Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Psalms 12
There are 29 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 9, footnote 6 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Clement of Rome (HTML)
First Epistle to the Corinthians (HTML)
Chapter XV.—We must adhere to those who cultivate peace, not to those who merely pretend to do so. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 65 (In-Text, Margin)
... their mouth, and lied to Him with their tongue; but their heart was not right with Him, neither were they faithful in His covenant.” “Let the deceitful lips become silent,” [and “let the Lord destroy all the lying lips,] and the boastful tongue of those who have said, Let us magnify our tongue; our lips are our own; who is lord over us? For the oppression of the poor, and for the sighing of the needy, will I now arise, saith the Lord: I will place him in safety; I will deal confidently with him.”[Psalms 12:3-5]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 62, footnote 18 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Ignatius (HTML)
Epistle to the Magnesians: Shorter and Longer Versions (HTML)
Chapter IX.—Let us live with Christ. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 691 (In-Text, Margin)
... relaxation of the body, admiring the workmanship of God, and not eating things prepared the day before, nor using lukewarm drinks, and walking within a prescribed space, nor finding delight in dancing and plaudits which have no sense in them. And after the observance of the Sabbath, let every friend of Christ keep the Lord’s Day as a festival, the resurrection-day, the queen and chief of all the days [of the week]. Looking forward to this, the prophet declared, “To the end, for the eighth day,”[Psalms 12] on which our life both sprang up again, and the victory over death was obtained in Christ, whom the children of perdition, the enemies of the Saviour, deny, “whose god is their belly, who mind earthly things,” who are “lovers of pleasure, and not ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 415, footnote 2 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book IV. (HTML)
Chapter V.—On Contempt for Pain, Poverty, and Other External Things. (HTML)
... lied to Him with their tongue; but their heart was not right with Him, and they were not faithful to His covenant.” Wherefore “let the false lips become speechless, and let the Lord destroy the boastful tongue: those who say, We shall magnify our tongue, and our lips are our own; who is Lord over us? For the affliction of the poor and the groaning of the needy now will I arise, saith the Lord; I will set him in safety; I will speak out in his case.”[Psalms 12:3-5] For it is to the humble that Christ belongs, who do not exalt themselves against His flock. “Lay not up for yourselves, therefore, treasures on the earth, where moth and rust destroy, and thieves break through and steal,” says the Lord, in reproach ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 494, footnote 2 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book VI (HTML)
Chapter VII.—What True Philosophy Is, and Whence So Called. (HTML)
... Pharisees revolted from the Law, by introducing human teachings,—the cause of these being not the Teacher, but those who choose to disobey. But those of them who believed the Lord’s advent and the plain teaching of the Scriptures, attain to the knowledge of the law; as also those addicted to philosophy, by the teaching of the Lord, are introduced into the knowledge of the true philosophy: “For the oracles of the Lord are pure oracles, melted in the fire, tried in the earth, purified seven times.”[Psalms 12:6] Just as silver often purified, so is the just man brought to the test, becoming the Lord’s coin and receiving the royal image. Or, since Solomon also calls the “tongue of the righteous man gold that has been subjected to fire,” intimating that the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 342, footnote 5 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Victorinus (HTML)
On the Creation of the World (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2205 (In-Text, Margin)
And thus in the sixth Psalm for the eighth day,[Psalms 12] David asks the Lord that He would not rebuke him in His anger, nor judge him in His fury; for this is indeed the eighth day of that future judgment, which will pass beyond the order of the sevenfold arrangement. Jesus also, the son of Nave, the successor of Moses, himself broke the Sabbath-day; for on the Sabbath-day he commanded the children of Israel to go round the walls of the city of Jericho with trumpets, and declare war against the aliens. Matthias also, prince of ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 447, footnote 9 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Constitutions of the Holy Apostles (HTML)
Book V (HTML)
Sec. III.—On Feast Days and Fast Days (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3125 (In-Text, Margin)
... set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against His Christ;” and, “They cast away the Beloved, as a dead man, who is abominable.” And since He was crucified on the day of the Preparation, and rose again at break of day on the Lord’s day, the scripture was fulfilled which saith, “Arise, O God; judge the earth: for Thou shalt have an inheritance in all the nations;” and again, “I will arise, saith the Lord; I will put Him in safety, I will wax bold through Him;”[Psalms 12:5] and, “But Thou, Lord, have mercy upon me, and raise me up again, and I shall requite them.” For this reason do you also, now the Lord is risen, offer your sacrifice, concerning which He made a constitution by us, saying, “Do this for a remembrance ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 611, footnote 5 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
The Decretals. (HTML)
The Epistles of Zephyrinus. (HTML)
To the Bishops of the Province of Egypt. (HTML)
On the Spoliation or Expulsion of certain Bishops. (HTML)
... the reproach of men, neither be ye afraid of their revilings;” considering what is written in the Psalm, “Shall not God search this out? for He knoweth the secrets of the heart, and the thoughts of such men, that they are vanity,” “They spoke vanity every one with his neighbour: with deceitful lips in their heart, and with an evil heart they spoke. But the Lord shall cut off all deceitful lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things; who have said, Our lips are our own; who is Lord over us?”[Psalms 12:2-4] For if they kept these things in memory, they would by no means break forth into so great wickedness. For they do not this by laudable and paternal instruction (probabili et paterna doctrina), but that they may wreak their vengeful feeling ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 233, footnote 13 (Image)
Gospel of Peter, Diatessaron, Apocalypses, Visio Pauli, Testament of Abraham, Acts of X/P, Zosimus, Aristides, Clement, Origen
The Epistles of Clement. (HTML)
The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians. (HTML)
We Must Adhere to Those Who Cultivate Peace, Not to Those Who Merely Pretend to Do So. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4072 (In-Text, Margin)
... their month, and lied to Him with their tongue; but their heart was not right with Him, neither were they faithful in His covenant.” “Let the deceitful lips become silent, [and “let the Lord destroy all the lying lips,] and the boastful tongue of those who have said, Let us magnify our tongue: our lips are our own; who is lord over us? For the oppression of the poor, and for the sighing of the needy, will I now arise, saith the Lord: I will place him in safety; I will deal confidently with him.”[Psalms 12:3-5]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 260, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
Letters of St. Augustin (HTML)
Letters of St. Augustin (HTML)
To Paulinus and Therasia (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1556 (In-Text, Margin)
... now president of the church in Milevis, and well known by the brethren in that city, joins me in respectful salutation to your Holiness. The brethren also who are with me serving the Lord salute you as warmly as they long to see you: they long for you as much as they love you; and they love you as your eminent goodness merits. The loaf which we send you will become more rich as a blessing through the love with which your kindness receives it. May the Lord keep you for ever from this generation,[Psalms 12:7] my brother and sister most beloved and sincere, truly benevolent, and most eminently endowed with abundant grace from the Lord.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 314, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
Letters of St. Augustin (HTML)
Letters of St. Augustin (HTML)
To Januarius (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1839 (In-Text, Margin)
... commanded to be taken on the right side of the ship, there is found the number 50 three times multiplied, with the addition of three more [the symbol of the Trinity] to make the holy mystery more apparent; and the disciples’ nets were not broken, because in that new life there shall be no schism caused by the disquiet of heretics. Then [in this new life] man, made perfect and at rest, purified in body and in soul by the pure words of God, which are like silver purged from its dross, seven times refined,[Psalms 12:6] shall receive his reward, the denarius; so that with that reward the numbers 10 and 7 meet in him. For in this number [17] there is found, as in other numbers representing a combination of symbols, a wonderful mystery. Nor is it without good reason ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 234, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the creation of angels and men, and of the origin of evil. (HTML)
Of the Revolution of the Ages, Which Some Philosophers Believe Will Bring All Things Round Again, After a Certain Fixed Cycle, to the Same Order and Form as at First. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 547 (In-Text, Margin)
... same Plato and the same school, and the same disciples existed, and so also are to be repeated during the countless cycles that are yet to be,—far be it, I say, from us to believe this. For once Christ died for our sins; and, rising from the dead, He dieth no more. “Death hath no more dominion over Him; and we ourselves after the resurrection shall be “ever with the Lord,” to whom we now say, as the sacred Psalmist dictates, “Thou shall keep us, O Lord, Thou shall preserve us from this generation.”[Psalms 12:7] And that too which follows, is, I think, appropriate enough: “The wicked walk in a circle,” not because their life is to recur by means of these circles, which these philosophers imagine, but because the path in which their false doctrine now ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 345, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
The history of the city of God from Noah to the time of the kings of Israel. (HTML)
Of Those Things Which a Man of God Spake by the Spirit to Eli the Priest, Signifying that the Priesthood Which Had Been Appointed According to Aaron Was to Be Taken Away. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1019 (In-Text, Margin)
... Priest, who is also God? For in that priesthood after the order of Aaron men did not come to the temple or altar of God for the purpose of worshipping the priest. But what is that he says, “With a piece of money,” if not the short word of faith, about which the apostle quotes the saying, “A consummating and shortening word will the Lord make upon the earth?” But that money is put for the word the psalm is a witness, where it is sung, “The words of the Lord are pure words, money tried with the fire.”[Psalms 12:6]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 252, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings
Writings in Connection with the Manichæan Controversy. (HTML)
Reply to Faustus the Manichæan. (HTML)
Faustus is willing to admit that Christ may have said that He came not to destroy the law and the prophets, but to fulfill them; but if He did, it was to pacify the Jews and in a modified sense. Augustin replies, and still further elaborates the Catholic view of prophecy and its fulfillment. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 731 (In-Text, Margin)
... is said, indeed, "Love wisdom, that ye may reign for ever." And if eternal life had not been clearly made known in the Old Testament, the Lord would not have said, as He did even to the unbelieving Jews: "Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think that ye have eternal life, and they are they that testify of me." And to the same effect are the words of the Psalmist: "I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord." And again: "Enlighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death."[Psalms 12:3] Again, we read, "The souls of the righteous are in the hand of the Lord, and pain shall not touch them;" and immediately following: "They are in peace; and if they have suffered torture from men, their hope is full of immortality; and after a few ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 90, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter. (HTML)
The Exclusion of Boasting. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 778 (In-Text, Margin)
... is driven off so as to pass away, but that it is clearly manifested so as to stand out prominently. Whence certain artificers in silver are called “ exclusores.” In this sense it occurs also in that passage in the Psalms: “That they may be excluded, who have been proved with silver,” —that is, that they may stand out in prominence, who have been tried by the word of God. For in another passage it is said: “The words of the Lord are pure words, as silver which is tried in the fire.”[Psalms 12:6] Or if this be not his meaning, he must have wished to mention that vicious boasting which comes of pride—that is, of those who appear to themselves to lead righteous lives, and boast of their excellence as if they had not received it,—and further to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 141, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on Nature and Grace. (HTML)
It Does Not Detract from God’s Almighty Power, that He is Incapable of Either Sinning, or Dying, or Destroying Himself. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1263 (In-Text, Margin)
... that, whether we will or not, we have the capacity of not sinning,—a capacity which he declares to be inherent in our nature. Of a man, indeed, who has his legs strong and sound, it may be said admissibly enough, “whether he will or not he has the capacity of walking;” but if his legs be broken, however much he may wish, he has not the capacity. The nature of which our author speaks is corrupted. “Why is dust and ashes proud?” It is corrupted. It implores the Physician’s help. “Save me, O Lord,”[Psalms 12:1] is its cry; “Heal my soul,” it exclaims. Why does he check such cries so as to hinder future health, by insisting, as it were, on its present capacity?
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 63, footnote 8 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount. (HTML)
On the Latter Part of Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, Contained in the Sixth and Seventh Chapters of Matthew. (HTML)
Chapter XXV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 491 (In-Text, Margin)
... came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it. And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at His doctrine: for He taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.” This is what I said before was meant by the prophet in the Psalms, when he says: “I will act confidently in regard of him. The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried and proved in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.”[Psalms 12:5-6] And from this number, I am admonished to trace back those precepts also to the seven sentences which He has placed in the beginning of this sermon, when He was speaking of those who are blessed; and to those seven operations of the Holy Spirit, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 507, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)
On the words of the Gospel of John vii. 6, etc., where Jesus said that He was not going up unto the feast, and notwithstanding went up. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3979 (In-Text, Margin)
... in itself, it is in itself true; with regard to him it is false, his conscience does not hold that which he is saying; he thinks in himself one thing to be true, he gives out another for truth. His is a double heart, not single; he does not bring out that which he has in it. The double heart has long since been condemned. “With deceitful lips in a heart and a heart have they spoken evil things.” Had it been enough to say, “in the heart have they spoken evil things,” where is the “deceitful lips”?[Psalms 12:2] What is deceit? When one thing is done, another pretended. Deceitful lips are not a single heart; and because not a single heart, therefore “in a heart and a heart;” therefore “in a heart” twice, because the heart is double.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 31, footnote 14 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm VIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 320 (In-Text, Margin)
... is Abel slain. Wherefore there is cause to fear, lest one coming down from the mountains of God’s righteousness (“for thy righteousness,” he says, “is as the mountains of God”) making choice of the broad and easy paths of carnal pleasure, be slain by the devil. See now too “the birds of heaven,” the proud, of whom it is said, “They have set their mouth against the heaven.” See how they are carried on high by the wind, “who say, We will magnify our tongue, our lips are our own, who is our Lord?”[Psalms 12:4] Behold too the fish of the sea, that is, the curious; who walk through the paths of the sea, that is, search in the deep after the temporal things of this world: which, like paths in the sea, vanish and perish, as quickly as the water comes together ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 290, footnote 14 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXVIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2753 (In-Text, Margin)
... the beauty of the house are divided, if ye sleep in the “midst of the lots,” wings of a dove silvered ye shall be: that is, into higher places ye shall be lifted up, adhering however to the bond of the Church. For I think no other dove silvered can be better perceived here, than that whereof hath been said, “One is My dove.” But silvered She is because with divine sayings she hath been instructed: for the sayings of the Lord in another place are called “silver with fire refined, purged sevenfold.”[Psalms 12:6] Some great good thing therefore it is, to sleep in the midst of the lots, which some would have to be the Two Testaments, so that to “sleep in the midst of the lots” is to rest on the authority of those Testaments, that is, to acquiesce in the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 643, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXL (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5753 (In-Text, Margin)
... cover: for, “Thou hast covered me in the day of battle.” Them what shall cover? “The head of their going about;” that is, pride. What is, “their going about”? How they go about and stand not, how they go in the circle of error, where is journeying without end. He who goeth in a straight line, beginneth from some point, endeth at some point: he who goeth in a circle, never endeth. That is the toil of the wicked, which is set forth yet more plainly in another Psalm, “The wicked walk in a circle.”[Psalms 12:8] But “the head of their going about” is pride, for pride is the beginning of every sin. But whence is pride “the toil of their own lips”? Every proud man is false, and every false man is a liar. Men toil in speaking falsehood; for truth they could ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 178, footnote 4 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)
Dialogues. The “Eranistes” or “Polymorphus” of the Blessed Theodoretus, Bishop of Cyrus. (HTML)
The Immutable. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1131 (In-Text, Margin)
“‘I am the vine, ye are the branches. My Father is the husbandman.’ For we according to the body are of kin to the Lord, and for this reason He himself said ‘I will declare thy name unto my brethren.’[Psalms 12:22] And just as the branches are of one substance with the vine, and of it, so too we, since we have bodies akin to the body of the Lord, receive them of His fulness, and have it as a root for our resurrection and salvation. And the Father is called a husbandman, for He Himself through the Word tilled the vine which is the Lord’s body.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 554, footnote 14 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
Life and Works of Rufinus with Jerome's Apology Against Rufinus. (HTML)
A Commentary on the Apostles' Creed. (HTML)
Section 30 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3365 (In-Text, Margin)
30. It is said then in the Psalms, “I laid me down and slept, and rose up again, because the Lord sustained me.” Again, in another place, “Because of the wretchedness of the needy and the groaning of the poor, now will I arise, saith the Lord.”[Psalms 12:5] And elsewhere, as we have said above, “O Lord, thou hast brought my soul out of hell; Thou hast saved me from them that go down into the pit.” And in another place, “Because Thou hast turned and quickened me, and brought me out of the deep of the earth again.” In the 87th Psalm He is most evidently spoken of: “He became as a man without help, free among the dead.” It is not ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 514, footnote 6 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Letters of Athanasius with Two Ancient Chronicles of His Life. (HTML)
The Festal Letters, and their Index. (HTML)
Festal Letters. (HTML)
For 331. Easter-day xvi Pharmuthi; iii Id. April; Æra Dioclet. 47; Coss. Annius Bassus, Ablabius; Præfect, Florentius; Indict. iv. (HTML)
... ministers a flame of fire.’ Wherefore, in the departure from Egypt, He forbade the multitude to touch the mountain, where God was appointing them the law, because they were not of this character. But He called blessed Moses to it, as being fervent in spirit, and possessing unquenchable grace, saying, ‘Let Moses alone draw near.’ He entered into the cloud also, and when the mountain was smoking, he was not injured; but rather, through ‘the words of the Lord, which are choice silver purified in the earth[Psalms 12:6],’ he descended purified. Therefore the blessed Paul, when desirous that the grace of the Spirit given to us should not grow cold, exhorts, saying, ‘Quench not the Spirit.’ For so shall we remain partakers of Christ, if we hold fast to the end the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 12, footnote 3 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Paul, an Old Man of Concordia. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 136 (In-Text, Margin)
Certainly their ablest literary men used to receive money for pronouncing eulogies upon their kings or princes. Following their example, I set a price upon my praise. Nor must you suppose my demand a small one. You are asked to give me the pearl of the Gospel, “the words of the Lord,” “pure words, even as the silver which from the earth is tried, and purified seven times in the fire,”[Psalms 12:7] I mean the commentaries of Fortunatian and—for its account of the persecutors—the History of Aurelius Victor, and with these the Letters of Novatian; so that, learning the poison set forth by this schismatic, we may the more gladly drink of the antidote supplied by the holy martyr Cyprian. In the mean ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 327, footnote 2 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
The Dialogue Against the Luciferians. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4098 (In-Text, Margin)
O. Certainly, but first I congratulate you, and thank Christ my God for your good dispositions which have made you turn from the unsavoury teaching of the Sardinians to that which the whole world approves as true; and no longer say as some do,[Psalms 12:1] “Help, Lord; for the godly man teaseth.” By their impious words they make of none effect the cross of Christ, subject the Son of God to the devil, and would have us now understand the Lord’s lamentation over sinners to apply to all men, “What profit is there in my blood, when I go down to the pit?” But God forbid that our Lord should have died in vain. The strong man is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 94, footnote 12 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
On the Words, And Rose Again from the Dead on the Third Day, and Ascended into the Heavens, and Sat on the Right Hand of the Father. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1666 (In-Text, Margin)
4. First, then, in the 11th Psalm He says, For the misery of the poor, and the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord[Psalms 12:5]. But this passage still remains doubtful with some: for He often rises up also in anger, to take vengeance upon His enemies.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 217, footnote 22 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
In Defence of His Flight to Pontus, and His Return, After His Ordination to the Priesthood, with an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2723 (In-Text, Margin)
... teach for hire, and the prophets divine for money—what does he say will be the result of this? Zion shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem be as a lodge in a garden, and the mountain of the house be reckoned as a glade in a thicket. He bewails also the scarcity of the upright, there being scarcely a stalk or a gleaning grape left, since both the prince asketh, and the judge curries favour, so that his language is almost the same as the mighty David’s: Save me, O Lord, for the godly man ceaseth:[Psalms 12:1] and says that therefore their blessings shall fail them, as if wasted by the moth.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 224, footnote 8 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
In Defence of His Flight to Pontus, and His Return, After His Ordination to the Priesthood, with an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2857 (In-Text, Margin)
96. Who is the man, whose heart has never been made to burn, as the Scriptures have been opened to him, with the pure words of God which have been tried in a furnace;[Psalms 12:7] who has not, by a triple inscription of them upon the breadth of his heart, attained the mind of Christ; nor been admitted to the treasures which to most men remain hidden, secret, and dark, to gaze upon the riches therein? and become able to enrich others, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 285, footnote 10 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book V. (HTML)
Prologue. (HTML)
... the money-lender,—the usury on speech, not on money; ye are the return given to the husbandman; ye are the gold, the silver, the precious stones of the builder. In your merits lie the chief results of the labours of the priest; in your souls shines forth the fruit of a bishop’s work; in your progress glitters the gold of the Lord; the silver is increased if ye hold fast the divine words. “The words of the Lord are pure words, as silver tried in the fire; proved on the earth, purified seven times.”[Psalms 12:6] Ye therefore will make the lender rich, the husbandman to abound in produce; ye will prove the master-builder to be skilful. I do not speak boastfully; for I do not desire so much my own advantage as yours.