Acts 10:13

From all slavish habits and excess we must abstain, and touch what is set before us in a decorous way; keeping the hand and couch and chin free of stains; preserving the grace of the countenance undisturbed, and committing no indecorum in the act of swallowing; but stretching out the hand at intervals in an orderly manner. We must guard against speaking anything while eating: for the voice becomes disagreeable and inarticulate when it is confined by full jaws; and the tongue, pressed by the food and impeded in its natural energy, gives forth a compressed utterance. Nor is it suitable to eat and to drink simultaneously. For it is the very extreme of intemperance to confound the times whose uses are discordant. …

In the Acts of the Apostles, a voice was heard by Peter, saying unto him, “Rise, Peter, slay and eat,” when all manner of four-footed beasts, and creeping things, and birds of the air, were presented before him; by which saying it is proved that no man is by nature [ceremonially] unclean, but that all men are equally welcome to the gospel of Christ. To which Peter answered, “Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.” And the voice spake unto him again the second time, “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.” Therefore he went to Cæsarea, and having entered the house of Cornelius, “he opened his mouth and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteousness is accepted with Him.” Thereafter “the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word; and they of the circumcis …

93. It requires closer examination to see the meaning of the first action of Moses in burning the calf in fire, and grinding it to powder, and sprinkling it in the water for the people to drink. The tables given to him, written with the finger of God, that is, by the agency of the Holy Spirit, he may have broken, because he judged the people unworthy of having them read to them; and he may have burned the calf, and ground it, and scattered it so as to be carried away by the water, in order to let nothing of it remain among the people. But why should he have made them drink it? Every one must feel anxious to discover the typical significance of this action. Pursuing the inquiry, we may find that in the calf there was an embodiment of the devil, as there is in men of all nations who have the devil as their head or leader in their impious rites. …

3. Be sure, then, whenever you discover anything else in Scripture to assail our faith with, to see, in the first place, that it is not against you, before you commence your attack on us. For instance, there is the passage you continually quote about Peter, that he once saw a vessel let down from heaven in which were all kinds of animals and serpents, and that, when he was surprised and astonished, a voice was heard, saying to him, Peter, kill and eat whatsoever thou seest in the vessel, and that he replied, Lord I will not touch what is common or unclean. On this the voice spoke again, What I have cleansed, call not unclean. This, indeed, seems to have an allegorical meaning, and not to refer to the absence of distinction in food. …

9. Let us then return to our subject. The perfection of righteousness is shown by the number forty. What is it to fulfil the number forty? To restrain one’s self from the love of this world. Restraint from temporal things, that they be not loved to our destruction, is, as it were, fasting from this world. Therefore the Lord fasted forty days, and Moses, and Elias. He then who gave His servants the power to fast forty days, could He not fast eighty or a hundred? Why then did He not will to fast more than He had given His servants to do, but because in this number forty is the mystery of fasting, the restraint from this world? What is this to say? What the Apostle says; “The world is crucified to me, and I to the world.” He then fulfils the number forty. …

4. “All have gone out of the way, they have together become useless:” that is, the Jews have become as the Gentiles, who were spoken of above. “There is none that doeth good, no not up to one” ( ver. 3 ), must be interpreted as above. “Their throat is an open sepulchre.” Either the voracity of the ever open palate is signified: or allegorically those who slay, and as it were devour those they have slain, into whom they instil the disorder of their own conversation. Like to which with the contrary meaning is that which was said to Peter, “Kill and eat;” that he should convert the Gentiles to his own faith and good conversation. “With their tongues they have dealt craftily.” Flattery is the companion of the greedy and of all bad men. …

26. “Let them not say in their heart, Aha, aha, so would we have it” ( ver. 25 ); that is, We have done what we could, we have slain him, we have taken him away. “Let them not say:” show them that they have done nothing. “Let them not say, We have swallowed him up.” Whence say those Martyrs, “If the Lord had not been on our side, then they had swallowed us up quick.” What is, “had swallowed us up”? Had passed into their own body. For that thou swallowest up, which thou passest into thy own body. The world would swallow thee up; swallow thou the world, pass it into thy own body: kill and eat. As it was said to Peter, “Kill and eat;” do thou kill in them what they are, make them what thou art. But if they on the other hand persuade thee to ungodliness, thou art swallowed up by them. …

15. “Behold, themselves shall speak in their mouth, and a sword is on the lips of them” ( ver. 7 ). Here is that sword twice whetted, whereof the Apostle saith, “And the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.” Wherefore twice whetted? Wherefore, but because smiting out of both Testaments? With this sword were slain those whereof it was said to Peter, “Slay, and eat.” “And a sword is on the lips of them. For who hath heard?” They all speak in their mouth, “Who hath heard?” That is, they shall be wroth with men that are slow to believe. They that a little before were even themselves unwilling to believe, do feel disgust from men not believing. And truly, brethren, so it is. …

3. “If the Lord Himself had not been in us, now may Israel say” ( ver. 1 )…When? “When men rose up against us” ( ver. 2 ). Marvel not: they have been subdued: for they were men; but the Lord was in us, man was not in us: for men rose up against us. Nevertheless men would crush other men, unless in those men who could not be crushed, there were not man, but the Lord. For what could men do to you, while ye rejoiced, and sang, and securely held everlasting bliss? what could men do to you when they rose against you, if the Lord had not been on your side? what could they do? “Perchance they had swallowed us up quick” ( ver. 3 ). “Swallowed us up:” they would not first have slain us, and so have swallowed us up. O inhuman, O cruel men! The Church swalloweth not thus. To Peter it was said, “ Kill and eat:” not, Swallow quick. …

This man is not a Jew, nor of those under the Law, but he had already forestalled our manner of life. Observe, thus far, two persons, both of high rank, receiving the faith, the eunuch at Gaza and this man; and the pains taken on behalf of these men. But do not imagine that this was because of their high rank: God forbid! it was because of their piety. For that the Scripture mentions their dignified stations, is to show the greatness of their piety; since it is more wonderful when a person being in a position of wealth and power is such as these were. …

(a) But let us look over again what has been said. “There was a certain man in Cæsarea,” etc. (Recapitulation, v. 1, 2 .) Observe with whom the beginning of the Gentiles is made, with “a devout man,” and one proved to be worthy by his works. For if, though the case be so, they are still offended, if this had not been the case, what would not have been the consequence! But mark the greatness of the assurance. (c) To this end all is done (in the way it is done), and the affair takes its beginning from Judea. (d) “He saw in a vision, evidently,” etc. ( v. 3 ). It was not in his sleep that the Angel appeared to him, but while he was awake, in the daytime, “about the ninth hour. He saw an Angel of God coming in unto him, and saying unto him, Cornelius. And when he looked on him, he was afraid.” So occupied was he with himself. …

2. I need not now conduct the stream of my discourse through the meadows of virtue, nor exert myself to shew to you the beauty of its several flowers. I need not dilate on the purity of the lily, the modest blush of the rose, the royal purple of the violet, or the promise of glowing gems which their various colours hold out. For through the mercy of God you have already put your hand to the plough; you have already gone up upon the housetop like the apostle Peter. Who when he became hungry among the Jews had his hunger satisfied by the faith of Cornelius, and stilled the craving caused by their unbelief through the conversion of the centurion and other Gentiles. By the vessel let down from heaven to earth, the four corners of which typified the four gospels, he was taught that all men can be saved. …