SR
← The Imitation of Christ/Book 3 · On Inward Consolation
Chapter 47Imit.3.47

Quod omnia gravia pro æterna vita sunt toleranda.

The Promise Beyond Present Pain

Christ comforts the disciple, assuring him that present labors and pains are brief and will soon end.

Son, don't let the labors you've taken on for my sake break you, and don't let troubles crush you completely; but let my promise strengthen and comfort you in every outcome. I am sufficient to repay beyond all measure and proportion.1 You won't labor here long, nor will you always be weighed down by pain. Wait a little while, and you'll see a swift end to these troubles. There will come an hour when all labor and turmoil will cease. Brief and short-lived is everything that passes with time.2

Faithful Labor and the Vision of Peace

The disciple is exhorted to work faithfully in Christ's vineyard, enduring hardships with the hope of eternal peace and the end of all anxiety.

Do what you are doing; work faithfully in my vineyard, and I will be your reward. Write, read, sing, lament, be silent, pray, endure hardships with courage: eternal life is worth all these struggles and greater battles still. Peace will come in a single day, a day known to the Lord. For there will be no day or night belonging to this present time, but perpetual light, infinite brightness, steadfast peace, and secure rest.3 You will not say then, 'Who will deliver me from this body of death?'✦4 Nor will you cry out, 'Alas for me, that my dwelling place has been prolonged,' for death will be cast down, and salvation will be unfailing, anxiety will be gone, joy will be blessed, fellowship sweet and beautiful.✦56

The Glory That Rewards Humility

A vivid vision of the saints' heavenly glory challenges the disciple to embrace contempt and suffering rather than worldly honor.

O, if you had seen the saints' perpetual crowns in heaven, and with how great a glory they now exult — they who were once despised by this world and thought unworthy of life itself — surely you would immediately humble yourself to the ground and desire rather to be subject to all than to preside over one; nor would you long for joyful days in this life, but you would rejoice to be troubled for God's sake, and you would count it the greatest gain to be reckoned as nothing among men.78

Lift Your Eyes to Heaven

The disciple is urged to let the reality of eternal life silence complaint, to endure every hardship for the kingdom, and to fix his gaze on Christ and the saints in their everlasting rest.

Oh, if these things truly meant something to you and sank deep into your heart, how could you dare — even once — to complain?9 Shouldn't every hardship be endured for the sake of eternal life? It is no small thing to gain — or to lose — the kingdom of God. So lift your eyes to heaven. See — I and all my saints, who in this age had a great struggle, now rejoice, now are comforted, now are at peace, and now rest, and they will remain with me without end in the kingdom of my Father.✦10

Read the original Latin

Fili, non frangant te labores quos assumsisti propter me, nec tribulationes te dejiciant usquequaque; sed mea promissio in omni eventu te roboret, et consoletur. Ego sufficiens sum ad reddendum supra omnem modum et mensuram. Non hic diu laborabis, nec semper gravaberis doloribus. Exspecta paulisper, et videbis celerem finem malorum. Veniet una hora, quando cessabit omnis labor et tumultus. Modicum est, et breve omne, quod transit cum tempore.

Age quod agis; fideliter labora in vinea mea, ego ero merces tua. Scribe, lege, canta, geme, tace, ora, sustine viriliter contraria: digna est his omnibus et majoribus præliis vita æterna. Veniet pax in die una, quæ nota est Domino. Non enim erit dies vel nox hujus scilicet temporis, sed lux perpetua, claritas infinita, pax firma et requies secura. Non dices tunc: Quis me liberabit de corpore mortis hujus? Nec clamabis: Heu mihi, quia incolatus meus prolongatus est, quoniam præcipitabitur mors, et salus erit indefectiva, anxietas nulla, jucunditas beata, societas dulcis et decora.

O, si vidisses Sanctorum in cælo coronas perpetuas, quanta quoque nunc exultant gloria, qui huic mundo olim contemtibiles, et quasi vita ipsa indigni putabantur: profecto statim te humiliares usque ad terram et affectares potius omnibus subesse, quam uni præesse; nec hujus vitæ lætos dies concupisceres, sed magis pro Deo tribulari gauderes, et pro nihilo inter homines computari maximum lucrum duceres.

O, si tibi hæc saperent, et profunde ad cor transirent, quomodo auderes vel semel conqueri? Nonne pro vita æterna cuncta laboriosa sunt toleranda? Non est parvum quid lucrari, aut perdere regnum Dei. Leva igitur faciem tuam in cælo. Ecce ego et omnes Sancti mei mecum, qui in hoc sæculo magnum habuerunt certamen, modo gaudent modo consolantur modo securi sunt et modo requiescunt, et sine fine in regno Patris mei permanebunt mecum.

Scripture echoes

  1. ↩Rom.7.24 — Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?
  2. ↩Ps.120.5;Ps.120.5 — Woe is me, for I have sojourned in Meshech; I have dwelt among the tents of Kedar. Ps.120.5 — Woe is me, for I have sojourned in Meshech; I have dwelt among the tents of Kedar.
  3. ↩Heb.12.1 — Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race set before us.

Notes

  1. 1 ↩Christ speaking in first person; reddendum (gerundive) conveys obligation/necessity of repayment — divine promise of full recompense.
  2. 2 ↩cum + ablative tempore read temporally ('with time / as time passes'); causal or concessive readings possible but temporal best fits the context of transience.
  3. 3 ↩enim rendered as For to preserve the explanatory force; sed rendered as but to mark the adversative turn from temporal day/night to eternal realities.
  4. 4 ↩Quis me liberabit de corpore mortis hujus echoes Romans 7:24 (Vulgate). Candidate allusion pending Moses resolution.
  5. 5 ↩Heu mihi, quia incolatus meus prolongatus est echoes Psalm 120:5 (Vulgate Ps. 119:5). Candidate allusion pending Moses resolution.
  6. 6 ↩Nec rendered as Nor to preserve the negative-additive force; quia and quoniam both rendered as for to preserve causal force without introducing variety that might obscure the parallel.
  7. 7 ↩affectares (from affecto) rendered as 'desire' — capturing the sense of earnest striving/willing rather than mere emotion.
  8. 8 ↩quasi rendered 'as if' rather than 'almost'; the sense is that they were regarded as though they were unworthy of life itself.
  9. 9 ↩vel rendered as 'even' rather than 'or' to capture the emphatic rhetorical force of the question.
  10. 10 ↩The repeated 'modo' (now/at one time) is rendered simply as 'now' in each instance to preserve the rhythmic contrast between past struggle and present glory without archaic diction.