Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
It contains various maxims about justice, equity, riches, counsel, secrecy, beneficence, etc.; but mostly antitheses about the just and the unjust, by which it represents the fruits and happiness of the just after this life, and the losses and misery of the unjust.
Vulgate Text: Proverbs 11:1-31
1. A deceitful balance is an abomination before the Lord, and a just weight is His will. 2. Where pride is, there also shall be disgrace; but where humility is, there also is wisdom. 3. The simplicity of the just shall guide them, and the deceitfulness of the perverse shall destroy them. 4. Riches shall not profit in the day of vengeance, but justice shall deliver from death. 5. The justice of the upright shall direct his way, and the wicked shall fall by his own wickedness. 6. The justice of the righteous shall deliver them, and the wicked shall be caught in their own snares. 7. When the wicked man is dead, there shall be no hope more, and the expectation of the anxious shall perish. 8. The just is delivered out of distress, and the wicked shall be given up in his stead. 9. The dissembler with his mouth deceives his friend, but the just shall be delivered by knowledge. 10. In the prosperity of the just the city shall rejoice, and at the destruction of the wicked there shall be praise. 11. By the blessing of the just the city shall be exalted, and by the mouth of the wicked it shall be overthrown. 12. He who despises his friend is wanting in heart, but a prudent man will hold his peace. 13. He who walks deceitfully reveals secrets, but he who is of a faithful spirit conceals what his friend has entrusted to him. 14. Where there is no governor, the people shall fall; but there is safety where there is much counsel. 15. He shall be afflicted with evil who makes himself surety for a stranger; but he who avoids snares shall be secure. 16. A gracious woman shall find glory, and the strong shall have riches. 17. A merciful man does good to his own soul, but he who is cruel casts off even his own kindred. 18. The wicked man does an unstable work; but to him who sows justice there is a faithful reward. 19. Clemency prepares life, and the pursuit of evil things, death. 20. A perverse heart is abominable to the Lord, and His will is in those who walk in simplicity. 21. Hand in hand the wicked shall not be innocent, but the seed of the just shall be saved. 22. A golden ring in a swine's snout, a woman fair and foolish. 23. The desire of the just is all good; the expectation of the wicked is fury. 24. Some distribute their own goods and grow richer; others seize what is not theirs and are always in want. 25. The soul that blesses shall be made fat, and he who inebriates shall himself be inebriated. 26. He who hides grain shall be cursed among the people; but a blessing upon the head of those who sell. 27. Well does he rise early in the morning who seeks good things; but he who is a seeker of evil things shall be oppressed by them. 28. He who trusts in his riches shall fall; but the just shall spring up as a green leaf. 29. He who troubles his own house shall inherit the winds; and the fool shall serve the wise. 30. The fruit of the just man is a tree of life, and he who gains souls is wise. 31. If the just man receives upon earth, how much more the wicked and the sinner?
Verse 1: A Deceitful Balance Is an Abomination
'Will,' that is, the thing willed, well-pleasing, agreeable to God. It is a metonymy; for the abstract is put for the concrete, the faculty for the object. The Hebrew, Aquila, and Symmachus: deceitful scales are an abomination to the Lord; and a perfect or complete stone is His will or good pleasure. A stone, that is, a perfect weight, as Aquila translates, and a full one, as Symmachus. For in ancient times they used stones for weights, as they still do in some places.
Emperor's law, by which he commands that public measures and weights should be of bronze or stone, lest they be easily worn away and diminished; whence now everywhere they are of iron or bronze. Wherefore the Septuagint clearly translates: deceitful balances are an abomination of the Lord; and a just weight is acceptable to Him; the Syriac, He loves just weights.
In the literal sense the meaning is clear. For he commands that in buying, selling, and every exchange, distribution, and contract of goods, a just measure should be used; and the buyer should not add anything, nor the seller subtract. The reason is that justice consists in arithmetic and precise equality; wherefore the mean of justice consists in an indivisible point, namely that you give precisely as much as you owe from justice, whereas in other virtues their mean has a latitude; so that, for example, temperance dictates that you eat approximately a pound of food; therefore if you take a little more or a little less, you do not deviate from the mean of the virtue of temperance. Hence Aristotle, Book V of the Ethics, chapter 7, says that the essence of all right and justice consists in equilibrium, and therefore right and justice are the same among all peoples, even though laws and statutes differ; just as among all peoples the method of measuring and weighing is the same, even though the measures (to which laws are compared) are different.
Moreover, God repeatedly commanded the Jews to maintain equity in weights and measures, and with severe penalties forbade their fraudulent diminution and alteration; as through Moses in Deuteronomy 25:14, through Amos chapter 8:5, through Hosea chapter 12:7, through Micah chapter 6:11, through Ezekiel chapter 45:10; because fraud in measures and weights disrupts the contracts and commerce of men, and overturns their society, civil life, and commonwealth; for this whole structure rests on justice, which is therefore the foundation and pillar of the commonwealth. When therefore you take justice away from the commonwealth, you take the sun from the world, and blind, confuse, and destroy it. Take away justice, and you will have taken away everything honorable, everything holy. For this reason in Rome on the Capitol there exist standard amphoras, foot-measures, and models of other measures and weights, lest they be vitiated and diminished by any fraud. Hence St. Augustine, Sermon 216 On the Times: "He truly, he says, is not only a Christian, but Christ Himself dwells in him, who fears deceitful balances and double measures as the sword of the devil." And the Council of Mainz decrees: "That whoever shall have dared to change just weights and measures for the sake of profit, shall do penance for thirty continuous days on bread and water alone."
Symbolically, the balance is a symbol of justice. Therefore Solomon decrees here the same thing that Pythagoras expressed by his hieroglyphic. "Do not overstep the balance," says Clement of Alexandria, Book II of the Stromata, namely that in all things we should preserve justice, equity, and equality, lest in judgment, distribution of goods or burdens, or any similar matter, we award the case to a friend and deprive an enemy of his right; lest we prefer the rich to the poor, the noble to the ignoble, a relative or fellow citizen to a stranger, etc. So also Bede brings forward this sense as virtually literal: "A deceitful balance, he says, is maintained not only in the measurement of money, but in judicial discernment. For he who hears the case of the poor one way, of the powerful another way, of a companion one way, of a stranger another, assuredly weighs with an unjust balance." Indeed in Canon Law 45, Canon 10 Omnis, from St. Isidore, Book III of the Sentences, chapter 52, it is thus decreed: "Everyone who judges justly holds a balance in his hand. In each pan (in each scale, namely in acquitting and condemning) he carries justice and mercy; but through justice he renders the sentence for sin, through mercy he tempers the punishment for sin, so that by a just weighing he corrects some things through equity, and pardons others through compassion." Hence justice is depicted as a maiden with veiled eyes, holding a balance in her hand, and equilibrating the weights of each scale.
Wherefore Pompey, when Phraates king of the Parthians demanded that the Euphrates be the boundary of Roman territory, replied: "Rather, it should be demanded that justice separate the borders of the Romans from the kingdom of the Parthians," as Plutarch testifies in the Sayings of the Romans. And the Emperor Trajan gave a drawn sword to the prefect of the City in the sight of all, saying: "Take this weapon; and if indeed I conduct the empire rightly, use it for me; if otherwise, use it against me." So Nicephorus, Book III of the History, chapter 23. And Alfonso, king of Aragon, compared princes neglecting justice to those falling from the comitial disease [epilepsy]: "For since the sole material of the soul is justice by which one tends to life, what remains for princes when justice, which is as it were the nourishment and food of life, has been taken away?" So Panormitanus on the sayings of Alfonso.
Tropologically, Bede says: "But also he who judges his own good deeds as better than those of his neighbors, and his own errors as lighter, weighs with a deceitful balance. And also he who places unbearable burdens on men's shoulders, but does not wish to touch them himself with even one finger. He also who does good things in public and evil things in secret, is abominated by the Lord for the iniquity of a deceitful scale. But he who acts sincerely in all things, who discerns one case and another with an equal balance, assuredly conforms to the will and action of the just Judge."
Hugh, however, understands by the balance, first, the judgment of reason, which is right and sincere when in it true things outweigh false, honorable things outweigh base, holy things outweigh profane, according to Sirach 21: "The words of the prudent shall be weighed in the balance;" but it is deceitful and depraved when it esteems profane things more than holy, base more than honorable, false more than true. So also the author of the Greek Catena: "The balance, he says, in a higher sense is the power of discerning and judging, which, since it exists in us by nature, ought to be free from every depraved affection and disturbance of the mind."
Second, says Hugh, there is the balance of love, in which, if the scale of the love of God is straight and sincere, it outweighs the love of the world; but if it is deceitful and corrupt, the love of the world overcomes the love of God. Third, the balance is the heart of man, in one scale of which present happiness and eternal punishment are weighed; in the other present tribulation and eternal happiness, according to Sirach 15: "He has set before you water and fire; stretch forth your hand to whichever you wish. Before man are life and death, good and evil; whichever shall please him shall be given to him."
Fourth, there is the balance of Sacred Scripture, which is straight and produces the orthodox faith if you receive it according to the unanimous sense of the Church and the holy Fathers; but deceitful if you distort it to the errors of heretics or philosophers. So St. Augustine, Book II, chapter 6, against the Donatists. And it is found at 24, Question I, canon 6: "Let us not bring, he says, deceitful balances, where we weigh what we will and how we will according to our own judgment, saying: This is heavy, that is light; but let us bring the divine balance from the Holy Scriptures, and in it let us weigh what is heavier, or rather let us not weigh, but recognize what has been weighed by the Lord." And further: "I see, he says, what men detest, what they abhor; nevertheless, returning to that balance, where not by human sense, but by divine authority all things are weighed," etc.
Fifth, the balance is the conscience, which is straight when it follows the law of God and eternal principles; but deceitful when it pursues the false pretenses, excuses, and deceits of the flesh. Hence the Apostle calls and summons to this tribunal of a right conscience the Gentiles, who lack the law, Romans 2:15: "Who show, he says, the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing testimony to them, and their thoughts among themselves accusing or even defending, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men;" for then a right conscience will come to light, and will condemn the deceitful one. Hence St. Isidore on Deuteronomy chapter 12: "It is forbidden, he says, that we have double measures in the house of our conscience, that is, lest we ourselves, presuming upon a more relaxed indulgence which softens the rule of strictness, burden those to whom we preach the word of God with stricter precepts and heavier weights than we ourselves can bear."
Sixth, St. Ambrose, Book III, Letter 19 to Constantius: "Let each one, he says, weigh his words without fraud and deceit. A deceptive balance is disapproved before God; I am not speaking of that balance which weighs another's merchandise, and in cheap things the deceit is rarely detected; but the balance of words itself is execrable before God, which displays the weight of sober gravity, and attaches little words of fraud. God especially condemns this, if someone deceives his neighbor by the kindness of promises, and oppresses with subtle iniquity the one he has placed under obligation, gaining nothing for himself by the arts of his cunning."
Seventh, the balance is the soul of man, in which the scales are reason and sense, will and concupiscence. Likewise man himself, in whom the scales are soul and body. So St. Basil on the text: "Attend to yourself: For just as, he says, it happens in balances that if you press down one scale, you raise the opposite one; in a similar way it usually happens in the soul and body: the overflowing abundance of one necessarily diminishes the other." Here applies Psalm 61:10: "But vain are the sons of men, the sons of men are liars in the balances, that they may deceive from vanity into the same thing," that is, as St. Jerome translates, but vanity are the sons of Adam, a lie the sons of man, they act fraudulently together in deceitful balances. And Theodotion: vapors are the sons of men, a lie the sons of man, like the movement of a balance, which is now carried upward, now downward.
On which words St. Basil says: "Liars, he says, are men having corrupt judgments of soul, whom the Prophet also proclaims wretched, saying: Woe to those who call darkness light, and light darkness, bitter sweet, and sweet bitter. Give me, you say, the present things, who knows the future? You weigh the balance badly, choosing evil things for good, preferring vain things to true, considering momentary things more valuable than perpetual, and finally choosing transitory pleasure over joy that will never end and is perpetual. Therefore men are liars in the balances of iniquity." And shortly after: "Nor indeed will it be permitted you to say on that day of judgment: I did not know what was good. For your own balance is given to you, which demonstrates a sufficient distinction between good and evil. For we test bodily weights in the scales of a balance, but those things that are to be chosen for the conduct of life, we discern by free will; which he also called a balance, because it can take an equal moment toward either scale."
And on the same psalm Rufinus says: "They are, he says, liars the sons of men in the balances, that is, in the scale of justice, in the deliberation of good and evil, when they make good outweigh evil. This is said in likeness to those who deceive buyers in balances in which justice seems to be present." And St. Hilary: "Liars, he says, because by the sense of their own impiety they are either deceived or deceive; and liars in this, that they may deceive in the balances, that is, performing unjust things under the name of justice." And Theodoret: "Vain indeed, he says, are all human affairs; nevertheless very many trust in fleeting things as if they were enduring, who despise equity; they hold the balance of an unjust mind, and despise justice, but rejoice in injustice." And Cassiodorus: "The sons of men are liars in the balances: Whether he touches, he says, those who deceive the simplicity of buyers with unjust weights, or because men pleasing themselves want to appear just and immovable, when they are deceitful with deceptive changeableness. For 'in the balances' signifies this: as if placed in the balance of justice, they are not believed to love deceit." And St. Ambrose on the same Psalm 61: "The sons of men are liars in the balances: For the sons of men, he says, seem to themselves to weigh equity and to examine justice by the gravity of a severer judgment, harsh to others, indulgent to wicked works, censors in speech. Whence Solomon says, Proverbs 11: Execrable to the Lord is a double weight, and a deceitful balance is not good."
Anagogically, St. Ambrose, Book III, Letter 19 to Constantius: "There hangs, he says, for each of us a balance of merits, and by the slight moments of either good work or base crime it is often inclined this way and that; if the evils preponderate, woe is me! If the good, pardon is at hand. For no one is immune from sin, but where the good things preponderate, sins are lifted up, overshadowed, covered. Therefore on the day of judgment either our works will help us, or they themselves will plunge us into the deep as if weighted down by a millstone. For iniquity is heavy, as if supported by a talent of lead, avarice is intolerable, and all pride is foul fraud."
Verse 2: Where Pride Is, There Shall Be Reproach
Now this disgrace is twofold, passive and active. Passive, as if to say: Pride is hateful to God and men; and therefore the proud are despised by all, censured, cast down, burdened with disgrace and reproaches; conversely, humility is pleasing and honored by God and men, and therefore the humble man truly has wisdom: and where humility is, there also is wisdom, because true wisdom is to please God and men through humility. Again, as if to say: The proud man is wounded and afflicted by contempt of himself, by disgrace and reproach, because since he aspires to be honored, he greatly grieves when he is despised, mocked, and assailed with insults; but the humble man humbly and wisely tolerates or ignores the contempt, mockery, and reproaches directed at himself; indeed he rejoices in them: for he rejoices in his own humiliation, and he rejoices in the tranquility and peace of mind which is found nowhere except in humility. The proud therefore by their pride draw reproach upon themselves; but the humble by their wise tolerance of reproach gain honor and glory for themselves.
Therefore, just as humility is true wisdom, and the humble man is truly wise, and therefore honored: so conversely pride is mere folly, and the proud man is truly foolish, and therefore despised. It is a metalepsis, catachresis, and metonymy, frequent in these antitheses: for from the antecedent and cause the consequent and effect is understood, and vice versa from the effect the cause: namely from pride, folly; from folly, contempt; and vice versa from humility, wisdom; from wisdom, honor and glory. Hence St. Augustine on Psalm 2: "Be humble, he says, in your humble God, that you may be exalted in your glorified Lord God." And further: "You know that He is exalted; if you make yourself exalted, He will be far from you; if you humble yourself, He will draw near to you." The same, Treatise 104 on John: "Humility, he says, is the merit of glory; glory is the reward of humility."
The active kind is the proud man's causing disgrace, as if to say: Where pride is, there is the proud man's contempt, mockery, and insult of others. For the proud, from the arrogance by which they look down on others before themselves, despise them, mock them, and assail them with reproaches: just as clouds swelling and heavy with vapors burst into hail, thunder, and lightning. Pride therefore begets contempt and insult; but the humble set no one below themselves, but place themselves after all: and therefore they are esteemed truly wise, that is, humble and endowed with virtue, and because of this humility and wisdom they are honored and loved by all. So Aben-Ezra.
This sense coheres with the former, and is its cause. The full sense therefore will be, if you join the active disgrace to the passive in this way, as if to say: The proud man because of his arrogance is despised by others and assailed with reproaches, and therefore in turn he despises them and assails them with reproaches, and quarrels with them and contends in insults, in order to prevail: so the author of the Greek Catena. But the humble man, when he is despised and harassed with reproaches, humbly is silent, wisely dissembles, and instead of hurling back reproaches returns words of wisdom, by which he makes known his patience and charity, and strives to soften, calm, and draw into love of himself those who are angry and casting reproaches, and to lead them to the fear of God; wherefore now by admonishing modestly, now by addressing gently, now by consoling mildly, he mitigates their anger, turns away reproaches, and gains their love and goodwill.
Note here that pride is fittingly punished with disgrace, but humility is crowned with glory, because it is fitting that those who exalt themselves should be humbled, and those who humble themselves should be exalted, as Christ says. Wherefore God is accustomed to punish the proud either with error in their counsels, or with misfortune in their outcomes, says Jansenius; but to endow the humble with wisdom by which they conduct themselves prudently, and from this they gain the name and glory of wisdom from all, while conversely the proud man ambitiously undertakes things beyond his capacity imprudently, and therefore while he cannot accomplish them, he is condemned by others for rashness and folly. For he begins to build a tower, that is, a great undertaking, without at all calculating the necessary expenses, and when he cannot complete it, all who see it mock him saying: "This man began to build, and was not able to finish." Thus about kings who proudly wished to decide matters by war with Nebuchadnezzar, Habakkuk says, chapter 1, verse 10: "His tyrants shall be ridiculous," that is, he will explode with laughter and hissing at proud princes daring to contend with him. Hence St. Augustine, on Psalm 37: "My bruises have rotted (for so he reads, instead of which we read, my scars) from the face of my folly. If you are humble, he says, you will be raised up; if you are puffed up, you will be bent down: for God will not lack a weight with which to bend you. That weight will be the burden of your sins; this will be rolled back upon your head, and you will be bent down." The same, at the beginning of Book I of The City of God, teaches that pride establishes the city of the devil, but humility the city of God, and therefore it surpasses the dignities of all princes. "For I know, he says, what strength is needed to persuade the proud how great is the virtue of humility, by which it happens that all earthly peaks wavering with temporal instability are surpassed by an eminence not seized by human arrogance, but given by divine grace." And he proves this from that text: "God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble," James 4:6 and 1 Peter 5:5. See what was said there.
The same St. Augustine on the Gospel according to Matthew, Sermon 10, explaining that saying of Christ, Learn from Me, for I am meek and humble of heart: "You wish to be great, he says, begin from the least. You think of constructing a great edifice of loftiness; first think of the foundation of humility." Therefore the foundation of loftiness and glory is humility. He gives the reason in the last homily among the 50: "In visible things indeed, he says, in order for someone to reach lofty heights, he is raised up on high; but God, since He is the most excellent of all, is reached not by pride but by humility. Hence it is said through the Prophet: The Lord is near to those who have crushed their heart. And again: The Lord is exalted, and He regards lowly things, and knows lofty things from afar. He put 'lofty things' for the proud. Therefore He regards those, to raise them up; He knows these, to cast them down and overthrow them." The same, Sermon 49 On the Times: "Better, he says, is a humble sinner than a proud just man." And Sermon 213: "By the steps of humility, he says, one ascends to the heights of heaven, because God who is exalted is reached not by pride but by humility, etc. Let us learn humility, through which we will be able to draw near to God; just as He Himself says in the Gospel: Learn from Me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your souls, Matthew chapter 11. Through pride the marvelous creature of the Angels fell from heaven, through humility the frailty of human nature ascended to heaven. For the practice of humility is honorable among men, as Solomon says: Where pride shall be, there shall also be reproach; but where humility is, there also is wisdom. Likewise another wise man says: The greater you are, the more humble yourself in all things, and before God you will find grace. Likewise God says through the Prophet: But upon whom shall I look, except upon the humble and quiet, and trembling at My words? Whoever is not humble and quiet, the grace of the Holy Spirit cannot dwell in him. God became humble for the sake of our salvation; let man be ashamed to be proud. As much as the heart is inclined downward by humility, so much does it advance on high. For he who shall be humble will be exalted in glory."
Verse 3: The Simplicity of the Just Shall Guide Them
The sense is plain, as if to say: The integrity of the just shall guide them, so that in their endeavors they may have prosperous success, and may pass unharmed through the frauds, deceits, and snares of the wicked. But the depravity of the wicked, by which they attempt to trip up others, will destroy them, because they will fall into the snare which they stretched for others, and will be caught by their own deceits and frauds; the perversity which they contrived against others will fall back upon their own heads; and they will incur the same or similar destruction by God's vengeance. This is what St. Jerome says in his letter to Pammachius: the simple are safe among daggers. Daggers are whips within whose rods a dagger lies hidden, says Servius on Aeneid VII. They are called dolones from deceiving, because they deceive with iron while presenting the appearance of wood. And St. Ambrose, Book III, Letter 19: "Good, he says, is the sincerity of pure speech, and rich before God, even if it walks among snares." And St. Macarius, Homily 40: "Indeed the slippery serpent slips through the very hands, the dove flying above looks down on the nets; the simple man easily escapes deceits and frauds, as if to say: As easily as the serpent by its slipperiness escapes from hands, and as the dove flying overhead passes over nets, so easily will the just man escape the deceits and frauds laid for him, both because he is directed by God, and because he has learned and put into practice that saying of Christ: 'Be prudent as serpents, and simple as doves,' Matthew 10."
Finally, Sirach chapter 27, verse 28: "The deceitful wound, he says, of the deceitful man divides wounds, and he who digs a pit will fall into it; and he who sets a stone for his neighbor will stumble on it; and he who lays a snare for another will perish in it," just as Haman was hung on the gallows which he had prepared for Mordecai. See what was said there. Brilliantly St. Augustine on Psalm 123: "Therefore, he says, a greater plunderer seeks you, because he found a lesser plunderer; therefore a greater eagle seeks you, because you first caught the hare; the lesser was prey to you, you will be prey to the greater." So R. Solomon, R. Levi, and Aben-Ezra.
Finally we see God directing and protecting the simple and sincere, and the fraudulent often stumbling into the snares which they set for the sincere. The reason is that the sincere come nearest to God, who is most simple and most sincere; hence also "the simplicity of things is a trace of God," as St. Augustine teaches, in his book On True Religion. The same, Book XI of The City of God, chapter 10: "There is therefore, he says, the one good that is simple, and on this account alone unchangeable, which is God. By this good all things were created, but not simple, and on this account changeable. Created indeed, I say, that is, made, not begotten. For what has been begotten from the simple good is equally simple." And shortly after: "The Father who begot is simple, and the Son who was begotten is equally simple; but He is called simple because what He has, this He is, except that each Person is spoken of relatively to the other." And St. Bernard, Sermon 80 on the Song of Songs, thus describes the simplicity of God: "In it, many things are brought into one, and diverse things into the same, so that it does not take plurality from the multitude of things, nor feel alteration from variety. It contains all places, and orders each to its own place, nowhere contained by places. Times pass under it, not by it. It does not await the future, does not recall the past, does not experience the present." And Sermon 81: "He who gives in simplicity, he says, is loved by God, and simplicity is brightness; for duplicity is a blemish: what is duplicity but deceit?" And shortly after: "The Bridegroom, since He is virtue, takes pleasure in virtues; and since He is a lily, He dwells among lilies; and since He is brightness, He delights in the bright." And Sermon 82: "In the foundation there remains utterly unshaken simplicity, but it by no means appears, covered over by the duplicity of human deceitfulness."
Mystically, the deceitfulness of the wicked, by which they perversely trip up and subject the mind and reason to concupiscence, will destroy them, because they make reason, which is mistress, a servant; and concupiscence, which is a servant, they make mistress. Therefore the head is in the feet, and the feet in the head.
Here applies the fable of the bird-catcher and the viper in Aesop: "A bird-catcher, he says, having taken birdlime and reeds, went out fowling; seeing a thrush sitting on a tall tree, and joining reeds together in length, he was looking up to catch it. But unknowingly he stepped on a sleeping viper. This, angry, bit him. He, already giving up his life, said: Wretched me, for while trying to catch another, I myself have been caught by another to my death. The moral: The fable signifies that those who lie in ambush for their neighbors often unknowingly suffer the same from others."
Verse 4: Riches Shall Not Profit in the Day of Vengeance
Hence the Chaldean translates: falsehood does not profit (false and deceptive riches, and the hopes of the rich placed in them) in the day of wrath; but justice delivers from an evil death. "Justice therefore shall deliver from death," which the just man awaits with equanimity as it approaches, endures as it comes, and admits as the beginning of a better life. He therefore lives when he dies, and according to outward appearance conquered by death, he conquers and tramples upon death itself, and treading it underfoot, and making it as it were a footstool for his feet, he seizes hold of immortal life: and not only does he deliver himself, but also others from death. For thus the body of Elisha touching a dead man recalled him from death to life, 2 Kings 13. So living, so efficacious is justice. Similar to this maxim is the saying of chapter 10, verse 2: "The treasures of wickedness shall profit nothing." And Sirach chapter 5, verse 10: "Do not be anxious about unjust riches; for they shall not profit you in the day of darkness and vengeance." See what was said there. And Tobit chapter 12, verse 9: "Almsgiving delivers from death, and it is what purges sins and causes one to find mercy and eternal life."
The Greek codices here insert another maxim, which is not in the Hebrew nor in the Latin, namely this: "The just man dying left behind repentance (the Complutensians incorrectly read, a penitent); but the destruction of the wicked comes easily and pleasantly." Which you may explain thus, as if to say: The just in this life do penance, but at death they bid it farewell, because through it they pass to glory; or, as Didymus says in the Greek Catena: The just man dying leaves behind grief and mourning for others, because others grieve and mourn over his death; but the wicked who spend their days in prosperity begin a late repentance at death, and therefore they will continue it through all eternity; wherefore their repentance and destruction comes as a joy to the just whom they afflicted, according to that saying: "The just man will rejoice when he sees the punishment of the sinner."
Verse 5: The Justice of the Simple Shall Direct His Way
Second and genuinely, as if to say: Justice directs, that is, favors and prospers, the ways, that is, the actions, of the just, so that they walk unharmed through all dangers, and with God's favor obtain happy successes in their affairs; but the wicked man because of his wickedness will stumble into many adversities and losses, and will fall into many misfortunes, so that everything seems to rebound against his shins, as the saying goes. Thus "to direct" is taken for "to favor and prosper" in Psalm 139:12: "The man of many words shall not be directed," that is, shall not prosper, "on earth." And frequently elsewhere, especially in the Psalms. So R. Levi, Hugh, Jansenius, and others.
Moreover, I take justice here again properly and broadly, because impiety is opposed to it; Baynus however and our Salazar understand by justice almsgiving alone, as if to say: Almsgiving prospers the almsgiver, and directs him by a straight road to heaven; but impiety, that is, avarice, by which one is impious toward the poor, causes the wicked man to fall into evils and into hell itself. Hence St. Chrysostom, Homily 9 On Penance, teaches that the straight and royal road to heaven is almsgiving: "Almsgiving, he says, is the royal road, which brings men most swiftly to the heights of heaven. A great thing is almsgiving (see how straight it goes to heaven), it surpasses the air, passes the moon, exceeds the rays of the sun, comes to the very summit of the heavens, passing through the heavens themselves, and running through the peoples of Angels and the choirs of Archangels and all the higher powers, it stands before the royal throne itself." And St. Augustine, Sermon 25 On the Words of the Lord: "The way to heaven, he says, is the poor man, through whom one comes to the Father. Begin therefore to give, if you do not wish to go astray. The shackle of your patrimony by which you are bound, loose it, so that free you may ascend to heaven."
Verse 6: The Justice of the Righteous Shall Deliver Them
Hence Cajetan understands deliverance from prison and chains, according to St. Chrysostom, Homily 7 On Penance: "Almsgiving breaks chains, dissolves darkness, extinguishes fire, opens the prison." The same, in his Homily On Riches and Poverty, teaches that almsgiving delivers from the love of riches, by which the avaricious are bound as by a chain, so that they seem like slaves bound and chained to their riches. Hence our Salazar explains "and the wicked shall be caught in their own snares" thus, as if to say: The avaricious and unjust hoarders of money will be held captive in their own snares, that is, by their own wealth unjustly and iniquitously acquired; which servitude and captivity of money is indeed greater than that of iron chains. Hence St. Chrysostom, Homily 43 on the First Letter to the Corinthians: "When, he says, we have been bound by riches, how shall we conquer our adversaries? For they are a heavy chain for those who do not know how to use them, a cruel and inhuman tyrant, commanding everything for the ruin of those who serve it; but if we wish, we shall overthrow these chains and this bitter tyranny from its seat. But how will this happen? If we distribute our riches to all: for when Plutus [Wealth] is alone against those who are alone, like a certain robber in a wilderness he does all manner of evil; but when we bring him into the midst, he will no longer overpower us, with all binding him on every side." This sense is subtle and pious, but narrower, and rather symbolic than literal: for in the literal sense, take both any justice of the righteous, and any snares of the wicked.
Verse 7: When the Wicked Man Is Dead
The conjunction "and" or is either a mark of similitude joining similar things, having the same force as "so"; or it is exegetical and explanatory, having the same force as "that is." In the former sense the meaning is, as if to say: Just as in death every hope of the wicked man perishes, both of the present life, to which he cannot return, and of the eternal, from which he is excluded: so likewise every hope and expectation of anxious men, that is, of those who eagerly and anxiously gape after the desire for wealth and honors, will perish in death, indeed often before death.
In the latter way the sense is, as if to say: When the wicked man dies, or when he is dead, no hope remains to him, and, that is, the expectation of the anxious, who greedily and eagerly gape after the goods of this world against or beyond the law of God, will perish. For in death life perishes, and with life every hope of the wicked, who in this life are anxious to accumulate riches, as if they were going to live here forever. It is signified therefore, says Jansenius, that for the wicked man, through death, there is irrecoverably cut off and taken away what he was accustomed to hope for and desire, namely riches, glory, and every happiness of this life, so that the same thing is signified here as through the Prophet: "They have slept their sleep, and all the men of riches found nothing in their hands." And: "His glory shall not descend with him." And elsewhere: "There are remnants for the peaceful man. But the unjust shall utterly perish, at once the remnants of the wicked shall perish," because after death nothing remains to him. According to the spiritual understanding, it is also rightly understood to be signified here that for the wicked man after death there is no hope of pardon, because in hell there is no redemption.
But R. Solomon says: "The expectation of the anxious, in Hebrew אונים onim, that is, the hope of their children, he says, who are their strength and riches, will perish and come to nothing; for because of the demerits of the parents they will enjoy no blessings whatsoever. But when the just man has died, his offspring will have something to hope for, because of the parents' justice." Aben-Ezra: "The expectation of the wicked, he says, by which they hoped to do unjust things, will come to nothing." R. Levi, as if to say: "The wicked man almost entirely dies; even the hope which he placed in his notable strength and power will vanish. Or as if to say: When the wicked man is dead, the hope will cease by which his friends had pledged themselves a certain protection from his strength and resources. The expectation also, by which they trusted that he would be able to bring present help, will collapse in vain: for with him dead, all his force and strength will have perished."
He alludes to Benjamin, whom his mother Rachel, eagerly straining in childbirth and dying of pain, called Benoni, that is, the son of my sorrow; but his father Jacob called him Benjamin, that is, the son of the right hand, as if to say: Just as Rachel, most desirous of children, paid for this desire of hers with death: for she perished in giving birth to Benjamin, and therefore called him Benoni; so likewise the expectation of onim, that is, of the anxious, that is, of those who gape after desires, and therefore grieve and sigh, will perish, indeed will kill them: for what is sought anxiously out of love, this is acquired with pain, and lost with grief, which often so afflicts and torments a person that it takes away his life.
Moreover, the Septuagint, if indeed an error has not crept into their manuscripts, translates in the opposite sense, so as to express the hidden antithesis here; for they read thus: when the just man has died, he will not lose his hope; but the boasting and glorying of the wicked perishes after death, as if to say: The just man dying does not lose the hope of a better life, but sends it ahead through the good works which he did in life: for these will receive and bless him after death in heaven; but all the hopes which the wicked man had placed in his wealth, friends, and dignity, and in which he boasted and gloried, will vanish at death along with the very life in which they were founded. Hence the author of the Greek Catena explains by examples thus: "The just man hoped to receive handsome offspring from a lawful wife, and behold he receives them; he hoped that his offspring would obtain great honors and many riches, and behold they obtain them. I would say the same about other similar things. Indeed this discourse can also be transferred to the future life and resurrection; for it intimates that the just man, having enjoyed all good things here, will by no means be frustrated of the hope of future goods as well; or that after death he will be glorious and celebrated not only in himself but also in his children. But the glory of the wicked, in which they had often vainly boasted, and in which they had all but placed their end, will be vain and momentary."
Verse 8: The Just Man Is Delivered from Distress
This maxim can be explained in two ways. First, in a strict sense, as if to say: God often delivers the just man from the evil which the wicked man contrives for him, and causes the wicked man to suffer the punishment of retaliation, and to fall into the evil which he contrived for the just man: as Haman fell upon the gallows which he had prepared for Mordecai; the enemies of Daniel fell into the jaws of the lions which they had prepared for Daniel; the adulterous elders fell under the stoning which they had contrived for Susanna, Daniel 13.
Second, in a broad sense, as if to say: The just man for a short time in this life is afflicted and distressed, but soon God puts an end to his affliction and delivers him; but He permits the wicked to rejoice and dominate for a short time, but soon puts an end to their joy, and causes them to succeed to the distresses of the just man. For these properly belong and are owed to the wicked man, so that they may abide with him always as with a convicted criminal subject to them and their proper subject. This often happens in life, always in death, when the just, freed from the distresses of this life, fly away to paradise; but the wicked enter into them to be tortured forever in hell.
The Septuagint translates: the just man was freed from the hunt, that is, from the chase or capture; but the wicked man will be given up in his place, as if to say: The rich man hunts the poor just man; but the just man is snatched by God from his snares and ambushes, and the rich man falls back into the same, when another more powerful man hunts and devours him, according to Sirach 13:23: "The hunting of a lion is the wild ass in the desert; so also the pastures of the rich are the poor." Hence the author of the Greek Catena reads: "The just man, lest he become the prey of plunderers, is freed; but in his place the wicked man is given over to capture." Where Didymus says: The just man, he says, always turning over the divine law in his mind and delighting himself in it, is both snatched from the snares of death and freed from the ambushes of hunters and demons, and is guarded finally from every seditious and turbulent speech. But the wicked man is given over and cast into those troubles. And if a just man as a man sometimes falls, he immediately rises again and emerges. And further: Or for this reason it is said, because the just man as a man was subject to whatever harms the wicked man inflicts and as it were extinguishes through unjust vexation; and thus he frees the just man from the punishment which he was going to undergo in the other world; but himself, because of his unjust vexation, he binds under the guilt of certain punishment; and the wicked man is subjected to this punishment by no one other than himself and his own malice, as one who had already before voluntarily thrown himself into a reprobate mind.
Verse 9: The Dissembler Deceives His Friend
The Septuagint translates: in the mouth of the wicked there is a snare for citizens, but the sense of the just proceeding prosperously; or, but the sense of the just turns out happy and fortunate. They say in reality the same thing as the Vulgate: for the snare of the mouth of the wicked is nothing other than simulation, hypocrisy, and flattery; but the just, endowed with sense and wisdom, either escape or dispel these snares prosperously and happily.
Verse 10: In the Prosperity of the Just the City Rejoices
Moreover, this is no small commendation of virtue, and reproach of vice, that all applaud virtue and all assail vice: for the voice of the people is the voice of God. Hence Aristotle, Book V of the Ethics, chapter 1, teaches that the voice of the people contains firm truth, similar to that which oracles have.
For "shall rejoice" Symmachus translates, cities shall exult; Theodotion, they shall be glad; the Syriac, the city shall be strengthened; the Septuagint, it conducted itself rightly, which the Complutensians translate as the city acted rightly, because it imitated the example of the virtue of the just; the Roman edition, it conducted itself well; the author of the Greek Catena clearly: in the prosperous success of the just the city advances and flourishes; but at the death of the wicked, exultation and applause arise. So also the Complutensians and the Chaldean; the Tigurina, when it is well with the just, the city rejoices; and when the wicked perish, it exults. It is therefore an antithesis of the object of joy and exultation, namely that the city rejoices over the goods of the pious, and grieves over their evils; but grieves over the goods of the wicked, and exults over their evils. Cajetan for "there will be praise" translates, there will be a song: namely the life of the just is like a song, which refreshes all and arouses them to a similar pursuit of virtue with festive applause; but the wicked man while he lives offends all, and therefore when he dies, all are so refreshed by his funeral rites and obsequies, that they celebrate them with songs, often composing verses for public rejoicings.
Verse 11: By the Blessing of the Just the City Is Exalted
You ask, what is "the blessing of the just?" I answer first: Blessing here, as often elsewhere, can be taken for the abundance and wealth of resources; for the just, since they are wealthy, are beneficent to the citizens, and adorn and exalt the city with colleges, monasteries, temples, and other magnificent buildings; so that blessing is the same as the goods of the just, in which he said the city rejoices in the preceding verse. So the author of the Greek Catena, as if to say: The wealth of the just exalts the citizens and the city, and makes it splendid and magnificent; but the words of the wicked overthrow it. He opposes "mouth" to "wealth," because the mouth of the wicked is so perverse that it is equivalent to, indeed surpasses, the wealth of the just; for it destroys more than the latter builds. Add that the wealthy are generally chosen to magistracies, and preside over and govern the city; wherefore when the just are wealthy, they are elected to the magistracy, and then with their just and sound counsels and laws they exalt the city; but the mouth, that is, the power of the wicked overthrows it; because when the wicked hold power in it, they overthrow it with their impious decrees, exactions, and plundering. For "mouth" often signifies command and authority; as when the Prophets so often repeat: "The mouth of the Lord has spoken," that is, the Lord has commanded this which we say.
Second, blessing is the same as beneficence; for the speech of God and the Saints is efficacious, and therefore the same as doing: for what they say, this they do. Thus the sense will be, as if to say: The just by their beneficence and almsgiving sustain and magnify the city; but the wicked by their mouth, that is, by their malediction as well as their maleficence, overthrow it.
Third, more properly and genuinely, blessing is a good prayer, and to bless is to pray well, as if to say: When the just pray well for the city, God hears their prayers and does good to the city and exalts it; but the wicked, cursing with their mouth both God and the citizens, deserve that God overthrow it. Thus the wicked citizens of Sodom deserved that it be overthrown by fire; but Lot, fleeing from Sodom to Segor, freed it from the fire to which it had likewise been destined, by his prayer and blessing, Genesis 19:21. Thus Jacob in Genesis 49, and Moses in Deuteronomy 33, about to die, blessing Israel, heaped good things upon them. Thus God preserved Jerusalem from the destruction of Sennacherib, because of the prayers of Isaiah and Hezekiah, Isaiah chapter 37; and He blessed Solomon and the Jews because of David, according to that saying: "For the sake of David your servant, do not turn away the face of your Anointed," Psalm 131:10. Thus St. Gregory by his litanies freed the city from a severe plague. This is what the Wise Man says, chapter 6:26: "A multitude of the wise is the health of the whole world."
Fourth, more fully, the blessing of the just consists in their good counsels, admonitions, speeches, and examples, by which they teach the ignorant, console the sorrowful, correct the erring, and strive to lead all to virtue and to God. For by these things the city is exalted; while it is overthrown "by the mouth of the wicked," that is, by evil counsels, lawsuits, quarrels, seditions, deceits, etc., according to that saying of Plutarch in the Moralia: "By the deceit and treachery of a single tongue, cities have fallen, kingdoms, republics. This is what Sirach says, chapter 28:16: "A third tongue has stirred up many, and dispersed them from nation to nation, and has destroyed the walled cities of the rich." See what was said there.
Hugh adds that by blessing is understood the eloquence and efficacy of speaking which the Saints possess, through which they frequently free cities and kingdoms from destruction. Thus St. Leo by his eloquence and gravity of speech restrained Attila from devastating Rome; and he persuaded Genseric, who had already occupied Rome, to refrain from burning it, and from committing outrages and slaughter. Thus St. Gregory by his modest, humble, and gentle eloquence reconciled the Emperor Maurice and other princes who were offended with him and with the City. Thus St. Bernard in the schism of Peter of Leo, by his grace in speaking and acting, bound the king of England and other magnates to Innocent II, the legitimate Pontiff, and to his Church, and ended the schism. In a similar way, religious distinguished for wisdom and eloquence celebrated and exalted their Orders and monasteries: as the Order of St. Benedict was celebrated by Gregory VII, Leo IX, Victor II, Urban II, and very many others, who from it were raised to the Pontificate because of their wisdom and virtue. The Cistercian Order was celebrated by St. Bernard, the Dominican by St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Vincent Ferrer, Peter of Tarentaise who was made Pope and called Benedict XI, and others; the Franciscan by St. Bonaventure, Alexander of Hales, John Duns Scotus, and others.
Verse 12: He Who Despises His Friend Is Wanting in Heart
The sense therefore is, as if to say: "He who despises from the heart his friend," that is, as the Hebrew reads, his neighbor, because he notices some vice or defect in him, and therefore speaks more contemptuously about him with his mouth, disparages, belittles, and casts him down; "is wanting in heart," that is, in understanding, judgment, and wisdom, that is, he is foolish and senseless, as Vatablus translates, both because he irritates and provokes his neighbor, so that in turn he despises him and speaks contemptuously about him; and because wisdom dictates that vices should be concealed but virtues proclaimed; and because by the just judgment of God it happens that with what measure we have measured, it will be measured back to us, according to Isaiah 33:1: "Woe to you who despise, will you not yourself also be despised?" And because this contempt arises from pride, by which he considers himself wise and another foolish, says R. Levi; but pride is folly. Hugh adds that he is wanting in heart, that is, in compassion of heart, sympathy, and gentleness, which teaches that the vices of others should be concealed, and treated with secret and gentle correction, Galatians 6:1.
But a prudent man will hold his peace. In Hebrew: a man of understandings or prudences, that is, very understanding and prudent, will be silent; the Septuagint: but a prudent man maintains silence; the Syriac: he dwells in silence, as in the cell of his heart, of his peace and tranquility, as if to say: The foolish man broadcasts the vices of his neighbor, since he despises, mocks, and assails him with reproaches; but the prudent man ignores the vices of his neighbor, indeed when he is despised by the foolish man and assailed with reproaches, he does not hurl back reproaches but endures and is silent. He who does this is truly a man of prudences, that is, of great prudence, and is as it were a marvel of wisdom, both because he shows peace of soul, modesty, and greatness of mind which despises all reproaches; and because by his modesty he refutes, confounds, and restrains the one who despises him. For he who hurls back reproaches at one who reproaches him, kindles them more, so that he hears more; but he who is silent in response, by his silence quiets them: just as he who barks back at a barking dog provokes it to bark more; but he who passes by silently checks the barking.
Hence St. Basil, in his Homily On Anger, compares them to an echo. For just as if you emit a voice, the echo will respond with the same voice, and the more you shout, the more the echo will shout: so likewise he who hurls reproaches with his voice will hear similar ones hurled back at himself from another, as from an echo. Wherefore concluding, he suggests this sound counsel: "Do not therefore, he says, return an evil favor, nor be a restorer of mutual evil. An angry man uttered an insult; conquer and remove the evil with silence. But you do the opposite, who, like a wave receiving the flow of his anger into the depths of your heart, imitate winds resisting against adverse blasts. Do not use your adversary as your teacher, nor emulate him whom you pursue with hatred, nor wish to become like a mirror, representing his form in yourself. Is he flushed with anger? Do not display any blush; are his eyes bloodshot? Let yours look on calmly and with gravity; is his voice harsh? Let yours be mild and gentle, or rather, none at all." Hear also Bede in the Collectanea, volume III: "When indeed, he says, the tongues of detractors cannot be corrected, they are to be tolerated with equanimity in all things. Often indeed when we complain about the lives of our neighbors, we try to change place, to choose the seclusion of a more remote life; not knowing that if the spirit is lacking, the place will not help. Therefore neighbors are to be tolerated everywhere; because there cannot be an Abel whom the malice of Cain does not test."
Thus Saul at the beginning of his reign, wisely governing himself and his people, was silent at the insults of his own men. Hear the Scripture, 1 Samuel 10:27: "But the sons of Belial said: Can this man save us? And they despised him, and did not bring him gifts; but he pretended not to hear." For that saying is true: "He who does not know how to dissemble does not know how to rule."
Moreover R. Levi understands this more generally: The prudent man, he says, does not mock and despise his companion, but is silent while the other speaks, and attentively listens to his words; and although the other brings forward things which he himself has already considered, nevertheless he listens, favoring the other's dignity, even if he gains no advantage from it. Following Solomon, Rabbi Simeon in the Pirke Avoth says: "Throughout my whole life, he says, I was educated among wise men, and I found nothing healthier for the body than silence." And Ben-Sira in his Sentences: "Have you seen a black donkey? Neither black nor white," that is, as his commentator explains: "Teach your tongue always to say: I do not know, lest at some point you be caught in your answer." Thus other Rabbis of the Hebrews commend denial in answering or silence. Hence an Anonymous writer: "Teach your tongue to say: I do not know, which is equal in value to gold and silver."
Here applies the maxim of the Arabs, Century 2, number 52: "Very often silence is an answer, so that one answers by omitting an answer." For indeed many accusations, complaints, and calumnies often contain manifest falsehood, and do not deserve a response or an apology; hence to be silent at their accusations is to respond sufficiently and to clear oneself. And Century 1, number 98: "Taciturnity wins love for its possessor. Repentance over silence is better than repentance over speech;" that is, it is better to repent of having been silent than of what was said. "For keeping silent has harmed no one, but speaking has harmed many," says Cato. The Arabs continue: "Taciturnity is wisdom, but rare is the one who practices it." Here applies the distich of Cato: Remember to avoid those who are downcast in spirit and silent: Where the river is placid, perhaps a deeper current lies hidden.
Thus St. Maurilius, Bishop of Angers, "was silent in speech, and speaking in silence," says Fortunatus in his Life.
Verse 13: He Who Walks Deceitfully Reveals Secrets
For "he who walks deceitfully" the Hebrew is רכיל rachil, that is, a trader, and thence an informer, detractor, slanderer. It is a beautiful metaphor. For the detractor is called rachil, that is, a merchant or trader, because just as a merchant acquires goods not for himself but to sell and distribute them, so the informer investigates and gathers the words and deeds of others, to report them to others and carry them around in circles as if for sale, so as to gain some profit from it. Hence rachil both in its letters and its meaning alludes to רגל ragal, that is, to go, to walk, to carry. So Pagninus in the Lexicon: Just as a trader, he says, has many kinds of merchandise which he buys from some and sells to others: so the detractor reports to others words collected and heard here and there. R. Abraham agrees, who writes thus: Just as a merchant sells to another what he buys from one, so the detractor reveals to another what he heard from someone. Rachil therefore is one who spies out the secrets, or vices, or counsels of others, and then announces them to others. Hence Cajetan translates: the spy reveals the secret, and the faithful spirit covers; St. Jerome on Isaiah chapter 39: he who is a faithful spirit hides affairs.
The sense therefore is, as if to say: The spy who deceitfully and fraudulently associates with a friend pretending to be a friend, and thus fishes out the friend's mind, and his secret counsels and secrets, immediately reveals them to others; but he who is of a faithful mind and spirit, he conceals what is entrusted by his friend, that is, the secret which his friend committed and entrusted to him. Again, what is committed, that is, some crime admitted or perpetrated. Thus Delilah, fishing out the secret of her husband Samson, namely that his strength consisted in his hair, betrayed it to the Philistines and destroyed Samson, Judges 16:17. Here applies the proverb of the Arabs, Century 2, number 54: "Your secret is of your blood; you have often revealed it, and it is the cause of your death." And Century 2, number 61: "A secret is a trust, that is, something entrusted to another's fidelity," as if to say: He who keeps a secret is held as faithful; he who divulges it, as unfaithful. Ibid., number 65: "Your secret is your captive, if you guard it; but you are a captive, if it is revealed." And number 59: "Expand your breast for your secret, that is, do not reveal it to anyone. He possesses his soul (or himself) who conceals his secret from his friend." And number 36: "Do not reveal your secret to apes, that is, do not uncover your secret to scoffers." For apes imitate and repeat everything they see, and in doing so seem to mock. And Century 1, number 74: "The mouth is the prison of the tongue. Beware lest your tongue strike your neck."
Here applies the maxim of the Hebrews: "Wine enters, the secret exits." For what lies hidden in the mind of the sober, this floats on the tongue of the drunk. Similar is the maxim of the Poet: It is an outstanding virtue to keep silence about matters; But conversely, it is a grave fault to speak what should be kept silent. And that saying of Thales: "See that a word spoken against those joined to you and your companions does not summon you to court," as if to say: Do not trust friends to the point of entrusting secrets to them, lest they blurt them out, to your great infamy and disgrace. So Laertius, Book I, chapter 1. And that saying of Ariston: "The most annoying winds are those that blow off cloaks; for with these we are protected against winds: so most gravely do friends injure us who fish out our secrets." And that saying of the Emperor Tiberius in Dio: "The mind of a prince should be known to no one or to very few." And that of Metellus Macedonicus who, asked what he was going to do after subduing the Arbachi, replied: "I would burn my tunic if I thought it knew my counsel." And that of Bede in the Collectanea: "The unskilled, just as they do not know how to speak, so they cannot keep silent. Admonish a friend in private, but praise him publicly." I said more about the revelation of secrets on Sirach 27:17.
For "faithful of spirit," Aquila and Theodotion translate נאמן רוח neemar ruach, which you would translate with the Romans as "faithful in spirit," to correspond precisely to the Hebrew ablative, which the Greeks lack; our Salazar however, taking it properly in the dative, translates "faithful to the spirit," and thus explains: He is called faithful to the spirit, that is, to his own mind, who keeps secrets, because to make public and spread abroad what lies safely hidden in the mind is a kind of betrayal against the mind; for the mind is betrayed by an open mouth no differently than a city by an opened gate. Or alternatively: He who does not violate secrets is called faithful to the Spirit, that is, to the Holy Spirit; as if conversely, he who makes public the secrets of friends is unfaithful to the Holy Spirit. He adds two reasons: The first is that to the Holy Spirit, who is the first and notional love, is attributed all honest benevolence, and all friendship is joined by His operation. But nothing equally tears apart the harmony of friends as the revelation of secrets. The second, that the revelation of secrets proceeds from love; therefore rightly the revelation of secrets is attributed to the same One to whom love is also attributed, namely the Holy Spirit, who is formal and causal love: for everywhere He binds and joins love and friendship. But these are mystical or accommodated senses; for the true translation is "faithful in spirit," as the Septuagint, the Chaldean, our translator, and others generally have it.
Thus St. Ambrose kept the secret of friends so silent with himself that he did not even share it with his most beloved brother Satyrus. Hence in On the Death of Satyrus: "Although, he says, all our things were common to us, one spirit, one affection, yet the secret of friends alone was not common; not because we feared the danger of sharing, but to keep our word of fidelity, etc. For it was a trustworthy sign that it had not been betrayed to a stranger, that it had not been shared with a brother."
Verse 14: Where There Is No Governor, the People Shall Fall
So also Cassian, Conference II On Discretion, chapter 4, reads: those who have no governance, that is, counsel and discretion, he says, fall like leaves. It is a metalepsis: for from counsels one understands good governance, considered and prudent; from governance, the governor himself, as our translator renders. The sense is, as if to say: Where there is no governor endowed with the wisdom and prudence of governing, there the people will fall into many dangers and losses; but where he is present, and either excels in his own counsel or uses that of others, there the people stands safe, immune from all evils, and secure.
The word תחבלות tachbuloth in the plural signifies first, that the ruler of a state needs many and great counsels and methods of governing, inasmuch as he must adapt himself to the various conditions, dispositions, and appetites of various men and peoples, so as to govern each one conformably to his own character. The Poets give Proteus as a parable or example of this, who turned himself into a thousand forms, so as to make himself like everyone and conform to each one's disposition and manners. There also applies what Sallust says in the Jugurthine War: "The common people are by nature seditious and quarrelsome, desirous of new things, opposed to quiet and leisure." And, as the same author says in the speech of Marcius: "Bold of tongue, cowardly of spirit." And Livy, Book 23: "This, he says, is the nature of the multitude: either it serves humbly or dominates arrogantly. They know neither how to moderately reject nor how to possess liberty, which lies in the middle." Philo, in the book On Joseph: "Just as, he says, a helmsman changes his navigational aids according to the nature of the winds, not directing the ship in one way only: so the moderator of the state should be multiform and versatile, one person in peace, another in war; opposing himself one way to few adversaries, another way to many," etc. St. Gregory of Nazianzus agrees in his First Apologetic Oration: "For indeed, he says, it seems to me that governing a human being, a creature most varied and complex, is a certain art of arts and sciences; that is, it is one art comprising many arts." And shortly after: "Just as, he says, if someone were to undertake to tame and lead a varied and complex beast, composed of many beasts both large and small, fierce and gentle, in governing a nature so varied and prodigious, the greatest labor would have to be undertaken everywhere, and a great contest: for it takes pleasure neither in the same voices, nor in the same foods, nor in the same touches of the hand and whistles, nor in other things; but different individuals are pleased or offended by different things according to their own nature and custom; so that whoever has undertaken the care of such a beast must be equipped with altogether varied and manifold knowledge. In a quite similar way, for this common body of the Church, like a certain composite and unequal beast, assembled from many and varied habits and languages, it is supremely necessary also that the Bishop be at once both simple, as regards the integrity of soul which he must bring to all matters; and as varied and versatile as possible, as regards winning the goodwill of each individual."
Second, tachbuloth signifies that the governor of a state should imitate the helmsman of a ship, about which Plato says much in the dialogue On Kingship and in Book VIII of the Republic, and Plutarch in the Moralia, where among other things he says: "Just as in great storms the strongest rudder, the best helmsman, and many supports are needed: so the one administering great and turbulent affairs needs the highest wisdom; which since the governor does not have from himself, he must borrow and learn from upright counselors." Hence Vegetius, Book III: "What should be done, he says, discuss with many; what you are going to do, with very few, or rather with yourself alone." See what was said on chapter 1, verse 5.
Wherefore Pius II, a wise and generous Pontiff, in Book I, Letter 387 to Louis, King of France, says: "The Scripture, he says, which says: Where there is much counsel, there is safety, does not require a multitude of counsels, but their maturity and digestion; which thing is found more easily in few than in many; for neither honesty nor justice is easily persuaded by a multitude, which, agitated by various affections, frequently inclines toward confusion; sudden is the crowd of advisors, nor does the situation go well where votes are counted, not weighed; for it often happens that the greater part conquers the better." Justinian also decreed in this manner: "But do not judge what is better and more equitable from the multitude of authorities, since the opinion of one, perhaps even an inferior one, can surpass many and greater ones in some respect." Cicero is witness that "Q. Scaevola, the most learned in law, when consulted about the law of estates, sometimes referred his own consultants to Furius and Casellius as experts." And it is established that Bartolus worked out most of his opinions based on the judgment of merchants and craftsmen. For, as the same M. Tullius teaches: "Constant practice devoted to a single matter often surpasses both talent and skill."
Thus the Emperor Severus never determined anything without a circle of very many jurists and other experts. Augustus even to his private council admitted Maecenas and Agrippa, just as Julius Caesar admitted Q. Pedica and Cornelius Balbus. And Augustus, after their death, if anything happened that he regretted, would exclaim: "None of this would have happened to me, if either Agrippa or Maecenas had lived."
Third, tachbuloth signifies that the safety of the state consists both in the wisdom of governors and in the obedience of citizens, just as the safety of a ship depends on the helmsman, of a choir on the choirmaster, of the world on the sun. For what the sun is in the world, the choirmaster in the choir, the helmsman in the ship, this a wise king or prince is in the state. Hence again the Hebrews call counsel סוד sod, from יסד iasad, that is, he founded; for what a foundation is in a house, this counsel is in a matter to be done, so that as it stands, the thing stands; as it falls, the thing falls. Hear St. Chrysostom, Homily 34 on the Epistle to the Hebrews: "Not to have a magistrate, leader, and ruler is evil, and is a sign of many calamities and the beginning of a breakdown of order, and of disturbance and confusion. For just as if you take away the choirmaster from the choir and the leader, there will no longer be a choir that is harmonious and ordered; and if you remove the general from the battle-line of the army, there will no longer be a numerous and ordered formation; and if you take away the helmsman from the ship, you will sink it: so also, if you take away the ruler from the people, you have overturned and destroyed everything." Then about those who have a prince but do not obey him, he adds this: "And indeed the lack of a magistrate and ruler is evil, namely an occasion of overthrow; but no less evil is the disobedience of subjects. For a people not obeying its ruler and magistrate is like one that has none, and perhaps even worse: for those who lack a ruler are pardoned if order and moderation are not maintained; but these are not so, but are worthy of punishment."
The same was the opinion of the Philosophers. Aristotle, in the Rhetoric to Alexander: "To take counsel, he says, is the most divine of things among men;" of Plato: "Deliberation is indeed a sacred thing;" for by counsel stand kingdoms, cities, houses. Sallust to Caesar: "I have found, he says, that all kingdoms, states, and nations had prosperous rule so long as true counsels prevailed among them. Wherever favor, fear, or pleasure corrupted them, shortly after their resources were diminished, then their power was taken away, and finally slavery was imposed." By the vote of all, Julius Caesar himself is condemned, who used the counsel of the senate neither in his dictatorship nor in his consulship, says Suetonius, whence he destroyed both himself and the republic. Nero did the same, who hated the senate to the death, says Suetonius. Similar was Hieronymus, king of Sicily, who convoked or consulted the public council about no matter, as Livy testifies, Book IV of the Second Punic War.
Cardinal Paleotti treats this argument at length, in his book On the Consultations of the Sacred Consistory, and Martin of Lodi, in his treatise On Counselors, and Boethius, On the Authority of the Great Council. Here applies the fact that all kings and princes have their counselors, senators, parliaments, etc. Moreover, "the rudder of counsels should be the divine law," says St. Cyprian.
Tropologically, St. Dorotheus teaches from this passage that the faithful person devoted to virtue needs a guide and governor. "He warns us, he says, to be careful not to form ourselves, not to consider ourselves learned, not to be persuaded that we are sufficient for our own governance. For we need help besides God; we need helpers. Nothing is more wretched, nothing that can be more quickly conquered, than those who have no guides, no mentors for the way to God. For he says: Those who have no governance fall like leaves. A leaf at the beginning is always green, always budding, always delightful: not long after it dries up and wilts, and falling it is crushed and trampled. Such is a man who is governed by no one. At the beginning most fervent for fasting, for vigils, for quiet, for obedience, and for every other good thing. Shortly after, when that fervor is extinguished, if he has no governor or nourisher who may stir up and kindle the extinguished fire, he dries up and falls, and finally, abandoned by his enemies, he is dragged away captive, and they assault him as they please." So he says, and excellently.
Cyril adorns this maxim with the illustrious fable of the fox and the ant, embroidered with festive parables like silken threads, in Book I of the Moral Apologues, chapter 10, whose title is: Where there is much counsel, there is safety. "To a little fox, he says, who was gathering materials to build herself a house upon the ground, an ant came along, and after greeting her, inquired what she was doing. And she replied: In the dark hiding places of the earth I have lived until now, but now I am inclined to build myself a nest in the light, which is most pleasant to all. To which the ant immediately said: Was that first dwelling of yours ever troublesome to you? She replied: Never certainly, but it was most safe and quiet; yet I am inclined to this desire by the sweetness of the light. Then the ant added: Indeed the light is sweet, and it is delightful for the eyes to see the sun, but life is far more savory, and a secure rest is more delightful. Wherefore, sister, although I am not so important as to be a counselor to your prudence, yet I recall this to your memory, and in this new venture it is true that you are not a little hated by chicken-keepers and furriers; by the former indeed because of their zeal for their hens, by the latter because of the desire for your furs. I advise therefore that in this new business you seek the counsel of the experienced: for counsel will guard you, and prudence will preserve you. To this the fox replied without deliberation: I pay very little attention to this, sister; for I think I have no need at all of your counsel. To which the ant prudently replied: The beginnings of things are small in bulk but greatest in power. For from a small seed a huge palm tree grows. Wherefore in the smallest beginnings the greatest counsels must be taken. Since a small error at the beginning is very great at the end. Thus a slight corruption of the root spreads through the whole body of the tree. For in this the reality of the whole is contained. Add that, if you neglect the smallest things, you gradually slip into greater ones, Sirach 19:4. For this reason Solomon said in the Proverb: Hear counsel, and receive instruction, that you may be wise in your latter days, Proverbs 19:20. For the thoughts of counsel are strengthened. To this the fox, conquered by reason, replied: Even if in this very thing which I am preparing, it is necessary to use counsel, yet I have enough counsel at home from nature. To which the ant prudently said: It is written, she said, Proverbs 3:7: Do not be wise in your own eyes, and do not lean on your own prudence, because those who say they are wise have become fools." Then confirming the same by the comparison of eyes, rays, and sailors, she adds: "Do not four eyes see more than two? And do multiplied rays illuminate more? Certainly the capacity of many is greater, and a vessel is steered more safely by many sailors. Nevertheless, whose is counsel? Is it not of wisdom? Indeed this wisdom reveals to one what it hides from another: and as a lover of humility, it very often teaches the right counsel about what is to be done through another person. And if you have judged well, with a counselor added as witness, you will be more certain, and will be rightly directed toward the better. The more counsel therefore comes from many, the more salutary it is. Since where there is much counsel, there is safety. Thus the wise man who listens will become wiser, and the one who understands will acquire governance, Proverbs 1:5. To this the little fox said: I know that you are provident; teach me, I ask, whose counsel should be heeded. Then she replied: Of the wise, the prudent, the knowledgeable, the experienced, of a faithful friend, the magnanimous, and the God-fearing. Having said these things, the provident ant dismissed the crafty fox, now educated by her, with a farewell."
Verse 15: He Shall Be Afflicted Who Makes Himself Surety
The Septuagint however translates thus: the evil man does evil when he has been mixed (for the Hebrew ערב arab properly means to mix, and thence to stipulate and pledge) with the just: and he hates the sound of security. For in Hebrew תקע taka means both to drive in and to sound and blow a trumpet. This Septuagint version can be adapted to the Vulgate, as if to say: The evil man, that is, the avaricious creditor, afflicts the just man who out of charity pledged himself for the debtor. Hence the just man hates the sound which he is accustomed to make in the stipulation of surety or guarantee by joining hands, as if to say: He hates the clasping of his hand with the hand of the creditor, that is, he hates suretyship. If however you take these words broadly as they sound, they signify that all commerce with an evil or impious man is dangerous for the just man: for there is a danger that he may be defrauded, entangled, or seduced by him.
Hence the author of the Greek Catena thus clearly translates and explains the Septuagint: the wicked mixed among the just act wickedly, and they despise the discourse about salvation and security (the doctrine of salvation) that has been established. And the Syriac, following the Septuagint as usual, says: the wicked man does evil when he encounters the just man, because he hates those who have hope; but the Chaldean says: the evil man acts evilly against the just man, because he stood as surety for a stranger, and he hates those who place their hope in God. Cassian finally, Conference I, chapter 20: "The evil one, he says, does harm when he has mixed himself with the just man, that is, the devil deceives when he has been covered with the appearance of holiness; and he hates the sound of protection, that is, the power of discretion, which proceeds from the words and admonition of the elders."
Verse 16: A Gracious Woman Shall Find Glory
"A gracious woman," or, as the Hebrew has it, of grace, is first a woman who is beautiful and lovely; second, gracious in words and deeds; third, honest, chaste, obedient to her husband, diligent, and endowed with every virtue. Hence some translate: a virtuous woman sustains honor, and the mighty sustain riches; the Chaldean: a kind woman shares glory, and the strong run after riches; Symmachus: a good woman shall obtain glory; Vatablus: a modest woman shall obtain glory, that is, a woman who is obedient to her husband will be commended: but the strict or rigorous shall obtain riches.
Now first, Baynus explains thus, as if to say: A woman of grace, that is, a beautiful wife, brings to her husband as a dowry the glory of her beauty: hence very beautiful women marry without a dowry, because their dowry is their form and beauty. But עריצים aritsim, that is, robust men, diligent and attentive to business, take wealth in preference to beauty, and seek a wealthy dowry with their spouse, finding more glory from wealth than from beauty. But this explanation adds much, and seems rather remote and forced.
Second, better is our Salazar, as if to say: Just as beauty brings glory to a woman, that is, a rich and noble marriage, namely a splendid and wealthy husband: so labor brings wealth to a man, as if to say: For women indeed, beauty and form bring riches and a great dowry; but for a man, only his own industry brings fortunes and means: and therefore it may perhaps be permitted for a woman to lead a sedentary, idle, and soft life; but for a man it is not so, but diligent labor and solicitude are needed. Thus "glory" is taken for "riches" in Genesis chapter 31:1, in the Hebrew. So Aben-Ezra.
Third, Cajetan, as if to say: Just as strong and vigorous men support their wealth and families by their strength and vigor, so a gracious wife, that is, a chaste and well-mannered one, sustains and carries both her own and her husband's honor and glory: for a man's honor and glory consist in his wife's chastity and probity. R. Levi agrees: The grace of a woman, he says, supports and preserves dignity, just as if it were a column and prop on which glory rests: just as the strong preserve riches, and are like certain columns which protect them from plunderers and destroyers. For the Hebrew תמך tamach, which our translator renders as "shall find" and "shall have," properly means to support, to sustain, just as columns support a house.
Fourth, simply and genuinely Jansenius: In Hebrew, he says, it literally reads: a woman of grace shall lay hold of glory, and the strong shall lay hold of riches. Now a woman of grace is a woman of pleasing beauty and probity. Hence our translator renders it as a gracious woman; others, a beautiful woman; and it is signified that, just as a woman by her beauty and grace and probity of manners obtains glory among men: so men by their strength should acquire riches; so that we understand that, just as the glory of a man is a beautiful wife, so the wealth of a family depends on the strength and diligence of the man. He teaches therefore that in women beauty and grace of manners are especially required, and in men industry and labor.
Moreover how much beauty (of soul more than of body) brings glory to a woman, St. Basil beautifully teaches in his treatise On Virginity: "A woman will present herself, he says, in bearing, gait, and her whole bodily comportment in such a way that those who happen to meet her, as if gazing upon a living image of God, will incline their faces to reverence and admiration of her holiness, and will venerate, I say, her appearance, and, as I said, will reverently step aside from the road as if for a divine image." Such was Judith, whose glory was her beauty, but more so her chastity, virtue, and fortitude, by which she killed Holofernes and freed Israel. Hence the people acclaimed her as victrix: "You are the glory of Jerusalem, you are the joy of Israel, you are the honor of our people," Judith 15:10. Such was Esther, who by her beauty and grace obtained the glory of the kingdom and the bed of Ahasuerus, hanged Haman, and saved the Hebrews.
Moreover the Septuagint, by inserting one sentence, express this maxim differently through a two-part antithesis: "A gracious woman, they say, raises up glory for her husband; but a throne of ignominy is a woman who hates what is just," that is, ignominy sits upon an improper, shameless, perverse woman as upon its throne: for nowhere is disgrace and ignominy more apparent than in an improper, wanton, and perverse woman. The Septuagint continue: those lacking in riches are the lazy, but the strong strive after riches. Following the Septuagint as usual, the Syriac says: a pious woman, he says, obtains praise for her husband; but a seat of ignominy is a woman who hates justice. The idle also are lacking in riches. But the strong obtain knowledge.
Symbolically and mystically, the author of the Greek Catena says: "A kind and gracious woman," he says, in a higher sense is a mild sentence pleasing to the ears, whose husband is the mind or soul: but a throne of ignominy is the force or power of infamy. For just as a man in whom sin reigns, and sits as it were as a king on his throne, is called the seat of iniquity: so a man covered with shame and ignominy is called "a seat of ignominy." Now ignominy is born from malice, and malice from sin. But what is born from something is a part of it, as a stone from a rock, and a clod from the earth, and other similar things: and therefore ignominy is a species or offspring of sin. "The lazy will end up lacking in wealth, but the strong and diligent are heaped with riches." A brave and spirited man tames and subjugates his body, but the wanton and intemperate man corrupts and destroys both his soul and his body together. Otherwise: A good and brave man bravely despises the allurements of the body; and he is entirely devoted to the welfare of his soul: but he who is disposed otherwise not only does not spare his soul, but also corrupts and destroys his own body. So he says.
Verse 17: A Merciful Man Does Good to His Own Soul
First therefore Vatablus thus translates and explains: he weans his soul, that is, the pious man defrauds his own disposition and desire, in order to be merciful to others: but the unmerciful man devours and gobbles up everything, and therefore is cruel even to his relatives. Others, as if to say: Mercy weans the merciful man from evil desires, and from an excessive love of his own, so that he may be merciful to the truly poor and pour out his riches.
Second, the Septuagint translates: a merciful man does kindly to his own soul; but the unmerciful man also destroys his own body. Which Jansenius thus explains, as if to say: The merciful man does good to his own soul, that is, to himself: but the cruel man harms not only others but also his own flesh, that is, himself. Others, as if to say: A beneficent man uses his goods and does good to himself from them: but the miser defrauds himself and wastes away from want. For thus God justly punishes the avaricious: because they do not expend their wealth on others, they also deny and refuse to themselves the very nourishment of life out of avarice. The author of the Greek Catena says thus, as if to say: A kind and generous man is by his nature devoted to the soul; but the avaricious and miserly man spares neither soul nor body, inasmuch as he does not nourish or treat it as he should; or certainly he is immoderately cruel and stingy: for by sating himself immoderately, he falls into bad health and poverty, and at length perishes entirely. So he says.
Third, better is our translator's understanding of "flesh" as relatives, as also Vatablus and others. Hence Lyranus, Hugh, and Dionysius explain thus, as if to say: The merciful man, while he does good to others, does good to his own soul: but the cruel man is unmerciful even to his relatives, and consequently to his own flesh and soul. The reason is first, because the man who is merciful to others counts as many patrons before God as he relieves with his aid. Second, because he makes God his debtor; for God has promised: "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy," Matthew 5. Third, because mercy alone accompanies the dead after death, to plead their cause at the tribunal of Christ, says St. Augustine through Lyranus. Hence for "does good," Aquila and Theodotion translate: he repays his own soul; the Syriac: the pious man, he says, creates for himself good pledges.
Here also agrees the explanation of Cajetan: The merciful man, he says, does good not only to others but also to his own soul, because he repays it what he owes, namely the act of virtue: for virtue is owed to the soul, since the soul by its own instinct is impelled toward virtue, and demands and desires it.
Fourth, our Salazar fashions the antithesis more profoundly thus, as if to say: He who is truly and sincerely merciful does good to his own soul, that is, he does not bestow his benefits and alms from an affection of the flesh, but so spends them that they benefit his soul, that is, not only to neighbors and blood-relations, whom we usually tend to favor from human affection; but he also distributes his goods to strangers. On the contrary, "he who is cruel casts off even his kindred:" that is, he who because of avarice strips off mercy and puts on cruelty, not only does not help strangers, but is also impious toward his blood-relations and those joined by kinship of flesh.
Fifth, plainly and simply, as if to say: The merciful man generously expends his means, and therefore first of all does good to his own soul, that is, to himself; then distributes his surplus to other needy people by doing good: but the cruel, that is, avaricious and unmerciful man, first defrauds strangers, then relatives, and third, finally himself of the necessities of life. For Solomon passes over many things in silence by aposiopesis, which he leaves for the reader to supply. For these maxims by their brevity elegantly and sharply exercise and sharpen the reader's mind. Or more clearly, as if to say: The merciful man does good to his soul, that is, to himself and to his family and relatives: but the unmerciful man is cruel not only to strangers, but also to his relatives and his own family, and consequently to himself and his own soul. Hence Symmachus translates: he troubles his own houses; the Chaldean: the kind man repays good; he who destroys his body is cruel. R. Solomon says: The merciful and pious man bestows benefits on his soul, that is, on his relatives (whom he loves as his own soul); but the cruel man troubles and casts off his relatives. For by resemblance, the similar is understood from the similar, the neighboring from the neighbor, the joined from that to which it is joined, e.g., a friend from a friend, a relative from the soul of a relative.
Mystically, it is signified that the first and proper work of a pious man is to provide for his soul and its eternal salvation through the pursuit of virtues and good works: for he knows that nothing is nearer and dearer to him than his soul, which if he loses, he loses everything: for he has only one, not two, not three. If therefore he loses the one, he loses all and everything, and that irreparably for all eternity. Hence the Wise Man admonishes: "If you lose all things, remember to save your soul." This is what Sirach 30:24 impresses: "Have mercy on your own soul, pleasing God." See what was said there.
Finally St. Thomas notes, II II, Question 159, article 1, ad 3, that cruelty is here taken for lack of mercy, which withholds benefits from relatives: for otherwise cruelty, he says, properly opposes clemency, and is a ferocity of mind in exacting punishments, just as clemency is a gentleness of mind for easily remitting and pardoning them. For cruelty is so named from crudity: for just as things that are cooked and digested have a pleasant taste, so conversely those things that are raw and undigested have a harsh and crude taste. In a similar way, clemency is gentleness and sweetness, but cruelty is harshness in exacting punishments: the former is sweet and savory, the latter austere and harsh. So St. Thomas.
Cyril illustrates this maxim with the beautiful fable of the silkworm and the spider, adorned with lovely roses of maxims, in Book III of the Moral Apologues, chapter 18, whose title is: What difference there is between the miser and the generous man. "To the silkworm, he says, the spider said: Why, my brother, do you thus torment yourself and eviscerate yourself for what is not yours? And he replied: But you, why do you do the same? Then she said: I, she said, labor for what is mine. Then he asked: What is yours? To which the spider said: My good is the prey which I catch falling into this little net. To this he said: What kind of prey? Then she said: My prey is a fly. Having heard this, the worm spoke saying: Certainly, sister, the art of fraud seems detestable to me, the labor of madness is vain, and the prey of misery is to be rejected. You do not yet know, as I see, what is the true proper good, that is, the intrinsic, not the extrinsic. For that alone is the true proper good which, unless its possessor voluntarily abandons it, is unconquered: for he is truly conquered who is stripped of his proper good. But an extrinsic good is that which is snatched away even against the possessor's will. Thus the proper good is recognized as virtue alone, which indeed will not leave you unless you leave it." The silkworm, applying the same to himself, adds: "Therefore my good is the truest virtue of liberality, by which when I share my own things, I appropriate them more to myself than when I possess others' things; and when I distribute, I gather; and while I spend, I store away. For this reason indeed, that it may profit all, the heaven revolves in its most rapid course, and the stars pour forth their light, the dewy air condenses into rain, and everywhere the earth germinates such useful things. Thus also nature produces gems not for itself but for others, and generously begets metals; fountains gush forth, trees bear fruit, bees make honey, and sheep bear precious fleeces. Therefore all the art, labor, and effort of nature concur in providing benefit from the virtue of liberality. Therefore by doing this I follow it, and I strive to bestow benefits from my most cherished depths. Having heard this, the illiberal spider, confounded by the teacher of liberality, fell silent."
Verse 18: The Wicked Does a Deceitful Work
There is an antithesis between the wicked man doing impious things, and the pious or just man doing pious and just things, in that the work of the pious man, that is, the reward and fruit of his work, is true, that is, certain, stable, faithful: but the reward and fruit of the work of the wicked man is false, that is, evanescent, because it will not endure, nor will he attain the fruit and reward he hoped for. Therefore the wicked man is like a spider which eviscerates itself to weave a web, which has no use or fruit except to catch flies. For what else are the riches, honors, and pleasures for which the wicked man labors and sweats, but tickling and troublesome flies? According to Isaiah 59:5: "They have woven the webs of spiders." And Hosea 8:6: "The calf of Samaria shall become spiders' webs." But the just man is like a bee, which makes wax and honey as if heavenly nectar. This is what St. Paul says, Galatians 6:7: "He who sows in the flesh, from the flesh will also reap corruption; but he who sows in the spirit, from the spirit will reap eternal life." And David: "Going they went and wept, casting their seeds; but coming they shall come with exultation, carrying their sheaves," Psalm 125:6.
I take justice here, as also above, in a general sense for any just work, and impiety for any impious and unjust work. R. Solomon however and our Salazar narrow justice to almsgiving, and impiety to avarice, as if to say: The wicked man, that is, the miser, does an unstable work, that is, he collects and amasses unstable and deceptive riches: which indeed never remain long with anyone, but quickly abandoning him migrate to another, and are deceptive and empty. "But to him that sows justice, the reward is faithful." That by the name of justice almsgiving is sometimes understood, I have noted elsewhere. And so he says: He who scatters his means and riches like seed among the poor will carry off a faithful, constant, and by no means deceptive reward. And that almsgiving is customarily compared to seed, no one is unaware. This sense is fitting but narrower: the former therefore is full and adequate. Hence Vatablus clearly translates: the wicked man does a deceptive work (vain, false); but he who sows justice will receive a solid reward.
Verse 19: Clemency Prepares Life
Our translator however renders "justice" as "clemency," both because he puts a species for the genus, and an example for a general rule; and because among the works of justice, clemency and almsgiving excel; hence in Scripture "justice" often signifies almsgiving, as Psalm 111:9: "He has dispersed, he has given to the poor, his justice (that is, almsgiving) remains forever and ever." Wherefore our Salazar at this passage likewise takes "justice" as it is in the Hebrew for almsgiving, and therefore judges that our translator rendered it as clemency. Hence he explains thus, as if to say: "Clemency prepares life and blessedness, and the pursuit of evils," that is, the avaricious search for riches and their sordid hoarding, "death," supply, prepares. Perhaps also our translator in the Hebrew, instead of צדקה tsedaka, that is, justice, read חסד chesed, that is, piety, clemency; whence חסידה chasida is the stork, a bird pious toward its parents. Be that as it may, it seems more true what Jansenius says, that by clemency any justice is understood synecdochically (for it is opposed to the pursuit of evils, that is, to iniquity and injustice), because from clemency all goodness, justice, and holiness flows forth like a stream from a spring.
For, as St. Ambrose says in On the Death of his Brother Satyrus: "If lust and anger are the nurses of the remaining vices, I would rightly say that chastity and clemency are certain parent virtues; although piety also, as it is the principle of all goods, so it is also the seedbed of the other virtues." Hence he is called clement who does not become angry, as if cultivating the mind, and not by anger disturbing or troubling it, says Donatus. For a clement, gentle, quiet, placid, and benign mind, just as it excludes the disturbances of the passions, so it renders itself capable of all virtues. Hence the Poet: The greater anyone is, the more he can be appeased of anger, And a generous mind captures easy tempers. And the Comic writer: He comes nearest to God who uses clemency. Clemency separates us from beasts. Clemency befits all, but kings especially. Clemency alone makes men equal to the gods.
Finally, Christ placed the summit of justice and Christian virtue in clemency and meekness: "Learn, He says, from Me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you will find rest for your souls," Matthew 11. And the first endowment of God, and the proper name which He gave Himself, is "clement and merciful," as is evident from Exodus 33:19, and chapter 34:6, Jonah 4:2.
Verse 20: A Perverse Heart Is Abominable to the Lord
Such was Satyrus, the brother of St. Ambrose, about whom he himself writes in the funeral oration On His Death: "How I congratulated myself that the Lord had endowed me with such a brother, so chaste, so effective, so innocent, so simple! So that when I considered your innocence, I despaired of your effectiveness; when your effectiveness, your innocence. But you joined both with a certain wonderful virtue." And further: "He was of such simplicity that, turned into a child, he shone with the harmless simplicity of that age, the perfect image of virtue, and a kind of mirror of innocent character. Therefore he entered the kingdom of heaven, because he believed the word of God, because like a child he rejected the art of flattery, he clemently absorbed the pain of injury, which he vindicated more clemently, readier for complaint than for guile, easy to satisfy, resistant to ambition, holy in modesty, so that you would more often praise the excessive modesty in him than seek the necessary kind." And shortly after: "For indeed he preserved the inviolate gifts of sacred baptism, clean in body, purer in heart; no less dreading the reproach of adulterous speech than of the body, judging that no less reverence should be paid to chastity through the integrity of words than through bodily purity."
Verse 21: Hand in Hand the Evil Man Shall Not Be Innocent
The seventh sense: Even if the wicked conspire together and lend one another mutual aid, and give their hands as a sign of this conspiracy, they will not escape punishment, even though many are accomplices in the crime. For against such a faction of evildoers is set the congregation of the just, of which Solomon says: "But the seed of the just shall be saved." So Jansenius expounds it. And thus in Psalm 19, it is said of the wicked: "They have enclosed their fat," that is, they joined all their forces to perpetrate evils, and thus David adds: "Their mouth has spoken pride."
The eighth sense, which is Baynus's: Where the hand of the son is added to the hand of the father for evil, when the son and descendants follow the sins of their ancestors, they will not go unpunished, and thus it follows: "But the seed of the just shall be saved." For the reward of the just, the piety of the parents whom they follow avails greatly.
The ninth sense: If the hand of God is brought alongside the hand of man, that is, if God's precepts are compared with the works that the wicked man does, he will manifestly be found guilty of punishment, nor will he be able to escape punishment. The Chaldean paraphrast supplies certain words, saying: he who stretches out or sends his hand against his companion is not innocent of evil.
Two other expositions concerning avarice and almsgiving our Salazar brings forward and prefers to the rest. The first is: Hand to hand, that is, added, signifies many hands; just as day to day, year to year, that is, added, signifies many days and years. The sense therefore is, as if to say: The miser who has many hands for plundering the goods of others, and is like the giant Briareus with a hundred hands, will not be innocent, that is, unpunished, but will pay the penalties of his crimes and robberies: "But the seed of the just shall be saved," that is, the children of the merciful, who do not seize the goods of others but generously distribute their own to the poor, will escape all punishments.
The latter: In ancient times, he says, among the Romans it was customary to lay hand on hand, or join hands, when a lawsuit was brought against someone over property or family estate. Whence that saying of Cicero in his epistle to Trebatius: Not by legal process with joined hands, but rather by the sword / They reclaim their property. Therefore, according to the Septuagint, he expounds it thus: he who unjustly lays or joins hand to hand will not go unpunished, that is, he who brings unjust lawsuits against the poor, and summons them to court with joined hands, in order to strip them of their goods by injury, will pay the deserved penalties of his crime. But he who sows justice will receive a faithful reward; justice is taken for almsgiving, as if to say: He who, conversely, does not despoil the poor, but helps them with generous gifts and relieves their poverty, will carry away a faithful, that is, a certain and constant reward. But this custom of joining hands in a lawsuit belonged to the Romans, not to the Hebrews.
Therefore in this proverb: Hand to hand, the Septuagint, Syriac, Arabic, and Chaldean consider it to signify violence; others leisure and laziness, as Salonius; others kinship; others multitude; others secrecy; others fraud; others endeavor; others swiftness. Whence Pagninus translates: soon, soon the evil man will not be unpunished; but the seed of the pious has escaped.
It is more probable that this proverb, Hand to hand, signifies conspiracy, association, lineage, posterity, as if to say: Even though the evil or impious man has many accomplices in crime, successors, and descendants as auxiliary hands, he will nevertheless not be innocent, that is, unpunished. Even if he leads forth the hand of children and grandchildren, friends and companions like an army into battle, still this force will not be able to protect him so as to escape the more powerful avenging hand of God. So Jansenius says: The sense is, as if to say: Even if the wicked have conspired among themselves, they will nevertheless not go unpunished; but the just and their posterity will escape both the conspiracy and the punishment of the wicked. Thus the antithesis aptly holds together; for the seed of the just is opposed to the seed and posterity of the wicked, as congregation to congregation, society to society, succession to succession, posterity to posterity. For the former are rewarded in themselves and in their posterity, and are happy; but the wicked are punished equally in themselves and in their posterity, and are unhappy. This sense is confirmed by the repetition of this saying in chapter 16, verse 5, where of the proud man, who goes about gloriously attended by children and companions, it is said: "Every arrogant person is an abomination to the Lord; even if hand be joined to hand, he will not be innocent." Again the same is confirmed by the fact that the hand is a symbol of society, and thence of power and strength, according to the saying: Do you not know that kings have long hands? And that: "Many hands make the burden lighter." For, as Heraclides says: "The fight of a single hand alone is weak, because one man is no man." And that of Virgil: "The ardent band of youths rushes forth;" for this is a copious, and therefore powerful, band of soldiers.
Morally, St. Gregory, book 25 of the Moralia, chapter 3: "The mind, he says, approaches God by as many steps as it advances by good impulses. And again it grows distant by as many steps as it declines by evil thoughts. Whence it very often happens that the impulse of the mind has not yet proceeded to action, and yet the guilt is already complete from the very culpability of the thought, as it is written: Hand in hand the wicked man will not be innocent. For hand is usually joined to hand when it rests in idleness, and no work of labor exercises it. Therefore hand in hand the wicked man will not be innocent, as if to say: Even when the hand ceases from wicked work, the wicked man is nevertheless not innocent through his thought."
Verse 22: A Golden Ring in the Nostrils of a Swine
First, Jansenius expounds it thus, as if to say: Just as a golden ring does not suit the nostrils of a sow, nor adorn it, so neither does beauty, which is in itself an excellent thing, suit a foolish woman, but seems badly placed there by nature, as is afterward said: "Eloquent words do not befit a fool." And: "Delights do not befit a fool." For just as a sow does not know how to make good use of a golden ring fixed in its nostrils, so neither does a foolish woman know how to use her beauty. Furthermore, just as a sow is not restrained by a golden ring from rooting up the earth, but nevertheless plunges itself into the mire and fouls the ring, so too a senseless woman, though she ought to gain glory from her beauty, is not thereby drawn back from the allurements of pleasures, but plunges herself into the mire of pleasures, and thus fouls and obscures her beauty by her folly. Therefore a man who has a beautiful and foolish wife must do what the maxim of the Syrians and Arabs advises: "If you have a net, pull it lest you be pulled by it," that is, if you have a wife, subject her to yourself, lest she subject you to herself and destroy you along with her.
Secondly and more forcefully, he compares a beautiful but foolish and immodest woman to a filthy sow or pig, and her beauty to a golden ring in the nostrils, as if to say: Just as a sow, turning the mire upwards and downwards with its nostrils, corrupts and utterly deforms that golden ornament of the ring, so a beautiful and immodest woman stains and disfigures her beauty with her uncleanness, indeed abuses it for lust, according to the saying of the Poet: Beauty has a great quarrel with chastity.
So applies the author of the Greek Chain, Bede, Lyranus, Baynus, indeed Clement of Alexandria, book 3 of the Pedagogue, chapter 11: "Just as, he says, gold is defiled by the filth of a sow, stirring up mud with its snout, so women who are somewhat more given to luxury, if they are invited by excessive abundance to lust and immodesty, bring reproach and disgrace upon true beauty, polluting it with the defilements of Venus." So too St. Chrysostom, whom the scholiast of Clement cites in the same place: "Just as a sow, he says, turning mud and mire with that particular part of its body (that is, its snout), taints and defiles clean gold, so too a woman stains her own good form.
Thirdly, our Salazar, as if to say: Just as a sow is dragged by anyone wherever he pleases by a golden ring driven into its nostrils, so a woman is dragged by gold and gifts by anyone to satisfy his lust. A similar expression is found in Job 40:21: "Will you put a ring in its nostrils?" The Septuagint: will you place a halter around its nose? But since gifts are not mentioned here, but only foolishness and beauty, which are compared to a golden ring, as the Septuagint translates, hence, fourthly, most aptly and most forcefully, an immodest woman is compared to a sow, her foolishness to a ring in the nostrils, her beauty to gold; for a woman's foolishness, that is, the ease with which she smiles at men, converses, consents — namely her senseless wantonness and immodesty — is like a ring by which lustful men seize her and lead her about, each to his own lusts; her beauty, however, is like the splendor of gold which strikes and captivates the eyes of men, so that they seize this golden ring, that is, her lascivious beauty, and through it subject the woman to their concupiscence. He alludes to and notes the earrings and ornaments with which women adorn themselves to attract men. For beauty here is understood as both natural and artificial, with which women paint themselves with kohl and adorn themselves with jewelry. For in Hebrew, nezem signifies an ornament or pendant, which is publicly displayed either on the forehead, or in the nostrils, or in the ears, for the purpose of winning favor; whence some lexicographers derive nezem, by metathesis of the first two letters, with the addition of the letter mem, from zana, that is, to fornicate, to earn by prostitution, to prostitute oneself.
He says therefore that this beauty of women, both natural and artificial from paint and jewelry, is like a golden ring of swine or pigs. First, because just as this ornament does not become or adorn swine, but rather disgraces them, so too this beauty does not adorn foolish and wanton women, but disfigures and defames them. Secondly, because just as swine stain the golden ring of their nostrils with mud when they turn the mire with their snouts, so lascivious women defile their beauty when they pollute it with lust. Thirdly, just as swine are dragged and led about by swineherds with a golden ring, so women are dragged and snatched to wickedness by the immodest through their beauty. Fourthly, to their nostrils mire smells more pleasant and sweet than perfume, says Lucretius in book 6: so to a harlot the filth of fornication smells sweeter than the spices and lilies of chastity.
Moreover, senseless and impure women are rightly compared to a sow. First, because the sow is a thoroughly stupid animal; whence St. Augustine, book 6 Against Faustus, chapter 7: "What the pig is among figures of things, he says, the fool is among kinds of things." And Horapollo in his Hieroglyphics teaches that the Egyptians represented the wise man by the elephant, the foolish and stupid by the sow. What therefore a sword is in the hand of a madman, that is beauty in a foolish and wanton woman; for just as the madman uses the sword uncontrollably and strikes many, so too the wanton woman lashes and strikes the eyes and hearts of many with her beauty.
Secondly, swine wallow in the mire all day long and delight in it: so too lascivious women find pleasure in nothing but wantonness and immodesty. "It is characteristic of pigs, says the author of the Imperfect Work on Matthew, homily 17, to wallow in the mire, never to look up to heaven, nor to seek their master:" so too immodest women, cast into the mire of pleasures, never look up to heaven, never think of God their Lord and Avenger.
Thirdly, swine are exceedingly prone to sexual indulgence, as Aristotle attests in book 6 of the History of Animals, chapter 18: so too are lascivious women. Again, the sow is a foul, gluttonous, and filthy animal. Whence Cicero, book 2 of On the Nature of the Gods: "What does a pig have, he says, besides food? To which indeed, lest it rot, Chrysippus says a soul was given in place of salt." For this reason the eating of pork was forbidden to the Jews, Leviticus 11:7. See what was said there.
Fourthly, the sow is an animal both shameless and unteachable: such too is an immodest woman or harlot. Whence Aristophanes said that the sons of Hippocrates resembled swine, because they were ignorant and of manners not at all refined. And Pierius, Hieroglyphics 9, chapter 11: The sow, he says, is a hieroglyphic of unteachableness; for among the physiognomists, a porcine forehead, being short and bristly with hairs standing upward, is a most manifest sign of unteachableness. For the sow is the most brutish of animals, and no animal is more unteachable, since all other beasts have something in which, while they live, use or industry or frugality is of benefit. Hence the proverb: "A Boeotian sow," meaning very slow and stupid. Hence also among the ancients a pig was a propitiatory offering for delirium, as Pierius shows in the same place, chapter 19.
Finally, St. Chrysostom, in the Greek Chain, poses the question: "Why does God, the author of nature, endow a woman deprived of intellect with a beautiful appearance? Or why, when she was created beautiful, was she made foolish?" And he responds: "God sometimes grants beauty of form to women who are naturally foolish, lest women endowed with prudence and keen intellect admire the grace of a fine form more than is fitting; but rather that they set prudence and understanding above beauty of form, and pursue what is truly good and beautiful: so too He sometimes grants great wealth and resources to foolish men, so that the prudent, considering and admiring the gift of understanding which fools lack, may not lose heart on account of their lack of wealth, but diligently pursue what is truly good."
Wherefore the author of the Imperfect Work, homily 45 on Matthew, gives this sound advice to young men: "You therefore, young man, he says, when you wish to take a wife, do not seek a rich one, but one of good morals, because good morals frequently acquire riches, but riches never made good morals. And more glorious is the poverty of the faithful than the riches of sinners. Do not seek beauty, because it is written: As a golden earring in the nostrils of a pig, so is the beauty of a woman of bad morals. Because harlots please by their appearance, but matrons by their character."
This maxim is explained by an elegant fable of the peacock and the crow by St. Cyril, book 2 of the Moral Apologues, chapter 25, entitled: Against those who glory in the beauty of the flesh. "The peacock, he says, adorned with golden feathers and resplendent with plumed light, was pouring forth vain glory of itself before the crow, and was mocking it for the blackness of its feathers. The crow, soon deriding his madness, said: I see well that the rule of physiognomy does not fail in you. For because you have a small head for such a large body, you are therefore of lesser sense. Whence I am not surprised if in a volatile feather, which is seized and carried off by the wind, you have placed your glory as lightly as a feather; for all flesh is grass (Isaiah 40:6), and all its glory is like the flower of the field; for the beauty of the flower is the beauty of the flesh. It gleams indeed with the beauty of its material, but it does not endure with firmness, and with lightness it flies away as quickly as possible. Therefore you are mad to glory in a shadow; but just as a golden ring is in the nostrils of a filthy sow, so is the brightness of the flesh with the slothfulness of the mind. If therefore you glory in the beauty of the body, your very brightness will now blacken you, and your own beauty will deform you. For the beauty of the flesh has taken away the beauty of the mind, and the light of the body has banished the splendor of the soul." He then shows that this beauty is obscured and overwhelmed by a greater deformity. "I would praise you, if I did not see deformity in the substance of your form. For you have a serpentine head, a howling sound in your breast, a malevolent heart, and a foul foot. Is the beauty of vain flesh to be praised, when the mind itself is deformed by the defect of its substantial form? Far from it: for the more beautiful the flesh is, the more deformed the soul itself becomes. The true beauty therefore is the virtue of the mind, and the glorious comeliness is the brightness of reason. Having said these things, he dismissed the peacock, confounded by its own beauty, sad and sorrowful.
Tropologically, Abbot Nesteros in Cassian, Conference 14, chapter 16, applies this to learned men who live shamefully: "Concerning those, therefore, he says, who seem to acquire a certain image of knowledge, or those who, while they diligently apply themselves to the reading of sacred volumes and the memorization of Scriptures, nevertheless do not abandon carnal vices, it is elegantly expressed in Proverbs: As a golden ring in its nostrils, so is beauty to a woman of bad morals. For what does it profit anyone to attain the ornament of heavenly eloquence and that most precious beauty of the Scriptures, if by clinging to works or thoughts of mud he defiles it, as if kneading the most filthy earth, or pollutes it in the miry wallowing-places of his lusts?" So too St. Jerome on Ezekiel chapter 16, at the words: And I put a ring upon your nose. "When we are alive, he says, and it can be said of us: Not the dead shall praise You, O Lord, but we who are living; then God smells the odor of our sacrifice of good fragrance, and we have the golden ring of divine senses and doctrines in our nostrils. But when we are dead, and we wallow in the mire and filth of shameful deeds, we have that earring in our nostrils of which Solomon wrote: As a golden earring in the nostrils of a sow, so is beauty to a woman of bad morals." So also Salonius: "The golden ring, he says, is the ornament of knowledge, which he plunges into the mire like a sow, who soils it with impure action. For his soul is beautiful through knowledge, but foolish through action."
Again, the foolish and beautiful woman is the faithful soul, washed and whitened from sins in baptism or penance, which then, enticed by its former desires, returns to them, and fornicates with them as with lovers, just as washed swine return to the mud, according to that saying of St. Peter, Epistle 2, chapter 2, verse 22: "For it has happened to them according to the true Proverb: The dog has returned to its own vomit; and: The washed sow to the wallowing-place of mud." Where I have said much on this matter. For in these cases the golden ring, by which the devil seizes them, leads them about, and brings them back to their accustomed sins, is the memory of former loves, the vivid representation of past pleasures, and the recollection of seductive sweetness. For the devil stirs up and sharpens this, especially in the agony of death; whence it happens that many then sin through lingering delights and are damned. He who is wise, therefore, while he lives and is vigorous, should abolish these images and allurements from his mind through contrary imaginations, prayers, meditations on the virtues and on divine things, especially on the Passion of Christ, than which nothing is more efficacious.
Relevant here is the apophthegm of Rabbi Jose in Pirke Avoth, that is, in the Chapters of the Fathers: "Every day a certain voice went forth from Mount Horeb, not obscurely threatening woe to those men through whom damage or injury is inflicted upon the law; because truly whoever carelessly applies himself to the study of the law is utterly reprobate and unhappy, as Scripture says: A golden ring in its nostrils, a beautiful and foolish woman."
Finally, Salvian, at the beginning of book 4 of On the Governance of God: "What else is, he says, authority without the sublimity of merits but a title of honor without the man? Or what is dignity in one who is unworthy, but an ornament in the mud? What else is a holy name without merit, but an ornament in the mud? A golden ring, says the Wise Man, in its nostrils, a beautiful and foolish woman. And in us likewise the name of Christian is, as it were, a golden adornment: which if we use unworthily, it comes about that we seem to be swine with an ornament."
Verse 23: The Desire of the Just Is All Good
The Chaldean: the desire of the just is for good, the expectation of the wicked is for fury; in Hebrew: the desire of the just is only good; but the expectation of the wicked is fury, or penetrating wrath; the Septuagint, instead of ebra, that is, fury, reading with different vowel points abera, that is, it has passed, translate: but the hope of the wicked shall pass away, that is, shall perish; the Scholiast: shall depart. It is a metonymy: for desire is called the thing desired, that is, what the just desire; the expectation of the wicked is what the wicked await and expect.
The sense is, as if to say: The desire of the just is directed toward all good, that is, toward everything honorable, toward every virtue; the just desire nothing other than to do good. So Polychronius in the Greek Chain. But the wicked await and expect to be able to conduct themselves furiously, to pour out their anger and fury upon others; for the anger by which one exceeds measure is called ebra, that is, fury, because it transgresses (abar) the limits of reason, says Aben-Ezra. Or, as others say, because it pervades, inflames, and devastates everything like fire. Whence Baynus, and from him our Salazar, translate: the desire of the just is all good, and explain it thus: The just desire nothing except to do good, and where the power is lacking, the desire to do good is present and is sharpened; on the contrary, the expectation of the wicked, that is, their anticipation and desire, is fury, that is, the pursuits of the wicked are of a far different kind; for their expectation is fury. Expectation here is also taken for desire, namely, the wishes of the wicked, proceeding from fury and anger, most eagerly desire the destruction of others. And so just as pious and just men desire to confer more good than they actually bestow, and compensate with wishes for what is lacking in ability, so too the wicked desire to inflict more evil than they actually inflict, and far surpass in desire the ability to do evil; and therefore they subject themselves to greater punishments than those which correspond to the damage actually inflicted. Hence the saying: "The whole life of the just man is a desire for good," because they desire to do nothing but good, they hunger and thirst for nothing but good, according to the saying: "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice," Matthew 5. Such was Daniel, who is therefore called a man of desires; and therefore he merited to understand the 70 weeks of the coming of Christ, Daniel chapter 9:23 and chapter 10:19. See St. Bernard, epistle 10, where among other things he says: "The desire of pilgrimage will be changed into the fullness of love, etc. And just as faith leads to full knowledge, so desire leads to perfect love."
Tropologically, from this maxim learn that the practice of growing in every virtue and merit is easy, if you conceive frequent and ardent desires for them. For through these desires we conceive, strengthen, and increase within the soul any virtue whatsoever, even one which we cannot externally exercise on account of poverty, infirmity, or some other deficiency. For example, a poor man who has an efficacious and great desire to give alms, if he had the means, acquires the virtue of almsgiving, and through that desire alone merits as much or more than the rich man who gives alms out of habit. A sick man who cannot fast or wear hairshirts should desire to do so. A religious, bound to a certain office by obedience, should desire to perform all the other duties that others discharge; should desire to preach effectively, to teach, to hear confessions, to visit the sick, to preach to the Indians, etc., if it were permitted, and offer these desires to God: for God will hold these desires as pleasing as if he had completed those works. That this is so, St. Paul teaches, 2 Corinthians 8:12: "For if, he says, the willing mind is ready, it is accepted according to what a man has, not according to what he does not have;" by these words signifying to us that God looks more to a ready will than to the gift itself. The reason for this is that the perfection and merit of almsgiving and of any other virtue whatsoever consists in the readiness of the will, not likewise in the multitude and magnitude of works. Whence St. Augustine on Psalm 105: "God, he says, crowns a good will, when He does not find the ability." And St. Bernard, epistle 77: "God, he says, undoubtedly grants to a good will what is lacking in ability." St. Thomas gives the a priori reason, I-II, Question 20, article 2: "Because, he says, the entire formal goodness of the exterior work depends on the goodness of the interior act, because it is elicited by the will." Whence it follows that if we desire to please God and to merit much, we should frequently conceive pious desires of performing good works, and also apply good intentions not only to the works which we intend to do, but also to those which we will not do, not indeed from a defect of good will, but of ability. The readier this good will is, the more abundant a harvest of spiritual fruits it will produce, as Blessed Bernard attests. You merit as much as you will; and as your good will grows, merit likewise grows.
Symbolically, Lyranus: The desire of the just is all good, that is, God Himself, in whom all good exists eminently, and who is good and goodness by essence. Whence Christ, when addressed by someone saying: "Good Master, what good shall I do that I may have eternal life?" responds: "Why do you ask Me about the good? One is good, God." And David: "As the deer longs for the fountains of waters, so my soul longs for You, O God. My soul has thirsted for the strong living God; when shall I come and appear before the face of God?" Psalm 41:2.
St. Bernard, sermon 84, explaining Song of Songs 3: In my bed through the nights I sought him whom my soul loves. "It is a great good, he says, to seek God. I consider this second to nothing among the goods of the soul. It is the first among gifts, the last among advances; it yields place to no virtue, none yields to it. To what would it yield? Nothing precedes it. What would precede it? It is the consummation of all; for what virtue can be ascribed to one who does not seek God, or what limit to one who seeks God? Seek, he says, His face always. I believe that even when He shall have been found, one will not cease from seeking. God is sought not by steps of the feet, but by desires. And surely a happy finding does not extinguish holy desire, but extends it. Is the consummation of joy the consumption of desire? It is rather oil to it: the flame itself now. So it is. Joy will be fulfilled, but there will be no end of desire, and therefore neither of seeking." The same, in his treatise On Loving God, speaking of the embrace of the bridegroom and the bride, namely of Christ and the holy soul: "Hence, he says, that satiety without disgust. Hence that insatiable curiosity without restlessness. Hence that eternal and inexplicable desire knowing no want. Hence finally that sober and true inebriation, not gorging on unmixed wine; not soaked with wine, but burning with God."
Anagogically, the desire of the just tends toward the good, namely toward heavenly beatitude, which is the totality of all good. "The expectation of the wicked is fury," that is, what the wicked await, the lot that is to befall them and that they must expect, is fury, that is, the wrath and vengeance of God in hell, penetrating to the inmost parts not only of the body but also of the soul, burning and tormenting. So Rabbi Solomon, Hugo, Dionysius, and others.
Whence St. Bernard, sermon 5 for the Vigil of the Nativity of the Lord: "Our desires, he says, seem to be principally established in three things: what is fitting, what is expedient, what is delightful," namely there is a threefold desire: for the honorable good, for the useful good, for the delightful good. And he teaches that this is to be fulfilled only in heaven; for there is "the supreme good, he says, the supreme utility, the supreme glory, the supreme pleasure. And this indeed is our expectation in the meantime, and the vision of majesty promised to us, so that God may be all in all, everything pleasant, everything useful, everything honorable." The same in his Sentences: "Threefold, he says, is the desire of the elect. To dwell together in one house. Whence the saying: One thing I have asked of the Lord. To obtain victory over the world. Whence the saying: Who will deliver me from the body of this death? To enjoy God's presence. Whence also that saying: I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ."
Verse 24: Some Distribute Their Own Goods and Become Richer
In Hebrew: there is one who scatters, and yet more is added; there is one who withholds from uprightness, yet indeed to his own deficiency; Vatablus: there is one who scatters his goods, and his goods increase the more; and one who spares his goods more than is right, but to poverty, that is, but he is oppressed by penury and want. Our translator takes 'withholds from uprightness' as meaning one who departs from justice and does unjust things in order to accumulate wealth; whence he translates: others seize what is not theirs; the Septuagint: there are those who sow their own goods (Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion: scattering) and make more; but there are those who gather (the goods of others, adds the Author of the Greek Chain) and are diminished; the Chaldean: there is one who scatters, and again it is added to him; want shall be his who departs from uprightness; the Syriac: there is one who sows his own and brings in much; there is one who gathers what is not his own, and it is little to him. The Syriac therefore agrees with our translator.
The sense is clear. For he contrasts the generous man with the miser: that the generous man distributes his own goods, is beneficent to all, and gives much alms, and yet does not thereby become poorer but richer; while the miser, hoarding his wealth and increasing and accumulating it by fair means and foul, through frauds, usury, and unjust contracts by which he seizes the goods of others, does not thereby become richer but poorer. He gives the reason through a comparison with sowing, as the Septuagint translates. For almsgiving and beneficence are like sowing. Just as a farmer who casts seed receives for one grain or measure twenty, thirty, indeed sometimes sixty and a hundred, when he gathers a copious harvest, so likewise the beneficent man who scatters his wealth among the needy casts as it were seeds, from which, being multiplied, he receives from God a great abundance of both temporal and spiritual goods with enormous interest. But the miser is like a granary in which grain is stored, where it contracts mold, is corrupted, is gnawed by mice, and thus gradually diminishes, producing no fruit: for so too the hoarded wealth of misers, God cursing it, gradually perishes, diminishes, and is consumed. This is what St. Paul teaches, 2 Corinthians 9:6: "He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly; and he who sows in blessings will also reap from blessings," etc., where I have said more on this subject. See also St. Chrysostom, homily That Almsgiving Is the Most Profitable of All Arts. Many examples of this you will find in Leontius, in the Life of St. John the Almsgiver, Patriarch of Alexandria.
This therefore is the paradox of the faithful, but one that is divine and most true: "Almsgiving enriches, hoarding impoverishes; what you give, you acquire; what you retain, you lose; by spending you accumulate wealth, by storing you diminish it." This saying, like others, signifies not what always happens, but what frequently happens; for sometimes we see the contrary occur, namely misers becoming wealthy and the generous becoming poor: but then God compensates the poverty of temporal things with an abundance of spiritual gifts. So Basil in the Greek Chain.
Cyril graphically represents this insane unhappiness of plunderers with the following fable of the wolf and the ox, book 3 of the Moral Apologues, chapter 15: "A rapacious wolf, wandering about in idleness, seeing an ox after the yoke of labor and service, feeding on grass, mowing it with the sickle of his tongue, soon came to him and said: What is this, that so powerful an animal, armed with sharp horns, not only tolerates from man the yoke of the heaviest servitude, but, what is worse, after the burden of such heavy labor, you live on the vilest food? Certainly if nature had given me, beyond my art of cunning and the strength of my teeth, such great bodily power, I would feast on good meats even without labor, so that I would disdain to eat even a donkey. But the ox, having ruminated on this statement, is said to have responded: O if you would weigh on the scale of reason the good of innocence, the fruit of meekness, the advantage of equity, and the honor of peace, and would balance the guilt of hostile rapacity with more diligent circumspection, you would surely see what a great calamity it is to rage hostilely and to live rapaciously, since a most wicked life is the plague of miserable youth. For when one lives wickedly, the nobler life of true virtue is destroyed; and the life that remains, since vital calamity lives in it, becomes a death worse than death, and thus true life is condemned through itself. Why therefore do you glory that you live in the wickedness of idle rapacity?" And concluding, he adds: "For every thief has a most filthy mind, a will friendly to discord, a gall-filled will, civility's rival, a most ferocious life. Therefore to bear the yoke is the sweetest burden of virtue for me, and the stormy freedom at the expense of others, and the slavery of viciousness, is for you. For it is dearer to me to eat hay from the labor of justice, than to eat a kid violently from the crime of avarice. Having heard this, the wolf departed, confounded."
Verse 25: The Soul That Blesses Shall Be Made Fat
In Hebrew: the soul of blessing shall be made fat; and he who irrigates, he himself also is iore, that is, rain, that is, by doing good to others he causes rain upon his own crops, so that they become most joyful and most abundant. For by his beneficence he merits that God should send rain upon his crops and bless, prosper, and multiply all his goods. The reason is that God gives wealth to the worthy; and he is worthy of wealth who knows how to use it; and those who know how to use it well are those who are beneficent and distribute it to the needy. Our translator, as well as others in Pagninus's Lexicon, takes iore by metathesis for iirue, that is, he shall be irrigated and inebriated; for this equally corresponds to marue, that is, he who irrigates and inebriates. "Inebriates," that is, generously bestows alms; thus inebriation is taken for satiety, abundance, and plenty. Psalm 35:9; Canticle 5:1; Proverbs 5:19. It is a metonymy: for the effect is put for the cause; for from an abundance of things follows inebriation. Whence he translates: "And he who satisfies the poor, he himself shall be satisfied," because, as it is said in chapter 19, verse 17: "He who has mercy on the poor lends to God, and He will repay him his reward."
Some take 'blesses' properly as meaning 'prays well for,' as if to say: He who wishes good things for others, in return others pray well for him, and God Himself blesses him. But this is too narrow: "Blesses" therefore means does good, whether by praying well, or by distributing one's goods, or by suggesting counsel, or by teaching, or in any other way. He gives the reason for what he said in the previous verse: "Some distribute their own goods and become richer," namely because he who blesses others, that is, does good to them, is enriched and made wealthy by God with goods both spiritual and temporal; and he who satisfies and as it were inebriates others with his resources, in turn will be inebriated by God, that is, will be abundantly enriched. He alludes to springs and rivers; for as much water flows down from springs below, so much flows into them from above; and as much as rivers pour down when the cataracts are opened, so much rain pours into them from above. For the beneficent and charitable man is like a spring and well that continually bubbles up, overflows, and pours forth benefits, as St. Basil teaches on Luke 12: "I will tear down my barns." Whence Chrysostom, homily 23 on Acts: "Springs, he says, from which irrigating water is drawn, must arise in the highest places. Therefore let us too be sublime in spirit, and immediately mercy will flow forth. For it cannot be that a lofty soul which despises riches should not also be merciful," according to the saying: "The springs of divine rivers are on high."
Another fruitful comparison is supplied by Clement of Alexandria, book 3 of the Pedagogue, chapter 7: Just as, he says, milk tends to flow to the breasts that are suckled or milked, so too riches will flow to those who distribute them. Wherefore Blessed Peter Chrysologus, sermon 104: "Be, he says, rich in mercy, if you wish always to be rich. And then your barns will be larger, then full, if they are not emptied by generosity, but enclosed by greed."
Moreover, this maxim has more application in spiritual goods than in temporal ones, as experience teaches. Whence the Chaldean, for 'he who inebriates shall himself be inebriated,' translates: he who teaches, he himself also will learn. Thus we see that doctors, preachers, confessors, etc., who generously pour out their gifts of the Holy Spirit upon others, are more copiously watered and inebriated by the same Holy Spirit; and the more generous they are toward their neighbor out of love of God, the more generous they find God to be in return toward them. Whence St. Gregory, part 3 of the Pastoral, chapter 26, explains 'the soul that blesses shall itself be made fat' thus: "For he who blesses externally by preaching, internally receives the fatness of increase; and while he does not cease to inebriate the minds of his hearers with the wine of eloquence, he himself grows, inebriated by the drink of multiplied gifts." Relevant here is Bede in the Collectanea, who among three riddles proposes this first: "What is that woman who extends her breasts to innumerable children, and the more she is suckled, the more she overflows?" and responds: "That woman is wisdom." The second: "Where is the soul of man when men sleep? In three places: either in the heart, or in the blood, or in the brain." The third: "What are the three friends and enemies without which no one can live? Fire, water, and iron."
Mystically, 'blesses' implies that the almsgiver is a mystical priest, who blesses the needy with his mouth, and even more with his hand. Thus Paul teaches, 2 Corinthians chapter 9, verse 12, that almsgiving is a sacrifice, of which the victim is the wealth distributed, the altar is the poor, the priest is the almsgiver, the immolation is the distribution, and the one distributing them, for example Paul, is the Deacon. St. Chrysostom teaches the same more extensively, homily 20 on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians.
Moreover, the Septuagint departs entirely in a different direction and plainly disagrees with the Hebrew, Chaldean, and Latin; for they have it thus: blessed is every simple soul; but a spirited man is not comely; or, as the author of the Greek Chain: but an angry man is disordered; others: unseemly, or dishonorable; for this is the Greek ouk euschemon, which St. Chrysostom, homily 17 on John, expounds thus, as if to say: A sincere soul, free from guile and pretense, as well as modest and gentle, is blessed and dear to God; but a spirited or angry man is not comely or seemly, because he puts on an unseemly and ugly face, unseemly cries, and unseemly actions and gestures of anger. St. Basil beautifully represents this ugliness of the face in anger, in his homily On Anger. Finally, the Syriac translates by antithesis: the soul that blesses shall be blessed; the soul that curses shall be cursed.
Verse 26: He Who Hides Grain Shall Be Cursed
In Hebrew: upon him who withholds grain, the people will pronounce a curse; St. Ambrose, book 3 of On Duties, chapter 6: he who manipulates the price of grain (St. Cyprian: he who corners the market) is cursed among the people; Aquila: the peoples will curse him; Symmachus and Theodotion: cursed by the people; St. Chrysostom, homily 39 on the First Epistle to the Corinthians: he who raises the price of grain is to be abhorred by the people; the Septuagint, however: he who withholds grain, let him leave it to the nations; and the Chaldean: he who withholds grain in time of necessity will leave it to his heirs. Misers are accustomed, in time of famine, to hide grain, or even to buy it up, so that as the famine grows they may sell it more dearly: the result is that the price of grain increases, and the poor suffer hunger, and sometimes die of starvation. This is certainly inhumane, and a grave sin against charity and legal justice. This therefore is what Solomon attacks here. Those who do this are called grain hoarders and Dardanarii, after a certain Dardanus who suppressed the grain supply in order to sell it more dearly, against whom Ulpian wrote in the law Annonam, concerning Extraordinary Crimes.
And St. Gregory Nazianzen, oration 15: "What shall we say to these things, he says, we who buy and sell grain, and watch for difficult times, in order to acquire wealth for ourselves, and to take delight in the calamities of others, and not, like Joseph, to manage the resources of the Egyptians for the sake of a greater dispensation (for he knew both, namely both how to collect rightly and how to distribute grain rightly; just as he also knew how to foresee famine and to resist it from afar); but in order, as wicked and villainous men, to acquire the wealth of our fellow citizens?"
And Isidore of Pelusium, book 1, epistle 81: "Some say, he says, that you are a certain insatiable, cruel, and savage Dardanarius, that is, a grain dealer, who watches the times and seizes from people's poverty an occasion for profit, and gathers a harvest from calamities. Wherefore, considering this with yourself, that others need not so much your resources as you need God's help, let kinship move you." And Apollonius the grain dealer, epistle 85: "The earth, he says, is the mother of all; for she is just. But you, since you are unjust, have made her your mother alone, and unless you desist, I will see to it that you are not permitted to dwell upon her."
More fully and forcefully, St. Ambrose, book 3 of On Duties, chapter 6, exaggerates the enormity of this vice: "Why, he says, do you turn the indulgence of nature to fraud? Why do you begrudge to human use the public harvests? Why do you diminish the abundance for the people? Why do you seek to create want? Why do you cause the poor to wish for barrenness? For since they do not feel the benefits of fertility, while you raise the price, while you hide the grain, they prefer that nothing be born rather than that you should profit from public famine. You court a shortage of grain, a scarcity of food, you groan at the earth's rich harvests, you weep at public fertility, you lament the full granaries of crops, you search out when the yield will be more barren, when the harvest more meager, and you rejoice that your wishes have been met with a curse, that nothing anywhere should be born. Then you rejoice that your harvest has arrived, then you heap up wealth for yourself from the misery of all; and you call this industry, you call this diligence, which is the cunning of craftiness, the shrewdness of fraud? And you call this a remedy, which is a device of wickedness? Shall I call this robbery or usury? The times are seized upon as for robbery, in which as a harsh plotter you creep into the very bowels of men." And further: "Rightly therefore Solomon says: He who withholds grain will leave it to the nations, not to his heirs, because the profit of avarice does not reach the rights of successors. What is not legitimately acquired is scattered, as if by certain winds, by strangers who plunder it. And he added: He who corners the grain market is cursed among the people; but a blessing is on the head of him who shares. You see therefore that it is fitting to be a generous provider of grain, not a manipulator of prices. This is therefore no advantage, in which more is taken from honor than is added to profit."
Memorable is what Trithemius, Cochlaeus, Genebrardus, Munsterus, Demochares, and others report, whom our Serarius cites, book 4 of the History of Mainz, chapter 1, concerning Hatto, Archbishop of Mainz, around the year of the Lord 970, namely that he greedily hoarded grain and called the poor 'mice,' and allowed them to die of hunger like mice; and therefore, by the just vengeance of God, he was attacked by mice, and fled to the tower which is still seen in the middle of the Rhine and is called by many the 'Tower of Mice,' and there was killed and devoured by the pursuing mice. Although Serarius in the same place contends that this story is a fable. By Dardanarii grain-hoarders of Straten, Blessed Charles, Count of Flanders, son of St. Canute, King of Denmark and martyr, was killed in the year of Christ 1127, because he opposed their avarice and compelled them to sell their grain in time of famine; the place of his death has been shown at Bruges in Flanders, where he is venerated as a martyr; for God declared his sanctity by many miracles and punished his killers with severe retribution. So Molanus in the Natales of the Saints of Belgium, on March 2, and Aimonius, book 5 of The Deeds of the Franks, chapter 5. A recent Life of his exists, published in Paris, in the year of the Lord 1615.
Moreover, because grain hoarders bring about famine by monopolizing the common food supply, the people execrate them as public plagues, devote them to curses, and not infrequently in an uprising plunder them, indeed kill and tear them apart. Noteworthy is the version of the Septuagint and the Chaldean: he who withholds grain, let him leave (the Chaldean and the author of the Greek Chain: he will leave, in the future tense) it to the nations. By which words Solomon either wishes or predicts that grain greedily stored by the miser will be distributed to the peoples: for this is what the miser's avarice deserves, and the nature of grain equally demands this: for God created it so that peoples and the poor might be fed by it. The author of the Greek Chain reads: he who withholds grain is compelled to leave it to the Gentiles and unbelievers; and by 'Gentiles' he understands the demons, who are the heirs of the avaricious, and invade and scatter their goods. And mystically he expounds it thus: "The grain is the word of God, which, while the Jews strive to hide it, has been given to the Gentiles who practice His justice." So indeed it often happens by the just vengeance of God, as St. Chrysostom teaches, homily 39 on 1 Corinthians: "Many, he says, have emptied even entire casks, and did not give so much as vinegar to the poor; they poured all the vinegar made from wine on the ground and ruined their casks together with the wine. Others again, though they did not share even a morsel with the hungry, threw whole bins of grain into the river; and because they did not listen to God commanding them to give to the needy, at the bidding of the weevil they unwillingly poured out whatever was inside, to their ruin and utter destruction."
BUT A BLESSING UPON THE HEAD OF THOSE WHO SELL. — The Septuagint: upon the head of him who shares; St. Cyprian: upon the head of him who distributes, that is, upon the head of him who makes others partakers of his wealth; the Author of the Greek Chain: favor and blessing upon the head of him who distributes, as if to say: He who distributes grain in time of famine obtains the grace, favor, and blessing of God and men; for all bless and applaud him, all praise and celebrate him.
Mystically, St. Gregory, part 3 of the Pastoral, chapter 26: "To hide grain, he says, is to keep to oneself the words of holy preaching; in the peoples, however, such a one is cursed, because by the sole fault of his silence he will be condemned in punishment for the many whom he could have corrected." Salonius copies the very words of St. Gregory and adds: "Those sell grain who announce the words of life to their hearers. What price do they receive from them? The price of faith and holy confession. How will the blessing come upon their heads? Because to each of them the Lord will say: Well done, good and faithful servant, because you have been faithful in a few things, enter into the joy of your Lord." So Salonius. Bede has the same word for word; whence Salonius appears to have copied these and certain other things from Bede. For Bede is more expansive, and these things have the flavor of Bede's style. Therefore this Salonius does not appear to be that ancient disciple of Salvian, and son of St. Eucherius, who was afterward made Bishop of Lyon around the year of the Lord 440; for Bede was far later than St. Eucherius, for he flourished around the year of the Lord 730. This Salonius must therefore be someone else.
Drawing many curses upon their own head along with this loss. But they themselves by no means go unpunished." For Chrysostom adds: "For just as these men throw into the rivers grain that has been eaten by the weevil and rendered useless, so God will cast into the river of fire those who have done this, having been made useless for this very reason. For just as the weevil and worm consume grain, so cruelty and inhumanity consume the souls of the just." The weevil (curculio) is a small animal that gnaws on grain and eats out its marrow: it is called curculio, as if gurgulio (gullet), because in it almost nothing else is seen but throat, says Varro.
Verse 27: He Who Seeks Good Rises Well at Dawn
For 'rises at dawn,' the Hebrew is schocher, that is, dawning, rising early, going early, that is, rising in the morning, seeking in the morning, doing something in the morning; for in the morning people are accustomed to attend to their affairs and conduct their business. For 'well,' the Hebrew is tob, that is, good (neuter), or good (masculine), as Aquila, Aben-Ezra, Rabbi Solomon, and Rabbi Levi translate. But our translator took tob adverbially for latob, that is, for good, that is, well; or more simply he took tob as masculine, as if to say: "A good man who rises early, that is, rises well at dawn, is he who seeks good." The sense therefore is, as if to say: He who in the morning, when he rises, conceives, investigates, seeks, and determines good works to perform throughout the course of the whole day, this man surely rises well, because he begets and prepares for himself great merits, by which he wins the grace of God and men; whence the Hebrew has: he who seeks good in the morning seeks favor, or good grace, as Aquila and the Septuagint translate; but he who is an investigator of evils, that is, he who in the morning thinks, schemes, and investigates evils to work during the day, this man surely rises badly, because to his own harm: for the evils he plots will fall back on his own head and overwhelm him: just as Saul, seeking the witch of Endor, received from her the news of his defeat and death, says Lyranus.
Whence Aquila clearly translates: the morning rising of the good man seeks good grace, as if to say: When a good man rises in the morning, he seeks to do good works by which he may merit the grace of God and men; and the Chaldean: he who rises at dawn for good, seeks favor; he who seeks evil, it will come upon him; the Syriac: he who seeks good seeks favor; the Septuagint: he who fashions good things seeks good grace, of God and men; him who pursues evil, evils will seize. Explaining which, the author of the Greek Chain says: "By those who fashion good things in their heart, he designates those who suggest things that lead to good; and likewise those who urge those in need of discipline to embrace it; for such receive grace from the Lord."
Moreover, our Salazar narrows this, as he does many other things in this chapter, to almsgiving and beneficence. Whence he explains it thus: "He who seeks grace rises well at dawn," namely he who by generous gifts and favors strives to gain the goodwill of others; "well," that is, not in vain, not for nothing, not gratuitously or without reward, he rises at dawn to bestow benefits. Rising in the morning to give, however, is to be referred to timeliness. For timeliness greatly increases benefits and gifts; for a gift quickly and seasonably given is in a certain way double (as we have said elsewhere). On the contrary: "He who is an investigator of evils shall be overwhelmed by them." This part must be stitched to the preceding part thus: namely, to him who prepares not benefits but evils for others, it will happen otherwise; for the evils he intends for others will return upon him more abundantly. This exposition is apt, but too narrow and does not fully match Solomon's meaning; for Solomon speaks of any good whatsoever and of any virtue. For many are poor who cannot give alms, and yet they can and should determine upon some other good in the morning and work at it throughout the day.
Again, it is the mark of the wise man to devote the morning not so much to almsgiving as to wisdom and to God through prayer, meditation, and study, as Solomon admonished in chapter 8, verse 34, and Moses in Deuteronomy 6:7, and David saying: "O God, my God, to You I watch from the light," Psalm 62:2. Whence teachers teach in the morning, and students learn arts and sciences; for in the morning the mind and intellect are most vigorous. Therefore Pagninus translates: he who seeks good seeks what is pleasing to God; and he who seeks evil, it will come to him. So also Vatablus. Hence also Rabbi Solomon translates and explains it thus: the good watchman, who strives to lead mortals into the right path and reproves and instructs them, this man seeks good things, that is, he desires to merit divine benevolence for himself; the Zurich Bible translates thus: he who early pursues good finds what he desires; but he who seeks evil, it will happen to him.
Rabbi Levi explains it in this way: He rises well at dawn, etc., that is, he who is good and diligently pursues the good is acceptable to God, so that he may enjoy what is good; for since man has been so constituted by God that he eagerly desires good things, therefore without doubt he will attain the end he desires; but he who is an investigator of evils, etc., that is, he who desires evil will be overwhelmed by evil. For things will turn out otherwise than he had planned; for what he was plotting against others will fall back upon himself, and he will be entangled in the nets which he had secretly prepared for others."
Jansenius also comes close to this, who instead of 'seeks good,' reading from the Hebrew 'seeks favor,' takes it, together with the Zurich Bible, as referring to what is pleasing, agreeable, and delightful to the doer; as if to say: Whoever rises in the morning to pursue the good, this man surely seeks that which, when he has obtained it, will be most pleasing and delightful to himself; otherwise the man who, out of eagerness to do evil, investigates new schemes of wickedness; for on account of the evil which he so eagerly pursues, when it comes to pass, he will grieve most deeply.
A good and upright man therefore, from the good resolutions he conceives in the morning, is always calm and joyful, because he spends his day in good and holy, and therefore joyful and glad, works; but the wicked man, from his evil machinations, spends his entire day in evil and wickedness, and therefore in sadness and anxiety. Solomon therefore signifies that at dawn when we rise, the mind should immediately be raised to God, that He may suggest and inspire what is pleasing to Him, and that the mind should form from these things good resolutions of virtue, says Lyranus, for example, of beneficence, humility, mortification, patience, etc., which one should carry out during the day; and should seek the ways and means by which one may more please God, and therefore should determine upon some heroic works of self-conquest and perfection, which one may exercise that day for the glory of God, by which one may greatly honor and delight God, sanctify oneself, and edify one's neighbors. For upon the morning resolutions, if they are efficacious and ardent, depends the happy and holy course of the entire day. Whence the wise and those devoted to virtue are accustomed to arrange in the morning the works of the whole day, namely what they will do at each hour, and to prescribe for themselves the manner of doing it, and then to offer everything to God, that these things may be pleasing to Him and that He Himself may direct and prosper them. On the contrary, the wicked, at the instigation of the devil, in the morning plot and plan frauds and crimes which they will carry out during the day, by which the devil is fed, they themselves become more wicked, and they drag others into the same crimes by word and example; but the end of the latter is hell, of the former, beatitude.
Whence the Gloss expounds it anagogically thus: "He rises well at dawn who seeks good, etc., that is, he will rise to life at the time of resurrection, because now he does good things in the time of working; but he who searches for evil things to say or do is held back from higher things by their weight." Wherefore Abbot Silvanus in the Lives of the Fathers, book 7, chapter 43 (I follow the edition of our Heribert Rosweyde), used to teach that in the morning one should think of every virtue: "Rising in the morning, he says, let him take the beginning of wisdom in every virtue and in every commandment of God, in great patience and long-suffering and in the charity of God, with humility of soul and body, in prayer and supplication, with groaning, with purity of heart and eyes, and custody of the tongue, etc. Think every day that death is near, and as though already enclosed in a tomb, be concerned with nothing of this world. Fasting from food, humility, and mourning, let them not depart from you. Let the fear of the Lord remain in you at every hour. Watch over these things, therefore, and whatever other virtue there is in them." And book 5, section 1, number 8, Abbot John says: "Every day, he says, rising in the morning, take a beginning from every virtue, and keep the commandment of God in great patience with fear and long-suffering, in tribulation of heart and watchfulness, in much prayer and supplications, with groaning, in purity and cleanness of tongue, and custody of the eyes, bearing injury and not growing angry, peaceful and not rendering evil for evil, not attending to the vices of others, nor exalting yourself; but be subject and more humble than every creature; renouncing every material thing, and those things which are according to the flesh, in suffering, in struggle, in humility of spirit, in fasting, in weeping, in labors, enclosing yourself in a tomb as though already dead, so that death may seem near to you every day.
Verse 28: He Who Trusts in His Riches Shall Fall
The word 'green' is not in the Hebrew, but our translator supplies it. The Septuagint translates: but he who clings to the just shall exanathelesei. Which the Complutensian translates: shall arise; the Roman: shall sprout; Vatablus: the just shall flourish like a tree adorned with foliage. The sense is clear, as if to say: He who confidently and arrogantly places his hopes in his riches rather than in God, and on account of them presumes all things securely and proudly, this man shall fall; in Hebrew: shall fall, namely as a dry leaf falls from a tree: both because riches are unstable, they fall and perish, so that he who today is rich may tomorrow be poor; he who today is Cyrus may tomorrow be Irus, and poorer than Irus; and because riches cannot resist the many hardships and tribulations, and especially the wrath and vengeance of God, according to Sirach 5:10: "Do not be anxious about unjust riches; for they will not profit you in the day of calamity and vengeance."
BUT THE JUST SHALL FLOURISH LIKE A GREEN LEAF — because they place their hopes in God, who causes their works, like a green leaf, to sprout and produce the fruits of grace and glory that endure for all eternity; for an ever-green leaf, such as that of the cedar, laurel, and palm, represents the appearance of immortal and eternal life, says St. Ambrose on Psalm 1. Whence Lyranus: The just, he says, shall sprout like a green leaf, that is, they shall advance from good to better, just as from the stem of a leaf a bud sprouts, from the bud a flower, from the flower a fruit, for example an apple, a nut, a pear. Whence Rabbi Levi: "Just as, he says, a shoot is born beneath a leaf, so the just shall put on a shoot, to bring forth the fruits which they had hoped for from God." And Cajetan: The just man, he says, will imitate a tree bringing forth leaves, because just as a tree produces green leaves, so he begets innumerable children as imitators and followers of his justice. I take 'just' in a general sense for any just and holy person; although our Salazar, in his customary fashion, narrows 'just' to the charitable giver, whose green leaf is the hope of blessed immortality; so that the sense would be, as if to say: Just as a tree warmed by the heat of spring puts forth green leaves, so the generous and merciful man (for by the name 'just' he is designated, as I have frequently noted elsewhere), warmed by the heat of charity and the fervor of mercy, will put forth hope in flourishing, as it were, vernal leaves.
St. Chrysostom on that saying of the Apostle, 'There must always be heresies': "Just as a root, he says, planted in rich soil produces timely fruits and leaves each year, so too money planted in the hands of the poor produces for us not only each year, but even each day, spiritual fruits and leaves: namely confidence in God, departure from sins, a good conscience, spiritual joy, pleasant hope, and the good things which God has prepared for those who love Him." This is what Paul says, 1 Timothy chapter 6, verse 17: "Charge the rich of this world not to be high-minded, nor to trust in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God (who gives us all things abundantly to enjoy), to do good, to be rich in good works, etc., to lay up for themselves a good foundation for the future, that they may lay hold on eternal life." See what I have noted there.
Solomon alludes to that saying of his father David: "The just man shall flourish like a palm tree, and shall multiply like a cedar of Lebanon," Psalm 91:13. And that saying about the just man: "And he shall be like a tree planted near the streams of water, which shall give its fruit in its season; and its leaf shall not fall off, and all things whatsoever he shall do shall prosper," Psalm 1:3. In turn Isaiah alluded to this, chapter 35, verse 1: "The wilderness shall rejoice, etc., and shall flourish like a lily. Sprouting it shall sprout, and shall exult joyfully and praising: The glory of Lebanon is given to it, the beauty of Carmel and Sharon."
Here note first: Man is like an inverted tree, whose root, that is, the head, inclines upward toward heaven, from which he received reason and mind; the branches, that is, the feet, are on the earth. Secondly, the wicked are barren trees without foliage, flower, or fruit; but the just are fruit-bearing trees, and ever-green like the palm and olive. Thirdly, the leaves are the word of God, says St. Augustine on Psalm 1, or, as St. Ambrose says in the same place, they are the moral virtues of the pagans; the fruits are the Christian and divine virtues. Or, as Origen says, the fruits are justice and love of wisdom; the leaves are riches and other things that pertain to the use of life. Or, as Theodoret on Psalm 1, the flowers and leaves are the hope of beatitude; the fruit is beatitude itself. More simply, the fruits are the good works of charity and the virtues in this life, and of praise, glory, and confession to God in the next, namely in heaven. The just therefore, like palms, are always green with leaves and foliage, that is, with the freshness and vigor of soul and action, and with the modesty, grace, and beauty of external conduct, by which, like leaves to fruits, they adorn, cover, cherish, protect the interior virtues, and day by day elicit and bring forth new ones.
Fourthly, the just man possesses all these things because, like a tree, he is planted by the waters and streams of grace, of the law, and of the word of God, by which he is watered and drinks in perennial life-giving sap. So Theodoret and St. Athanasius in the same place. Hence fifthly, he always prospers, because he is ruled and governed by God. So Eusebius in the same place.
Symbolically, the tree of life is Christ raised on the cross, whose branches are the Apostles and apostolic men, and indeed all the faithful; the farmer is God the Father; the root is faith and wisdom; the leaves are hope and manifold prayer; the fruits are the elect who are saved, or the fruit is the blood and water flowing from the side of Christ, so that by the blood He might represent the martyrdom, and by the water the baptism He had instituted. The fruit of the cross flowered in the Patriarchs, sprouted in the Prophets, gave forth fragrance in the Incarnation, ripened in the Passion, and is eaten after the Resurrection. So St. Chrysostom on Psalm 1: "For the death of Christ has been turned into the interest of immortality." Wherefore Bede explains this verse of Solomon thus, as if to say: "He who trusts in riches, etc., that is, he who, gaping after present goods, does not think of future ones, will lack both in the last day; but those who, in hope of future rewards, do good things in the present, justly receive what they hope for. For a green leaf on a tree signifies that fruits, which it does not yet display, are to come; and the just sprout like a green leaf, because, made safe by hope, they do not cease to advance in the grace of faith and the virtues."
Verse 29: He Who Troubles His Own House Shall Inherit the Winds
In Hebrew: and the foolish servant serves the wise of heart; the Septuagint: he who does not conduct himself at home shall inherit the wind; and the imprudent shall serve the prudent; in Greek: me symperiferomenos, which others more aptly translate for the present matter: he who does not show himself easy and affable at home; about which more presently. For symperiferesthai signifies both to associate and to show oneself accommodating. The latter meaning is required here by the Hebrew ocher, that is, he who troubles his own house.
Now first, the Syriac translates and explains it thus: he who builds his house through oppression leaves sighs to his children; he who does not gather in his house divides winds to his children, as if to say: A father who gathers wealth through usury, fraud, and robbery, or squanders it — his patrimony will vanish into the wind, and he will leave his children no other inheritance than wind, that is, nothing.
Secondly, the Zurich Bible translates: he who troubles his house shall receive the wind as his inheritance; and the servant of a fool passes over to one wise of heart, as if to say: A master who vexes, scolds, beats, and starves his servants and maids will make them flighty, so that like the wind they flee from him and pass over to a prudent master who treats them kindly and humanely.
Thirdly, Vatablus: as if to say: He who troubles his house, that is, who squanders the family estate, in the end will have nothing, and the fool will be servant to the wise of heart, that is, whatever the fool possesses the wise man will come to have: the goods of the fool will fly away, as from an unworthy possessor, to the wise man, as to their rightful lord and master. Rabbi Levi adds: The word 'servant,' he says, signifies fortuitous events, as if to say: The works and labor of the fool will pass to the benefit of the wise man, according to the saying: "The unjust man prepares, but the just man shall be clothed."
Fourthly, Cajetan, as if to say: A cruel father, raging against his children, deprives himself of paternal authority over his children, either because the children flee from him, or because the ruler exempts them from the tyrannical power of the father: conversely, a wise father reduces a foolish and insolent son back into his power by his kindness.
Fifthly, the author of the Greek Chain from the Septuagint translates thus: he who does not show himself easy, accommodating, and affable to his household shall possess the winds; but he who lacks sense shall serve the prudent, and explains it thus: "He who is inflamed by every domestic inconvenience (blazes with anger, quarrels, shouts, etc.) will eventually be banished from his homeland, and will be humbled by the inclemency of the weather. Rather, an accommodating and frugal head of household should accommodate himself to everyone, as far as possible; he should, for example, show some indulgence to his wife as the weaker vessel, and gratify her in those things in which he lawfully can; he should take the greatest care not to cast his children into anger or sadness of spirit for a slight cause; he should relieve brothers pressed by poverty with help and assistance; he should administer justice and equality to his servants; and finally he should render to all what is fair and just, and strive earnestly to do all these things. By wind, moreover, one may understand the sickness of soul born from untimely anger. But the fool shall serve the prudent, for prudence, having strength, exerts itself to attract the foolish and turn them to its own use."
Sixthly and genuinely, as if to say: The foolish and stupid man who troubles his house, that is, his family, whether by vexing and scattering it with quarrels, brawls, and bad management, or by squandering the family estate through gluttony and luxury, this man shall inherit the wind, that is, he shall be reduced to nothing and the most extreme poverty, and therefore he himself, as a fool, will be compelled to serve the wise man who may manage his affairs, revenues, and estates, so that he may repair his poverty; or certainly the fool himself will employ a wise person as a servile administrator who may prudently manage his affairs, lest he slide further and further into ruin each day. This sentence, explained in this way, is adequate and contains, as I judge, the genuine sense of Solomon. For the whole verse is comprehended in these few words: The affairs of fools, through fools, pass over to the wise.
Verse 30: The Fruit of the Just Man Is a Tree of Life
The Chaldean: and the receiver of souls is wisdom; Cajetan: and he who captures souls is wisdom. "The tree of life" is the tree of life, or life-giving tree, such as was created in paradise to prolong man's life, Genesis 2:9. Now the tree of life is put for the fruit of the tree of life. For the words are to be aptly arranged thus, as if to say: The fruit of the just man is like the fruit of the tree of life, which the tree of life produced. For the tree of life mystically is wisdom and justice itself, and consequently the wise and just man himself: its fruits are just and holy works. The sense therefore is, as if to say: The just man is like the tree of life: for just as this tree, situated in the middle of paradise, produced sweet and pleasing fruits that would have prolonged man's life and conferred immortality, from which anyone was permitted to take as much as he wished — for the tree itself was accessible to all, and by the abundance and sweetness of its fruits invited and attracted all to itself — so likewise the just man by his wisdom and virtue produces sweet and pleasing fruits of justice, by which he wins eternal life and blessed immortality both for himself and for others whom he teaches justice by word and example, and offers them to all, and by them attracts and invites all to himself.
Therefore the just man who "wins souls," in Hebrew lokeach, that is, takes, that is, as Vatablus says, entices, attracts, and draws to himself and to God, this man is surely wise: for he is wise not only for himself but also for others, whom he instructs, justifies, and leads by the straight path to blessed eternity. Whence Pagninus translates: he who teaches souls is wise; for lacach sometimes means to teach: whence lecach is called doctrine, because the disciple receives and takes it from the mouth of the teacher. This is what Daniel says, chapter 12: "Those who instruct many unto justice shall shine like the stars for perpetual eternities." Again, to receive (suscipere) in Scripture is to help, direct, cherish, and protect, as is evident throughout the Psalms. Therefore to receive souls is to help them, and to direct them by every means and effort toward virtue and salvation.
Moreover, what the Septuagint, adding an antithesis about the wicked as is their custom, translates: from the fruit of justice is born the tree of life; but the souls of the wicked shall be taken away untimely; and the Syriac: the souls of the wicked shall be destroyed; and the Arabic: from the fruits of justice the tree of life shall be shaped; and the souls of those who turn from the law shall be removed before their time — these have a similar sense, as if to say: From justice, as from a seed, sprouts the tree of life, that is, the longevity and happiness of the present life, and the blessed eternity of the future life, similar to that which the eating of the fruit of the tree of life would have conferred: conversely, the wicked shall be taken from this life quickly and prematurely, before old age, indeed before manhood. For since life is given and prolonged by God for the purpose of practicing justice, he who does not practice it but lives wickedly, surely deserves to be deprived of life by God. A similar maxim was found in chapter 3:18, where it is said of wisdom, that is, justice: "She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her; and blessed is he who holds her fast." See what was said there.
Our Salazar again narrows this to almsgiving, as if to say: The just man, that is, the merciful man, in place of reward will receive the tree of life, that is, he will prolong his life no less than if he ate the fruit of the tree of life, daily redeeming the losses of his age as it slips away day by day. And he who wins souls is wise, as if to say: Therefore he who wins souls, that is, he who relieves many poor, who receives strangers and endows them with necessary benefits, etc., this man truly and from the heart is wise. This exposition is apt, but too narrow and not adequate, as is clear from what has been said.
Mystically, the author of the Greek Chain takes the tree of life as the perfect knowledge of God which is born from justice: From the product of justice is born the tree of life, that is, he says, "the end of the virtues is the fruit of justice; and the perfection of these is the knowledge of God, which is sometimes called the tree of life." See what I have said about the tree of life in chapter 3:18, Genesis 2:9, Revelation 2:7, and chapter 22:2.
Morally, learn here that it is the mark of the wise and holy person to receive souls even when burdened with sins, afflicted with hardships, oppressed by temptations, blinded by ignorance, entangled in anxieties and scruples, etc., and to relieve, console, strengthen, enlighten, free them, and restore them to God, to salvation, and to heaven. For even a single soul of the lowliest peasant, Indian, or barbarian is worth more and of greater price than heaven and earth and the entire universe. For the soul is the living image of God and of the Holy Trinity, created for His glory, to praise and celebrate Him forever: whereas the soul that is lost through sin perpetually execrates and blasphemes God and the Saints in hell. Thus Christ received all manner of souls, as their true Shepherd. Whence He Himself says in John 10:10: "I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down His life for His sheep." And St. Paul, Romans 15:7: "Wherefore receive one another, he says, as Christ also has received you to the honor of God."
So St. Ambrose received everyone, as his Life records: "Access to him was very easy, he says, even for the lowliest; the holy man was openly available to all who wished to speak with him; no one was prevented by doorkeepers from entering, indeed he did not even wish to be informed of anyone's arrival: he was accustomed to receive kindly all who came to him, to hear each person's affairs, to serve all needs and opportunities, to relieve the troubles of each, and to bear their miseries and infirmities." And further: "Whenever anyone confessed his falls to him in order to gain penance, he was so moved with compassion that, weeping for the sins of others as for his own, he would also move the penitent to tears, and the causes of the crimes which they confessed to him he spoke of to no one except the Lord before whom he interceded." So Paulinus in the Life of St. Ambrose. So he himself received St. Augustine, then a young Manichaean and one living with a concubine, when he converted him to the faith and to chastity. So he received the Emperor Theodosius after the massacre of the Thessalonians, saying: "You who followed him when he erred (David), follow him when he repents."
Remarkable in this matter was Vitalius, who every day, working with his hands, spent the wages of his labor on harlots, in order thereby to redeem them from their fornication, as Leontius, Bishop of Neapolis in Cyprus, reports in the Life of St. John the Almsgiver: "Entering the city, he says, he writes down all the known harlots, and began to do small jobs and to receive one siliqua per day. Therefore when the sun set, he would eat lupins worth one as. And he would enter to one of the harlots and give her copper coins, and would say: 'Give me this night, and do not fornicate.' And he would remain beside her that night, watching her lest she fornicate. So he would stand from evening in one corner of the room where the woman slept, singing psalms and praying for her and making genuflections until dawn, and on leaving he would receive a promise from her that she would tell no one of his conduct." So too St. Simeon, surnamed Salus (the Fool), used to redeem harlots from their fornication by paying them their fee, as the same Leontius reports in his Life: who adds that he had received from God the gift of chastity so exceptional that even while associating with harlots he was entirely devoid of any feeling of lust.
Verse 31: If the Just Man Receives His Due on Earth
Some expound this saying about the rewards of the just, as if they were opposed to the punishments of the unjust, as if to say: If God not only rewards the just in the future life but also heaps many gifts upon them in the present, how much more will He not only punish the wicked in hell but also torment them with many afflictions in this present life? Whence some Hebrews translate thus: the just man will have peace on earth. For the Hebrew word signifies both to make peace and to repay; the Chaldean: behold, the just man is strengthened on earth: but the wicked and sinners shall perish from the earth.
Better, others generally take this as referring to the tribulations of the just, as if to say: If the just are chastised with so many hardships in this life for slight and venial faults, how shall the wicked be punished for their most grievous crimes, not so much in this life as in hell? Whence the Septuagint, whom St. Peter follows, Epistle 2, chapter 4, verse 18, translate: if the just man is scarcely saved, where shall the wicked and the sinner appear? The Arabic: where shall the sinner appear? Cajetan: behold, the just man shall be corrected on earth; the Syriac: if the just man scarcely lives, where shall the wicked and the sinner be found? As if to say: If the just man, struggling through many tribulations, with great labor barely reaches salvation, what punishments will the wicked pay in hell for so many enormous crimes?
Hence that trembling voice of St. Hilarion in death, speaking to his soul: "For nearly seventy years you have served Christ, and you fear death?" So St. Ambrose, book 2 of the Apology of David, chapter 3: "If the just, he says, have received the sentence of a more severe punishment, how do you propose to yourself the hope of impunity, when Scripture says: If the just man is scarcely saved, where shall the sinner and the wicked appear?" And St. Augustine, book 20 Against Faustus: "For what is more just than the Only-Begotten (Son of God), whom nevertheless God did not spare? And what is more evident than that He does not spare even the just, correcting them with a variety of tribulations? since concerning this matter it has been plainly said: Even if the just man is scarcely saved." And St. Gregory, book 26 of the Moralia, chapter 17: "Sins, he says, the divine severity by no means permits to remain unpunished, but the wrath of judgment begins from our (the just men's) correction here, so that it may come to rest in the condemnation of the damned, as at the end of a motion:" just as a stone moves through the air but comes to rest in the earth as in its center. I have explained this saying fully and precisely at 1 Peter 4:18; therefore I shall not repeat it here, nor go over what has already been done.
Moreover, Lyranus explains it with examples thus: "If the Martyrs, he says, suffered so much unjustly, what torments await their torturers? If Job, Tobias, and other elect of God suffered so much in this life, what wonder is it if some affliction touches us who are far inferior? For even if we are not wicked, certainly if we deny that we are sinners, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us," 1 John 1. Relevant here is that saying of Cato: What you suffer by your own desert, remember to bear patiently: / And when you are guilty, condemn yourself as your own judge.
Tropologically, St. Gregory, book 20 of the Moralia, chapter 19: "While the unjust rage, he says, the just are purified, and the life of the wicked serves the benefit of the innocent, since by pressing it down it humbles it, and by humbling always forms it for the better. Whence rightly also it is said through Solomon: He who is foolish shall serve the wise. Yet we often see the wise subject, while the foolish hold the citadel of dominion: the wise obey servilely, while the foolish lord it over them with tyrannical pride. How therefore, by the decree of the divine sentence, does the fool serve the wise man, while he generally oppresses him by right of temporal dominion? But it must be known that against the life of the wise man, while the fool in his preeminence exercises the terror of power, while he wearies him with labors and tears him with insults, he assuredly purges him of all the rust of vices by burning. Therefore the fool serves the wise man even by dominating him, advancing him to a better state by pressing him down. Thus sometimes servants preside over their young masters for the purpose of discipline, frightening, pressing, striking them; and yet they by no means cease to be servants: because they were appointed for this very purpose, that they might serve their advancing masters even by striking them. Because, therefore, the evils of the reprobate purify the good while they torment them, even the power of the wicked serves the benefit of the just." So also Bede, who furthermore adds that he who troubles the house of his soul feeds the winds, that is, delights the demons. "The fool, he says, is any sinner who, while he envies the life of the wise man, that is, the just man, and in his envy persecutes him, serves for his testing as fire serves for gold. He who does not fear to disturb his mind with the tumults of harmful thoughts opens it to the waves of evil spirits by which it may be overwhelmed. And he who is foolish persecutes the wise man. Through this he serves him even by dominating him: because by pressing his patience, he makes it more tested, so that, with himself condemned, the other may receive the prize for which he was striving."