HOMILY X.] HOMILIES ON PHILIPPIANS. ceive a youth that knows no old age, a youth too, which, joined with great riches, hath far more of spirit, to be unwilling to give up a little trifle, but to hold fast things that contribute not a whit to the present life. They can never rescue you from death, they have no power to drive away disease, to stay old age, or any one of those events, which happen by necessity and according to the law of nature. And do you still hold to them ? Tell me, what do you gain ? Drunkenness, gluttony, pleasures contrary to nature and various in kind, which are far worse torturers than the hardest masters. These are the advantages which we gain from riches, nor is there one besides, since we are not so minded, for if we had had the mind, we might have won heaven itself for our inheritance by our riches. " So then riches are good," he says. It is not riches, but the will of the pos sessor that effects this, for because it is the will that does this, it is in the power even of a poor man to win heaven. For, as I have often said, God does not regard the amount of the gifts, but the will of the givers ; it is possible even for one in poverty, who has given but little, to bear off all, for God requires a measure proportioned to our ability, neither will riches secure heaven to us, nor poverty, hell ; but a good or a bad will, either one or the other. This then let us correct, this let us repossess, this let us regulate, and all will then be easy to us. For as the artificer works the wood the same, whether his axe be of iron or of gold, or rather he does it the better with an implement of iron, so here too, the straight path of virtue is more easily kept in a state of poverty. For touching riches we read, " It is easier for a camel to go through a needle s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of Heaven." (Matt. xix. 24.) But He has made no such declara- tions about poverty ; nay, the very reverse, " Sell thy goods, and give to the poor, and come follow Me" (v. 21) ; as if the act of following were to spring from the selling. Never then let us flee from poverty as an evil, for it is the procurer of heaven. Again, let us never follow riches as a good ; for they are the ruin of such as walk unwarily, but in everything directing our eyes to God, let us, as occasion requires, use those gifts which He has vouch safed us, both strength of body, and abundance of money, and every other gift ; for it is unnat ural that we, who have our being for Him, should make these things serviceable to others, yet not to Him who has made us. He formed thine eye : make it serviceable to Him, not to the devil. But how serviceable to Him ? By con templating His creatures and praising and glori fying Him, and by withdrawing it from all gaze at women. Did He make thy hands? Preserve them for His use, not for the devil, not putting them out for robbery and rapine, but for His commandments and for good deeds, for earnest prayers, for holding out help to the fallen. Hath He made thine ears? Give these to Him, and not to effeminate l strains nor to disgraceful tales ; but " let all thy communication be in the law of the Most High." (Ecclus. ix. 15.) For "stand," he says, " in the multitude of the elders, and who ever is wise, cleave unto him." (Ecclus. vi. 34.) Did he make thy mouth ? Let it do nought that is displeasing to Him, but sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. " Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth," says the Apostle, " but such as is good for edifying as the need may be, that it may give grace to them that hear" (Eph. iv. 29); for edification and not for subversion, for fair words and not for evil speaking and plotting against other, but the very opposite. He hath made thy feet, not that thou shouldest run to do evil, but to do good. He made thy belly, not that thou shouldest cram it to bursting, but to practice lessons of wisdom. For the production of children, He implanted desire in thy mind, not for fornication, nor for adultery. He gave thee understanding, not to make of thee a blasphemer or a reviler, but that thou mightest be without falsehood. He gave us both money to be used on fitting occasion, and strength likewise to be used on fitting occasion. He instituted arts, that our present state of ex istence might be held together by them, not that we should separate ourselves from spiritual things, not that we should devote ourselves to the base arts but to the necessary ones, that we might minister to one another s good, and not that we should plot one against another. He gave us a roof, that it might afford shelter from j the rain, and no more, not that it should be ! decked out with gold, while the poor man j perishes with hunger. He gave clothing to i cover us, not to make a display withal, not that things like these should have much gold | lavished upon them, and that Christ should perish naked. He gave you a place of shelter, not that you should keep it to yourself, but to offer it to others also. He gave thee land, not that, cutting off the chief portion of it, you should spend the good gifts of God upon har lots, and dancers, and actors, and flute players, and harp players, but upon those that hunger and are in want. He gave you the sea to sail on, that you might not be wearied with journey ing, not that you should pry into its depths, and bring up thence precious stones and all the other things of the same kind, nor that you should make this your business. "Why then are there precious stones?" he broken," so called from using the chromatic scale to excess.