’ And a
writer’s
inkhorn at his reins.
St Gregory - Moralia - Job
In this way then, whilst they set themselves to defend their guilt, they made the addition that the sin should be rendered more heinous when examined, than it had been when committed.
31. Hence now also the branches of the human race derive bitterness still from this root, so that when a man is charged home for the evil in him, he hides himself under words of self-defence, as under a kind of leaves of trees, and as it were flies the face of his Creator to a kind of darkened retreats of self-exculpation, whereas he has no mind to have that known that he has been guilty of. By which same concealment he has not hidden himself from the Lord, but the Lord from himself. For he manages that he should not see Him Who sees all things, not that he himself should not be seen. Contrarily to every sinner the first step now of enlightenment is the humility of confessing, in that he now refuses to spare himself, who does not blush to avow the evil that he has done, and he who by defending himself might have been laid open to be accused, by accusing himself defends himself most quickly. And hence to dead Lazarus, who was kept down by a great weight, it is not said, ‘be thou restored to life;’ but, Come forth, [John 11, 43] by which same rising again, which was carried on in the body of that man, it is signified in what way we ourselves rise again in the heart, i. e. when it is said to the dead man, Come forth; that is to say, that man being dead in his sin, and through the mass of bad habit already buried, because he lies hidden from sight within his own conscience by wickedness, should go forth from himself without by confession. For to the dead man it is said, Come forth, that from the excusing and concealing of sin he may be called forth to come out to the accusing of himself with his own lips. Whence David the Prophet, in coming to life from that death of his great guilt, as it were went forth at the voice of the Lord, when being rebuked by Nathan he brought accusation of what he had done.
32. Therefore because this sin of concealing grew to a dreadful excess in the human race, blessed Job, when he was saying, If I covered my transgression, rightly inserted the words as man, because
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he sees that to be proper to man, which descends by the copying of our old parent. Whence it is fitly subjoined; And did hide mine iniquity in my bosom. For sacred Scripture is very often used to put the ‘bosom’ for the mind; as where in the voice of Holy Church it is said by the Psalmist of our persecutors, who are joined to us indeed in nature, but disjoined in life, And render unto our neighbours sevenfold into their bosom. [Ps. 79, 12] As though he said in plain speech; ‘Let them receive that in their minds, which in raging against us they practise over our bodies, that whereas they punish us outwardly in part, they may themselves be punished inwardly to a complete degree. ’ And so because the ‘bosom’ is interpreted the privacy of the mind, to ‘conceal iniquity in the bosom’ is to hide it in the recesses of the conscience, nor to uncover it by confession, but to veil it by defence. Contrarily James says, Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be saved. [James 5, 16] Solomon also says, He that covereth his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy. [Prov. 28, 13]
33. But herein it is necessary to be known that men very often both confess their sins and are not humble. For we know many who when no man charges them confess that they are sinners, but when perhaps they are rebuked for their sin, they seek the support of defence that they may not seem to be sinners; which persons, if, when they say the thing of their own accord, they did then with genuine humility see themselves to be sinners, when they are charged home by others would never deny that they are what they had confessed. In which case the tokens of true confession are, if when a man calls himself a sinner, he does not contradict another as well advancing that about him. For because it is written, The just man in the beginning is the accuser of himself; [Prov. 18, 17] he does not rather aim to appear a sinner, but a just man, when any one confesses himself a sinner, no man charging him. But when another inveighs against the evil that we have done, he proves the truth of confession. Which same if we defend in a proud spirit, it is clear that it is feignedly that of ourselves we called ourselves sinners. Whence it is above every thing to be taken care of that the evil things we have done, we both confess of our own accord, and do not deny them when others charge us home with them. For it is the evil of pride that the thing which a man as if by his own act deems it meet to confess about himself, this he should disdain to have said to him by others.
34. Thus blessed Job shewed what singular humility he was of, in that he both knew that he was living amongst adversaries, and yet was not afraid to disclose his offences with the voice of confession. But observe that above he tells his virtuous qualities, lower down he confesses his sin. For hence he clearly proves what truth he had spoken of the good in him, in that he would not hold his tongue concerning the evil. One while he points out his virtues, at another time transgressions; that he had both committed sin, and had not kept it silent, he makes plain. Whence it appears without all doubt what extraordinary purity he was of in the sight of Almighty God, who both avoided evil things that he should not commit them, and yet what things it did chance to him to commit he did not conceal from men; so that to him there should at once be the high credit of righteousness to have shunned sin, and the safe keeping of righteousness to have brought to light what he was not able to shun. Let this man seem to any one great in his virtues, to me without doubt he appears most grand even in his sins. Let those, who are so minded, admire in him the self- control of chastity, let them admire the faithfulness of justice, let them admire the bowels of pitifulness; I do not less admire in him the humblest confession of sins, than such lordly achievements of virtue. For I know well that through the shame of infirmity it is generally a worse conflict, to bring to light the sins we have committed, than it is to avoid them not being committed, and each instance of evil, though it may be avoided with more vigorousness, is yet brought to view
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with greater humility. Thus blessed Job, who whilst supported by so many great practices was not ashamed to confess his sin, shewed in the midst of his virtues, how humble he was. But because from true humility there ever springs secure authority, so that the soul should dread nothing without, in proportion as by the longing of self-elation it does not pant after the topmost height of affairs, the confession of sin having been set forth, it is rightly subjoined;
Ver. 34. Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of neighbours terrify me, and I did not rather keep silence, and went not out of the door?
[xvi]
35. It is great assuredness of heart to have nought of worldly concupiscence. For if the heart pants after attaining earthly things, it can never be secure and tranquil, because either things not possessed it desires, in order that it may possess them, or things obtained it is afraid for lest it should lose them, and whilst in adverse circumstances he dreads prosperous ones, so in prosperous circumstances he dreads such as are adverse, and he is tossed hither and thither as it were by a kind of waves, and is hurried about in various fashions by the changeableness of shifting affairs. But if once the mind is fixed with strong stedfastness in the longing after the Country Above, it is less distressed by the annoyance of earthly things. For from all outward commotions it seeks that its aim, like a kind of most secret retreat, and there attaching itself to the Unchangeable, [al. ‘Unchangeably attached,’ which however would be a hyperbolic expression. ] and mounting above all changeable things, by the mere calmness of its repose, while in the world, it is henceforth without the world. It goes beyond all things below by its stressing after the highest, and all the objects which it does not go after it feels itself by a certain liberty to get above, nor within is it subject to the tempest of things temporal, which it views without, for all earthly things which being longed after might have borne down the mind, being looked down upon lie beneath it. Whence it is well said by the Prophet, Set a look out for thyself; [Jer. 31, 21] that whilst a man views things above, he may rise high above things beneath. Hence likewise Habakkuk says, I will stand upon my watch. [Hab. 2, 1] For he ‘stands upon his watch,’ who by wise policy of discipline, does not bow down beneath, but rises high above earthly desires, that while he aims at Eternity, which is ever stedfast, he should have beneath his feet every thing that passes by.
36. Yet because with whatever goodness the holy man has advanced, the infirmity of the flesh still outwardly bears him down whilst set in this life, as it is written, Though man walk in the image of God, yet he is disquieted in vain: [Ps. 39, 6] it very often takes place that he is at once disquieted without, and holds on not subject to disquietude within, and that he is liable to be ‘disquieted in vain’ comes from the infirmity of the flesh, though that he ‘walks in the image of God’ is from the excellency of the mind, in order that he should both be inwardly strengthened by the Divine aid, and yet be still pressed down without by the human burthen. Whence Habakkuk again has well delivered a single sentence serving for both particulars. For he says, And trembling entered into my bones, and my power [virtue] was disquieted underneath me. [Hab. 3, 16] As though he said; ‘It is not my power, wherein being transported above, I remain free from liability to disquietude, but it is my own power wherein I am disquieted below. ’ And so the same is free from disquietude above himself, and the same exposed to disquietude below himself; because he had mounted above himself, in so far as he was caught away to things on high; and he was beneath himself, in so far as he still dragged a remains into that which is below. The same above himself is free from liability to disquietude, because he had now passed away into the contemplation of God: the same under
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himself is liable to be disquieted, because beneath himself he still remained a frail human being. The Prophet David according with this sentence saith; I said in the excess of my mind, All men are liars. [Ps. 116, 11] To whom the answer may be made; ‘If every man, then thou too; and the sentence will henceforth be false, which thou being a liar hast uttered, because whilst thou art true- spoken, every man is not found out a liar. ’ But observe that it is prefaced, I said in the excess of my mind. And so by ‘excess of the mind’ he transcended himself even, when he determined about the character of man. As though he said in plain speech; ‘I delivered a true sentence respecting the falseness of all men from the same cause, whereby I was myself above man;’ being now so far himself a ‘liar’ as far as he was himself man, but so far altogether not a ‘liar,’ as ‘by excess of the mind’ he was above man.
37. Thus, therefore, thus all the perfect, though they are still subject to something disquieting from the infirmity of the flesh, ret already enjoy within the calmest privacy by the contemplation of the mind, so that whatsoever thing happens without, it should in nought disquiet them within. Whence blessed Job, exhibiting the security of a holy mind, after he had delivered so many announcements of the parts of virtue with reference to himself, following that which we have set before, added; If I feared at an exceeding great multitude, or the contempt of neighbours terrified me, and I did not rather keep silence, and went not out of the door. As though he said in a plainer manner; ‘While others were disquieted against me without, I myself remained in mine own self free from being disquieted within. ’ For what else ought we in this place to take ‘the door’ to be, but the mouth? For by this we as it were go forth, when with what words we are able, we disclose the secrets of our hearts; and what we remain within in the conscience, such we go forth without by the tongue.
38. But there are some persons who are altogether afraid to be despised, and lest they should chance to be judged as contemptible, aim to appear wise. These are driven to ‘go forth out of the door,’ because when assailed with insults, how great in themselves they lie buried from sight, they give out telling it. And when being overcome by impatience they put forth things about themselves, which were unknown, they as it were ‘go forth by the door’ of the mouth. And so blessed Job being about to say, that he had never ‘gone forth out of the door of the lips,’ justly set before; I kept silence; i. e. because agitated by impatience he would have gone forth out of the house of the conscience, if he had not known how to keep silence. For holy men, when they are under the trial of being perturbed, shun wholly and entirely to exhibit themselves to view, and when they cannot benefit those that hear them, they are willing by keeping silence to be even despised, lest they pride themselves upon the exhibition of their own wisdom. And when they say any thing with good understanding, they seek not their own glory, but the life of their hearers. But when they see that they cannot by speaking gain the life of their hearers, by keeping silence they hide their own knowledge. For we hide to the imitating the life of the Lord, as to a kind of mark set before us. For He Himself, because he saw that Herod sought not advancement, but that he desired to wonder at His signs or His knowledge, on being asked by him held His tongue, and because He kept silence with constancy, He went forth derided by him. For it is written; And when Herod saw Jesus, he was exceeding glad; for he was desirous to see Him of a long season, because he had heard many things of Him; and he hoped to have seen some miracles done by Him: [Luke 23, 8] where it is also added; Then he questioned with Him in many words, but He answered him nothing. [v. 9] But how greatly the Lord in holding His peace was despised, is shewn when the words are brought in there directly; And Herod with his men of war set Him at nought, and mocked Him. [v. 11] Which same transaction we ought to hear and learn, in order that as often as our hearers desire to be made
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acquainted with things of ours, as things to be praised, and not to alter what is wrong of their own, we should altogether hold our peace; lest, if we speak the Word of God with the design of display, both the fault of those persons, which then was, should not cease to be, and our own fault, which was not, should be brought to pass.
39. A person will perhaps say,’ How do we know with what feelings of the heart a man will hear? ’ But there are a number of things that bring to light the mind of him who hears; first and foremost, if our hearers both always praise what they hear, and never follow the thing that they praise. This vain glory of speaking the great Preacher had shunned, when he said, For we are not as many, which corrupt the word of God: but as of sincerity, but as from God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ. [2 Cor. 2, 17] For to ‘corrupt the Word of God’ is to think of Him otherwise than He is, or to seek from it not spiritual fruits, but the corrupt offspring of human praise. But ‘to speak as of sincerity,’ is not to seek for aught in Revelation beyond what behoves. Now he ‘speaks as from God,’ who knows that he himself hath not from himself, but that he hath received from God what he says. And he speaks ‘before God,’ who in all that he speaks seeks not human regards, but minds the presence of Almighty God, and who looks for, not his own glory, but the glory of his Creator. But he who indeed knows well that he has himself received from God the thing that he speaks, and yet in speaking seeks his own glory, speaks ‘as from God,’ but not ‘before God,’ because Him he considers as absent, Whom he docs not set before his heart, when he preaches Him. But holy men at once ‘speak as from God’ and ‘before God,’ in that they both know that they have from Him the thing that they say, and they see that He is Himself present at their discoursings, their Judge and their Hearer. Hence it comes to pass, that whereas they know themselves to be set at nought by their neighbours, and that their words do not advantage the life of the persons hearing them, they hide from sight what great goodness they are of, lest if the speech delivered disclose the secret of the heart to no purpose, it should break forth into vain glory.
40. Therefore blessed Job in the midst of stubborn hearts not aiming to shine forth by the disclosure of his virtue, says, And if the contempt of neighbours terrified me and I did not rather keep silence, and went not out of the door. For he who being stedfast through humility never feared to be despised, him never did impatience master, that the tongue should cast him forth out of doors. When it is rightly put first, If I feared at an exceeding great multitude; that it might be seen and known what great constancy he was of, in this respect, because no number of men ever terrifies without, whom no rout of bad habits lays waste within. For in this life he who seeks nothing that has to do with prosperity, doubtless dreads nothing that has to do with adversity.
[MYSTICAL INTERPRETATION]
41. Which same words if we carry on to a mystical meaning, we directly find therein the Redeemer’s mode of practice. For He was not ‘afraid at an exceeding great multitude,’ Who smote with a single answer only His persecutors coming with swords and staves, saying, I am He. [John 18, 6] ‘Him the contempt of His neighbours did not terrify,’ Who, in freeing us from eternal punishments, received strokes on the face with a composed mind. ‘He kept silence, and did not go forth out of the door,’ Who in the very hour now of His Passion, when He was undergoing the weak conditions of humanity, refused to call into action the power of Divinity. For to the Mediator between God and man it would have been ‘to go forth out of the door,’ if when He was held as Man He had been minded to display the power of His Majesty, and by the mightiness of His Divinity to
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surmount the weak conditions of the flesh taken upon Him. For that He might die manifest to man, He remained hidden God. For had they known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of Glory. [1 Cor 2, 8] And so He did not ‘go forth out of the door,’ Who even when questioned by Pilate kept silence; and in the midst of the hands of the persecutors He both offered His Body to suffering, which He had taken upon Him in behalf of the Elect, and would not display to those that were against Him What He was. Whence also it is said by the Psalmist, They have made Me an abomination unto them, I was given up, and I went not forth. [Ps. 88, 8] For when He was despised because He appeared man, He would have ‘gone forth,’ if He had been minded to display His hidden Majesty. But because he brought infirmity to view, and hid power from sight, herein, that He remained unknown to His persecutors, to those persecutors He did not ‘go forth. ’ Who, however, does ‘go forth’ to the Elect, because to those that seek for it, He discloses the sweetness of His Divine Nature. Whence it is said to Him by the Prophet, Thou wentest forth for the salvation of Thy people, that Thou mightest save Thine Anointed. [Hab. 3, 13] It goes on:
Ver. 35. Who would give me a helper that the Almighty might hear my desire. [xvii]
[HISTORICAL INTERPRETATION]
42. The holy man after he related so many high achievements of the virtues in him, knowing well that he cannot attain to the things on high by his own deserts, seeks for a helper. And whom verily does he fix his eye on but the Only-begotten Son of God, Who whereas He took upon Him human nature travailing in this mortal state, did give help? For He helped man, being made Man; that because to mere man there was no way open of returning to God, there should be made a Way of returning by means of The God-Man [Homo-Deus. ]. For we were far removed from the Righteous and Immortal One, being mortal and unrighteous. But between the Immortal and Righteous One and ourselves the mortal and unrighteous, appeared the Mediator of God and man, mortal and righteous, Who might at once own death with mortals, and righteousness with God; that whereas by our things below we were far removed from things above, He might in Himself singly unite the things below with the things above, and that herein there might be a Way made for us of returning to God, in the degree that He joined ours beneath with His own on high. This One then blessed Job, in his personating of the whole Church, asks for as Mediator, who when he had said, Who would give me a helper, suitably added, that the Almighty might hear my desire. For he knew that for the rest of Eternal deliverance, the prayers of man can never be heard excepting through his Advocate. Concerning Whom it is said by the Apostle John; If any one sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, even Jesus Christ the righteous; and He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. [1 John 2, 1. 2. ] Concerning Whom Paul likewise saith; It is Christ Jesus that died for us, yea, rather, that is risen again, Who is even at the right hand of God, Who also maketh intercession for us. [Rom. 8, 34] For, for the Only-begotten Son to ‘intercede’ for man, is to shew Himself Man in the presence of the Coeternal Father, and for Him to have besought for human nature, is to have taken upon Him that same nature in the loftiness of the Divine Nature. And so the Lord intercedes for us not with the voice but by the act of compassionating; because that which He would not should be condemned in the Elect, he set free by taking upon Himself. And so a helper is sought for, that ‘the desire may be heard;’ because except that the intercession of the Mediator were employed in our behalf, surely the accents of our prayers would remain silent to the ear of God.
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43. Moreover it requires to be noted that it is not said, ‘my prayers, but, my desire, that the Almighty might hear. For true beseeching does not lie in the accents of the lips, but in the thoughts of the heart. For the stronger accents in the deepest ears of God it is not our words that make, but our desires. For if we seek eternal life with the mouth, but yet do not desire it with the heart, in crying out we keep silence. But if we desire in the heart, even when we are silent with the mouth, in being silent we cry out. It is hence that in the wilderness the people clamour with their voices, and Moses is still to the clamouring of words, and yet whilst keeping still he is heard by the ear of divine Pity, whereas it is said, Wherefore criest thou unto Me? [Exod. 14, 15] Thus within in the desire is the secret cry, which does not reach to the ears of men, and yet fills the hearing of the Creator. It is hence that Anna going to the temple was silent indeed with the lips, and yet uttered so many accents of her desire. Hence the Lord says in the Gospel, Enter into thy chamber, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father Which is in secret, and thy Father Which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. [Matt. 6, 6] For ‘the door being shut he prays in his chamber,’ who while his mouth is silent, pours forth the affection of the heart in the sight of the Pitifulness Above. And the voice is ‘heard in secret,’ when there is a crying out in silence by holy desires. Whence also it is rightly said by the Psalmist, The Lord hath heard the desire of the poor; Thine ear hath heard the preparing of their heart. [Ps. 10, 17] Now blessed Job in the subjoined words discloses whom he seeks for himself as a helper, in the ‘hearing of his desire,’ saying,
And that he himself who judgeth would write a book !
[xviii]
44. For because to the People still fearing, the Law was committed by the hands of a Servant, but upon the loving Children, the grace of the Gospel was bestowed by the Lord, Who as coming for our Redemption, instituted the New Covenant for us, but in examining as touching the precept of that Covenant one day cometh as Judge also, it is not requisite that by explaining it should be made clear, that He Who Judges is the Same Who writes a book. For Truth Itself says by Itself, The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son. [John 5, 22] And so He will then be the Enacter of judgment Who is now the Composer of the ‘book;’ that He should then demand in strictness, what He now bids in mildness. For thus we see every day that masters set children the rudiments of their letters caressing them, but exact those of them dealing hardly with them; and what they give with gentleness, they require back with the rod. For now the precepts of Divine Revelation sound gentle, but they shall be to be thought harsh in the exacting of them. Now, there is a gentle warning of One calling, but then there shall come the strict justice of the Judge, because it is certain that no whit even of the very least commandment will pass without scrutinizing. By which same it is apparent that He that ‘judgeth is the Same That wrote the Book,’ Which same ‘Book’ of the New Testament, that the Redeemer of man should Himself frame in His own Person at the last, the Prophet Ezekiel rightly tells forth, saying, And behold six men came from the way of the higher gate, which lieth toward the north, and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; and one man among them was clothed with linen, with a writer’s inkhorn at his reins.
[Ez. 9, 2] For what else is there denoted in the ‘six men coming’ but the six ages of mankind? [St. Gregory’s division of ages, Him. in Ev. xix. §. 1. from Adam to Noah, Noah to Abraham, Abraham to Moses, Moses to Our Lord, and then to the end, will not suit this place. What is meant is probably that in St. Isidore of Seville, Etym. lib. v. c. 39. De Discretione temporum, where two more divisions are made, at David, and the Captivity. He compares these
ages to the days of Creation. The same division is given in the beginning of his Chronicon. ] Who ‘come from the way of the higher gate,’ because from the state of Paradise as from the beginning of the world, they are unwound from the upper generations. Which ‘gate looks to the North’ in this way, because the
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mind of man lying open to evil, except that, abandoning the warmth of charity, it had courted the numbness of the interior, would never have gone out to this breadth of mortality. And every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; because each particular generation being evolved by the several respective ages, before the Coming of the Redeemer, had in its practice that wherefrom it took the punishment of condemnation. And one man among them was clothed with linen. Because our Redeemer deigned to have parents even of the priestly Tribe [‘Tribu,’ perhaps ‘nation,’ but Elizabeth, ‘of the daughters of Aaron,’ was a kinswoman of the Blessed Virgin. Luke 1, 5. and 36. ] after the flesh, he is described as coining ‘clothed with linen. ’ Or, surely, because linen is from the earth, and is not like wool produced from the corruptible flesh, seeing that He derived the covering of His Body from a Virgin mother, and not by the corruptness of copulation, therefore He came to us ‘clothed with linen.
’ And a writer’s inkhorn at his reins. In the ‘reins’ is the hind part of the body. And because the Lord Himself after that He died for our sakes, and rose again, and ascended up into heaven, then wrote the New Testament through the Apostles, this man had an ‘inkhorn at his reins. ’ For He Who after He departed framed the writing of the New Testament, as it were, carried an ‘inkhorn’ behind him. Thus this ‘inkhorn’ he sees to hold fast to the man ‘clothed with linen,’ who says, And that the same who judges would write a book. But wherefore, blessed Job, desirest thou that a book should be written by Him, Who is Judge? It goes on;
Ver. 36. That I might bear it upon my shoulder, and put it round me like a crown.
[xix]
45. To ‘bear the book upon the shoulder,’ is by practising to carry out Holy Scripture. And observe how orderly it is described both first as being ‘carried on the shoulder,’ and afterwards ‘put round’ him ‘as a crown;’ because, that is to say, the precepts of Sacred Revelation, if they be now borne in practice, afterwards set forth for us the crown of victory in the recompensing. But why does blessed Job beg for ‘the book to be written by the Judge,’ who was not able to attain to the times of the New Testament? But, as has been often said already, he uses the accents of the Elect, and in the personifying of them begs that, which he foresaw would benefit them in all respects. For he himself by the Spirit had for long had that book with him, which by the grace of Inspiration he had obtained, that both by living he should be made acquainted with, and by foreseeing he should announce.
But herein it requires to be known that when we take thought of the precepts of Sacred Revelation, and when we draw off the mind from love of the life of corruption, we as it were hasten on by a kind of footsteps of the heart, to the interior scene of things. Now no man, in abandoning things below, is directly made at the top; because for earning the title to perfection, whilst the soul is day by day being led forward on high, doubtless there is an attaining thereto as it were by a kind of steps of ascending. Whence in this place also it is fitly added;
By my several steps I will declare it.
[xx]
46. Since concerning these ‘steps’ of merits it is said by the Psalmist, They go from virtue to virtue. [Ps. 84, 7] Concerning these, again, regarding Holy Church he says; God is distinguished in her steps, what time He shall receive her. [Ps. 48, 3. not as V. ] For neither is there any attaining suddenly to things above, as has been said, but to the topmost pitch of virtuous attainments the soul
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is led on by accessions. For hence it is that the same Prophet saith again; I was exercised, and my spirit failed little by little. [Ps. 77, 3] What does he mean, then, that he says, my spirit, but the spirit of man, i. e. the spirit of exaltation? And because by secret grace we advance to the love of God by a measure regulated from above, in proportion as virtue is daily increased in us by the Spirit of God, our own spirit proportionally goes off. Which spirit of error, because it is not at once cut clean away from us, is justly recorded to have ‘failed little by little. ’ But we then make complete advance in God, when we have wholly and entirely fallen away from ourselves. Thus these measures of growing virtues by the words of the holy man are styled ‘steps. ’ For every elect person sets out from the tenderness of his embryo in the first instance, and afterwards comes to firmness for strong and vigorous achievements. Which thing Truth plainly shews in the Gospel, saying, So is the kingdom of heaven, as if a man should cast seed into the ground, and should sleep and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up he knoweth not how. Which same seed describing the growths of he adds; For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. The end of whose progress too he also makes to succeed, saying, But when it has brought forth the fruits from itself, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come. [Mark 4, 26-29] Observe, by the voice of Truth the accessions of merits are marked out by the characters of fruits. For He says, first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. Was not Peter still a ‘blade’ then, when by the mouth of a maid he was in a moment bent down by the blast of a single speech, already green indeed through devotedness, but still tender through infirmity. But he was found ‘full corn in the ear’ when he withstood the rulers persecuting him, saying, We ought to obey God rather than men. [Acts 5, 29] For he was found ‘full corn in the ear’ when, in the winnowing of persecution, he underwent such numberless wounds, but yet he was never made small after the manner of chaff, but continued whole grain. For little by little in each several soul, so to say, the moisture of interior grace abounds, that the blade may grow into fruit. So let no one when he sees any neighbour still a ‘blade’ despair of the ‘full corn. ’ Since from the leaves of the blades, which hang softly, flowing hither and thither, the rising grains of fruitage come to firmness.
47. Now the Prophet Daniel, whereas, when the Lord was speaking to him, he made it his business to tell us the posture of his body, did rightly represent those stages of merits. Thus he says; Yet heard I the voice of his words, and when I heard the voice of his words, then was I dismayed upon my face, and my face clave to the ground. And, behold, a hand touched me, which set me upon my knees, and upon the joints of my hands. And he said, O Daniel, a man greatly beloved, understand the words that I speak unto thee, and stand upright; for unto thee am I now sent: and when he had spoken this word unto me, I stood trembling; and he said unto me, Fear not. [Dan. 10, 9-12] Which same posture of his body, whilst he was listening to the words of one speaking inwardly, he would never set forth to us with so much pains, if he had known it to be void of mysteries. For in Sacred Writ not only what holy men say is prophecy, but also very often what they do. Thus the holy man, being pregnant with interior mysteries, by the posture of his body, likewise represents the power of the voice; and by this that he first lay prostrate on the earth, by this that he afterwards set himself up on the joints of his hands and on his knees, by this that at last he stood fast erect indeed, yet trembling, he makes known to us in his own person all the order of our progress. For the words of God we hear ‘lying on the ground,’ when being settled in our sins, allied to earthly pollution, we are made acquainted with spiritual precepts from the voice of the Saints. At which precepts, we are as it were set up upon our knees and the joints of our hands, because withdrawing ourselves from earthly defilements, we as it were henceforth lift up our mind from things below. For as he wholly
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cleaves to the ground, who lies dismayed, so he who is bent down upon his knees and the joints of his fingers, his advancement commencing, is already in a great measure hung aloft from earth. But at the last by the voice of the Lord we stand there erect indeed, yet trembling, in that being perfectly lifted up from earthly objects of desire, the more fully we know the words of God, the more we are afraid. For he as it were still lies prostrate on the ground, who by desires after the earthly cares nothing to be lifted up to the heavenly. But it is as if he being lifted up still ‘rested upon his hands and knees,’ who already forsakes some defilements, but does not yet withstand some earthly practices. But he now stands there present erect at the words of God, who perfectly lifts up the mind to things aloft, and scorns to be bent down by impure desires.
48. Now he rightly shews that he ‘stood trembling;’ because the scrutiny of interior exactness is the more fearfully dreaded, the more advanced the progress in respect thereto. Where it is fitly subjoined by the voice of God, fear not; because the more that we ourselves learn what we should have occasion to fear, the more we have infused in us from God by interior grace what may call for love, so that both our contempt little by little may pass away into fear, and fear pass away into charity; that wherein God when He seeks us, by contempt we withstand, and by fear flee from, both contempt and fear being one day set aside, we should be joined to Him by love only. For little by little we learn even the very fear of Him [The readings vary. The Ben. Editor seems not to have seen that noticed in the Italian reprint, which is also in the Merton and Trin. Coll. MSS. and others at Oxford, ‘Eum timere didiscimus, eique vi solius &c. ’ ‘we unlearn fearing Him, and are attached to Him by the force of love alone. ’], to the love of Whom only we are attached. And thus as it were there being placed a kind of steps of our advance, the foot of the mind first by fear we set below, and afterwards by charity lift it to the heights of love, that from that wherewith a man is puffed up he may be checked, so that he fear, and from that, which he now dreads he may be lifted up, that he may have boldness. Now these steps of virtuous attainments it is no great labour to lay hold of, since there is the passing from one to another.
49. But the subject requires the nicest handling, when the mind strives to estimate in the case of one and the same virtue with what steps of advancement it is lifted up. For to mention the first elements of virtue, i. e. faith and wisdom, they cannot be severally gained, except we ascend thereto by marked and ordered methods as by a kind of steps. For faith itself which imbues us for taking in hand in a perfect manner what else there is good, very often in its beginnings both totters and is firmly based, and it is now held most surely, and yet touching the assurance thereof there is still trembling under the effects of misgiving. For a part of it is received first, that it may be afterwards perfectly completed in us. For if there were not an advancing by a sure step in the mind of one who believes, the father of the child to be healed would not have said on being questioned, in the Gospel, Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief. [Mark 9, 24] And so he was still ascending upwards as to the faith which he had already received, who at one and the same time both cried out that he already believed and still doubled from unbelieving. Hence it is also that it said to our Redeemer by His disciples, Increase our faith, that that which had been already received in beginning, might by the accessions of steps arrive at perfection.
50. Moreover Wisdom herself, who is required to be the mistress of good works, is vouchsafed to the panting soul by degrees of increase, that surely the ascending thereto should be by the steps of wonderful regulation. Which some the Prophet Ezekiel well describes in a figurative relation, who concerning that man whom he had seen on a high mountain tells, saying, He measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the water up to the ancles; again he measured a thousand, and
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brought me through the water up to the knees; again he measured a thousand, and brought me through the water up to the reins. Afterward he measured a thousand, and it was a torrent that I could not pass over, for there swelled deep waters of a torrent, which could not be passed over. [Ez. 47, 3-5] For what is denoted by the number of a ‘thousand,’ but the fulness of the benefit vouchsafed? Thus the man who appeared ‘measures a thousand cubits,’ and the Prophet is led through the waters ‘up to the ancles,’ because our Redeemer, when to us on our being converted to Him He bestowed the fulness of a good beginning, bathed the first treadings of our practice by the gift of spiritual wisdom. For the water’s reaching up to the ancle is our henceforth maintaining the treadings of longed-for righteousness by wisdom being vouchsafed to us. Again, he ‘measures a thousand cubits,’ and the Prophet is led through the water ‘up to the knees,’ because when the fulness of good practice is bestowed, our wisdom is increased even to this degree, that there is not henceforth any bending in bad deeds. Thus it is hence said by Paul, Wherefore lift up the hands that hang down, and the feeble knees, and make straight steps with your feet. [Heb. 12, 12] Thus ‘the water reaches to the knees,’ when the wisdom that is is obtained perfectly braces us to uprightness of good practice. And again, he ‘measures a thousand,’ and the Prophet is ‘led through the water up to the reins’ in this way, because the fulness of good practice then grows to a height in us, when the wisdom vouchsafed has killed in us as far as it is possible all the gratification of the flesh as well. For except the gratification of the flesh was seated in the reins, the Psalmist would never have said, Burn my reins and my heart. [Ps. 2, 26] Therefore the water comes up ‘to the reins,’ when the sweetness of wisdom destroys the very incitements of the flesh too, so that the burnings of the flesh that might have scorched up the soul are cooled down. And he still further ‘measured a thousand,’ ‘and it was a torrent which the Prophet could not pass,’ of which he also says, Because there swelled deep waters of a torrent, which could not be passed over. For perfectness of practice having been received, we come to contemplation; in which same contemplation while the mind is carried up on high, being uplifted it sees in God that the thing that it sees it cannot fathom, and as it were it touches the water of the torrent, which it cannot pass through, because at once it beholds in gazing what it may be pleased to behold, and yet is not able perfectly to behold that very thing that it pleases. And so the Prophet sooner or later comes to the water ‘which he cannot pass through,’ because when we are at last brought to the contemplation of wisdom, the mere immensity thereof, which by itself lifts man to itself, denies the human mind a full acquaintance, so that it should at once by touching love this wisdom, and yet never by passing through penetrate it.
51. Thus blessed Job called these, increasings of virtues by the title of ‘steps,’ because he saw them to be in distinct divisions, bestowed on men by gift from above; seeing that by them only do we ascend so as to come to the attaining of heavenly things. And so in making mention of the Sacred Book, i. e. of Divine Revelation, he says; By my several steps I will declare it, in this way surely, because he really ascends to the teaching of God, who has broken forth to the attaining thereof by the steps of holy practice. And he as it were ‘by his several steps declares the book’ who proves that he has been vouchsafed the knowledge of it not in respect of words only, but also of deeds. Whence it is yet further added;
And as to a prince I will offer it.
For every thing that we offer, we hold in our hands. And so ‘unto the Prince’ coming to Judgment ‘to offer the book’ is to have held the words of His precepts in our behaviour. It proceeds;
Ver. 38—40. If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain: if I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof; let the thistle
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grow for me instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley.
[xxi]
[ALLEGORICAL INTERPRETATION]
52. For what is it for the ‘land to cry,’ for ‘the furrows to weep,’ and to have ‘eaten one’s own fruits buying them? ’ To whom is it necessary to buy what is his own? who has heard ‘the land crying? ’ Who has seen ‘the furrows weeping? ’ And whereas the furrows of the land are always of the land, why is it that by a separate declaration it is both said that the land did not cry, and that the furrows thereof did not weep along with it? For whereas a furrow of the earth is nothing else but earth, it does not need the accounting of much difference, that he adds; And along with it the furrows thereof weep. In which same point because the order of the history falls to the ground, the mystical meaning displays itself to us, the doors as it were being now set open. As though it exclaimed in plain speech; ‘Whereas ye know that the reasonableness of the letter has dropped dead, doubtless it remains that ye should fall back to me without misgiving. For every one who either by private right rules a domestic household, or for the common advantage is set over faithful multitudes, herein that he possesses the rights of government over the faithful committed to him, what else does he but hold the land to cultivate it? Since it is for this end that each individual is advanced above the rest, by Divine distribution, that the mind of those under him, like land subdued, may be made fruitful by the seed of his preaching. But ‘the land crieth against’ its possessor, if it chance that against him, who is set at the head, either a private family, or Holy Church utters any just murmur. Since for ‘the land to cry,’ is for those under charge to grieve with reason against the injustice of him who rules them; where it is rightly subjoined, And along with it the furrows thereof weep. For the land even when not cultivated by any works generally produces something of sustenance for the service of man, but when ploughed it bears fruits to superabundance. And there are some persons, who ‘not being cleft by any ploughshare of reading, or any of exhortation, do yet of themselves produce some good things, though but the least, like land not yet ploughed up. But there are some who for always hearing and retaining, applying themselves to holy preachings and meditations, as it were cleft with a kind of ploughshare of the tongue, as to the former hardness of the heart, receive the seed of exhortation, and by the furrows of voluntary chastening render the fruits of good practice. But it is very often the case that those who are set at the head do things unjust, and it comes to pass that the very persons injure those under them, who were bound to do them good. Which when uninstructed persons see, being enraged they murmur against their ruler, and yet do not by sympathy grieve violently for their neighbours. But when these who are already broken in pieces by the plough of reading, and dressed for the fruitage of practice, see innocent persons borne down even in the least things, they are forthwith turned by sympathy to tears of sorrow, because they bewail as their own the things that their neighbours suffer unjustly. For the perfect, whereas they are ever affected with regard to what is spiritual, are taught to lament for the bodily hurts of others, so much the more in proportion as they are now instructed not to lament for their own. And so every one who is set in authority, if he executes what is bad in the case of those under him, ‘the earth crieth against him and the furrows weep,’ because against his injustice the uninstructed peoples indeed break out in accents of murmuring, while all the perfect severally chasten themselves in tears for his wicked practice, and for what the inexperienced cry out and do not grieve, those under authority of a more tried life bewail and hold their peace. And so for ‘the furrows to bewail along with the land crying out,’ is by that thing whereas the multitude of the faithful complains with justice against the ruler, for persons of a more fruitful life to be brought to
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tears of sorrow. Thus the furrows are both of the earth, and yet are distinguished from the term of ‘the earth,’ because those in Holy Church, who cultivate their mind with the labour of holy meditation, are as much better than the rest of the faithful, in proportion as by the seeds received they render more abundant fruits of deeds. And there are some who being set over holy peoples obtain the payments of livelihood by the bountifulness of the Church, but do not pay the ministrations of exhortation that are due. In opposition to whom the example of the holy man is yet further subjoined aright, when it is directly added by him;
If I have eaten the fruit thereof without money.
[xxii]
53. For to ‘eat the fruit of the land without money’ is to receive indeed our charges from the Church, but not to yield to that Church the price of preaching. Of which same preaching it is said by the voice of the Creator, Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury. [Matt. 25, 27] And so he ‘eats the fruits of the earth without money,’ who receives the Church’s benefits for the service of the body, but does not pay to the people the ministry of exhortation. What do we pastors say to these things, who while we are the forerunners of the Advent of the Strict Judge, take upon us the function of a herald indeed, but devour the Church’s supplies with dumb mouths? We exact all that is owed to our own body, but we do not pay back what we owe to the soul of those committed to our charge. Mark how the holy man, tied down by so many pledges in this world, in the midst of numberless employments, was free for the pursuit of preaching. And he never ‘ate the fruits of the earth without money,’ because surely he paid back the word of good warning to those under his charge, from whom he received the fruit of bodily serving. For this every one who is set over the people owes to Almighty God, he who is set over many, and he who is set over a smaller number, that he should in such sort exact the due ministration from those subject to him, that he may himself mind with heedful regard what of warning he at all times owes. For all we who subject to the appointment of the Creator are joined amongst ourselves by a vicarious ministry in obedience to our true Lord, what else are we but servants to one another? Whereas, then, he who is subordinate serves in obeisance, assuredly it remains that he who is set over him should serve to the word. Whereas he who is subordinate yields obedience to orders, it is required that he who is at the head should bestow the care and concern of solicitude and of pity. And so it comes to pass, that whilst we studiously endeavour to serve one another now by charity, we may one day rule together with the true Lord in common rejoicing. But there are some, who herein, that they discharge the office of preaching, grudge others the good that they have, and so do not any longer have it in a true sense. To whom it is rightly said by James, But if ye have bitter envying among yourselves, and strife in your hearts, this wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. [James 3, 14. 15. ] Hence here also when it is said, If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, it is rightly subjoined;
Or have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof.
[xxiii]
54. For they are the ‘tillers’ of the land, who, being placed in a lower situation, with what earnestness they are able, with the best practice that they can, cooperate in the grace of preaching to the instructing of Holy Church. Which same ‘husbandmen of this land’ not to afflict, is this, viz.
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not to envy their labours; that the ruler of the Church, while he vindicates to himself alone the right of preaching, should not, by envy gnawing him, gainsay others also that preach in a right way. For the religious mind of the pastor, because it seeks not its own glory but the glory of the Creator, desires to have all that it does aided by all persons. For the faithful preacher wishes, if it might be brought to pass, that the truth which he is not able to give utterance to alone, the mouths of all should sound out. Whence when Joshua would have withstood the two who remained in the camp and prophesied, it is rightly said by Moses, Enviest thou for my sake? Would God that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them! [Numb. 11, 29] For he was willing for all to prophesy, in that he envied not others the good that he had. Thus because blessed Job introduced all those things as under suspension, and if he had not done them, binds himself with the sentence of cursing, it goes on;
Ver. 40. Let the thistle grow for me instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley. [xxiv]
55. As though he said in plain words; ‘If I have done aught unjust towards those under me, if I have exacted the debts due to me, and have not myself paid what I owed, if I have envied others the executing of good practice, for the good things which refresh for ever and ever, may evil things that sting be repaid me in the Judgment. ’ Since ‘instead of the wheat there springs up the thistle, and instead of barley the thorn,’ when in the final Retribution, wherefrom the recompensing of our labour is looked for, the piercing of pain is met with. And observe, that as barley is different from wheat, though both regale, so the thorn differs from the thistle, though either be a thing that pricks, because the thistle is softer, and the thorn always the harder as to pricking. Thus he says, Let the thistle grow instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley. As if he said plainly and openly; ‘I know indeed that I have both done great good acts and lesser ones; and if it is not so, may lesser evils match me for my great good acts, and the greater evils for the lesser good ones. ’ Though this may also be understood in another sense. For in ‘wheat’ there is denoted in spiritual action which regales the mind, but in ‘barley’ the disposal of earthly things. Wherein while we are often forced to serve the weak and carnal, we as it were prepare their food for the beasts of burthen, and the very practice of our deeds after the manner of barley has somewhat of a mixture of chaff. And it very often happens, that the ruler who is set at the head, while he enforces what is unjust against those under his charge, while he cheers not the good with any soothing, whilst, that which is more grievous, all those acting rightly he distresses out of envy, still some good things he sometimes does, as if he sowed corn, and mixed in the disposing of earthly things at times not in the passion of avarice, but for the use of the carnal, and so looks for the fruit of that labour as a crop of barley. But the several persons under his charge, in consideration of this, that they are borne hard upon in the chief things, cannot feel joy in his lesser good things; because neither is this practice well pleasing in the sight of God, which is defiled by the injustice of other practice, nor yet is the very disposal of earthly things believed to be undertaken for the service of those under his charge, when he who is over them is seen to pant with avarice. Whence it happens that even in answer to the few good things themselves, which they see to be done in the midst of a multitude of evil ones, they give back not praises but groans, and that those that go weakly murmur, while they take thought that that which they see is not a thing of pure practice. And so he says, If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain; if I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof: let the thistle grow instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley. As if he said plainly, ‘If the great things which I owed I have not needfully performed, may I
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receive the prickings of murmuring from those under me, even with reference to the good that I have done. If I have omitted to set forth what might cheer, may their tongue springing forth into complaint with justice pierce me. ’
56. Wherein it requires always to be minded with heedful consideration, that neither they that are set at the head offer examples of bad practice to those under them, and kill the life of those by the sword of their evil doing, nor they that are subject to the control of another presume to judge lightly the deeds of their rulers, and from this, that they utter murmurs touching those who are placed over them, set themselves not against a human appointment but against that Divine Appointment, which disposes all things. For to those it is said, And as for My flock they eat that which ye have trodden with your feet: they drink that which ye have fouled with your feet. [Ez. 34, 19] For ‘the sheep drink what is fouled with the feet,’ when those under charge for example of living seek after things, which the persons over them severally corrupt by bad practice. But on the other hand these persons hear from those in command; And what are we? Your murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord. [Ex. 16, 8] For he that murmurs against power established over him, it is plain reproves Him Who gave that power to man.
At length, God vouchsafing it, we have explored those sentences of blessed Job, full of mystical force, in which he made answer to the words of his friends. Now it remains that we come to the words of Elihu, which are to be weighed with so much the graver caution, in proportion as they are also put forward through the boldness of youth with a hotter spirit.
BOOK XXIII.
31. Hence now also the branches of the human race derive bitterness still from this root, so that when a man is charged home for the evil in him, he hides himself under words of self-defence, as under a kind of leaves of trees, and as it were flies the face of his Creator to a kind of darkened retreats of self-exculpation, whereas he has no mind to have that known that he has been guilty of. By which same concealment he has not hidden himself from the Lord, but the Lord from himself. For he manages that he should not see Him Who sees all things, not that he himself should not be seen. Contrarily to every sinner the first step now of enlightenment is the humility of confessing, in that he now refuses to spare himself, who does not blush to avow the evil that he has done, and he who by defending himself might have been laid open to be accused, by accusing himself defends himself most quickly. And hence to dead Lazarus, who was kept down by a great weight, it is not said, ‘be thou restored to life;’ but, Come forth, [John 11, 43] by which same rising again, which was carried on in the body of that man, it is signified in what way we ourselves rise again in the heart, i. e. when it is said to the dead man, Come forth; that is to say, that man being dead in his sin, and through the mass of bad habit already buried, because he lies hidden from sight within his own conscience by wickedness, should go forth from himself without by confession. For to the dead man it is said, Come forth, that from the excusing and concealing of sin he may be called forth to come out to the accusing of himself with his own lips. Whence David the Prophet, in coming to life from that death of his great guilt, as it were went forth at the voice of the Lord, when being rebuked by Nathan he brought accusation of what he had done.
32. Therefore because this sin of concealing grew to a dreadful excess in the human race, blessed Job, when he was saying, If I covered my transgression, rightly inserted the words as man, because
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he sees that to be proper to man, which descends by the copying of our old parent. Whence it is fitly subjoined; And did hide mine iniquity in my bosom. For sacred Scripture is very often used to put the ‘bosom’ for the mind; as where in the voice of Holy Church it is said by the Psalmist of our persecutors, who are joined to us indeed in nature, but disjoined in life, And render unto our neighbours sevenfold into their bosom. [Ps. 79, 12] As though he said in plain speech; ‘Let them receive that in their minds, which in raging against us they practise over our bodies, that whereas they punish us outwardly in part, they may themselves be punished inwardly to a complete degree. ’ And so because the ‘bosom’ is interpreted the privacy of the mind, to ‘conceal iniquity in the bosom’ is to hide it in the recesses of the conscience, nor to uncover it by confession, but to veil it by defence. Contrarily James says, Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be saved. [James 5, 16] Solomon also says, He that covereth his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy. [Prov. 28, 13]
33. But herein it is necessary to be known that men very often both confess their sins and are not humble. For we know many who when no man charges them confess that they are sinners, but when perhaps they are rebuked for their sin, they seek the support of defence that they may not seem to be sinners; which persons, if, when they say the thing of their own accord, they did then with genuine humility see themselves to be sinners, when they are charged home by others would never deny that they are what they had confessed. In which case the tokens of true confession are, if when a man calls himself a sinner, he does not contradict another as well advancing that about him. For because it is written, The just man in the beginning is the accuser of himself; [Prov. 18, 17] he does not rather aim to appear a sinner, but a just man, when any one confesses himself a sinner, no man charging him. But when another inveighs against the evil that we have done, he proves the truth of confession. Which same if we defend in a proud spirit, it is clear that it is feignedly that of ourselves we called ourselves sinners. Whence it is above every thing to be taken care of that the evil things we have done, we both confess of our own accord, and do not deny them when others charge us home with them. For it is the evil of pride that the thing which a man as if by his own act deems it meet to confess about himself, this he should disdain to have said to him by others.
34. Thus blessed Job shewed what singular humility he was of, in that he both knew that he was living amongst adversaries, and yet was not afraid to disclose his offences with the voice of confession. But observe that above he tells his virtuous qualities, lower down he confesses his sin. For hence he clearly proves what truth he had spoken of the good in him, in that he would not hold his tongue concerning the evil. One while he points out his virtues, at another time transgressions; that he had both committed sin, and had not kept it silent, he makes plain. Whence it appears without all doubt what extraordinary purity he was of in the sight of Almighty God, who both avoided evil things that he should not commit them, and yet what things it did chance to him to commit he did not conceal from men; so that to him there should at once be the high credit of righteousness to have shunned sin, and the safe keeping of righteousness to have brought to light what he was not able to shun. Let this man seem to any one great in his virtues, to me without doubt he appears most grand even in his sins. Let those, who are so minded, admire in him the self- control of chastity, let them admire the faithfulness of justice, let them admire the bowels of pitifulness; I do not less admire in him the humblest confession of sins, than such lordly achievements of virtue. For I know well that through the shame of infirmity it is generally a worse conflict, to bring to light the sins we have committed, than it is to avoid them not being committed, and each instance of evil, though it may be avoided with more vigorousness, is yet brought to view
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with greater humility. Thus blessed Job, who whilst supported by so many great practices was not ashamed to confess his sin, shewed in the midst of his virtues, how humble he was. But because from true humility there ever springs secure authority, so that the soul should dread nothing without, in proportion as by the longing of self-elation it does not pant after the topmost height of affairs, the confession of sin having been set forth, it is rightly subjoined;
Ver. 34. Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of neighbours terrify me, and I did not rather keep silence, and went not out of the door?
[xvi]
35. It is great assuredness of heart to have nought of worldly concupiscence. For if the heart pants after attaining earthly things, it can never be secure and tranquil, because either things not possessed it desires, in order that it may possess them, or things obtained it is afraid for lest it should lose them, and whilst in adverse circumstances he dreads prosperous ones, so in prosperous circumstances he dreads such as are adverse, and he is tossed hither and thither as it were by a kind of waves, and is hurried about in various fashions by the changeableness of shifting affairs. But if once the mind is fixed with strong stedfastness in the longing after the Country Above, it is less distressed by the annoyance of earthly things. For from all outward commotions it seeks that its aim, like a kind of most secret retreat, and there attaching itself to the Unchangeable, [al. ‘Unchangeably attached,’ which however would be a hyperbolic expression. ] and mounting above all changeable things, by the mere calmness of its repose, while in the world, it is henceforth without the world. It goes beyond all things below by its stressing after the highest, and all the objects which it does not go after it feels itself by a certain liberty to get above, nor within is it subject to the tempest of things temporal, which it views without, for all earthly things which being longed after might have borne down the mind, being looked down upon lie beneath it. Whence it is well said by the Prophet, Set a look out for thyself; [Jer. 31, 21] that whilst a man views things above, he may rise high above things beneath. Hence likewise Habakkuk says, I will stand upon my watch. [Hab. 2, 1] For he ‘stands upon his watch,’ who by wise policy of discipline, does not bow down beneath, but rises high above earthly desires, that while he aims at Eternity, which is ever stedfast, he should have beneath his feet every thing that passes by.
36. Yet because with whatever goodness the holy man has advanced, the infirmity of the flesh still outwardly bears him down whilst set in this life, as it is written, Though man walk in the image of God, yet he is disquieted in vain: [Ps. 39, 6] it very often takes place that he is at once disquieted without, and holds on not subject to disquietude within, and that he is liable to be ‘disquieted in vain’ comes from the infirmity of the flesh, though that he ‘walks in the image of God’ is from the excellency of the mind, in order that he should both be inwardly strengthened by the Divine aid, and yet be still pressed down without by the human burthen. Whence Habakkuk again has well delivered a single sentence serving for both particulars. For he says, And trembling entered into my bones, and my power [virtue] was disquieted underneath me. [Hab. 3, 16] As though he said; ‘It is not my power, wherein being transported above, I remain free from liability to disquietude, but it is my own power wherein I am disquieted below. ’ And so the same is free from disquietude above himself, and the same exposed to disquietude below himself; because he had mounted above himself, in so far as he was caught away to things on high; and he was beneath himself, in so far as he still dragged a remains into that which is below. The same above himself is free from liability to disquietude, because he had now passed away into the contemplation of God: the same under
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himself is liable to be disquieted, because beneath himself he still remained a frail human being. The Prophet David according with this sentence saith; I said in the excess of my mind, All men are liars. [Ps. 116, 11] To whom the answer may be made; ‘If every man, then thou too; and the sentence will henceforth be false, which thou being a liar hast uttered, because whilst thou art true- spoken, every man is not found out a liar. ’ But observe that it is prefaced, I said in the excess of my mind. And so by ‘excess of the mind’ he transcended himself even, when he determined about the character of man. As though he said in plain speech; ‘I delivered a true sentence respecting the falseness of all men from the same cause, whereby I was myself above man;’ being now so far himself a ‘liar’ as far as he was himself man, but so far altogether not a ‘liar,’ as ‘by excess of the mind’ he was above man.
37. Thus, therefore, thus all the perfect, though they are still subject to something disquieting from the infirmity of the flesh, ret already enjoy within the calmest privacy by the contemplation of the mind, so that whatsoever thing happens without, it should in nought disquiet them within. Whence blessed Job, exhibiting the security of a holy mind, after he had delivered so many announcements of the parts of virtue with reference to himself, following that which we have set before, added; If I feared at an exceeding great multitude, or the contempt of neighbours terrified me, and I did not rather keep silence, and went not out of the door. As though he said in a plainer manner; ‘While others were disquieted against me without, I myself remained in mine own self free from being disquieted within. ’ For what else ought we in this place to take ‘the door’ to be, but the mouth? For by this we as it were go forth, when with what words we are able, we disclose the secrets of our hearts; and what we remain within in the conscience, such we go forth without by the tongue.
38. But there are some persons who are altogether afraid to be despised, and lest they should chance to be judged as contemptible, aim to appear wise. These are driven to ‘go forth out of the door,’ because when assailed with insults, how great in themselves they lie buried from sight, they give out telling it. And when being overcome by impatience they put forth things about themselves, which were unknown, they as it were ‘go forth by the door’ of the mouth. And so blessed Job being about to say, that he had never ‘gone forth out of the door of the lips,’ justly set before; I kept silence; i. e. because agitated by impatience he would have gone forth out of the house of the conscience, if he had not known how to keep silence. For holy men, when they are under the trial of being perturbed, shun wholly and entirely to exhibit themselves to view, and when they cannot benefit those that hear them, they are willing by keeping silence to be even despised, lest they pride themselves upon the exhibition of their own wisdom. And when they say any thing with good understanding, they seek not their own glory, but the life of their hearers. But when they see that they cannot by speaking gain the life of their hearers, by keeping silence they hide their own knowledge. For we hide to the imitating the life of the Lord, as to a kind of mark set before us. For He Himself, because he saw that Herod sought not advancement, but that he desired to wonder at His signs or His knowledge, on being asked by him held His tongue, and because He kept silence with constancy, He went forth derided by him. For it is written; And when Herod saw Jesus, he was exceeding glad; for he was desirous to see Him of a long season, because he had heard many things of Him; and he hoped to have seen some miracles done by Him: [Luke 23, 8] where it is also added; Then he questioned with Him in many words, but He answered him nothing. [v. 9] But how greatly the Lord in holding His peace was despised, is shewn when the words are brought in there directly; And Herod with his men of war set Him at nought, and mocked Him. [v. 11] Which same transaction we ought to hear and learn, in order that as often as our hearers desire to be made
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acquainted with things of ours, as things to be praised, and not to alter what is wrong of their own, we should altogether hold our peace; lest, if we speak the Word of God with the design of display, both the fault of those persons, which then was, should not cease to be, and our own fault, which was not, should be brought to pass.
39. A person will perhaps say,’ How do we know with what feelings of the heart a man will hear? ’ But there are a number of things that bring to light the mind of him who hears; first and foremost, if our hearers both always praise what they hear, and never follow the thing that they praise. This vain glory of speaking the great Preacher had shunned, when he said, For we are not as many, which corrupt the word of God: but as of sincerity, but as from God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ. [2 Cor. 2, 17] For to ‘corrupt the Word of God’ is to think of Him otherwise than He is, or to seek from it not spiritual fruits, but the corrupt offspring of human praise. But ‘to speak as of sincerity,’ is not to seek for aught in Revelation beyond what behoves. Now he ‘speaks as from God,’ who knows that he himself hath not from himself, but that he hath received from God what he says. And he speaks ‘before God,’ who in all that he speaks seeks not human regards, but minds the presence of Almighty God, and who looks for, not his own glory, but the glory of his Creator. But he who indeed knows well that he has himself received from God the thing that he speaks, and yet in speaking seeks his own glory, speaks ‘as from God,’ but not ‘before God,’ because Him he considers as absent, Whom he docs not set before his heart, when he preaches Him. But holy men at once ‘speak as from God’ and ‘before God,’ in that they both know that they have from Him the thing that they say, and they see that He is Himself present at their discoursings, their Judge and their Hearer. Hence it comes to pass, that whereas they know themselves to be set at nought by their neighbours, and that their words do not advantage the life of the persons hearing them, they hide from sight what great goodness they are of, lest if the speech delivered disclose the secret of the heart to no purpose, it should break forth into vain glory.
40. Therefore blessed Job in the midst of stubborn hearts not aiming to shine forth by the disclosure of his virtue, says, And if the contempt of neighbours terrified me and I did not rather keep silence, and went not out of the door. For he who being stedfast through humility never feared to be despised, him never did impatience master, that the tongue should cast him forth out of doors. When it is rightly put first, If I feared at an exceeding great multitude; that it might be seen and known what great constancy he was of, in this respect, because no number of men ever terrifies without, whom no rout of bad habits lays waste within. For in this life he who seeks nothing that has to do with prosperity, doubtless dreads nothing that has to do with adversity.
[MYSTICAL INTERPRETATION]
41. Which same words if we carry on to a mystical meaning, we directly find therein the Redeemer’s mode of practice. For He was not ‘afraid at an exceeding great multitude,’ Who smote with a single answer only His persecutors coming with swords and staves, saying, I am He. [John 18, 6] ‘Him the contempt of His neighbours did not terrify,’ Who, in freeing us from eternal punishments, received strokes on the face with a composed mind. ‘He kept silence, and did not go forth out of the door,’ Who in the very hour now of His Passion, when He was undergoing the weak conditions of humanity, refused to call into action the power of Divinity. For to the Mediator between God and man it would have been ‘to go forth out of the door,’ if when He was held as Man He had been minded to display the power of His Majesty, and by the mightiness of His Divinity to
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surmount the weak conditions of the flesh taken upon Him. For that He might die manifest to man, He remained hidden God. For had they known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of Glory. [1 Cor 2, 8] And so He did not ‘go forth out of the door,’ Who even when questioned by Pilate kept silence; and in the midst of the hands of the persecutors He both offered His Body to suffering, which He had taken upon Him in behalf of the Elect, and would not display to those that were against Him What He was. Whence also it is said by the Psalmist, They have made Me an abomination unto them, I was given up, and I went not forth. [Ps. 88, 8] For when He was despised because He appeared man, He would have ‘gone forth,’ if He had been minded to display His hidden Majesty. But because he brought infirmity to view, and hid power from sight, herein, that He remained unknown to His persecutors, to those persecutors He did not ‘go forth. ’ Who, however, does ‘go forth’ to the Elect, because to those that seek for it, He discloses the sweetness of His Divine Nature. Whence it is said to Him by the Prophet, Thou wentest forth for the salvation of Thy people, that Thou mightest save Thine Anointed. [Hab. 3, 13] It goes on:
Ver. 35. Who would give me a helper that the Almighty might hear my desire. [xvii]
[HISTORICAL INTERPRETATION]
42. The holy man after he related so many high achievements of the virtues in him, knowing well that he cannot attain to the things on high by his own deserts, seeks for a helper. And whom verily does he fix his eye on but the Only-begotten Son of God, Who whereas He took upon Him human nature travailing in this mortal state, did give help? For He helped man, being made Man; that because to mere man there was no way open of returning to God, there should be made a Way of returning by means of The God-Man [Homo-Deus. ]. For we were far removed from the Righteous and Immortal One, being mortal and unrighteous. But between the Immortal and Righteous One and ourselves the mortal and unrighteous, appeared the Mediator of God and man, mortal and righteous, Who might at once own death with mortals, and righteousness with God; that whereas by our things below we were far removed from things above, He might in Himself singly unite the things below with the things above, and that herein there might be a Way made for us of returning to God, in the degree that He joined ours beneath with His own on high. This One then blessed Job, in his personating of the whole Church, asks for as Mediator, who when he had said, Who would give me a helper, suitably added, that the Almighty might hear my desire. For he knew that for the rest of Eternal deliverance, the prayers of man can never be heard excepting through his Advocate. Concerning Whom it is said by the Apostle John; If any one sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, even Jesus Christ the righteous; and He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. [1 John 2, 1. 2. ] Concerning Whom Paul likewise saith; It is Christ Jesus that died for us, yea, rather, that is risen again, Who is even at the right hand of God, Who also maketh intercession for us. [Rom. 8, 34] For, for the Only-begotten Son to ‘intercede’ for man, is to shew Himself Man in the presence of the Coeternal Father, and for Him to have besought for human nature, is to have taken upon Him that same nature in the loftiness of the Divine Nature. And so the Lord intercedes for us not with the voice but by the act of compassionating; because that which He would not should be condemned in the Elect, he set free by taking upon Himself. And so a helper is sought for, that ‘the desire may be heard;’ because except that the intercession of the Mediator were employed in our behalf, surely the accents of our prayers would remain silent to the ear of God.
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43. Moreover it requires to be noted that it is not said, ‘my prayers, but, my desire, that the Almighty might hear. For true beseeching does not lie in the accents of the lips, but in the thoughts of the heart. For the stronger accents in the deepest ears of God it is not our words that make, but our desires. For if we seek eternal life with the mouth, but yet do not desire it with the heart, in crying out we keep silence. But if we desire in the heart, even when we are silent with the mouth, in being silent we cry out. It is hence that in the wilderness the people clamour with their voices, and Moses is still to the clamouring of words, and yet whilst keeping still he is heard by the ear of divine Pity, whereas it is said, Wherefore criest thou unto Me? [Exod. 14, 15] Thus within in the desire is the secret cry, which does not reach to the ears of men, and yet fills the hearing of the Creator. It is hence that Anna going to the temple was silent indeed with the lips, and yet uttered so many accents of her desire. Hence the Lord says in the Gospel, Enter into thy chamber, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father Which is in secret, and thy Father Which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. [Matt. 6, 6] For ‘the door being shut he prays in his chamber,’ who while his mouth is silent, pours forth the affection of the heart in the sight of the Pitifulness Above. And the voice is ‘heard in secret,’ when there is a crying out in silence by holy desires. Whence also it is rightly said by the Psalmist, The Lord hath heard the desire of the poor; Thine ear hath heard the preparing of their heart. [Ps. 10, 17] Now blessed Job in the subjoined words discloses whom he seeks for himself as a helper, in the ‘hearing of his desire,’ saying,
And that he himself who judgeth would write a book !
[xviii]
44. For because to the People still fearing, the Law was committed by the hands of a Servant, but upon the loving Children, the grace of the Gospel was bestowed by the Lord, Who as coming for our Redemption, instituted the New Covenant for us, but in examining as touching the precept of that Covenant one day cometh as Judge also, it is not requisite that by explaining it should be made clear, that He Who Judges is the Same Who writes a book. For Truth Itself says by Itself, The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son. [John 5, 22] And so He will then be the Enacter of judgment Who is now the Composer of the ‘book;’ that He should then demand in strictness, what He now bids in mildness. For thus we see every day that masters set children the rudiments of their letters caressing them, but exact those of them dealing hardly with them; and what they give with gentleness, they require back with the rod. For now the precepts of Divine Revelation sound gentle, but they shall be to be thought harsh in the exacting of them. Now, there is a gentle warning of One calling, but then there shall come the strict justice of the Judge, because it is certain that no whit even of the very least commandment will pass without scrutinizing. By which same it is apparent that He that ‘judgeth is the Same That wrote the Book,’ Which same ‘Book’ of the New Testament, that the Redeemer of man should Himself frame in His own Person at the last, the Prophet Ezekiel rightly tells forth, saying, And behold six men came from the way of the higher gate, which lieth toward the north, and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; and one man among them was clothed with linen, with a writer’s inkhorn at his reins.
[Ez. 9, 2] For what else is there denoted in the ‘six men coming’ but the six ages of mankind? [St. Gregory’s division of ages, Him. in Ev. xix. §. 1. from Adam to Noah, Noah to Abraham, Abraham to Moses, Moses to Our Lord, and then to the end, will not suit this place. What is meant is probably that in St. Isidore of Seville, Etym. lib. v. c. 39. De Discretione temporum, where two more divisions are made, at David, and the Captivity. He compares these
ages to the days of Creation. The same division is given in the beginning of his Chronicon. ] Who ‘come from the way of the higher gate,’ because from the state of Paradise as from the beginning of the world, they are unwound from the upper generations. Which ‘gate looks to the North’ in this way, because the
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mind of man lying open to evil, except that, abandoning the warmth of charity, it had courted the numbness of the interior, would never have gone out to this breadth of mortality. And every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; because each particular generation being evolved by the several respective ages, before the Coming of the Redeemer, had in its practice that wherefrom it took the punishment of condemnation. And one man among them was clothed with linen. Because our Redeemer deigned to have parents even of the priestly Tribe [‘Tribu,’ perhaps ‘nation,’ but Elizabeth, ‘of the daughters of Aaron,’ was a kinswoman of the Blessed Virgin. Luke 1, 5. and 36. ] after the flesh, he is described as coining ‘clothed with linen. ’ Or, surely, because linen is from the earth, and is not like wool produced from the corruptible flesh, seeing that He derived the covering of His Body from a Virgin mother, and not by the corruptness of copulation, therefore He came to us ‘clothed with linen.
’ And a writer’s inkhorn at his reins. In the ‘reins’ is the hind part of the body. And because the Lord Himself after that He died for our sakes, and rose again, and ascended up into heaven, then wrote the New Testament through the Apostles, this man had an ‘inkhorn at his reins. ’ For He Who after He departed framed the writing of the New Testament, as it were, carried an ‘inkhorn’ behind him. Thus this ‘inkhorn’ he sees to hold fast to the man ‘clothed with linen,’ who says, And that the same who judges would write a book. But wherefore, blessed Job, desirest thou that a book should be written by Him, Who is Judge? It goes on;
Ver. 36. That I might bear it upon my shoulder, and put it round me like a crown.
[xix]
45. To ‘bear the book upon the shoulder,’ is by practising to carry out Holy Scripture. And observe how orderly it is described both first as being ‘carried on the shoulder,’ and afterwards ‘put round’ him ‘as a crown;’ because, that is to say, the precepts of Sacred Revelation, if they be now borne in practice, afterwards set forth for us the crown of victory in the recompensing. But why does blessed Job beg for ‘the book to be written by the Judge,’ who was not able to attain to the times of the New Testament? But, as has been often said already, he uses the accents of the Elect, and in the personifying of them begs that, which he foresaw would benefit them in all respects. For he himself by the Spirit had for long had that book with him, which by the grace of Inspiration he had obtained, that both by living he should be made acquainted with, and by foreseeing he should announce.
But herein it requires to be known that when we take thought of the precepts of Sacred Revelation, and when we draw off the mind from love of the life of corruption, we as it were hasten on by a kind of footsteps of the heart, to the interior scene of things. Now no man, in abandoning things below, is directly made at the top; because for earning the title to perfection, whilst the soul is day by day being led forward on high, doubtless there is an attaining thereto as it were by a kind of steps of ascending. Whence in this place also it is fitly added;
By my several steps I will declare it.
[xx]
46. Since concerning these ‘steps’ of merits it is said by the Psalmist, They go from virtue to virtue. [Ps. 84, 7] Concerning these, again, regarding Holy Church he says; God is distinguished in her steps, what time He shall receive her. [Ps. 48, 3. not as V. ] For neither is there any attaining suddenly to things above, as has been said, but to the topmost pitch of virtuous attainments the soul
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is led on by accessions. For hence it is that the same Prophet saith again; I was exercised, and my spirit failed little by little. [Ps. 77, 3] What does he mean, then, that he says, my spirit, but the spirit of man, i. e. the spirit of exaltation? And because by secret grace we advance to the love of God by a measure regulated from above, in proportion as virtue is daily increased in us by the Spirit of God, our own spirit proportionally goes off. Which spirit of error, because it is not at once cut clean away from us, is justly recorded to have ‘failed little by little. ’ But we then make complete advance in God, when we have wholly and entirely fallen away from ourselves. Thus these measures of growing virtues by the words of the holy man are styled ‘steps. ’ For every elect person sets out from the tenderness of his embryo in the first instance, and afterwards comes to firmness for strong and vigorous achievements. Which thing Truth plainly shews in the Gospel, saying, So is the kingdom of heaven, as if a man should cast seed into the ground, and should sleep and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up he knoweth not how. Which same seed describing the growths of he adds; For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. The end of whose progress too he also makes to succeed, saying, But when it has brought forth the fruits from itself, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come. [Mark 4, 26-29] Observe, by the voice of Truth the accessions of merits are marked out by the characters of fruits. For He says, first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. Was not Peter still a ‘blade’ then, when by the mouth of a maid he was in a moment bent down by the blast of a single speech, already green indeed through devotedness, but still tender through infirmity. But he was found ‘full corn in the ear’ when he withstood the rulers persecuting him, saying, We ought to obey God rather than men. [Acts 5, 29] For he was found ‘full corn in the ear’ when, in the winnowing of persecution, he underwent such numberless wounds, but yet he was never made small after the manner of chaff, but continued whole grain. For little by little in each several soul, so to say, the moisture of interior grace abounds, that the blade may grow into fruit. So let no one when he sees any neighbour still a ‘blade’ despair of the ‘full corn. ’ Since from the leaves of the blades, which hang softly, flowing hither and thither, the rising grains of fruitage come to firmness.
47. Now the Prophet Daniel, whereas, when the Lord was speaking to him, he made it his business to tell us the posture of his body, did rightly represent those stages of merits. Thus he says; Yet heard I the voice of his words, and when I heard the voice of his words, then was I dismayed upon my face, and my face clave to the ground. And, behold, a hand touched me, which set me upon my knees, and upon the joints of my hands. And he said, O Daniel, a man greatly beloved, understand the words that I speak unto thee, and stand upright; for unto thee am I now sent: and when he had spoken this word unto me, I stood trembling; and he said unto me, Fear not. [Dan. 10, 9-12] Which same posture of his body, whilst he was listening to the words of one speaking inwardly, he would never set forth to us with so much pains, if he had known it to be void of mysteries. For in Sacred Writ not only what holy men say is prophecy, but also very often what they do. Thus the holy man, being pregnant with interior mysteries, by the posture of his body, likewise represents the power of the voice; and by this that he first lay prostrate on the earth, by this that he afterwards set himself up on the joints of his hands and on his knees, by this that at last he stood fast erect indeed, yet trembling, he makes known to us in his own person all the order of our progress. For the words of God we hear ‘lying on the ground,’ when being settled in our sins, allied to earthly pollution, we are made acquainted with spiritual precepts from the voice of the Saints. At which precepts, we are as it were set up upon our knees and the joints of our hands, because withdrawing ourselves from earthly defilements, we as it were henceforth lift up our mind from things below. For as he wholly
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cleaves to the ground, who lies dismayed, so he who is bent down upon his knees and the joints of his fingers, his advancement commencing, is already in a great measure hung aloft from earth. But at the last by the voice of the Lord we stand there erect indeed, yet trembling, in that being perfectly lifted up from earthly objects of desire, the more fully we know the words of God, the more we are afraid. For he as it were still lies prostrate on the ground, who by desires after the earthly cares nothing to be lifted up to the heavenly. But it is as if he being lifted up still ‘rested upon his hands and knees,’ who already forsakes some defilements, but does not yet withstand some earthly practices. But he now stands there present erect at the words of God, who perfectly lifts up the mind to things aloft, and scorns to be bent down by impure desires.
48. Now he rightly shews that he ‘stood trembling;’ because the scrutiny of interior exactness is the more fearfully dreaded, the more advanced the progress in respect thereto. Where it is fitly subjoined by the voice of God, fear not; because the more that we ourselves learn what we should have occasion to fear, the more we have infused in us from God by interior grace what may call for love, so that both our contempt little by little may pass away into fear, and fear pass away into charity; that wherein God when He seeks us, by contempt we withstand, and by fear flee from, both contempt and fear being one day set aside, we should be joined to Him by love only. For little by little we learn even the very fear of Him [The readings vary. The Ben. Editor seems not to have seen that noticed in the Italian reprint, which is also in the Merton and Trin. Coll. MSS. and others at Oxford, ‘Eum timere didiscimus, eique vi solius &c. ’ ‘we unlearn fearing Him, and are attached to Him by the force of love alone. ’], to the love of Whom only we are attached. And thus as it were there being placed a kind of steps of our advance, the foot of the mind first by fear we set below, and afterwards by charity lift it to the heights of love, that from that wherewith a man is puffed up he may be checked, so that he fear, and from that, which he now dreads he may be lifted up, that he may have boldness. Now these steps of virtuous attainments it is no great labour to lay hold of, since there is the passing from one to another.
49. But the subject requires the nicest handling, when the mind strives to estimate in the case of one and the same virtue with what steps of advancement it is lifted up. For to mention the first elements of virtue, i. e. faith and wisdom, they cannot be severally gained, except we ascend thereto by marked and ordered methods as by a kind of steps. For faith itself which imbues us for taking in hand in a perfect manner what else there is good, very often in its beginnings both totters and is firmly based, and it is now held most surely, and yet touching the assurance thereof there is still trembling under the effects of misgiving. For a part of it is received first, that it may be afterwards perfectly completed in us. For if there were not an advancing by a sure step in the mind of one who believes, the father of the child to be healed would not have said on being questioned, in the Gospel, Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief. [Mark 9, 24] And so he was still ascending upwards as to the faith which he had already received, who at one and the same time both cried out that he already believed and still doubled from unbelieving. Hence it is also that it said to our Redeemer by His disciples, Increase our faith, that that which had been already received in beginning, might by the accessions of steps arrive at perfection.
50. Moreover Wisdom herself, who is required to be the mistress of good works, is vouchsafed to the panting soul by degrees of increase, that surely the ascending thereto should be by the steps of wonderful regulation. Which some the Prophet Ezekiel well describes in a figurative relation, who concerning that man whom he had seen on a high mountain tells, saying, He measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the water up to the ancles; again he measured a thousand, and
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brought me through the water up to the knees; again he measured a thousand, and brought me through the water up to the reins. Afterward he measured a thousand, and it was a torrent that I could not pass over, for there swelled deep waters of a torrent, which could not be passed over. [Ez. 47, 3-5] For what is denoted by the number of a ‘thousand,’ but the fulness of the benefit vouchsafed? Thus the man who appeared ‘measures a thousand cubits,’ and the Prophet is led through the waters ‘up to the ancles,’ because our Redeemer, when to us on our being converted to Him He bestowed the fulness of a good beginning, bathed the first treadings of our practice by the gift of spiritual wisdom. For the water’s reaching up to the ancle is our henceforth maintaining the treadings of longed-for righteousness by wisdom being vouchsafed to us. Again, he ‘measures a thousand cubits,’ and the Prophet is led through the water ‘up to the knees,’ because when the fulness of good practice is bestowed, our wisdom is increased even to this degree, that there is not henceforth any bending in bad deeds. Thus it is hence said by Paul, Wherefore lift up the hands that hang down, and the feeble knees, and make straight steps with your feet. [Heb. 12, 12] Thus ‘the water reaches to the knees,’ when the wisdom that is is obtained perfectly braces us to uprightness of good practice. And again, he ‘measures a thousand,’ and the Prophet is ‘led through the water up to the reins’ in this way, because the fulness of good practice then grows to a height in us, when the wisdom vouchsafed has killed in us as far as it is possible all the gratification of the flesh as well. For except the gratification of the flesh was seated in the reins, the Psalmist would never have said, Burn my reins and my heart. [Ps. 2, 26] Therefore the water comes up ‘to the reins,’ when the sweetness of wisdom destroys the very incitements of the flesh too, so that the burnings of the flesh that might have scorched up the soul are cooled down. And he still further ‘measured a thousand,’ ‘and it was a torrent which the Prophet could not pass,’ of which he also says, Because there swelled deep waters of a torrent, which could not be passed over. For perfectness of practice having been received, we come to contemplation; in which same contemplation while the mind is carried up on high, being uplifted it sees in God that the thing that it sees it cannot fathom, and as it were it touches the water of the torrent, which it cannot pass through, because at once it beholds in gazing what it may be pleased to behold, and yet is not able perfectly to behold that very thing that it pleases. And so the Prophet sooner or later comes to the water ‘which he cannot pass through,’ because when we are at last brought to the contemplation of wisdom, the mere immensity thereof, which by itself lifts man to itself, denies the human mind a full acquaintance, so that it should at once by touching love this wisdom, and yet never by passing through penetrate it.
51. Thus blessed Job called these, increasings of virtues by the title of ‘steps,’ because he saw them to be in distinct divisions, bestowed on men by gift from above; seeing that by them only do we ascend so as to come to the attaining of heavenly things. And so in making mention of the Sacred Book, i. e. of Divine Revelation, he says; By my several steps I will declare it, in this way surely, because he really ascends to the teaching of God, who has broken forth to the attaining thereof by the steps of holy practice. And he as it were ‘by his several steps declares the book’ who proves that he has been vouchsafed the knowledge of it not in respect of words only, but also of deeds. Whence it is yet further added;
And as to a prince I will offer it.
For every thing that we offer, we hold in our hands. And so ‘unto the Prince’ coming to Judgment ‘to offer the book’ is to have held the words of His precepts in our behaviour. It proceeds;
Ver. 38—40. If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain: if I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof; let the thistle
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grow for me instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley.
[xxi]
[ALLEGORICAL INTERPRETATION]
52. For what is it for the ‘land to cry,’ for ‘the furrows to weep,’ and to have ‘eaten one’s own fruits buying them? ’ To whom is it necessary to buy what is his own? who has heard ‘the land crying? ’ Who has seen ‘the furrows weeping? ’ And whereas the furrows of the land are always of the land, why is it that by a separate declaration it is both said that the land did not cry, and that the furrows thereof did not weep along with it? For whereas a furrow of the earth is nothing else but earth, it does not need the accounting of much difference, that he adds; And along with it the furrows thereof weep. In which same point because the order of the history falls to the ground, the mystical meaning displays itself to us, the doors as it were being now set open. As though it exclaimed in plain speech; ‘Whereas ye know that the reasonableness of the letter has dropped dead, doubtless it remains that ye should fall back to me without misgiving. For every one who either by private right rules a domestic household, or for the common advantage is set over faithful multitudes, herein that he possesses the rights of government over the faithful committed to him, what else does he but hold the land to cultivate it? Since it is for this end that each individual is advanced above the rest, by Divine distribution, that the mind of those under him, like land subdued, may be made fruitful by the seed of his preaching. But ‘the land crieth against’ its possessor, if it chance that against him, who is set at the head, either a private family, or Holy Church utters any just murmur. Since for ‘the land to cry,’ is for those under charge to grieve with reason against the injustice of him who rules them; where it is rightly subjoined, And along with it the furrows thereof weep. For the land even when not cultivated by any works generally produces something of sustenance for the service of man, but when ploughed it bears fruits to superabundance. And there are some persons, who ‘not being cleft by any ploughshare of reading, or any of exhortation, do yet of themselves produce some good things, though but the least, like land not yet ploughed up. But there are some who for always hearing and retaining, applying themselves to holy preachings and meditations, as it were cleft with a kind of ploughshare of the tongue, as to the former hardness of the heart, receive the seed of exhortation, and by the furrows of voluntary chastening render the fruits of good practice. But it is very often the case that those who are set at the head do things unjust, and it comes to pass that the very persons injure those under them, who were bound to do them good. Which when uninstructed persons see, being enraged they murmur against their ruler, and yet do not by sympathy grieve violently for their neighbours. But when these who are already broken in pieces by the plough of reading, and dressed for the fruitage of practice, see innocent persons borne down even in the least things, they are forthwith turned by sympathy to tears of sorrow, because they bewail as their own the things that their neighbours suffer unjustly. For the perfect, whereas they are ever affected with regard to what is spiritual, are taught to lament for the bodily hurts of others, so much the more in proportion as they are now instructed not to lament for their own. And so every one who is set in authority, if he executes what is bad in the case of those under him, ‘the earth crieth against him and the furrows weep,’ because against his injustice the uninstructed peoples indeed break out in accents of murmuring, while all the perfect severally chasten themselves in tears for his wicked practice, and for what the inexperienced cry out and do not grieve, those under authority of a more tried life bewail and hold their peace. And so for ‘the furrows to bewail along with the land crying out,’ is by that thing whereas the multitude of the faithful complains with justice against the ruler, for persons of a more fruitful life to be brought to
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tears of sorrow. Thus the furrows are both of the earth, and yet are distinguished from the term of ‘the earth,’ because those in Holy Church, who cultivate their mind with the labour of holy meditation, are as much better than the rest of the faithful, in proportion as by the seeds received they render more abundant fruits of deeds. And there are some who being set over holy peoples obtain the payments of livelihood by the bountifulness of the Church, but do not pay the ministrations of exhortation that are due. In opposition to whom the example of the holy man is yet further subjoined aright, when it is directly added by him;
If I have eaten the fruit thereof without money.
[xxii]
53. For to ‘eat the fruit of the land without money’ is to receive indeed our charges from the Church, but not to yield to that Church the price of preaching. Of which same preaching it is said by the voice of the Creator, Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury. [Matt. 25, 27] And so he ‘eats the fruits of the earth without money,’ who receives the Church’s benefits for the service of the body, but does not pay to the people the ministry of exhortation. What do we pastors say to these things, who while we are the forerunners of the Advent of the Strict Judge, take upon us the function of a herald indeed, but devour the Church’s supplies with dumb mouths? We exact all that is owed to our own body, but we do not pay back what we owe to the soul of those committed to our charge. Mark how the holy man, tied down by so many pledges in this world, in the midst of numberless employments, was free for the pursuit of preaching. And he never ‘ate the fruits of the earth without money,’ because surely he paid back the word of good warning to those under his charge, from whom he received the fruit of bodily serving. For this every one who is set over the people owes to Almighty God, he who is set over many, and he who is set over a smaller number, that he should in such sort exact the due ministration from those subject to him, that he may himself mind with heedful regard what of warning he at all times owes. For all we who subject to the appointment of the Creator are joined amongst ourselves by a vicarious ministry in obedience to our true Lord, what else are we but servants to one another? Whereas, then, he who is subordinate serves in obeisance, assuredly it remains that he who is set over him should serve to the word. Whereas he who is subordinate yields obedience to orders, it is required that he who is at the head should bestow the care and concern of solicitude and of pity. And so it comes to pass, that whilst we studiously endeavour to serve one another now by charity, we may one day rule together with the true Lord in common rejoicing. But there are some, who herein, that they discharge the office of preaching, grudge others the good that they have, and so do not any longer have it in a true sense. To whom it is rightly said by James, But if ye have bitter envying among yourselves, and strife in your hearts, this wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. [James 3, 14. 15. ] Hence here also when it is said, If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, it is rightly subjoined;
Or have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof.
[xxiii]
54. For they are the ‘tillers’ of the land, who, being placed in a lower situation, with what earnestness they are able, with the best practice that they can, cooperate in the grace of preaching to the instructing of Holy Church. Which same ‘husbandmen of this land’ not to afflict, is this, viz.
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not to envy their labours; that the ruler of the Church, while he vindicates to himself alone the right of preaching, should not, by envy gnawing him, gainsay others also that preach in a right way. For the religious mind of the pastor, because it seeks not its own glory but the glory of the Creator, desires to have all that it does aided by all persons. For the faithful preacher wishes, if it might be brought to pass, that the truth which he is not able to give utterance to alone, the mouths of all should sound out. Whence when Joshua would have withstood the two who remained in the camp and prophesied, it is rightly said by Moses, Enviest thou for my sake? Would God that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them! [Numb. 11, 29] For he was willing for all to prophesy, in that he envied not others the good that he had. Thus because blessed Job introduced all those things as under suspension, and if he had not done them, binds himself with the sentence of cursing, it goes on;
Ver. 40. Let the thistle grow for me instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley. [xxiv]
55. As though he said in plain words; ‘If I have done aught unjust towards those under me, if I have exacted the debts due to me, and have not myself paid what I owed, if I have envied others the executing of good practice, for the good things which refresh for ever and ever, may evil things that sting be repaid me in the Judgment. ’ Since ‘instead of the wheat there springs up the thistle, and instead of barley the thorn,’ when in the final Retribution, wherefrom the recompensing of our labour is looked for, the piercing of pain is met with. And observe, that as barley is different from wheat, though both regale, so the thorn differs from the thistle, though either be a thing that pricks, because the thistle is softer, and the thorn always the harder as to pricking. Thus he says, Let the thistle grow instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley. As if he said plainly and openly; ‘I know indeed that I have both done great good acts and lesser ones; and if it is not so, may lesser evils match me for my great good acts, and the greater evils for the lesser good ones. ’ Though this may also be understood in another sense. For in ‘wheat’ there is denoted in spiritual action which regales the mind, but in ‘barley’ the disposal of earthly things. Wherein while we are often forced to serve the weak and carnal, we as it were prepare their food for the beasts of burthen, and the very practice of our deeds after the manner of barley has somewhat of a mixture of chaff. And it very often happens, that the ruler who is set at the head, while he enforces what is unjust against those under his charge, while he cheers not the good with any soothing, whilst, that which is more grievous, all those acting rightly he distresses out of envy, still some good things he sometimes does, as if he sowed corn, and mixed in the disposing of earthly things at times not in the passion of avarice, but for the use of the carnal, and so looks for the fruit of that labour as a crop of barley. But the several persons under his charge, in consideration of this, that they are borne hard upon in the chief things, cannot feel joy in his lesser good things; because neither is this practice well pleasing in the sight of God, which is defiled by the injustice of other practice, nor yet is the very disposal of earthly things believed to be undertaken for the service of those under his charge, when he who is over them is seen to pant with avarice. Whence it happens that even in answer to the few good things themselves, which they see to be done in the midst of a multitude of evil ones, they give back not praises but groans, and that those that go weakly murmur, while they take thought that that which they see is not a thing of pure practice. And so he says, If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain; if I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof: let the thistle grow instead of wheat, and the thorn instead of barley. As if he said plainly, ‘If the great things which I owed I have not needfully performed, may I
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receive the prickings of murmuring from those under me, even with reference to the good that I have done. If I have omitted to set forth what might cheer, may their tongue springing forth into complaint with justice pierce me. ’
56. Wherein it requires always to be minded with heedful consideration, that neither they that are set at the head offer examples of bad practice to those under them, and kill the life of those by the sword of their evil doing, nor they that are subject to the control of another presume to judge lightly the deeds of their rulers, and from this, that they utter murmurs touching those who are placed over them, set themselves not against a human appointment but against that Divine Appointment, which disposes all things. For to those it is said, And as for My flock they eat that which ye have trodden with your feet: they drink that which ye have fouled with your feet. [Ez. 34, 19] For ‘the sheep drink what is fouled with the feet,’ when those under charge for example of living seek after things, which the persons over them severally corrupt by bad practice. But on the other hand these persons hear from those in command; And what are we? Your murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord. [Ex. 16, 8] For he that murmurs against power established over him, it is plain reproves Him Who gave that power to man.
At length, God vouchsafing it, we have explored those sentences of blessed Job, full of mystical force, in which he made answer to the words of his friends. Now it remains that we come to the words of Elihu, which are to be weighed with so much the graver caution, in proportion as they are also put forward through the boldness of youth with a hotter spirit.
BOOK XXIII.
