Chapter 4.—That the Great Reason for the Advent of Christ Was the Commendation of Love.

7. Moreover, what greater reason is apparent for the advent of the Lord than that God might show His love in us, commending it powerfully, inasmuch as “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us”?28    Rom. v. 8, 10 And furthermore, this is with the intent that, inasmuch as charity is “the end of the commandment,”29    1 Tim. i. 5 and “the fulfilling of the law,”30    Rom. xiii. 10 we also may love one another and lay down our life for the brethren, even as He laid down His life for us.31    1 John iii. 16 And with regard to God Himself, its object is that, even if it were an irksome task to love Him, it may now at least cease to be irksome for us to return His love, seeing that “He first loved us,”32    1 John iv. 10, 19 and “spared not His own only Son, but delivered Him up for us all.”33    Rom. viii. 32 For there is no mightier invitation to love than to anticipate in loving; and that soul is over hard which, supposing it unwilling indeed to give love, is unwilling also to give the return of love. But if, even in the case of criminal and sordid loves, we see how those who desire to be loved in return make it their special and absorbing business, by such proofs as are within their power, to render the strength of the love which they themselves bear plain and patent; if we also perceive how they affect to put forward an appearance of justice in what they thus offer, such as may qualify them in some sort to demand that a response be made in all fairness to them on the part of those souls which they are laboring to beguile; if, further, their own passion burns more vehemently when they observe that the minds which they are eager to possess are also moved now by the same fire: if thus, I say, it happens at once that the soul which before was torpid is excited so soon as it feels itself to be loved, and that the soul which was enkindled already becomes the more inflamed so soon as it is made cognizant of the return of its own love, it is evident that no greater reason is to be found why love should be either originated or enlarged, than what appears in the occasion when one who as yet loves not at all comes to know himself to be the object of love, or when one who is already a lover either hopes that he may yet be loved in turn, or has by this time the evidence of a response to his affection. And if this holds good even in the case of base loves, how much more34    Reading quanto plus, for which some mss. give plurius, while in a large number we find purius = with how much greater purity should it hold good, etc. in (true) friendship? For what else have we carefully to attend to in this question touching the injuring of friendship than to this, namely, not to give our friend cause to suppose either that we do not love him at all, or that we love him less than he loves us? If, indeed, he is led to entertain this belief, he will be cooler in that love in which men enjoy the interchange of intimacies one with another; and if he is not of that weak type of character to which such an offense to affection will serve as a cause of freezing off from love altogether, he yet confines himself to that kind of affection in which he loves, not with the view of enjoyment to himself, but with the idea of studying the good of others. But again it is worth our while to notice how,—although superiors also have the wish to be loved by their inferiors, and are gratified with the zealous attention35    Reading studioso…obsequio, for which studiose, etc., also occurs in the editions = are earnestly gratified with the attention, etc. paid to them by such, and themselves cherish greater affection towards these inferiors the more they become cognizant of that,—with what might of love, nevertheless, the inferior kindles so soon as he learns that he is beloved by his superior. For there have we love in its more grateful aspect, where it does not consume itself36    Æstuat= burn, heave. in the drought of want, but flows forth in the plenteousness of beneficence. For the former type of love is of misery, the latter of mercy.37    Ex miseria…ex misericordia And furthermore, if the inferior was despairing even of the possibility of his being loved by his superior, he will now be inexpressibly moved to love if the superior has of his own will condescended to show how much he loves this person who could by no means be bold enough to promise himself so great a good. But what is there superior to God in the character of Judge? and what more desperate than man in the character of sinner?—than man, I ask, who had given himself all the more unreservedly up to the wardship and domination of proud powers which are unable to make him blessed, as he had come more absolutely to despair of the possibility of his being an object of interest to that power which wills not to be exalted in wickedness, but is exalted in goodness.

8. If, therefore, it was mainly for this purpose that Christ came, to wit, that man might learn how much God loves him; and that he might learn this, to the intent that he might be kindled to the love of Him by whom he was first loved, and might also love his neighbor at the command and showing of Him who became our neighbor, in that He loved man when, instead of being a neighbor to Him, he was sojourning far apart: if, again, all divine Scripture, which was written aforetime, was written with the view of presignifying the Lord’s advent; and if whatever has been committed to writing in times subsequent to these, and established by divine authority, is a record of Christ, and admonishes us of love, it is manifest that on those two commandments of love to God and love to our neighbor38    Matt. xxii. 40 hang not only all the law and the prophets, which at the time when the Lord spoke to that effect were as yet the only Holy Scripture, but also all those books of the divine literature which have been written39    Reading conscripta, for which some mss. have consecuta = have followed, and many give consecrata, dedicated. at a later period for our health, and consigned to remembrance. Wherefore, in the Old Testament there is a veiling of the New, and in the New Testament there is a revealing of the Old. According to that veiling, carnal men, understanding things in a carnal fashion, have been under the dominion, both then and now, of a penal fear. According to this revealing, on the other hand, spiritual men,—among whom we reckon at once those then who knocked in piety and found even hidden things opened to them, and others now who seek in no spirit of pride, lest even things uncovered should be closed to them,—understanding in a spiritual fashion, have been made free through the love wherewith they have been gifted. Consequently, inasmuch as there is nothing more adverse to love than envy, and as pride is the mother of envy, the same Lord Jesus Christ, God-man, is both a manifestation of divine love towards us, and an example of human humility with us, to the end that our great swelling might be cured by a greater counteracting remedy. For here is great misery, proud man! But there is greater mercy, a humble God! Take this love, therefore, as the end that is set before you, to which you are to refer all that you say, and, whatever you narrate, narrate it in such a manner that he to whom you are discoursing on hearing may believe, on believing may hope, on hoping may love.

CAPUT IV.

7. Praecipua causa adventus Christi, charitatis commendatio. Ad dilectionem referenda esse quae de Christo ex Scripturis narrantur in catechismo. Quae autem major causa est adventus Domini, nisi ut ostenderet Deus dilectionem suam in nobis, commendans eam vehementer? quia cum adhuc inimici essemus, Christus pro nobis mortuus est (Rom. V, 6-9). Hoc autem ideo, quia finis praecepti et plenitudo legis, charitas est (I Tim. I, 5, et Rom. XIII, 10): ut et nos invicem diligamus, et quemadmodum ille pro nobis animam suam posuit, sic et nos pro fratribus animam ponamus (I Joan. III, 16); et ipsum Deum, quoniam prior dilexit nos (Id. IV, 10), et Filio suo unico non pepercit, sed pro nobis omnibus tradidit eum (Rom. VIII, 32), si amare pigebat, saltem nunc redamare non pigeat . Nulla est enim major ad amorem invitatio, quam praevenire amando; et nimis durus est animus qui dilectionem si nolebat impendere, nolit rependere. Quod si in ipsis flagitiosis et sordidis amoribus videmus, nihil aliud eos agere qui amari vicissim volunt, nisi ut documentis quibus valent aperiant et ostendant quantum ament; eamque imaginem justitiae praetendere affectant, ut vicem sibi reddi quodam modo flagitent ab eis animis quos illecebrare moliuntur; ipsique ardentius aestuant, cum jam moveri eodem igne etiam illas mentes quas appetunt sentiunt: si ergo et animus qui torpebat, cum se amari senserit excitatur, et qui jam fervebat, cum se redamari didicerit magis accenditur; manifestum est nullam esse majorem causam qua vel inchoetur vel augeatur amor, quam cum amari se cognoscit qui 0315 nondum amat, aut redamari se vel posse sperat, vel jam probat qui prior amat. Et si hoc etiam in turpibus amoribus, quanto plus in amicitia? Quid enim aliud cavemus in offensione amicitiae, nisi ne amicus arbitretur quod eum vel non diligimus, vel minus diligimus quam ipse nos diligit? Quod si crediderit, frigidior erit in eo amore quo invicem homines mutua familiaritate perfruuntur: et si non ita est infirmus, ut haec illum offensio faciat ab omni dilectione frigescere; in ea se tenet, qua non ut fruatur, sed ut consulat diligit. Operae pretium est autem animadvertere, quomodo, quanquam et superiores velint se ab inferioribus diligi, eorumque in se studioso delectentur obsequio, et quanto magis id senserint, tanto magis eos diligant, tamen quanto amore exardescat inferior, cum a superiore se diligi senserit. Ibi enim gratior amor est, ubi non aestuat indigentiae siccitate, sed ubertate beneficentiae profluit. Ille namque amor ex miseria est, iste ex misericordia. Jam vero si etiam se amari posse a superiore desperabat inferior, ineffabiliter commovebitur in amorem, si ultro ille fuerit dignatus ostendere quantum diligat eum qui nequaquam sibi tantum bonum promittere auderet. Quid autem superius Deo judicante, et quid desperatius homine peccante? qui se tanto magis tuendum et subjugandum superbis potestatibus addixerat, quae beatificare non possunt, quanto magis desperaverat posse sui curam geri ab ea potestate quae non malitia sublimis esse vult, sed bonitate sublimis est.

8. Si ergo maxime propterea Christus advenit, ut cognosceret homo quantum eum diligat Deus; et ideo cognosceret, ut in ejus dilectionem a quo prior dilectus est, inardesceret, proximumque illo jubente et demonstrante diligeret, qui non proximum, sed longe peregrinantem diligendo factus est proximus; omnisque Scriptura divina quae ante scripta est, ad praenuntiandum adventum Domini scripta est; et quidquid postea mandatum est litteris et divina auctoritate firmatum, Christum narrat, et dilectionem monet: manifestum est non tantum totam Legem et Prophetas in illis duobus pendere praeceptis dilectionis Dei et proximi (Matth. XXII, 40), quae adhuc sola Scriptura sancta erat cum hoc Dominus diceret, sed etiam quaecumque posterius salubriter conscripta sunt memoriaeque mandata divinarum volumina Litterarum. Quapropter in Veteri Testamento est occultatio Novi, in Novo Testamento est manifestatio Veteris. Secundum illam occultationem carnaliter intelligentes carnales, et tunc et nunc poenali timore subjugati sunt. Secundum hanc autem manifestationem spirituales, et tunc quibus pie pulsantibus etiam occulta patuerunt, et nunc qui non superbe quaerunt, ne etiam aperta claudantur, spiritualiter intelligentes donata charitate liberati sunt. Quia ergo charitati nihil adversius quam invidentia; mater autem invidentiae superbia est: 0316 idem Dominus Jesus Christus, Deus homo, et divinae in nos dilectionis indicium est, et humanae apud nos humilitatis exemplum, ut magnus tumor noster majore contraria medicina sanaretur. Magna est enim miseria, superbus homo; sed major misericordia, humilis Deus. Hac ergo dilectione tibi tanquam fine proposito, quo referas omnia quae dicis, quidquid narras ita narra, ut ille cui loqueris audiendo credat, credendo speret, sperando amet.