Chapter XX.
Of the feigned patience of some who offer the other
cheek to be smitten.
We
are not ignorant also
of another kind of insanity, which we find in some of the brethren
under colour of a counterfeit patience, as in this case it is not
enough to have stirred up quarrels unless they incite them with
irritating words so as to get themselves smitten, and when they have
been touched by the slightest blow, at once they offer another part of
their body to be smitten, as if in this way they could fulfil to
perfection that command which says: “If a man smite thee on the
right cheek, offer him the other also;”
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while they totally ignore the meaning
and purpose of the passage. For they fancy that they are practising
evangelical patience through the sin of anger, for the utter
eradication of which not only was the exchange of retaliation and the
irritation of strife forbidden, but the command was actually given us
to mitigate the wrath of the striker by the endurance of a double
wrong.
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S.
Matt. v. 39
.