Exhortation to Martyrdom 44

Paul says somewhere to those who had endured at the beginning, urging them, consistently with their former endurance, to bear second dangers for the sake of the word: “But recall the former days, in which, after you were enlightened, you endured a great contest of sufferings, sometimes being made a public spectacle by reproaches and afflictions, and sometimes becoming partners with those so treated. For you sympathized with my bonds, and you accepted with joy the plundering of your possessions, knowing that you have a better and lasting possession. Do not, therefore, throw away your boldness, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance.” Let us too, then, now endure “a great contest of sufferings,” being made “a public spectacle” “by reproaches and afflictions,” and accepting “with joy the plundering of” our “possessions”; for we are persuaded that we have “a better possession,” not earthly nor even bodily, but invisible and incorporeal. For we look not to “the things that are seen,” seeing that these are “temporary,” but those “eternal.”