Jeremiah 3:24

(Verse 24.) The confusion devoured the labor of our fathers from our youth: their flocks and herds, their sons and daughters. All the labors of the heretics, of which it is written, They have failed in searching examination (Psalm 63:7), from their youth whom they deceived, their sons and daughters who progressed in heresy or were merely held captive by luxury, our confusion has overwhelmed them. From this they conclude:

Therefore we who are of the nations say, concerning ourselves, repenting over the false things which we thought to be true: "Truly the hills were for a lie, and the power of the mountains"; and concerning Israel who shall be saved after us: "yet through the Lord our God is the salvation of the house of Israel." Then, confessing concerning the sins in which both our fathers came to be and we ourselves, worshipping idols, we say: "But shame has consumed the toils of our fathers from their youth, their sheep and their oxen, their sons and their daughters." "Shame has consumed the toils of our fathers," and the rest of what is said. If, then, the wretched toil and the false work of the fathers is to be consumed, shame must come about; for before shame the toil of the fathers is not consumed, and the things brought in after. On this account let us consider the differences of those who sin. There are those who sin and are not ashamed nor feel any shame over their sins, nor blush. Such are those who have become past feeling and have given themselves over to all licentiousness and all uncleanness. For look at those of the nations, in what manner they at times recount their fornications and their adulteries as though they were deeds of valor, not even ashamed to confess that they have done such things, and they do not call them sins. Insofar as they are not ashamed, their toils are not consumed. Their sins are not consumed. It is the beginning of good things that a man be ashamed of the things of which he was not ashamed. On this account I do not think that a curse is being spoken in the prophets in the words "Let all who hate Zion be put to shame and turned back." For he prays that those who are without perception of the works of shame may come to a sense of it, so that, being ashamed, they may be able to consume their toils and their sins. And the irrational motions of the fathers he called "sheep" and "calves." For not all irrational things are praiseworthy; but there are certain irrational things that are blameworthy, such as the sheep of the fathers who have sinned; and there are certain irrational things that are praiseworthy, as: "My sheep hear my voice." These too were sheep, to which we have reason analogous, having the good shepherd in our souls. For whenever the Savior says, "I am the good shepherd," I do not hear it only as all hear it, that he is a…