To the weak and infirm, what is moderate appears excessive.
3. BOOK II. SERMON 46, ON THE LAZY AND INDOLENT. To the weak and infirm, what is moderate appears excessive.
4.BOOK II. SERMON 55, ON YOUR NEIGHBOUR--THAT YOU ARE TO BEAR HIS BURDENS, ETC. The reproof that is given with knowledge is very faithful. Sometimes also the knowledge of those who are condemned is found to be the most perfect demonstration.
5. BOOK IL SERMON 74, ON THE PROUD, AND THOSE DESIROUS OF VAINGLORY. To the man who exalts and magnifies himself is attached the quick transition and the fall to low estate, as the divine word teaches.
6. BOOK II. SERMON 87. Pure speech and a spotless life are the throne and true temple of God.
IX.--FRAGMENT OF THE TREATISE ON MARRIAGE.
MAXIMUS, SERMON III. P. 538, ON MODESTY AND CHASTITY. ALSO, JOHN OF DAMASCUS, BOOK III.-- PARALLEL CHAP. 27. It is not only fornication, but also the giving in marriage prematurely, that is called fornication; when, so to speak, one not of ripe age is given to a husband, either of her own accord or by her parents.
X.--FRAGMENTS OF OTHER LOST BOOKS.
MAXIMUS, SERMON 2.--JOHN OF DAMASCUS, II. CHAP. 70.--ANTONIUS MELISSA, BOOK I. SERMON 52. Flattery is the bane of friendship. Most men are accustomed to pay court to the good fortune of princes, rather than to the princes themselves.
MAXIMUS, SERMON 13, P. 574.--ANTONIUS MELISSA, SERMON 32, P. 45, AND SERMON 33, P. 57. The lovers of frugality shun luxury as the bane of soul and body. The possession and use of necessaries has nothing injurious in quality, but it has in quantity above measure. Scarcity of food is a necessary benefit.
MAXIMUS, SERMON 52, P. 654.--ANTONIUS MELISSA, BOOK I. SERMON 54. The vivid remembrance of death is a check upon diet; and when the diet is lessened, the passions are diminished along with it.
MAXIMUS, SERMON 55, P. 661. Above all, Christians are not allowed to correct with violence the delinquencies of sins. For it is not those that abstain from wickedness from compulsion, but those that abstain from choice, that God crowns. It is impossible for a man to be steadily good except by his own choice. For he that is made good by compulsion of another is not good; for he is not what he is by his own choice. For it is the freedom of each one that makes true goodness and reveals real wickedness. Whence through these dispositions God contrived to make His own disposition manifest.
XI.--FRAGMENTS FOUND IN GREEK ONLY IN THE OXFORD EDITION.
FROM THE LAST WORK ON THE PASSOVER. Quoted in the Paschal Chronicle. Accordingly, in the years gone by, Jesus went to eat the passover sacrificed by the Jews, keeping the feast. But when he had preached He who was the Passover, the Lamb of God, led as a sheep to the slaughter, presently taught His disciples the mystery of the type on the thirteenth day, on which also they inquired, "Where wilt Thou that we prepare for Thee to eat the passover?"[1] It was on this day, then, that both the consecration of the unleavened bread and the preparation for the feast took place. Whence John naturally describes the disciples as already previously prepared to have their feet washed by the Lord. And on the following day our Saviour suffered, He who was the Passover, propitiously sacrificed by the Jews.
THE SAME. Suitably, therefore, to the fourteenth day, on which He also suffered, in the morning, the chief priests and the scribes, who brought Him to Pilate, did not enter the Praetorium, that they might not be defiled, but might freely eat the passover in the evening. With this precise determination of the days both the whole Scriptures agree, and the Gospels harmonize. The resurrection also attests it. He certainly rose on the third day, which fell on the first day of the weeks of harvest, on which the law prescribed that the priest should offer up the sheaf.