524 .I shall use comparisons to illustrate this. The sins which are retained in an unrepentant person may be compared with the various illnesses he suffers, and unless cures are applied to get rid of the harmful element, he may die of them; in particular with the condition called gangrene, which, if not cured in time, spreads around and leads inevitably to a fatal outcome. Likewise they may be compared with boils and abscesses, unless they are resolved and opened up, for they lead to empyema or gatherings of pus which invade neighbouring parts, then attacking the adjacent viscera, and finally the heart, so causing death.

[2] I may also compare them with tigers, leopards, lions, wolves and foxes, which, unless kept in cages or secured with chains or ropes, would attack flocks and herds and slaughter them, as a fox does hens. Or with poisonous snakes, which unless pinned down with forks or deprived of their teeth, would inflict fatal injuries on a person. A whole flock of sheep, if left in fields where noxious plants grow, would perish if the shepherd did not lead them away into harmless pastures. The silk-worm, and thus all silk, would perish if other grubs were not shaken out of the leaves of the tree it lives on.

[3] Another comparison might be with grain in barns ¹ or houses, which would turn mouldy and rotten and become unfit for use, if air were not allowed to circulate around and prevent this damage. A fire, if not put out at its outset, might devastate a whole town or a whole forest. A garden would become completely overgrown with caltrops, thistles and briars, if these were not uprooted. Expert gardeners know that if a tree springs from a poor seed or a poor root, it introduces its poor juices into the trunk of a good tree which is grafted or inoculated into it, and the poor juices which rise into it are turned into good juices and produce useful fruit. Much the same happens to a person when evil is removed by means of repentance, for by this a person is grafted onto the Lord like a branch onto a vine, and produces good fruit (John 15:4-6).

Imibhalo yaphansi: