Page:The Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages.djvu/156

 138 THE CLASSICAL HERITAGE [chap. the ascetic principle, that the senses are evil and should be suppressed, continually joins with the mo- tive of sacrifice for the Kingdom of Heaven's sake. Thus the system keeps itself in part accord with the life of Him who came eating and drinking and pro- claiming no fasts or penances or celibacy, but announc- ing the Kingdom of Heaven, and bidding men live unto it in love of God and man, according to whose words there might be also eunuchs — as other martyrs — for its sake. One man must be burned, another must give up his goods, and a third renounce his heart's love — for the Kingdom of Heaven's sake, and not because marriage is lower than virginity. The motives of such sacrifice are not ascetic, but Christian. Still another consideration : acts which may appear ascetic are a natural accompaniment of penitence. It is the instinct of the repentant soul to mourn in sack- cloth and ashes. When the sinner, stung by love of the Crucified, turns to penitence, his heart cries for punishment. Or he may have fear of hell before him and seek to undergo temporal in order to avert eternal pain. In either case, penance, self-flagella- tion, may have motives which are not ascetic. When St. Martin came to die, he would lie only upon ashes ; " and I have sinned if I leave you a different example." ^ Centuries afterward, when Coeur de Lion — no monk and no saint ! — was dying, he would be beaten, hang- ing head downward, in penitence for his sins. What motives entered these deathbed insistences? Some,, at least, that were not ascetic. The earlier ethical ideals of Greek philosophy 1 Sulpicius Severus, Epist. III.