8. Thus we have changed our creditor, not discharged our debt, nay we may even say we have discharged it, for although it remains, our bond is cancelled, the Lord Jesus having _said to the prisoners, Go forth; to them that are in darkness, Shew yourselves_; your sins therefore are forgiven. Thus He has forgiven all, nor is there any one to whom He has not shewn mercy. For so it is written, that He has _forgiven all trespasses; blotting out the hand-writing of the ordinances that was against us_. Why then do we hold the bonds of others? why would we exact our claims from others when we have obtained remission of our own? He Who has shewn mercy to all requires of each of us that what he remembers to have been remitted to himself he should himself remit to others. Sidenote: S. Matt. xviii. 23. et seq. Sidenote: Ib. 35. 9. Beware lest you begin to incur heavier blame as a creditor than you did as a debtor; as that servant in the Gospel to whom his Lord forgave all his debt began to exact from his fellow servant what he himself had not paid; wherefore his Lord was wroth, and exacted from him with the greatest severity what he had before remitted to him. Let us beware therefore lest the same evil befal us, lest by not remitting our debts we also be called on to pay what had been forgiven us, for so it is written in the words of the Lord Jesus, _So likewise shall My heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses _. Let us then forgive small things to whom great have been forgiven, and understand that the more we forgive the more acceptable we shall be to God, for we are so much the more acceptable to God the more we have been forgiven. Sidenote: S. Luke vii. 42. Sidenote: Ib. 43. Sidenote: Gen. iv. 7. 10. Further, when the Pharisee was asked by our Lord, _Which of them loved him most_, he answered, _I suppose that he to whom he forgave most_. Whereupon the Lord said, _Thou hast rightly judged_. The Pharisees judgment is praised, but his affection is blamed. Of others he judges correctly, but what he believes of others, he does not believe in his own case. Thus you hear the Jew praising the discipline of the Church, praising its true graces, honouring its priests; but when you exhort him to believe he refuses to do so, and thus follows not himself what he praises in us. His eulogy then is not complete, though Christ has said to him, _Thou hast rightly judged_, for Cain also offered rightly, but did not divide rightly, wherefore God said unto him, _If thou offer rightly, but divide not rightly, thou hast sinned; be still_. And so this man offered rightly, because he judges that Christ, having forgiven Christians many sins, ought to be more earnestly loved by them; but he has not divided rightly, because he believes that He Who remitted the sins of men could possibly be ignorant of them. Sidenote: S. Luke vii. 44. Sidenote: Gen. xlix. 12.