Hebrews 10:30

“But I say unto you which hear” (displaying here that old injunction, of the Creator: “Speak to the ears of those who lend them to you”), “Love your enemies, and bless those which hate you, and pray for them which calumniate you.” These commands the Creator included in one precept by His prophet Isaiah: “Say, Ye are our brethren, to those who hate you.” For if they who are our enemies, and hate us, and speak evil of us, and calumniate us, are to be called our brethren, surely He did in effect bid us bless them that hate us, and pray for them who calumniate us, when He instructed us to reckon them as brethren. …

There is, too, another chief spur of impatience, the lust of revenge, dealing with the business either of glory or else of malice. But “glory,” on the one hand, is everywhere “vain;” and malice, on the other, is always odious to the Lord; in this case indeed most of all, when, being provoked by a neighbour’s malice, it constitutes itself superior in following out revenge, and by paying wickedness doubles that which has once been done. Revenge, in the estimation of error, seems a solace of pain; in the estimation of truth, on the contrary, it is convicted of malignity. For what difference is there between provoker and provoked, except that the former is detected as prior in evil-doing, but the latter as posterior? Yet each stands impeached of hurting a man in the eye of the Lord, who both prohibits and condemns every wickedness. …

2. First, then, they seized an old man of the name of Metras, and commanded him to utter words of impiety; and as he refused, they beat his body with clubs, and lacerated his face and eyes with sharp reeds, and then dragged him off to the suburbs and stoned him there. Next they carried off a woman named Quinta, who was a believer, to an idol temple, and compelled her to worship the idol; and when she turned away from it, and showed how she detested it, they bound her feet and dragged her through the whole city along the rough stone-paved streets, knocking her at the same time against the millstones, and scourging her, until they brought her to the same place, and stoned her also there. …

But the just man will omit no opportunity of doing anything mercifully: nor will he pollute himself with gain of this kind; but he will so act that without any loss to himself, that which he lends may be reckoned among his good works. He must not receive a gift from a poor man; so that if he himself has afforded anything, it may be good, inasmuch as it is gratuitous. If any one reviles, he must answer him with a blessing; he himself must never revile, that no evil word may proceed out of the mouth of a man who reverences the good Word. Moreover, he must also diligently take care, lest by any fault of his he should at any time make an enemy; and if any one should be so shameless as to inflict injury on a good and just man, he must bear it with calmness and moderation, and not take upon himself his revenge, but reserve it for the judgment of God. …

[4.] Next he adds testimony, saying, ( ver. 31, 30 ) “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God.” “For” it is written: “Vengeance [belongeth] unto Me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge His people.” “Let us fall,” it is said, “into the hands of the Lord, and not into the hands of men.” ( Ecclus. ii. 18 .) But if ye repent not, ye shall “fall into the hands of” God: that is fearful: it is nothing, to “fall into the hands of men.” When, he means, we see any man punished here, let us not be terrified at the things present, but shudder at the things to come. “For according to His mercy, so is His wrath.” And, “His indignation will rest upon sinners.” ( Ecclus. v. 6 .)