But, they say, the Catholic Christians have Christ for a foundation, and they have not fallen away from union with Him, no matter how depraved a life they have built on this foundation, as wood, hay, stubble; and accordingly the well-directed faith by which Christ is their foundation will be enough to deliver them some time from the continuance of that fire, though it is with loss, since those things they have built on it will be burned. Let the Apostle James summarily reply to them: “If anyone says he has faith, and does not have works, can faith save him?” James 2:14 And who then is it, they ask, of whom the Apostle Paul says, “But he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire?” Let us join them in their inquiry; and one thing is very certain, that it is not the one of whom James speaks, or else we would make the two apostles contradict one another, if the one says, “Though a man's works are evil, his faith will save him as by fire,” while the other says, “If he does not have good works, can his faith save him?” We shall then find out who it is who can be saved by fire, if we first discover what it is to have Christ for a foundation. And this we may very readily learn from the image itself. In a building the foundation is first. Whoever, then, has Christ in his heart, so that no earthly or temporal things — not even those that are legitimate and allowed — are preferred to Him, has Christ as a foundation. But if these things are preferred, then even though a man seems to have faith in Christ, Christ is not the foundation to that man; and much more if he, in contempt of wholesome precepts, seeks forbidden pleasures, he is clearly convicted of putting Christ not first but last, since he has despised Him as his ruler, and has preferred to fulfill his own wicked lusts, in contempt of Christ's commands and allowances. Accordingly, if any Christian man loves a prostitute, and, attaching himself to her, becomes one body, he does not now have Christ for a foundation. But if anyone loves his own wife, and loves her as Christ wants him to love her, who can doubt that he has Christ for a foundation? But if he loves her in the world's way, carnally, as the disease of lust prompts him, and as the Gentiles love who do not know God, even this the apostle, or rather Christ by the apostle, allows as a venial fault. And therefore even such a man may have Christ for a foundation. For as long as he does not prefer such an affection or pleasure to Christ, Christ is his foundation, though on it he builds wood, hay, stubble; and therefore he will be saved as by fire. For the fire of affliction will burn such indulgent pleasures and earthly loves, though they are not damnable, because enjoyed in lawful marriage. And of this fire the fuel is bereavement, and all those calamities which consume these joys. Consequently the superstructure will be loss to him who has built it, for he will not retain it, but will be agonized by the loss of those things in the enjoyment of which he found pleasure. But by this fire he will be saved by virtue of the foundation, because even if a persecutor asked whether he would retain Christ or these things, he would prefer Christ. Do you want to hear, in the apostle's own words, who he is who builds on the foundation gold, silver, precious stones? “The one who is unmarried,” he says, “cares for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord.” 1 Corinthians 7:32 Do you want to hear who builds wood, hay, stubble? But the one who is married cares for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife. 1 Corinthians 7:33 “Each one's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it,”— the day, no doubt, of tribulation — “because,” he says, “it shall be revealed by fire.” 1 Corinthians 3:13 He calls tribulation fire, just as it is elsewhere said, “The furnace tests the vessels of the potter, and the trial of affliction tests righteous men.”⁠a Sirach 27:5 And “The fire shall test each one's work to show what sort it is. If anyone's work endures” — for a man's care for the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord, endures — “which he has built on it, he shall receive a reward,”— that is, he will reap the fruit of his care. “But if anyone's work is burned, he shall suffer loss,”— for what he loved he will not retain:— “ but he himself shall be saved,” — for no tribulation will have moved him from that stable foundation —“yet so as by fire;” 1 Corinthians 3:14-15 for that which he possessed with the sweetness of love he does not lose without the sharp sting of pain. Here, then, as it seems to me, we have a fire which destroys neither, but enriches the one, brings loss to the other, tests both. But if this passage [of Corinthians] is to interpret that fire of which the Lord will say to those on His left hand, “Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire,” Matthew 25:41 so that among these we are to believe there are those who build on the foundation wood, hay, stubble, and that they, by virtue of the good foundation, will after a time be liberated from the fire that is the reward of their evil deeds, what then are we to think of those on the right hand, to whom it will be said, “Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you,” Matthew 25:34 except that they are those who have built on the foundation gold, silver, precious stones? But if the fire of which our Lord speaks is the same as that of which the apostle says, “Yet so as by fire,” then both — that is to say, both those on the right as well as those on the left — are to be cast into it. For that fire is to test both, since it is said, “For the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall test each one's work to show what sort it is.” 1 Corinthians 3:13 If, therefore, the fire will test both, in order that if anyone's work endures — that is, if the superstructure is not consumed by the fire — he may receive a reward, and that if his work is burned he may suffer loss, certainly that fire is not the eternal fire itself. For into this latter fire only those on the left hand will be cast, and that with final and everlasting condemnation; but that former fire tests those on the right hand. But some of them it so tests that it does not burn and consume the structure which is found to have been built by them on Christ as the foundation; while others of them it tests in another way, so as to burn what they have built up, and thus cause them to suffer loss, while they themselves are saved because they have retained Christ, who was laid as their sure foundation, and have loved Him above all. But if they are saved, then certainly they will stand at the right hand, and will with the rest hear the sentence, “Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you;” and not at the left hand, where those will be who will not be saved, and will therefore hear the sentence, “Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire.” For from that fire no one will be saved, because they all will go away into eternal punishment, where their worms will not die, nor their fire be quenched, in which they will be tormented day and night forever. But if it is said that in the interval of time between the death of this body and that last day of judgment and retribution which will follow the resurrection, the bodies of the dead will be exposed to a fire of such a nature that it will not affect those who have not in this life indulged in such pleasures and pursuits as will be consumed like wood, hay, stubble, but will affect those others who have carried with them structures of that kind; if it is said that such worldliness, being venial, will be consumed in the fire of tribulation either here only, or here and hereafter both, or here so that it may not be hereafter — this I do not contradict, because possibly it is true. For perhaps even the death of the body is itself a part of this tribulation, for it results from the first transgression, so that the time which follows death takes its color in each case from the nature of the man's building. The persecutions, too, which have crowned the martyrs, and which Christians of all kinds suffer, try both buildings like a fire, consuming some, along with the builders themselves, if Christ is not found in them as their foundation, while others they consume without the builders, because Christ is found in them, and they are saved, though with loss; and other buildings still they do not consume, because such materials as last forever are found in them. At the end of the world there will be in the time of Antichrist tribulation such as has never before been. How many edifices there will then be, of gold or of hay, built on the best foundation, Christ Jesus, which that fire will test, bringing joy to some, loss to others, but without destroying either sort, because of this stable foundation! But whoever prefers, I do not say his wife, with whom he lives for carnal pleasure, but any of those relatives who give no delight of such a kind, and whom it is right to love — whoever prefers these to Christ, and loves them in a human and carnal way, does not have Christ as a foundation, and will therefore not be saved by fire, nor indeed at all; for he will not possibly dwell with the Savior, who says very explicitly concerning this very matter, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” Matthew 10:37 But whoever loves his relations carnally, and yet so that he does not prefer them to Christ, but would rather be without them than without Christ if he were put to the test, will be saved by fire, because it is necessary that by the loss of these relations he should suffer pain in proportion to his love. And whoever loves father, mother, sons, daughters, according to Christ, so that he aids them in obtaining His kingdom and clinging to Him, or loves them because they are members of Christ, God forbid that this love should be consumed as wood, hay, stubble, and not rather be counted a structure of gold, silver, precious stones. For how can a man love those more than Christ whom he loves only for Christ's sake?