Sin And Patience

Aut divitias bonitatis ejus, et sustentationis, et patientiae contemnis? Ignoras quonaim benignitas Dei ad poenitentiam te adducit? Divitias bonitatis Dei ille agnoscere potest,qui considerat quanta in terris mala quotidie homines gerunt, et quomodo pene omnes declinantes, et simul inutiles facti, latam et spatiosam perditionis ambulant viam, angusto vitae itinere neglecto, et tamen his omnibus Deum productentem solem suum quotidie, et pluvias ministrantem, et qui considerat quanti quotidie in Deum blasphemant, et in coelum extendunt linguas suas. Jam quid de fraudibus, de vi, de scelere, de sacrilegiis et piaculis dicam? Quibus tamen omnibus in hoc loco illi videntur in scelere praeferri, qui alios judicantes,ipsi commitunt quae in caeteris puniunt. Si quis ergo hanc bonitatem Dei et sustentationem ejus, et patientiam contemnit, ignorat quod per haec ad poenitentiam provocatur. Sustentatio vero a patientia hoc videtur differre, quod qui infirmitate magis, quam proposito delinquunt,sustentari dicuntur: qui vero pertinaci mente velut exsultant in delictis suis, ferri patienter dicendi sunt. Sed sicut omnia in mensura fecit Deus,et pondere, et numero,ita etiam patientiae ejus certa mensura est: quam mesuram credendum est esse consumatam vel ab his qui diluvio perierunt vel ab his qui in Sodomis colelesti igne vastati sunt. Unde et de Amorrhaeis dicitur: Nondum enim repleta sunt peccata Amorrhaeorum usque nunc. Fert ergo Deus patienter, et exspectat uniuscujusque poenitentiam. Sed non nos dissolvat hoc, et tardos ad conversionem faciat,quia rursus patientiae ejus et sustentationis certa mensura est. Origenes, Commentariorum In Epistolam Beati Pauli Ad Romanos, Liber II, Interprete Rufino Aquileiense Source: Migne PG 14.874b-875a

Or do you scorn the riches of His kindness and endurance and patience? Are you ignorant that the kindness of God is to lead you to penance? 1 He is able to recognise the riches of the kindness of God who considers how much evil in the world men do every day, and how everyone goes astray and at the same time do worthless things, walking in the way of ruin that is wide and easy and neglecting the narrow way of life, and yet for all these God brings forth His sun every day and serves them with rain. 2 And consider how many blaspheme God everyday and thrust out their tongues to heaven. 3 What then shall I say of lies and violence and crimes and sacrilege and shameful acts? By all which things they also appear bearing wrong, who condemn others and then do what they punish in others. If, then, someone should scorn the kindness and endurance and patience of God, he neglects that which calls him to penance. Now endurance seems to differ from patience in this way: endurance pertains to him who wanders from what is wished because of weakness, but patience is a bearing with one who exults in his wickedness because of an obstinate mind. But as God takes the measure of all things, and weighs them, and reckons them, 4 so His patience has a certain measure, which measure must be thought to have been filled up either with those who perished in the flood, or with those who were consumed by heavenly fire in Sodom. Whence it is said of the Amorites: 'Not yet even now are the sins of the Amorites filled up.' 5 Therefore God is patient and hopes for the penance of everyone. But this should not cause us to relax and make us tardy for conversion, because His patience and endurance has a certain measure. Origen, from the Commentary on the Letter of Paul to the Romans, Book 2, Translated by Rufinus of Aquileia. 1 Rom 2.4 2 Mt 7.13-14, 5.45 3 Ps 72.9 4 Wisd 11.21 5 Gen 15.16