12 the remembrance of wrongs worketh death.70 And you, Hermas, have endured great per- sonal71 tribulations on account of the transgressions of your house, because you did not attend to them, but were careless72 and engaged in your wicked transactions. But73 you are saved, because you did not depart from the living God, and on account of your simplicity and great self-control. These have saved you, if you remain stedfast. And they will save all who act in the same manner, and walk in guilelessness and simplicity. Those who possess such virtues will wax strong against every form of wickedness, and will abide unto eternal life. Blessed are all they who practice righteousness, for they shall never be destroyed. Now you will tell Maximus: Lo!74 tribulation cometh on. If it seemeth good to thee, deny again. The Lord is near to them who return unto Him, as it is written in Eldad and Modat,75 who prophesied to the people in the wilderness.” Chap. IV. Now a revelation was given to me, my brethren, while I slept, by a young man of comely appearance, who said to me, “Who do you think that old woman is from whom you received the book?” And I said, “The Sibyl.” “You are in a mistake,” says he; “it is not the Sibyl.” “Who is it then?” say I. And he said, “It is the Church.”76 And I said to him, “Why then is she an old woman?” “Because,” said he, “she was created first of all. On this account is she old. And for her sake was the world made.” After that I saw a vision in my house, and that old woman came and asked me, if I had yet given the book to the presbyters. And I said that I had not. And then she said, “You have done well, for I have some words to add. But when 70 The Vat. adds: but forgetfulness of them, eternal life. [Lev. xix. 18. See Jeremy Taylor, Of Forgiveness, Dis- course xi. vol. i. p. 217. London, Bohn, 1844.] 71 Personal. Worldly.—Vat. 72 You … careless. You neglected them as if they did not belong to you.—Vat. [See cap. iii. supra, “easy- minded.”] 73 But you will be saved for not having departed from the living God. And your simplicity and singular self- control will save you, if you remain stedfast.—Vat. 74 Now you will say: Lo! Great tribulation cometh on.—Vat. Lo! Exceedingly great tribulation cometh on.—Lips. [Maximus seems to have been a lapser, thus warned in a spirit of orthodoxy in contrast with Montanism, but with irony.] 75 [The sense is: This is the temptation of those who pervert the promises made to the penitent. They may say, “we are threatened with terrible persecution; let us save our lives by momentarily denying Christ: we can turn again, and the Lord is nigh to all who thus turn, as Eldad and Medad told the Israelites.”] Eldad (or Eldat or Heldat or Heldam) and Modat (Mudat or Modal) are mentioned in Num. xi. 26, 27. The apocryphal book inscribed with their name is now lost. Cotelerius compares, for the passage, Ps. xxxiv. 9. 76 The Church. The Church of God.—Vat. [See Grabe’s note, Bull’s Defens. Fid. Nicæn., 1. cap. 2. sec. 6; Works, vol. v. part. 1. p. 67.] 19 Vision Second. Again, of His Neglect in Chastising His Talkative Wife and…