Theorema de sacramentorum nucleo

even though the unfaithful, not recognizing the power of the treasure, despise the wealth of the faithful.

But all the faithful ought to be Margaritarii pearl-merchants. For pearls are intended for the Saints, not for profane men who are compared to dogs and swine. Therefore, Ambrose says: He loses the grace of the heavenly pearl, he says, who tries to give it to a most filthy sinner. For a gem, as you yourselves know, does not suit anything but gold; a pearl is not fitted for anything but precious necklaces. Be, therefore, the best gold; be the precious necklace, so that the spiritual pearl may be enclosed within you. For Christ the Lord is the Pearl, which the merchant in the Gospel hastened to buy, having sold all his possessions; and he preferred to lose all the gems of the world that he had, only so that he might buy the one Pearl of Christ.

Concerning the native soil of pearls, Pliny says: The vast Indian Ocean sends these forth. Among those great and monstrous beasts, coming through so many seas, by such a long stretch of lands, from such great heat of the sun, and also from the Indian islands, they seek them, and very few are found. Taprobane and Toidis are very fertile, as we have said in the circuit of the World; likewise the promontory of India, Perimula. But they are especially praised around Arabia in the Persian Gulf of the Red Sea (Book 9, Chapter 35).

The Gospel has been brought from heaven. Since it embraces the entire counsel of God concerning our salvation, and no one has ever seen God, the ἐμφάντωρ τῆς ἀληθείας manifestor of truth, the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he himself has declared it to us (John 1:18). And why should we not resolve to spare no expense or labor for the sake of obtaining and retaining the evangelical pearl, when we understand through faith that this alone has eternal power and grace?

Ammianus Marcellinus, in Book 23, subscribing to Pliny, describes the origin of pearls as follows: Among the Indians and Persians, pearls are found in robust and white sea-shells, conceived by the mixing of dew at a preordained time of year. For, desiring a certain coupling, they take in the humor from the lunar spray by opening wide. And then, pregnant, they produce small