st. john of damascus (676-749 - Cristo Raul

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34 ST. JOHN OF DAMASCUS.
honour
of which St. Paul deems the elder that rules
well to be worthy (i Tiro. v. 17), to mean rather a
double responsibility,
and a twofold obligation to
keep
both the body
and mind under discipline, he
set himself the mental labour of diligently revising
and correcting his former writings. Wherever there
was too much of a flowery luxuriance (says this
biographer, who is a noticeable offender in the same
way), he would use the pruning-hook, and reduce his
style to the measure of a due sobriety. Along with
this, he continued his labours of preaching in defence
of the sacred images, earning from his nephew
Stephen, when he too came to glorify God like his
namesake, the first martyr, the title of venerable and
inspired^ Thus occupied, death came upon him;
and he of whom I write, says his biographer, now
sees God face to face. This humble record has
been written, he adds, not to increase his glory,
or to keep his memory from fading (which needs
no such memorials to preserve it),
but rather that
he, the glorified saint, may remember me, and fill
1
The reference to this martyr
is introduced somewhat
abruptly and obscurely, but there seems no doubt who is
intended. St. Stephen, called the Sabaite, from the place of his
prolonged abode, was brought (according to Leontius) at the age
of ten years to this convent by his uncle, John of Damascus,
and died there in A.D. 794, after a residence of nearly sixty
years. It is to him that we owe what, in Dr. Neale s transla
tion, is one of the most beautiful of modern hymns :
"
Art thou weary, art thou languid,
Art thou sore distrest ?
Come to me, saith One ;
and coming,
Beat rest.
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