Good is Limitless No Good has a limit in its own nature but is limited by the presence of its opposite, as life is limited by death and light by darkness … Just as the end of life is the beginning of death, so also stopping in the race of virtue marks the beginning of the race of evil. Whoever pursues true virtue participates in nothing other than God, because […]
Read moreMan and the World For it cannot be that while in yourself there is a mind appointed as your ruler which all the community of the body obeys and each of the senses follows, the world, the fairest, and greatest and most perfect work of all, of which everything else is a part, is without a king who holds it together and directs it with justice. That the king is […]
Read moreThe Ideal Lawgiver Moses, through God’s providence, became king and lawgiver and high priest and prophet. But to command what should be done and forbid what should not be done is the peculiar function of law; so that it follows at once that the king is a living law and the law a just king. But a king and lawgiver ought to have under his purview not only human but […]
Read moreFriend of God For, since God judged him worthy to appear as a partner of His own possessions, He gave into his hands the whole world as a portion well fitted for His heir. Therefore, each element obeyed him as its master, changed its natural properties and submitted to his command, and this perhaps is no wonder. For if, as the proverb says, what belongs to friends is common, and […]
Read moreGod’s resting is not, then, as some conceive, that God ceased from doing. For, being good, if He should ever cease from doing good, then would He cease from being God, which it is sacrilege even to say. The resting is, therefore, the ordering that the order of created things should be preserved inviolate, and that each of the creatures should cease from the ancient disorder. For the creations on […]
Read moreWe ourselves are accustomed to observe certain days, as for example the Lord’s day, the Preparation, the Passover, or Pentecost. To the perfect Christian, who is ever in his thoughts, words, and deeds serving his natural Lord, God the Word, all his days are the Lord’s, and he is always keeping the Lord’s day. He also who is unceasingly preparing himself for the true life, and abstaining from the pleasures […]
Read moreAltar, Statue, and Temple We regard the spirit of every good man as an altar from which arises an incense which is truly and spiritually sweet-smelling, namely, the prayers ascending from a pure conscience. Therefore it is said by John in the Revelation, “The odours are the prayers of saints;” and by the Psalmist, “Let my prayer come up before Thee as incense.” And the statues and gifts which are fit […]
Read more