Homilies on the Statues

^16. If one of your servants owed you an hundred pieces of gold; and some one again was indebted to him in a few pieces of silver; and if the servants' debtor were to come, and entreat and supplicate you that he might obtain indulgence, and you were to call in your own servant, and charge him, saying, “Forgive this man the debt, and from the sum you owe me I will deduct this debt;” should that servant afterwards be wicked and shameless enough to seize on his debtor, could any one then rescue him out of your hands? Would you not most assuredly inflict a thousand stripes upon him, as having been insulted to the last extremity? And very justly too. This also God will do: for He will say to you on That Day, O wicked and villainous servant, yea, was it of your own you forgave him? Out of what thou were indebted to Me, thou were ordered to account to him. For “Remit,” He says, “and I will remit unto you! Although, to speak truly, if I had not added this condition, it would have been even then your duty to have remitted at the instance of your Lord. But in this case, I did not command you as a master, but I asked it as a favour from a friend; and I asked it out of My own property; and I promised to give greater things in return; and yet with all this, thou were not made a better man.” Moreover men, when they act in this manner, put down as much to their own servants' accounts, as the measure of the debt is. Thus, for example, suppose the servant owes his master a hundred pieces of gold; and the debtor of the servant owes ten pieces, should the latter remit his debt, the master does not remit him his hundred pieces, but these ten only; and all the rest he still demands. But it is not so with God; if you remit a few things to your fellow-servant, He remits all your debt.