The preacher as adversary

 "So who is the adversary? [(Mt 5:25)] The word of God. The word of God is your adversary. Why is it your adversary? Because it commands things against the grain which you don't do [(Quia contraria jubet, quam tu facis)]. . . .
     ". . . Because the word of God is your adversary in giving such commands, I am afraid that I too may be some people's adversary because I am speaking like this. Well, why should that bother me? May he who terrifies me into speaking make me brave enough not to fear the complaints of men. Those who don't want to be faithful in chastity to their wives—and there are thousands of such men—don't want me to say these things. But whether they want me to or not, I'm going to say them."

     St. Augustine, Sermon 9.3 on the ten strings of the harp, trans. Edmund Hill, WSA III/1, 261-262.  Latin:  CCL 41, 105-151; PL 38, cols. 76-78 (75-91).