[1] “The life for God is not this natural life, which is subject to decay.... Ought we not then to sigh after future things, and be averse to all these temporal things?... Wherefore we should find consolation in heartily despising this life and this world, and from our hearts sigh for and desire the future honour and glory of eternal life.”—Luther (Th. i. s. 466, 467). [↑]
[2] “Eo dirigendus est spiritus, quo aliquando est iturus.”—Meditat. Sacræ Joh. Gerhardi. Med. 46. [↑]
[3] “Affectanti cœlestia, terrena non sapiunt. Æternis inhianti, fastidio sunt transitoria.”—Bernard. (Epist. Ex Persona Heliæ Monachi ad Parentes). “Nihil nostra refert in hoc ævo, nisi de eo quam celeriter excedere.”—Tertullian (Apol. adv. Gentes, c. 41). “Wherefore a Christian man should rather be advised to bear sickness with patience, yea, even to desire that death should come,—the sooner the better. For, as St. Cyprian says, nothing is more for the advantage of a Christian than soon to die. But we rather listen to the pagan Juvenal when he says: ‘Orandum est ut sit mens sana in corpore sano.’”—Luther (Th. iv. s. 15). [↑]
[4] “Ille perfectus est qui mente et corpore a seculo est elongatus.”—De Modo Bene Vivendi ad Sororem, s. vii. (Among the spurious writings of St. Bernard.) [↑]
[5] On this subject see “Hieronymus, de Vita Pauli Primi Eremitæ.” [↑]
[6] Naturally Christianity had only such power when, as Jerome writes to Demetrius, Domini nostri adhuc calebat cruor et fervebat recens in credentibus fides. See also on this subject G. Arnold.—Von der ersten Christen Genügsamkeit u. Verschmähung alles Eigennutzes, l. c. B. iv. c. 12, § 7–16. [↑]
[7] How far otherwise the ancient Christians! “Difficile, imo impossibile est, ut et præsentibus quis et futuris fruatur bonis.”—Hieronymus (Epist. Juliano). “Delicatus es, frater, si et hic vis gaudere cum seculo et postea regnare cum Christo.”—Ib. (Epist. ad Heliodorum). “Ye wish to have both God and the creature together, and that is impossible. Joy in God and joy in the creature cannot subsist together.”—Tauler (ed. c. p. 334). But they were abstract Christians. And we live now in the age of conciliation. Yes, truly! [↑]
[8] “Perfectum autem esse nolle delinquere est.”—Hieronymus (Epist. ad Heliodorum de laude Vitæ solit.). Let me observe once for all that I interpret the biblical passages concerning marriage in the sense in which they have been interpreted by the history of Christianity. [↑]
[9] “The marriage state is nothing new or unwonted, and is lauded and held good even by heathens according to the judgment of reason.”—Luther (Th. ii. p. 377a). [↑]
[10] “Præsumendum est hos qui intra paradisum recipi volunt debere cessare ab ea re, a qua paradisus intactus est.”—Tertullian (de Exhort. cast. c. 13). “Cœlibatus angelorum est imitatio.”—Jo. Damasceni (Orthod. Fidei, l. iv. c. 25). [↑]