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Translated by Bl. Jackson.
St Basil the Great Resources Online and in Print
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80 Pages (Homilies: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
Page 63
5. I myself have seen these marvels, and I have admired the wisdom of God in all things. If beings deprived of reason are capable of thinking and of providing for their own preservation; if a fish knows what it ought to seek and what to shun, what shall we say, who are honoured with reason, instructed by law, encouraged by the promises, made wise by the Spirit, and are nevertheless less reasonable about our own affairs than the fish? They know how to provide for the future, but we renounce our hope of the future and spend our life in brutal indulgence. A fish traverses the extent of the sea to find what is good for it; what will you say then--you who live in idleness, the mother of all vices? [1628] Do not let any one make his ignorance an excuse. There has been implanted in us natural reason which tells us to identify ourselves with good, and to avoid all that is harmful. I need not go far from the sea to find examples, as that is the object of our researches. I have heard it said by one living near the sea, that the sea urchin, a little contemptible creature, often foretells calm and tempest to sailors. When it foresees a disturbance of the winds, it gets under a great pebble, and clinging to it as to an anchor, it tosses about in safety, retained by the weight which prevents it from becoming the plaything of the waves. [1629] It is a certain sign for sailors that they are threatened with a violent agitation of the winds. No astrologer, no Chaldaean, reading in the rising of the stars the disturbances of the air, has ever communicated his secret to the urchin: it is the Lord of the sea and of the winds who has impressed on this little animal a manifest proof of His great wisdom. God has foreseen all, He has neglected nothing. His eye, which never sleeps, watches over all. [1630] He is present everywhere and gives to each being the means of preservation. If God has not left the sea urchin outside His providence, is He without care for you?
"Husbands love your wives." [1631] Although formed of two bodies you are united to live in the communion of wedlock. May this natural link, may this yoke imposed by the blessing, reunite those who are divided. The viper, the cruelest of reptiles, unites itself with the sea lamprey, and, announcing its presence by a hiss, it calls it from the depths to conjugal union. The lamprey obeys, and is united to this venomous animal. [1632] What does this mean? However hard, however fierce a husband may be, the wife ought to bear with him, and not wish to find any pretext for breaking the union. He strikes you, but he is your husband. He is a drunkard, but he is united to you by nature. He is brutal and cross, but he is henceforth one of your members, and the most precious of all.
[1628] Otiosa mater est nugarum noverca omnium virtutum. St. Bernard.
[1629] "Tradunt saevitiam maris praesagire eos, correptisque opperiri lapillis, mobilitatem pondere stabilientes: nolunt volutatione spinas atterere, quod ubi videre nautici, statim pluribus ancoris navigia infraenant." Plin. ix. 5. cf. Plut., De Solert. An. 979, Oppian, Halieut. ii. 225, and AElian, Hist. An. vii. 33.
[1630] cf. Prov. xv. 3: "The eyes of the Lord are in every place," and Ps. cxxi. 3. So Hesiod, panta idon Dios ophthalmos kai panta noesas. Hes. Works and Days, 265.
[1631] Eph. v. 25.
[1632] The fable is in AElian, Hist. An. ix. 66, and is contradicted by Athenaeus, who says (vii. p. 312): 'Andreas de en to peri ton pseudos pepisteumenon pseudos phesin einai to Murainan echii mignusthai proserchomenen epi to tenagodes, oude gar epi tenagous echeis nemesthai, philedountas limodesin eremiais. Sostratos de en tois peri Zoon sunkatatithetai te mixei.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/basil/hexaemeron.asp?pg=63
