The Treatises of Cyprian

In Isaiah: “Seek the Lord; and when you have found Him, call upon Him. But when He has come near unto you, let the wicked forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him be turned unto the Lord, and he shall obtain mercy, because He will plentifully pardon your sins.” Of this same thing in Solomon: “I have seen all the works which are done under the sun; and, lo, all are vanity.” Of this same thing in Exodus: “But thus shall you eat it; your loins girt, and your shoes on your feet, and your staves in your hands: and you shall eat it in haste, for it is the Lord's passover.” Of this same thing in the Gospel according to Matthew: “Take no thought, saying, What shall we eat?

Or, What shall we drink? Or, Wherewith shall we be clothed? For these things the nations seek after. But your Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” Likewise in the same place: “Think not for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for itself. Sufficient unto the day is its own evil.” Likewise in the same place: “No one looking back, and putting his hands to the plough, is fit for the kingdom of God.” Also in the same place: “Behold the fowls of the heaven: for they sow not, nor reap, nor gather into barns; and your heavenly Father feeds them.

Are not you of more value than they?” Concerning this same thing, according to Luke: “Let your loins be girded, and your lamps burning; and you like men that wait for their lord, when he comes from the wedding; that, when he comes and knocks, they may open to him. Blessed are those servants, whom their lord, when he comes, shall find watching.” Of this same thing in Matthew: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the heaven have nests; but the Son of man has not where He may lay His head.” Also in the same place: “Whoso forsakes not all that he has, cannot be my disciple.” Of this same thing in the first to the Corinthians: “You are not your own, for you are bought with a great price.

Glorify and bear God in your body.” Also in the same place: “The time is limited. It remains, therefore, that both they who have wives be as though they have them not, and they who lament as they that lament not, and they that rejoice as they that rejoice not, and they who buy as they that buy not, and they who possess as they who possess not, and they who use this world as they that use it not; for the fashion of this world passes away.” Also in the same place: “The first man is of the clay of the earth, the second man from heaven.

As he is of the clay, such also are they who are of the clay; and as is the heavenly, such also are the heavenly. Even as we have borne the image of him who is of the clay, let us bear His image also who is from heaven.” Of this same matter to the Philippians: “All seek their own, and not those things which are Christ's; whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and their glory is to their confusion, who mind earthly things. For our conversation is in heaven, whence also we expect the Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall transform the body of our humiliation conformed to the body of His glory.” Of this very matter to Galatians: “But be it far from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” Concerning this same thing to Timothy: “No man that wars for God binds himself with worldly annoyances, that he may please Him to whom he has approved himself.

But and if a man should contend, he will not be crowned unless he fight lawfully.” Of this same thing to the Colossians: “If you be dead with Christ from I the elements of the world, why still, as if living in the world, do you follow vain things?” Also concerning this same thing: “If you have risen together with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is sitting on the right hand of God. Give heed to the things that are above, not to those things which are on the earth; for you are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

But when Christ your life shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory.” Of this same thing to the Ephesians: Put off the old man of the former conversation, who is corrupted, according to the lusts of deceit. But be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, him who according to God is ordained in righteousness, and holiness, and truth. Of this same thing in the Epistle of Peter: “As strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; but having a good conversation among the Gentiles, that while they detract from you as if from evildoers, yet, beholding your good works, they may magnify God.” Of this same thing in the Epistle of John: “He who says he abides in Christ, ought himself also to walk even as He walked.” Also in the same place: “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.

If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Because everything which is in the world is lust of the flesh, and lust of the eyes, and the ambition of this world, which is not of the Father, but of the lust of this world. And the world shall pass away with its lust. But he that does the will of God abides for ever, even as God abides for ever.” Also in the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians: “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new dough, as you are unleavened. For also Christ our passover is sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not in the old leaven, nor in the leaven of malice and wickedness, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”