However, man began to hear about the virtues, and he began to will them, but he did not attain them. He began to detect the vices, but to follow them; to hate the offenses, but to commit them; to stand aghast at the crimes, but to carry them out. Consequently, he slowly perceived that he was a captive slave, condemned to the evil of madness, and he began to cry out: 'Unhappy man that I am! Who will deliver me from the body of this death?' He received the reply: 'The grace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ.'
After hearing that, he began to seek freedom through his Creator, salvation through forgiveness, and to hope for life through grace alone. For long he had failed to know where difficult innocence comes from, and arduous justice, and toilsome sanctity, and laborious virtue, and faith completely full of dangers. He had not known whence the offences get such great force, whence vices grow strong even while they are being pruned, why virtues fail even while they are being cultivated. The Law opened this up, and taught it, and showed with full light that in human hearts and human minds crimes rule through sin and virtues through God. It made evident that offences cannot be overcome until their source has been extinguished, that is, sin which Christ took away, as John testifies: 'Behold the lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.' - St. Peter Chrysologus, *Sermon 116 (On Rom 7:7-12)*
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