holy Apostle, healing the Church, and caring for its members, subjoins the cure of these things, saying 'I am persuaded better things,' &c. (Heb. vi. 9.) You see how absolutely he declared that the renewal cannot take place a second time: but still did not exclude from salvation those who yet repented; but declared that they were yet allied to it, and had God as the helper of their good deeds, when they repented most thoroughly of their offences, and turned and forsook them." And not in the case of gross sin only, but of the infirmities of good Christians, they held that the scar still remained, even towards the end of life; to be effaced only by continued repentance to the very last. "I think," says Basil[1], "that those noble combatants of God, who have during their whole life wrestled thoroughly with the invisible enemies, after they have escaped all their persecutions, and are come to the end of life, are examined by the ruler of this world, that if they be found to have wounds from their contests, or any stain or mark of sin, they may be a while detained [in life]; but if they be found unwounded and unstained, as being invincible and free, they have their rest given them by Christ."
The Fathers urge the difficulty of the cure of sin after Baptism, at the same time that they urge men to seek it: they set side by side the possibility and the pains of repentance; they urge against the Novatian heretic, that there is still "mercy with God, that He may be feared:" they urge this truth against our own fears, and the insinuations of the evil one, who would suggest hard and desponding thoughts of God, in order to keep in his chain those more energetic spirits, who feel the greatness of their fall, and would undergo any pains whereby they might be restored: but the Antient Church consulted at the same time for that more relaxed and listless sort, (of whom the greater part of mankind consist) who would make the incurring of eternal damnation, the breaking of Covenant with God, the forfeiture of His Spirit, the profanation of His Temple (ourselves) a light thing and easy to be repaired. Therefore, while they set forth the greatness of
- ↑ Hom. in Psalm vii., t. i. p. 99. ed. Bened.
