The Sermon on the Mount (Bossuet)/Day 46
Forty-sixth Day
What true virtue consists in. — Matt. vii. 21; xxi. 28-32.
JESUS CHRIST has just spoken of trees without fruit; and, of these, one especially bad kind should be noted. This is the Christian who bears the appearance of goodness, whilst in reality he is not good at all. Such a man talks much and does nothing. ' Lord, Lord! ' he says; but he had much better not so often name the Lord, and do what He commands.
There are some people who object to nothing: who will undertake whatever you may suggest to them. Yes, I will do and say what you like; I will pray; I will help in everything: — but when it comes to putting all this into practice, nothing can be got out of them. The Jews were of those who make many professions; and Jesus said to them: — ' The publicans and harlots shall go into the Kingdom of God before you': — by which He meant that their purely external piety made them entertain a false opinion of their own virtue; whilst those who are openly wicked often become ashamed of themselves, and are converted at last more readily than the outwardly righteous.
Consider those two young men in the Parable. One of them is ashamed to disobey his Father openly by saying ' I will not ’; yet after having said ' I go, sir,’ he followed his own inclination 'and he went not.’ The other said openly ' I will not'; but afterwards, ‘being moved with repentance, he went.’ One had the presumption to wish to appear virtuous, but was so in words only: hence he fell. The other became horrified at his own boldness, and repented.
We should, therefore, neither pay too much attention to the presumptuous assertions of those who promise everything, nor despair of those who seem to give up everything. Great offences more often lead to repentance than do faults that are hidden under a sham piety, which consists in nothing but words; and whose professors think they have done all when they have praised the Law and the practice of virtue, like the Jews.
Bestir yourself, O Christian Soul! Have you promised anything? No matter how great a thing it may be, do more than you promised. Have you refused to do something? Be ashamed of your refusal, and do whatever you said you could not or would not undertake.
He who both listens and performs — in whom virtue becomes a habit by force of practice — is 'the wise man who built his house upon a rock.' Temptations may come — disease may enfeeble — every sort of trial may afflict that soul; but it will not succumb. Those, on the contrary, who only listen — who take delight in the beauty or truth of the Sacred Word, without putting it into practice, or doing so but imperfectly — 'have built their house upon the sand,’ and it will fall upon the first occasion, 'and great ’ will be ' the fall thereof.’[1]
- ↑ Matt. vii. 24-27.