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Translated by W. Moore and H. A. Wilson
St Gregory of Nyssa Resources Online and in Print
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44 Pages
Page 42
But in this mighty and sublime ambition it is not property, or secular glory lasting for its hour, or any external fortune, that is at stake;--of such things [1509] , whether they settle themselves well or the reverse, the wise take small account;--here rashness can affect the soul itself; and we run the awful hazard, not of losing any of those other things whose recovery even may perhaps be possible, but of ruining our very selves and making the soul a bankrupt. A man who has spent or lost his patrimony does not despair, as long as he is in the land of the living, of perchance coming again through contrivances into his former competence; but the man who has ejected himself from this calling, deprives himself as well of all hope of a return to better things. Therefore, since most embrace virginity while still young and unformed in understanding, this before anything else should be their employment, to search out a fitting guide and master of this way, lest, in their present ignorance, they should wander from the direct route, and strike out new paths of their own in trackless wilds [1510] . "Two are better than one," says the Preacher [1511] ; but a single one is easily vanquished by the foe who infests the path which leads to God; and verily "woe to him that is alone when he falleth, for he hath not another to help him up [1512] ." Some ere now in their enthusiasm for the stricter life have shown a dexterous alacrity; but, as if in the very moment of their choice they had already touched perfection, their pride has had a shocking fall [1513] , and they have been tripped up from madly deluding themselves into thinking that that to which their own mind inclined them was the true beauty. In this number are those whom Wisdom calls the "slothful ones [1514] ," who bestrew their "way" with "thorns"; who think it a moral loss to be anxious about keeping the commandments; who erase from their own minds the Apostolic teaching, and instead of eating the bread of their own honest earning fix on that of others, and make their idleness itself into an art of living. From this number, too, come the Dreamers, who put more faith in the illusions of their dreams [1515] than in the Gospel teaching, and style their own phantasies "revelations." Hence, too, those who "creep into the houses"; and again others who suppose virtue to consist in savage bearishness, and have never known the fruits of long-suffering and humility of spirit. Who could enumerate all the pitfalls into which any one might slip, from refusing to have recourse to men of godly celebrity? Why, we have known ascetics of this class who have persisted in their fasting even unto death, as if "with such sacrifices God were well pleased [1516] ;" and, again, others who rush off into the extreme diametrically opposite, practising celibacy in name only and leading a life in no way different from the secular; for they not only indulge in the pleasures of the table, but are openly known to have a woman in their houses [1517] ; and they call such a friendship a brotherly affection, as if, forsooth, they could veil their own thought, which is inclined to evil, under a sacred term. It is owing to them that this pure and holy profession of virginity is "blasphemed amongst the Gentiles [1518] ."
[1509] hon kai kata gnomen kai hos heteros dioikoumenon oligos tois sophronousin ho logos. The Latin here has "quas quidem res ego sane despicio, exiguamque harum tanquam extrinsecus venientium)" &c.; evidently katagnoien must have been in the text used.
[1510] anodias tinas kainotomesosin (anodi& 139;, anodiais, is frequent in Polybius; the word is not found elsewhere in other cases).
[1511] Ecclesiastes iv. 9.
[1512] Ecclesiastes iv. 10. Gregory supports the Vulgate, which has "quia cum ceciderit, non habet sublevantem se."
[1513] hetero ptomati, euphemistically.
[1514] Prov. xv. 19.
[1515] The alternative reading is ton therion; but oneiron is confirmed by three of the Codd. Cf. Theodoret, lib. 4, Haeretic. fab., of the Messaliani; and lib. 4, Histor. c. 10, hupno de sphas autous ekdidontes tas ton oneiron phantasias propheteias apokalousi
[1516] Heb. xiii. 16.
[1517] See Chrysostom, Lib. Pros tous suneisaktous echontas.
[1518] ton exothen. Cf. Rom. ii. 24
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/nyssa/virginity.asp?pg=42
