COMMENTARIES ON HOLY SCRIPTURE By Reverend Father Cornelius a Lapide, of the Society of Jesus, formerly professor of Holy Scripture at Louvain, afterwards at Rome, Carefully revised and illustrated with notes by Augustinus Crampon, Priest of the Diocese of Amiens. VOLUME ONE Containing the Literal and Moral Exposition upon the Pentateuch of Moses, Genesis and Exodus PARIS Published by Ludwig Vives, bookseller and publisher, 13, Street commonly called Delambre, 13. 1891

TO THE MOST REVEREND AND MOST ILLUSTRIOUS LORD
HENRY FRANCIS VAN DER BURCH,
ARCHBISHOP AND DUKE OF CAMBRAI,
PRINCE OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE, COUNT OF CAMBRAI.

It happened opportunely, by God's providential arrangement, Most Illustrious Lord, that at the very time you were being inaugurated as Archbishop and Prince of the Holy Roman Empire at Cambrai, this Moses of mine — destined for you from its very first conception and indebted to you on many counts — was brought into the light.

All know how close the union of our souls has been for many years, a bond which a sympathy of nature, shared affections, and similar studies first brought about, which familiarity increased, and which the grace of God confirmed and perfected in the nearly identical pattern of both our lives. For this reason, summoned by you from Mechlin to the Metropolitan Church over which you presided as Dean — as a confessor for the more solemn feasts of the year — I made free and generous use of your hospitality and table companionship for many years, until our Society established both a Novitiate and a College in that city.

But what Saint John the Baptist said of Christ — "He must increase, but I must decrease" — this I long foresaw concerning your Most Illustrious Lordship and myself, though I am no prophet; and we all see that it has come to pass, and we rejoice.

For indeed, to whom could this Moses of mine more fittingly belong than to your Most Illustrious Lordship, who presides over the people of God as both an ecclesiastical and a secular Duke, as both a Bishop and a Prince — just as Moses formed, ruled, and directed the Church of the Hebrews no less than their Commonwealth, and led them out of Egypt through trackless deserts and past countless enemies, unharmed and indeed victorious, to the promised land. For he established and governed the Church by the ceremonial precepts of the Decalogue received from God, the Commonwealth by the judicial precepts, and both by the moral precepts. In Moses therefore, just as in Melchizedek, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the other ancient patriarchs, both supreme powers — that is, of the prince and of the priest — were held in conjunction, so that he administered civil affairs as a kind of prince, and sacred affairs as a kind of priest, pontiff, and hierarch; until he transferred the one office, namely the priesthood, to his brother Aaron, and consecrated him as High Priest. Moses was therefore a shepherd — first of sheep, then of men, whom he both rescued from Pharaoh with his pastoral staff, the instrument of so many miracles, and governed with the most holy laws of both the ecclesiastical and civil spheres; for a king and prince no less than a priest and pontiff must be a shepherd.

Homer calls a king the shepherd of the peoples, because he ought to feed them, as a shepherd feeds sheep, and not fleece them.

Be therefore, Most Illustrious Lord, our Moses of the Low Countries; look upon this Moses of ours, and, as you already do, more and more express him in your life and conduct — so you will lead the people of God not into the land of the Canaanites promised to the Jews, but into the land of the living and of those who triumph in heaven; indeed you will bring them all the way there, which Moses himself was not able to do.

Saint Basil was the Moses of his age, says his peer Blessed Gregory Nazianzen in his Oration in Praise of Saint Basil, and he learned to act like Moses from Moses himself. Saint Basil himself acknowledges this in letter 140 to Libanius the Sophist: "We indeed, he says, O distinguished man, converse with Moses and Elijah and such blessed men, who impart their teaching to us in a foreign tongue; and what we have heard from them we speak — true in meaning, though rough in words." How thoroughly Saint Basil wore out his Moses is shown by the Hexaemeron alone — those works which he so laboriously composed as a commentary on the Genesis of Moses that Saint Ambrose translated them, and gave to Latin ears not so much his own work as that of Saint Basil, in his treatise On the Work of the Six Days.

Rufinus attests that after Saint Basil and Saint Gregory Nazianzen had studied eloquence and philosophy at Athens, they devoted thirteen years to reading and meditating upon Moses and the Sacred Scriptures. All know, Most Illustrious Lord, how greatly you delight in Moses and Sacred Scripture, how diligently, when your duties allow, you are accustomed to read, pore over, and scrutinize it. You recall how much our conversation at table, when I was the guest of your hospitality, was customarily given over to it; you recall that at a single meal we would read through ten or twelve chapters of Genesis together, and you put to me many difficult questions concerning them, which I resolved on the spot as best memory served — but in this work you will see them drawn out from the very beginning, examined at length, explained in full, and treated in continuous thread.

Moses was born of the noble lineage of the Patriarchs, and was a great-great-grandson of Abraham. For Abraham begot Isaac, Isaac Jacob, Jacob Levi, Levi Caath, Caath Amram, and Amram Moses.

Saint Basil too was descended from parents illustrious for piety no less than for birth — Basil and Emmelia — and his mother followed her son even when he withdrew into the wilderness. Your lineage, Most Illustrious Lord, conspicuous for virtue no less than for blood, is held in high regard by your fellow citizens. Your grandfather was President of the Council of Flanders, who discharged that honor to great personal credit and to the gratitude of the Commonwealth. Your father, a man of the highest judgment and discernment, was first President of the great Parliament of Mechlin, and then of the Privy Council; he stood firm and unshaken in loyalty to his Prince amid the wondrous and grievous upheavals and storms of these Low Countries, and for this reason was most dear to the Catholic King Philip II, of glorious memory. And though he discharged these very great honors and offices for many years, in the course of which he might have amassed immense wealth, he did not increase the family fortune, always intent on the public good, so that he seemed to neglect his own private affairs.

The same was achieved by that illustrious Chancellor of England and martyr, Blessed Thomas More, who, having spent fifty years in public life and holding the highest offices, yet did not increase his annual income to seventy gold pieces. On the contrary, your father diminished his own estate and suffered grave losses of fortune precisely because he remained faithful and steadfast in his loyalty to his Prince. For in the year 1572, when the heretics seized Mechlin by surprise, he was cast into a degrading prison, subjected to many hardships, and also endured a severe loss of fortune; and had the Duke of Alba not suddenly arrived with his army, he was already destined for death. Then in the year 1580, when the same city was again occupied by the heretics, his house was pillaged once more, and all his goods plundered, and moreover he was compelled to pay many thousands of florins to ransom his wife, who had been unable to save herself by flight.

Moses did not spring at once to power, but ascended to leadership by degrees. In the first forty years he was educated at the court of Pharaoh in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and learned to deal with great men. In the second forty years, tending sheep, he gave himself to contemplation; and then, being eighty years old, he took up the pastorate and leadership of the people. Saint Basil did the same, of whom Saint Gregory Nazianzen says: "After he had first read the sacred books and become their interpreter, he was ordained a priest by Hermogenes, Bishop of Caesarea," and so on.

In like manner Saint Cyprian praises Saint Cornelius, Bishop of Rome, in book IV, letter 2 to Antonianus: "This man (Cornelius), he says, did not come to the episcopate all at once, but having been advanced through all the offices of the Church, and having often merited well of the Lord in the divine ministrations, he ascended to the lofty summit of the priesthood by every step of religious life. Then he neither sought the episcopate itself, nor desired it, nor seized it as others do who are puffed up by the swelling of their arrogance and pride; but quiet and modest, and such as those are accustomed to be who are divinely chosen for this place, out of the modesty of his virginal conscience, and out of the humility of the diffidence innate to him and carefully preserved, he did not, as some do, force his way to become a bishop, but himself suffered compulsion to accept the episcopate."

Is it not with these very words with which he portrays Cornelius that Saint Cyprian also portrays you, Most Illustrious Lord, and your spotless character? You ascended step by step to the summit of the priesthood. First you fulfilled the roles of canon and priest — not in idleness and inactivity, but by giving religious formation to your household, by devoting yourself to hearing confessions, by applying yourself to study, by attending without intermission to the psalmody, by assisting the needy with counsel no less than with alms, and by persisting in works of hospitality and mercy. This innocent and pure life, as full of charity and zeal as it was of virtue, drew the votes of all, so that they chose you as Dean of the Metropolitan Church of Mechlin — and what you accomplished in that office, the choir and clergy of Mechlin, who are a mirror of virtue and religion for all the Low Countries, still declare without any word from me. Soon you were appointed Vicar-General by the Most Illustrious Archbishop of Mechlin; in which office you surveyed and administered the entire practical governance of the Church with such fidelity, diligence, grace, and skill that you everywhere restored, increased, and confirmed ecclesiastical discipline — a disciple worthy of so great a master. And in this it was especially remarkable that you discharged both offices with such exactitude that neither the choir ever missed its Dean nor the diocese its Vicar. You were always first in choir, even in the depths of winter, in the most bitter cold, even when you returned home wearied from a pastoral visitation abroad, indulging your body no rest. By this step you were called to the bishopric of Ghent by our Most Serene Archduke, who in selecting prelates applies a keen and singular judgment, conceding nothing to favor or to blood, but everything to virtue — in which role you so commended yourself to him and to all the Low Countries that now you are not merely invited to the archbishopric, but virtually compelled to accept it.

Moses, called by God to take up the leadership a third and fourth time, declined, making excuses to the point of provoking God's anger, rejecting the honour and the burden alike. In Exodus iv he says: "I beseech you, Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore nor since you have spoken to your servant; but I am slow of speech and of tongue: I beseech you, Lord, send whom you will send." Saint Basil likewise fled the bishopric of Neocaesarea, as he himself writes in Epistle 164. Similarly, after he had faithfully stood by his friend Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, through his illness until death, once Eusebius had died Basil immediately hid himself away; discovered, he feigned sickness; and only reluctantly, with great resistance, was he made bishop.

When you were serving as Vicar, you wished to shake off the burden, to withdraw, and to live for yourself and for God; and you would have accomplished this in fact, had not our Reverend Father Provincial — once your teacher in Philosophy — drawn you back from this resolve and persuaded you to bow your neck again to the pious burden.

Moreover, when His Most Serene Highness the Archduke was considering transferring you from the bishopric of Ghent and had nominated you as Archbishop of Cambrai, good God! how deeply you grieved, how long you resisted, how many means of escape you sought — and only when driven and compelled by the importunate entreaties of many, and by threats and near-force, lest you appear to resist God who was calling you through so many signs, did you at last unwillingly accept the office.

The same thing was done in the preceding century, to the wonder of the whole world, by John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, the illustrious martyr of England, who was raised to the bishopric of Rochester on account of his incomparable learning and innocence of life. And when this benefice seemed afterwards too modest for the merits of so great a man, and Henry VIII wished to promote him to something grander, he could never be prevailed upon to abandon his own bride — modest she was indeed, but first by God's calling, and tended as best he could by his own labours of many years — in exchange for any wealthier see whatsoever. He added this: "that he would count himself most blessed if he could at least render a proper account on the Day of the Lord for this small flock entrusted to him, and for the not especially great emoluments received from it; since a stricter reckoning will then be required both for souls well-cared-for and for money rightly spent, than mortals generally suppose or care to think."

Holy Scripture bestows this praise upon Moses: that he was the meekest of all mortals. Saint Basil, the Christian Moses, vanquished his adversaries by his steady kindness, as Saint Gregory Nazianzen writes of him.

Your courtesy, Most Illustrious Lord, is marvelled at by all — the courtesy with which you receive everyone graciously, greet them honourably, and show to all a serene face, a ready word, and a generous spirit. By this means you have drawn the hearts of the people of Ghent into love for you, removed scandals, restored ecclesiastical discipline, corrected or removed parish priests of dissolute life, so that a new splendour — indeed a glory — shines out upon all Belgium like a new radiance from the Church of Ghent. For as Belgium is the jewel of the world, so Ghent is the jewel of Flanders and Belgium, renowned not least as the birthplace of Charles V the Unconquered Emperor. Hence those whispered voices of the common people as you pass through the streets: "See, an angel passes. See, our angel." That most wise providence of God which divinely governs the whole world, as the Sage testifies, "reaches from end to end mightily, and orders all things sweetly." This providence you imitate: by sweetness you soften and penetrate difficulties, by strength you overcome them. And so whatever you set your mind to, you accomplish happily and bring to completion. Rightly therefore let your motto be: Sweetly and Strongly.

Moses bore a motherly love toward his hard-hearted people, and so greatly did he love them that he prayed to be blotted out of the book of life. Hence, like a nurse, he fed that people for forty years in the desert on heavenly bread — that is, manna; and he laboured even more to inflame their souls with the fear and love of God, as is evident throughout the whole of Deuteronomy. Rufinus recounts the zeal and benefactions of Saint Basil toward his own people, Book II, chapter ix: "Basil," he says, "journeying through the cities and countryside of Pontus, began to rouse with his words the sluggish minds of that people — little concerned about their future hope — and to kindle them with his preaching, and to wear away from them the callus of long neglect. He brought them, setting aside their vain and worldly cares, to know themselves, to come together as one, to build monasteries; he taught them to devote themselves to psalms and hymns and prayers, to care for the poor, to establish religious houses for virgins, and to make a chaste and pure life almost desirable to all. Thus in a short time the face of the whole province was transformed."

While Saint Basil was preaching, Saint Ephrem saw a dove whispering the sermon into his ear — a dove, I say, which is the sign and hieroglyph of the Holy Spirit, as Gregory of Nyssa testifies. Consider, then, what kind of sermon his was, and how zealous and fervent! Saint Gregory Nazianzen testifies that a public famine was relieved by Saint Basil's efforts: "He fed all," he says, "but in what manner? Listen. By opening the granaries of the wealthy with his speech and exhortation, he did what Scripture says: He breaks bread for the hungry, satisfies the poor with loaves, nourishes them in famine, and fills hungry souls with good things. But how exactly? When he had gathered the famished into one place — some barely drawing breath — men, women, little children, old people, every age deserving of pity: collecting every kind of food that is wont to drive away hunger, setting before them pots full of pottage; and then, imitating the service of Christ, who girded himself with a linen cloth and was not at all reluctant to wash the feet of his disciples, while also employing the service of his boys or fellow-servants for this purpose, he cared for both the bodies and the souls of the poor. Such was our new steward and second Joseph," etc. But Basil's own brother Gregory of Nyssa adds that at that time Saint Basil also gave away his own personal inheritance to the poor.

All your pastors, clergy and laity alike, proclaim your charity, solicitude, zeal, and service to all. You have restored many churches, estates, and episcopal residences, and in these and similar works of charity you have spent not only the revenues of the Church but also your own personal patrimony. All the poor, the sorrowful, and the afflicted celebrate your charity; nature prompts you to it and grace drives you forward; truly may you say those words of holy Job: "From my infancy compassion grew up with me, and from my mother's womb it came forth with me."

You have told me more than once — and I have found it to be true from experience — that there is nothing you do more willingly, nothing more pleasurable, than to visit hospitals and the homes of the poor and the wretched, to comfort them, to assist them with alms, and to refresh them with every office of mercy. The people of Hainaut and Mons experienced this very thing this year. For when they were afflicted with a most grievous plague, which carried off many thousands of them, and no remedy remained to check the evil, you sent to them the relics — the body of Saint Macarius, once Archbishop of Antioch in Armenia — and as soon as it was brought into the city, the pestilence, as if struck back from heaven, began to recede and diminish, and did not cease to decrease until it was entirely extinguished. All the people of Mons acknowledge this and celebrate it publicly, and in thanksgiving they erected a silver reliquary for Saint Macarius at generous expense.

Moses instituted the Nazirites and dictated laws for them in Numbers v. Saint Basil, the Moses of cenobitic monks, raised up monasteries throughout the whole East and prescribed monastic constitutions for them. The heretics attacked him on this account, as though he had turned out to be an inventor of novelties; to whom he replied in Epistle 63: "We are accused," he says, "of this way of life too, because we have men who are monks devoted to piety, who have renounced the world and all its cares, which the Lord compared to thorns that hinder the fruitfulness of the word; such men carry about in their bodies the mortification of Jesus, and each taking up his own cross follows the Lord. For my part I would spend my whole life that these crimes might be charged against me, and that I might have with me men who, with me as their teacher, have thus far embraced this study of piety," etc. He then adds that Egypt, Palestine, and Mesopotamia are full of those who follow this Christian Philosophy; and that even women, emulating the same pursuit, have happily attained an equal rule of life. Since this sublime manner of living was already beginning to take root among his own people, he expressed the desire that it might spread as widely as possible; and to envy this enterprise, he declares in the words that follow, is nothing other than to have surpassed the devil himself in wickedness: "This I affirm to you and confirm: that what the father of lies, Satan, has not heretofore dared to say, rash hearts now speak unceasingly and with complete licence, held back by no rein of restraint." From these words consider what manner of men the heretics and corrupt Christians who are enemies of Religious should be held to be.

You, Most Illustrious Lord, are not a Religious by formal profession or by belonging to a religious house; but what is more arduous, you live a religious life in the world. Your household, your family are so ordered, so religious, that it seems to be a monastery. Whence this? Clearly because what Gregory Nazianzen says of Saint Basil — "the life of Basil was for all a rule of living" — applies equally to you. You are a friend of our Society and of all Religious who are truly Religious, and especially of those who live not for themselves alone but also for others, and devote their efforts to directing souls toward salvation.

The monasteries of women throughout the whole archdiocese of Mechlin in former times, and now in the diocese of Ghent, have been so frequently visited, reformed, built up, and directed by you with holy ordinances, that all regard you as a father, love you, and rest their confidence in you.

Moses withstood Pharaoh and his Magicians with marvellous constancy; he sustained, conquered, and subdued the enemies of the people of God on every side. Saint Basil overcame and slew Julian the apostate Emperor: for so Damascene writes from Helladius, in his first Oration On Images: "Basil," he says, "the pious, stood before the image of Our Lady, on which also was depicted the figure of Mercury the celebrated martyr, and stood there in prayer that the impious apostate Julian might be removed. And from that image indeed he learned what was to come to pass. For he saw the martyr at first dim and obscure, but not long afterwards holding a bloodied spear."

Furthermore, how glorious were the struggles of Saint Basil against Valens and the Arians? Modestus, the Prefect of Valens, as Gregory Nazianzen testifies, pressed Basil to follow the religion of the Emperor. He refused. Then the Prefect said: "We who issue these commands — what do we seem to you in the end?" "Nothing at all," said Basil, "while you command such things; for Christianity is distinguished not by the rank of persons but by the integrity of faith." Then the Prefect, inflamed with anger and rising up: "What," he said, "are you not afraid of this power?" — "And why should I be afraid?" said Basil; "what will happen? what shall I suffer?" "What will you suffer?" the Prefect replied. "One thing out of the many that lie within my power." — "And what are those?" Basil added: "make us understand." — "Confiscation of goods," said he, "exile, torture, death." Then Basil: "If you have something else, threaten me with that; for of the things you have just named, none touches us." "How so?" said the Prefect. "Because," said Basil, "a man who has nothing is not subject to confiscation of goods — unless perhaps you need these tattered and worn-out rags of mine, and these few books, in which all my wealth and resources consist. As for exile, I do not know it, for I am bound to no particular place; I do not even call this land I now inhabit my own, and wherever I may be cast, I count as my own; or rather, to speak more truly, I know that all the earth is God's, of which I am a stranger and a pilgrim." Hear yet greater things and a greater spirit. "As for tortures, what can I receive, seeing I lack bodily substance? — unless perhaps you mean the first blow: for of that alone the decision and the power rests with you. Death, moreover, will be a benefit to me: it will send me more quickly to God, for whom I live and in whose service I am engaged, and whose death I have in large part already died, and toward whom I have long been hastening. Fire and sword, wild beasts, and claws tearing the flesh, are to us a pleasure and a delight rather than a terror. Therefore heap insults upon us, threaten, do whatever you please, enjoy your power; let even the Emperor hear this — you will assuredly never conquer us, nor bring it about that we consent to impious doctrine, even if you were to threaten worse things than these."

Broken by this boldness, the Prefect went to the Emperor and said: "We have been vanquished by the Bishop of this Church; he is superior to threats, firmer in argument, stronger than fair words. Some more timid man must be tried." Rightly therefore did Cyrus Theodorus mock this Prefect — who later, when ill, was compelled to beg for Basil's help — with these verses:

You are Prefect over all men else, Modestus,
but under Basil the Great you take your place.
However much you crave to be in command, you submit;
an ant you are, though you may roar like a lion.

Theodoretus, Book IV, chapter 17, adds this: There was present also, he says, a certain man named Demosthenes, prefect of the imperial kitchen, who in a thoroughly barbarian fashion rebuked Basil, master of the whole world. But Saint Basil, smiling, said: "We have seen an illiterate Demosthenes." And when the man, blazing with greater anger, began to threaten, Basil said: "Your business is to look after the seasoning of broths; for since your ears are stuffed with filth, you cannot hear sacred doctrine."

Your constancy in defence of faith and discipline, Most Illustrious Bishop, is celebrated everywhere; for all can see that you do not desist until you have confirmed it, and have gently brought the rebellious back under the yoke of the Lord, so that afterwards they themselves marvel at having surrendered and at being so changed. Some say that you possess some magic charm of allurement and enchantment, in that you can persuade anyone of anything, and do not cease until you have drawn whomever it may be into your view — that is, back to a sound mind. You have swallowed much that was hard in this work; you will swallow harder things yet, but God will be present and will grant you to overcome them.

Moses, departing to his fathers, left an immense longing for himself among the people — "and the children of Israel wept for him in the plains of Moab thirty days."

At the death and funeral of Saint Basil, Saint Gregory Nazianzen writes that there was so great a gathering of mourners — even of Jews and pagans — that several were crushed and killed in the crowd.

The whole city speaks of what grief your people of Ghent feel at your departure, mourning it as the death of a father. Through the crossroads these voices are heard: "Alas! we were not worthy of so great a man; our sins are taking this Bishop from us. We account this a great scourge of God. Our angel departs — who will guard us? who will guide us?" On the other side, as great as is the mourning of those in Ghent who are losing you, so great is the rejoicing of those in Cambrai who receive you; the Mons region rejoices, Valenciennes exults, Cambrai cries aloud with joy.

A great harvest rises up before you here, to be reaped with great labour: nearly eight hundred parishes to be administered; how many thousands of the faithful to be pastured? how many thousands of souls to be saved? Here your diligence will be sharpened, your charity roused, your zeal set ablaze — especially as you ponder, and now ponder, that saying of Saint Gregory Nazianzen: "Basil, through the single Church of Caesarea, gave light to the whole world."

You will find in the Annals of the Church of Cambrai — which is most ancient, and among the foremost in Belgium — that very many of its bishops have been enrolled in the catalogue of saints, each one having shone with marvellous holiness through his own distinctive virtue and practice.

Saint Vindicianus devoted great resources and efforts to building sacred places and adapting them for the assembly of the faithful: he erected monasteries and churches above all else.

Saint Lietbert, "most cautiously avoided injuries," says the author of his Life, "bore them most equably, and brought them to an end most swiftly; he believed the love of money to be the surest poison of all his hopes; he used his friends to repay kindness, his enemies to practise patience, and the rest to cultivate good will." On departing for Jerusalem he drew with him three thousand men, who accompanied him on pilgrimage. His holiness was made manifest by a miracle: for his grey hairs after death returned to the colour and beauty of youthful vigour.

Authert shone among the people of Cambrai and Hainault with marvellous humility and holiness. Under him Hainault began to flourish in the Christian faith, with many companions called in to assist, such as Saint Landelin, Saint Ghislain, Saint Vincent Count of Hainault, and Saint Waldetrudis, wife of Vincent. For this reason King Dagobert of the Franks came not infrequently to receive the counsel of Saint Authert. He burned with such zeal to convert a single sinner that he nearly consumed himself in tears and penances. He also adorned the relics of the saints with the greatest seemliness.

Saint Gaugericus, even as a boy, was most strongly inclined toward sacred things: he miraculously freed very many prisoners from dungeons and chains, in which grace he especially excelled. He built many churches during the thirty-nine years he presided over his see.

Saint Theodoric was his near equal, whose virtues Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims, extols.

Likewise Saint John, his successor, celebrated by the same Hincmar.

Saint Odo, Bishop of Cambrai, was of such faith and constancy toward God and the Church that, when driven from his see by the Emperor Henry IV because he refused to receive again as a gift from him the staff and ring which he had received from the Church at his consecration, he spent the rest of his life in exile at Anchin and died in that exile.

These will be your household mirrors, these the spurs to glorious labours undertaken for that same Church, to glorious contests bravely engaged in for her. Go on as you have begun: sincere and vigorous fellow workers will not be lacking; choose them shrewdly, and invite and co-opt them as partners in this holy work. Imitate Moses in all things; express Basil. I pray the Divine goodness, and will not cease to pray, that it may pour out upon you the spirit of both men — abundant and double — so that you may feed the thousands of souls entrusted to you in the fear, worship, and love of God, and lead them to blessed eternity. My love for you and my concern for your affairs, which you know well, drives me to this.

In hours set aside from other duties you will be able to read this work through at leisure: I hope that the variety and pleasantness of histories, examples, ancient rites and ceremonies will delight you, and that from it, coming to know Moses better, you will be the more stirred to emulate him. My method here is the same as it was in the Pauline commentaries, except that here I am briefer in words and ampler in matter. For here the variety and breadth of the subject is greater, as also is its accessibility and pleasantness — for much is historical, other parts typological, adorned with beautiful figures and symbols — and these two things compelled me to be sparing of words, lest the work grow too large; for the same reason I also spared myself the engravings of the Ark, the Cherubim, the altar, the tabernacle, and the rest.

I have set down here what I gathered over twenty years of commenting on the Pentateuch, and of teaching the same material a second and a third time. I have woven in throughout solid and pleasing allegories of the ancient ceremonies, seasoned with choice sayings, examples, and apophthegms of the ancients. I was moved by that line of the Poet:

He wins all votes who blends the useful with the sweet.

But lest I exceed the measure of an epistle, I will say more about Moses and my method in the preface.

Receive therefore, Most Illustrious Lord, this token and pledge of the love and esteem which I, the Louvain College, and our whole Society bear toward you; and since I am now called away hence to other duties, and shall perhaps never see Your Most Illustrious Reverence again in this world, let this be an enduring memorial of me in your heart, so that, absent in body for a time but always present in spirit, after this brief and wretched life we may be joined together in heavenly glory in Christ our Lord — to whose honour all this labour of ours sweats and strains — and may each of us receive, you abundantly, I in measure only of my poor capacity, that which was promised by Daniel: 'They that are learned shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that instruct many unto justice, as stars for all eternity.' Amen.

MUTIUS VITELLESCHI.
SUPERIOR GENERAL OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS.
Since three theologians of our Society, to whom this task was entrusted, have reviewed the Commentaries on the Pentateuch of Father Cornelius Cornelii a Lapide, theologian of our Society, and have approved them as fit to be published: we grant permission for them to be committed to the press, if it shall so seem good to those to whom the matter pertains. In witness whereof we have given these letters signed with our own hand and secured with our seal, at Rome, 9 January 1616.
MUTIUS VITELLESCHI.

PERMISSION OF THE VERY REVEREND FATHER PROVINCIAL SUPERIOR
OF THE PROVINCE OF FLANDRO-BELGICA.
I, Charles Scribani, Provincial Superior of the Society of Jesus in the province of Flandro-Belgica, by authority granted to me for this purpose by the Very Reverend Father General Mutius Vitelleschi, grant to the heirs of Martin Nutius and to Jan Moretus, printers of Antwerp, permission to commit to the press the Commentaries on the Pentateuch of Moses, authored by Father Cornelius Cornelii a Lapide, theologian of our Society. In witness whereof I have given these letters written with my own hand and secured with the seal of my office, at Antwerp, 23 August, in the year 1616.
CHARLES SCRIBANI.

CENSOR'S ASSESSMENT.
This Commentary of the Very Reverend Father Cornelius Cornelii a Lapide, theologian of the Society of Jesus, is learned and pious, and in every respect worthy of publication, so that it may instruct all who are eager for learning and advance them in piety. This I attest, 9 May, in the year 1615.
EGBERT SPITHOLDIUS,
Licenciate in Sacred Theology, Canon and Parish Priest of Antwerp, Censor of Books.

Annotations by which Aug. Crampon, priest of the diocese of Amiens, has illustrated and enriched Father Cornelius a Lapide's Commentaries on the Pentateuch.
Nothing hinders their printing.
Given at Amiens, 2 May in the year 1852.
JACOBUS ANTONIUS
Bishop of Amiens.

THE LIFE OF CORNELIUS A LAPIDE.

Cornelius Cornelii a Lapide, a Belgian by nationality, a native of Bocholt in the region of Eupen, born of respectable parents, began to worship God in faith, hope, and charity from the first use of reason. As a young man he entered the Society of Jesus on 8 July in the year of salvation 1592; within it, before the passing of his youth, he was ordained a priest and daily offered the sacred Host as a perpetual sacrifice, even to the very end of his life. He taught the Sacred Language and Holy Scripture publicly at Louvain for more than twenty years, and was then summoned to Rome by his superiors, where he expounded the same subjects for many years with the greatest celebrity of name, until, yielding to the strain of that work, he turned himself entirely to private writing. What manner of life he established at that time, I can explain in no words more apt than his own; speaking with God he thus expressed it: 'These labours of mine, and their fruits, all my studies, all my learning, all my commentary, I have consecrated to Your glory, O most holy Trinity and threefold Unity, and I have desired that my every action, every suffering, and my whole life might be nothing other than your continual praise. You revealed Yourself to my mind long ago, that I might esteem and seek You alone, and might lightly reckon and disdain all other things as mean, empty and fleeting. Wherefore I flee courts and shores: I pursue a solitude and retreat that is pleasant to me and not unprofitable to others, in company with Saint Basil, Gregory, and Jerome, whose holy Bethlehem, so earnestly sought by him in Palestine, I have found here in Rome. Once in my younger days I played Martha; now in the declining slope of age I play and love the part of Mary Magdalene more, mindful of life's brevity, mindful of God, mindful of eternity drawing near. Of my cell alone — which is to me more faithful and dearer than all the earth, and seems a very heaven on earth — and of silence alone I am the inhabitant; a dweller in my cell, a frequenter of my sacred study, I strive to be a dweller in heaven; I pursue the leisure, nay the business, of holy contemplation, reading, and writing. I give myself over to God, one and triune, to receive, ponder, and celebrate His oracles and inspirations; I sit at the feet of Christ, hanging upon His lips to drink in the words of life, which I may then pour out upon others.'

This he did as an old man, laden with the merits of a long holiness; for from the very moment of his entry into the Society of Jesus, by the unceasing contemplation of blessed eternity, he was so roused to contempt for human things and desire for heavenly things, that from that time forward he aimed at nothing other than the enduring will, praise, and glory of Christ, in life and in death, in time and in eternity; he strove and laboured to celebrate and promote that alone, with all his vows and studies, with all the powers of body and soul; he expected nothing from any mortal in this world, desired nothing; he did not linger over the judgements and applause of men; desiring to please God alone, and fearing to displease Him, he had this one end in view, this one petition, to this one end all his reading and writing, all his labour sweated out: that His holy name might be hallowed, and His holy will be done as in heaven so on earth. The most ardent desire to undergo martyrdom, divinely implanted from his very first novitiate, he always so persistently retained that he unceasingly besought that crown for himself with all his vows. He had almost already clasped it in his hands in the year 1604, when, staying near the shrine of Our Lady of Aspromont, renowned for miracles, not far from Louvain, and assisting the crowds of people who came for religious purposes through confessions, sermons, and other sacred duties, a Dutch cavalry unit fell upon the place unexpectedly on the very feast of the Nativity of Our Lady, laying everything waste with sword and fire; he was surrounded, and all but captured and slaughtered. But by the help of the Most Holy Eucharist, which he was carrying out of the church lest it be profaned by heretics, and by the aid of Our Lady, whom he implored with an urgent vow, the danger was dispersed, not without the appearance of a miracle; he himself was preserved unharmed by a wonderful providence. Moreover, how the desire for martyrdom never left him is sufficiently shown by those words with which, having completed his Commentary on the four Prophets, he addresses the holy four Prophets thus: 'O Prophets of the Lord, you have made me a sharer in your prophecy and your doctoral laurel; make me, I ask, a sharer also in martyrdom, that I too may seal with my blood the truth which I have drawn from you, taught to others, and set down in writing. For my doctorate will not be perfect and consummated unless it is equally closed with this seal. For nearly thirty years I have willingly and freely borne with you and for you the continual martyrdom of religious life, the martyrdom of sicknesses, the martyrdom of studies and writing: obtain for me, I beseech you, as a crowning gift the fourth martyrdom, that of blood. I have exhausted for you my vital and animal spirits; I shall exhaust my blood also. For all the labour I have lavished through all these years in expounding you by God's grace, illuminating you, and making you speak and prophesy in a new tongue, so that I in a manner prophesied together with you — obtain for me, as the wages of your prophet, martyrdom, I say, from the Father of lights, even as you obtain mercy.' Soon turning to the most blessed Mother of God, to whom he owed himself and all he had, by whom he had been called, unworthy as he was, into the holy Society of her Son, in which she had directed, aided, and instructed him in a wonderful way, he entreats her to make him attain martyrdom; then he urgently implores the Lord Jesus, his love, through the merits of his Mother and of the Prophets, that he may not live an idle life nor die an idle death in bed, but one brought by wood or iron. Consistent with these desires were the ornaments of his other virtues, which it would take too long to pursue here. Nothing could have seemed gentler than he, nothing more modest, nothing more temperate. So humble was his opinion of himself amid so vast a learning and such a breadth of all human and divine wisdom, that he would affirm: 'Truly and in my conscience, I am the most foolish of men, and the wisdom of men is not with me; I am a little child who does not know his own going out or coming in.' Elsewhere he likewise declares: 'For nearly forty years now I have applied myself to this sacred study, for thirty years I have done nothing else, nor ceased to teach Holy Scripture, and yet I feel how little progress I have made in it.' He clung so firmly to the strictness of religious life that, lest it suffer any harm on his account, he refused to have anything exceptional set before him at meals, even though his health was always frail, burdened by age, and spent in studies that would benefit God's Church, and he could not manage the food set before the others. Obedience was always dearer to him than life, and the love of truth. He placed truth first in all his writing, and obedience was what led him to bring his writings into the public light — writings which he would otherwise have condemned to eternal silence. Absorbed in these pursuits of holiness, after he had passed seventy years of age, he paid at last the debt of nature in the Holy City, where he had always desired to mingle his bones with those of the saints, on 12 March in the year 1637. His body, by authority of his superiors, was enclosed in its own coffin so that it might one day be identifiable, and buried. The catalogue of his works is as follows: Commentaries on the Pentateuch of Moses, Antwerp 1616, again in 1623 in folio; on the books of Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Kings, and Chronicles, Antwerp 1642, in folio; on the books of Ezra, Nehemiah, Tobit, Judith, Esther, and Maccabees, Antwerp 1644; on the Proverbs of Solomon, Antwerp and Paris, at Cramoisy's, 1635; on Ecclesiastes, Antwerp 1638, Paris 1639; on Wisdom; on the Song of Songs; on Ecclesiasticus; on the four Major Prophets; on the twelve Minor Prophets; on the four Gospels of Jesus Christ; on the Acts of the Apostles; on all the Epistles of the Apostle Saint Paul; on the Catholic Epistles; on the Apocalypse of the Apostle Saint John.

He left incomplete his commentaries on the books of Job and Psalms.

DECREES OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT
(SESSION IV).

ON THE CANONICAL SCRIPTURES.

The sacred, œcumenical and general Council of Trent, lawfully assembled in the Holy Spirit, with the three legates of the Apostolic See presiding over it, keeping this perpetually before its eyes: that, the errors being removed, the very purity of the Gospel be preserved in the Church; which Gospel, promised before through the prophets in the holy Scriptures, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, first promulgated with His own mouth, and then commanded to be preached to every creature by His Apostles as the source of all saving truth and moral discipline: perceiving that this truth and discipline are contained in written books and in unwritten traditions, which, received by the Apostles from the mouth of Christ Himself, or from the Apostles themselves, the Holy Spirit dictating, have come down to us, transmitted as it were from hand to hand: following the examples of the orthodox Fathers, receives and venerates with equal affection of piety and reverence all the books both of the Old and of the New Testament — since one God is the author of both — as also the said traditions, as well those pertaining to faith as those pertaining to morals, as having been dictated either by Christ’s own word of mouth or by the Holy Spirit, and preserved in the Catholic Church by a continuous succession.

It has thought it meet that a list of the sacred books be inserted in this decree, lest any doubt should arise in anyone’s mind as to which are the books that are received by this Synod. They are as follows:

Of the Old Testament: the five books of Moses, to wit, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; Josue, Judges, Ruth; four books of Kings; two of Paralipomenon; the first and second of Esdras, the latter of which is called Nehemias; Tobias, Judith, Esther, Job, the Davidical Psalter of one hundred and fifty psalms; the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Canticle of Canticles, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Isaias, Jeremias with Baruch, Ezechiel, Daniel; the twelve minor Prophets, to wit, Osee, Joel, Amos, Abdias, Jonas, Michæas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sophonias, Aggæus, Zacharias, Malachias; two books of the Machabees, the first and the second.

Of the New Testament: the four Gospels, according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; the Acts of the Apostles written by Luke the Evangelist; fourteen Epistles of Paul the Apostle: to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians, two to the Thessalonians, two to Timothy, to Titus, to Philemon, to the Hebrews; two of Peter the Apostle; three of John the Apostle; one of James the Apostle; one of Jude the Apostle; and the Apocalypse of John the Apostle.

But if anyone does not receive the said books entire with all their parts, as they have been used to be read in the Catholic Church and as they are contained in the old Latin Vulgate edition, and knowingly and deliberately contemns the traditions aforesaid, let him be anathema.

II.
ON THE EDITION AND USE OF THE SACRED BOOKS.

Moreover, the same sacred and holy Synod, considering that no small utility may accrue to the Church of God if it be made known which out of all the Latin editions now in circulation of the sacred books is to be held as authentic, ordains and declares that the said old and Vulgate edition, which, by the long usage of so many centuries, has been approved in the Church itself, be held as authentic in public readings, disputations, sermons and expositions; and that no one may dare or presume to reject it under any pretext whatsoever.

Furthermore in public readings, disputations, sermons, and expositions, to be held as authentic; and that no one may dare or presume to reject it under any pretext whatsoever.

Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, it decrees that no one, relying on his own prudence, in matters of faith and morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, twisting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, shall dare to interpret the sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church — whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures — has held and does hold; or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never intended to be brought to light. Those who contravene shall be declared by the ordinaries and punished with the penalties established by law.

Moreover, wishing to impose a proper limit on printers in this matter (who now without any limit — that is, thinking that whatever pleases them is permitted — print the sacred books of Scripture themselves and annotations and expositions upon them by anyone whatsoever, often with the press kept silent, often even with a false imprint, and, what is more grievous, without the name of the author; and also rashly sell such books printed elsewhere), it decrees and establishes that hereafter the sacred Scripture, and especially this old and Vulgate edition, shall be printed as correctly as possible; and that it shall not be lawful for anyone to print or cause to be printed any books whatever on sacred matters without the name of the author; nor to sell them in the future or even keep them with himself unless they have first been examined and approved by the ordinary, under penalty of anathema and the fine imposed in the canon of the most recent Lateran Council. And if they are regulars, besides such examination and approval, they shall also be bound to obtain permission from their superiors, after the books have been reviewed by them according to the form of their ordinances. Those who communicate them in writing or publish them without having them first examined and approved shall be subject to the same penalties as the printers. And those who have them or read them, unless they report the authors, shall be regarded as the authors themselves. Moreover, the approval of such books shall be given in writing, and therefore it shall authentically appear on the front of the book, whether written or printed; and the whole of this, that is, both the approval and the examination, shall be done gratis, so that what is worthy of approval may be approved and what is unworthy may be rejected.

After this, wishing to repress that rashness by which the words and sentences of sacred Scripture are turned and twisted to profane things — namely to scurrilous, fabulous, vain, adulatory, detractive, impious and diabolical incantations, divinations, lots, and even defamatory libels — it commands and enjoins, in order to remove such irreverence and contempt, that henceforth no one may dare to use the words of sacred Scripture for these and similar purposes in any way whatsoever, so that all men of this kind, rash violators and profaners of the word of God, may be restrained by bishops with the penalties of law and at their discretion.

PREFACE TO THE READER (1)

Among the many and great benefits which God has bestowed upon His Church through the sacred Tridentine Synod, this one seems especially to be counted first: that among so many Latin editions of the divine Scriptures He declared by a most solemn decree the sole Old and Vulgate edition—which had been approved by the long use of so many centuries in the Church—to be authentic.

For (to pass over the fact that not a few of the recent editions seemed to have been licentiously twisted to confirm the heresies of this age), that great variety and diversity of versions could certainly have produced great confusion in the Church of God. For it is now well established that in our own age almost the very thing has happened which St. Jerome testified occurred in his time: namely, there were as many copies as there were manuscripts, since each person added or subtracted according to his own whim.

Yet the authority of this Old and Vulgate edition has always been so great, and its excellence so outstanding, that fair judges could not doubt that it should be far preferred to all other Latin editions. For the books contained in it (as handed down to us almost by hand from our forefathers) were received in part from the translation or emendation of St. Jerome, and in part retained from a certain most ancient Latin edition which St. Jerome calls the Common and Vulgate, St. Augustine the Italic, and St. Gregory the Old translation.

And indeed, concerning the purity and excellence of this Old (or Italic) edition, there stands the splendid testimony of St. Augustine in the second book of On Christian Doctrine, where he judged that, among all the Latin editions then circulating in great numbers, the Italic should be preferred because it was—as he himself says—“more tenacious of the words while preserving the clarity of the meaning.

But concerning St. Jerome, there exist many outstanding testimonies from the ancient Fathers: St. Augustine calls him a most learned man and most skilled in three languages, and confirms by the testimony even of the Hebrews themselves that his translation is truthful. The same St. Gregory praises him so highly that he says his translation (which he calls the new one) has rendered everything more truly from the Hebrew speech, and therefore is most worthy that full faith be placed in it in all matters. St. Isidore, moreover, in more than one place prefers the Hieronymian version to all others and affirms that it is commonly received and approved by the Christian churches because it is clearer in words and truer in meaning. Sophronius also, a most erudite man, observing that St. Jerome’s translation was highly approved not only by Latins but also by Greeks, valued it so greatly that he translated the Psalter and the Prophets from Jerome’s version into elegant Greek.

Furthermore, the most learned men who came after—Remigius, Bede, Rabanus, Haymo, Anselm, Peter Damian, Richard, Hugh, Bernard, Rupert, Peter Lombard, Alexander, Albert, Thomas, Bonaventure, and all the others who have flourished in the Church over these nine hundred years—have used St. Jerome’s version in such a way that the other versions (which were almost innumerable) have, as it were, slipped from the hands of theologians and become utterly obsolete.

Therefore the Catholic Church not undeservedly celebrates St. Jerome as the greatest Doctor and as one divinely raised up for the interpretation of the sacred Scriptures, so that it is now not difficult to condemn the judgment of all those who either do not accept the labors of so eminent a Doctor or even trust that they can produce something better—or at least equal.

However, lest so faithful a translation, and one so useful in every respect to the Church, should be corrupted in any part either by the injury of time, or the negligence of printers, or the rash audacity of those who emend temerariously, the same most holy Synod of Trent wisely added by its decree that this same Old and Vulgate edition should be printed as correctly as possible, and that no one should be permitted to print it without the permission and approval of the Superiors. By this Decree it at the same time set a limit to the temerity and license of printers, and aroused the vigilance and industry of the Pastors of the Church in retaining and preserving so great a good with the greatest diligence.

And although the theologians of distinguished Academies labored with great praise in restoring the Vulgate edition to its pristine splendor, yet because in so great a matter no diligence can be excessive, and because several more ancient manuscript codices had been sought out by command of the Supreme Pontiff and brought to the City, and finally, because the execution of the decrees of general councils, and the very integrity and purity of the Scriptures themselves, are known to pertain especially to the care of the Apostolic See: therefore Pius IV, Supreme Pontiff, with his incredible vigilance over all parts of the Church, entrusted that task to certain most select Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, and to other men most skilled both in sacred letters and in various languages, that they should most accurately correct the Latin Vulgate edition, making use of the most ancient manuscript codices, inspecting also the Hebrew and Greek sources of the Bible, and finally consulting the commentaries of the ancient Fathers.

Pius V likewise carried forward the same undertaking. But that assembly, which had long been interrupted because of various and most grave occupations of the Apostolic See, Sixtus V, called by divine Providence to the supreme Pontificate, recalled with most ardent zeal, and at length ordered the completed work to be committed to the press. When it had already been printed, and the same Pontiff was taking care that it should be sent forth into the light, observing that not a few things had crept into the sacred Bible by a fault of the press which seemed to require renewed diligence, he judged and decreed that the whole work should be recalled under the hammer. But since he was prevented by death from accomplishing this, Gregory XIV, who after the twelve-day Pontificate of Urban VII had succeeded Sixtus, carrying out his intention of mind, undertook to complete it, with certain most eminent Cardinals and other most learned men again deputed for this purpose.

But when he also, and the one who succeeded him, Innocent IX, had been taken from this light in the briefest time, finally at the beginning of the Pontificate of Clement VIII, who now holds the helm of the universal Church, the work at which Sixtus V had aimed was, with God’s good help, perfected.

Receive therefore, Christian reader, with the approval of the same Clement, Supreme Pontiff, from the Vatican Press, the Old and Vulgate edition of the Holy Scripture, corrected with as much diligence as could be applied: which indeed, just as it is difficult to affirm that it is perfect in every respect, given human weakness, so it is by no means to be doubted that it is more emended and purer than all the others which have appeared up to this day.

And although in this recognition of the Bible no small zeal was applied in comparing manuscript codices, Hebrew and Greek sources, and the very commentaries of the ancient Fathers: yet in this widely circulated edition, just as some things were deliberately changed, so also other things which seemed to need changing were deliberately left unchanged: both because St. Jerome more than once warned that this should be done, to avoid offending the people; and because it is to be believed that our forefathers, who made Latin versions from the Hebrew and Greek, had a supply of better and more corrected books than those which have come down to us after their age (which perhaps, through being copied repeatedly over so long a period, have become less pure and intact); and finally, because it was not the intention of the sacred congregation of most eminent Cardinals and other most learned men chosen by the Apostolic See for this work to produce some new edition, or to correct or emend the ancient translator in any part; but rather to restore the Old and Vulgate Latin edition itself—purged from the errors of ancient copyists and from the mistakes of corrupt emendations—to its original integrity and purity as far as possible, and once restored, to strive with all their strength to have it printed as correctly as possible according to the decree of the Ecumenical Council.

Moreover, in this edition it seemed good to add nothing that is not canonical, nothing spurious, nothing extraneous. And this is the reason why the books inscribed as III and IV Esdras (which the sacred Tridentine Synod did not number among the canonical books), and also the Prayer of King Manasseh (which exists neither in Hebrew nor in Greek, is not found in the older manuscripts, and is not part of any canonical book) have been placed outside the series of canonical Scripture. And no concordances (which are not prohibited from being added later), no notes, no various readings, no prefaces at all, and no arguments at the beginning of the books are to be seen in the margins.

But just as the Apostolic See does not condemn the industry of those who prepare concordances of passages, various readings, prefaces of St. Jerome and other things of that kind in other editions: so too it does not prohibit that, in another style of print in this same Vatican edition, helps of this kind may be added in the future for the convenience and benefit of students, provided however that various readings be not annotated at the margin of the Text itself.

POPE CLEMENT VIII.
FOR A PERPETUAL MEMORIAL OF THE MATTER.

Since the text of the Vulgate edition of the sacred Bible, restored with the greatest labors and watchfulness and most accurately purged of errors, by the blessing of the Lord, is coming forth from our Vatican Press into the light: We, desiring opportunely to provide that the same text may hereafter be preserved incorrupt, as is fitting, by Apostolic authority, by the tenor of these presents strictly forbid that for ten years to be counted from the date of these presents, either this side of the mountains or beyond them, it be printed by anyone anywhere other than in our Vatican Press. After the aforesaid decade has elapsed, We command that this caution be observed: that no one presume to commit this edition of the Holy Scriptures to the press unless he has first obtained a copy printed in the Vatican Press, and that the form of this copy be inviolably observed without changing, adding, or removing even the smallest particle of the text, unless something occurs that is manifestly to be ascribed to a typographical error.

If any printer in whatsoever kingdoms, cities, provinces, and places, whether subject to the temporal jurisdiction of our Holy Roman Church or not, shall presume in any way to print, sell, offer for sale, or otherwise publish or circulate this same edition of the Holy Scriptures within the aforesaid ten years, or after the ten years have elapsed, in any way other than according to such a copy as is mentioned above; or if any bookseller shall presume, after the date of these presents, to sell, offer for sale, or circulate printed books of this edition, or books to be printed, that differ in any respect from the aforesaid restored and corrected Text, or printed by anyone other than the Vatican printer within the ten years, he shall incur, besides the loss of all the books and other temporal penalties to be inflicted at Our discretion, also the sentence of major excommunication ipso facto; from which he cannot be absolved except by the Roman Pontiff, except when in danger of death.

We therefore command all and each of the Patriarchs, Archbishops, Bishops, and other Prelates of churches and places, even regular ones, that they take care and ensure that these present letters be inviolably and perpetually observed by all in their respective churches and jurisdictions. They shall repress contradictors by ecclesiastical censures and other opportune remedies of law and fact, setting aside appeal, and invoking also, if need be, the aid of the secular arm, notwithstanding Apostolic constitutions and ordinances, and statutes and customs of general, provincial, or synodal councils, whether general or special, and of whatsoever churches, orders, congregations, colleges, and universities, even of general studies, confirmed by oath, Apostolic confirmation, or any other firmness, and privileges, indults, and Apostolic letters issued or to be issued to the contrary in any way: all of which We derogate most broadly for this effect and decree to be derogated.

We also will that transcripts of these presents, even when printed in the volumes themselves, be given the same faith everywhere in court and outside, as would be given to the presents themselves if they were exhibited or shown.

Given at Rome, at St. Peter’s, under the Fisherman’s Ring, on the 9th day of November 1592, in the first year of Our Pontificate.

M. VESTRIUS BARBIANUS.