Remembering The Past

Quia persecutus est inimicus animam meam; humiliavit in terra vitam meam; collocavit me in obscuris, sicut mortuos saeculi. Et anxiatus est super me spiritus meus; in me turbatum est cor meum. Memor fui dierum antiquorum et meditatus sum in omnibus operibus tuis et in factis manuum tuarum meditabor. Scit Adam a diabolo captum; et idcirco memor est antiquorum dierum. Scit eum per transgressionem legis constitutae et a promissionibus Dei et ab incolatu paradisi excidisse, et ideo memor est operum Dei. Scit non sufficere ex praeterito innocentiam, sed beatum esse qui usque in finem innocens esse permanserit; et ideo in factis Dei manuum meditabitur. Facta manuum Dei homo ipse est: qui postquam peccavit, peccati servus effectus est. Talis igitur esse meditatur, qualis ille, qui a Deo factus est, fuit ante peccatum. Per quod quia non mortuus saeculi, sed tamquam mortuus saeculi in obscuris est collocatus, meditabitur semper; et meditabitur semper, quia antiquorum dierum memor, scit per transgressionem legis mortem introisse peccati. In eo autem quod et memor antiquorum dierum, et in operibus Dei meditatus est, atque meditabitur, quamquam per fidem suam coeperit, tamen non propium suum esse, ne insolens existimetur, sed per auxilium Dei ad quem oravit sibi indultum esse demonstrat, dicens: Expandi manus meas ad te, anima sicut terra sine aqua. Terra sine aqua arida et infecunda est, et irrigari sese semper imbre pluviae coelestis exspectat: ita et sancti anima natutae suae conscia, immadescere se dono divini eloquii desiderat: de quo Moses ait: Exspectetur sicut pluvia dictum meum, et descendant sicut ros verba mea, ut pluvia super gramen, et ut nives super foenum. Arens ergo et sitiens anima, tali propheticae doctrinae imbre perfunditur: ut mortua et jejuna ariditate naturae, in uberes fructus praeceptorum Dei cognitione revirescat. Sanctus Hilarius Pictaviensis, Tractatus super Psalmos, Tractatus in Psalmum CXLII Source: Migne PL 9.839c-840b

'The enemy has chased down my soul, he has crushed down my life into the earth, he has gathered me into darkness, like the dead of long ago. My spirit was anxious within me, my heart was troubled. I was mindful of the days of old, and I meditated on all your works, and on the works of your hands I will meditate.' 1 He knows that Adam was ensnared by the devil, and therefore he is mindful of the days of old. He knows that he was expelled from dwelling in paradise because of the transgression of the established law and the promises of God. He knows he cannot depend on former innocence, but that blessed is he who remains innocent until the end. And therefore on the deeds of the hands of God he will meditate. Man was made by God, who after he sinned was made a servant of sin. On such things he meditates, on what he was like who was made by God before he sinned. Because of which, since he is not the dead of long ago, but like the dead of long ago, gathered into darkness, he shall always meditate, and he shall always meditate because he is mindful of the days of old. He knows that man entered into the death of sin by transgression of the law. In that he is mindful of the days of old and he has meditated on the works of God, and he shall meditate on them, whatever through his faith he shall begin, but it is not only he who does it, lest he be judged proud, but it is by the help of God to whom he prays to show kindness to him, saying: 'I stretched out my hands to you, my soul like a land without water.' 2 Earth without water is dry and fruitless and it always hopes to be watered by the moisture of heaven's rain, so even the soul of the holy man is conscious of his nature, so that he desires to water himself with the gift of Divine speech. Concerning which Moses said: 'Let my speech be like the rain, let my words fall as the dew, as a shower on herbs, and as snow on the grass.' 3 Therefore the burning and thirsting soul is watered with the rain of prophetic teaching, so that the dead and withered aridity of nature might be revived by the knowledge of God's commands to the yielding of fruit. Saint Hilary of Poitiers, Homilies on the Psalms, from Psalm 142 1 Ps 142.3-5 2 Ps 142.6 3 Deut 32.2