AT LAST HE REACHES THE RECORD OF HIS THIRTY-SECOND YEAR, BY FAR THE MOST MEMORABLE OF HIS WHOLE LIFE, IN WHICH HAVING BEEN INSTRUCTED BY SIMPLICIANUS, WITH REFERENCE TO THE CONVERSION OF OTHERS, AND ON THE REASON FOR SUCH A COURSE OF ACTION, AFTER A VIOLENT MENTAL STRUGGLE, HIS WHOLE SPIRIT IS RENEWED, AND HE IS CONVERTED TO GOD.

CHAPTER I.

In the struggle between his devotion to Divine things, and his captivity to his passions, he consults Simplicianus concerning Spiritual Renewal.

"Let my

MY God, let me, with thanksgiving, remember, and confess unto Thee Thy mercies upon me. bones" be bathed in Thy love, and " say, Lord, who is like unto Thee" (Ps. xxxv. 10), "Thou hast broken my bonds in sunder, I will offer unto Thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving" (Ps. cxvi. 16). And how Thou hast broken them, I will declare; and all who worship Thee, when they hear this, shall say, "Blessed be the Lord, in heaven and in earth, great and wonderful is His name." Thy words had stuck fast in my heart, and "I was hedged round about on every side by Thee" (Job i. 10). Of Thy eternal life I was now certain, though I saw it in a figure and as "through a glass" (1 Cor. xiii. 12). And all my doubt as to an incorruptible substance, and as to all other substance having their being from it, was removed; nor did I now desire to be more certain of Thee, but more stedfast in Thee. But for my temporal life, all was wavering, and "my heart had to be purged from the old leaven" (1 Cor. v. 7). The Way, the Saviour Himself, well pleased me, but as yet I was reluctant to journey thereon, by reason of its straitness. And Thou didst put into my mind, and it seemed good in

my sight, to go to Simplicianus, who appeared to be a good servant of Thine; and Thy grace shone in him. I had heard also, that from his youth up, he had most devoutly lived to Thee. At that time he had grown old, and from his long years spent in so zealously following Thy ways, he seemed to me to have had much experience, and to have learned much; and truly such was he. I wished then that he would tell me, after learning of my difficulties, what means would be suitable for one, situated as I was, to walk in Thy way.

For, I saw the church full; and one went this way, and another that way. But I did not like to lead a secular life, and now that my desires ceased to inflame me, as they had formerly done, with ambition of honour and wealth, the burden of such a slavery was too great for me to bear. For, in comparison of Thy sweetness, "and the beauty of Thy house which I loved" (Ps. xxvi. 8), those things delighted. me no longer. But still I was enthralled with the love of woman; nor did the Apostle forbid me to marry, although he advised me to something better, and especially "would that all men were even as he himself" (1 Cor. vii. 7). But I being weak, chose the softer place; and because of this alone, was distressed and wearied in all beside, and languishing with wasting anxieties, because even in other matters, which I was unwilling to endure, I was obliged to conform to the conjugal life, to which, as I had given myself, I was bound. I had heard from the mouth of the Truth, “ that there were some eunuchs, which had made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake: but," saith He, "he that is able to receive it, let him receive it" (S. Matt. xix. 12). Surely vain are all men who are ignorant of God, and could not out of the good things that are seen, know Him that is" (Wisd. xiii. 1). But I was no longer in that vanity; I had surmounted it; and, by the consent of Thy whole creation, had found Thee our Creator, and Thy Word, God with Thee, and together with Thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, by whom Thou hast created all things. There is yet another kind of ungodly, "who knowing God, glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful" (Rom. i. 21). Into this also had I fallen, but "Thy right hand hath holden me up" (Ps. xviii. 35), and Thou didst take me thence, and place me where I might recover.

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For

Thou hast said unto man, "Behold, the fear of the Lord is wisdom" (Job xxviii. 28), and, "Be not wise in thine own eyes" (Prov. iii. 7), because "they that professed themselves to be wise, became fools" (Rom. i. 22). But I had now “found the goodly pearl, which, selling all that I had" (S. Matt. xiii. 46), I ought to have "bought," and I hesitated.

CHAPTER II.

That holy veteran, Simplicianus, is glad that he has read Plato and the Scriptures; and tells him how Victorinus the Rhetorician read the Sacred Books and was converted to the Faith.

STRA

To him I

TRAIGHTWAY I went to Simplicianus, the father in receiving Thy grace of Ambrose, who was then Bishop, and who truly loved him as a father. related the compass of my errors. But when I mentioned that I had read certain books of the Platonists, which Victorinus, formerly Rhetoric Professor of Rome (who had died a Christian, as I had heard), had translated into Latin, he rejoiced with me that I had not fallen in with the writings of other philosophers, full of fallacies, "and deceits, after the rudiments of this world" (Col. ii. 8); whereas, in those books, God and His Word are, by every means, suggested. Then to exhort me to the humility of Christ, "hidden from the wise, and revealed to babes" (S. Matt. xi. 25); he told me of Victorinus himself whom while at Rome he had most intimately known: and what he related of him I will not pass by in silence. For it contains great praise of Thy grace, to be confessed unto Thee, how that aged man, most learned and skilled in the liberal sciences, and who had read, and weighed so many works of the philosophers; the instructor of so many noble Senators, who also, as a monument of his excellent discharge of his office, had deserved and obtained a statue in the Roman Forum, which citizens of this world consider a high distinction; he even to that age a worshipper of idols, and a partaker of the sacrilegious rites, to which almost all the nobility of Rome were given up, and had inspired the people with the love of monster gods of every kind, and barking Anubis, which once had taken arms against Neptune and Venus, and

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Minerva (Virg. Æn. viii. 698), which Rome once conquered, now adored, all which the aged Victorinus had with loud and awsome voice for so many years defended: he now blushed not to become the child of thy Christ, and the babe of Thy Font; submitting his neck to the yoke of humility, and subduing his forehead to the reproach of the Cross.

O Lord, Lord, "which bowed the heavens and came down, touched the mountains and they did smoke" (Ps. cxliv. 5), by what means didst Thou glide into that breast? He used. to read (as Simplicianus said) the holy Scripture, most studiously examined and searched into all the Christian writings, and used to say to Simplicianus, not openly, but privately and confidentially, "Understand that I am already a Christian." And he would answer, "I will not believe it, nor will I reckon you among Christians, unless I see you in the Church of Christ." The other would laughingly rejoin, "Do walls then make Christians?" And this he often said, that he was already a Christian; and Simplicianus often made the same answer, and the jest of the "walls was by the other often renewed. For he feared to offend his friends, proud demon-worshippers, from the height of whose Babylonian dignity, as from "cedars of Libanus," which "the Lord" had not " yet broken" (Ps. xxix. 5), he supposed the weight of enmity would rush down upon him. But after that by reading and earnest thought he had gathered firmness, and feared to be "denied by Christ before the holy angels, should he now be afraid to confess Him before men" (S. Luke ix. 26), and appeared to himself guilty of a heavy offence, in being ashamed of the Sacra ments of the humility of Thy Word, and not being ashamed of the sacrilegious rites of those proud demons, which he had participated in, and had imitated their pride, he grew ashamed of vanity, and was shamed by Truth, and suddenly and unexpectedly said to Simplicianus (as himself told me), "Let us go to the Church; I wish to be made a Christian.” But he, not containing himself for joy, went with him." And having been admitted to the first rites of instruction, he not long after further gave in his name, that he might be regenerated by baptism, Rome wondering, the Church rejoicing. The proud "saw, and were wroth: they gnashed with their teeth, and melted away" (Ps. cxii. 10). But the

"Lord God was the hope" of Thy servant, and "he regarded not vanities and lying madness" (Ps. xl. 5).

To conclude, when the hour was come for making profession of his faith, which at Rome they, who are about to approach to Thy grace, deliver, from an elevated place, in the sight of all the faithful, in a set form of words committed to memory, the presbyters, he said, offered Victorinus, as was customary in the case of such as seemed likely through bashfulness to be alarmed, to make his profession more privately but he chose rather to profess his salvation in the presence of the holy multitude. "For it was not

salvation that he taught in rhetoric, and yet that he publicly professed how much less then ought he, when pronouncing Thy word, to dread Thy meek flock, who, when delivering his own words, had not feared multitudes of madmen." When, then, he went up to make his profession, all, as they knew him, uttered his name, one to another, with a cry of congratulation. And who there knew him not? and a hushed sound ran through the lips of the rejoicing assembly, Victorinus! Victorinus! Sudden was the sound of exultation that they saw him; sudden also the silence of attention, that they might hear him. He pronounced the true faith with an excellent boldness, and all wished to draw him into their very heart: yea by their love and joy they drew him thither; such were the hands of them that drew him there.

CHAPTER III.

That God and the angels rejoice more over one sinner that repenteth, than over many just persons.

GOOD God, whence is it that men rejoice more over

the salvation of a soul despaired of, and freed from greater peril, than if there had always been hope of him, or the peril had been less? For so Thou also, merciful Father, "dost more rejoice over one that repenteth, than over ninety and nine just persons that need no repentance.' And with great joy do we listen, when we hear "how the angels rejoice when the sheep which had strayed, is brought back upon the shepherd's shoulder," and "how the neighbours rejoice with the woman, who hath found the piece