119 that we are strengthening our enemy, our real enemy, and that for him we are doing wrong to our own members. Wouldest thou be revengeful and be at enmity? Be at enmity, but be so with the devil, and not with a member of thine own. For this purpose it is that God hath armed us with anger, not that we should thrust the sword against our own bodies, but that we should baptize343 the whole blade in the devil’s breast. There bury the sword up to the hilt; yea, if thou wilt, hilt and all, and never draw it out again, but add yet another and an- other. And this actually comes to pass when we are merciful to those of our own spiritual family and peaceably disposed one towards another. Perish money, perish glory and repu- tation; mine own member is dearer to me than they all. Thus let us say to ourselves; let us not do violence to our own nature to gain wealth, to obtain glory. Ver. 28. “Let him that stole,”344 saith he, “steal no more.” Seest thou what are the members of the old man? Falsehood, revenge, theft. Why said he not, “Let him that stole” be punished, be tortured, be racked; but, “let him steal no more”? “But rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing that is good, that he may have whereof to give to him that hath need.” Where are they which are called pure;345 they that are full of all defilement, and yet dare to give themselves a name like this? For it is possible, very possible, to put off the reproach, 343 βαπτίζωμεν τὴν μάχαιραν εἰς τὸ τοῦ διαβόλου στῆθος. 344 [“‘The stealer (ὁκλέπτων) is to steal no more.’ The present participle does not stand for the past, but is used substantively (like ὁσπείρων, Matt. xiii. 3.). As there were in the apostolic church ‘fornicators’ (1 Cor. v. 1.), so there were also ‘stealers,’ and the attempts to tone down the word are arbitrary and superfluous.”—Mey- er.—G.A.] 345 καθαροί. The Cathari, or pure, was the title which the Novatians indirectly assumed, by maintaining that none were in God’s favor but those who had not sinned after baptism, or who were pure as baptism made them, and by separating from the Church for granting absolution to penitents. The schism originated at Rome in the middle of the third century. Accordingly St. Chrysostom in the text says, that whereas all men need pardon continually, they who affected to be clean or pure without securing it were, as being without it, of all men most unclean. [And he strongly asserts, as against the Novatians, that it is possible to put away the guilt of sins com- mitted after baptism, by ceasing from the practice of them and working that which is good. This view, however, differs from the Protestant view, that the putting away the guilt of sin is at first and always through God’s mercy and grace in Jesus Christ.—G.A.] In the sixth of eleven new Homilies edited by the Benedictines, t. xii. p. 355, he says that we may as well talk of the sea being clear of waves as any soul pure from daily sins, though not from transgressing express commandment, yet from vainglory, willfulness, impure thoughts, coveting, lying, resentment, envy, &c., and he mentions as means of washing away sins, coming to Church, grieving for them, confessing them, doing alms, praying, helping the injured, and forgiving injuries. “Let us provide ourselves with these,” he proceeds, “every day, washing, wiping ourselves clean, and withal confessing ourselves unprofitable,” unlike the Pharisee. “Thus ordering ourselves, we shall be able to find mercy and pardon in that fearful day, &c.” This homily was delivered at Constantinople. [On the Novatians, see Schaff, Church History, II., pp. 196, 197.—G.A.] 222 Ephesians 4:25-27