onsecrated
by the cross, this flesh shall not only rest in hope but work in power.
Approach, and be healed! Approach, and see the glory of the saints, the
glory of the poor. Approach, and learn that that which man despises,
God hath highly esteemed; that that which man rejects, God accepts; that
that which man punishes, God rewards. Approach, and see how God hath
chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise, and the
weak things of this world to confound the strong. Man abhors the cross:
The Son of God condescended to endure it! Man tramples on the poor: The
Son of God hath not where to lay His head. Man passes by the sick as
useless: The Son of God chooses them to be partakers of His sufferings,
that the glory of God may be made manifest in them. Man curses the
publican, while he employs him to fill his coffers with the plunder of
the poor: The Son of God calls him from the receipt of custom to be an
apostle, higher than the kings of the earth. Man casts away the harlot
like a faded flower, when he has tempted her to become the slave of sin
for a season; and the Son of God calls her, the defiled, the despised,
the forsaken, to Himself, accepts her tears, blesses her offering, and
declares that her sins are forgiven, for she hath loved much; while to
whom little is forgiven the same loveth little....'

Philammon heard no more. With the passionate and impulsive nature of
a Greek fanatic, he burst forward through the crowd, towards the steps
which led to the choir, and above which, in front of the altar, stood
the corpse of Ammonius, enclosed in a coffin of glass, beneath a
gorgeous canopy; and never stopping till he found himself in front of
Cyril's pulpit, he threw himself upon his face upon the pavement, spread
out his arms in the form of a cross, and lay silent and motionless
before the feet of the multitude.

There was a sudden whisper and rustle in the congregation: but Cyril,
after a moment's pause, went on--

'Man, in his pride and self-sufficiency, despises humiliation, and
penance, and the broken and the contrite heart; and tells thee that only
as long as thou doest well unto thyself will he speak well of thee: the
Son of God says that he that humbleth himself, even as this our penitent
brother, he it is who shall be exalted. He it is of whom it is written
that his father saw him afar off, and ran to meet him, and bade put the
best robe on him, and a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet, and