Liber Secundus, Caput Primum. Apologiam instituit, ob infelicem successum expeditionis in Terram-Sanctam susceptae.

Liber Secundus, Caput Primum. Apologiam instituit, ob infelicem successum expeditionis in Terram-Sanctam susceptae.

Mindful of my promise, by which I have been bound to you for some time now, most excellent Pope Eugene, I wish to set myself free — even if it's late. I would be ashamed of this delay if I knew in my own heart that I was guilty of neglect or contempt.¹ But that's not what happened. We have fallen — as you yourself know — into a time so grievous that it seemed almost to proclaim the end of life itself, let alone of study. For the Lord, provoked by our sins, seemed in some way to have judged the earth's world before its time — in justice, yes, but forgetful of his mercy.²³ He did not spare his people; he did not spare his own name.^✦ Isn't this what they say among the nations: Where is their God?^✦✦ And no wonder. The sons of the Church — those who are counted by the Christian name — lie beaten down in the wilderness, some cut down by the sword, others consumed by hunger. Strife has poured out over our leaders, and the Lord has made them wander in trackless country, not on the road.^✦ There is crushing grief and misfortune in their paths; fear, sorrow, and confusion in the inner chambers of their kings. How confused are the feet of those announcing peace, of those announcing good things! We said, 'Peace,' and there is no peace; we promised good things, and behold, there is turmoil. As if we acted recklessly in this undertaking, or used lightness. We rushed clearly into it, not as if into uncertainty, but commanded by you, indeed through you, God. Why then did we fast, and he did not look upon us? We humbled our souls, and he did not know? For in all these things, his fury is not turned away, but still his hand is outstretched. How patiently he still hears, even now, sacrilegious voices and Egyptians blaspheming, because he craftily led them out so that he might kill them in the wilderness? And indeed, the judgments of the Lord are true — who wouldn't know this?^✦ But this judgment is such a deep abyss that I may seem to myself not undeservedly to call blessed the one who has not been scandalized by it.^✦ And yet how does human recklessness dare to condemn what it can barely begin to understand? Let us call to mind the judgments of heaven that have been from ages past, if perhaps there may be some consolation in this. For someone spoke this way: I have remembered your judgments from ages past, Lord, and I have been comforted. I'm speaking of something once unknown to anyone, and now plain to no one. This is just how human hearts are: what we know when there's no need for it, we forget in the moment of need. When Moses was about to lead the people out of the land of Egypt, he promised them a better land.^✦ For when the people would not follow him in the same way, would a wise man pursue the land alone? He led them out; yet those he led out he did not bring into the land he had promised.^✦ Nor can the sad and unexpected outcome be blamed on the leader's recklessness. He did everything with the Lord commanding, the Lord cooperating, and the work confirmed by the signs that followed.^✦ But that people, you say, were stiff-necked, always acting contentiously against the Lord and against Moses, his servant.^✦ True enough, those were unbelieving and rebellious; but what about these? Ask them yourselves. What need is there for me to say it, since they confess it themselves? I say one thing. What could they accomplish, who kept turning back whenever they set out? When did these people, too, not turn back in their hearts to Egypt along the whole way?^✦ If those others fell and perished on account of their own wickedness, why are we surprised that these, doing the same things, have suffered the same things?⁴ But surely their falling did not work against the promises of God?^✦ And neither did these people's.⁵ For God's promises never work against God's justice.^✦6 And hear something else. Benjamin has sinned: the remaining tribes gird themselves for vengeance, and not without God's will. In the end, he himself appointed a leader for those about to fight. And so they fight, relying on a stronger hand and a juster cause — and, what is greater than these, on divine favor. But how terrible God is in his counsels over the sons of men! The avengers of crime gave their backs to the wicked, and the many to the few. But they return to the Lord. And the Lord says to them: 'Go up,' he says. They go up again, and again they are routed and thrown into confusion. And so, with God first indeed favoring, and then commanding, the just enter upon a just contest — and yield. But the weaker they were in the contest, the stronger they proved to be in faith. What do you think those men would have done to me, if at my urging they had gone up again and fallen back again? — when they heard me warning them a third time to repeat the journey, to repeat the very work in which they had already been frustrated once and a second time? And yet the Israelites, not counting the first or the second frustration, obeyed the third time — and prevailed. But perhaps those men will say: How do we know that this message has come from the Lord? What signs do you perform, so that we may believe you? There is no need for me to answer such things — I must spare my own modesty. Answer for me and for yourself, according to what you have heard and seen, or at least according to what God inspires in you. But perhaps you're surprised that I'm pursuing this, since I had intended something else. I'm doing so not out of forgetfulness of my purpose, but because I don't think foreign matters should be judged apart from that purpose.⁷ On the subject of consideration, as I recall, I have a message for Your Grace.⁸ And this is truly a serious matter, and one needing no small amount of consideration. For if great matters ought to be considered by great ones, to whom does such concern equally belong as to you, who have no equal on earth? But you, according to the wisdom and authority given you from above, will form your judgment about this. It's not for my humility to dictate to you that something should be done this way or that. It's enough to have intimated that something needs to be done, by which the Church may be comforted and the mouth of those who speak unjustly be stopped.⁹¹⁰ Let these few words serve as an apology, so that your conscience itself, whatever shape it takes, may have from me the grounds to consider me excused — and you as well, even if not in the eyes of those who judge actions by their outcomes, then certainly in your own. A person's perfect and complete defense is the testimony of their own conscience. I care very little about being judged by those who call good evil and evil good, who put light for darkness and darkness for light.^✦ Even though one of two things must come to pass, I would rather face the grumbling of people against us than have God's wrath come upon us. It would be a good thing for me, if he deigns to use me as a shield. Gladly I take upon myself the slanderous tongues of those who tear others down, and the poisoned arrows of blasphemers, so that they may not reach him. I do not refuse to be stripped of glory, so that no assault may fall upon the glory of God. Who will grant me to glory in that voice: Because of you I have endured reproach; shame has covered my face?^✦ My glory is to share in Christ's lot — that Christ whose voice says, "The reproaches of those who reproached you have fallen on me."^✦ Now let the pen return to its proper subject, and let the discourse move forward along the path we set out on.