Clement of Alexandria — Paedagogus 10

If, then, we have shown that the plan of dealing stringently with humanity is good and salutary, and necessarily adopted by the Word, and conducive to repentance and the prevention of sins ; we shall have now to look in order at the mildness of the Word. For He has been demonstrated to be just. He sets before us His own inclinations which invite to salvation ; by which, in accordance with the Father's will, He wishes to make known to us the good and the useful. Consider these. The good ( τὸ καλόν ) belongs to the panegyrical form of speech, the useful to the persuasive. For the hortatory and the dehortatory are a form of the persuasive, and the laudatory and inculpatory of the panegyrical. For the persuasive style of sentence in one form becomes hortatory, and in another dehortatory.

So also the panegyrical in one form becomes inculpatory, and in another laudatory. And in these exercises the Instructor, the Just One, who has proposed our advantage as His aim, is chiefly occupied. But the inculpatory and dehortatory forms of speech have been already shown us; and we must now handle the persuasive and the laudatory, and, as on a beam, balance the equal scales of justice . The exhortation to what is useful, the Instructor employs by Solomon, to the following effect: I exhort you, O men; and I utter my voice to the sons of men. Hear me; for I will speak of excellent things; Proverbs 8:4, 6 and so on.

And He counsels what is salutary: for counsel has for its end, choosing or refusing a certain course; as He does by David, when He says, Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsels of the ungodly, and stands not in the way of sinners, and sits not in the chair of pestilences; but his will is in the law of the Lord . And there are three departments of counsel: That which takes examples from past times; as what the Hebrews suffered when they worshipped the golden calf , and what they suffered when they committed fornication, and the like. The second, whose meaning is understood from the present times, as being apprehended by perception; as it was said to those who asked the Lord, If He was the Christ , or shall we wait for another?

Go and tell John, the blind receive their sight, the deaf hear, the lepers are cleansed, the dead are raised up; and blessed is he who shall not be offended in Me. Such was that which David said when he prophesied, As we have heard, so have we seen. And the third department of counsel consists of what is future, by which we are bidden guard against what is to happen; as also that was said, They that fall into sins shall be cast into outer darkness, where there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth, and the like. So that from these things it is clear that the Lord, going the round of all the methods of curative treatment, calls humanity to salvation . By encouragement He assuages sins , reducing lust , and at the same time inspiring hope for salvation .