Page:The Church, by John Huss.pdf/265

Rh Hence Augustine, Com. on Psalm 122: 5 [''Nic. Fathers'', 7: 594], "The seats sat in judgment," speaks thus of the thing in question: "How did those seats sit in judgment? Wonderful enigma, wonderful question, if seat does not mean what the Greeks call throne! The Greeks call chairs thrones, as something honorable. Therefore, my brethren, it is not wonderful if men sit on seats, on chairs, but that the seats themselves sit, how are we to understand this? As if some one were to say, let the cathedras sit here, or the chairs sit here; to sit in a chair, to sit in seats, they sat in cathedras. The seats themselves do not sit. What, therefore, is the meaning of this, that the seats sat for judgment? Surely ye are accustomed to hear what the Lord said: 'Heaven is my throne and the earth is the footstool of my feet.' But in Latin the whole is said to be: 'Heaven is my seat [or seats].' Who are these but the righteous? Who are the heavens but the righteous? What church? The churches are many and yet they are one. So, therefore, it is also with the righteous. The righteous are heaven that they may be the heavens. On these God sits, and the things pertaining to them God judges. And not without reason was it said that 'the heavens declare the glory of God.'

"The apostles, however, are made heaven. Whence are they made heaven? Because they are made righteous. How is the sinner made earth, to whom it is said, 'Thou art earth and unto earth thou shalt go'? Even so those who have been made righteous are made heaven. They have borne God; for their sakes God has made wonderful lights to shine, thundered terrors, rained consolations. Therefore the righteous were heaven and ‘declared the glory of God.' Now that ye may know that these are the heavens spoken of, it is said in the same Psalm, ‘Their sound is gone out through all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world.' You ask, Whose sound? and you will find, the sound of the heavens. If, therefore, heaven is God's seat and the apos-