence, faith, prudence, justice, fortitude, concord, continence, chastity, while in bodies possessed they punish what is contrary to these things, and remove the stains of vices. But this mercy, and this affection for teaching, and indeed these riches of relics, and these fiery rays of light, they have in themselves even when they shall begin to weigh our sins. It belongs to a good king to judge without favor. There pure truth is found, where there is no leaning of the judge to one side. But we are aided by the very benefits which we now enjoy from them. Therefore into one heap, as it were, will be gathered all the goodness of the Saints that is now diffused, so that without favor, without the injury of partiality, they may hold the scepter of judgment. Sins are darkness, light is innocence.

It is necessary, therefore, that the prison of darkness appear, when that which belongs to the light begins to return from itself into itself.

The benefits of the sun are broad; it fills and illumines all the expanses of the earth, the eyes of all dwellings, and does not depart from itself in the abundance it gives. It pours out its gift and receives it back, and possesses just as much as it had bestowed before; it gives, and is found the lord of the things it has given. Not otherwise, most dear ones, before the day of judgment, is the splendor of the just poured into all Basilicas, into all churches, into the breast of all the faithful, destined to return into itself when it shall have assumed the person of the judge. If this comparison should seem base to anyone, let him take it as belonging to majesty, not to error, that we compare corruptible things with divine ones, small things with great ones. The beginnings that are without a genus of their own cannot be defined. The substance of the Godhead, though it condescends, retains within itself the dignity of its own likeness.

Neither quality nor quantity is found to which the Trinity can be equated. The heavenly reckoning is taught, not compared; it is suggested, not adorned. The example of the sun, then, has taught us of divinity. Yet it has not mingled itself with unity. This now is plain to all, that God made out of nothing that which did not exist, whence often the venom of the dialecticians is dashed to pieces.

For if God, the author of all things, fashioned this spiritual vessel and its members out of nothingness, why could He not translate an animated body, and one, as it were, clotted by the ferment of blood, into the substance of His own light? But we, amid so great a rejoicing, are filling the book with a tumult of questions. Not undeservedly, however, for the investigation of truth is the delight of the inquirer. Thus is God, thus the Saviour recognized; thus is the triumph found extended with saving arms; thus is eternal splendor acquired for bodies. We learn from heavenly speech that angels contain a spirit of fiery majesty: for thus we read: Who makes His angels spirits, and His ministers a burning fire. Therefore if there is blood in the body, and that same blood is mingled with the supernal ardor, no question remains, but that we must gather that the concord of the blessed is one and the same with the universal whole.

That suspicion now, dearest brethren, must be wiped away and abolished from our minds, lest anyone, perchance deceived by common error, in the small fragments of the just, and in this apostolic consecration, should think that the truth of the whole bodily passion does not subsist there. But we with full faith and authority proclaim that in the relics nothing is lacking of fullness. For the limbs are whole where the healing is whole. We say that the flesh is held together by the glue of blood, and that the spirit too, moist with the dew of blood, has drawn the flaming ardor of the Word. Since this is so, it is most certain that our Apostles and Martyrs have come to us with their powers entire. That this is so, we are admonished even by present benefits. For when we acknowledge the right of translation with their own consent, we understand this: that they do not bring loss upon themselves by their own dissemination, but scatter benefits while remaining enriched in unity.

Flame pours forth and gives away its brightness, and yet suffers no loss of its bounty. So the Saints are generous without loss, full without addition; so they have come to us without the weariness of pilgrimage. In the relics, therefore, there is a token of perfection, not an injury of division. Whatever is formed from a dissimilar conception, and is not bathed in the liquid of the first fountain, must necessarily be perishable. Let the sun and stars, the earth, and the remaining names of vanities receive corruptibility, because they have no spiritual origin. But the passion of the Saints is an imitation of Christ, and Christ is God. Therefore division is not to be inserted into fullness; rather, in the very division which lies before the eyes, the truth of fullness is to be adored.

Why then do we call them relics? Because words are images and signs of things; blood and clay lie before the eyes. This we mark, because we cannot do otherwise, with the term "relics," as it were by the impression of a living word. But now, speaking of the whole in the part, let us open not the barriers of bodily lights, but the eyes of the heart. For things do not serve words, but words serve things. Whence, once the snares of speech are removed, let thing contend with thing, reason with reason. Every part, which is called species, must necessarily receive within itself the force and definition of its genus. For when I say that "animal" is an animated substance, and a sensible substance, I have at the same time stated the definition of men, and oxen, and the rest of living creatures—how is it a man who does not perceive the things that are of God?

But if in the definition of the genus the measures of the species too are weighed, how can it be that in the relics there should not be carnal fullness, since the spiritual reason is the same? We have thus shown that the whole can exist in a part. Whence we can no longer complain of smallness; for when we have said that, after the manner of the genus, nothing perishes of the most sacred bodies, we have certainly established this: that what is divine cannot be diminished, because the whole is in the whole. And where anything is, there the whole is. But we gather from divine reading that the body is imbued with the eternal spirit. It is concluded, therefore, that nothing further is to be desired where fullness is perceived. For the sake of teaching, let us dwell on that easy and common example. We speak of the ray of fire, we speak of its color, and yet, nature commanding it, one is not divided from the other except by the sole distinction of name.

Light gives birth to splendor, and yet there is no separation made between light and splendor. Man himself, in that he is man, holds a single fellowship with all by the common bond of birth. Bronze, gold, and the other kinds of metals, though seized in different directions by the hooked claws of avarice, nevertheless retain the quality of an undivided substance. It is clear, then, that species is to be referred to nature. It is clear, then, that in the relics there is the perfection of the members, because in the spiritual consecration there is a shared communion. For as is the heavenly one, so are the heavenly ones. If we were to say that the relics are divided from the spirit, then rightly would every joining and solidity of the inward parts be sought. But since we perceive that the substance is united, it is beside the point to search for the whole in the whole. It is an injury to unity to inquire after a greater power. This is a deception of the eyes.

Clearer are the lights of reason. We behold small relics, a little of blood. But truth beholds these fragments to be brighter than the sun, the Lord saying in the Gospel: My saints shall shine as the sun, in the kingdom of the Father; and then the sun shall shine more brightly, and more clearly than now.

To this it may be added that healing occurs no less in parts than in the whole. Do they, in the East, at Constantinople, Antioch, Thessalonica, Naissus, Rome, in Italy, offer to the wretched a different medicine? Or are suffering bodies relieved differently? At Ephesus John the Evangelist heals, and elsewhere too in many places—he whom we have received never departed from Christ's breast, not even before his consecration, and his very medicine is with us. At Bologna Proculus and Agricola heal, and we too behold their majesty. At Piacenza Antoninus works. Saturninus and Trajanus heal in Macedonia. Nazarius heals at Milan; Mutius, Alexander, Datysus, Chindeus pour forth the grace of health with abundant power. Regata, Leonida, Anastasia, Anatolia heal—as the Apostle Paul says: unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, by one and the same Spirit, who works all things in all. I ask, is the healing of the aforesaid saints among us other than among others?

But if all the saints, wherever they are, defend, cleanse, and protect their votaries with equal devotion, then worship is to be increased, not their majesty discussed. But even if there were not full weight of virtue in the relics, still it would not be of a good mind to detract anything from such dignity. For it does not profit to know, but to fear. For it is written: The fear of the Lord drives out sin. For whoever is without fear can nowhere be justified. Countless things occur to me, but I seek only the pure streams and paths of the matter. I am not entangled by the hypothetical and categorical modes of syllogisms, nor deceived by the empty sophisms of philosophers: truth itself opens its own face, faith spits upon arguments, crime seeks hiding places, innocence seeks the public light. With my hand, therefore, I point to what is sought, I touch the relics, I affirm that in these relics is perfect grace and perfect power.

In this place, if the matter were to be unfolded by the clash of words, I would say that they are the same in genus, species, and number; concerning which the faithless calumny of the doubter is uncertain—not doubting, perhaps, but not loving. But since I hold the whole thing by faith, I think for the present that superfluous matters should be set aside; things are to be seen, not sought out. Behold, the torturer of the unclean and polluted spirit presses in, yet he who tortures does not come into view. There are no chains, and yet he who suffers is bound. The wrath of heaven has its rack in the air. There is no hook, and yet so great are the crimes confessed; no wound appears, and yet the gnashing of teeth is heard; there is no interrogation by one disputing, and yet permission to depart follows. No one, surely no one, is so poor in mind as to say that fullness is lacking, when he sees that nothing is lacking to the examination.

For God, without doubt, God is whoever it is that tortures and judges invisible things. An imperfect nature does not know how to wound the spirit. None judges the inward parts except He who heals. None commands the elements except He who treads the scepter underfoot. None holds the Trinity except He who is whole in the parts, and entire in the whole; the first sense needs no addition. But the Apostles and the Saints not only do not seek additions, but even bestow the benefits of health and salvation. Therefore there is one sense, one spirit, one intermingling of these with truth. He who heals also lives; he who lives is in the relics. But the Apostles and Martyrs heal and cleanse. In the relics, therefore, they are bound by the bond of entire eternity. Every cutting is wrapped in the cloud of death. We have sufficiently and more than sufficiently declared that the Saints know no loss of part.

It remains, then, for us to understand that it is a matter of mercy, not of question, that the just bestow themselves upon all; he who loves, believes; he who believes seeks faith in the disputant and the priest, not words. Whence if our discourse should seem contemptible to anyone, certainly our zeal will by no means displease him. If indeed he sees that we have composed this book with simple faith, not with words; with reverence, not with arguments; with veneration, not with curiosity. Whoever pays reverence is a lover of truth; whoever raises a question is its hater.

Wherefore, most beloved, while the throng of saints is still fresh among us, let us press on, and bring forth sighs from the deepest veins of our bodies. Advocates are present; let us unfold in speech the deeds of our sins. The judges are favorable, and can mitigate the sentence—those to whom it was said: You shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. They are always judges, because they are always Apostles. But it is not so much zeal for speaking as the duty of faith that has drawn me on so far; boundless rejoicing knows not how to be silent. It is a loss to joy if the hearer be lacking. Therefore, if I could have kept silent amid so great a celebration of rejoicing, I would incur the crime of gloom: the Apostles and Martyrs come, and it is not fitting for the Bishop to be silent. The altars are raised; let the people take their beginning from the joy of the priest. Who, I ask, is so brutish? Who so profane?

Who so ignorant of law and religion, as not to feel these joys? If some secular prince were now to visit our city, at once all the open spaces, wreathed with garlands, would smile, mothers would fill the rooftops, the gates would stir the wave of the people, every age, divided in its pursuits, would sing of laurels and warlike deeds, would marvel at the flames of the purple robe and the Tyrian dye, would be astonished at the price of the Red Sea and the frozen tears of sea-creatures: things indeed to be marveled at if you look upon them, to be despised if you consider them—after all, they are but stones; these, I say, would hold the gaping crowd. But indeed, most blessed ones, when the triumph of the Martyrs and the pomp of their virtues enter beneath our roofs, why should we not be dissolved into joy? Nor is there lacking cause for wonder: instead of royal apparel, the raiment of eternal light is at hand.

Here is the purple, here the free togas of the Saints, here the diadems set with gems of varied light—of wisdom, understanding, knowledge, truth, counsel, fortitude, endurance, temperance, justice, prudence, patience, chastity—these virtues are expressed and inscribed in each several stone. Here the Savior, the artificer, has adorned the crowns of the Martyrs with spiritual gems. Toward these gems let us stretch the sails of our souls; nothing in them is fragile, nothing that a greater thing diminishes, nothing that suffers loss. More and more they flourish in beauty; that the marks of eternity have been brought forth, even the blood shows, which still signs the fire of the Holy Spirit in these very bodies and remains of the members. We rejoice, dearest brethren, as often as we see darkness scattered by light. Why should we not rush forth more freely into joy, when we perceive the radiance of saving and eternal lights brought to us? The day seems to me to have taken on the gladness of a clearer serenity.

Nor without cause; for, as I have said, the Martyrs are seven times brighter than the sun. But now, most beloved, we must pray, not deliver a peroration, I say, that every assault of the devil may be driven from us, he who by stealthy encroachment enters our breast. Strengthen, therefore, O Saints, strengthen your worshippers, and build our breast upon the cornerstone. The enemy is dangerous and strong; he explores every approach, every entrance. But nothing is to be feared; great is the multitude of Saints who come to meet us. Since, then, so great a number of soldiers and kings has come to us from the camps of heaven, let us take up the arms of justice and prudence, and let us protect ourselves with the shield of faith too; let us fortify our breasts not with the scales of a corselet, but with the plates of temperance and chastity. With our right hands let us ever brandish the weapons of faith and patience. Let us strike at once, if any enemy should assail us.

Such were the arms the Apostles bore of old. Armed with these, they broke the necks of intemperance, wantonness, greed, ambition, and of wrath too, and of pride.

Thus the Saviour's mercy has denied us nothing, neither arms nor defenses. Wherefore we must take care again and again lest the torpor of vices invade us as though we were drowsy, lest the enemy of faith, unbelief, steal upon us, or anger delay us, or greed vex us, or ambition strive against us. Our Martyrs will gladly dwell with us, if we bring a pure conscience to their service. If to anyone this warfare seems hard and inescapable, let him not cast away his spear before the trumpet sounds, nor let the chill of death invade him before the battle. Let no one desert the standards of the Saviour. He has given the example, he sends aid. Victory is certain with such fellow-soldiers, and to fight with Christ as commander; then indeed the helmet of the Priest will shine in me, if your charity beholds me in the battle-line; it is a blaze of glory to fight while you watch, while you follow.

A safe station, and the most secure harbor of salvation, is unshaken faith and spiritual constancy. A good life profits nothing if you do not know for whom you live. The whirlwind of the winds will sweep away a light and unbelieving mind into the deep. It is faith that carried the Saints to heaven; it is faith that turned flames into dew, and sent a saving chill into the balls of fire; it is faith that solidified the waters of the surging waves beneath the footsteps of those who walked upon them; it is faith that presents the Martyrs consecrated as an example of death; it is faith that fortified the souls of the Confessors in the contest of their passion; it is faith that feeds, in humility, on scanty, stale, and dry food; it is faith that guards virginity, widowhood, and continence with modest integrity; it is faith that removed bodily desire and instilled the love of the heavenly kingdom; it is faith that joins immortality to the Lord through the death of the cross.

This faith, through the world's hatreds, presents to the Lord those hated together with Him; this faith comforts the Confessors in prisons, shut up in the most dreadful horror of darkness, and while they are tossed about in filth and squalor, and pierced upon the very beds of earth itself, not free even in sleep, they take rest for but a little time. While thus, day by day, they are torn by every kind of torment; while at last they are pressed by manifold punishments, their virtue advances toward the crown. It is faith that, amid so many conflicts, presents to God a dear unity, and returns to Christ in kind, by dying for Him. As the head is dead to the body for the sake of the members, so the members die for the head, that as the head lives, so the members may be quickened together with the head.

This the most blessed Paul confirms: "If we die together with Christ, we shall also live together with Him; if we endure, we shall also reign together with Him." It remains, most beloved, that the confession of our sins also follow. Not that the divine powers do not know the retreats and secrets of our souls; but an unforced confession easily draws out the mercy of the Judge. Let there be no day, dearest brothers, on which we do not dwell upon these accounts: that Martyr did not turn pale under the torturer, that one outran by his haste the delays of his executioner, that one eagerly drank the flames; that one was cut, yet stood whole; that one called himself happy, to whom it fell to be tortured; that one, amid the hands of the executioners, bid the waters to return, lest any delay be made for one hastening on.

That girl grieved for her father's tears as a daughter, yet despised them as a Martyr; that one, eager for death, provoked the lion's rage by her defiance; that one, while her son was fasting, offered her full breasts to the beasts; that virgin bared her neck, adorned with the necklaces of eternity, to the executioner. There are thousands, dearest brothers, of examples of virtue which holy Scripture records. But we have gathered a few out of many, more for the sake of exhortation than instruction. For to the faithful a few suffice, while to the unbelieving many profit nothing. The desires of the saints ought not to be delayed. Why do we tarry? Let the hall lie open to the divine Martyrs, let their relics be joined; let graces too be joined, let the beginnings of the first resurrection come together as one. Meanwhile, let our confession steal in. The pardon of sins is the rejoicing of the powers above. Not without reason, dearest brothers, have I, as an eager builder, undertaken the space of this basilica.

The coming of the saints excuses my eagerness. They themselves, by the hidden working of my desire, have ordained that a hall be prepared for them. So indeed it is, so it is. For we have laid the foundations, we have carried the walls forward in length, and today we learn for whom the purpose of our work has been growing. Wherefore all delay has been driven off by rebuke; nothing pleases me that is slow and sluggish. It delights me to turn the stones with my own hands, and to carry great blocks upon my shoulders. Let the earth drink my sweat; and would that it might drink my blood for the name of the Saviour! Meanwhile, let the earth, which is to receive the altars, drink my sweat. If our faithful Apostles and Martyrs behold us, they will invite others.