Isaias 5:7

Now, since you join the Jews in denying that their Christ has come, recollect also what is that end which they were predicted as about to bring on themselves after the time of Christ, for the impiety wherewith they both rejected and slew Him. For it began to come to pass from that day, when, according to Isaiah, “a man threw away his idols of gold and of silver, which they made into useless and hurtful objects of worship;” in other words, from the time when he threw away his idols after the truth had been made clear by Christ. Consider whether what follows in the prophet has not received its fulfilment: “The Lord of hosts hath taken away from Judah and from Jerusalem, amongst other things, both the prophet and the wise artificer;” that is, His Holy Spirit, who builds the church, which is indeed the temple, and household and city of God. …

Who would be unwilling that we should distress ourselves about sustenance for our life, or clothing for our body, but He who has provided these things already for man; and who, therefore, while distributing them to us, prohibits all anxiety respecting them as an outrage against his liberality? who has adapted the nature of “life” itself to a condition “better than meat,” and has fashioned the material of “the body,” so as to make it “more than raiment;” whose “ravens, too, neither sow nor reap, nor gather into storehouses, and are yet fed” by Himself; whose “lilies and grass also toil not, nor spin, and yet are clothed” by Him; whose “Solomon, moreover, was transcendent in glory, and yet was not arrayed like” the humble flower. …

10. But if any quibbler, from the fact that I said that God is the Maker and Creator of all things, thinks that I said that He is also Creator of Christ, let him observe that I first called Him Father, in which word the Son also is at the same time expressed. For after I called the Father the Creator, I added, Neither is He the Father of those things whereof He is Creator, if He who begot is properly understood to be a Father (for we will consider the latitude of this word Father in what follows). Nor is a maker a father, if it is only a framer who is called a maker. For among the Greeks, they who are wise are said to be makers of their books. The apostle also says, “a doer ( scil . maker) of the law.” Moreover, of matters of the heart, of which kind are virtue and vice, men are called doers ( scil . …

The Catholic Church is the plantation of God and His beloved vineyard; containing those who have believed in His unerring divine religion; who are the heirs by faith of His everlasting kingdom; who are partakers of His divine influence, and of the communication of the Holy Spirit; who are armed through Jesus , and have received His fear into their hearts; who enjoy the benefit of the sprinkling of the precious and innocent blood of Christ; who have free liberty to call Almighty God, Father; being fellow-heirs and joint-partakers of His beloved Son: hearken to this holy doctrine, you who enjoy His promises, as being delivered by the command of your Saviour, and agreeable to His glorious words. Take care, ye children of God, to do all things in obedience to God; and in all things please Christ our Lord. …

But the wicked brother is, in the person of his son ( i.e ., his work), the boy, or slave, of his good brothers, when good men make a skillful use of bad men, either for the exercise of their patience or for their advancement in wisdom. For the apostle testifies that there are some who preach Christ from no pure motives; “but,” says he, “whether in pretence or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice.” For it is Christ Himself who planted the vine of which the prophet says, “The vine of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel;” and He drinks of its wine, whether we thus understand that cup of which He says, “Can ye drink of the cup that I shall drink of?” and, “Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me,” by which He obviously means His passion. …

Add to this, that sins, however great and detestable they may be, are looked upon as trivial, or as not sins at all, when men get accustomed to them; and so far does this go, that such sins are not only not concealed, but are boasted of, and published far and wide; and thus, as it is written, “The wicked boasteth of his heart’s desire, and blesseth the covetous, whom the Lord abhorreth.” Iniquity of this kind is in Scripture called a cry . You have an instance in the prophet Isaiah, in the case of the evil vineyard: “He looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.” Whence also the expression in Genesis: “The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great,” because in these cities crimes were not only not punished, but were openly committed, as if under the protection of the law. …

58. A difficulty, however, may certainly arise when we observe how Matthew tells the story of the paralytic after this fashion: “And He entered into a ship, and passed over, and came into His own city. And, behold, they brought to Him a man sick of the palsy, lying on a bed;” whereas Mark speaks of the incident as taking place not in His own city, which indeed is called Nazareth, but in Capharnaum. His narrative is to the following effect: “And again He entered into Capharnaum after some days; and it was noised that He was in the house. And straightway many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, not so much as about the door: and He spake a word unto them. And they came unto Him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four. …

As long as we are in the hand of God, “no one is able to pluck us out” ( John x. 28 .), for that hand is strong; but when we fall away from that hand and that help, then are we lost, then are we exposed, ready to be snatched away, as a “bowing wall, and a tottering fence” ( Ps. lxii. 3 .); when the wall is weak, it will be easy for all to surmount. Think not this which I am about to say refers to Jerusalem alone, but to all men. And what was spoken of Jerusalem? “Now will I sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved touching His vineyard. My well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill, and I made a fence about it, and surrounded it with a dike, and planted it with the vine of Sorech, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also dug a wine press in it, and I looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth thorns. …

22. It is related that when Pilate would fain have released Him all the people cried out, “Crucify Him, Crucify Him!” This also the Prophet Jeremiah foretells, saying, in the person of the Lord Himself, “My inheritance is become to Me as a lion in the forest. He hath uttered his voice against Me, wherefore I have hated it. And therefore (saith He) I have forsaken and left My house.” And again in another place, “Against whom have ye opened your mouth, and against whom have ye let loose your tongues?” When He stood before His judge, it is written that “He held His peace.” Many Scriptures testify of this. …

Clearly since he had previously used such expressions, while bidding a long farewell to the Arians, he demands a good conscience from his hearers, being entitled to plead the difficulty, or perhaps one may say the incomprehensibleness of the problems concerned, namely that they may judge not of the words but of the meaning of the writer, and the more so as there is very much to shew his intention. For instance he says himself: ‘I used the examples of such relations cursorily, as being less adequate, the plant and the husbandman for instance; while I dwelt upon the more pertinent examples, and went at greater length into those nearer the truth.’ But a man who says this shews that it is nearer the truth to say that the Son is eternal and of the Father, than to say that He is originated. …