Barlaam and Ioasaph

hath the Church of Christ received as a tradition from the inspired Apostles, and the blessed Fathers, who did thus enact for the salvation of our race. For the pathway to virtue is rough and _ steep, especially for such as have not yet wholly turned unto the Lord, but are still at warfare, through the tyranny of their passions. For this reason also we need many encouragements thereto, whether it be exhortations, or the record of the lives of them that have travelled on the road before us; which latter draweth us towards it the less painfully, and doth accustom us not to despair on account of the difficulty of the journey. For even as with a man that would tread a hard and difficult path; by exhortation and encouragement one may scarce win him to essay it, but rather by pointing to the many who have already completed the course, and at the last have arrived safely. So I too, ‘walking by this rule, and heedful of the danger hanging over that servant who, having received of his lord the talent, buried it in the earth, and hid out of use that which was given him to trade withal, will in no wise pass over in silence the edifying story that hath come to me, the which devout men from the inner land of the Ethiopians, whom our tale calleth Indians, delivered unto me, translated from trustworthy records. It readeth thus.

Tur country of the Indians, as it is called, is vast How the and populous, lying far beyond Egypt. On the side Pestle of Egypt it is washed by seas and navigable gulphs, Pe cecoal but on the mainland it marcheth with the borders of ie Persia, a land formerly darkened with the gloom age idolatry, barbarous to the last degree, and wholly given up to unlawful practices. But when ‘the only-begotten Son of God, which is in the bosom of the Father,’ being grieved to see his own handiwork in bondage unto sin, was moved with compassion for the same, and shewed himself amongst us without sin, and, without leaving his Father’s throne, dwelt for a season in the Virgin’s womb for our sakes, that we might dwell in heaven, and be re-claimed from the ancient fall, and freed from sin by receiving again the adoption of sons; when he had fulfilled every stage of his life in the flesh for our sake, and endured the death of the Cross, and marvellously united earth and heaven; when he had risen again from the dead, and had been received up into heaven, and was seated at…