Ambrosiaster : What a grave sin is covetousness, though we gloss over it when compared with fornication and uncleanness. We treat covetousness as a minor fault when in fact it is a grave matter. No one can be a saint in whom is found any of these things that he forbids. — EPISTLE TO THE Ephesians 5.3 Clement of Alexandria : From filthy speaking we ourselves must entirely abstain, and stop the mouths of those who practise it by stern looks and averting the face, and by what we call making a mock of one: often also by a harsher mode of speech. "For what proceedeth out of the mouth," He says, "defileth a man,"—shows him to be unclean, and heathenish, and untrained, and licentious, and not select, and proper, and honourable, and temperate. And as a similar rule holds with regard to hearing and seeing in the case of what is obscene, the divine Instructor, following the same course with both, arrays those children who are engaged in the struggle in words of modesty, as ear-guards, so that the pulsation of fornication may not penetrate to the bruising of the soul; and He directs the eyes to the sight of what is honourable, saying that it is better to make a slip with the feet than with the eyes. This filthy speaking the apostle beats off, saying, "Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but what is good." And again, "As becometh saints, let not filthiness be named among you, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which things are not seemly, but rather giving of thanks." — The Instructor Book 2 Gaius Marius Victorinus : The name, the mind and the conscience of the saints demand that the tongue itself should be an agent of holiness. If a person who is holy in his ways speaks unnecessarily of abominable behaviors, he may harbor sin. Even speaking of them may show how well acquainted he is with vices better left unspoken. — EPISTLE TO THE Ephesians 2.5.3 Ignatius of Antioch : Let no one addicted to idleness eat, lest he become a wanderer about, and a whoremonger. Let drunkenness, anger, envy, reviling, clamour, and blasphemy "be not so much as named among you." Let not the widows live a life of pleasure, lest they wax wanton against the word. Be subject to Caesar in everything in which subjection implies no [spiritual] danger. Provoke not those that rule over you to wrath, that you may give no occasion against yourselves to those that seek for it. But as to the practice of magic, or the impure love of boys, or murder, it is superfluous to write to you, since such vices are forbidden to be committed even by the Gentiles. I do not issue commands on these points as if I were an apostle; but, as your fellow-servant, I put you in mind of them. — Epistle of Pseudo-Ignatius to the Antiochians Jerome : Even one who is in fact free of fornication is not holy if he remains mentally preoccupied with some uncleanness or with the avaricious pursuit of the pleasures that have once delighted him. — Commentary on Ephesians 5:3-4 John Chrysostom : He has spoken of the bitter passion, of wrath; he now comes to the lesser evil: for that lust is the lesser evil, hear how Moses also in the law says, first, "Thou shalt do no murder," which is the work of wrath, and then, "Thou shalt not commit adultery," which is of lust. For as "bitterness," and "clamor," and "all malice," and "railing," and the like, are the works of the passionate man, so likewise are "fornication, uncleanness, covetousness," those of the lustful; since avarice and sensuality spring from the same passion. But just as in the former case he took away "clamor" as being the vehicle of "anger," so now does he "filthy talking" and "jesting" as being the vehicle of lust. — Homily on Ephesians 17 Origen of Alexandria : Fornication in the strict sense is consorting with prostitutes. Impurity is the generic name, in the maelstrom of our bodily existence, not only for adultery and pederasty but also all the other inventions of sexual licentiousness in all their many and diverse practices. Greed can be taken either straight-forwardly or, as I have established [with regard to 1 Thessalonians 4:4-6], in the sense of "adultery." — EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS Tertullian : Again: "But let fornication and every impurity not be even named among you, as becometh saints," -so far is it from being excused,-"knowing this, that every fornicator or impure (person) hath not God's kingdom. — On Modesty