On the Death of Satyrus

¹⁰ But we have not incurred any grievous sin by our tears. Not all weeping proceeds from unbelief or weakness. Natural grief is one thing, distrustful sadness is another, and there is a very great difference between longing for what you have lost and lamenting that you have lost it. Not only grief has tears, joy also has tears of its own. Both piety excites weeping, and prayer waters the couch, and supplication, according to the prophet's saying, washes the bed. Their friends made a great mourning when the patriarchs were buried. Tears, then, are marks of devotion, not producers of grief. I confess, then, that I too wept, but the Lord also wept. He wept for one not related to Him, I for my brother. He wept for all in weeping for one, I will weep for you in all, my brother.

11. He wept for what affected us, not Himself; for the Godhead sheds no tears; but He wept in that nature in which He was sad; He wept in that in which He was crucified, in that in which He died, in that in which He was buried. He wept in that which the prophet this day brought to our minds: “Mother Sion shall say, A man, yea, a man was made in her, and the Most High Himself established her.” He wept in that nature in which He called Sion Mother, born in Judæa, conceived by the Virgin. But according to His Divine Nature He could not have a mother, for He is the Creator of His mother. So far as He was made, it was not by divine but by human generation, because He was made man, God was born.

12. But you read in another place: “Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given.” In the word Child is an indication of age, in that of Son the fullness of the Godhead. Made of His mother, born of the Father yet the Same Person was both born and given, you must not think of two but of one. For one is the Son of God, both born of the Father and sprung from the Virgin, differing in order, but in name agreeing in one, as, too, the lesson just heard teaches for “a man was made in her and the Most High Himself established her;” man indeed in the body, the Most High in power. And though He be God and man in diversity of nature, yet is He at the same time one in each nature. One property, then, is peculiar to His own nature, another He has in common with us, but in both is He one, and in both is He perfect.

13. Therefore it is no subject of wonder that God made Him to be both Lord and Christ. He made Him Jesus, Him, that is, Who received the name in His bodily nature; He made Him of Whom also the patriarch David writes: “Mother Sion shall say, A man, yea, a man is made in her.” But being made man He is unlike the Father, not in Godhead but in His body; not separated from the Father, but differing in office, abiding united in power, but separated in the mystery of the Passion.

14. The treatment of this topic demands more arguments, by which to demonstrate the authority of the Father, the special property of the Son, and the Unity of the whole Trinity; but today I have undertaken the office of consolation, not of discussion, although it is customary in consoling to draw away the mind from its grief by application to discussion. But I would rather moderate the grief than alter the affection, that the longing may rather be assuaged than lulled to sleep. For I have no wish to turn away too far from my brother, and to be led off by other thoughts, seeing that this discourse has been undertaken, as it were, for the sake of accompanying him, that I might follow in affection him departing, and embrace in mind him whom I see with my eyes. For it gives me pleasure to fix the whole gaze of my eyes on him, to encompass him with kindly endearments; while my mind is stupefied, and I feel as though he were not lost whom I am able still to see present; and I think him not dead, my services to whom I do not as yet perceive to be wanting, services to which I had devoted the whole of my life and the drawing of every breath.

15. What, then, can I pay back in return for such kindness and such pains? I had made you, my brother, my heir; you have left me as the heir; I hoped to leave you as survivor, and you have left me. I, in return for your kindnesses, that I might repay your benefits, gave wishes; now I have lost my wishes yet not your benefits. What shall I, succeeding to my own heir, do? What shall I do who outlive my own life? What shall I do, no longer sharing this light which yet shines on me? What thanks, what good offices, can I repay to you? You have nothing from me but tears. And perchance, secure of your reward, you desire not those tears which are all that I have left. For even when you were yet alive, you forbade me to weep, and showed that our grief was more pain to you than your own death. Tears are bidden to flow no longer, and weeping is repressed. And gratitude to you forbids them too, lest while we weep for our loss we seem to despair concerning your merits.

16. But for myself at least you lessen the bitterness of that grief; I have nothing to fear who used to fear for you. I have nothing which the world can now snatch from me. Although our holy sister still survives, venerable for her blameless life, your equal in character, and not falling short in kindly offices; yet we both used to fear more for you, we felt that all the sweetness of this life was stored up in you. To live for your sake was a delight, to die for you were no cause of sorrow, for we both used to pray that you might survive, it was no pleasure that we should survive you. When did not our very soul shudder when a dread of this kind touched us? How were our minds dismayed by the tidings of your sickness!

17. Alas for our wretched hopes! We thought that he was restored to us whom we see carried off, and we now recognize that your departure hence was obtained by your vows to the holy martyr Lawrence! And indeed I would that you had obtained not only a safe passage hence, but also a longer time of life! You could have obtained many years of life, since you were able to obtain your departure hence. And I indeed thank You, Almighty Everlasting God, that You have not denied us at least this last comfort, that You have granted us the longed-for return of our much loved brother from the regions of Sicily and Africa; for he was snatched away so soon after his return as though his death were delayed for this alone, that he might return to his brethren.

18. Now, I clearly have my pledge which no change can any more tear from me; I have the relics which I may embrace, I have the tomb which I may cover with my body, I have the grave on which I may lie, and I shall believe that I am more acceptable to God, because I shall rest upon the bones of that holy body. Would that I had been able in like manner to place my body in the way of your death! Had you been attacked with the sword, I would have rather offered myself to be pierced for you; had I been able to recall your life as it was passing away, I would have rather offered my own.