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Wo to thee, Corozain, wo to thee, Bethsaida: for if
in Tyre and Sidon had been wrought the miracles that
have been wrought in you, they had long ago done
penance in sackcloth and ashes.(1) Such is the word
of Our Saviour. Hark I pray you, Theotimus, how the
inhabitants of Corozain and Bethsaida, instructed in
the true religion, and having received favours so
great that they would effectually have converted the
pagans themselves, remained nevertheless obstinate,
and never willed to use them, rejecting this holy
light by an incomparable rebellion.
Certainly at the day of judgment the Ninivites and
the Queen of Saba will rise up against the Jews, and
will convict them as worthy of damnation: because, as
to the Ninivites, though idolators and barbarians, at
the voice of Jonas they were converted and did
penance; and as to the Queen of Saba, she, though
engaged in the affairs of a kingdom, yet having heard
the renown of Solomon's wisdom, forsook all, to go
and hear him. Yet the Jews, hearing with their ears
the heavenly wisdom of the true Solomon, the Saviour
of the world; seeing with their eyes his miracles;
touching with their hands his virtues and benefits;
ceased not for all that to be hardened, and to resist
the grace which was proffered them.
See then again, Theotimus, how they who had less
attractions are brought to penance, and those who had
more remain obdurate: those who have less occasion to
come, come to the school of wisdom, and those who
have more, stay in their folly.
Thus will be made the judgment of comparison, as
all doctors have remarked, which can have no
foundation save in this, that notwithstanding some
have had as many calls as others have, or more, they
will have denied consent to God's mercy, whereas
others, assisted with the like, yea even lesser
helps, will have followed the inspiration, betaking
themselves to holy penance. For how could one
otherwise reasonably reproach the impenitent with
their impenitence, in comparison with such as are
converted?
Certainly Our Saviour clearly shows, and all
Christians in simplicity understand, that in this
just judgment the Jews shall be condemned in
comparison with the Ninivites, because those have had
many favours and yet no love, much assistance and no
repentance, these less favour and more love, less
assistance and much penitence.
The great S. Augustine throws a great light on
this reasoning, by his own arguments in Book XII. of
the 'City of God,' Chapters vi., vii., viii., ix. For
though he refers particularly to the angels, still he
likens men to them in this point.
Now, after having taken, in the sixth chapter, two
men, entirely equal in goodness and in all things,
attacked by the same temptation, he presupposes that
one resists, the other gives way to the enemy; then
in the ninth chapter, having proved that all the
angels were created in charity, stating further as
probable that grace and charity were equal in them
all, he asks how it came to pass that some of them
persevered, and made progress in goodness even to the
attaining of glory, while others forsook good to
embrace evil unto damnation, and he answers that no
other answer can be rendered, than that the one
company persevered by the grace of their Creator in
the chaste love which they received in their
creation, the other, having been good, made
themselves bad by their own sole will.
But if it is true, as S. Thomas extremely well
proves, that grace was different in the angels in
proportion and according to their natural gifts, the
Seraphim must have had a grace incomparably more
excellent than the simple angels of the last order.
How then did it happen that some of the Seraphim, yea
even the first of all, according to the common and
most probable opinion of the ancients, fell, while an
innumerable multitude of other angels, inferior in
nature and grace, excellently and courageously
persevered?
How came it to pass that Lucifer, so excellent by
nature and so superexcellent by grace, fell, while so
many angels with less advantages remained upright in
their fidelity? Truly those who persevered ought to
render all the praise thereof to God, who of his
mercy created and maintained them good. But to whom
can Lucifer and all his crew ascribe their fall, if
not, as S. Augustine says, to their own will, which
by their liberty divorced them from God's grace that
had so sweetly prevented them? How art thou fallen
from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the
morning?(2) Who didst come out into this invisible
world clothed with original charity as with the
beginning of the brightness of a fair day, which was
to increase unto the mid-day of eternal glory? Grace
did not fail thee, for thou hadst it, like thy
nature, the most excellent of all, but thou wast
wanting to grace. God did not deprive thee of the
operation of his love, but thou didst deprive his
love of thy co-operation. God would never have
rejected thee if thou hadst not rejected his love. O
all-good God! thou dost not forsake unless forsaken,
thou never takest away thy gifts till we take away
our hearts.
We rob God of his right if we attribute to ourselves
the glory of our salvation, but we dishonour his
mercy if we say he failed us. If we do not confess
his benefits we wrong his liberality, but we
blaspheme his goodness if we deny that he has
assisted and succoured us. In fine, God cries loud
and clear in our ears: Destruction is thy own, O
Israel: thy help is only in me.(3)
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