14. Ye see then that Christ wills to suffer in His servants. What if He saith to this servant also, _I will that he tarry, but follow thou Me_? what if He wills to taste of the fruit from this tree? For if it was His meat to do His Father’s Will, it is His meat also to feed upon the sufferings of His servants. To take an example from our Lord Himself, did He not suffer when He willed, and was He not found when they sought for Him? But when the hour of His passion had not arrived, He passed through the midst of them who sought for Him, and they who saw Him could not detain Him. Wh ich evidently shews that when the Lord wills, each man is found and taken, while he whose time is not come although he meet the eyes, is not captured. 15. And did I not go out daily to make visits, or go to the tomb of the Martyrs? Did I not in going and returning pass close by the Royal palace? And yet no man arrested me, though they wished to drive me from the city, as they shewed afterwards by saying, ‘Leave this city, and go where thou wilt.’ I expected, I confess, something great, to be burned or slain with the sword for the name of Christ, but they offered me delights in the place of sufferings; and yet the soldiers of Christ seeks not for delights but for sufferings. Wherefore let no man trouble you by the intelligence that they have prepared a carriage[115], or that Auxentius, who calls himself Bishop, has uttered what he thinks terrible words. Sidenote: 2 Cor. xi. 14. 16. Many said that executioners had been sent, that the punishment of death had been decreed; I fear them not, nor will I desert my post. For whither should I go to find a place that is not full of nothing but tears and groans? For in every Church the Catholic clergy are ordered to be cast forth; if they resist, to be put to death; all the senators[116] who do not obey this mandate, to be proscribed. And it is a Bishop who writes these orders with his own hand and dictates them with his own mouth, who to prove his learning omitted not an ancient precedent; for we read in the prophet that he saw a flying sickle[117], and in imitation of this Auxentius sent a winged sword through all the cities. And thus _Satan transforms himself into an Angel of light_, and imitates his power for evil purposes. Sidenote: Ps. l. 16. Sidenote: 2 Cor. vi. 15. Sidenote: 1 Kings xxi. 3.