d with
fervor the monastic state, insensibly fell into lukewarmness, and at
length returned into the world, where he enjoyed large possessions,
lived in pomp, and abandoned himself to the pursuit of vanity and
pleasures; till, opening his eyes upon the remonstrances of certain
pious friends, he distributed his whole estate among the poor, and spent
the rest of his life in the desert with extraordinary fervor. Another
ascetic, falling by degrees, in an advanced age, committed the crime of
fornication; but immediately rising, attained to an eminent degree of
sanctity, and was honored with the gift of miracles. The disciple of St.
John, who had been a captain of a troop of robbers and murderers, became
an illustrious penitent. In like manner, our saint exhorts and conjures
this sinner to rise without delay, before he was overtaken by the divine
judgments, and to confess his sins with compunction of heart, abundant
bitter tears, and a perfect change of life, laboring to efface his
crimes by good works, to the least of which Christ has promised a
reward.

St. Chrysostom begins his second Exhortation to Theodorus, which is much
shorter than the first, by expressing his grief as follows: (t. 1, p.
35:) "If tears and groans could have been conveyed by letters, this
would have been filled. I grieve not that you have taken upon you the
administration of your affairs; but that you have trampled under your
feet the sacred engagement you had made of yourself to Christ. For this
I suffer excessive trouble and pain; for this I mourn; for this I am
seized with fear and trembling, having before my eyes the severe
damnation which so treacherous and base a perfidiousness deserves." He
tells him yet "that the case is not desperate for a person to have been
wounded, but for him to neglect the cure of his wounds. A merchant after
shipwreck labors to repair his losses; many wrestlers, after a fall,
have risen and fought so courageously as to have been crowned; and
soldiers, after a defeat, have rallied and conquered. You allege," says
he, "that marriage is lawful. This I readily acknowledge; but it is not
now in your power to embrace that state: for it is certain that one who,
by a solemn engagement, has given himself to God as his heavenly spouse,
if he violates this contract, he commits an adultery, though he should a
thousand times call it marriage. Nay, he is guilty of a crime so much
the more enormous as the majesty of God surpasses man.