which thou hast not received? See how evil and bitter a thing it is for thee to have forsaken the Lord thy Creator, and to be so ungrateful and noxious to thy greatest benefactor.
I created thee to my own image and likeness, and signed upon thee the light of my countenance, that thou mightst acknowledge and praise me as thy Creator, and set thee over the works of my hands. But thou, when thou wert in honour, understoodst not; thou art compared to senseless beasts, and art become like the horse and the mule, which have no understanding.
Yet have I preserved thee, and fostered thee hitherto with a father’s care, as the eagle enticing her young to fly, and hovering over them. I have given thee health and strength, safety in so many dangers and adversities, the necessaries of life, and countless other blessings. But how many times hast thou been made only the more insolent by my very gifts and blessings, and abused them to my reproach; whilst thou hast grown fat and gross, and forsaken the God who made thee?
And if these seem small things, recollect others, that are far greater. When thou wert a lost slave to Satan, and a debtor to suffer eternal death, for thy sake I came down from heaven, and was made man; for thy sake I took the form of a servant, although I was Lord of all. I endured so many labours and sorrows, and redeemed thee at a great price, not with corruptible things, as gold or silver, or precious gems, but with my own blood, that thou mightst glorify me, and bear me in thy heart and in thy body; and what is there that I ought to do more to my vineyard that I have not done to it?
But what hast thou rendered to me for all the things that I have rendered to thee? Has it not been evil for good, and hatred for my love? I looked for thee to bring forth grapes, and thou hast brought forth wild grapes. The price of thy soul is my blood, and yet thou hast sold it for nought. For what are all those things for which thou so often and so readily barterest away thy soul, wasting my blood as though it were worthless, — what but smoke and shadow? What else is the filthy pleasure of the flesh? What else the most empty vanity of the world, or the base desire of gain? All these things have my apostle, and the rest of my friends, esteemed as dung, that they might gain me. But thou holdest them so high, that thou preferrest often to offend me rather than man, and rather to despise my com-
