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Ad eos qui ipsum acciverant nec occurrerant

ORATION III.

To those who had called him, and had not met him.

35.517 I. How slow you are to our discourse, O friends and brethren, though indeed

swift to tyrannize, and to tear me from our acropolis of solitude, which I, above all things, had embraced, and as a fellow-worker and mother of the divine ascent, and deifying, I both especially admired and set before my whole life? How is it that you despise what you desired to receive, now that you have it, and have shown yourselves better at desiring us when absent, than at enjoying us when present, as if you had wished rather to master our philosophy than to profit by it? Or it is well for me to say this also: we became a surfeit to you, before you had tasted, or had experience of us; a most paradoxical thing. 35.520

II. And you did not even gather us as strangers, or gather with us, that I may say something more tenderly, reverencing this commandment, if nothing else; nor did you lead by the hand those who were beginning, nor encourage the timid, nor comfort those who were constrained; but you have made the festival no festival for us—I hesitate to say it, but let it be said nevertheless—and you have greeted us with ill omens; and you have mingled gloom with the solemn assembly, which lacks the greatest source of its pleasure, you, my conquerors—for to call you lovers is not true. So easily despised is everything that is easily conquered; and what is lofty is courted, but what is humbled for God's sake is dishonored.

III. What do you wish? Shall I be judged by you, or shall I become judge? Shall I cast a vote, or receive one? For I expect both to win if I am judged, and to condemn justly if I pronounce sentence. The charge is that you do not repay our love with equal measure, nor do you give in return the honor of your obedience, nor do you guarantee the future by your present zeal, which can with difficulty be trusted even with this; since everyone is more ardent at the beginning. But each of you puts something else before both the old and the new shepherd, reverencing neither the gray hairs, nor welcoming the youth.

IV. There is in the Gospels a splendid supper, and a skillful host, and friends, and a most pleasant banquet; for it is a son's wedding. And he invites them, but they do not come; and he is angry; and I pass over what comes between because of its unpleasantness; but, to speak moderately, he fills the banquet with others. This, then, we pray to avert; but you have become to me so much (how shall I put it mildly?) loftier or more audacious than they, inasmuch as those who were invited to the supper rise up against it, and insult him who invited them. But you, not being from without, nor among those invited to the wedding, but having yourselves invited us, and bound us to this holy table, and showed us the splendor of the bridal chamber, then 35.521 having abandoned us—for this is your most noble act; one to his own field, another to his newly bought yoke of oxen, another to his newly married wife, another to some other of the little things, you have been scattered and have leapt away, caring little for the bridal chamber and the bridegroom.

V. For this reason I have been filled with despondency and perplexity; for I will not be silent about what I have suffered; and I almost held back the discourse, which I intended to offer as a gift at the wedding, the most beautiful and most precious thing I had; and almost let you go, you who were longed for, since I was once forced away; seeing that I had thus laid hold of a splendid

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Ad eos qui ipsum acciverant nec occurrerant

ΛΟΓΟΣ Γʹ.

Πρὸς τοὺς καλέσαντας, καὶ μὴ ἀπαντήσαντας.

35.517 Αʹ. Πῶς βραδεῖς ἐπὶ τὸν ἡμέτερον λόγον, ὦ φίλοι καὶ ἀδελφοὶ, καίτοι γε

ταχεῖς εἰς τὸ τυραννῆσαι, καὶ τῆς ἡμετέρας ἀκροπόλεως ἀποσπᾶσαι τῆς ἐρημίας, ἣν ἐγὼ πάντων μάλιστα ἠσπασάμην, καὶ ὡς συνεργὸν καὶ μητέρα τῆς θείας ἀναβάσεως, καὶ θεοποιὸν, δια φερόντως ἠγάσθην τε καὶ παντὸς τοῦ βίου προεστη σάμην; Πῶς ὃ λαβεῖν ἐποθεῖτε περιφρονεῖτε λαβόν τες, καὶ βελτίους ἐφάνητε ποθεῖν ἀπόντας, ἢ ἀπολαύ ειν παρόντων, ὥσπερ κρατῆσαι μᾶλλον τῆς ἡμε τέρας φιλοσοφίας ἢ ὄνασθαι ταύτης θελήσαντες; Ἢ καλόν μοι καὶ τοῦτο εἰπεῖν· ἐγενήθημεν ὑμῖν εἰς πλησμονὴν, πρὶν γευσθῆναι, καὶ πεῖραν δοῦναι· τὸ παραδοξότατον. 35.520

Βʹ. Καὶ οὐδὲ ὡς ξένους ἡμᾶς συνηγάγητε, ἢ συνήχθητε μεθ' ἡμῶν, ἵν' εἴπω τι συμπαθέστερον, ταύ την, εἰ μή τι ἄλλο, τὴν ἐντολὴν αἰδεσθέντες· οὐδὲ ὡς ἀρχομένους ἐχειραγωγήσατε, οὐδὲ ὡς δειλοὺς ἐθαρσύνατε, οὐδὲ ὡς βιασθέντας παρεκαλέσατε· ἀλλ' ἀνέορτον ἡμῖν, ὀκνῶ μὲν εἰπεῖν, εἰρήσθω δὲ ὅμως, πεποιήκατε τὴν ἑορτὴν, καὶ προοιμίοις οὐκ ἀγαθοῖς ἡμᾶς ἐδεξιώσασθε· καὶ τῇ πανηγύρει κατή φειαν κατεμίξατε, τὸ μέγιστον εἰς ἡδονὴν οὐκ ἐχούσῃ τοὺς ἐμοὺς νικητὰς ὑμᾶς, οὐ γὰρ ἐραστὰς εἰπεῖν ἀλη θές. Οὕτως εὐκαταφρόνητον ἅπαν τὸ ῥᾳδίως νικώμενον· καὶ θεραπεύεται μὲν τὸ ὑψηλὸν, ἀτιμάζεται δὲ τὸ Θεῷ ταπεινούμενον.

Γʹ. Τί βούλεσθε; Κριθῶ πρὸς ὑμᾶς, ἢ κριτὴς γένωμαι; ἐνέγκω ψῆφον, ἢ δέξωμαι; Καὶ γὰρ νική σειν ἐλπίζω, κρινόμενος, καὶ καταψηφιεῖσθαι δικαίως ἀποφαινόμενος. Τὸ δὲ ἔγκλημα, ὅτι μὴ τοῖς ἴσοις μέ τροις ἀμείβεσθε τῆς ἀγάπης ἡμᾶς, μηδὲ τῆς εὐ πειθείας τὴν τιμὴν ἀντιδίδοτε, μηδὲ τὸ μέλλον ἐγγυᾶσθε τῇ νῦν προθυμίᾳ, μόγις καὶ μετὰ ταύτης πιστευθῆναι δυνάμενον· ἐπειδὴ θερμότερος ἅπας ἀρ χόμενος. Ἄλλος δὲ ἄλλο τι προτιμότερον τίθεσθε καὶ τοῦ παλαιοῦ καὶ τοῦ νέου ποιμένος, μήτε τὴν πολιὰν αἰδούμενοι, μήτε τὴν νεότητα προσκα λούμενοι.

∆ʹ. ∆εῖπνόν ἐστιν ἐν τοῖς Εὐαγγελίοις λαμπρὸν, καὶ δεξιὸς ἑστιάτωρ, καὶ φίλοι, καὶ τὸ συμπόσιον ἥδιστον· υἱοῦ γὰρ γάμος. Καὶ ὁ μὲν συγκαλεῖ, οἱ δὲ οὐ συνέρχονται· ὁ δὲ ἀγανακτεῖ· καὶ παρίημι τὰ ἐν μέσῳ διὰ τὸ δύσφημον· ἀλλ' ὃ μέτριον εἰπεῖν, δι' ἄλλων πληροῖ τὸ συμπόσιον. Τοῦτο μὲν οὖν ἀπευχόμεθα· ὑμεῖς δὲ τοσοῦτον ἐκείνων γεγόνατέ μοι (πῶς εἴπω πράως;) ὑψηλότεροι ἢ θρασύτε ροι, ὅσον οἱ μὲν κεκλημένοι τοῦ δείπνου κατεξανί στανται, καὶ κατὰ τοῦ κεκληκότος ὑβρίζουσιν· ὑμεῖς δὲ, οὐ τῶν ἔξωθεν ὄντες, οὐδὲ τῶν κεκλημένων ἐπὶ τοὺς γάμους, ἀλλ' αὐτοὶ συγκαλέσαντες ἡμᾶς, καὶ τῇ ἱερᾷ ταύτῃ τραπέζῃ προσδήσαντες, καὶ τοῦ νυμφῶνος τὴν λαμπρότητα παραδείξαντες, ἔπειτα 35.521 καταλιπόντες ἡμᾶς τοῦτο γὰρ ὑμῶν τὸ γενναιότα τον· ὁ μὲν ἐπὶ τὸν ἴδιον ἀγρὸν, ὁ δὲ ἐπὶ τὸ ζεῦ γος τῶν βοῶν τὸ νεώνητον, ὁ δὲ ἐπὶ τὴν γυναῖκα τὴν νεόνυμφον, ὁ δὲ ἄλλος ἐπ' ἄλλο τι τῶν μικρῶν διεσπάρητε καὶ ἀπεπηδήσατε, μικρὰ τοῦ νυμφῶνος καὶ τοῦ νυμφίου φροντίσαντες.

Εʹ. ∆ιὰ τοῦτο ἀθυμίας ἐνεπλήσθην καὶ ἀπο ρίας· οὐ γὰρ ὃ πέπονθα, σιωπήσομαι· καὶ μικροῦ μὲν ἀνέσχον τὸν λόγον, ὃν δωροφορῆσαι διενοούμην τῷ γάμῳ, τὸ κάλλιστον ὧν εἶχον καὶ τιμιώτατον· μικροῦ δὲ ὑμῖν ἐπαφῆκα τοῖς ποθουμένοις, ἐπει δή γε ἅπαξ ἐξεβιάσθην· ἅτε δὴ λαμπρᾶς οὕτω λαβόμενος