Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
He who would depart from a friend seeks pretexts; the wicked man is incorrigible; one must not deviate from the truth; the mouth of the fool crushes him; the just man accuses himself; a brother helping a brother is like a strong city; the fruit of the mouth fills the belly; a good wife is a great good, a bad one a great evil; the poor man speaks humbly, the rich man harshly; a friendly man is more a friend than a brother.
Vulgate Text: Proverbs 18:1-24
1. He who wishes to withdraw from a friend seeks pretexts: at all times he will be blameworthy. 2. A fool does not accept words of prudence, unless you tell him what revolves in his own heart. 3. When the wicked man has come into the depth of sins, he shows contempt: but disgrace and reproach follow him. 4. Deep waters are the words from the mouth of a man, and an overflowing torrent is the fountain of wisdom. 5. To show partiality to the wicked is not good, so as to turn aside from the truth of judgment. 6. The lips of the fool involve themselves in quarrels, and his mouth provokes contentions. 7. The mouth of the fool is his destruction: and his lips are the ruin of his soul. 8. The words of the double-tongued are as if simple: and they reach even to the interior of the belly. Fear casts down the slothful: and the souls of the effeminate shall hunger. 9. He who is soft and lax in his work is brother to the one who dissipates his own works. 10. The name of the Lord is a most strong tower: the just man runs to it, and shall be exalted. 11. The substance of the rich man is the city of his strength, and as a strong wall surrounding him. 12. Before destruction, the heart of a man is exalted; and before he is glorified, he is humbled. 13. He who answers before he listens shows himself to be a fool, and worthy of confusion. 14. The spirit of a man sustains his weakness: but a spirit prone to anger, who can endure? 15. The prudent heart shall possess knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks doctrine. 16. A man's gift makes room for him, and brings him before great men. 17. The just man is the first accuser of himself: his friend comes, and shall search him out. 18. The lot suppresses contradictions, and judges even among the powerful. 19. A brother who is helped by a brother is like a strong city, and judgments are like the bars of cities. 20. Of the fruit of a man's mouth shall his belly be filled, and with the produce of his lips he shall be satisfied. 21. Death and life are in the power of the tongue: those who love it shall eat its fruits. 22. He who finds a good wife finds a good thing: and shall draw forth delight from the Lord. He who casts out a good wife casts out a good thing: but he who keeps an adulteress is foolish and wicked. 23. The poor man shall speak with supplications, and the rich man shall speak harshly. 24. A man who is lovable in company shall be more a friend than a brother.
1. He who wishes to withdraw from a friend seeks pretexts: at all times he will be blameworthy.
The Hebrew here seems to disagree with the Vulgate, and literally reads thus: He who according to desire (so Aquila and Symmachus) seeks, being separated, in all existence or wisdom will mingle himself; which, first, the Chaldean thus translates and explains: He who is separated seeks desire, and derides all counsel; the Syriac more clearly: he who in his silence thinks on desirable things derides good doctrine, as if to say: He who follows concupiscence derides wisdom. R. Solomon: He who, he says, is torn from God, not obeying His precepts, obeys his lusts and depraved movements of soul; and so at length at all times he will be blameworthy, that is, among the wise he will betray his own disgrace.
Third, Baynus takes this of those who seek a counterfeit wisdom in order to show it off; whence he translates: according to a certain desire more than from the heart and good judgment he seeks, namely wisdom, since he is separated from wisdom; or, he who seeks some separated word or knowledge separated from true wisdom — this man will mingle himself in all wisdom, that is, among all the wise he will thrust himself with a certain ostentation, destitute indeed of the virtue of the truly wise, by which he would restrain his words, thinking humbly of himself. For thus true and false wisdom are distinguished, according to St. James, ch. 3, v. 17: "But the wisdom," he says, "that is from above is first indeed chaste, then peaceable, modest, persuadable, consenting to what is good; but earthly, sensual, devilish, where there is envy and contention;" which Solomon calls mingling oneself with those who are wise.
But the more ancient Rabbis explained this of Lot, who, carried away by his own desire, separated himself from Abraham, according to that text: "And Lot chose for himself the region around the Jordan, and departed from the East, and they were divided from each other," Genesis 13:11. But this verse looks to the declaration of his incestuous crime, which at length was published in all the assemblies and schools of Israel; for it was unlawful for the Ammonites and Moabites, who had their origin from that wicked intercourse, to be admitted among the Israelites, according to that text: "The Ammonites and Moabites shall not enter into the assembly of the Lord," Deuteronomy 23:3.
Second, Aben-Ezra and Pagninus thus translate and explain: He who on account of desire (for wisdom) is torn from his home or fatherland to pursue wisdom, on account of the vehement desire with which he burns to obtain it — this man will mingle himself in all wisdom, that is, he will mingle with all learned men and have intercourse with them. And Vatablus: Out of love for wisdom, the studious man, he says, seeks to be separated from men, that is, with all things held in contempt he seeks to devote himself to wisdom alone, and is accustomed to mingle himself in sound doctrine.
The same author adds another explanation, as if to say: He who by some vain or juvenile desire investigates matters that are separated and which cannot be understood by men, separates himself from all true wisdom; so that this proverb is said against the vanity of those who are wholly occupied with trifles. The first explanation is better and better accords with the following verse. So says Baynus.
Fourth, Cajetan thus translates and explains: For the sake of appetite he seeks wisdom; in every statute he will mingle himself. See, he says, how different the published Vulgate is from the Hebrew truth. A man separated in mind from common intercourse will seek, that is, he perseveres in seeking according to appetite, that is, a manner of living according to his own appetite. For he to whom common intercourse does not please continually seeks some manner of living conformable to his own appetite, and in seeking mingles himself in every statute, turns over the codes of diverse statutes concerning diverse ways of living, if perchance he may find or draw some way of living according to his desire. So says Cajetan.
You see here, reader, how far astray those go who depart from the Vulgate, which nevertheless the Septuagint, as the most ancient, so also the most learned interpreters, exactly support. They therefore, together with the Vulgate, in the Hebrew instead of taava, that is, concupiscence or desire, more clearly and fittingly, and therefore more truly, read taana, that is, occasion. Again, tuscia, which the more recent translators render as wisdom, they better translated as existence; now "in all existence" is the same as "at all times," as the Septuagint and our translator render it. Moreover they also translate blameworthy, because in the Hebrew they read iitgaal, that is, he will be reproached, or will be a reproach; now by metathesis they read iitgalla, that is, he will mingle himself with quarrels, will cast reproaches, will upbraid. Whence, reading it thus, our translator and the Septuagint rightly translate blameworthy, not passively but actively, that is, one who reproaches and casts insults. So "incredibilis" is often taken in Scripture actively for "incredulous"; "persuasibilis" for "persuasive," 1 Corinthians 2:4; "desperabilis" for "desperate and causing despair," Jeremiah 15:18.
Finally, even if you read the Hebrew entirely as it now stands, you may rightly accommodate it to the reading of the Vulgate and Septuagint in this way: He who for desire, that is, at his own pleasure, seeks to be separated, that is, to depart from a friend — he in all existence, that is, in every matter and at all times will cast reproaches, that is, he will hurl quarrels and insults at his friend. With the Vulgate and Septuagint agrees the Arabic version, which translates: a rich man who wishes to divide his friends takes pretexts, and at all times will be upbraiding.
The sense therefore is, as if to say: He who, weary of a friend and of friendship, wishes to dissolve and break it off, whether from inconstancy of mind, or because he thinks himself injured by his friend, or in order to pursue more useful friendships with others — this man, lest he seem to renounce the friendship rashly and without reason, and therefore faithlessly or maliciously, seeks pretexts, excuses, and causes by which he may appear to do it justly, now blaming his friend's faults, now his own occupations, now other things. Hence "at all times he will be blameworthy" — passively, that is, he will be disgraceful and deserving of censure both to the friend himself and to others, who will assail his faithlessness and tear him apart with reproaches; because when he ought not to have withdrawn from friendship even if he had been injured, he nevertheless pretends causes of anger and of deserting his friend without any real occasion. Or rather, he will be blameworthy actively, that is, he will continually hurl quarrels and insults at his friend, in order to drive him away from himself and his friendship; for this is what the Hebrew means, whether you read iitgaal with our translator, or iitgalla by metathesis with the more recent scholars. And so you may also explain the Greek eponeidisos, which the Septuagint have, actively, so that it means the same as reproachful, insulting, hurling reproaches. For the latter hemistich seems to explain the former, namely to teach that the pretexts for dissolving friendship which the unfaithful friend seeks are quarrels and insults, which he continually hurls at his friend. For the old proverb is true: "Injury dissolves love;" which however an excessive and insane lover contends to be false, when in an epigram he sings thus: It is a fable, what they boast, that injury dissolves love: For thus this madness all the more reignites.
He speaks, as I said, of an unfaithful and unjust friend. Yet the reasoning is similar for a just and faithful friend. For when such a friend wishes to send away a friend because he is vicious and harmful to him, he seeks occasions by which he may do so opportunely and conveniently, lest he make the friend or others hostile to himself and stir them up against him: for all sudden things are violent, and therefore odious, especially if done importunely. Whence the old saying is: "Friendships should not be broken, but carefully unstitched." So Samson, at the prompting of God, seeking a Philistine wife, sought an occasion for breaking peace with the Philistines and throwing off their yoke, Judges 14:4. So the king of Israel, seeing that the king of Syria had sent to him Naaman the leper to be cured of leprosy, said: "Observe and see that he seeks pretexts (for breaking the alliance and bringing war) against me," 2 Kings 5:7.
The fundamental reason is that occasion is the opportune time for action: whence in undertaking and completing a business it has the chief importance, as I have shown elsewhere. Hence Festus defines occasion thus: "It is an opportunity of time occurring by chance." Cicero, however, in Book I On Invention: "Occasion," he says, "is a portion of time, having in itself the fitting opportunity for doing or not doing something." Therefore prudent men in any matter, and especially in forming or dissolving friendship, seek a suitable occasion and opportunity; for on the opportunity depends the desired success of the matter, and the prosperous effect and fortunate outcome of the action. The truth of this maxim is manifest in daily experience, and most of all in heretics, who, since through weariness of antiquity or their own malice they seek departure from the Church, allege whatever they can, exaggerating and calumniating the most minute things, assailing and traducing everything before the people, hammering home hardly anything else in all their sermons except the vices of Churchmen, against which they continually rant.
Relevant here is the fable of the fox and the rooster among the fabulists: For the fox, having found an occasion to seize the rooster, accused him of disturbing her sleep and that of the other animals by crowing at dawn. The rooster excused himself. On the contrary, he said, by my voice I rouse you and all others to awake and seek food and prey. To which the fox replied: Be that as it may, I must have my breakfast; I will not leave you unfed; wherefore she strangled the rooster and devoured him.
Similar is the story of the lion who accused a stag of making the water muddy with its feet when entering a pool to drink, then attacked and ate it.
Mystically the Author of the Greek Chain: "Occasion," he says, "or pretext in this place signifies sins; and friends signifies the saints, with whom he was joined by the cultivation of virtues. He will moreover be perpetually held bound by disgrace, who lives destitute of the friendship and constancy of these." Thus in this age Henry VIII, King of England, in order to plunder the tomb of St. Thomas of Canterbury, rich in gems and gold — to whom he himself, with all England, had shortly before been living bound by ties of devotion and benefactions — struck him not only from the roll of friends but also from the roll of saints, by a sacrilege unheard of for ages. And in order to appear to do this by right, he prosecuted him as one guilty of treason as a rebel against Henry II, and condemned him by a sentence pronounced in the tribunal, as Sanders narrates at length in Book II On the Schism of the English. By which deed he brought upon himself the eternal hatred and reproach of God, angels, and men. In a similar way, the sinner, on account of his beloved pleasures, riches, and desires, renounces the friendship of God and the saints, and forms an alliance with the devil and the world, whose punishment and reproach will therefore last forever in hell. Such persons tacitly and in deed say that word of the impious in Isaiah 28:15: "We have struck a covenant with death, and with hell we have made a pact. When the overflowing scourge passes through, it shall not come upon us; for we have placed our hope in lies, and by lies we are protected." To whom therefore God, threatening the scourge: "Your covenant with death," He says, "shall be abolished, and your pact with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge passes through, you shall be trodden down by it." Moreover, the pretexts which the wicked man puts forward to renounce the friendship of God and the saints, Christ enumerates in the parable of those invited to the wedding feast, Luke 14:18: "And they all began," He says, "at once to make excuses. The first said: I have bought a farm, and I must go out and see it; I beg you, have me excused. And another said: I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to try them. And another said: I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come." See here St. Ambrose, St. Chrysostom, and the other interpreters. These St. James rightly rebukes, ch. 4: "Adulterers," he says, "do you not know that the friendship of this world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wishes to be a friend of this world is made an enemy of God." See what I have noted on that passage.
2. A fool does not accept words of prudence, unless you tell him what revolves in his own heart.
The Hebrew has: the fool does not want words of understanding, except in the revealing of his heart, that is, unless you reveal to him what he himself revolves in his heart. Aquila: the senseless man does not want prudence, that is, wisdom — supply: to hear and learn. It is a Hebraism; for the Hebrews construct verbs of contact, such as "to hear," with the ablative, using the preposition "in." The Septuagint: he has no need of wisdom, or rather, he has no use for (for this is what chreia signifies, and to this corresponds the Hebrew lo iachpots, that is, he does not want) wisdom, the man devoid of mind; for he is led more by folly than by wisdom. The Chaldean: the fool does not want understanding, but in folly his mind remains. The Syriac: the fool does not love wisdom, because his heart thinks on folly. Vatablus: the fool does not delight in understanding, but only in those things which he turns over in his heart.
From these versions, therefore, first you may draw this plain sense, as if to say: The fool does not love nor accept words that are sensible and prudent, "because they are distasteful to him on account of the contrary habit," says Lyra; but only vain, light, carnal, and foolish things, such as he himself loves and turns over in his mind; because his heart is full of these, according to that text: "The natural man does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit of God," 1 Corinthians 2:14. Again, as if to say: The fool does not accept the wise opinions of the learned, but clings tenaciously to his own opinions which he has conceived in his heart; therefore unless you say the same things he himself thinks, he will not listen to you but will reject you. For he is driven and blinded by folly, that is, by foolish concupiscence and curiosity; and therefore he does not admit words of prudence and virtue. So the Author of the Greek Chain, Lyra, Hugo, Arboreus, Dionysius, Jansenius, and others. According to this sense, the word "unless" is taken not as exceptive but as adversative, meaning "but" or "only."
Second, more precisely and profoundly, as if to say: The fool does not accept prudence unless you state and teach it through those things which he himself turns over in his heart, that is, unless you accommodate yourself to his rudeness and stupidity, so as to play the fool with the foolish, as it were, and become foolish with the fool. It teaches therefore that the teacher must, as it were, be foolish with fools and play the fool. According to this sense, the word "unless" is properly taken as a mark of exception. For from the statement that the fool does not grasp words of prudence, it excepts one case, namely if you accommodate yourself to the fool: for thus through folly you will lead him from folly to wisdom. Therefore this maxim signifies first, that the fool is so sunk in and attached to his folly that he cannot rise to wisdom. Second, that the teacher, in order to teach the fool wisdom, must conform himself, as far as is lawful, to the fool's inept and stupid conceptions, so that from those things which the fool grasps and loves, he may gradually be elevated and led to wisdom. So Christ clothed Himself in our flesh, in order to lead carnal and foolish men to God and divine things; for He accommodated Himself to their carnal senses; whence He taught through parables of weddings, seeds, harvests, weeds, etc., which were well known and familiar to common and uneducated people, and through them He foreshadowed and, as it were, depicted in a rough and crude manner heavenly and divine things, which men would otherwise not have understood if they had been proposed by Christ bare and as they are in themselves.
Imitating Christ, St. Paul, 1 Corinthians 1:18 and following, celebrates and preaches the folly of the cross of Christ: "Because," he says, "the foolishness of God is wiser than men." And Galatians 4:20: "I wish," he says, "I were present with you now, and could change my voice," so that with you as with little children and stammerers I might stammer.
So St. Ignatius, founder of our Society, taught us the practice of converting the worldly and carnal, saying: "To convert such people, let us enter with what is theirs, but let us come out with what is ours," as if to say: At first let us mix in conversations about worldly things, which the worldly understand; but from there let us conveniently draw the conversation to those things which pertain to the salvation of the soul, which is our end and purpose.
And St. Francis Xavier with the Indians and barbarians acted as an Indian and a barbarian, with children he became like a child again, with soldiers he talked of warfare, with farmers of agriculture, with merchants of merchandise; and so, made all things to all men, he won all for Christ. Thus each person must be lured with his own bait and caught with his own hook.
Moreover others explain this maxim differently: first, R. Levi, as if to say: "The senseless man does not love prudence except when his own ignorance and disposition is laid bare: for only then does he judge prudence to be of great power; but afterward he is not stirred to acquire and store up wisdom in his mind." So also Vatablus.
Second, Cajetan translates: the fool does not want understanding; but if he does, it is to uncover his own heart. And the sense is that the fool does not strive to understand: but if he does strive to understand, he strives for this purpose — to uncover his own heart, that is, to display to others what he himself understands. Thus vainglory is described as the end of the imprudent man, if he strives to penetrate something with the intellect. But absolutely speaking, understanding of things or of writings does not please him. So says Cajetan.
Such are those who devise new opinions and laugh at and reject the tried and sound opinions of the ancients; which is a mark of pride as much as of folly. Baynus agrees: He asserts, he says, that the fool does not seek wisdom for love of wisdom, but solely for show, to display his heart and to be considered learned: for no other reason will he want wisdom. For so it reads in Hebrew: except for the revelation of his heart.
Third, Cassian, Collation 14, ch. 17, reads from the Septuagint thus: there is no need of wisdom where sense is lacking; for folly leads more, and so explains it, as if to say: The way of virtue and perfection is not to be taught to the impious and impure; for these are incapable of it, and laugh at and mock it, according to that saying of Christ: "Do not give what is holy to dogs, nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and turn and tear you," Matthew 7:6. These senses are not improbable, nor incongruous with this passage.
3. When the wicked man has come into the depth of sins, he shows contempt: but disgrace and reproach follow him.
In Hebrew: when the wicked man comes, contempt also comes, and with disgrace (Pagninus: with a disgraceful man) comes reproach. Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion: in the coming of the wicked man, contempt comes. The Chaldean: when the wicked man comes in folly, he comes also in disgrace and in reproach. The Syriac: folly and reproach and calumny come upon him. The Septuagint agrees with the Vulgate; for they have: when the wicked man has come into the depth of evils, he shows contempt; but dishonor and reproach come upon him. Therefore the phrase "into the depth of sins" is not in the Hebrew, but the Septuagint and our translator understood and supplied it. For it is tacitly contained in the word "wicked." For "wicked" is here taken in the perfect or completed sense. Therefore he is called wicked who has not fallen into sin once or twice out of weakness or ignorance, but who continually sins out of malice and impiety, so that he has already formed a callus of sin — one who has truly descended into the depth of sins.
Now various authors explain this variously. First, from the Hebrew, Aben-Ezra: When the wicked man, he says, comes to light, together with him there comes the contempt by which he holds others in derision; and the reproach with which he will assail them comes at the same time. The sense is that reproach arises from contempt, just as one crime is the occasion of another. And R. Levi: When the wicked man arrives, he says, contempt is also present at the same time; for it is his custom to hold others of no account. But in addition to the contempt and disgrace for which he himself is notorious on account of his shameful and disgraceful deeds, he will pin the same insults on others: for the stains and reproaches under which he himself labors, he takes care to brand on others as well.
So also Jansenius, Cajetan, and Baynus explain it, as if to say: The wicked man despises upright men and afflicts them with disgrace and reproach, attributing and imputing to them the crimes to which he himself is subject, so that he may have companions in wickedness and infamy, by whom he may cover himself and profit. Whence Gregory of Nazianzus in his Iambics On Spectacles, to Seleucus, says that the wicked strive to rub off their itch of sin on others, "so that having many companions in their crimes they may cover their own stains." And in Oration 28: "All the wicked," he says, "are easily led to partly suspect and partly speak of their own vices as belonging to others."
But the plain and clear sense of our Vulgate version and of the Septuagint is, as if to say: The wicked man, growing daily in wickedness and continually heaping one sin upon another and a greater upon a lesser, at length slides into the deep abyss of wickedness; and once he has slid there, he now despises all admonitions and those who admonish, all crimes and reproaches, all decency and shame (whence St. Athanasius, Sermon 4 Against the Arians, explains "contemns" as "puts off shame"), all losses and dangers, all laws divine and human, all things sacred and profane, and even all the heavenly beings and angels and God Himself, whose providence and even whose essence and existence he at length denies, according to Psalm 13:1: "The fool has said in his heart: There is no God." Whence Hugo explains: "He contemns," he says, "his conscience." Lyra: "He contemns punishments;" again, he contemns all correction, all pardon, and all remedy. "But disgrace and reproach follow him," by which, on account of his continual crimes, he becomes infamous — indeed a disgrace and reproach to heaven and earth, to men and angels — and at length becomes food for hell, and the eternal mockery of demons.
Moreover the wicked man despises all the things just mentioned, both because, blinded by sins, he does not see nor appreciate the harm threatening him from sin; and because, allured by the sweetness of sin, he is wholly carried away into it. And so, in order to sin more freely and pleasurably, he casts off, repels, and despises the fear of any evil that could recall him from sin. The depth of sins, therefore, into which he hurls himself, is the cause of his contempt.
You may ask: what is this depth of sins that drives the wicked man into contempt, and from there into reproach and ruin? Various authors assign various answers. From all the expositions of the various authors arranged in order, I shall construct the steps of this depth and abyss from the words and mind of the Fathers.
First, then, St. Chrysostom understands by the depth the habit of sinning: for this habit brings about a certain necessity of sinning, by which it happens that a man, as if unable to control himself, is carried away into his lusts, to which he has voluntarily surrendered himself entirely. It follows that he spurns and contemns everything that could call him back from sin — just as swine that wallow and bury themselves in mud despise all cleanliness and purity, and indeed delight and feed themselves in mud and filth. Hear St. Chrysostom, in his epistle to Theodore, in which he raises him up, after his fall, to hope for pardon if he guards against relapse: "Only," he says, "do not relapse, do not cut off your ample hopes, do not admit into yourself what happens to the impious. For the abundance of sins, however overflowing, has never been accustomed to cast into despair, but rather to make the soul impious. Therefore Solomon did not say simply: whoever comes into the depth of evils, contemns; but he specifically says, the impious man: because that sickness belongs only to them, after they have descended into the depth of evils. But this is what does not permit them to look back, nor to return whence they fell. For shameful despair presses upon the neck of the soul like a collar, and compelling the eyes to look down at the ground, prevents them from looking up to their Lord." Hear the same author, Homily 22 on Genesis:
"The wicked man, when he has fallen into the depth of evils, shows contempt; for it is grievous, grievous, beloved, to be caught in the snares of the devil: for the soul afterward, as if caught in nets, is dragged along, and just as a sow is plunged in a wallowing-place of mud, so also the soul, overwhelmed by evil habit, does not even sense the stench of its own sins." For habit is like a bed in which the sinner pleasantly reclines and sleeps, so that he seems to taste or feel nothing else; indeed it is like a center in which he utterly rests and is fixed. Whence for "depth" the Greek is bathos, that is, the lowest depth, which in a circle, namely in the globe of the earth, is the center itself. First, therefore, just as all heavy things are naturally borne to the center, so the sinner accustomed and imbued with sin is carried to sin as by a natural impulse. Second, just as a stone rests in its center, so the sinner rests in the allurement of sin. Third, just as the center holds fast the things fixed to it, so the habit of sin holds the sinner fast, that he may persevere in it unto death and hell. Fourth, just as things in the center feel no motion or impulse, so the sinner accustomed to sin feels no remorse of conscience or impulse of exciting grace. The habit of sinning, therefore, is the first step among the sins by which one descends gradually to the bottom of the deep abyss. The second follows.
Second, St. Athanasius, Sermon 4 Against the Arians, understands by the depth the blindness of mind that follows from the habit of sinning. For sin continually repeated increasingly blinds the mind, so that it does not see what it does, nor discern evil from good — indeed it judges the evil it does to be good. Therefore it despises everything good that is contrary to it, according to Ephesians 4: "That you should no longer walk as the Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened, alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart, who despairing have given themselves up to lasciviousness, unto the working of all uncleanness, unto covetousness," etc.
Third, others understand by the depth the hardening of the heart, namely impudence, impenitence, stubbornness, and obstinacy in sinning. For the sinner, blinded by the habit of sin, becomes hardened in sinning, and becomes impudent, stubborn, and obstinate, whence he laughs at and contemns everything else. So St. Isidore, Book I of the Sentences, ch. 14: "To perpetrate some crime," he says, "is the death of the soul; to despise penance and remain in sin is to descend into hell after death. Therefore to sin pertains to death, but to despair is to descend into hell. Whence Scripture also says: The wicked man, when he has come into the depth of evils, contemns." And Gratian, On Penance, dist. 1, canon 60, from St. Gregory: "The wicked, had they been able, would have wished to live without end so that they could sin without end. For they show that they desire always to live in sin, who never cease sinning while they live. It pertains therefore to the great justice of the Judge that they should never lack punishment who in this life never wished to lack sin." Then Gratian adds: "Hence Christ, in the person of His members, says: Let not the deep swallow me up, nor the pit shut its mouth upon me. Which St. Augustine explains, saying: The pit is the depth of human iniquity; if you fall into it, it will not shut its mouth upon you if you do not shut your mouth. Confess therefore and say: From the depths I have cried to Thee, O Lord; and you shall escape. The Lord will shut up in that depth the one who contemns in the deep; from whom, as from a dead man, as from one who is not, confession perishes. Hence the same Prophet says: Enter His gates with confession; showing that no one can reach the gates of mercy except through the confession of sin." Hence also St. Jerome on Ezekiel 1 understands by the depth of sins the loss of conscience and synderesis: "We see conscience," he says, "precipitated in some people, and losing its place, according to what is written: The wicked man, when he has come into the depth of sins, contemns." Stubbornness therefore is the third step of sins. The fourth follows.
Fourth, St. Bernard, On the Steps of Humility, understands by the depth the contempt of God, which is engendered by hardness of heart and stubbornness. For a hard heart neither fears men nor reverences God. For he says thus, at step 11: "After the tenth step, therefore, which is called rebellion, the one expelled or having gone out from the monastery is immediately received by the eleventh. And now he enters upon ways that seem good to men, whose end (unless God perhaps has hedged them off for him) will plunge him into the depth of hell, that is, into contempt of God. For the wicked man, when he has come into the depth of evils, contemns." So also Hugo, heaping up many things: "The depth of sins," he says, "may be called stubbornness, obstinacy, self-defense, boasting, despair, presumption, blindness of the intellect, corruption of the affections." Where note the four dimensions of this depth. For the height is boasting, when someone exults gloriously over his misdeeds as if they were good deeds; the depth opposed to this is despair of pardon and salvation; the length is the habit of sinning; the breadth is presumption upon the mercy of God.
Fifth, Bede and St. Caesarius of Arles, Homily 13 On Penance, understand by the depth despair, which is engendered by hardness of heart and contempt of God. Hear Bede: "He who, wrapped in the long darkness of sins, once despairs of the light, now from despair contemns, that is, he everywhere loosens for himself the reins of sinning; but such a man in no way escapes the reproach of future damnation, whom no memory of divine fear restrained from the practice of his iniquity." Hear St. Caesarius: "From the multitude of sins," he says, "despair is born, and from despair the reins of sinning are loosened without any reverence, and that is fulfilled which is written: The wicked man, when he has come into the depth of sins, contemns." Hear also the Author of the Imperfect Work, Homily 40 on Matthew: "A man who commits a grave sin, since he has nothing more to hope for from God, commits worse things, as Solomon says: When the wicked man has come into the depth of evils, he contemns. For just as a sick man, as long as he has a moderate ailment and hopes he can be cured, preserves himself from harmful foods; but if he has realized that he is incurable, he no longer spares himself: so also a man, as long as he sins moderately and hopes for salvation, preserves himself from evil as much as he can; but if by sinning gravely he has begun to despair, he no longer hesitates to do anything, as one who by his sins now overcomes the judgment of God — not knowing, wretch that he is, that just as in good there are degrees of glory, and each one according to the measure of his good receives glory, so also in evil there are degrees of punishment, and each one according to the measure of his evil will receive punishment. For as God is infinite in the rewarding of good, so He is infinite in the retribution of evil."
The sixth and lowest depth of sins is hell itself and the hellish life that despair produces. For the desperate lead a hellish life and live like demons and the damned; indeed they sometimes see demons and the place destined for them with them in hell, as Theodoretus, Chrysaorius, and that man of Iconium saw, according to St. Gregory, Book IV of the Dialogues, ch. 38. These at last, as if lost, despise all things, perjure themselves, blaspheme, and commit abominable things.
Gather now these steps of sins, and from them construct the ladder by which one descends straight into hell: namely, from sin the sinner descends to the first step of the depth, which is the habit of sinning; from there he descends to the second, which is blindness of mind; from there to the third, which is stubbornness; from there to the fourth, which is contempt of God; from there to the fifth, which is despair; from there to the sixth, which is hell and the hellish life. By similar but opposite steps of virtues the just ascend on high, namely to the summit of heaven: for from one virtue one ascends to another, thence to the habit of virtues, thence to the strengthening of the soul, thence to sure confidence in salvation, thence to constant love of God, thence to perseverance and continual union with God, thence to God and the enjoyment of God in heaven, according to that text: "They shall go from virtue to virtue; the God of gods shall be seen in Zion," Psalm 83:8.
4. Deep waters are the words from the mouth of a man: and an overflowing torrent is the fountain of wisdom.
For "torrent" the Hebrew is nachal, which signifies both a river and a torrent: some wrongly translate it as "pool." Aquila translates it phleps, that is, "vein." For "overflowing" the Hebrew is nobea, which the Septuagint translate anapedōn, that is, "it gushes forth." In many manuscripts it is anapedōn, that is, "springing forth." Theodotion: anombrōn, that is, "overflowing." Aquila and Symmachus: anablyzōn, that is, "bursting forth." Whence the Chaldean translates: deep water is the mouth of a man, an overflowing torrent is the fountain of wisdom. The Roman and Complutensian Septuagint: deep water is the word in the heart of a man; but a gushing river and fountain of life. But instead of "life," with the Hebrews, the Vulgate, the Chaldean, Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, and all others, one should read "wisdom." Whence the Author of the Greek Chain clearly reads and explains it thus from the Septuagint: "The doctrine that is contained in the heart of a just man is like deep water; the same is like a gushing river and fountain of life. Knowledge, of the kind that cannot be comprehended by the mind, lies hidden in the heart of a man who walks according to God, which in this place is called a fountain of life, elsewhere a river of peace. Or what he says tends to this: When someone keeps a word of wisdom in the depth of his heart and does not communicate it to anyone, it becomes in him a gushing river, that is, something great and deep. For a fountain of life can sometimes produce a river from a single word." Otherwise: "A gushing river is of such a kind that it irrigates the land beneath it, and richly drenches it, and prepares it for fertility and abundance."
From this it is clear that by "man" is here understood a prudent and wise man; for, as R. Solomon says, the Hebrew isch, that is, "man," in Scripture signifies one who is strong and vigorous, and who is great and excellent on account of his prudence and fortitude.
Some, from the version of the Roman and Complutensian Septuagint, think that the words of the wise are here compared to three kinds of water: first, the deep waters of a river; second, an overflowing torrent; third, a gushing fountain. As if to say: One wise man pours forth his speech as rich and flowing as a great river, just as formerly St. Jerome called St. Hilary "the Rhone of Christian eloquence"; another rolls his discourse like a stream; yet another sends forth his words like a fountain. So Plutarch in his Life of Pericles attributes a river of oratory to Demosthenes, accommodates a stream to Isocrates, and ascribes a fountain to Aeschines. So among Christians, St. Chrysostom rolls forth rich and copious oratory like a river; the eloquence of Gregory of Nazianzus imitates a stream; and finally the discourse of Basil represents a perennially flowing fountain.
Again, one and the same wise man, according to the variety of place, time, and persons, now pours himself forth copiously and weightily like a river, now moderately like a torrent, now softly like a fountain. On this St. Augustine, Book IV On Christian Doctrine, ch. 19: "And yet," he says, "although the teacher should be a speaker of great things, he should not always speak of them grandly, but softly when something is being taught, moderately when something is blamed or praised; but when something must be done, and yet we speak to those who ought to do it but are unwilling, then those great things must be spoken grandly and in a manner suited to bending their minds." If otherwise, one may say what Theocritus said of Anaximenes declaiming, according to Stobaeus, Sermon 34: "A flood of words begins, a drop of thought."
But since the Hebrew, the Chaldean, Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, and all the rest, and even the Septuagint in the Greek Chain, make this sentence two-membered, as I showed shortly before, and instead of "fountain of life" have "fountain of wisdom," and remove the "and" which the Roman and Complutensian Septuagint insert between "river" or "torrent" and "fountain" — hence the genuine sense is that the latter hemistich explains the former and assigns its cause and origin, as if to say: The words flowing from the mouth of the wise man are like the deep water of a river or torrent, because the heart of the wise man is like a deep vein or fountain of wisdom, which continually flows with wisdom, just as a fountain continually pours forth water, which, gradually collected, produces a torrent or river. For the reason why the words of the wise man are copious and deep is that they flow from a deep heart full of wisdom, as if to say: The deep mind of the wise man pours forth deep wisdom like a deep, copious, and perennial fountain.
For just as in the Alps we see fountains gush forth abundant waters, from the collection of which arise the Rhine, the Inn, the Rhone, and other rivers; and in similar fashion from Mount Parnassus arise the Bactrus, the Choaspes, the Araxes, the Tanais, and the Indus, as Aristotle says, Book I of the Meteorology, ch. 1 (indeed in the Alps I have seen waters collected from the highest mountains rushing down into the valleys below with great volume and roar, and there immediately forming immense torrents and rivers that swallow up men, horses, and chariots, especially in winter): so likewise the mind of the wise man is a perennial vein and fountain continually bubbling forth wise discourses, which are therefore so copious and deep that they seem to be torrents and rivers of wisdom. So Sirach explains Solomon, Ecclesiasticus 21:16: "The knowledge of a wise man shall abound like a flood, and his counsel endures like a fountain of life."
Therefore the words of the wise man and of wisdom are compared to the deep waters of a river or torrent; but the heart, or mind, is compared to the vein or fountain from which these waters gush forth.
First, because just as a river flows from a fountain, so the words of the mouth flow from the heart. Hence "fountain" (fons) is said from "pouring" (fundendo), says Festus, because it pours forth waters. It is also called a "vein." For just as a vein is a receptacle of blood and is named from "coming" (veniendo), because blood comes from it and through it permeates the whole body: so also from a fountain, as from a vein, water comes and permeates lands and fields. In Greek, "vein" is called plethein, that is, "to overflow," because it is full of blood or water and overflows. What the vein or fountain is to the river, therefore, the heart is to the mouth and to words — namely their origin and source, as if to say: The words of the wise man are born not in the mouth but in the heart, because they flow from the bottom of the heart, and thus flow from the abundance and depth of the heart like a river from a gushing and ever-flowing fountain.
Second, just as a fountain never dries up but pours forth perennial waters, so the heart of the wise man pours forth perennial teachings of wisdom, as if to say: The words of the wise man are like the deep water of a river, because they gush from a deep and perennial fountain, which is the heart. So Aben-Ezra: "The words of the wise man," he says, "are like deep waters, which are clear; for in the same way as a torrent continually bubbles up waters, so the spring of wisdom in a wise man cannot be exhausted." Third, just as the waters of a river or torrent, flowing from a constant fountain, are copious and therefore deep, so the teachings of the wise man flowing from a wise heart are copious and deep. Whence the Tigurine translates: the words of a man's mouth are like deep waters, and the fountain of wisdom like a most abundant river; that is, says Vatablus, as deep water cannot be exhausted, so neither do the words of a wise man ever fail. Indeed, as R. Levi says, it is not easy to grasp their force and end, nor to penetrate their secrets.
Fourth, just as from a fountain, however much water flows out, just as much flows in from elsewhere: so also the heart of the wise man, the more it pours forth, the more it receives; for the more things flow from it, the more remain that can flow from it, says R. Levi. Fifth, a fountain first fills its own basin, then pours forth the overflowing water and communicates it to others: so also the wise man first imbues his own mind, then others, with wisdom, according to that saying of St. Bernard: "Let the teacher be a basin, not a channel," which retains none of the water but pours out everything it receives. Sixth, just as a river has open waters on the surface, which it shares with all, but deep waters below, which only divers penetrate: so also the wise man shares common things with all, but reveals the secrets of wisdom to few, so that with St. Paul he gives milk to little ones to drink, and speaks wisdom in mystery to the wise — so Bede.
Seventh, just as waters flowing from veins and fountains are filtered through the hidden twists, passages, and meanders of their courses, so as to lay aside their bitterness, saltiness, thickness, or other defect; so also the words of the wise man are filtered through the various meditations, considerations, and examinations of the mind and reason, so that before they come to the mouth they lay aside all bitterness, disturbance, anger, and awkwardness, and become sweet, pleasant, prudent, etc. Moreover, just as the waters of springs, as they pass through veins of gold, silver, iron, vitriol, sulfur, etc., absorb the power of these minerals, so that they cure kidney stones, dropsy, inflammations, etc., as do the springs of Pozzuoli, Spa, and Aachen: so likewise the words of the wise, passing through the veins of meditations on humility, patience, gentleness, charity, and fervor, absorb the power of these virtues, and become humble, patient, gentle, benevolent, and fervent. Eighth, just as a fountain from a small opening gently pours forth a moderate amount of water, which, increasing by continual pouring, grows into a river: so likewise the teacher of wisdom gently teaches wisdom through moderate precepts, lest by their multitude and weight he overwhelm the unlearned pupil, but gradually instilling more and more, at length he imbues and fills him with all wisdom like a river. St. Gregory of Nazianzus represents this same thing with the elegant simile of a violent rain or downpour, and a gentle rain or drizzle, in Oration 15 On the Plague of Hail: for a violent storm flattens the crops and quickly ceases, but a gentle rain nourishes the crops and endures: the same is true of excessive and moderate, or calm and gentle, teaching.
5. To show partiality to the wicked is not good, so as to turn aside from the truth of judgment.
In Hebrew: so as to cast down the just man in judgment. The Chaldean: nor to turn aside from judgment against the just man. The Syriac: nor even to pervert judgment against the just man. The Septuagint: to admire the person of the wicked is not good, nor is it holy to turn aside the just man in judgment. For "to accept" the Hebrew is seet, which Cajetan translates as "to elevate the person"; the Septuagint, "to admire or look up to"; Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, "to take"; our translator, "to accept"; others, "to bear or carry." All come to the same thing. For he who reverences, looks up to, elevates, and admires the person of the wicked man because he is powerful, or rich, or a friend, or great — this man takes up and elevates his lawsuit and cause as if it were more just and better, and conversely depresses and condemns the cause of the just man who is rightly litigating against the wicked man in judgment. Whence R. Levi: "It is wicked," he says, "that a criminal's case should be regarded in judgment, so that the innocent man loses his case through a disturbed trial; for if the judge honors the wicked man in judgment, it happens that the just man's mouth is shut, so that he cannot respond fittingly, since he is persuaded that the mind of the judge favors the wicked party opposing him in judgment."
This is a grave sin, first, because it overturns justice, which is the foundation of the commonwealth. Whence St. Ambrose on Malachi: "Among all sins of priests," he says, "the greatest is that they consider not causes but persons, and, despising the just poor man, honor the unjust rich." And St. Bernard, Book II On Consideration, to Pope Eugene: "Do not think yourself," he says, "guilty of a small sin if you take on the faces of sinners rather than judging the causes of merit; for it is a vice from which, if you feel yourself immune, among all those I have known who have ascended to their seats of authority, you will sit alone, in my judgment, because you have truly and singularly raised yourself above yourself. I have found none among the great who has sufficiently guarded against the wiles of this most cunning little fox."
Second, because it perverts the judgment of God and of Christ, whose vicar the judge is and whose office he performs: for God and Christ show Themselves fair and equal to all, both poor and rich. "And He distributes heavenly grace," says St. Cyprian, Book I, Epistle 1, "equally to all, without distinction of sex, without discrimination of age, without partiality of person." Therefore, as St. Jerome says on Amos: "Whoever is led in judging by kinship or friendship, or conversely by hostile hatred or enmity, perverts the judgment of Christ. For He is the supreme judge, and therefore all judgment pertains to Him; wherefore the other judges, since they judge in the place of Christ, if they pervert justice, pervert the judgment of Christ."
Third, because they give grave scandal to the entire commonwealth, and cause men to pursue avarice and injustice, which they see honored and preferred by such judges, rather than modesty and justice, which they see set aside and depressed by them. See the comments on James 2:1.
6. The lips of the fool involve themselves in quarrels, and his mouth provokes contentions.
In Hebrew: the lips of the fool come into strife (or with strife), and his mouth calls for blows. Aquila: they lead him into strife. Symmachus: into quarrel. The Septuagint: the lips of the fool lead him into evil, and his bold mouth invokes death. The Hebrew rib signifies first, a lawsuit; second, a quarrel; third, a judgment. Whence the Chaldean translates: the lips of the fool lead him into judgment, and his mouth brings him to quarrel. And the Syriac: the lips of the fool enter into judgment, and his mouth brings him to death — as if to say: The fool, by his imprudent, insolent, slanderous speech, by his insults, calumnies, and mockeries, causes himself to be summoned to court by the one he has injured, and there to be condemned by the judge to a fine, and sometimes to death.
The sense of our Vulgate version, which best expressed the force of the Hebrew phrase, is, as if to say: Whenever the fool hears a quarrel and quarrelers, he immediately rushes in from levity, curiosity, and folly, and mingles himself in it — ostensibly to make peace between them, but in reality to increase the quarrels and stir them up against himself. For since he is imprudent, he easily blurts out something that stings the quarrelers and sharpens the quarrel. Again, since he is led by his passions, he easily inclines to one side and favors its cause; therefore he provokes the other side against himself. Moreover, since he himself is petulant, contentious, and quarrelsome, he delights in quarrels and either instigates them or promotes those already started, so that they can scarcely be calmed at last. For it is a matter of great wisdom and skill to settle lawsuits and quarrels. For this purpose it is necessary to calm and reconcile both parties, both the offending and the offended, with fair and fitting reason — which is difficult. For if one upholds the right of the offended and accuses the offender of injury, one will irritate him further. Again, it is difficult to interpose oneself between two in such a way that one does not incline to either side, but shows oneself impartial and even-handed to both. Therefore to accomplish this is the work not of a fool but of a prudent man. So we see rash, bold, and combative men rush to quarrels as flies rush to honey, and thus they set them ablaze with destruction to themselves and others alike. "The fool," says Lyra, "incites quarrelers to greater contentions, like one who incites dogs to bite each other." For in Hebrew, "contentions" is mahalumot, that is, blows, beatings, strikes, as a smith by hammering strikes an anvil. Whence Vatablus translates: his mouth provokes to fights. R. Solomon translates: beatings — "the fool," he says, "is the craftsman of his own beating." Aben-Ezra: "The fool," he says, "is brought to strife on account of blows and beatings, that is, because he has cried out to strike and afflict his companion with blows. Therefore his mouth will be his destruction, that is, will bring ruin upon himself." And R. Levi: "The mouth of the fool sows strife and discord, since it utters nothing but calumnies and insults, and it provokes upon himself blows and heavy beatings, by which a man may be destroyed," and which bring slaughter and death, as the Septuagint translate, both to himself and to others.
7. The mouth of the fool is his destruction; and his lips are the ruin of his soul.
For "destruction" the Hebrew is mechitta, which signifies both terror and crushing and breaking. Whence Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion translate it ptoēsis, that is, dread. The Chaldean: fear. The Tigurine: the mouth of the fool is a terror to himself, that is, it creates for him terrible anxieties, dangers, and punishments. For "ruin" the Hebrew is mokes, that is, a snare, as the Septuagint, Chaldean, Pagninus, Vatablus, and others translate it. The Syriac: he ensnares himself with his own lips. Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion translate it skandalon, that is, a stumbling-block — such as is the trigger in a mousetrap, which when a mouse incautiously disturbs it, strikes and suffocates itself in the trap. The talkative fool does likewise. This verse connects with the preceding and explains it, as if to say: The mouth of the fool provokes contentions and, as it is in Hebrew, beatings both upon himself and upon others. The result is that he himself is beaten and crushed on account of his mouth, that is, on account of the foolish and quarrelsome words of his mouth; and on account of what he has rashly and thoughtlessly blurted from his lips, he prepares ruin and a snare for his "soul," that is, his life — or for his "soul," that is, for himself — by which he is caught and strangled both in body and in soul, according to that text: "The mouth that lies kills the soul." So says Lyra.
Cajetan explains differently: The mouth of the fool, he says, is destruction, that is, it crushes, breaks, and dashes himself, because in order to defend his false and foolish words that he has blurted out, he is forced to assert contradictory things; by these, therefore, he ensnares and entangles himself, from which he cannot free himself. Similar to this maxim is Psalm 13:3: "Destruction and unhappiness are in their ways" — in the active sense, as if to say: The wicked are wholly bent on crushing others along with themselves and afflicting them with unhappiness or calamity; because "they have not known the way of peace," that is, because they hate the peaceful, quiet, and tranquil way. And that text in ch. 14:3: "In the mouth of the fool is the rod of pride." And that in ch. 17:11: "The wicked man always seeks quarrels; but a cruel angel shall be sent against him."
8. The words of the double-tongued are as if simple; and they reach even to the interior of the belly.
For "double-tongued" the Hebrew is nirgan, that is, a whisperer, flatterer, murmurer, who praises openly but secretly detracts and sows discords — an informer and defamer who carries infamy from one person to another. For "simple" the Hebrew is mitlahamim, a word found only here and in ch. 26:22, where the Septuagint translate: the words of flatterers (Greek kerkōpōn, that is, "tailed ones," those who fawn with their tail) are soft; but they strike the interior of the bowels. Aquila: the words of the whisperer are deceptive. Symmachus: the words of the murmurer spoken in passing. Theodotion: the words of the cunning are as if simple. R. Emmanuel: as if bland.
The more recent scholars consider mitlahamim to be a metathesis of mithallamim. Whence Cajetan, Pagninus, and others translate: the words of the whisperer are like blows, or like wounds (for halam signifies to strike, to shake, to bruise). R. Solomon: they are like bruises and beatings. Vatablus: they are like those of wounded men, that is, of those who feign themselves struck and wounded — that is, they are smooth so as to deceive. Pagninus from the Arabic language translates: the words of the double-tongued are as if swallowed or hidden. So also Aben-Ezra: they are, he says, like hidden and veiled words, the words, I say, of a deceiver. The Chaldean: the words of the whisperer cause him pain and lead him down to the depth of hell. The Syriac: the words of the evildoer cast him down into evil; they lead him to the dwellings of the dead.
First, R. Levi, translating nirgan, that is, double-tongued, as informer, thus explains: The speech of the informer, who complains without cause and laments without having suffered injury, is fashioned after the manner of those who pretend to be wounded and maimed, so as more easily to stir up the pity of others toward themselves. These words are therefore so grievous to those against whom they are uttered that they penetrate the hidden depths of the soul, and the mind is greatly distressed by them: for it is most grievous if one is accused of having said or done something shameful, of which one is entirely innocent and unaware.
Second, the Septuagint for nirgan, that is, double-tongued, translate kerkōpōn, that is, "tailed ones," meaning crafty people, such as flatterers are. The Author of the Greek Chain thinks there is an allusion to foxes, which with their kerkon, that is, tail, cover their ōpa, that is, face, to pretend they are sleeping, and by this means lure simple birds to themselves, catch them, and devour them: for the crafty and flatterers do similar things, to catch and destroy others. Others think there is an allusion to dogs, which fawn with their tail before their masters to wheedle food from them: for in this way flatterers fawn upon the rich to extract their wealth. Others think there is an allusion to tailed apes, which are therefore called cercopitheci, according to that line of Martial: If I had a tail, I would be a cercopithecus. For just as apes imitate the gestures of men, so flatterers imitate the gestures and manners of their friends, as Plutarch testifies in his book On How to Tell a Flatterer from a Friend.
Well known is the Aesopic fable of the ape which, having been punished by the loss of its tail on account of its tricks and mimicking gestures, in order to cover this disgrace — indeed to transform its own shame into a public honor — cunningly tried to persuade the other animals to cut off their tails as a useless and unsightly bodily weight. Hence "to cercopize" means the same as "to flatter." So says Caelius, Book 11, ch. 33. Hence the proverb: "An assembly of Cercopes," meaning a gathering of the crafty and deceitful. For they relate that certain Cercopes in Ephesus were men of notorious deceitfulness, who by their tricks attempted to impose upon Jupiter, whence they were also called Perperi (impostors), and when caught, Melampygus, that is, Hercules, the avenger hung them up with their heads hanging down.
The words of the flatterer are "simple," that is, they seem candid, true, sincere, bland, and smooth, like oil; but they carry poison with them, which quickly penetrates the inmost parts of the body and heart. For physicians teach that poison placed in oil, carried by the smoothness and slipperiness of the oil, immediately pervades the inmost parts of the body. Truly St. Augustine says on Psalm 59: "The false praise of the flatterer and feigned affection softens rigid minds from the rigor of truth."
Again, the words of the flatterer are "as if wounds," that is, not truly wounds, but they seem as if they were wounds, because the flatterer, in order to pretend himself a friend, assumes the manner of a free speaker, and from time to time freely criticizes the faults of the friend he flatters — but hypocritically, and therefore softly and weakly. So Plutarch in the passage already cited: "They never flatter more," he says, "than when they seem to rebuke, to strike, and to speak freely." And again: "Just as women's cushions, when they seem to resist and push back against heads, yield all the more and accommodate themselves: so the freedom of the flatterer swells indeed, but receives into itself the one who leans upon it."
Third, most fittingly by nirgan, that is, double-tongued, understand the detractor and whisperer: for his words are like blows and wounds; because at first, when they are simply spoken, their detractions seem to be light bruises — indeed they seem to be words of "those who have been struck," as if these faults of a friend strike their own heart and wound them with compassion. But when these words are exaggerated and amplified, they drive a sting into the mind of the listeners, which, then chewed over and more frequently considered, pervades the inmost parts of the belly, that is, of the heart and mind, so that they begin to think little of their friend and at last grow weary of and pursue him with hatred — as if to say: it wounds, injures, and stings the inmost soul.
Again, the words of the whisperer are "simple," that is, they seem sincere, bare, candid, proceeding from candor and love; but they channel the malice of hatred, infamy, and harm into the inmost parts of the heart. For while they pretend to narrate the faults of their neighbor out of piety and compassion, they lend credibility to their words and drive them more deeply into the mind of the listeners, so that the listener believes them and considers the person detracted from to be worthless and infamous. Therefore their words, which seem simple, are in reality blows and hammers that strike and batter the inmost parts of the heart: for halmut means a hammer; whence mithallamim are "hammerings," that is, the blows and bruises that are made with a hammer.
Hear St. Bernard, Sermon 24 on the Canticle: "Others," he says, "try to color over with a certain pretense of feigned modesty the conceived malice that they cannot hold back. You may see deep sighs sent forth first, and then with a certain gravity and slowness, with a mournful face, lowered eyebrows, and a plaintive voice, the curse comes forth; and the more persuasively inasmuch as it is believed by those who hear it to come from a devoted heart and from an affection of compassion rather than from malice. 'I am deeply grieved for him,' he says, 'because I love him much, and I have never been able to correct him in this matter.'" See what follows.
Sirach, as usual, harmonizes with Solomon, Ecclesiasticus 28:15: "The whisperer," he says, "and the double-tongued are cursed; for they have disturbed many who had peace," etc., where he inveighs at length against this vice. And ch. 2:14: "Woe to the double heart and to wicked lips!" For the double-tongued are double-hearted, like the partridges of Paphlagonia, which, according to Pliny, Book 11, ch. 37, have a double heart: for in a similar way whisperers have one heart in their breast and another in their mouth, thinking one thing and saying another. So in turn they have one tongue in the presence of a friend and another in his absence, praising him when present, blaming him when absent.
See what was said in both places: for I do not repeat those things here, lest I do what has already been done.
Fear casts down the slothful: and the souls of the effeminate shall hunger.
This verse is not in the Hebrew, nor in the Latin Complutensian edition and some others; it does however appear in the Roman edition: it was transcribed from the Septuagint, who expressed the following ambiguous Hebrew verse, which can be translated in two ways, with a double meaning. For the Hebrew mitrappe signifies both "slothful" and "one who heals" (as the Septuagint translate in the next verse): otherwise this verse agrees in matter and sense with the following one, and seems to be its paraphrase. For the sluggard is soft and lax, and therefore dissipates his works, and so is reduced to want and hunger.
The sense therefore is, as if to say: Fear of labor dismays the sluggard, and makes him effeminate, so that like a woman he flees from and dreads labor and pursues idleness. Therefore through inertia he brings upon himself poverty and hunger. Whence the Author of the Greek Chain: "The man," he says, "who by his will and inclination is a woman will never attain the virtue that nourishes the soul."
For "effeminate" the Greek is androgynōn, as if to say "man-women," or those who degenerate from men into women. For androgynes are hermaphrodites, who have both the female and male sex, so that the same person is at once man and woman, and therefore a half-man, effeminate, soft, and passive. Pliny, Book 7, ch. 3, teaches that there are such in Africa who have the right breast masculine and the left feminine; whence Cicero, Book 1 On Divination, calls such people monsters of nature, indeed fateful monsters. And St. Augustine, Book 3 On Genesis Literally, ch. 22, refuting those who think Adam was androgynous because Scripture says "male and female He made them," says thus: "Lest anyone should think it was so made that in a single human being both sexes were expressed, as sometimes those are born whom they call androgynes, he shows that he used the singular number because of the unity of their union." The sluggard therefore is an androgyne, because sloth makes him effeminate and turns a man, as it were, into a woman.
Note here that the companions and signs of sloth or laziness are fear, softness, and effeminacy. Hear Aristotle, in his book On Virtues: "Softness, effeminacy, torpor, and love of life accompany cowardice. There is also a certain timidity and an avoidance of strife." Whence Jamblichus thus depicts idleness: "An unwarlike man in feminine dress and garb reclining on a cushion." The same Aristotle in the Problems, Section 3, Questions 5 and 25, gives cold as the cause of fear, which is also the cause of torpor: whence we see in winter that cold people shiver, tremble, and grow torpid. On the other hand, heat and warm spirits are the cause of magnanimity, agility, and fervor. The same author in the Physiognomics, ch. 6, gives the same signs for fear and torpor: "The signs of the timid," he says, "are: soft hair; the body inclined, not erect; calves contracted upward; somewhat pale about the face; eyes weak and excessively blinking; and the extremities of the body weak, and the legs small; hands long and thin; loins small and weak; the figure tense in its movements; not rash, but supine and easily startled; the expression in the face changeable; mournful."
Now hear the harms of laziness and idleness through examples and comparisons. Just as through a crack in the bilge water secretly enters and rises until the ship is sunk through the negligence of the sailors: so from idleness and sloth evil thoughts and lusts multiply, until the ship of the heart, succumbing to them, is imperiled in sin, says St. Bernard, Sermon on St. Andrew. Birds that are prepared for banquets, in order that they may easily grow fat while motionless, are kept in the dark: so for those who lie about without any exercise, swelling invades the sluggish body, and inert fattening grows into a proud mass, says Seneca, Epistle 121. Just as water that lacks flow and lies in ditches rots and becomes unfit for human use and fills up with poisonous and harmful creatures: so also a body wasted by the disease of idleness begets the madness of carnal lusts, says Lawrence Justinian, in his book On the Steps of Perfection, ch. 9.
Finally, sloth and torpor is like the torpedo fish, as well as that other fish called the echeneis or remora. Of the former, Pliny, Book 32, ch. 1, asserts: "If it is touched even with a spear or rod, however powerful the arms, they grow numb, however swift the feet, they are shackled — as if it affects the limbs by its smell alone and a certain exhalation of its body." Of the echeneis he says it holds and stops ships driven by strong winds. "Let the winds rage," he says, "and storms rage, it commands the fury, restrains such great forces, and compels ships to stand still — what no chains, no anchors cast with irrecoverable weight can do. It curbs impulses and tames the fury of the world with no effort of its own, not by holding back, nor by any other means than adhering. But armed fleets mount upon themselves the battlements of towers, so that at sea too there may be fighting as if from walls. Alas, human vanity! when a half-foot-long little fish can hold back and keep fettered those beaks armed with bronze and iron for striking." In a similar way, sloth numbs all the powers of the mind, all the members of the body, and holds back and stops the great endeavors of the mind, like ships driven by the wind.
9. He who is soft and lax in his work is brother (Chaldean: companion) to one who dissipates his own works.
For "soft and lax" the Hebrew is mitrappe, which Aquila translates as nōcheleuomenos, that is, slothful; Symmachus, strangeuomenos, that is, ceasing; Theodotion, aneimenos, that is, relaxed; the Tigurine: he who is cold in his work is brother to the one who dissipates; Vatablus: he who abandons his own work is brother to the master who wastes — supply: his possessions. He uses "brother" for "similar," because brothers are usually alike, as if to say: He who is negligent loses everything he has. Or he is called "brother" symbolically: because both, namely the soft man and the dissipator, are sons of carelessness, which does not look out for itself but allows its own things to be wasted.
For "dissipating" the Hebrew is baal maschit, that is, of the man who is a destroyer — so Cajetan; or of the man who lays waste, cuts down, and loses. As if to say: He who does some work in a relaxed, cold, and drowsy manner does not so much do the work as destroy it, and therefore is most similar to him who dissipates and demolishes work already done. Less properly Jansenius and some others translate it as "of a spendthrift or prodigal"; for the Hebrew maschit properly signifies a devastator and destroyer, although in its own way the spendthrift and prodigal is such. As if to say: Just as the prodigal loses his things through extravagance, so the lazy man loses his through sloth and idleness.
This maxim therefore signifies that torpor, sluggishness, and sloth so far from advancing a work begun actually dissipate and destroy what has been begun: both because the sluggard does not preserve what he has worked and earned, but lets it slip away and dissolve; and because a work begun, unless it is completed, gradually crumbles, deteriorates, and is destroyed — for the beginning of a work depends on its middle and end, so that if it is deprived of these, it begins to collapse. This can be seen in buildings. For the man who has erected walls and constructed a floor: if he neglects to put on a roof, by his negligence he causes the rain, pouring onto the walls and floor, to corrupt and destroy them. The same can be seen in gardens and plants: for unless one continually waters, hoes, prunes, and cultivates them, they deteriorate and instead of fruits produce weeds, briers, and thorns — for everything requires cultivation to be preserved. Hear Ovid, Book V of the Tristia, elegy 12, demonstrating this through examples from nature:
Add that genius, damaged by long rust, Grows numb, and is much less than it was before. If a fertile field is not renewed by constant plowing, It will have nothing but grass with thorns. The horse that has stood long will run badly, and among Those released from the starting gates, it will go last. A boat turns to soft decay and gapes with cracks, If for a long time it lies idle from its accustomed waters.
Wherefore Cato in his Distichs thus commands: Flee sluggishness, which is called the sloth of life: For when the spirit languishes, inertia consumes the body.
Therefore the sluggard, torpid in his work, dissipates it, because what he builds with one hand he, as it were, destroys with the other; for what he constructs by his labor he loses and ruins by his sluggishness and torpor. Therefore such people are like the web that Penelope used to weave: what she had woven by day, she unwove and dissolved by night. This verse therefore teaches much the same thing as the common saying: It is no less a virtue to guard what has been gained than to seek it.
And it teaches that not only extravagance but also the negligence of the head of a household makes the family property worse. Likewise the negligence of magistrates harms the commonwealth no less than any enemy. And the carelessness and ignorance of bishops has afflicted the Church almost no less than the cruelty of tyrants who tried to crush it by arms.
There is a notable fable on this subject about Ocnus (for in Greek oknos means sluggard). The ancients depicted Ocnus sitting in the underworld and twisting a rope; but standing beside him was a she-ass, which immediately devoured whatever he had twisted: for oknos is onos, that is, the sluggard is an ass. In other words, whatever the sluggard sluggishly does, laziness, whose symbol is the ass, immediately consumes and wastes. Whence Propertius, Book 4, elegy 3: More fitting to twist a rope with slanting Ocnus, And forever feed your hunger, little she-ass.
Hence the proverb: "The sluggard twists a little rope; he weaves the rope of Ocnus." Pausanias, Book 10 On Phocis, writes that Ocnus was industrious and hardworking, but had a lazy wife who consumed all her husband's earnings. See Pierius, Hieroglyphics, Book 12. Like Ocnus today are workmen who waste in playing, drinking, and carousing on Sunday what they have earned during the week. Thus what the long and hard labor of the man gathers, the she-ass of the flesh immediately devours. On Ocnus see Pausanias, Pliny, Varro, and Plutarch.
Moreover this maxim is true for spiritual goods as much as for temporal ones. See St. Gregory, Part III of the Pastoral, admonition 35.
The Rabbis add that the sluggard is brother to the one who dissipates not only his own works but the whole world. For the phrase "his own works" is not in the Hebrew, which has absolutely: he is brother to the dissipater. For those who devote themselves to no honest pursuit but idle, feast, and indulge their appetite — as far as it is in their power they attempt to demolish and destroy the world. So says Baynus.
Mystically R. Solomon: He who, he says, is negligent in the work and study of the Law, and has profanely given himself entirely to Gentile philosophy — this man is the brother of maschit, that is, of the destroyer, namely Satan.
Finally, the Complutensian and Roman Septuagint translate: he who does not heal himself in his works is brother to the one who destroys himself. For the Hebrew mitrappe, if derived from rapha with aleph (for the letters he and aleph are often interchanged), signifies to cure, to heal. To heal one's works is to direct and moderate them so that there is no defect in them (for a defect is to a work what a disease is to a body), no excess, no deficiency — so that they are done neither sluggishly and torpidly, nor hastily and recklessly, but prudently and moderately. The Author of the Greek Chain from the Septuagint translates: he who does not satisfy himself with his own works is like the one who destroys and dissipates himself. And he thus explains: the sense is: "He who passes his life in wickedness differs in nothing from one who destroys himself." But this is a mystical sense; for literally the satisfaction with works is the moderation just described. For he who performs them out of virtue is satisfied with them; but he who is intemperate and immoderate is not satisfied with them, as can be seen in the avaricious, who work night and day and consume the strength of body and mind with excessive labors in order to grow rich. For these, just as they are not satisfied with gain, so they are not satisfied with labor, and are insatiable.
Parallel to this maxim is that in ch. 10:4: "The slack hand works poverty; but the hand of the strong prepares riches." And ch. 12:11: "He who works his land shall be filled with bread; but he who pursues idleness is most foolish." And v. 24: "The hand of the strong shall rule; but the slack hand shall serve under tribute." And ch. 23:21: "Drowsiness shall be clothed with rags." The counterpart is Christ's parable of the talents, in which the master commands the talent to be taken from the idle servant, saying: "To everyone who has (that is, who uses and works) shall be given, and he shall abound; but from him who has not (that is, does not use, does not work), even what he seems to have shall be taken from him," Matthew 25:29.
Nor otherwise does Cicero say, Tusculan Disputations II: "As burdens are borne more easily by bodies that are braced, while they crush relaxed ones: very similarly the mind by its own exertion repels all the pressure of weights, but by relaxation is so weighed down that it cannot raise itself."
10. The name of the Lord is a most strong tower: the just man runs to it, and shall be exalted.
So the Roman and other editions. Therefore some less correctly read "to it" (feminine), namely to the tower; although it can be so translated from the Hebrew, and the sense comes to the same thing. For if the name of the Lord is a tower, then whoever runs to it runs to the tower; and country folk and townspeople are accustomed, when an enemy threatens, to take refuge in towers. Whence the Chaldean translates: in it the just man runs, and shall be exalted in it. In Hebrew: a tower of strength (Aquila and Theodotion: a tower of power) is the name of Jehovah; in Him or to it the just man shall run and be exalted. The Syriac: and he shall be strong. The Tigurine: he is out of the range of missiles. Aben-Ezra translates and explains the Hebrew bo iaruts in two ways: first, in Him he shall run, that is, by the help of the divine name he shall run; second, in Him he shall crush his enemies — for if you derive iaruts from ruts, it means "he shall run"; but if from ratsats, it means "he shall crush." These two roots are often interchanged, as is clear from Judges 9:53; Ecclesiastes 12:6; 2 Samuel 23:42, and elsewhere.
He alludes to the custom of the ancients, who in cities and villages erected towers, to which, as to citadels, they would flee when the enemy attacked.
Such was the one at Rome on the Capitol; whence when the city was captured by the Gauls, the Capitol preserved Rome and the Romans. Hence learned men consider that "Burg" is named from the Greek pyrgos, that is, tower, because in the Burgs there were towers like citadels. Now from Burg the Germans call citizens Burgers, the French Bourgeois; hence the Burgundians were so named, because they dwelt in Burgs, that is, in fortified places, namely towers and citadels, on account of the frequent invasions of the Vandals, Goths, and Alans. Such was the tower of Babel, Genesis 11, which gave its name to the city of Babylon, of which St. Jerome says on Isaiah chapters 13 and 14: "The citadel," he says, "and Capitol of the city is the tower built after the flood."
Solomon says therefore that just as the Romans in every attack of the enemy fled to the Capitol, the Babylonians to the tower of Babel, the Burgundians to the Burg: so the just should run to God by invoking Him, as to the unconquerable Tarpeian citadel, and an inviolable asylum, from which they not only defend themselves but also assail and crush the enemy by hurling missiles from above, as Aben-Ezra translates. Therefore, just as one who takes refuge in a tower is exalted by its height: so also one who takes refuge in God most high is exalted in Him and through Him. Again, "he shall be exalted," that is, he shall stand like a soldier in his garrison and post; for garrison soldiers are accustomed to keep watch in towers and from there to fight and attack the enemy. Hence they are called "stationarii" (garrison soldiers). For he who is in a tower is higher and superior to the rest who are on the ground, and from above looks down upon the enemy and everything else, because he alone can stop and dislodge a hundred enemies climbing up the narrow approach.
The Septuagint translate: from the magnificence of strength (another interpreter reads: from the greatness of works) is the name of the Lord; and the just running to Him are exalted. Which the Author of the Greek Chain clearly renders thus: "From the greatness and excellence of strength the Lord is named (or: the name of the Lord is the magnificence of strength), and the just who run to Him are exalted." Which the same author then explains thus: "God is called the all-powerful Lord of great virtues, and He makes such those who join themselves to Him. By the name of the Lord, the knowledge of God is also sometimes signified. To it the just shall run, etc., that is, through an upright and blameless life they approach God; and through contemplation they are exalted by Him. Or what is said aims at this: From created things and their greatness and beauty, the omnipotence of God is known and magnified." So the Author of the Chain, mystically rather than literally.
You may ask: what is the name of the Lord, by taking refuge in which the just man is exalted? I answer, it is manifold. First, the Rabbis grammatically understand the name Jehovah, which is in the Hebrew. For this was among the Jews, as it were, God's proper name, as is clear from Exodus 6:3, and it protected and safeguarded those who invoked it. This is also the tetragrammaton, and with its four letters, like the four sides, it represents a square tower; finally, by the names Adonai or Elohim, which are customarily joined to it, it is, as it were, surrounded and fortified with a rampart.
Second, more fully and profoundly, by the name of God understand God Himself represented by His name; for often a name signifies the thing named by metonymy, as when we pray daily: "Hallowed be Thy name," that is: cause, O God, that Thou Thyself be worshipped and celebrated as holy by all, that Thy majesty and holiness be acknowledged and adored by all. So St. Augustine on Psalm 64:4, explaining that text said of God — "A tower of strength from the face of the enemy" — says thus: "Christ has been made for us a tower from the face of the enemy. Take care lest you be struck by the devil; flee to the tower. The darts of the devil have never followed you to that tower; there you will stand fortified and fixed. Before you is the tower; remember Christ, and enter the tower. Whatever you suffer, consider that He suffered first; and consider to what end He suffered — that He might die and rise again. Hope for such an end for yourself as preceded in Him; and you have entered the tower."
Third, by the name understand the might and omnipotence of God; for the name of God is Almighty, All-powerful, Most Strong, God of Israel, etc.; whence the Septuagint translate: the magnificence of strength is the name of the Lord, as I said shortly before. In a similar sense, signing ourselves with the cross we say: "In the name (that is, in the power) of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" — supply: I begin or do this work.
Fourth, the name of God is the help and protection of God. So Christ says, John 17:11: "Holy Father, keep them in Thy name," that is, preserve them under Thy protection and guardianship, says Theophylactus and Euthymius, according to Psalm 90:1: "He who dwells in the help (as in a most fortified tower and citadel) of the Most High shall abide under the protection of the God of heaven." See here St. Bernard.
Fifth, the name of God is the naming and invocation of God by His name, as if to say: Prayer and the invocation of God is like the loftiest tower, to which the just flee in any tribulation and are exalted, because with mind raised to God they dwell in Him as if exalted, free from every enemy, secure from any adversity, above the earth, citizens of heaven, members of God's household. Hear St. Chrysostom, Book 2 On Praying to God: "Just as a city that is not surrounded by towers and walls easily falls into the power of enemies: so also the soul not fortified by prayers the devil easily reduces to his dominion, and without much effort fills with every kind of sin. But he does not dare to approach more closely a soul fortified by prayers, fearing the strength and fortitude that prayer provides." He alludes to the post of soldiers in towers, from which the Church took the name of "stations." For thus she calls the appointed days dedicated to prayer and fasting, on which the faithful keep watch, as it were, at their post, and fight against the devil and other enemies.
Whence Tertullian, in his book On Prayer, at the end, says that the station should be dissolved upon receiving the body of the Lord: "Will not your station be more solemn," he says, "if you have also stood at the altar of God? If the station took its name from the military example (for we too are the militia of God), then certainly no joy or sorrow befalling the camp cancels the soldiers' stations" — so that they would leave their posts on account of happy or sad news. As if to say: So neither should Christians desert the station of prayer and fasting, whatever happy or sad occasion may arise.
Finally, the name of God is the name Jesus; for this is the proper name of the incarnate Word, which grants the salvation it signifies to all who flee to it as to a tower, according to that text: "For there is no other name under heaven given to men, by which we must be saved," Acts 4:12. See St. Bernard, Sermon 15 on the Canticle. See also what I have said on this name at Philippians 2:10; Numbers 13; Habakkuk 3:18.
11. The substance of the rich man is the city of his strength: and as a strong wall surrounding him.
The first hemistich we heard at ch. 10, v. 15, where I explained it. For the latter part, the Hebrew has thus: and a high wall, bemaskito, which Pagninus and Baynus translate as "in his imagination," that is, as Vatablus says, "he imagines to himself that his riches are in the place of a most strong city and a most high wall." Cajetan: in his carvings. R. David: in his painting. Others: in his chambers. Others: in his sight. R. Solomon: in his innermost parts. The Chaldean: like a wall, his dwelling is raised up. The Syriac: his dwelling is in strong walls. The Septuagint: but his glory greatly overshadows. About which more later.
Hence R. Levi and Aben-Ezra consider this verse to be opposed to the preceding one, as if to say: For the just man the tower of strength is the name of the Lord, which protects him so that he cannot be conquered by any adversity; but for the rich man, the city and tower of strength are his riches — but with this difference, that for the just man the name of the Lord is truly a tower of strength, whereas for the rich man his riches are not really but only in his opinion and persuasion a city of strength. For he thinks that through them he will be safe from adversity and by their help will be exalted, just as the just man is by the divine name. The just man therefore has in God a true asylum and defense; the rich man in his riches has only a fictitious, painted, and imagined one. For he forms and paints this for himself in his mind, but it exists nowhere; therefore at the slightest assault of adversity it is blown away and vanishes like a spider's web, according to that text of Isaiah 59: "They have woven spider's webs; their webs shall not serve for clothing." This therefore is the first sense, in which bemaskito means "in his imagination."
The second sense is that by which Cajetan translates: in his carvings. R. David: in his paintings. As if to say: The rich man, when he walks about in his finely carved chambers, considers himself safe and happy, just as if he were walled around by high walls. Or, as R. Abraham says: "And he regards the carved gold and silver, with which his house is filled, as a raised wall." The same author adds that it can be translated: and like a high wall in his sight, as if to say: The rich man continually has his gold in his sight, that is, he continually looks upon it as a wall in which his hope, safety, and defense rests. Another explains it thus, as if to say: Just as one who stands on a high place, if he looks down, is seized by dizziness, by which he is turned around and of his own accord rushes downward and is dashed to pieces: so the rich man, driven to pride by his riches, owing to the weakness of his head and senses plunges headlong and is carried to ruin.
Third, our translator renders bemaskito as "in his covering," from the root sacach, that is, he covered, he concealed; whence he translates "surrounding," that is, covering, walling in, fortifying him, as if to say: The rich man, when he sees himself covered and surrounded by his riches, thinks himself covered and walled in by a strong wall.
Finally, the Septuagint translate bemaskito as "in his overshadowing"; whence they translate: but his glory greatly overshadows. Which first can be taken so as to agree with the Vulgate, as if to say: it "overshadows," that is, covers, surrounds, and fortifies the rich man with the glory and pomp that he creates for himself with his riches. For when dressed in splendid garments, surrounded by servants, carried on horse or chariot, he walks in pomp, he seems to be surrounded and fortified on all sides by these, indeed to overshadow, cover, and protect others. Whence the Author of the Greek Chain renders this verse from the Septuagint thus: "Riches are to the rich man like a bulwark and a fortified city; meanwhile glory and majesty are that by which they greatly defend and adorn them."
Second, the word "overshadows" can be referred to painting; for painters shade small and obscure things, so that by the contrast of shadow they represent large and bright things more clearly with colors, and thus the whole art of painting consists in properly mixing and suitably arranging shadows and colors. Moreover, the natural shadow is an image of the body: whence painters learned to paint images from shadows. "The shadow of a man traced by lines, which Cleophantus of Corinth was the first to color with ground clay," says Pliny, Book 35, ch. 3.
The word "overshadows" therefore signifies first, that riches are not a body and solid good but merely a fleeting and vanishing shadow. What is more empty and fleeting than a shadow? Yet riches and the pomps of this world are but a shadow. Second, that riches by their shadow and appearance overshadow and deceive the eyes and minds of men. For just as the shadows of bodies in the morning and evening are very large and far larger than the body: so the appearance of riches is far greater than the reality; for they display something great and blessed when they contain nothing of the sort, as is evident to the dying at death and to the Blessed in heaven — for there, as in the full light and noonday of happiness, all the shadows of wealth and earthly, shadowy happiness are put to flight, according to that text of the Canticle 2:17: "Until the day breaks and the shadows decline."
Moreover Pliny, Book 2, ch. 10, asserts that "night is nothing other than the shadow of the earth." And shortly after: "Therefore the boundary of those (shadows) is the limit of the air and the beginning of the ether. Above the moon all things are pure and full of lasting light."
Third, painters, says our Salazar, when they want to depress something, paint shadow, and when they want to raise it, color it; for a large area of shadow depresses, while a small amount of color elevates. As if to say: The rich man covers the greater goods, that is, spiritual and eternal ones, with the shadows of ignorance or passions, and illuminates the other things, namely perishable and temporal ones, with brilliant colors; therefore the latter seem higher and the former lower to him. The just and pious man, on the other hand, elevates these spiritual goods, which are in themselves greater and more worthy, with the illumination of colors and pigments; and likewise covers and depresses temporal and perishable things, which are in themselves lesser and lighter, with added shadows.
Mystically Bede: "Earthly substance," he says, "cannot always defend; indeed most people have been captured or killed on account of their riches. Whence Ecclesiastes 5 also says: Riches are preserved to the evil of their owner; for they perish in the worst affliction. It is better therefore to understand the substance praised as that of virtues, with which whoever abounds wards off all the snares of the enemy as with an impregnable wall." Our Alvarez de Paz agrees, Book 4 On Perfection, Part 2, ch. 21, who by substance understands the perfection of virtues, which fortifies and protects a man against all vices, demons, and universal evils, and assigns the cause: The presence of the Lord, he says, dwelling in the soul and protecting it, is the cause of this security. But in what does this security consist? Certainly in this, that the perfect man, in proportion to his life and progress, has overthrown grave sins, extinguished vices, cast down disordered affections, and now, having conquered them, has subjected them to reason and the divine will. And being placed at a certain height of life, he has no reason to fear those things that trouble those who stand in the depths. This man has stored up treasures in heaven, that is, in the loftiest purity of life which bears the likeness of heaven, where no thief approaches nor moth corrupts; and therefore he neither fears thieves, that is, external adversaries, nor dreads the moth, that is, internal desires for evil things. For what should he who, out of desire for perfection and love of poverty, has despised all things and scarcely admits even the barest sustenance and the cheapest clothing necessary for his body, fear from the war of avarice and the desire to possess temporal things? What should he fear from the poisonous hissing of his own flesh, who, in order to subject it to the rule of the spirit, tames it with every kind of hardship and affliction, and frequently denies it even lawful things, lest it desire unlawful ones? What should he dread from the encounter with his own will and the desire for honors and dignities, who flees even the slightest indication of honor, and shudders at following his own will in even some small matter as at the most deadly plague?
12. Before destruction, the heart of a man is exalted: and before he is glorified, he is humbled.
In Hebrew: before breaking, the heart of a man shall be elevated, and before glory, humility. Symmachus and Theodotion: and before glory, meekness. Vatablus: abasement precedes glory, as if to say: The proud are humbled, and the humble are exalted.
The Author of the Greek Chain from the Septuagint thus translates: the heart of a man is not exalted before it is depressed and crushed, nor does it again obtain glory before it is humbled. St. Jerome, Epistle 32, reads: Before glory the heart of a man shall be humbled, and before ruin it is exalted. This verse is repeated from ch. 16, v. 18, where I explained it. To which add that someone explains it morally thus, as if to say: A man is afflicted and crushed because he exalted himself through pride; whence, in order to be freed from his troubles and return to his former prosperity, it is necessary that he humble himself.
St. Bernard says beautifully, Sermon 54 on the Canticle: "It behooves one who strives for higher things," he says, "to think humbly of himself, lest while he raises himself above himself, he fall from himself." And shortly after: "Without the merit of humility the greatest things are by no means obtained." Relevant here is the proverb of the Arabs, century 1, no. 3: "If you do not know how to climb by a ladder, you will not walk upon the roof" — that is, if you cannot humble yourself and submit to being led, neither will you be a leader. For those who cannot contain themselves under the authority of others are not accustomed to be promoted to authority; because no one rightly plays the master who has not previously been a servant, so much so that servitude is the way to command, just as a ladder is the way to the roof.
13. He who answers before he listens shows himself to be a fool, and worthy of confusion.
Because he answers too hastily about the matter on which he is questioned, responds impertinently about something else, or exposes himself to the danger of answering inappropriately — lest when asked about beans he answer about onions, as the saying goes. In Hebrew: he who returns a word before he has heard, it is folly and disgrace to him. The Septuagint: it is impudence and reproach to him. The Chaldean: confusion. Vatablus: he is affected with shame and confusion. Following Solomon, Sirach says, Ecclesiasticus 11:8: "Before you hear, do not answer a word, and in the midst of a discourse do not interject speech" — where I fully explained the sense of both maxims; therefore here I will not add a jot.
14. The spirit of a man sustains his weakness: but a spirit prone to anger, who can endure?
As if to say: No one, except the very patient and gentle, says Lyra. For "prone to anger," the Hebrew is nechea, which first, Theodotion, deriving it from nacha, that is, "he struck," translates as "struck": "And a struck spirit," he says, "who will bear it?" Second, others deriving it from kaa, that is, to grieve, to be sad, to be weak, translate it as grieving, sad, weak. The Syriac: shaken with grief. Third, the Septuagint translate oligopsychon, that is, of small soul, or pusillanimous. The Chaldean: abject. Fourth, the Tigurine: affected by passions, which our translator renders as "prone to anger." Fifth, others: disturbed, troubled, darkened — one from whom the light of joy has been taken away by sadness or anger.
First, Aben-Ezra explains it thus, as if to say: The spirit, that is, the soul, of a man will bear sickness and irrigate the body — that soul, I say, which, filled with the possession of wisdom, patiently endures pains; for this is a "man" who, excelling in strength, does not allow his mind to be overcome by grief but prudently receives whatever happens with a cheerful spirit. But a spirit nechea, that is, a dejected mind, succumbing to grief and anger over the empty things of this world when it cannot obtain them — who will sustain it? And R. Levi: If the mind itself, he says, is so vexed by disease that it succumbs and languishes, what will restore it? For there is nothing by which it can be repaired. Whence Vatablus also translates: the spirit of a man bears his illness, but a struck spirit who will bear? And thus explains: as if to say: "The spirit of a man easily bears the illness of the body; but the illness of the spirit, that is, its own illness, it cannot bear — that is, if the mind is unwell, no one can heal it."
Second, Cajetan thus translates and explains: the spirit of a man will bear his own sickness, and a contrite spirit — who will bear it? And he explains thus: The disparity between the evils of the spirit (evils that are, as it were, innate or arising from within) and the evils of the same coming from without is described by the fact that the former are tolerable but the latter intolerable. Comparing therefore the evils arising from without to intrinsic diseases, he says that the spirit of a man will endure its own diseases (such as pusillanimity, precipitate anger, and other such diseases of the mind), but a spirit crushed by another (that is, not only struck and broken but also, as it were, ground down by disgraces, contempts, mockeries, and other injuries) — who will endure it? As if he had said more plainly: It is intolerable — not that it is utterly intolerable, but because it can be endured only with very great difficulty.
Third, some translate in the nominative: "A spirit prone to anger, what can it endure?" As if to say: The spirit of a man, that is, a manly spirit, easily tolerates its own weakness; but a pusillanimous spirit, which takes offense and flares up at a light blow or a mere word, can tolerate nothing or the very least adversity. But all others translate in the accusative: "A spirit prone to anger, who can endure?" For the Hebrew mi signifies "who," not "what"; for the interrogative is of a person, not a thing.
Fourth, the Septuagint understand by "spirit" anger; for the angry blow forth from their nostrils copious breath or exhalation. By "weakness" they understand a weak, lowly, and abject servant. Whence they translate: a prudent servant mitigates the anger of a man; but a man of small spirit, who will endure him? As if to say: The anger of a sensible, prudent, and magnanimous man a prudent servant will calm by his wise counsel and speech, because such a man allows himself to be led by reason and prudence; but a pusillanimous man who can endure nothing but flares up at everything — who will bear him? For he is continually driven not by reason but by anger and impatience. Whence the Author of the Greek Chain infers: By these words it is plainly shown, he says, that cowardice and abjection of spirit is worse than anger; since an angry man even a household servant, though he has no power and no great liberty of speech, may in time pacify; but one who is broken by cowardice and fear of labor, never.
Fifth and genuinely, "the spirit of a man" is a manly, generous, magnanimous spirit, and therefore vigorous, joyful, and eager; this spirit easily suffers and bears any weakness, both its own and that of others, like some most robust giant. But a pusillanimous spirit, which if even touched by a pin grows angry and flares up, is so unable to tolerate and bear anything that it itself is unbearable and intolerable both to itself and to others, even the generous and strong. "Because," as Bede says, "he who is prone to anger cannot even endure himself, so that when angry he often says things which, when he is calm, he repents of having said, and generally does not even know whether he said them."
Note that the phrase "the spirit of a man sustains" is in Hebrew iekalkel, that is, bears, carries, supports. For it alludes to porters, who, when they have a strong breath and respiration, carry heavy and weighty loads; because, as Aristotle says in his book On Respiration, the measure of strength and vigor for carrying loads is the breath and respiration: for the more powerfully and deeply one breathes through the nostrils, the stronger one is for carrying loads; but the more feebly and shortly one draws and exchanges breath through the nostrils, the weaker one is and the less able to carry burdens. Fittingly therefore Solomon says that "the spirit of a man," that is, a manly, strong, and constant spirit, brings sufficient strength to carry any weakness. For the spirit of a man is a manly and magnanimous soul — indeed it is virtue itself, strength, and magnanimity. Whence St. Ambrose, Book 1 on Luke, on that text about St. John the Baptist — "For he shall be great before the Lord" — says: "There is," he says, "before the Lord, greatness of soul, greatness of virtue. There is also smallness of soul and infancy of virtue, etc. John therefore shall be great not by virtue of body but by greatness of soul: small in the world, great in spirit."
Relevant here is that saying of Seneca, Epistle 66: "Magnanimous is he who bears all the burdens of diverse things with an unbending neck, who stands above fortune. It is no wonder not to be shaken in tranquillity; marvel rather that someone is raised up where all are cast down, that someone stands where all lie prostrate." And again: "The magnanimous man stands upright under any weight; no circumstance makes him lesser; nothing that must be endured displeases him, and he does not complain that whatever can befall a man has befallen him." And Pliny, Book 16, ch. 43: "Just as a branch of the palm tree," he says, "when a weight is placed upon it, does not bend down to the ground in the manner of other trees, but resists and of its own accord raises itself up against the weight of the burden: so the spirit of a strong man, the more it is pressed by troubles and the more fiercely fortune rages, the more erect it stands," and says to you: "Do not yield to misfortunes, but go more boldly against them." Whence Lyra thus explains, as if to say: "The spirit of a man," that is, the goodness of heart, sustains his own weakness on the part of the body, because sometimes it does more than one who has a strong body and a weak heart. Whence St. Gregory, Homily 12: "The strength," he says, "that inexperience denies, charity supplies." The opposite happens in the pusillanimous; for they do not bear the weight of a straw but immediately collapse, become sad, complain, and grow angry. Whence St. Basil, Homily On Giving Thanks: "Just as worms," he says, "are born in softer wood, so the impieties of the mind arise in the softer minds of men." And St. Chrysostom, Homily 38 on 1 Corinthians: "Just as healthy bodies, even if they live on bread alone, are nevertheless plump and vigorous; but sickly ones, even with a luxurious and varied table, are rendered more feeble: so it is wont to happen in the souls of men. The pusillanimous, even if they were to enjoy a diadem and immense honors, cannot return to themselves; but philosophers even in chains and fetters enjoy pure pleasure." So Christ sustained and overcame the weakness of the flesh in His Passion by the strength of the spirit. Whence He says: "The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak," says Bede, who also adds: "It can also be taken of any holy man who sustains the weakness of the flesh by the fortitude of the mind, lest it yield in temptations" — as all the holy martyrs, confessors, and virgins did. "For torments consecrate the martyrs of God, and sanctify them in the very proving of their passion," says St. Cyprian, Book 4, Epistle 1 to Rogatianus. So St. Paul says: "When I am weak, then I am strong," 2 Corinthians 12:10. So the spirit of St. Francis sustained his flesh, exhausted by penances and labors, so that even on the road he would of his own charity take upon his shoulders the great burdens of travelers and cheerfully carry them, says St. Bonaventure. Thus St. Paula sustained the diseases of her body with a strong spirit, as St. Jerome attests in her Life.
Moreover, the source and author of this manly spirit is the Holy Spirit: "For He it is," says St. Ambrose on the Creed, "who not only drives out sorrows, griefs, and evil thoughts of shameful things, but also grants us the memory of God in ourselves, so that we may deservedly say with David: I remembered God, and I was delighted. And again: I will remember Your wonders, Psalm 76. He it is who, coming to us who rightly believe and do good works, driving out the darkness and anguish and faintheartedness of heart, and illuminating us with His light, mingles the mind of Christ with our understanding, so that we may think upon our life which is hidden in Christ, and consider what our state shall be in the eternal and future ages; following the Son of God Jesus, who has penetrated the heavens, and sitting at the right hand of God, and present in every place, leaves nothing empty of His presence."
And this is the a priori reason for this maxim. For just as by breathing we draw in spirit, which adds strength and vigor to us for bearing burdens, so likewise by breathing in and invoking the Holy Spirit, we draw in spirit, vigor, and strength of soul for bravely enduring any infirmities and adversities, according to Romans 8:26: "The Spirit helps our weakness." Again, just as there is a force that carries a weight—whence however great the force, so great a weight it can carry: if small, a small one; if great, a great one; for every weight requires proportionate strength in the one carrying it—so likewise the force of the soul is its spirit and strength, which bears infirmities both bodily and spiritual, both its own and others': whence however great the spirit, so great a weight of infirmities it can bear; if great, a great one; if small, a small one; so that, just as Atlas is imagined by the poets to be of such great strength that he sustains the machinery of the heavens on his shoulders, according to that verse of Virgil, Aeneid IV:
Of hardy Atlas, who props up the sky upon his head.
So let a great spirit be like Atlas sustaining all hard and bitter things, which either the earth suggests to him or God rains down upon him from heaven, so that he stands unmoved though beaten by wind and rain.
Finally, we see that enormous loads and ships laden with merchandise are lifted by wheels and pulleys by the small strength of a few men, as I myself observed while sailing on the Antwerp river toward Brussels, where enormous bridges are raised and lifted by a boy through these devices. So too we daily observe that by a lever, greater loads are lifted than the strength of those lifting them would allow, and Vitruvius teaches the method in Book X, chapter 8. Aristotle gives the reason in Mechanical Problems, Question 3, that the lever is like a balance balancing, and thus lightening every weight; for it makes the mover more distant from the center of the weight, and thus as it were balances and suspends it, and therefore moves it more easily, as Nicolaus Leonicus clearly explains there. See also the fuller commentary on Aristotle's Mechanics by Bernardino Baldi of Urbino, who also rightly observes that Aristotle's statements must be limited to cases having a fulcrum, that is, when between the lever and the weight to be lifted there is a fulcrum in the middle on which the lever rests; for then the fulcrum is like a center in which both the moving force and the weight moved are balanced and suspended, and therefore the fulcrum creates an equilibrium of both, otherwise not. The same reason applies, says the same Aristotle in Question 4, why those who are in the middle of a ship, the rowers, move the ship most, because the oar is a lever. And why great masses of ships are moved by a small rudder, because the rudder is a lever." The same happens with the spirit: namely, we see greater things endured and borne through it than its natural strength would allow, if by a wheel, pulley, or lever of special grace, as well as of prudence and ingenuity, it is carried. For prudence is ingenious in devising means, methods, reasons, and considerations by which the weight of sorrow or adversity may be lightened. Thus we see that if some fine maxim or reasoning suited to one's nature and agreeable to one's taste is offered to one who is afflicted or melancholic, he is immediately, if not freed, at least relieved of his affliction and melancholy.
Tropologically, "the spirit of a man," that is, firmness and stability of soul, is what strengthens a man for embracing virtue and fortifies him for overcoming opposing vices; but if at the least temptation arising he immediately grows angry and loses heart from sorrow and faintheartedness, who would not be provoked against him, who desists from good on so slight an occasion?
Verse 15: A Prudent Heart Will Possess Knowledge
15. A PRUDENT HEART (Syriac, a clean and pure heart) WILL POSSESS KNOWLEDGE: AND THE EAR OF THE WISE SEEKS DOCTRINE. — The Syriac has, listens; the Septuagint, the heart of the prudent possesses understanding; and the ears of the wise seek thought. In Greek ennoun, that is, well-reasoned understanding; Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion have knowledge or doctrine, as the Vulgate. For in Hebrew the same word daat stands for both knowledge and doctrine; Vatablus: a prudent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise is devoted to learning. Aben-Ezra connects this verse to the preceding one, as if to say: A broken spirit prone to anger does not attain wisdom; but the mind of the prudent, patiently bearing its affliction, will be enriched with knowledge through the aid of its prudence. "And the ear of the wise," etc., as if to say: The wise man, bearing whatever happens with equanimity, will diligently devote himself to learning.
The same, or virtually the same, are in this book knowledge, doctrine, prudence, understanding, wisdom, and sense, as I have already frequently noted: namely, by all these is signified practical knowledge or prudence directing all a man's actions according to the norm of what is honorable and virtuous. The conjunction "and" has a causal meaning, signifying "because"; for the latter hemistich gives the reason for the former, as if to say: The heart of the prudent acquires and by acquiring possesses wisdom, because his ear— seeks and tracks it out; for he listens to teachers and wise men, and what he hears from them he ruminates upon in his mind and stores away. For by these two means wisdom is obtained and possessed, namely by diligent listening and by studious meditation upon it; see what was said at chapter 1:5, on the text: "The wise man, hearing, will be wiser." The ears therefore are like ferrets, which track out a hare or rabbit hiding in its burrow and force it to come out; the mind, however, is like a dog, which catches, seizes, and possesses the hare as it emerges. The word "will possess" signifies first, that wisdom is the proper possession and treasure of the mind and spirit of the wise man; second, that it is most dear to him and held in the highest esteem; third, that it cannot be taken from him against his will by anyone, as external goods are taken by an enemy. So Lyranus.
Verse 16: A Man's Gift Makes Room for Him
16. A MAN'S GIFT MAKES ROOM FOR HIM: AND MAKES SPACE FOR HIM BEFORE PRINCES. — In Hebrew, a man's gift makes it wide for him, and leads him before the great; the Chaldean, the gift of the son of man enlarges him, and before princes sustains him; the Syriac, establishes him; the Septuagint, the gift of the son of man enlarges him, and makes him sit before princes. For "gift" in Greek is doma, which the Royal and Complutensian editions wrongly translate as "house"; for domos means house, but doma means gift.
First, the plain and genuine sense is, as if to say: A gift given either to doorkeepers and chamberlains, or rather sent ahead to the king or prince himself, prepares access for the one who gave it, and paves as it were a broad road to the king or prince, so as to lead him into his presence and make space—that is, give him a place and opportunity to meet the prince; indeed, it makes space for him before the prince, so that he may dwell in his court and presence, as a minister and official of the king, or a courtier and intimate.
Thus R. Levi: "When, he says, one must approach a magnate on account of one's business, if he has first bound him with gifts, the way will be smooth and open by which access to him lies open, so that he may accomplish what he desired and obtain his favor and goodwill on all sides.
Note: The phrase "the gift makes broad" signifies first, that it provides wide access; second, that it grants broad liberty and license for living and acting; third, that it leads from confinement or prison to a broader place, says Aben-Ezra. Just as, therefore, forerunners—for example, Swiss bodyguards—clearing away the crowd, prepare a broad way for the coming Pontiff or King to proceed: so gifts, clearing away obstacles, make a broad way for the giver to reach those to whom he sends gifts. The a priori reason is that love expands the soul of the beloved and compels him to love the lover in return; but love and goodwill are most discerned in beneficence and gifts, and so these entice, expand, and compel the soul of the recipient to love the giver in return and to show himself in turn benevolent, indeed beneficent and generous. Thus Jacob, by sending gifts ahead, paved the way for himself to his brother Esau and reconciled him, though hostile, to himself, Genesis chapter 33. Thus Barlaam, pretending to have a precious gem to give to Josaphat the king's son, opened for himself a way on all sides closed to the same, and converted him to the faith of Christ, as Damascene attests in his History. For kings, as it were certain earthly gods and divinities, by their right demand gifts, as a tribute and payment of the honor owed to them. Therefore among the Persians of old, no access to the king was open except with a gift sent or brought beforehand. Following Solomon, Plato says in Politics Book III: "Gifts bend Gods and reverend Kings." And Ovid:
Gifts, believe me, captivate both men and gods; Jupiter himself is appeased by his own offerings.
An anonymous writer in the Greek Catena objects to himself: "What do I hear here? he says. A little before you were saying that he who would give or accept gifts would perish by an evil death; in what sense, then, do you here command them to be bestowed?" And he answers: "Because there is no danger, if the one is cheerful and ready to give, while the other is slow and by no means inclined to receive."
More plainly and fully one may answer that those gifts are forbidden by which the favor of judges or the like is sought for overthrowing justice or a similar virtue; but here those are approved by which the way is paved to magnates, so that one may obtain a right owed to oneself, or a favor not owed but honorable and useful for the public or private good.
Second, the anonymous author in the Greek Catena renders this maxim from the Septuagint thus: he who gives liberally will be enlarged, and will be established among princely men; and he refers it to almsgiving, as if to say: "He will not be constrained or reduced to straits who has been generous to the needy and the poor; rather, by this one path he will be enlarged and made equal to princely men." And R. Solomon: Allegorically, he says, this maxim pertains to those who bestow their wealth upon the poor, for whom in the future age the same portion will be amplified; and even while they are confined in the prison of the body, they are led before magnates and esteemed as men of great repute. More fully, our Salazar: Solomon, he says, exhorts to beneficence, as if to say: Liberal and lavish generosity wonderfully enlarges the beneficent person—that is, amplifies, ennobles, and leads him to greatness—so that beneficence appears to be the breadth and amplitude of heart, as well as of house and family; so much so that it makes him sit among princes, as the Septuagint translates, or as our Vulgate: "And before princes it makes space for him," that is, it gives him a place among princes. For liberality and magnificence is a royal or imperial virtue; therefore he who cultivates it is plainly to be reckoned in the rank of kings and princes, because he practices a virtue worthy of a prince.
Symbolically, the author of the Greek Catena takes "gift" to mean wisdom or virtue, as if to say: Wisdom given by God spreads and expands the soul, and places its possessor among the number of the wise.
Tropologically, Bede and Salonius take "gift" to mean charity, that is, the gift most excellent of all gifts: "What, he says, is the gift that broadens a man's way, and that makes space for him before princes? This gift is the gift of charity, or of other virtues, which the faithful receive from the Lord. This gift, indeed, broadens his way, that is, his course of action, because each faithful person, the more he is inwardly filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit, the more he broadens his way outwardly, that is, multiplies the steps of good works."
Thus St. John the Almsgiver saw in a vision almsgiving as a radiant maiden standing beside him and saying: "I am the daughter of the supreme King, most intimate with Him, and I introduce all my followers to Him and make them pleasing and familiar to Him: for I have great confidence with Him. Therefore if you honor me, I will introduce you to Him and make you most dear to Him." So Leontius in his Life. Moreover, Tobias, chapter 4, verse 11: "Almsgiving, he says, delivers from all sin and from death, and will not suffer the soul to go into darkness. Almsgiving will be a great confidence before the most high God, for all who practice it." This maxim therefore signifies the powerful force of gift-giving and beneficence, which wins over all, even kings and princes, and indeed God Himself, and merits His grace.
Verse 17: The Just Man Is the First Accuser of Himself
17. THE JUST MAN IS THE FIRST ACCUSER OF HIMSELF: HIS FRIEND COMES AND WILL INVESTIGATE HIM. — In Hebrew, the just man is first in his lawsuit (the Chaldean and Symmachus, in his judgment); his companion or neighbor comes and examines him; the Chaldean, and defeats him; the Septuagint, the just man is the accuser of himself at the beginning of his speech; but when the adversary has added his part, he is refuted; the Syriac, a man is just in judgment; when his companion comes, he proves him.
First, Aben-Ezra and R. Levi connect this verse to the preceding one, as if to say: The just man, bringing a gift to a magnate, is first in his lawsuit: whence he is declared innocent and just by the magnate. Therefore, even if another comes afterward who investigates charges against him in court, he will nevertheless be unable to find him guilty. For we tend to give more credence, says R. Levi, to those who have first presented their case. Or more clearly, as Vatablus puts it, as if to say: He who is first in his lawsuit by bringing gifts to the judge, this man is just—that is, he is superior and victorious in the suit—because he has already bent the judge's mind toward himself and his cause by both words and gifts: therefore even if his companion afterward comes who examines the case of the one who was first, he will accomplish nothing unless he brings greater arguments and gifts.
Others explain it the opposite way: The just man is first in his lawsuit, that is, the just man, trusting in his justice and the equity of his cause, presents himself to the judge; his companion comes, who has given a gift to the judge, and examines and accuses him, and by accusing prevails, as the Chaldean has it, as if to say: By examining he will raise some apparent objection that will bend the judge, already inclined toward himself through gifts, to pass sentence in his favor and condemn the just man.
Second, Cajetan says: It is a parable signifying that when a suit or complaint arises against a just man, and generally when some crime is charged against him, the just man is the first to speak, not waiting for an accuser or witnesses; but knowing himself to be just, he speaks first, trusting in his innocence. Moreover, he speaks the truth, and does not wait to be examined, but willingly responds to the charges. But his investigator must not be an enemy, and therefore it is added: "And his friend comes," who is not driven by hatred or any passion against the just man; a friend comes, I say, not of the man, but of justice, and will investigate him by examining his case. For if the judge were not a friend of justice, it would be easy to corrupt the judgment.
Third, Jansenius, inverting the order of the words, explains it in two ways: First, he says, let this be the order: he who is first in his lawsuit is just, that is, he who speaks first in the suit and controversy he has with another claims right for himself and appears to be just; but one must wait until his neighbor comes, who is the adversary in his case, from whose inquiry it will finally be clear what kind of man he was. And so this maxim teaches that no one should be rashly judged unless both sides have been heard, according to the saying: "Hear the other side." Second, let this be the order: He who is just is first in his case or lawsuit; that is, the just man immediately at the beginning of the lawsuit opens his case simply and confidently to the judges, showing his innocence and that he wants nothing but what is just and equitable, so much so that when his neighbor who litigates with him comes, he confidently allows himself to be examined by him.
Finally, others explain it as if to say: The just man is first in his suit, that is, he anticipates and preoccupies the judge, and sincerely informs him of the truth and equity of his case, lest the judge be preoccupied by others and badly informed to the prejudice of his truth and innocence.
But all these versions and explanations disagree with the Vulgate, with which, however, the Septuagint agrees, as do indeed the Hebrew. For what they have—the just man is first in his lawsuit—means the same, as if to say: The just man first litigates with himself, reproves himself, accuses himself. Solomon does not speak precisely of sacramental confession, since that was not yet instituted or in use, but of confession in general. He signifies, therefore, that the just man, if he has sinned through weakness (for there is no just man who does not sin), does not defend his sin, does not wait for another's reproof, but before others is first in accusing, reproving, and condemning himself, and therefore also patiently endures that his friend should come and investigate him, so that if he finds anything worthy of correction, he may admonish him of it. For the voice of the just man is: "Let the just man correct me in mercy and reprove me; but let not the oil of the sinner anoint my head," Psalm 140. Or the sense is: The just man, before he accuses and reproves others, first accuses himself. For thus Bede understands it: Everyone, he says, who is truly just, when he sees the faults of sinners, first turns the eye of consideration upon himself, and when he has anxiously accused his own frailty, then at last he kindly puts forth his tongue to correct others, as if to say: When the just man has accused himself, then he will examine the friend who comes to him, and if he finds anything in him worthy of correction, he will correct and reprove him. So St. Ambrose, Book I of Offices, chapter 25: "The just man, he says, accuses himself before others. For that man is just who does not spare himself and does not allow his hidden faults to remain concealed, etc. The just man at the beginning of his speech is the accuser of himself. He who accuses himself, even if he is a sinner, begins to be just, because he does not spare himself and confesses his sins to God, whom he believes nothing can escape." Confession, therefore, honors truth and God, and thereby turns away His wrath and vengeance, as Pacianus teaches in the Exhortation to Penitents.
To this pertains the Septuagint version: The just man is the accuser of himself at the beginning of his speech; but when the adversary has added his part, he is refuted, as if to say: The just man in his controversies at the beginning of his speech so sincerely, honestly, and confidently accuses himself, narrating and confessing all things that can truly be objected against him, that when the adversary comes adding and objecting other crimes against him, besides those he has confessed, the adversary is convicted of falsehood and lying, or can easily be convicted. St. Cyril adds, in Book II on John, chapter 147, that these things are said by Solomon to warn that self-praise must be avoided: for this becomes base and worthless in the mouth of one praising himself; and therefore the just and prudent man begins with self-blame, not with praise. For explaining that saying of Christ: "If I bear witness of Myself, My testimony is not true," he confirms it with this maxim of Solomon: "The just man is the accuser of himself in his speech." And again, chapter 27: "Let your neighbor praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips. For it is certainly annoying to listeners when someone wishes to bear testimony of his own great deeds in his own voice, not another's; for we are born by nature to believe less those who attribute preeminent glory to themselves." Therefore the just man, to avoid this vice of self-love, is accustomed to conceal his praises and reveal his vices and faults, and to accuse himself: and while he does this, his friend comes and examines him, and upon examination, finding that nothing or very little can be blamed in him, extols and praises him as much as the man had humbled and accused himself.
But the author of the Greek Catena, taking the Greek epipleta, which the Complutensians and others translate passively as "is refuted," translating it actively (for it is of the middle voice) as "refutes, censures, reproaches," thus renders from the Septuagint with a clear antithesis, and explains it thus: the just man at the beginning of his speech is the accuser of himself; but the adversary and the unjust man begins his speech with reproaches and rebukes. He who begins to act justly, he says, before all else accuses himself. Otherwise, as if to say: "It is more natural for the wicked and unjust man to hurl reproaches and weave calumnies than to accuse himself or turn to amendment."
To this relates the teaching of St. Augustine on Galatians chapter 6: He who wishes to correct his neighbor and amend some vice of his must first correct and amend the same thing in himself. To this relates that saying of Plutarch, in his treatise On the Advantage to be Derived from Enemies: "But if, he says, you are carried away to speaking ill, take care that you be as far removed as possible from those things which you charge against another; examine your own soul, see where you are faulty, lest your own vice sing back to you that line of the tragedian:
You wish to heal others, while yourself teeming with sores.
If you call someone illiterate, apply yourself to the zeal and labor of learning; if cowardly, arouse your own courage; if lustful, erase from your soul whatever trace of lust still lurks within. For nothing is more shameful or vexing than a curse rebounding upon its author. But just as reflected light more injures weak eyes, so also curses more gravely offend when turned back upon the slanderer by truth itself. For just as the Cacias wind draws clouds to itself, so a vicious life draws reproaches to itself. Plato indeed, whenever he was present among men acting against decorum, would withdraw and address himself thus: Do I perhaps also labor under such a vice?"
Hence St. Ambrose notes on Psalm 118, section 4, from the phrase "at the beginning," that this is the order of speaking, that confession ought to be first, both before God and before men: whence when we pray to God, we ought first and before all else to make ourselves guilty and confess our sins before Him and seek pardon for them, and then proceed to ask other blessings from God: "That man is just, he says, who accuses himself at the beginning of his speech; but he is unjust who confesses what he had previously denied. The former finds the grace of modesty, the latter incurs the mark of shamelessness. Thus ignorance of proper order disrupts the nature of affairs and the form of merits." The same in Psalm 37, near the end, speaking of David's confession: "First, he says, he asks to be reproved; then (which is greater), to be corrected. Then he not only confesses his sins, but also enumerates and accuses them. For he does not want his offenses to be hidden. For as fevers deep-seated cannot be alleviated, when they have broken out they bring hope of ending: so the disease of sins, while it is covered, burns hotter; if it is brought forth by confessions, it evaporates. And therefore the just man is the accuser of himself at the beginning of his speech, before the contagion of the ulcer creeps inward. For the memory of sins burdens the conscience, unless medicine is sought. And if the physician delays, the sick person must present himself so that he may be cut sooner; just as David offered himself to the scourges of the Lord, saying: I am prepared for scourges. And elsewhere: Let Your hand be upon me, that is, repay me double for my sins, provided You punish them here." To this pertains that passage of Isaiah 43, according to the Septuagint: Declare your sins first, so that you may be justified.
Moreover, this confession of the mouth must proceed from a sincere heart. Hence Abbot Serapion, in Cassian's Conference 18, chapter 11, rebuking someone who falsely accused himself so as to be considered humble: "Perhaps, he said, while you were humbling yourself, you were expecting from our lips the sentence: The just man is the accuser of himself at the beginning of his speech? Therefore true humility of heart must be retained, which descends not from affected humility of body and words, but from the intimate humiliation of the mind. This humility will then at last shine with the most evident signs of patience, when a person has not boasted of crimes against himself that others would not believe, but has despised things arrogantly thrust upon him by others, and has tolerated injuries inflicted upon him with gentle equanimity of heart."
Furthermore, St. Ambrose, frequently citing these words of Solomon, applies them to the penitence by which the Jews, before the institution by Christ of sacramental confession, confessed their sins to God in contrition, and sought and obtained pardon from Him. For such confession frees both from guilt and from punishment, and easily refutes and repels the devil who demands us for torment. St. Ambrose adds, in Book II On Penitence, chapter 8: "The Lord, he says, knows all things, but He awaits your voice, not to punish, but to forgive; He does not want the devil to insult you and convict you of hiding your sins. Anticipate your accuser; if you accuse yourself, you will fear no accuser; if you denounce yourself, even if you have died, you will come back to life." Again, St. Ambrose on Psalm 35: The just man, he says, knows how to loose the bonds of his sins; he does not wait for an accuser but anticipates him, so that by confessing his fault he may lighten every offense and leave nothing for the adversary to charge. For he snatches the voice from the adversary and, as it were, binds certain teeth prepared for the prey of hostile accusation by the confession of his sins." He gives there the example of Eve, who confessed her sin: "The serpent, she said, deceived me, and I ate," Genesis 3. Whence St. Ambrose adds, in his book On Paradise, chapter 14: "The fault is pardonable which is followed by a declaration of offenses. Therefore the woman was not in despair, because she did not keep silent before God, but rather confessed her sin," as if to say: The punishment which transgression brought on, confession drives away. And immediately he adds concerning Cain, that because he denied his guilt so as to escape temporal punishment, he was handed over to the devil, to be tormented with him in eternal punishment. Cain refused to accuse himself, lest he be subject to the punishment he feared. "And therefore, he says, his accusation was reserved for the devil as accuser, so that he would be scourged with the angels, who refused to submit with men."
And so he who abstains from confession is subject to condemnation; but he who accuses himself of his fault is excused from his punishment. Hence St. Ambrose, Book II On Abel and Cain, chapter 9: "Confession, he says, is a shortcut through punishments." For even the eternal punishments that we deserve for transgression, we avoid through confession.
Even Seneca, though a pagan, says in Letter 28: "As much as you can, reprove yourself, inquire into yourself; first play the part of the accuser, then of the judge."
Moreover, many apply this maxim to sacramental confession. For this, by the institution of Christ, must now precede forgiveness and grace, and indeed satisfaction and meritorious works, either in act or in desire. For Solomon wrote these maxims for every age, but to be adapted to each person's state and condition; therefore they are more truly fulfilled in the law of Christ, and through it are more perfectly accomplished.
Finally, St. Chrysostom, in Oration 5 Against the Jews, presses the phrase "at the beginning of the speech," and, as Isaiah says, chapter 43: "Declare your iniquities first, that you may be justified." For rebuking Cain, who did not confess first, but after he was rebuked and convicted by God, confessed his fratricide, and therefore did not receive pardon for his sin but condemnation, he says thus: "For He did not simply say: Declare your iniquities; but He said: Declare your iniquities first. What is required is not simply to declare them, not to wait for the rebuke of an accuser. But this man did not speak first, but waited until he was rebuked by God; indeed, even when God rebuked him, he denied it. But after the sin was once made manifest, then he declared the sin, which indeed is not a true confession. Therefore, you too, beloved, when you have sinned, do not wait to be accused by another; but before you are accused and denounced, condemn what has been done. For if someone else afterward reproves you, it is no longer the office of confession but the correction of one who accuses. Wherefore someone else also says: The just man is the accuser of himself at the beginning of his speech. And so what is required is not that you accuse yourself, but that you accuse yourself first, and not wait for rebuke from others. Peter, therefore, on account of that infamous denial, because he quickly remembered his own sin and with no one accusing him declared his sin and wept bitterly, so thoroughly washed away that denial that he was even made the first of the Apostles and brought the whole world into subjection."
Following Solomon as usual, Sirach says in Ecclesiasticus 4:31: "Be not ashamed to confess your sins;" where he touches the root of the evil, namely confusion and false shame, which hinders people and closes their mouth and throat so that they do not confess their sins, but cover and excuse them. But this shame is misplaced; for it is shameful to commit sins, but praiseworthy to confess them. St. Augustine gives the reason, in Treatise 12 on John: "Because, he says, he who confesses and accuses his sins already works with God. God accuses your sins, and if you accuse them too, you are united with God. There are, as it were, two things: the man and the sinner. What you hear as 'man,' God made; what you hear as 'sinner,' the man himself made. Destroy what you have made, so that God may save what He made. You must hate your own work in yourself, so that you may love God's work in yourself. When what you have done begins to displease you, from that point your good works begin, because you accuse your evil works: the beginning of good works is the confession of evil works."
Symbolically, R. Simeon, as cited by Galatinus in Book VII of On the Secrets of the Faith, chapter 4, expounds this verse concerning the Blessed Virgin, whom the Hebrews call the first just one, indeed the first human being and the mother of all humans, because she was conceived and predestined in the mind of God before Adam and all other humans, while Adam and the rest of humanity exist through her and her Son Christ: "The just one, he says, is first in his lawsuit (or in his judgment); his friend comes and investigates him. The meaning is: When the holy and blessed God comes to judge the world on the day of judgment, the whole world will tremble and fear that terrible day, and they will say: O David, our king, pray to God for us, because from you the Messiah came forth. But he will answer them: For this very reason that you speak of, I am not sufficient. For from me many kings came forth who offended God in many things. Moreover, God was offended with me because of the sin of Bathsheba and Uriah." He then adds that they will similarly approach in order Moses, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham, and each will respond that they are guilty of sin and therefore are not sufficient to intercede for others on the day of judgment; wherefore finally all by common consent will approach the first human being, that is, the Mother of the Messiah, and will ask her to intercede for all, as one free from all sin. "The first just one, therefore, in his lawsuit," as if to say: "This first human being, who is the Mother of the Messiah, on account of whom the Messiah Himself, or Christ, is called the Son of Man, is just in the lawsuit in which she was accused by adversaries of having been conceived in original sin. And his friend comes, that is, God, and investigated this lawsuit, and pronounced the sentence saying: You are entirely beautiful, my friend, and there is no stain in you. This authority the ancient Hebrew teachers seem to have adduced for the confirmation of the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of the Messiah." Thus far R. Simeon.
Verse 18: The Lot Suppresses Disputes
18. THE LOT SUPPRESSES DISPUTES, AND DECIDES EVEN AMONG THE POWERFUL. — In Hebrew, the lot causes disputes to cease, and divides among the powerful—namely, the dispute, that is, the matter in controversy; Aquila has dialepsei; Symmachus and Theodotion, diastelei, that is, will divide, will judge; the Chaldean, the lot abolishes contentions, and settles them among the strong; so also the Syriac; the Septuagint, however, the silent man settles contradictions, and determines among the powerful (dunastais; but others better read dunastais, that is, rulers, powerful ones). So the Roman and Complutensian editions. But there seems to be an error, in that for kleros, that is, lot, the scribes erroneously wrote sigeros, that is, silent man. This is proven first, because the Hebrew goral means lot, not silent man; and so all the others translate. Second, because many Greek codices read kleron, and Origen, in Homily 23 on Joshua: The lot, he says, restrains contradictions, and determines among the powerful. Third, because so reads the author of the Greek Catena, and he explains it thus: "The lot, he says, settles controversies and resolves disputes arising among the powerful. The lot that fell to Matthias settled the controversy that arose concerning the successor of Judas Iscariot; and among the powerful, namely the Apostles, it determined whom they should choose. There are those who read sigeros in place of kleros, so that the sense would be: that a patient and silent man easily settles disputes and contentions arising from any quarter; whereas on the contrary, those who answer back and contradict the disputant sharpen the strife and quarrel." So far that author.
The meaning of this maxim is plain and clear, as if to say: When the matter in dispute is doubtful and uncertain as to whose it is, either because the right of each party is uncertain and doubtful, or because each party brings forward strong arguments in its favor, or for another similar reason; then no other means of settling the disputes is available than to have the lot resolve and determine them. Hence R. Solomon notes that for "powerful" the Hebrew is atsumim, by which he understands those who vigorously wage a lawsuit, who clash with strong arguments on both sides, each confirming his cause with all his might. And so this word is taken in Isaiah 41:21. Since therefore their disputes are difficult, robust, and strong, they are called powerful, whom no one can reconcile except the lot.
Furthermore, atsam means to shut, to close, Isaiah 33:15. Atsumim therefore denotes obscure disputes, and therefore closed ones, which no one can open and resolve except the lot. Hence from the Hebrew one may translate: those who strengthen themselves in contention; Vatablus: it separates the disputants. He teaches therefore that the means of settling disputes in complicated and doubtful matters is the lot, and moreover that where the contending parties are obstinate and intractable, unwilling to admit either reason, nor a judge, nor an arbiter, one must have recourse to the lot, if the parties accept it. The a priori reason is that just as in certain and manifest matters reason dominates, so in uncertain, doubtful, obscure, and fortuitous matters the lot and chance dominate. Therefore just as the former must be decided in deliberation by reason, so that the party prevails which relies on stronger arguments, so the latter must be determined by lot; for they are in the right and domain of fortuitous things, which are subject to the lot and over which the lot rules, as their king and governor. Thus Joshua, chapter 15, divided the holy land among the twelve tribes and each of their families by lots, and so settled all the disputes of the Hebrews.
Verse 19: A Brother Helped by a Brother Is Like a Strong City
19. A BROTHER WHO IS HELPED BY A BROTHER IS LIKE A STRONG CITY; AND JUDGMENTS ARE LIKE THE BARS OF CITIES. — For "who is helped," the Hebrew is nipsa, that is, transgressing, falling away, rebelling. Hence Aquila translates: a brother rebelling is stronger than a fortified city; the Chaldean: a brother who falls away from a brother is like a strong city, and shut as if by a strong bar; the Tigurine: if a brother is perfidiously abandoned (the anger becomes more vehement) than the strongest city, and contention is like the bar of a citadel; Vatablus: a brother rebelling (against a brother) more than a strong city, and disputes (of brothers are) like the bars of a palace, as if to say: "The rebellion of a brother is harder than that of a city rebelling against a prince, and the disputes of brothers are like bars by which the doors of a palace are closed, as if to say: Nothing is heavier than the enmities and dissensions of brothers." R. Solomon: A brother, he says, falling away from a brother and rebelling against him, even loses the most fortified city through his defection. Aben-Ezra connects this verse to the preceding, as if to say: The lot settles even the most serious disputes, such as those of brothers when they disagree with each other: for these are hard and strong like the bars of cities. R. David: "A brother who has been injured is harder than a strong city, and the disputes of brothers are like the bar of a palace." So also the other Hebraists. And indeed this sense corresponds well to the Hebrew. It signifies, therefore, that the disputes of brothers are bitter and often irreconcilable. The reason is that intense love, when injured, turns into intense hatred: just as strong wine, if it spoils and turns sour, is converted into sharp vinegar. Hence Aristotle, Politics Book VII, chapter 7: "It is said in a proverb: The contentions and angers of brothers are the most bitter, and those who love too much hate too much." The angers of brothers, therefore, are powerful like a strong city, both because, just as a city fortified most strongly with walls and bars is as it were impregnable to siege engines, so also the powerful resentments of brothers can scarcely be overcome by any reasoning, conquered by no love, overcome by no kindness; and because just as a city is impregnable where the citizens are strong and defend it most vigorously, so where brothers contend most vigorously against each other, their hatred and enmity seems irreconcilable and impregnable.
But our Vulgate translates the Hebrew nipsca, that is, rebelling, as "who is helped." But by what reasoning, by what authority? For rebelling and helping are opposites?
Third, we will reconcile these more easily and plainly by saying that our translator read not nipsca with shin—for thus it means rebelling—but nipsa, with sin, that is, walking, strolling, as if to say: A brother walking and strolling fraternally with a brother (and thus helping and protecting him) is for him in the place of a strong city.
Moreover, that our translator did not read and translate thus rashly is evident from the Syriac, which reads and translates in the same way: a brother who is helped by his brother is like a strong city; and the Septuagint: a brother helped by a brother, like a fortified and lofty city; and St. Cyprian, Letter 14: "A brother helping a brother will be exalted like a great city." He adds the reason: "Namely, that brotherly compassion provides a bulwark for the soul fighting, and resists like a wall the various blows of an afflicted mind."
Furthermore, R. Levi, although he reads nipsca with shin and translates it as offended, injured, nevertheless adapts it to the meaning already given and explains it thus: "Although a brother may be attacked and offended by a brother's defection, he is nevertheless more useful to him than a fortified city, bringing help at the opportune time of need and preserving his brother; nor will he then charge him with the crime of defection, since both consist of the same bodily constitution."
A brother helping a brother, therefore, serves him in place of a city (in Hebrew, more than a city, that is, more valuable and stronger than a city), or in lieu of a fortified city, both because just as a fortified city protects its inhabitants from every hostile attack, so also a brother defends and protects his brother from whatever adversities; and because just as citizens in a fortified city mutually fortify themselves, and with common strength fight for the city and drive away enemies from it, so likewise brothers mutually helping each other protect one another with common arms and forces, and repel adversaries, as the Maccabean brothers Judas, Jonathan, and Simon did, who therefore unconquered defeated the enormous armies of Antiochus.
This maxim signifies, therefore, that a few brothers united are like a strong city, and are equivalent to many citizens defending a city; for what in a city the multitude of citizens accomplishes, in a family the union and intimate love of brothers accomplishes: hence it happens that a few harmonious brothers are equivalent to many citizens, and indeed from one robust family of brothers a city arises, and even a nation and kingdom, as was evident in the twelve Patriarchs, the sons of Jacob, who constituted the kingdom of Israel. Conversely, this maxim implies that citizens in a city are what brothers are in a family; and therefore just as united brothers protect the family, so harmonious citizens protect the city and render it impregnable. Hence Lycurgus, the founder of Sparta, fortified it with the concord of its citizens in place of walls. Therefore Agesilaus, king of Sparta, when asked by someone why Sparta was not surrounded by walls, showed them the armed and unanimous citizens: "These, he said, are the walls of the Spartan city;" signifying that cities are protected by no fortification more securely than by the virtue of citizens in agreement. So Plutarch in the Laconic Apophthegms. Again, when the Lacedaemonians were in danger and were deliberating about surrounding the city with walls, the sophist Isaeus recited that verse of Homer:
Shield pressed on shield, helmet on helmet, and man on man.
And he added: "Stand thus for me, Lacedaemonians, and we are surrounded by walls." So Philostratus in his Lives of the Sophists.
To this relates the proverb of the Arabs: "Strike fire for me, and I will shine for you," that is, be to me and I will be to you: help me, and I in turn will be your helper.
This maxim of Solomon is illustrated by the example of Scilurus in Plutarch's Sayings of Kings: Scilurus, he says, having eighty male children, when he was about to die, offered a bundle of javelins to each one and ordered them to break it. When each refused because it seemed impossible, he himself drew out the javelins one by one and thus easily broke them all, admonishing his sons with these words: "If you remain in harmony, you will remain strong and unconquered; but if you are torn apart by dissensions or sedition, you will be weak and easy to overcome." A Scythian could not have put the matter before their eyes in a more Scythian fashion.
Sallustius reports a similar story about King Micipsa in the Jugurtha: Micipsa, he says, on the point of death, admonishes his sons with fatherly affection to remain in harmony, adding a maxim always worthy of being written in golden letters: "For by concord small things grow, but by discord even the greatest things fall apart."
Severus, Emperor of the Romans, falling into a most serious illness, when he perceived that the end of his life was at hand, summoned to himself his sons Marcus Antonius and Geta, from whom what he wished—
Or he read the Hebrew differently. he earnestly urged: "See to it, he said, that you agree among yourselves, enrich the soldiers; despise all others." For he knew that his sons, most eager for the kingdom, would dispute the succession after his death; and unless they bent the soldiers' minds with money, they would utterly perish. So Dio of Nicaea and Xiphilinus in the Life of Severus.
Finally, the truth of this maxim is evident in the Apostles and Apostolic men of the early Church, who were unconquerable to the world—indeed, they conquered the whole world and subjected it to Christ. On the other hand, formerly Arius, Nestorius, Pelagius, etc., and now Luther, Calvin, and the other heretics, attacking their faithful brothers, tore the Church apart and opened the way for the Turks to occupy Hungary and other provinces: for the Turks have always grown and continue to grow through the dissensions of Christians, which heretics stir up. So the author of the Greek Catena, who translates and explains thus: "A brother, helped by a brother, is like a fortified and lofty city. The same again, like a well-founded kingdom, is strong and powerful. The disciples and brothers of Christ, agreeing among themselves, were like a kingdom fortified with a thousand ramparts and garrisons, strong and mighty. In short, one helped by another in good faith becomes unconquerable."
We experience the same in religious orders and reformed monasteries, in which discipline, humility, and charity flourish. For these are stronger than all rivals and enemies, and even than demons, through the concord and common purpose of the religious. Hence St. Basil, preferring the cenobitic life as a fraternal one to the eremitic and solitary life, gives this reason in his Monastic Constitutions, chapter 19: "I call that most perfect community of life from which all private and individual possession of anything is excluded, and from which all dissension, all disturbance and quarreling is absent; where on the contrary all things are common: minds, intellects, bodies, and those things which we necessarily use for worship and sustenance; a common God, common commerce of piety, common salvation, common struggles, common labors, common rewards, and crowns of contests; where many are one, and one is not alone but is in many. What, in the end, can justly be compared with this way of life? What can be called more blessed, what more aptly conceived than this union, unity, and intimate bond? What more elegantly imagined than the mutual blending of characters and souls? Men coming from diverse nations and regions have so coalesced as it were into one through the exact likeness of customs and discipline, that in many bodies only one soul seems to dwell, and conversely many bodies are seen to be instruments of one mind. He who is in poor bodily health has the souls of many as sharers in his infirmity; and he who is sick in soul has many at hand to care for him and continually raise him up." See more in our Jerome Plati, Book I On the Good of the Religious State, chapters 26 and 27.
To this relate the maxims of philosophers. Antisthenes used to say that brothers who were in harmony were stronger than any wall. Quintilian, Declamation 321: "What else, he says, is brotherhood but a shared spirit?" P. Nigidius, in Gellius Book XII, chapter 10: "A brother, he says, is called such as being almost another self." Plato, Book II of the Republic, cites the old saying: "Brother, stand by your man," commonly said of faithful help; since in dangerous matters a brother hardly ever fails his brother.
AND JUDGMENTS ARE LIKE THE BARS OF CITIES. — Lyranus, Baynus, Jansenius, and others take "judgments" to mean decrees, as if to say: The decrees of brothers, established by the common consent of brothers, are strong like the bars of cities, and therefore can hardly be broken, because the brothers handle and defend them with united minds and arms. For, says Jansenius, what is said of judgments can be taken of the equity of judgments and sentences, which makes the state of the republic firm. So that this whole maxim signifies that a city is stabilized by two things, namely, the concord of citizens and the equity of judgments.
But since the Hebrew midianim does not mean sentences and decrees, but disputes and contentions, it is more truly said that these are called "judgments" by our translator. For thus St. Paul says, 1 Corinthians 6:7: "Already it is altogether a fault among you, that you have judgments among you," that is, disputes and contentions. For in these the litigants are accustomed to appeal to court and contend before a judge.
Hence our Salazar explains it thus, as if to say: The concord of brothers is like the most fortified and strongest city. "Judgments," however, that is, the disputes and dissensions of brothers, are "like the bars of cities:" I take bars to mean doors, that is, like cities with their doors unbarred and opened, and accessible to enemies, as if to say: When brother begins to make war on brother and to disagree with one another, conversely they are like cities which, with bars unfastened, give free access to enemies. And so I think the bars or bolts in this passage, which are instruments for closing and opening, are to be referred not to closing but to opening. So Salazar.
But "bars of cities" usually denote the strength of cities: and this strength they provide to cities not when they are opened, but when they close and bar. Hence the Chaldean translates: and the cause like a strong bar; and the Septuagint: memochloumenon (so the Roman edition, though the Complutensians read tethelemeliomenon, that is, founded), that is, like a kingdom barred shut; Aquila: and strife like the bar of a palace. So also the others. The meaning, therefore, is, as if to say: A brother helping a brother, that is, the concord of brothers, is strong and invincible like a powerful and fortified city; similarly the discords, disputes, and contentions of brothers, especially public and forensic ones, are strong, irreconcilable, and impregnable like the bars by which palaces and cities are closed: for just as cities are barred shut with bars, so discord, strife, and contention like bars shut up the hearts of brothers, so that they give no entry to reconciliation, no access to conversation, love, and goodwill.
The reason is twofold: The first, which I gave at the beginning, is that the highest love, such as that of brothers, if provoked, turns into the highest and most stubborn hatred, just as the best wine turns into the strongest vinegar. The second is that an injury inflicted by a brother seems to be more bitter: for from a brother, as one most closely connected, people expect the greatest things and consider the greatest favors owed to them; therefore if instead of favors they receive injuries, they consider a grave and bitter wrong to be inflicted upon them. Thus the brothers of Joseph, seeing him loved more than the rest by their father Jacob, pursued him with the utmost hatred even unto death. Thus Esau propagated his hatred of Jacob to his descendants. Hence the Idumeans and Jews were perpetual and supreme enemies. See what was said at Amos 1, verse 14.
Finally, just as the more recent interpreters refer this entire maxim to the discord and contentions of brothers, so on the other hand the Chaldean and the Septuagint refer all of it to the concord of brothers and declare its force and strength. Our translator, however, takes a middle way, and refers the first hemistich to the concord, the second to the discord of brothers. The Septuagint, therefore, has it thus: a brother, helped by a brother, is like a fortified and lofty city; and he grows strong like an established kingdom; or, as St. Ephrem has it in his treatise On Self-Reproof: "For he is like an established kingdom, and powerful," as if to say: The concord and common purpose of brothers is strong and impregnable, like a fortified and lofty city surrounded by strong and lofty walls and towers: for this loftiness is provided to brothers by the nobility of kinship; for after parents, the highest degree of union and blood relationship is brotherhood, or the bond and link of brothers; moreover, this concord and love of brothers grows and strengthens, so that it becomes powerful and great not only like one city, but like an entire established and strong kingdom, able not only to repel the force of others but also to invade and subdue them. Thus the brothers Romulus and Remus, conspiring together, won many to their side, subjugated others by force and arms, built the city of Rome, united the Roman people, and established in it the kingdom of Italy—indeed, the empire of the world. This maxim therefore signifies that concord among brothers must be studiously preserved, and if any controversy arises among them, forensic contentions must be avoided, which tend to sharpen hatreds, indeed make them immortal, and the controversy should rather be settled by lot, as the preceding verse said.
Morally, learn here how much good concord brings, and how much evil discord. The Scyrus stone, which is found on the island of Scyrus, has this remarkable property: when whole it floats, when broken it sinks, says Pliny, Book 36, chapter 17. So a concordant and united society stands, but one discordant and divided is scattered. For:
Numbers defend, and phalanxes joined shield to shield.
"Common danger must be repelled by concord," says Tacitus. Golden are these words of Lucan, Book IV:
Concord embraces all things in an eternal bond, The safety of so many things and of the mingled world, And the sacred love of the earth.
Allegorically, Bede says: "When both peoples, that is, of the Jews and of the Gentiles, agree in fraternal charity in Christ, they now build the one city of the Catholic Church; and just as the bars of cities fortify the gates, so the doctrines of both Testaments defend the Churches throughout the world, which make up the one Catholic Church, from the attacks of unbelievers."
Tropologically, Hugo says: The two brothers are reason and appetite, or intellect and will; these, if they fittingly agree with each other—that is, if the lesser conforms to the greater, namely appetite to reason, and will to intellect, and subjects itself—they are strong like a fortified city; but if they disagree, and the will rebels against the intellect, a deadly dissension and schism arises that devastates and destroys both.
Verse 20: From the Fruit of a Man's Mouth His Belly Will Be Filled
20. FROM THE FRUIT OF A MAN'S MOUTH HIS BELLY WILL BE FILLED: AND THE PRODUCE OF HIS LIPS WILL SATISFY HIM. — In Hebrew, from the produce of his lips he will be satisfied. The produce, therefore, is the yield of the lips, or the fruit of the mouth, which is twofold: The first and proximate fruit of the mouth is words and speeches, both good and bad; the second and remote fruit consists of the advantages and damages that good and bad speeches bring: for by these everyone is fed and satisfied—by good things and advantages as by honey, but by evil things and damages as by gall and wormwood, which he himself has sown for himself. Cajetan refers this to those who earn their living by speaking, indeed make their profit by it; for their mouth fills the belly, such as lawyers, orators, teachers, and preachers. R. Levi better refers this to gentle and harsh words, as if to say: He who uses gentle and soft speech soothes another's anger with his responses and does not lack the fruit of his speech, since he wards off evil from himself; but he who speaks harsh and bitter things provokes anger and is quickly punished when destruction comes swiftly.
Most excellently and most fully, take these words in general of all kinds of speeches, whether good or bad, as if to say: Speeches cause a man good or evil, joy or sorrow, reward or punishment. For if someone speaks well, kindly, and prudently, he will win over all people, the Angels, and God Himself; but if badly, imprudently, and bitingly, he will provoke everyone, and consequently will be punished by them. Hence, explaining further, he adds: "Death and life are in the hand of the tongue." By belly he metaphorically means the inmost parts of a person, such as the mind and conscience. For these rejoice when praised and rewarded for good words, but are tormented, grieved, and groaning when blamed and afflicted for bad words. This verse harmonizes with verse 14 of chapter 12: "From the fruit of his mouth each one will be filled with good things;" and with verse 2 of chapter 13: "From the fruit of his mouth a man will be satisfied with good things." See what was said there.
Mystically, the author of the Greek Catena says: The receptacle of the soul is filled with spiritual words, since external and sensible words cannot fill the belly of the soul, it remains that the vessel be filled with spiritual nourishment; moreover, the belly is filled not by any person simply, but by a man. So he.
Verse 21: Death and Life Are in the Hand of the Tongue
21. DEATH AND LIFE ARE IN THE HAND OF THE TONGUE: THOSE WHO LOVE (Septuagint, who control) IT WILL EAT ITS FRUITS. — Aben-Ezra refers this to the preceding verse: "From the fruit of a man's mouth his belly will be filled," as if to say: If someone speaks evil things, death will befall him; but if rightly, he will attain life. Take "death and life" both of nature and of grace and glory, both present and eternal. For heretics such as Arius, Luther, Calvin, sent both themselves and many thousands of their disciples to eternal death in hell by their perverse doctrine; conversely, the Apostles and Apostolic men, and holy teachers, preachers, and confessors, with their fiery tongues win the life of grace and glory both for themselves and for all their own.
He alludes to the nature of the tongue; for in the embryo it is the last part to receive life, and in a dying person it is the first to lose life and die, as Aristotle and Pliny attest. For in a similar way it happens in the ethics of the tongue: namely, in the spiritual life, the perfection of the tongue's virtues is the last to be acquired, as the crowning of perfection, according to James 3: "If anyone does not offend in word, he is a perfect man;" conversely, the death of the soul commonly takes its beginning from the vice of the tongue. Hear Pliny, Book II, chapter 37: "The mouth, he says, is said to die first and last." For just as in an animal the heart is the first to live and the last to die, so conversely the tongue is the last to live and the first to die; therefore just as life begins from the heart, so death begins from the mouth and tongue. "For it happens to all that what is last made is the first to fail; and what was first, last—as if nature were running the course backward and returning from the finish line to the starting gates from which it set out," says Aristotle, Book II On the Generation of Animals, chapter 4. So also Pliny, Book XI, chapter 37. In a similar way, in the demolition of a house, the roof, which was made last, is destroyed first, then the walls and the rest down to the foundations. For this is the natural order of dissolution. In a similar way it happens in moral matters. Hence St. Chrysostom on Psalm 140: "The tongue, he says, is virtually the only gateway of death." For this reason, then, death and life are said to be "in the hand of the tongue," because it is the tongue's role to guard life or to open a wide and spacious door to death. For just as in the generation of a human being the heart is perfected first and the tongue last, so in spiritual regeneration the heart and will are formed and perfected for virtue first, and the tongue last. And just as in a human being the heart dies last and the tongue first, so also the death of the soul generally begins from the mouth and tongue, and ends in the will. Now then, The first question is: whose death and life is in the hand of the tongue—the speaker's, the listener's, or the third person about whom one speaks?
First, St. Bernard understands all three of these, when he asserts that the tongue of the detractor kills three with a single blow, namely the speaker, the listener, and the third person whose reputation it diminishes, in his sermon On the Threefold Guard of Hand, Tongue, and Heart: "Is not this tongue (of the detractor) a viper? Most ferocious indeed, which so lethally infects three with a single breath. Is not this tongue a lance? Indeed most sharp, which pierces three with a single thrust: Their tongue, he says, is a sharp sword. A two-edged sword indeed—nay, three-edged—is the tongue of the detractor. Nor should you hesitate to call such a tongue crueler even than the blade that pierced the Lord's side. For this tongue too digs into the body of Christ and member from member, and does not dig into what is already lifeless, but makes it lifeless by digging. It is more harmful even than the thorns which military fury placed upon that sublime head; or even than the iron nails which the Jewish consummation of iniquity drove into those most holy hands and feet. For unless He had preferred the life of this body of His, which is now pierced and transfixed, to the life of that body, He would never have delivered that one to the injury of death and the ignominy of the cross for the sake of this one." Hence he concludes by exhorting: "Indeed, for this reason it is fitting that greater diligence and more careful guard be shown to it, because according to Scripture death and life are in the hands of the tongue. Otherwise, if it contained only life, not even circumcision would be needed; if only death, even amputation would be owed. But now we must set a guard upon our mouth, and a door of due measure upon our lips, so that the lock may not condemn vital edification to eternal silence, nor lethal destruction of words gain egress."
Laertius, Book V, chapter 1, reports that Aristotle reproved Callisthenes, who was speaking many things improperly and too freely in the presence of Alexander, by reciting that line of Homer:
If you speak such things, you will not live much longer.
And he was a true prophet; for Callisthenes was killed by Alexander. The same author, Book I, chapter 9, reports that Anacharsis, when asked what in a man was the best and what the worst, answered: the tongue; for if you use it well, you will bring life; if badly, death to yourself and others. To this relates the Arabic proverb: "Beware lest your tongue strike your own neck;" for intemperance of the tongue destroys many. Finally, Bias, when King Amasis demanded from a sacrificial victim both the best and the worst part, immediately sent the tongue, because it brings the most advantage or the most damage, as Plutarch attests in the Banquet of the Seven Sages.
Second, others take death and life in an active sense for the speaker and a passive sense for the listener. For the tongue of a teacher, counselor, or persuader wins present and eternal life for the listener, if it teaches, counsels, and persuades what is good and salutary; but death, if evil. Hence Vatablus explains, as if to say: "The tongue can kill by its speech, and it can also save." To this relates the exposition of Hugo, who explains partly literally, partly mystically, as if to say: The tongue of the detractor, calumniator, false witness, etc., inflicts death upon the speaker, but life upon him who patiently endures his calumnies, injuries, and false testimonies; for it increases his patience and merits, and even sometimes heals his fault. Plutarch in his Moralia gives the example of someone who, wishing to kill Prometheus, with his sword opened a lethal abscess of his, and thus contrary to his intention restored him to health and life instead of death. "Thus often, he says, a reproach hurled in anger by an enemy heals a fault of soul either unknown to us or neglected; and the blow of one who wished to inflict death brings life."
Third, others generally take death and life as belonging to the speaker, as if to say: The speaker, if he speaks well and prudently, wins life for himself; but if badly and imprudently, he not infrequently brings death upon himself. And this seems to be rightly what Solomon intends; for he explains and reinforces what he said in the preceding verse: "From the fruit of a man's mouth his belly will be filled, and the produce of his lips will satisfy him." Consequently, however, and by analogy or similarity, understand the death and life of listeners and of those about whom one speaks, as I said from St. Bernard. St. Chrysostom says excellently in Homily 4 to the Newly Baptized, Volume 5: "The tongue, he says, is the middle ground of both parties, and if it belongs to both, you are its master. For a sword placed in the middle, if it has been seized against enemies, is found to be salutary for the one who takes it; but if it is thrust into the bowels of the one holding it, it prepares death for the one inflicting the wound—not because such is the nature of iron, but because such is the purpose of the user. So also let the tongue be regarded as a sword placed in the middle. Let it be armed against your sins, not prepared for a brother's wound. And the Lord, explaining this quality of the tongue, says: From your words you will be justified, and from your words you will be condemned. Because if this fountain of words gushes forth the pure water of holy words, it contributes to the speaker's justification; but if from it the foul water of wicked words erupts, it leads to his condemnation."
Hence Bonaventure writes thus of St. Francis, in chapter 5 of his Life: "He wanted the evangelical silence to be observed by the brothers, namely, that they should carefully abstain from every idle word at all times, as those who would render an account of such things on the day of judgment. And if he found any brother accustomed to vain words, he would sharply rebuke him, affirming that modest taciturnity and the guarding of a pure heart is no small virtue, since death and life are said to be in the hands of the tongue not so much by reason of taste as by reason of speech."
Second question: what is the hand of the tongue, containing in itself death and life?
First, Salonius takes the hand of the tongue to mean the words themselves: because, he says, each person will be condemned or justified by his own words. "Why, he asks, is the tongue said to have hands, when it cannot have hands?" I answer: "It is said metaphorically, that is, by a figure of speech, just as the winds are said to have wings. For the hands of the tongue are the words themselves, by which one either merits life by speaking well, or merits death by speaking badly. Otherwise, by 'hands' the operations are often designated in the Sacred Scriptures, as in: You shall eat the labors of your hands. He says 'in the hands of the tongue,' that is, in its works. For the works of the tongue are conversations good or bad, from which death or life is born."
Second, others take "hand" to mean danger, as if to say: Death and life are in the hands of the tongue, that is, they are imperiled in the tongue, so fragile, fickle, and prone to slip. For in a similar phrase the Psalmist says, Psalm 118: "My soul is always in my hands," as if to say: My soul, that is my life, is in the greatest danger, just as if I were carrying it in my hand, to be offered to anyone I meet, even an enemy seeking it, so that he might take it from me and snatch it away at will. Hence the Chaldean translates: my soul is in danger, as if on the surface of my hands. And Jephthah says, Judges chapter 12:3: "I put my soul in my hands," that is, I exposed my life to certain danger of being taken from me. So also here life and death are said to be in the hand of the tongue, so that whenever it moves and turns, life and death seem to be turned and endangered in it.
Third, properly and genuinely, the author of the Greek Catena, the Rabbis, and generally both Latins and Greeks, take "hand" to mean right, faculty, and power, as if to say: It is in the power and discretion of the tongue to bring either life or death to itself and to others, as it pleases; therefore so great is the tongue's jurisdiction, right, and power that at will it inflicts death or life not only on itself but on others. The tongue therefore has, as it were, the power of life and death over all. Thus we see that the tongues of two witnesses in court either acquit or condemn the accused, and thus bring him either life or death. This is the kingdom of the tongue, vast and wide indeed. Hence the author of the Greek Catena translates: death and life are placed in the hand and power of the tongue; as many as master it will eat its fruits.
Symbolically, Hugo takes the hand of the tongue to mean the work and deeds corresponding to the tongue's words: "Death and life are in the hand of the tongue: In the operation of speech, he says, is the death of demons and the life of the faithful; for if preachers would join the hand to the mouth, that is, do what they teach, sinners already dead would rise again to life, and demons on the contrary would waste away as if dead."
THOSE WHO LOVE IT WILL EAT ITS FRUITS. — First, Vatablus takes this of the tongue both bad and good, as if to say: Talkative people who love and enjoy chattering, and are inclined to speaking, tend to eat the fruits flowing from speech either good or bad, as I said in the preceding verse.
Better, others restrict this part to the good tongue, as if to say: Those who love themselves and their tongue, and therefore restrain its fickleness and prudently moderate their words—these "will eat its fruits," that is, will reap copious fruit and rewards from their good and prudent speech. Hence the Septuagint translates kratountes, that is, those who control, restrain, and master their tongue will feed on its fruits. And R. Solomon explains thus: "He who loves his tongue and accustoms it to divine praises feeds on its fruits while he is still confined in the prison of life." For whoever speaks of God breathes sanctity and life, indeed divinity, into others, according to that saying of St. Dionysius in On the Celestial Hierarchy, chapter 2, to Timothy: "But you, O son, by speaking divine things become divine," and make others divine.
Verse 22: He Who Finds a Good Wife Finds a Good Thing
22. HE WHO FINDS A GOOD WIFE FINDS A GOOD THING, AND WILL DRAW DELIGHT FROM THE LORD. — In Hebrew, and he will bring forth from the Lord favor or goodwill; Aquila, the Syriac, and Theodotion have eudokias, that is, grace, favor; the Septuagint: he who finds a good wife finds charitas, that is, graces, and receives cheerfulness from God; the Chaldean: he who finds a wife finds a good thing, and receives his desire from God. The word "good" is not in the Hebrew, but is understood; for it is included in the word isscha, that is, a woman or wife—not just any wife, but a manly one, or virago: for from is, that is, man, is derived isscha, as it were a female man or virago, Genesis 2:23. Hence the Scholiast translates: he who finds a useful wife, such as Solomon describes in chapter 31. A good woman here is called not only chaste, faithful, gentle, and obedient, but also manly, that is, diligent, vigorous, and industrious in feeding and governing the family.
The word "finds" signifies that a good woman, namely a virago, is a rare thing, and must therefore be sought with great effort and care. For many seek a beautiful wife, others a noble one, others a wealthy one, but few seek a good and manly one, which is nonetheless what should be chiefly sought and is obtained by few. For a woman, fragile by nature, is covetous, lazy, talkative, impudent, deceitful, and malicious, so much so that Ecclesiasticus 25:26 says: "All malice is short compared to the malice of a woman." Famous is the saying of Socrates, who said he had obtained three evils: Grammar, poverty, and a destructive wife—the first two he had now escaped, the third he could not escape. So Antonius in the Melissa, Part II, sermon 34. And that saying of Menander: "A wife is a necessary evil." Second, the word "finds" denotes that a good wife is something fortuitous: for what we obtain by deliberate planning we are said to take or receive; but what comes by chance, to find; especially because all women, before they are taken as wives, show themselves as good, generous, and lovable, and conceal their angers, desires, idleness, and vices; but after they are married, they bring them out. Therefore if someone happens upon a good one, he has obtained good fortune. Third, "finds" suggests that a good woman is a good lot which God gives at His pleasure to whom He wills; for God dispenses and metes out to each person his own lot and fortune. Therefore, from God one must constantly request this good lot when intending to marry. For as Ecclesiasticus chapter 26:3 says: "A good wife is a good portion; she will be given to a man who fears God as a reward for his good deeds."
Note the phrase "finds a good thing," namely a singular, rare, and outstanding good; for a good wife cultivates peace, love, and faithfulness with her husband, manages the household providently and frugally, raises children honorably and uprightly, and so upon her depends the concord, prosperity, and well-being of the entire family. Hence the Septuagint translates: he finds charities, that is, graces, meaning an abundance of graces. Hence Homer, as Seneca attests in Book I On Benefits, chapter 3, joined one of the Graces to marriage, as presiding over it, and called her Pasithea, that is, "all goddess," because the gifts of all gods and goddesses flow into marriage where a good husband and a good wife conspire as one. Again, he finds the Graces, which the pagans said were three and sisters of the Hours, because they encompass three differences of time, namely, a good wife brings her husband a stable grace and love, which grows weary at no time or chance event, but endures and burns with time. Moreover, the author of the Greek Catena says: "He calls graces here, he says, the advancements she makes and the good actions of the household she manages." Vividly, therefore, what a good wife brings into the family are increases of wealth, provisions, peace, concord, integrity, and all virtues, and thus of all gladness and delight. Hence Plutarch rightly said that grace is the mother of delight. Plutarch offers examples of good women in his book On the Virtues of Women. To this relates the fact that a good and upright wife often makes a good and upright husband, according to that saying of St. Paul, 1 Corinthians 7: "The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife." St. Chrysostom gives the reason, Homily 6 on John: "Nothing, he says, is more powerful than a good wife for instructing and forming her husband in whatever she wishes; for he will not tolerate friends, teachers, or princes as readily as a wife advising and counseling. For there is a certain pleasure in a wife's admonition, since she loves very much the one she counsels. I could name many harsh and fierce men who have been made gentle and mild through their wife; for she, sharing with her husband in the table, the bed, the fellowship of children, in what to say and what to keep silent about, in coming and going, in hearing and in many other things, and, like a body joined to its head, if she is prudent and diligent, will overcome all."
Thus St. Cecilia converted her bridegroom Valerian, Clotilde converted Clovis, St. Helena converted Constantius the father of Constantine the Great, etc. To this relates that passage of Euripides in Stobaeus, sermon 65:
For a good wife joined to her husband Prevents the ruin of the man and preserves the house.
Following Solomon, Sirach heaps up many things to this effect, Ecclesiasticus 26:1, 2, 3, 16, 18, 19.
Hence it is clear that this decree of Solomon about dismissing an adulteress is not only a matter of counsel but also of precept; for the husband who transgresses this by retaining an adulteress is called in this passage not only foolish but also "impious," and as St. Chrysostom reads, unjust. St. Chrysostom gives the reason, Homily 22 from various passages in Matthew: "Therefore, he says, it is not he who dismisses who commits adultery, but he who marries another; indeed, just as he is cruel and unjust who dismisses a chaste wife, so also he is foolish and unjust who retains a harlot; for he who conceals his wife's crime is a patron of shame." And St. Jerome, on Matthew chapter 19: Whoever dismisses his wife, except for the cause of fornication, and marries another, commits adultery: "Fornication alone, he says, is what overcomes the affection of a wife; indeed, when she has divided one flesh into another and separated herself from her husband by fornication, she must not be retained, lest she bring the husband too under a curse, as Scripture says: He who retains an adulteress is foolish and impious." These words have been incorporated into Canon Law, and are found in 32, Question 1, chapter Dixit Dominus.
Mystically, R. Levi takes the good wife to mean the senses obedient to reason, that is, to the husband; which is the supreme good of man. "He whose faculties of soul, he says, have been so brought into order that they serve in subjection to their rulers and embrace them with love, while they devote all their effort to the mind—this man has attained good; for he will thus achieve the perfect fulfillment of manhood, and will obtain from God what he desired, with God's singular providence watching over the affairs of such a man."
AND HE WILL DRAW DELIGHT FROM THE LORD. — Our translator reads veiuphec, that is, "and he will draw"; now with a different vowel point, through the conversive vav, they read vaiaphec, that is, "and he drew"; both are true and come to the same thing, as if to say: He who finds a good wife, through her has drawn, draws, and will continuously and constantly draw every good pleasure—as the Hebrew has it, that is, every desirable good, every grace, and thence every happiness and delight from the Lord, so that he seems to himself to be in paradise and to be living the life of Adam and Eve, the first married couple, in the state of innocence.
He adds "from the Lord" to signify first, that a good wife is a singular gift of God; second, that God through a good wife, as through an instrument and channel, pours forth a fountain of goods and graces into the husband and family.
Mystically, apply these words to the Blessed Virgin; for she brought every good not only into the family of Joseph but also into the entire Church and the whole world, both through herself and through her Son Christ. Hence the Poet truly sang of her:
Nor was any mother more fruitful than Yours (O Christ). She who alone gave so many good things through her one birth.
HE WHO EXPELS A GOOD WIFE EXPELS GOOD (Septuagint, good things, namely all those just mentioned); BUT HE WHO RETAINS AN ADULTERESS IS FOOLISH AND IMPIOUS. — This verse is not in the Hebrew, nor in the Latin Complutensian edition; it was transcribed from the Septuagint, who drew it from the former verse by necessary consequence. For if a good wife is the good of the husband and family, then he who casts her out casts out good from himself and from the family; "but he who retains an adulteress is foolish and impious"—foolish, because he stupidly either does not notice his wife's adultery or endures and overlooks it with grave infamy to his name and injury and harm to his children; impious, because by retaining his adulterous wife he seems to approve and foster her adultery, and thus sacrilegiously violates the sanctity of marriage. This is most true when a husband retains an adulteress by giving her the opportunity to live impurely, either to satisfy her incontinence or to profit from her prostitution, which is pandering; for such a man is a panderer and an adulterer of his own wife. He contrasts the good and manly wife with the adulteress because adultery carries all evils with it. For an adulteress is shameless, infamous, quarrelsome, proud, extravagant, and she squanders and consumes her husband's resources with her paramour; finally, she ruins her husband, her children, and herself.
Mystically, the author of the Greek Catena takes the adulteress to mean erroneous doctrine, such as that of judicial astrologers, magicians, and heretics, as well as malice and wickedness. For these must be dismissed and kept far away.
St. Isidore, in his book On the Office of the Church, chapter 19, says: "Only adultery, as St. Jerome says, is what overcomes the affection of a wife; indeed, when she has divided one flesh into another and separated herself from her husband by fornication, she must not be retained," etc. In addition, a husband who retains an adulteress gives scandal to the entire city or republic. Hence the words of Emperor Marcus Antoninus were soft and effeminate, when, urged by friends to repudiate his adulteress Faustina or have her killed, he replied: "If we dismiss our wife, let us also return the dowry," by the name of dowry signifying the empire, which he had received by adoption from his father-in-law at the will of Emperor Hadrian: so Julius Capitolinus in his Life. Understand this of an unrepentant adulteress persisting in adultery. For if Christ received the penitent Magdalene, why should not a husband also take back his wife? For although by strict law he may prosecute her as guilty of a capital offense, yet he will act more mercifully and more in conformity with Christian piety if he pardons her the offense. So St. Augustine, Book II to Pollentius, On Adulterous Marriages, chapter 6.
Verse 23: The Poor Man Speaks with Entreaties
23. THE POOR MAN SPEAKS WITH ENTREATIES, AND THE RICH MAN WILL SPEAK HARSHLY. — In Hebrew, the poor man speaks entreaties, and the rich man will answer with strong, that is, harsh words; the Chaldean, the poor man speaks pleadings or prayers; the Syriac, he speaks soft and gentle words; R. Solomon, the poor man speaks as a suppliant, though the rich man answers harshly; Aben-Ezra, when the poor man wishes to request something from the rich man, he uses simple speech, while the rich man answers with fierce and rigid words. First, therefore, and properly, this maxim looks to the poor, who humbly request something from the rich, who out of avarice or pride answer them with swollen and harsh words, as the Hebrew has it: for poverty makes one humble and suppliant; but riches make one proud and rigid.
Second, more generally extend this to poor and rich not speaking among themselves, but conversing with anyone at all. For the poor man, as one in need and want, being timid everywhere, speaks timidly and supplicatingly; but the rich man, abounding in wealth and trusting in it, puffed up everywhere, breathes arrogance: therefore he acts and speaks imperiously. For as Augustine says: "The worm breeds in the fruit; the worm of riches is pride." Furthermore, R. Levi thinks these words are said in commendation of poverty and humility, because by his humble speech the poor man wins the goodwill of all; and in detestation of wealth and pride, because by harsh responses the rich man alienates and provokes everyone against himself.
Finally, Bede extends this maxim to the poor and rich when they pray to and address God: for the poor man humbly asks God to grant him grace; but the rich man rigidly demands it as if owed to him by right, just as the Publican, poor in merits, prayed saying: "God, be merciful to me, a sinner;"
But the Pharisee, esteeming himself rich in virtues: "I give You thanks, Lord, he says, that I am not like the rest," etc. Luke chapter 18. "The humble in spirit, says Bede, humbly worship God, like that Publican of the Gospel; the proud boast of their merits, like the Pharisee."
Following Solomon, Sirach says in Ecclesiasticus chapter 13:4: "The rich man, he says, has acted unjustly and will rage; but the poor man, having been injured, will be silent." See what was said there. This maxim therefore censures the harshness of the rich; but it comforts the poor and advises them to soften the rich with similar speech, and thus obtain from them what they ask. Nor should they marvel and think it something new or rare happening only to themselves, since this is the common habit of the rich, as it were innate to wealth and naturally resulting from it, just as fierce lightning bolts result and burst forth from thunder. "The poor man therefore speaks with entreaties," as if to say: Whatever the poor man says, he says so modestly, faintly, and humbly that he seems not so much to utter words as entreaties, not so much to speak as to beseech. Therefore the poor man speaks honeyed words; but the rich man responds with hard and stony words, so that he seems not so much to speak words as to cast stones and diamonds—indeed, to belch and hurl thunders and lightning bolts.
Verse 24: A Man Lovable for Companionship Is More a Friend Than a Brother
24. A MAN WHO IS LOVABLE FOR COMPANIONSHIP WILL BE MORE A FRIEND THAN A BROTHER. — In Hebrew, a man of friends for loving (or rather, says Baynus, for befriending, that is, suited and made for it, namely "inclined to practice friendship and show himself a friend"), and is a lover adhering more than a brother, or more than a brother. Hence in the Vulgate, for "a lovable man," the Complutensians and many others read "an amicable man"; and this is somewhat more expressive and better corresponds to the Hebrew and the Septuagint, which translate: a man of friends for friendship, and he adheres beyond a brother—that is, as the author of the Greek Catena clearly translates: a man inclined to friendship will cultivate friendship more constantly than a brother. Now then, First, the Chaldean translates and explains thus: there are companions who associate, and there is a friend who adheres more than a brother; and the Syriac: there are friends who are friends, and there is a friend who adheres more than a brother, as if to say: Many are companions and friends; but the singular friend and companion is one who loves and helps more than a brother.
Second, the Tigurine translates: a man suited for friendship, and who has it at heart to cultivate friendship, loves more and adheres more firmly than a brother.
Third, Vatablus: "A man of friends (supply: must be ready) to show himself a friend, since there is one who loves and is closer than a brother; that is, a man who has many friends must show himself a friend to them so as to retain them in friendship; for they surpass brothers in friendship."
Fourth, R. Solomon, as if to say: When someone constantly wins friends for himself, perhaps the time will come when he needs them; and they will indeed be at hand and will help more than brothers.
Fifth, Aben-Ezra, as if to say: A man of friendship will embrace a friend with love, so that he may enter into friendship with him and associate with him; for some friends are bound by a closer tie than a brother.
All these amount to nearly the same thing. The meaning, therefore, is, as if to say: "A lovable" or amicable man, in Hebrew, a man of friends, that is, a man who is loving and devoted to friendship, who whether by nature or by virtue seems born and made for companionship and friendship, who seems to be all love, benevolence, and beneficence—this man certainly will be more of a friend; in Hebrew, will love more, will care more, will help more than a brother. The word "lovable," therefore, is taken not only passively but also actively, as if to say: one who is loved, who loves, and by his kindnesses binds all to himself and makes them his friends. The a priori reason is that just as it is the nature of heat to make warm, so it is the nature of friendship and love to love, and of beneficence to do good. Therefore a friend, compounded of love and beneficence, cannot but love and do good, whereas often the goodwill even of blood relatives and brothers is rare, as the Poet says. For they often look more to themselves and their own interests than to their brothers'.
This maxim therefore signifies the power of true friendship—not any friendship, but a singular and eminent one—and of a friend who is entirely benevolent and obliging (as the Chaldean, Syriac, and Aben-Ezra have noted): that such a friend in love and services often equals or surpasses brothers, and therefore such friendship must be greatly sought, courted, cultivated, and preserved in every way. "A man of friends" can also be taken as a man who is eager to befriend everyone and to make many friends for himself.
Such a friend, indeed the king and prince of friends, is Christ to us, who spent and expended Himself entirely for His friends, indeed for His enemies, to make them friends of God and of Himself, of whom therefore the Church sings:
Being born He gave Himself as companion, At supper as food, In dying as ransom, In reigning He gives Himself as reward.
If therefore you seek a true friend, seek Christ, who, when all others abandon you, will not abandon you, neither in life, nor in death, neither in time, nor in eternity; but everywhere and always He will be with you, and will fill you with every good, every grace, and glory. How wisely that soul knew who said: "My mind is founded and established in Christ!" Christ, therefore, is the man of loves, because He is the man of sorrows; for without sorrow there is no living in love. "In peace, therefore, in the selfsame, I will sleep and rest."
The philosophers followed Solomon. It is a maxim of Menander: "Consider brothers as true friends." Zeno, when asked "who is a friend?" answered: "Another self," which Aristotle quotes, in the Great Ethics: "For, he says, as we are accustomed to say, a friend is another self." Cicero says the same in his book On Friendship. And St. Jerome says to St. Augustine: "One should speak with a friend as with another self." Hence Hesiod:
Let one beware of making a companion equal to a brother.
Pythagoras, as Cicero attests in the passage already cited from On Friendship, "wanted it to be brought about that one be made from many." Therefore friendship equals or surpasses fraternal affection, which after parents is the greatest: for friendship is as it were a certain brotherhood. Hence Valerius Maximus, Book IV, chapter 7, at the beginning: "Let us now contemplate, he says, the powerful and prevailing bond of friendship, in no way inferior to the force of blood, indeed more certain and proven, because the lot of birth contracts the former as a fortuitous work, while the latter is contracted by the free will of each individual based on solid judgment. And so it is quicker to summon a relative without blame than a friend, because the one abandonment is subject to the charge of injustice, the other certainly to that of fickleness. For since a man's life would be desolate, surrounded by the protection of no friendship, so necessary a support should not be rashly assumed; but once rightly grasped, it should not be spurned." And immediately he gives the example of Pylades and Orestes, one of whom was willing to die for the other. Hence the saying:
To prove myself a Pylades, let someone provide me an Orestes. This is not done with words, Marcus: to be loved, love.
Plutarch lists many more such pairs of friends in his book On the Multitude of Friends, such as Theseus and Pirithous, Achilles and Patroclus, Pythias and Damon, Epaminondas and Pelopidas: such were Nisus and Euryalus in Virgil, Aeneid IX. Among the Hebrews, David and Jonathan were similar; among the Greeks, St. Basil and Nazianzen.
St. Thomas asks, in the Summa Theologiae II-II, Question 26, article 8, whether blood relatives, according to the order of charity, are to be loved more than others bound by any other connection, such as friendship or military service; and he answers affirmatively, because the friendship of blood relatives is natural and intimate, for it is radically founded in the bond of natural origin, whereas the friendship of fellow citizens is founded only in civil fellowship, and the friendship of fellow soldiers in military fellowship. He then raises as an objection this maxim of Solomon: "An amicable man for companionship is more a friend than a brother;" and answers: "Although the friendship of companions is contracted by personal choice, in those things that fall under our choice, namely in matters of action, this love outweighs the love of blood relatives, so that we agree more with them in matters of action. Yet the friendship of blood relatives is more stable, as being more natural, and prevails in those things that pertain to nature; hence we are more bound to them in the provision of necessities." Where Francisco Suarez, following Francisco de Victoria, teaches that a friend's benefits to a friend can be so great that it may be lawful to love him more than one's own father, from whom one was begotten and received life. But here envy must be guarded against, lest a brother or father, seeing a friend preferred to himself, envy him.
The manner in which envy can be guarded against in this matter is taught by Plutarch, in his treatise On Fraternal Love, near the end.
Following Solomon as usual, Sirach says in Ecclesiasticus 6:11: "A friend, he says, if he remains steadfast, will be to you as an equal;" and verse 15: "To a faithful friend there is no comparison," etc. See what was said there.
Mystically, Bede says: The man who is lovable for companionship, he says, is the people of the Gentiles, who believed in Christ and the Apostles, and clung faithfully and constantly even unto death and martyrdom, more than a brother—that is, more than the people of the Jews, who were the kinsmen and brothers of Christ according to the flesh; but unbelieving and rebellious, they persecuted Christ and the Apostles even unto death.