NINETEENTH HOMILY. "Cain departed from the face of God and dwelt in the land of Naid, opposite the region of Eden. (Gen. IV, 16, etc.)

ANALYSIS.

1. The soul subjugated by sin no longer even hears the exhortations that remind her of virtue; it is not an effect of his helplessness; no, the soul is free, and it remains free, even under the yoke of sin, to follow the inspirations of God who will help, but not force it. 2. God is so good that he deigned to interrogate Cain after his crime, he questioned him to excite him to repent, and to find a way to show him mercy. 3. Cain after his arrogant and impious response, was cursed of God. Difference between this curse and that which God pronounced after the sin of Adam; this one strikes the earth, that one the sinner Cain himself. 4. Penance and confession are useless when they are used outside the proper time. 5. What do the seven vengeances for the one who will kill Cain mean? - 6. Exhortation.

1. As there are incurable wounds that yield neither to energetic remedies nor to those which have the effect of softening; likewise when a soul once became captive to the devil, that it has committed some sin and that it does not even want to understand its interest, then it is vain to lavish on it the instructions and the councils, it is lost grief, and it takes no more advantage of the exhortation than if the sense of hearing was dead in it, which happens not for want of power, but for want of will. This is how the vices of the will differ from the infirmities of the body. As for the body, the affections that come from nature are for the most part incurable; it is quite different from the free will. As bad as one is, one can, if one wants to, change and become good, and one can also, although good, slip to evil if one neglects oneself.

After having made our nature capable of self-determination, the God who is the author of all things, who is goodness in essence, neglects nothing to bring us to good, and as he knows the most intimate feelings, the most secret, agitating in the depths of our hearts, he exhorts us, he advises us, he warns our bad designs. It is not that he uses constraint, but he uses remedies appropriate to the ills of each, and then he abandons everything to the decision of the patient.

This is the conduct he has held especially with regard to Cain. See, however, in what an abyss of malice this one has fallen, in spite of the efforts of a providence so attentive! He must, since he was conscious of the crime he meditated, apply only to correct the perversity of his thought; but not dominated by a sort of intoxication, to the wound which his soul has already received he has brought a second; as for the remedy which was applied to him with such a gentle hand, he can not bear it, but he hastens to execute the murder of which he has conceived the black design; he goes about it with cunning and cunning, he finds misleading words to make his brother fall into the trap. Such is the ferocity of the man who turns to evil. Great and respectable when his effort tends to good, this reasonable animal becomes as basely cruel as ferocious beasts when it is towards the evil that its energy is directed. His (114) natural sweetness and reason are changed into ferocity and brutality, so much so that he prevails in this respect over the very beasts of the forests.

But let's see the story. And Cain said to his brother, Let's go out into the country. Fraternal words intended to conceal a homicidal project. What are you doing, Cain? Do not you know who you are talking to? Do you forget that this word is addressed to your brother? Do not you think that he came out of the same breast as you? Is not your conscience struck by what is abominable in your design? Do you not fear the infallible judge? Do not you shudder at the thought of your company? What is your goal in dragging your brother into the countryside, tearing his paternal arms? Why do you want to deprive him of his father's help? What is new so that you take your brother to the countryside, so that you do what you are not used to, so that under the pretext of showing him the friendship of a brother, are you prepared to treat him with the cruelty of an implacable enemy? Where does this rage come from? Why this rabies? Either your conscience is blinded, the feelings you have for a brother, you have stifled them, you have silenced the voice of nature; but why declare war on him who has not done you any harm? And your parents? What do you have to reproach them for in order to inflict upon them, deliberately, a mourning which will now overwhelm their existence, to display the first before their eyes the dreadful spectacle of death, and a violent death? Is this how you reward them for raising you? What artifice of the devil led you to this action? You can not even say that the benevolence of the Sovereign Master towards your brother has inspired him with disdain for you. To prevent the outbursts of your homicide nature, the Lord did not submit this brother to your authority? Did he not say: In you will be his recourse, and you will be his master? These words indeed mark the submission of Abel to Cain. Some interpreters hear them of the sacrifice offered to God, who would have said to Cain: the return (apostrophe can mean also recourse and return) of him, that is to say of your sacrifice, will be towards you, and you will be master from him, that is to say, you will enjoy it. I give these two interpretations to your intelligence, and I leave you free to choose the one that seems more suitable to you. As for me, I bow for the first.

And it came to pass, as they were in the field, that Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. A terrible attack! horrible package! abominable action! unforgivable sin! design conceived in a fierce soul! He rose against his brother Abel and killed him. O villainous hand! O criminal arm; or rather it is not the hand that must be called scoundrel, but the thought whose hand was only the instrument. Let us say, O reckless thought, miserable and criminal! say everything we want, because we can not say enough. How does this hand not become numb? How, she said, did she carry the blow? How did the soul of the murderer not fly away from his body? How could she have the strength to execute such a horrible attack? How did she not flinch, and change her design? How did she stifle the voice of nature? How, before executing, did she not consider the consequences of the execution? How, after the murder, would the murderer have the heart to see the body of his brother throb on the ground? How could he sustain the sight of a dead body lying on the ground without feeling the bonds of life in him? If we who live so many centuries later, who every day see the dying, we are so moved by the spectacle of a death even natural, and that when it comes to men who are nothing to us, that we feel our force us to abandon ourselves, that our strongest hatred does not survive the death of an enemy; how much more did Cain have for life to be extinguished in his heart, for his soul to flee for ever from his body, who saw the one who had just spoken to him, this brother who had the same mother and the same father as he, the one who had been borne in the same womb, the one for whom God had shown special benevolence. who saw him suddenly deprived of life and motion, and only throbbing on the ground where he lay?

2. But let's see again, after such an unforgivable attack, let us see from what condescension, what goodness the sovereign lord of all things has towards the culprit. And God said to Cain. What proof of kindness already to address the jay had just committed such a crime! If we reject as odious our parents who have been dishonored by crime, it is a reason for (115) more to admire the good God when he uses so much patience. Because God is a doctor, he is a very tender father: as a doctor he gives all his care to the healing of those who suffer: as a tender father he tries to bring back to their first happiness those of his children who are fallen. by their fault the privileges of their birth. He therefore wishes, because of his immense goodness, to show kindness to this great culprit, and he says to him: Where is your brother Abel? Astonishing, and infinite patience of God! If he questions, it is not that he does not know: he had already questioned the father after his fault, nothing prevented him from using the same with the son. Sending Adam, who was hiding because of the shame his nakedness gave him, he asked him, Where are you? (Gen. III, 9.) He was not unaware where he was, but he wanted, by exciting him to trust, to lead him to obliterate his sin by the confession he would make of it. Such is his ordinary conduct: he provokes and first demands the confession of sins, then he grants pardon; therefore he now asks Cain, and saith unto him, Where is thy brother Abel? He pretends to ignore, this merciful Master; he tries to bring by his questions the culprit to the confession of his sin, so that he can thus obtain his pardon and find mercy. Where is your brother Abel?

What does this man, without heart, without entrails, answer, that rash man, that impudent man? He must have thought that God knew nothing whatever he questioned, that he wanted to provoke a confession, while at the same time informing us that we must not condemn anyone until we have heard and convinced him; he must remember the counsel of God, who had tried to prevent this crime; from God, who, seeing beforehand his culpable designs, had endeavored to prevent their execution; he had to make all these reflections and not to push further his criminal madness; he had to say what he had done, show his wound to the doctor, and receive from him remedies for his cure; but, on the contrary, he aggravates his wound even more, he renders his wound deeper. He replied: I do not know. What an impudent answer! Is the man you are talking to a man, that you tried to deceive him? Do you not know, miserable man, who is He with whom you speak? Do you not see that it is from kindness that he asks you, that he seeks an opportunity to show his mercy, that he wants to do for you everything that depends on him, so that on the day of the condemnation you have no more excuses to present, since you will have run from yourself in front of the punishment?

And he answered: I do not know. Am I the guardian of my brother? Notice here with me the force of an accusing conscience, see how, pushed by this consciousness, it does not limit itself to saying: I do not know, but it adds: am I the guardian of my brother? Word by which he condemns himself, very nearly, expressly. Yes, certainly, if one wanted with you to proceed with the rigor, one would say to you that, according to the law of the nature, you were obliged to be the guardian of the salvation of your brother. It is indeed a law of nature that those born of the same womb must mutually keep and defend. If you did not want to fulfill this duty, or be the guardian of your brother, why did you become his murderer? why did you kill him who did not hurt him? Did you believe, then, that there would be no witness to convince you? But wait, and you will see an accuser rise in the one you killed; yes, this dead brother lying on the ground will accuse you aloud, you who live, you who walk.

And God said, why did you do that? How many things in this brief word! Why did you do that, commit this abominable crime, this execrable action, this inexpiable crime, this work of incredible madness, this murder, new sin, unheard of, and for the first time introduced by, your hand in the life of men? Why did you commit this big, this. frightful sin, I no more grievance that can be committed? The voice of your brother's blood cries from the earth to me. Do you think that I am like men who hear no voice other than the one whose language is the organ? I am God, and I hear the voice of the blood that the murder has shed; I hear the complaints of the unfortunate man who has been killed by the homicide. Do you see how far the voice of this blood is! it ascends from the earth to the sky, it even crosses the celestial regions, arrives higher than the powers from above, to the throne of the great King, where it accuses by moaning your parricide. The voice of your brother's blood cries from the earth to me. It's not a stranger, an enemy that your hand has hit; it was your brother, your brother, who had not offended you in any way. Perhaps the benevolence that I showed to her was the cause of her death, and as she could not reproach me, you made the weight of your anger fall on him. That is why I will inflict on you a punishment that will not let your crime fall into oblivion, a punishment that will serve as an example and a lesson to all future men. And now, since you have done this, since you have done your evil design, and the excess of envy has precipitated you into murder, you will be cursed on the earth.

3. Do you see, my dear listener, how this curse differs from that of Adam? Do not go carelessly, but by the greatness of the curse understand the enormity of the crime. How much more sinful this sin was than the prevarication of the first man, you can judge by the difference of the curse. God said to Adam, "The earth is cursed in your works" (Gen. III, 17), spreading the curse on the earth and sparing man out of kindness; but here, as the work is deadly, that it is a crime, a monstrous and unforgivable iniquity, it is Cain himself who is struck by a curse.

And now you are cursed on the earth. He had practically done the same thing as the serpent, he had like him served as an instrument at the thought of the devil, as he used the cunning to introduce death into the world, since he had deceived his brother to do so to go out into the country, and having armed his hand, he had killed him. So God, who cursed the serpent, You will be cursed among the beasts of the earth, God also cursed Cain, whose work resembled that of the serpent. The devil was tormented by envy; he could not see without bitter vexation the immense blessings with which God had filled man from the first day of his life; that is why he wove an artificial train that introduced death into the world. In the same way Cain looked enviously and jealously at the special benevolence of God for Abel, and from envy he went on to murder. This is why God says to him: You will be cursed on the earth. You will be an abomination to this very land that has opened its mouth to receive from your hand the blood of your brother. Yes, it will repel you with horror, this earth, because it is indignant to have been sprinkled with such blood, stained with such a crime, outraged by your homicidal hand.

Then the Holy Scripture, interpreting the curse, adds: When you have cultivated it, it will not give its fruit. Terrible punishment and denotes great indignation in the person who inflicts it. Thou shalt bear the burden of labor, thou shalt employ all that thou hast forcibly to cultivate this soil soiled with this blood, and thou shalt not gather any fruit from thy hard labors; whatever pain you endure, it will not produce anything. There will not be limited your punishment, but you will moan and trembling through the earth. What greater torture to always moan and tremble! Since you have not served your body strength and the vigor of your limbs properly, here I am bothering you with continual agitation and trembling, not only so that you have a perpetual warning and imperishable remembrance of your crime yourself, but also that all who see you will be instructed by sight alone, so that your only appearance will be like a powerful voice warning the spectators to abstain from if they want to avoid punishment, so that the punishment that will weigh on you teaches men not to defile the earth with the blood of their brethren. And to better achieve this goal, I will not make you die too soon, lest your lump sum be forgotten, but I will make you live a life more painful than death, so that you know what is your crime.

And Cain said to the Lord, My crime is too great for me to be forgiven. This is a word which, if we are attentive, will furnish us with a very important and very useful teaching for our salvation. And Cain said, My crime is too great for me to be forgiven. The confession is complete. My sin is so great, he says, that it is not possible for me to receive forgiveness. So he confessed, and confessed entirely? Yes, but without any profit, because he did it in an untimely way. It should have been done in due time, while the Judge was disposed to mercy. Remember what I told you before, that in this terrible last day, and before the Tribunal where there will be no acceptance of persons, each one of us will feel a sharp repentance of his sins, when he will have before his eyes the now inevitable torments and punishments of hell, but it will be a useless repentance, because it (117) will not happen in a proper time.

When it precedes punishment, penance comes in its time, and its virtue is immense. That is why, I conjure you, while this admirable remedy still retains its efficiency, hasten to take advantage of it; Let us apply the treatment of penance while we are in this life, and let us be convinced that it will be useless to repent after the tragedy of this world is played and when the time of the struggles is past.

4. Let's go back to our subject. It was when the Lord asked him, Where is your brother Abel? that Cain must confess his sin, prostrate himself, pray, implore mercy. But then he refused the remedy, and now, after the sentence pronounced, when all is over, when the voice of the bloodshed has loudly heard an overwhelming accusation, he confesses, but belated and useless confession, against which stands the word of the Prophet: The righteous himself is his accuser in the first place. (Prov., XVIII, 77.) Cain himself, if he had warned the reprimand, would have been judged worthy of some pity, so great is divine mercy. There is no sin, however great, that surpasses the charity of God for men, provided we do penance at the proper time and implore our forgiveness.

And Cain said, My crime is too great for me to be forgiven. Confession sufficient, but untimely. Cain said again, "If you drive me out of the earth today, I will go and hide myself from your face, and I will be groaning and trembling on the earth; and it will happen that whoever finds me will kill me. Words that excite pity! Unfortunately, they come too late, and the lack of opportunity robs them of all value: If you drive me out, from the earth, I will hide from your face, and I will be moaning and trembling on the earth. ; and it will happen that whoever meets me will kill me. Since you have made me execrable to the earth, since you repulse me yourself, that you give me to a punishment so severe, that it must make me moan and tremble, nothing will prevent from now on, that being in this state, and without any help on your part, I am not killed by the first who will meet me. I will be easy to win for the first comer who wants to take my life. I do not have the strength to resist on my own with these limbs impeded and agitated by a continual trembling; besides, it will be known that you have deprived me of your assistance, and this motive will determine to kill those who desire it.

What does the merciful and good Master answer? And the Lord God said to him, It will not be so. Do not think it's like that. No one will be allowed to kill you, if you will; but I will prolong your life to increase your pain, I will leave you to instruct future generations as a living example; your aspect will make you wise, and nobody, seeing you, will have the desire to imitate your conduct. And the Lord says, No, it will not be so, whoever will kill Cain will be responsible for seven vengeance.

Perhaps I am long, perhaps I have tired you, materially at least? But what do you want? Your keen attention, the kind of greed with which you receive the nourishment of the holy word, are the cause; this is what encourages me to continue my explanation to the end according to my strength. What does this word mean: will he be responsible for seven vengeances? But here I am still held back by the fear of piling up so many things in your memories, that the last born make you forget the first ones; I would not, however, be fastidious. But if you still have a little courage, take patience, I finish the explanation of the verses I recited, and I finish. And the Lord God said to him, It will not be so. Whoever will kill Cain will be responsible for seven revenges. And the Lord God put a sign on Cain lest anyone kill him, coming to meet him. Are you afraid that you will be killed? Trust, it will not be. And whoever does it will draw on his head seven punishments. That's why I'm marking you with a sign, lest anyone who kills without knowing you should be caught up in this terrible punishment.

5. But I should show you more clearly how the murderer of Cain will be punished by seven punishments. Be attentive, please. As I have often said to your charity these past days, if, now that the time of fasting brings us so much tranquility, and it removes from our minds thoughts that would be likely to disturb them, we Let us not study with much care the teachings included in the (118) divine Scriptures, in what other time can we do it? I beg you, I entreat you, and, ready to throw myself on your knees, I beseech you to listen to what I say to you with an attentive mind, so that you do not retire to your houses without carrying away here is something that elevates your souls and brings them to God.

What does this word mean: will he be responsible for seven vengeances? Let us first observe that in Holy Scripture the number seven is often used indeterminately and means many or many; for example, one reads in the first book of Kings (II, 5): The one who was sterile has become a mother of seven, that is to say a large number of children. There are many examples of such a meaning. Here the Scripture gives us a glimpse of the enormity of Cain's package, since it does not consider it a single sin, but as constituting seven sins, for each of which severe punishment is intended. Let's try to list these sins. First of all, he envied his brother because of the benevolence God showed him, and he would not have needed more to lose him; secondly, it is his own brother that he envies; third, it tends to be a trap; fourth, he commits murder; fifthly, it is his own brother that he kills; sixth, he is the author of the first murder that was committed; seventh, he lies to God. Have you followed this enumeration, or must I resume it by showing you that each of these aggravating circumstances deserves a serious torture? To envy the one whom God favors is this excusable? This is already an unforgivable mistake. It gets even worse when it is to a brother, from whom one has suffered no injustice, that one envies. So this is still a sin that is not the smallest. It is a third fault to lay a trap, to deceive, to lead into the country, to trample on nature. Murder forms the fourth sin. The fifth results from the fact that it is a brother who is put to death, a brother born of the same breast. Introducing a new kind of sin into the world is the sixth sin. The seventh sin: the murderer dares to lie to God who deigns to question him. This is why God says: He who tries to kill him will take the burden of seven vengeance upon himself. So, do not be afraid of that; for behold, I put on you a sign that will make you recognize whoever will meet you. Your infirmity will be useful to future generations, and this crime which you have committed without witness, all will learn by seeing you tremble and groan; This trembling of your whole body will be like a voice heard by all, which will say: Let no one do what I have done, lest, if he dares, he be struck by such a punishment.

6. May these teachings be engraved in your minds, my dear brothers; and that they do not just do that, brush them by the way. To come here every day to feed on the nourishment of the holy word is very good, but that is not enough, it will be of no use to you to hear the law of God if you do not practice it. Having always present to the thought the sin of Cain, its causes and unforgivable enormity, of Cain become homicide for envy, homicide of a brother who had done him no harm, let us fear much less to suffer ourselves from harm than to to cause others. Evil truly strikes only one who tries to harm his neighbor. So that you are convinced, look here with me which of the two is the most unfortunate, who kills or who is killed. Is it not obvious that he is the murderer? Why? because here the praise of him who has been slain is still in every mouth, because his name is always pronounced with admiration, like that of the first martyr of truth, as Blessed Paul says: All dead that he is, Abel still speaks. (Heb XI, 4.) But the murderer, besides having lived more miserably than all men, has remained odious to all mankind, and the Holy Scripture continually offers it to all ages as a terrible example. of divine vengeance and curse. Such is the parallel for this present and perishable life; but if we wished to pursue it to the other life where the righteous Judge will render to each according to his works, what speech could express all that there will be happiness on the one hand, misfortune on the other. For Abel, the kingdom of heaven, the eternal tabernacles, the choruses of the patriarchs, prophets and apostles, and the great assembly of saints, where he will reign for ever and ever in the company of the King Jesus Christ, (119) unique of God and God himself; for Cain, the hell of fire, and thousands of other torments that will torment him forever; he will be there with all the murderers like himself; However, divine vengeance will be more rigorous against those who, under the rule of the law of grace, have become slaves of the most vile passions. Listen, indeed, what St. Paul says: All who have sinned without the law, shall perish without the law (Romans II, 12); that is to say, will suffer a lighter penalty because they have not had a law to keep them in good by a threatening sanction, but all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law; that is to say, all other conditions being equal, those who have benefited from the help of the law will endure more rigorous punishment. And nothing is more just, since neither the law nor the example of the misfortunes of others will have made them more temperate and virtuous. I conjure you therefore, take advantage at least, from now on, of the teachings of others to become wiser; Let us finally lead our lives according to the law of the Lord, obey his commandments. Let neither envy, nor jealousy, nor carnal love, nor glory, nor the other miserable benefits of this life, nor the gross pleasures of the table, nor any other bad passion, reign over the thoughts of our hearts . Let us be rid of all obscenity and worldly pleasure; let us say goodbye to all our shameful and illicit attachments, and strive with all our strength for that blessed life, for those ineffable goods which God has prepared for those who love him; May we be found worthy by the grace and charity of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom glory, power, honor, be to the Father and to the Holy Spirit, now and forever, and for ever and ever. So be it.