outh of a priest.
Whereby it is to be considered how deeply should they repent who of
their own fault have fallen into the heaviest offences, when this holy
man so deeply repented of, and so strictly atoned for, one falsehood
alone. Alas! what hearts of clay do they bear unto the resistance of
sin, but what hearts of stone unto repentance! For many men, wicked,
sinful, abandoned in their lives (the which cannot be observed without
grief), take on themselves the cure of souls, and think to wash away
the guilt of others with their own denied hands; who, being themselves
bound with the chain of mortal sin, desire to loose others' bonds, and
thus heap on themselves increased offence. These men, being placed
under the spiritual control, can repent of and atone for their own
guiltiness, but, when seated in the pastoral chair, bound are they to
account for the faith of all those who are entrusted to their charge.
Since, then, the words of a priest must be either a truth or a
sacrilege, terrible is the judgment on those priests whose tongue is
defiled with falsehoods and with perjuries. Thus much let us show, as
speaking by digression, how earnestly not only crimes and evil deeds,
but even falsehoods, are to be avoided by all Christian men, and
especially by the pastors of souls. Now let us return unto the thread
of our sacred story. The aforementioned monks, unwilling to separate
from Saint Asycus, continued with him even unto the end of his life;
and after he was buried, building there a monastery, served they the
Lord in holiness and in truth.

CHAPTER CIX.

_The Tempest of the Sea is Composed._

While on a certain time Saint Patrick was preaching unto the heathens,
for the sake of instructing and baptizing them, he made in that place a
long stay. But his disciple Benignus was grieved thereat; and the
saint declared that he would not depart until his disciples and pupils
should arrive from foreign regions. And one day he beheld the sky to
grow dark, and the ocean to be perturbed and shaken with a strong wind.
Then the saint, covering his face for very sorrow, showed unto his
attendants his sons which were born unto him in Christ laboring under
grievous peril; and he was sorely afflicted for them, and feared he
chiefly for his young pupil, the son of Erchus; but when every one said
that the vessel could not endure so violent a storm, forthwith the
saint betook himself unto prayer. And after a short space, ev