3o8 WORKS OF ST. CHRYSOSTOM. [HOMILY X. deathless bonds shall she also be bound There, both hands and feet ; she that has been bound with Paul s, shall have them in that day as it were an ornament about her. Free both thy self from thy bonds, and the poor man from his hunger. Why rivetest thou fast the chains of thy sins ? Some one saith, How ? When thou wearest gold whilst another is perishing, when thou, to get thee vainglory, takest so much gold, whilst another hast not even what to eat, hast thou not wedged fast thy sins? Put Christ about thee, and not gold ; where Mammon is, there Christ is not, where Christ is, there Mam mon is not. Wouldest not thou put on the King of all Himself? If one had offered thee the purple, and the diadem, wouldest thou not have taken them before all the gold in the world? I give thee not the regal ornaments, but I offer thee to put on the King Himself. And how can one put Christ on, doth any say? Hear Paul saying, "As many of you as were baptized into Christ, did put on Christ." (Gal. iii. 27.) Hear the Apostolical precept, "Make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof." (Rom. xiii. 14.) Thus doth one put on Christ, if one provide not for the flesh unto its lusts. If thou have put on Christ, even the demons will fear thee ; but if gold, even men will laugh thee to scorn : if thou have put on Christ, men also will reverence thee. Wouldest thou appear fair and comely? Be content with the Creator s fashioning. Why dost thou overlay these bits of gold, as if about to put to rights God s creation? Wouldest thou appear comely? Clothe thee in alms; clothe thee in benevolence ; clothe thee in modesty, humbleness. These are all more precious than gold ; these make even the beautiful yet more comely ; these make even the ill formed to be well formed. For when any one looks upon a countenance with good will, he gives his judg ment from love ; but an evil woman, even though she be beautiful, none can call beauti ful ; for the mind being confounded pronounc- eth not its sentence aright. That Egyptian woman of old was adorned ; Joseph too was adorned ; which ofthem was the more beautiful? I say not when she was in the palace, and he in the prison. 1 He was naked, but clothed in the garments of chastity ; she was clothed, but more unseemly than if she had been naked ; for she had not modesty. When thou hast excessively adorned thee, O woman, then thou art become more unseemly than a naked one ; for thou hast stripped thee of thy fair adorning. Eve also was naked ; but when she had clothed herself, then was she more 1 Dowries would remove the negative; but the meaning is "not only when," &c., but " even when he was exposed by the loss of his garment." unseemly, for when she was naked indeed, she was adorned with the glory of God ; but when she had clothed herself with the garment of sin, then was she unseemly. And thou, when array ing thyself in the garment of studied finery, dost then appear more unseemly. For that costli ness availeth not to make any appear beautiful, but that it is possible even for one dressed out to be even more unseemly than if naked, tell me now ; if thou hadst ever put on the dresses of a piper or a flute-player, would it not have been unseemliness? And yet those dresses are of gold ; but for this very reason it were unseem liness, because they are of gold. For the costli ness suits well with people on the stage, trage dians, players, mimes, dancers, fighters with wild beasts ; but to a woman that is a believer, there are given other robes from God, the Only-Be gotten Son of God Himself. " For," he saith, " as many as were baptized into Christ, did put on Christ." (Gal. iii. 27.) Tell me, if one had given thee kingly apparel, and thou hadst taken a beggar s 2 dress, and put this on above it, wouldest thou not, besides the unseemliness, have also been punished for it? Thou hast put on the Lord of Heaven, and of the Angels, and art thou still busied about earth? I have spoken thus, because love of ornament is of itself a great evil, even were no other gen dered by it, and it were possible to hold it with out peril, (for it inciteth to vainglory and to pride,) but now many other evils are gendered by finery, evil suspicions, unseasonable expenses, evil speakings, occasions of rapacity. For why dost thou adorn thyself? Tell me. Is it that thou mayest please thy husband ? Then do it at home. But here the reverse is the case. For ifthou wouldest please thine own husband, please not others ; but if thou please others, thou wilt not be able to please thine own. So that thou shouldest put away all thine ornaments, when thou goest to the forum or proceedest to the church. Besides, please not thy husband by those means which harlots use, but by those rather which wives that are free employ. For wherein, tell me, doth a wife differ from a har lot ? In that the one regardeth one thing only, namely, that by the beauty of her person she may attract to herself him whom she loves ; whilst the other both ruleth the house, and shar- eth in the children, and in all other things. Hast thou a little daughter? look to it lest she inherit the mischief, for they are wont to form their manners according to their nurture, and to imitate their mothers behavior. Be a pattern to thy daughter of modesty, deck thy- 2 [The Greek has a word, AUTOS, not elsewhere found in this sense, but explained (Field s Annotations) by a similar word, Awrdf, employed and interpreted in another passage by Chrys. The cor rectors changed AUITOU into the familiar eiAcuros, a Helot. J. A. B.J