Psalms 71:5

Lastly, there followeth the reason why I say this: "for Thou art my patience" (ver. 5). Now if He is patience rightly, He is that also which followeth, "O Lord, my hope from my youth." My patience, because my hope: or rather my hope, because my patience. "Tribulation," saith the Apostle, "worketh patience, patience probation, but probation hope, but hope confoundeth not." With reason in Thee I have hoped, O Lord, I shall not be confounded for everlasting. "O Lord, my hope from my youth." From thy youth is God thy hope? Is He not also from thy boyhood, and from thine infancy? Certainly, saith he. For see what followeth, that thou mayest not think that I have said this, "my hope from my youth," as if God noways profited mine infancy or my boyhood; hear what followeth: "In Thee I have been strengthened from the womb." Hear yet: "From the belly of my mother Thou art my Protector" (ver. 6). Why then, "from my youth," except it was the period from which I began to hope in Thee? For before in Thee I was not hoping, though Thou wast my Protector, that didst lead me safe unto the time, when I learned to hope in Thee. But from my youth I began in Thee to hope, from the time when Thou didst arm me against the Devil, so that in the girding of Thy host being armed with Thy faith, love, hope, and the rest of Thy gifts, I waged conflict against Thine invisible enemies, and heard from the Apostle, "There is not for us a wrestling against flesh and blood, but against principalities, and powers," etc. There a young man it is that doth fight against these things: but though he be a young man, he falleth, unless He be the hope of Him to whom he crieth, "O Lord, my hope from my youth." "In Thee is my singing alway." Is it only from the time when I began to hope in Thee until now? Nay, but "alway." What is, "alway"? Not only in the time of faith, but also in the time of sight. […]

We saw the martyr enduring immense tortures with the greatest patience: but his soul was submitted to God, for his patience was from Him. And lest human frailty, failing through impatience, deny Christ, and bring the enemy to joy, he knew to whom he should say: My God, deliver me from the hand of the sinner, from the hand of the lawbreaker and the wicked; for You are my patience. For thus, he who sang these things indicated how a Christian ought to ask for deliverance from the power of enemies, not by not suffering anything, but by enduring what he suffers most patiently. Deliver me from the hand of the sinner, from the hand of the lawbreaker and the wicked. But if you seek how he wishes to be delivered, consider what follows: for You are my patience. There is glorious suffering where there is a pious confession: so that, he who glories, may glory in the Lord. Therefore, let no one presume upon his own heart when he completes his speech: let no one rely on his strength when he endures temptation; because, for us to speak good things, our wisdom is from Him: for us to endure bad things, our patience is from Him. Therefore, it is ours to will, but we are called that we may will; it is ours to ask, but we do not know what to ask; it is ours to receive, but what shall we receive if we do not have? It is ours to have, but what do we have if we do not receive? Hence, he who glories should glory in the Lord.

We have witnessed a great spectacle with the eyes of faith, the holy martyr Vincent constantly triumphing. He triumphed in words, he triumphed in sufferings; he triumphed in confession, he triumphed in tribulation; he triumphed burned by flames, he triumphed submerged by waves: finally, he triumphed tortured, he triumphed dead. When his body, in which was the trophy of Christ the victor, was cast into the sea from a small boat, it silently said: We are cast down, but we perish not. Who granted such patience to his soldier, except he who first shed his blood for him? To whom it is said in the Psalm: For thou art my patience, Lord; Lord, my hope from my youth. A great contest gains great glory; not human, nor temporal, but divine and eternal. Faith fights; and when faith fights, no one overcomes the flesh. For even if it is torn, even if it is lacerated; when does he perish who has been redeemed by the blood of Christ? A powerful man cannot lose what he bought with his gold, and does Christ lose what he purchased with his blood? But all this should be attributed not to the glory of man, but of God. From him truly is patience, true patience, holy patience, religious patience, right patience; Christian patience is a gift of God.

): " Thou hast been my trust from my youth; ever since I was capable of discerning between my right hand and my left, I stayed myself upon thee, and saw a great deal of reason to do so; for by thee have I been holden up from the womb. " Ever since he had the use of his reason he had been a dependent upon God's goodness, because ever since he had had a being he had been a monument of it.

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens

); that is, "thou hast proposed thyself to me in thy word as the proper object of my hope and trust; I have hoped in thee, and never found it in vain to do so." 2. How his confidence in God is supported and encouraged by his experiences (

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation