Psalms 131:9

69. Augustin answered: In this question you are speaking just as though we were at present inquiring what constituted a true priest, not what constituted true baptism. For that a man should be a true priest, it is requisite that he should be clothed not with the sacrament alone, but with righteousness, as it is written, "Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness." But if a man be a priest in virtue of the sacrament alone, as was the high priest Caiaphas, the persecutor of the one most true Priest, then even though he himself be not truthful, yet what he gives is true, if he gives not what is his own but what is God’s; as it is said of Caiaphas himself, "This spake he not of himself: but being high priest that year, he prophesied." And yet, to use the same simile which you employed yourself: if you were to hear even from any one that was profane the prayer of the priest couched in the …

4. But one will say, What of one man? what strange, what great matter is it, if one among the crowd “not having a wedding garment” crept in unperceived to the servants of the Householder? Could it be said because of that one, “they invited good and bad”? Attend therefore, my Brethren, and understand. That one man represented one class; for they were many. Here some diligent hearer may answer me, and say, “I have no wish for you to tell me your guesses; I wish to have it proved to me that that one represented many.” By the Lord’s present help, I will prove it clearly; nor will I search far, that I may be able to prove it. God will assist me in His own words in this place, and will furnish you by my ministry with a plain proof of it. …

10. Lo, thou art in confusion, tossed to and fro; thy heart as a ship is shaken about by tempests. Christ is asleep: awake Him, that sleepeth, and thou shalt be exposed no more to the raging of the storm. Awake Him, who was pleased to have nothing here, and thou hast all, who came even to the Cross for thee, whose “Bones” as He was naked and hanging “were numbered” by them that mocked Him; and “beware of all covetousness.” Covetousness of money is not all; “beware of covetousness” of life. A dreadful covetousness, covetousness much to be feared. Sometimes a man will despise what he has, and say, “I will not give false witness; I will not. You tell me, I will take away what thou hast. Take away what I have; you do not take away what I have within. …

9. “Let Thy priests be clothed with righteousness, and let Thy saints sing with joyfulness” ( ver. 9 ). When Thou risest from the dead, and goest unto Thy Father, let that royal Priesthood be clothed with faith, since “the righteous liveth by faith;” and, receiving the pledge of the Holy Spirit, let the members rejoice in the hope of resurrection, which went before in the Head: for to them the Apostle saith, “Rejoicing in hope.”