Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
He teaches that the harlot must be fled as a plague. He suggests the remedy of flight at verse 15, namely the love of one's own wife: for thus the stranger will be avoided, since chaste love drives out unchaste love, and a wife drives out the harlot.
Vulgate Text: Proverbs 5:1-23
1. My son, attend to my wisdom, and incline your ear to my prudence, 2. that you may guard your thoughts, and that your lips may preserve discipline. Do not attend to the deceit of a woman: 3. for the lips of a harlot are a dripping honeycomb, and her throat is smoother than oil; 4. but her end is bitter as wormwood, and sharp as a two-edged sword. 5. Her feet go down to death, and her steps penetrate to hell. 6. They do not walk by the path of life; her steps are wandering and untraceable. 7. Now therefore, my son, hear me, and do not depart from the words of my mouth. 8. Make your way far from her, and do not approach the doors of her house. 9. Do not give your honor to strangers, nor your years to the cruel one, 10. lest strangers be filled with your strength, and your labors be in the house of another, 11. and you groan at the last, when you have consumed your flesh and your body, and say: 12. Why did I detest discipline, and my heart not acquiesce to reproofs, 13. nor did I hear the voice of those teaching me, and I did not incline my ear to my masters? 14. I was nearly in every evil, in the midst of the assembly and the congregation. 15. Drink water from your own cistern, and the streams of your own well: 16. let your fountains be dispersed abroad, and in the streets divide your waters. 17. Have them for yourself alone, and let not strangers be sharers with you. 18. Let your spring be blessed, and rejoice with the wife of your youth: 19. a most dear hind and a most graceful fawn; let her breasts inebriate you at all times, delight constantly in her love. 20. Why are you seduced, my son, by a stranger, and warmed in the bosom of another? 21. The Lord beholds the ways of man, and considers all his steps. 22. His own iniquities catch the wicked man, and he is bound with the ropes of his sins. 23. He shall die because he did not have discipline, and in the multitude of his folly he shall be deceived.
First Part of the Chapter
Verse 1: My Son, Attend to My Wisdom
1. MY SON, ATTEND TO MY WISDOM (the Septuagint has: apply your ear to my words), AND INCLINE YOUR EAR TO MY PRUDENCE. — Solomon, about to give a new lesson of wisdom concerning the flight from the harlot, after his custom arouses the attention of his disciple, so that he may notice and weigh how important it is. He therefore says to him: Silently and studiously attend and pay heed to my words. For silence is the guardian of discipline. Whence Pythagoras imposed a five-year silence on his disciples.
Verse 2: That You May Guard Your Thoughts
2. THAT YOU MAY GUARD YOUR THOUGHTS, AND THAT YOUR LIPS MAY PRESERVE DISCIPLINE. — The Septuagint has: that you may guard good thought (Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion: good knowledge); and the sense of my lips commands you, that is to say: My lips declare the interior thought of my wisdom and its meaning, and command that you simply accept it as it is declared, impress it on your mind, and carry it out in practice.
Others read: the sense of my lips I command to you. Therefore take "thoughts" here not as the disciple's but as those of wisdom and of Solomon, that is to say: Attend so that you may guard my concepts, my precautions, my counsels, as Vatablus translates. Whence the Chaldean renders: that you may be admonished in counsel; the Syriac: that you may be cautious in thought; R. Levi: that you may guard the thoughts by which you are trained in prudence. So also Aben-Ezra.
Nevertheless, take "thoughts" also as the disciple's; for he who guards the thoughts of wisdom, he surely guards his own as well. For the thoughts and counsels of wisdom teach and prescribe the guarding of one's own thoughts. Whence St. Gregory, Part III of his Pastoral Rule, Admonition 15: "That you may guard your thoughts: For nothing, he says, in us is more fleeting than the heart, which departs from us as often as it flows away through evil thoughts. When therefore thought is restrained by watchfulness, the heart, which was accustomed to flee, is found."
DO NOT ATTEND TO THE DECEIT OF A WOMAN. These words are not expressed in the Hebrew, but are tacitly understood. Whence the Septuagint, and from them our Vulgate, expressed them. Therefore these words depend on what follows: "For the lips of a harlot are a dripping honeycomb, etc."; for from these the conclusion is drawn: "Therefore do not attend to the deceit of a woman." By "deceit" then he means the blandishments, softness and elegance of words, beauty, adornment of clothing, the painting of the face, pretenses, arts and wiles by which harlots are accustomed to attract, ensnare and pervert their lovers. Whence the Septuagint has: do not attend to an evil woman, that is, a wicked, depraved, perverse, deceitful woman; St. Jerome on Isaiah chapter 23: do not attend to a most wicked (St. Cyril, Book 15 On Adoration: a shameless) woman; therefore it is strange that the Arabic renders it: do not listen to a good woman.
St. Chrysostom, Homily 14 to the People, reads: do not gaze upon another's beauty, and do not meet a fornicating woman; for honey, etc. -- as if these words pertained to the eyes; as if he were saying: Do not look upon the beautiful face of a painted and adorned harlot, because this beauty is another's, that is, of another woman who is not your wife. Again "another's" because this beauty is often not natural but painted, and borrowed from elsewhere, namely from antimony, rouge and cosmetics, and from clothing and gems. For a woman especially strikes and wounds the one who gazes upon her most beautiful face and eyes, like a serpent and a basilisk. Yet in this passage he refers more to the flattering and deceitful words of harlots, as is clear from what follows. For with these they deceive and drive mad many men, especially when the painting of the face and eyes is added. Whence Codrus sings of them: "The sky does not have so many stars, nor the rivers so many fish, as the wicked woman carries wiles in her mind."
For since a woman excels neither in strength, nor in talent, nor in counsel, she therefore turns to wiles, so that what she cannot achieve by the former, she may obtain and accomplish by the latter: just as weak animals are cunning for the same reason, such as foxes, monkeys, cats, etc., while on the contrary lions, tigers, and wolves are not cunning but violent, because since they carry out their designs by strength and power, they have no need of cunning. Add that a woman has something serpentine about her. The serpent, in seducing Eve, seems to have breathed his own character and deceptions into her and her entire sex. Add also the malice of harlots and their zeal for deceiving, indeed their continual practice, by which they daily devise new arts of deception, so that they seem to think of nothing else, dream of nothing else, and appear wholly stitched together from frauds. Ecclesiasticus treats the same theme in chapter 25, verse 22, where I said more on this matter. Therefore I shall be brief here.
St. Jerome says excellently in Book I Against Jovinian, near the end: "Love of beauty is forgetfulness of reason and next to madness, a foul vice most unbecoming to a sound mind; it disturbs counsels; it breaks lofty and generous spirits; it drags one down from great thoughts to the lowest ones; it makes one querulous, irascible, rash, harshly domineering, slavishly flattering, useless to all, and finally even to love itself. For when it blazes with an insatiable desire for enjoyment, it wastes much time in suspicions, tears, and complaints; it produces self-hatred, and finally becomes hateful even to itself." And after some remarks: "It is the saying of a most learned man that chastity must above all be retained: once it is lost, every virtue collapses. In this lies the preeminence of womanly virtues; this commends the poor woman, exalts the rich one, redeems the ugly one, adorns the beautiful one: it deserves well of ancestors, whose blood it does not corrupt with illegitimate offspring."
Wherefore St. Augustine, in the book On Honest Women, chapter 2: "Among other battles of Christians, he says, only the battles of chastity are fierce, where the fight is daily and victory rare. For chastity has been allotted a grievous enemy, who is resisted daily and always feared." And St. Ephrem, in his sermon Against Wicked Women: "For what is a woman, he says? An elegant snare, enticing men to pleasures, who with splendid appearance and lofty neck winks with her eyes and smiles with her cheeks, but singing sweetly with her tongue she deceives others with her voice and allures with her speech, etc. What is a woman? A shipwreck on land, a fountain of iniquity, a treasure of uncleanness and malice, a deadly conversation and companionship, the ruin of eyes, the destruction of souls, a dart to the heart, the perdition of youths, the scepter of hell, and headlong lust. What is a woman? The cause of the devil, the resting place of the serpent, the consolation of the devil, inconsolable grief, a burning furnace, an incurable malice, daily chatter, the lodging of the lustful and the workshop of demons," etc.
For this reason St. Jerome to Nepotian, on the life of clergy and priests: "Let the feet of women seldom or never wear down the threshold of your little dwelling. All the maidens and virgins of Christ either equally ignore or equally love. Do not stay under the same roof: nor trust in past chastity. You cannot be holier than David, nor stronger than Samson, nor wiser than Solomon. Remember always that a woman cast the inhabitant of paradise out of his possession."
Moreover, another trick of harlots, and one of the chief ones, is this: they flee in such a way that they want to be seen; they fight in such a way that they want to be conquered; they exercise hatred in such a way that they then love most intensely. So Plutarch writes of Cleopatra in his Life of Antony: "She took care to be seen frequently weeping, but immediately wiped away her tears and concealed them, as if she wished to hide from Antony." Hear St. Jerome, Epistle 47: "From time to time her shawl slips, to bare her white shoulders, and as if she had not wished to be seen, she hastily covers what she had willingly exposed."
St. Nilus in his Maxims, chapter On Fornication: "Flee the gatherings of women, he says; as soon as you meet them, with face cast down to the ground they speak gently and calmly, and shed such tears as suggest compassion: they compose themselves modestly and frequently sigh: they inquire about chastity, and listen studiously and diligently. If you look upon them, they gradually raise their heads. Then they gaze at you with more fixed eyes, and smile, indeed they burst into unrestrained and dissolute laughter, and finally they deploy all the hooks of death and the enticements of illusion, and every kind of net by which the soul is besieged." And soon after: "The grass flourishes, he says, that is near to water, and the feeling of lust in the conversation of women. Painted beauty is the ruin and shipwreck of the intemperate."
Wherefore St. Gregory Nazianzen in his Precepts for Virgins: "Be a virgin, he says, in your eyes, be a virgin in your ears and your tongue; for by these three it is easy to depart from the right path."
Diogenes, seeing two women talking together, said: "The asp borrows venom from the viper." Secundus the Philosopher, asked by the Emperor Hadrian "what a woman is," replied: "A man's shipwreck, a household storm, a captivity of life, an embracing lioness, an adorned Scylla, a malicious animal, a necessary evil."
Mystically, all that is said here about the harlot, Olympiodorus and Polychronius in the Greek Chain, and St. Jerome on Ezekiel chapter 6, and others apply to heresy; Lyranus to idolatry; you apply it to pleasure and concupiscence, of which Damascene aptly says in Book III of the Parallels, chapter 28, from St. Chrysostom: "Pleasure is like a dog, O man; if you drive it away, it flees; if you feed it, it remains. Pleasure is the capital of all evils."
Verse 3: For the Lips of a Harlot Are a Dripping Honeycomb
3. FOR THE LIPS OF A HARLOT ARE A DRIPPING HONEYCOMB, AND HER THROAT IS SMOOTHER THAN OIL. — In Hebrew: for the lips of the strange woman drip honeycomb, and her palate is smoother than oil. So Pagninus and Vatablus, who translates "smoother" as "more flattering"; others: "more slippery"; others: "her throat is made smooth beyond oil." For the Hebrew chalak means soft, tender, light, gentle, slippery; and such things are usually fatty. "Fattens" therefore means: soothes, flatters, stuffs, and ensnares with the fatty oil of blandishments.
Hugo of St. Victor aptly says in his book On Avoiding Carnal Marriages: "In the honeycomb, he says, there are two things, namely honey and wax. In the face of a harlot there are likewise two things, namely beauty and grace, that is, the comeliness of the mouth, and the sweetness of speech. Wax kindles fire, honey provides the smoothness of anointing: thus the beauty of the harlot inflames the flesh with the fire of lust, and the flattery of enticing speech subverts the mind; honey drips from the wax, while the harlot softens her words and makes them sweet."
St. Chrysostom, Homily 14 to the People, refers the "honeycomb" of the lips to the flattering kisses of harlots, and the throat smoother than oil to their flattering speeches. "For a harlot, says Chrysostom, does not know how to love, but only to lie in ambush; her kiss has venom, poison and ruin. But if it does not appear immediately, for that very reason one ought to flee from her all the more, because she conceals destruction and has hidden death, and does not allow it to appear manifest from the beginning."
Others more correctly refer both universally to the words of harlots; for they so sweeten these that they seem to drip honey (whence Diogenes called them "a honeyed snare"), and so soften them that they appear softer than oil, and are most effective at soothing and softening even the most virile minds. For like oil they lubricate and flow into minds, softening, weakening and effeminating them; for they are the voices and songs of Sirens.
Furthermore, flattering and deceitful words are rightly compared to oil: first, on account of a similar slipperiness; second, because oil has the greatest power of penetrating inwardly -- honeyed words have the same; third, because oil, according to Galen, is endowed with both biting and soothing properties. Rightly therefore gentle words, which yet fix stings in the soul, are compared to oil, which soothes the skin but bites the interior. Hence to "smear the mouth" means the same as to deceive by flattery and cajolery.
Mystically, St. Ephrem in his treatise On Abstaining from Desires takes these words of the pleasure of the flesh or concupiscence: "Let us remember, he says, what the Sage says: The lips of the harlot are a dripping honeycomb, signifying the sweetness of concupiscence by the honeycomb; and what he adds saying: Which for a time makes the throat smooth, but afterwards you will find it more bitter than gall, and sharper than a two-edged sword."
Boethius says excellently, in Book III of the Consolation of Philosophy: "Every pleasure has this trait: it drives those who enjoy it with its stings; and like a swarm of flying bees, when it has poured its pleasant honey, it flees, and with too tenacious a bite it strikes the smitten hearts."
Verse 4: But Her End Is Bitter as Wormwood
4. BUT HER END IS BITTER AS WORMWOOD, AND SHARP AS A TWO-EDGED SWORD. — For "wormwood" the Hebrew is laana, which some translate as bitterness, poison or venom; but commonly they translate it as wormwood. It signifies therefore that the honey of the harlot's speeches is turned into the gall of sorrows: sorrows, I say, which are so sharp and deadly as if they had been inflicted by a two-edged sword; just as honey and all sweet things are converted in the stomach into gall and bitter and painful bile, as Galen and the physicians teach. The bitterness of this wormwood and the sharpness of this sword is felt by fornicators: first, in filth, nausea and diseases, especially in the Neapolitan plague, by which God chastises fornication; second, in losses of worldly goods, for harlots drain wealth; third, in infamy; fourth, in lawsuits, quarrels and fights with the harlot, who, more shameless than a dog, vomits all her venom upon her lover; fifth, in the guilt of sin and the wrath of God, and finally in present and eternal death which it brings; sixth, because it deprives a man of talent, judgment, fortitude both of mind and body, and makes a man virtually irrational and brutish.
Plautus in the Truculentus: "In honey, he says, are these tongues of yours (he addresses harlots), and your speeches are milky, but your hearts are steeped in gall and bitter vinegar. From your tongues you give sweet words, but in your hearts you deal bitterly."
Wherefore Solomon rightly says "a dripping honeycomb," because pleasure gives only a drop of honey, soon to give a sea of gall: on the other hand, virtue gives a drop of gall, soon to give a sea of honey.
Verse 5: Her Feet Go Down to Death
5. HER FEET GO DOWN TO DEATH, AND HER STEPS PENETRATE TO HELL. — For "penetrate" the Hebrew is itmochu, that is, they will sustain, support, foster, strengthen hell, just as a wall is sustained by a buttress lest it fall and perish. For in a similar manner harlots sustain hell, because the greater part of mankind is damned on account of lust, that is to say: Hell would be emptied and would as it were collapse, unless the lustful filled and sustained it, say Cajetan and R. Levi. Lust therefore is the buttress and foundation of hell.
Verse 6: They Do Not Walk by the Path of Life
6. THEY DO NOT WALK BY THE PATH OF LIFE; HER STEPS ARE WANDERING AND UNTRACEABLE. — The Septuagint: she does not enter the ways of life; and her slippery paths are not easily tracked. The Hebrew literally has: perhaps you would weigh the way of life -- and expand? Her steps are wandering or shifting, so that you may not know, that is to say: If you seek the way of life, which leads to life -- here to a healthy and prosperous one, but in heaven to a blessed and eternal one -- do not follow the feet and steps of harlots, because they do not walk by the way of life, but are wandering, and are so variously tossed by the surges of lusts that their ways, desires and actions are untraceable.
For wandering love makes a wandering heart, a wandering heart makes a wandering imagination, and a wandering imagination makes the feet, hands and whole body wander.
Verse 7: Now Therefore, My Son, Hear Me
7. NOW THEREFORE, MY SON, HEAR ME, AND DO NOT DEPART FROM THE WORDS OF MY MOUTH. — The Septuagint has: do not make my words void. For young men entangled in love are accustomed to scorn and nullify the advice of the wise as the ravings of old men.
The word "now" after the Hebrew manner, following the enumeration of the damages caused by the harlot, is aptly added as a particle of one who concludes and exhorts to flight from her, that is to say: I have said that the harlot is more bitter than wormwood, sharper than a two-edged sword, that she leads to death and hell, etc. "Now therefore, my son, etc., make your way far from her"; lest by shameful and slight pleasure you foolishly bring such great damages upon yourself.
Verse 8: Make Your Way Far from Her
8. MAKE YOUR WAY FAR FROM HER, AND DO NOT APPROACH THE DOORS OF HER HOUSE. — For the whole remedy for fornication, the whole salvation lies in withdrawal and flight from harlots and occasions of sin, as St. Cyprian teaches vigorously and elegantly throughout his treatise On the Singularity of the Clergy. Indeed the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 6:18 says: "Flee fornication." For to touch the doors of a harlot and even to knock lightly with the hand, can and usually is the beginning of impure fornication.
Mystically, the most frivolous harlot is the frivolity of the mind, whose doors, that is, first approaches, the religious man must avoid and flee, unless he wishes to be defiled by greater vices: for frivolity of mind generates scurrility, detraction and mockery, arouses anger and indignation in those who are deceived, and not infrequently bursts forth into open insults hurled back and forth.
Verse 9: Do Not Give Your Honor to Strangers
9. DO NOT GIVE YOUR HONOR TO STRANGERS, NOR YOUR YEARS TO THE CRUEL ONE. — For "honor" the Hebrew is hod, which means celebrity, dignity, honor, glory, majesty. Therefore in this place, by honor, first, understand the glory and reputation of integrity and chastity: Do not lose the honor and glory of chastity through the disgrace of fornication. Second, by honor understand public honors, such as magistracies, prefectures, prelacies, etc. Third, by honor understand the glory and distinction of noble deeds. Fourth, by honor understand the flower of youth and its beauty and strength.
He alludes to Samson, who handed over his honor to a foreigner, namely his Philistine Delilah, when he revealed to her the secret of his strength: for when she had shaved it off, he was as if weakened, captured by the Philistines, and with his prodigious strength he lost his glory and his life, Judges 16.
AND YOUR YEARS TO THE CRUEL ONE. Others more correctly take "the cruel one" to mean the harlot. For she is cruel because she cruelly takes away the wealth, reputation and life of many. Or, which amounts to the same thing, by "the cruel one" understand lust; for this rages cruelly against the whole body and life of a man, indeed even against the mind and soul, which it torments with a thousand cares, jealousies, anxieties, remorse, sins, punishments, and finally the torments of hell.
Verse 10: Lest Strangers Be Filled with Your Strength
10. LEST STRANGERS BE FILLED WITH YOUR STRENGTH, AND YOUR LABORS BE IN THE HOUSE OF ANOTHER. — It is better to take "strength" and "power" as meaning wealth: for harlots are satiated with this. For harlots do not court young men, but the purses and wealth of young men, and are never satiated with gifts until they have drained everything and stripped the youths bare, and thus expose them naked and poor to be the laughingstock of all. Wherefore St. Chrysostom, Homily 63 to the People, calls harlots "the shoals and rocks of patrimony." Thus the prodigal son exhausted his entire patrimony on harlots, so that from poverty he was compelled to feed pigs, Luke chapter 15, verse 17.
Verse 11: And You Groan at the Last
11. AND YOU GROAN AT THE LAST, WHEN YOU HAVE CONSUMED YOUR FLESH AND YOUR BODY. — For "groan" the Hebrew is nahamta, that is, you shall roar like a hungry lion, or one wounded and struggling with death: for thus he also roars, that is, the young man grieves and wails inconsolably and miserably, when through fornication, having consumed everything, both his strength and his wealth, "at the last," that is, finally or at length, he finds himself drained of wealth, consumed in strength and flesh, and that irretrievably.
Moreover, lust emaciates the entire body and exhausts the vigor and flesh of each member. First, because it pours out the blood and vital spirits by which all parts of the body are nourished and enlivened. Second, because it injures the vital parts, namely the brain, heart, liver and stomach, which give nourishment and strength to the other parts. Third, because seed is drawn from each member and part of the body, and therefore through frequently poured out seed, each member is depleted and weakened.
Verse 12: And You Shall Say: Why Did I Detest Discipline
12 AND 13. AND YOU SHALL SAY: WHY DID I DETEST DISCIPLINE, AND MY HEART DID NOT ACQUIESCE TO REPROOFS, NOR DID I HEAR THE VOICE OF THOSE TEACHING ME, AND I DID NOT INCLINE MY EAR TO MY MASTERS? — The words are clear: for they signify the immense, but late and useless grief and repentance of a life consumed in lusts, when the profligate man, naked, wretched and sick, will cry out and beat everything with miserable and useless complaints. Similar, but more pathetic, is the cry of the wicked in Wisdom 5:6: "Therefore we have erred from the way of truth, and the light of justice did not shine upon us. We wearied ourselves in the way of iniquity and destruction, and walked difficult roads; but the way of the Lord we did not know. What has pride profited us? Or what has the boasting of riches brought us? All those things have passed away like a shadow," etc.
These are the four degrees of those who despise correction. First, overcome by pleasure they do not acquiesce to the warning. Second, they avoid and flee the warner. Third, they scorn him. Fourth, they provoke him with harsh words, mockery and insults.
Verse 14: I Was Nearly in Every Evil
14. I WAS NEARLY IN EVERY EVIL, IN THE MIDST OF THE ASSEMBLY AND THE CONGREGATION. — By "evil," first, understand the evil of guilt: for lust is the origin and cause of all evil, that is, of all guilt and sin. Second, by "evil" understand the evil of punishment. Third, by "every evil" understand every infamy. Fourth, others by "evil" understand the devil. Fifth, by "every evil" understand hell. For just as in heaven is every good, so in hell is every evil. Through his lusts he very nearly fell into hell; only a step was between him and hell. Let the penitent therefore say with St. Mary of Egypt: "I will sing the mercies of the Lord forever."
Second Part of the Chapter: The Love of the Harlot Must Be Suffocated by the Love of a Wife
Verse 15: Drink Water from Your Own Cistern
15. DRINK WATER FROM YOUR OWN CISTERN, AND THE STREAMS OF YOUR OWN WELL. — Therefore, in the literal sense, by the cistern and well understand a wife, from whom the husband draws pure water, that is, the chaste pleasure of marriage and the procreation of children. He alludes to the Hebrew etymology; for in Hebrew a woman is called nekeba, as if mackebet, that is, a cistern. These sentences: "Drink water from your cistern, and the streams of your well," etc., are proverbs or parables, which in their parabolic sense literally signify nothing else than: Love your wife, use her honorably in the fear of God; rejoice with her, so that through her you may quench the thirst of concupiscence, and beget many and excellent children. For God, to quench the fire and thirst of lust, instituted marriage, and attached His grace to it, so that spouses might live chastely in this their state and vocation.
Mystically, the Fathers expound this sentence variously. First, Origen by the well understands the knowledge of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Second, St. Augustine by the well and fountain understands the Holy Spirit, and by the water the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Third, St. Ambrose by the fountain understands wisdom and moral teaching. Fourth, St. Ambrose by the cistern and well understands interior grace and holiness. Fifth, others by the cistern and fountain understand a good mind, from which holy thoughts emanate. Sixth, Salonius and St. Jerome by the cistern and fountain understand Sacred Scripture.
Verse 16: Let Your Fountains Be Dispersed Abroad
16. LET YOUR FOUNTAINS BE DISPERSED ABROAD, AND DIVIDE YOUR WATERS IN THE STREETS. — The meaning is, as if to say: From you and your wife, as from copious and pure fountains, let many legitimate, beautiful, and well-mannered offspring be begotten and come forth, who may run through the streets like the clearest streams. He signifies that the end and fruit of marriage is the good of abundant and honorable offspring, and that spouses ought to aim at and seek this.
Moreover he calls wives "fountains," because in that age polygamy was permitted to the Jews. Yet in order to show that monogamy is far to be preferred to polygamy, for the sake of peace and for a better upbringing of children, he repeatedly calls the wife in the singular a vein, a cistern, a well, a deer, a fawn.
Mystically, we channel the fountains of our wisdom and virtue abroad when we teach others, give good counsel, admonish, and form and perfect them in all holiness.
Verse 17: Have Them for Yourself Alone
17. HAVE THEM FOR YOURSELF ALONE, AND LET NOT STRANGERS BE PARTAKERS WITH YOU. — It is better to understand this not so much of children as of the wife, with Hugo, Jansenius, Baynus, and others, as if to say: "Have," that is, you will have these waters, namely legitimate offspring, "alone," if you beget them from your wife alone; nor will strangers, namely adulterers and fornicators, claim a share in them for themselves.
Mystically, St. Gregory, Book I on Ezekiel, homily 12, by the fountains understands the wisdom which we ought to preach with a pure and sincere intention of promoting the glory of God and the salvation of souls. He both divides the waters in the streets and has them alone, who by the fact that he preaches to many does not exalt himself in the thought of temporal glory. "For then a man possesses what he teaches, when he rejoices not in being known, but in being useful."
St. Bernard, Book I of On Consideration, chapter 5, from this passage admonishes Pope Eugenius that amid so many affairs of the Pontificate he should from time to time return to the fountain of his own heart: "All equally have a share in you, all drink from the public fountain of your breast, and will you stand thirsting apart? Remember therefore, I do not say always, I do not say often, but at least sometimes to give yourself back to yourself."
Verse 18: Let Your Vein Be Blessed
18. LET YOUR VEIN BE BLESSED, AND REJOICE WITH THE WIFE OF YOUR YOUTH. — The Septuagint: let the fountain of your water be your own, and rejoice with the wife who is from your youth. By the vein or fountain understand the wife: Cause your wife to be fruitful and blessed by God, and happy with the blessings of the womb. You will accomplish this if, content with love of her and legitimate use, you do not exhaust the strength of your body through vagrant and unlawful lust. For thus your wife will be blessed by God, and will beget for you many distinguished, strong, and virtuous children, according to that saying of Psalm 127: "Your wife shall be as a fruitful vine on the sides of your house; your children like young olive plants around your table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord."
So St. Joachim rejoiced with St. Anna, especially when by the oracle of an Angel, after long barrenness, he miraculously begot from her the Virgin Mary, Mother of God.
Verse 19: A Most Dear Deer, and a Most Graceful Fawn
19. A MOST DEAR DEER, AND A MOST GRACEFUL FAWN. LET HER BREASTS INEBRIATE YOU AT ALL TIMES; BE DELIGHTED CONTINUALLY IN HER LOVE. — This is the application and explanation of the preceding parable about the use of the cistern, well, and vein, as if to say: by these parables I urge nothing else upon chaste ears than that they should beware of the foreign loves of harlots, and being content with their wife alone, whom they loved and married as a virgin in their youth, should use her honestly, and rejoice and live pleasantly with her. This love, however, is conjugal, that is, honest and moderate; not adulterous, that is, dishonest and immoderate.
"Breasts" signify loves. Hence Vatablus translates: let her loves perpetually refresh you. The meaning therefore is: The love, grace, services, and devotion of your wife, let these inebriate you, that is, fill and satisfy your desire, so that you may not seek the loves and pleasures of a foreign harlot.
The ten loves and duties of spouses are best represented by female and male deer. First, the love of stags and does is singular; second, the doe is lovable and a delight to man; third, the stag and doe lack gall, signifying the charity of spouses; fourth, they mate chastely and only in secret; fifth, they are very swift to help each other; sixth, the love of stags for does is most ardent and strong; seventh, does are faithful to their mate; eighth, the stag immediately after mating hides himself as if ashamed; ninth, after conception they abstain from mating; tenth, deer support one another and bear the mutual burdens of their heads; eleventh, does give birth with very great difficulty, hence they love their young most deeply; twelfth, the doe pursues and devours serpents; thirteenth, does are timid, which teaches them circumspection and prudence. Finally, does, because they lack gall, are long-lived.
Allegorically, the stag and doe represent the marriage of God with the holy and religious soul. Symbolically, St. Ambrose by the "stag of loves and foal of graces" understands Christ, who is the love of loves and the grace of graces.
Verse 20: Why Are You Seduced, My Son, by a Strange Woman
20. WHY ARE YOU SEDUCED, MY SON, BY A STRANGE WOMAN, AND WARMED IN THE BOSOM OF ANOTHER? — This is the conclusion, as if to say: Since you clearly see how great are the advantages of an honest wife and marriage, and how great the damages of a dishonest harlot and fornication, will you still be so mad and senseless as to allow yourself to be seduced and cherished by a foreign harlot to your own destruction and ruin?
Verse 21: The Lord Beholds the Ways of Man
21. THE LORD BEHOLDS THE WAYS OF MAN, AND CONSIDERS ALL HIS STEPS. — In Hebrew: before the eyes of the Lord are the ways of man, and He weighs all his paths exactly. This is a new and effective argument for dissuading fornication and intimacy with a strange woman: that although fornicators seek darkness and dens in which to hide, as if seen by no one, yet God most clearly beholds their baseness and crimes, and will at the public judgment weigh them in the balance and scale, and condemn and punish them. For He Himself weighs, examines, and ponders "all his steps," that is, actions, whether they are good or evil; and how much reward or punishment they deserve.
Verse 22: His Own Iniquities Capture the Wicked Man
22. HIS OWN INIQUITIES CAPTURE THE WICKED MAN, AND HE IS BOUND BY THE ROPES OF HIS SINS. — This verse connects rightly both to the preceding and to the following. With the preceding: God as judge and avenger beholds sins, and the sinner is already bound by the ropes of his own sins, to be brought before the judge. With the following: fornicators persuade themselves that in old age they will do penance, but they err, because vices strengthened by habit are like ropes woven from many strands, which bind the soul so strongly that even in old age one cannot extricate oneself. "While lust is served, habit is formed; and while habit is not resisted, necessity is produced," says St. Augustine.
What are the "ropes of sins"? First, the fault or stain of sin. Second, the guilt attached to the stain. Third, the very slavery of the devil. Fourth, the habits and customs of sinning. Fifth, the connection and linking together of sins; for one sin draws to another: gluttony draws to lust, lust to theft, theft to murder, etc., from all of which is made a rope so entangled and thick that it can equal nautical cables.
Verse 23: He Shall Die, Because He Had Not Discipline
23. HE SHALL DIE, BECAUSE HE HAD NOT DISCIPLINE, AND IN THE MULTITUDE OF HIS FOLLY HE SHALL BE DECEIVED. — The persistence in fornicating and sinning, which like a rope binds the young fornicator, will drive him to present and eternal death, because he did not accept discipline and instruction, and refused to obey it. Hence because of his great folly he will be deceived; because when he hopes for a long life still ahead, he will die struck by a sudden plague or disease, or by sword, weapon, or similar accident. Again, he will hope that in old age he will change his life, but he will be deceived, because in old age he will find the vices of his youth adhering and clinging to him, indeed ingrained.
Therefore it is an immense folly that the sinner always promises himself a longer life and does not put an end to sinning. The devil promotes this folly by suggesting to a person every year: You are still strong; this year you will not die. But this suggestion the devil renews every year: whence it happens that when the very year of death arrives, they are deceived, because they die unprepared. Let sinners therefore hear the wise counsel of St. Augustine: "The remedies of conversion to God are not to be deferred by any delay, lest the time of correction be lost through tardiness. For He who promised indulgence to the penitent did not pledge tomorrow to the procrastinator." And: "There is no place to hide in God, nor is there any escape from Him except to Him. He who wishes to escape Him offended, let him take refuge in Him appeased."