Chapter I. (Sermo IV.)
When the waters obey divine command, it is disgraceful for humans not to obey it. The gathering of waters in the Church symbolizes this. How splendid a spectacle the Church presents; and how it is founded upon the rivers.
On this third day, let us be born in our discourse, which arose in the reading. A glorious day, which set the land free from shipwreck, as God said: 'Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place' (Gen. I, 9). Let us begin with a preface to this. It is said, 'Let the water be gathered,' and it was gathered; and it is often said, 'Let the people be gathered,' and they are not gathered. It is no small shame to the elements, which are insensible, to obey the command of God, and for men not to obey, to whom the sense has been given by the same author. And perhaps shame has prompted you to gather more today, so that on the day when the water gathered into one assembly, the people would not seem to be gathered in the Church of the Lord.
2. Nor do we have this example of obedient water only; for it is also written elsewhere: The waters saw you, O God, the waters saw you and trembled (Ps. 76:17). For it seems unlikely that this is not said about the waters, since the same prophet also says elsewhere: The sea saw and fled, the Jordan turned back (Ps. 114:3). For who is ignorant of the truly amazing fact, that the sea fled before the crossing of the Hebrews, when the waves were divided; the people passed over with dusty footprints, believing the sea to have been destroyed and the waves to have fled? Finally the Egyptian believed this, and entered: but the wave returned to him, which had fled. So the water knows how to gather, and to fear, and to flee, when God commands. Let us imitate this water and know the one gathering of the Lord, the one Church.
3. Once, water was gathered here from every valley, from every swamp, from every lake. The valley is heresy, the valley is paganism; for God is of the mountains, not of the valleys. In the Church there is rejoicing, in heresy and paganism there is weeping and mournfulness. Thus it says: He has assigned weeping in the valley (Ps. LXXXIII, 6-7). Therefore, the Catholic people are gathered from every valley. Now there are not many congregations, but there is one congregation, one Church. And it is said here: let water be gathered from every valley, and a spiritual gathering was made, and one people was formed; the Church is filled with heretics and pagans. The valley is a stage, the valley is a circus, where the deceitful horse runs for salvation, where base and contemptible contention occurs, where there is a hideous ugliness of disputes. Therefore, from those who were accustomed to adhere to the circus, the faith of the Church grew, and the daily assembly increased.
4. The marsh is luxury, the marsh is intemperance, the marsh is incontinence: in which are swirling the desires, the murmurs of beasts, the hiding places of passions: where all who fall in are engulfed and do not emerge: where footprints slip, where the steps of individuals float: where coots pollute themselves while bathing: where mournful cooing of doves comes from above: where the lazy turtle remains stuck in the muddy whirlpool; finally, the boar in the marsh, the deer at the springs. And so, from all the swamp, where the frogs were singing an old complaint, faith was gathered, purity of heart was gathered, and simplicity of mind.
5. The water is gathered from every lake and every well, so that no one may dig a well for his brother, into which he himself falls; but let everyone love one another, let everyone support one another, and, like one body, let the different members sustain each other: not by deadly songs and the entertainments of actors that soften the mind for love, but by the harmony of the Church and the melodious voice of the people praising God and the pious life pleasing to him: not by purple spectacles and precious curtains for the sake of pleasure, but by beholding this most beautiful structure of the world, this connection of distant elements, the vaulted sky as a accommodation, covering those who dwell in this world, the earth given for work, the spread out air, the enclosed seas; this people is the instrument of divine operation, in which the melody of the divine oracle resounds and the Spirit of God works within; this temple is the sanctuary of the Trinity, the dwelling place of holiness, the holy Church, in which the heavenly curtains shine, of which it is said: Enlarge the place of your tents, and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out; spare not: lengthen your cords, and strengthen your stakes; still extend them to the right hand and to the left, and your descendants shall possess the nations and inhabit the desolate cities (Isaiah 54:2-3). Therefore, he has curtains, which lift up a good life, cover sins, and overshadow fault.
This is the Church which is established upon the seas, and prepared upon the rivers. For it is confirmed and prepared above you, who like pure rivers flow into it from the fountain of the world, of which it is said: The rivers have lifted up, O Lord, the rivers have lifted up their voices from the voice of many waters (Psalm 92:3). And it adds: Wonderful are the elevations of the sea, wonderful is the Lord on high (ibid. 4). Good are the rivers; for you have drawn from that perpetual and full fountain, from which you flow, of whom it is said to you: Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his belly (John 7:38). But he was speaking about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were about to receive; for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. But now, as if you were turning back with me to the beginning of the Jordan's streams.