The Impatient and the Patient

Admonition 10. The impatient are to be admonished in one way, and the patient in another. The impatient must be told that while they neglect to bridle their spirit, they are hurried over many steep places of wickedness that they never sought; for rage drives the mind where desire does not draw it, and the mind, once agitated, does without knowing it what it later grieves over when it knows. The impatient must also be told that when they are carried headlong by the force of their feelings, they act in some ways as if they were out of their minds, and afterward they are hardly aware of the evil they have done. And since they offer no resistance to their agitation, they throw into confusion even things that may have been done well while the mind was calm, and in a sudden fit they overturn whatever they may have built up over a long time with careful labor. [b]

For the very virtue of love, which is the mother and guardian of all virtues, is lost through the vice of impatience. For it is written, “Love is patient.” So where there is no patience, there is no love. Through this vice of impatience, too, instruction, the nurse of the virtues, is scattered. For it is written, “A man’s instruction is known by his patience.” So each person is shown to be that much less instructed as he is proved to be less patient. For he cannot truly impart what is good by instruction if in his own life he does not know how to bear the evil in others with an even mind.

Further, it is mostly through this vice of impatience that the sin of arrogance pierces the mind. For when someone cannot bear to be looked down on in this world, he tries to show off whatever hidden good he may have; so impatience draws him on to arrogance, and because he cannot bear contempt, he boasts and puts himself on display. That is why it is written, “The patient is better than the arrogant.” For truly, a patient person chooses to suffer any evils at all rather than have his hidden good become known through the vice of showing off. The arrogant, on the contrary, would rather have even a pretended good boasted of him than possibly suffer even the least evil. [c]

Since, then, when patience is given up, all the other good things that have been done are overturned too, Ezekiel is rightly commanded to make a trench in the altar of God, so that the whole burnt offerings laid on the altar might be kept safe in it. For if there were no trench in the altar, the passing breeze would scatter every sacrifice it found there. But what do we take the altar of God to be, if not the soul of the righteous man, which lays on itself before his eyes as many sacrifices as it has done good deeds? And what is the trench of the altar but the patience of good men, which humbles the mind to endure hardship and so shows it to be set low, like a ditch? So let a trench be made in the altar, so that the breeze may not scatter the sacrifice laid on it. That is, let the mind of the elect keep patience, so that it does not, stirred by the wind of impatience, lose even what it has done well. And it is well that this same trench is ordered to be a single measure, about 21 inches; for if patience does not fail, the measure of unity is kept. That is why Paul also says, “Bear one another’s burdens, and so you will fulfill the law of Christ.” For the law of Christ is the love of unity, and only those fulfill it who do not go to excess even when they are burdened.

Let the impatient hear what is written: “The patient is better than the mighty, and one who rules his spirit than one who takes cities.” For victory over cities is a lesser thing, because what is conquered lies outside; but what is conquered by patience is far greater, since the mind is overcome by itself and subjects itself to itself, when patience compels it to bridle itself within. Let the impatient hear what the Truth says to his elect: “By your patience you will possess your souls.” For we are so wonderfully made that reason possesses the soul, and the soul the body. But the soul is driven from its right to possess the body if it is not first possessed by reason. So the Lord showed that patience is the guardian of our condition when he taught us to possess ourselves in it. From this we learn how great the sin of impatience is, through which we lose possession of the very thing we are. Let the impatient hear what is said again through Solomon: “A fool utters all his mind, but a wise man puts it off and keeps it back until later.” For such a person is so driven by the force of impatience that he pours out his whole mind; and the agitation within throws it out all the more quickly because no discipline of wisdom fences it in. But the wise man puts it off and keeps it back until later. For when he is wronged, he does not wish to avenge himself now, because in his forbearance he even wishes people to be spared; yet he knows well that all things are justly avenged at the last judgment.

On the other hand, the patient are to be admonished not to grieve inwardly over what they bear outwardly. Otherwise they may spoil, with the infection of malice within, a sacrifice of such great value, which they offer whole on the outside; and the sin of their grieving, which people do not see but which is still seen as sin under God’s scrutiny, may become all the worse for claiming the fair appearance of virtue before people.

So the patient should be told to make an effort to love those they have to put up with, so that if love does not follow patience, the virtue they display may not turn into the worse fault of hatred. That is why Paul, when he said, “Love is patient,” at once added, “is kind,” showing surely that love does not stop loving, with kindness too, those it bears with in patience. That is why the same excellent teacher, urging his disciples to patience, said, “Let all bitterness and wrath and indignation and shouting and evil speaking be put away from you.” Having now, as it were, set all the outward things in good order, he turns to those within when he adds, “with all malice.” For it is useless to put indignation, shouting, and evil speaking away from the outward things if malice, the mother of vices, rules in the inward things; and it is pointless to cut wickedness off from the branches outside if it is kept at the root within, to spring up in more ways than before. [h]

That is why the Truth in person also says, “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute you and falsely speak evil of you.” So it is virtue before people to bear with opponents, but it is virtue before God to love them; for the only sacrifice God accepts is the one that the flame of love kindles before his eyes on the altar of good work. Hence to some who were patient and yet did not love, he says, “Why do you see the speck in your brother’s eye, and do not see the beam in your own eye?” For the agitation of impatience is a speck, but malice in the heart is a beam in the eye. The breeze of temptation blows the speck back and forth; but a settled wickedness carries the beam almost without moving. And rightly it is added there, “You hypocrite, first take the beam out of your own eye, and then you will see to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” It is as if it were said to the wicked mind that grieves inwardly while it shows itself holy outwardly by patience: “First shake off the weight of malice from yourself, and then blame others for the lightness of impatience. Otherwise, while you take no pains to conquer your pretense, bearing with the faults of others will go all the worse for you.”

For it often happens with the patient that at the moment when they suffer hardships or hear insults, they are struck by no resentment at all, and they show patience in such a way that they also keep innocence of heart. But when, after a while, they call back to memory the very things they endured, they set themselves on fire with resentment, look for reasons for revenge, and, going back over it, turn into malice the meekness they had in bearing it. The preacher helps such people more quickly if he lays bare the cause of this change.

For the cunning adversary wages war against two. He inflames one to be the first to give insult, and he provokes the other, smarting under the wrong, to return it. But it often happens that while he has already conquered the one he persuaded to inflict the injury, he is conquered by the one who bears it with an even mind. So, victorious over the one he subdued by enraging him, he rises with all his strength against the other, and is pained that this one resists firmly and wins. And because he could not move him in the very hurling of the insults, he rests for a while from open combat, and, provoking his thoughts by secret suggestion, looks for a fitting time to deceive him. For having lost in open warfare, he burns to lay hidden traps. In a time of quiet he comes back to the mind of the victor. He brings back to his memory either his earthly losses or the darts of the insults, and by greatly exaggerating all that was done to him, he makes it seem unbearable. And he so upsets the mind with resentment that the patient person, taken captive after his victory, very often blushes at having borne such things calmly, is sorry he did not return the insults, and looks to pay back something worse if the chance is given.

What are such people like, then, but those who win in the field by their bravery, and afterward, by their negligence, are captured inside the gates of the city? What are they like but those whom a violent attack of sickness does not take from life, but who die when a fever comes gently back on them? So the patient are to be admonished to guard their hearts after victory; to watch for the enemy, beaten in open warfare, laying traps against the walls of their minds; and to fear all the more a sickness creeping back. Otherwise the cunning enemy, if he deceives them later, may rejoice with all the greater glee at treading on the necks of conquerors who had long stood unbending against him.