has * his roots dried up below:' but ^ above his crop is k2 132 The vain ambition of Antichrist for a lasting/ name.
Jot 18, spoiled,' in that he, who persists barren here, after this life is — '- — - bidden to no rewards. It goes on; Ver. 17. Let his rememhrance perish from the earthy and let not his name be repeated hi the streets, xxi. 25. It is deserving of our notice, that Bildad the Shuhite "°^"* so expresses himself of each one of the wicked, that his words are secretly directed against the head of all the wicked; for the head of the wicked is the devil. And he in his own person having in the last times entered into that vessel of perdition, shall be called * Antichrist,' who will endeavour to spread his name far and wide, which same every individual now likens himself to, when, by the memorial of an earthly name, he strives to extend the gloriousness of his praise, and exults in transitory reputation. Therefore let these words be so understood of each one of the wicked, that they be referred in a particular manner to the head of the wicked himself. Therefore let him say, Let his rememhrance perish front the earthy and let not his name be repeated in the ^■plsitea.' streets, For^ streets are called by a Greek term from width, ™ / and so Antichrist aims to settle the remembrance of himself < broad.' upon earth, when he longs, if it were possible, to remain for ever in temporal glory. He delights to have ' his name celebrated in the street,' whilst he spreads the working of his wickedness far and wide. But whereas this wickedness of his is not permitted to be reared to a height for a long time, let it be said, Let his remembrance perish from the earthy and let not his name be repeated in the street; i. e. that he should both quickly part with the fame of his earthly power, and lose all the pleasures of his name, which he had spread far and wide in the shortlived prosperity of time. It goes on; Ver. 18. He shall drive him from light into darkness.
xxiii. 26. He is led ' from light to darkness,' when for honour in the present life, he is condemned to eternal punishments.
And hence it is more plainly added, And translate him out of the world.
For he is ' translated out of the world,' when upon the Judge above appearing, he is taken away from this world, in which he wickedly glories; and for this, that when the end of the world breaks in upon him, he is condemned with all his followers, it is rightly subjoined;, His seed cut off, Enoch and Ellas to be slain by him. 133 Ver. 9. There shall neither be seed of him, nor offspring Book in his people, nor any remnant in his parts.
For it is written, that the Lord Jesns shall consume Am2Thess.
with the Spirit of His month, and shall destroy him with the ' brightness of His coming. And so, then, whereas his wick- edness is ended together with the settled constitution of the world, there shall be * no offspring of him left in his people,' in that both he himself and his people along with him are equally forced to punishment; and all the wicked, who by his evil advising were born in bad comses, by the brightness of the Lord's coming are struck with eternal destruction together with that head of theirs. And there is ' no offspring of him remaining in the world,' in that the strict Judge ends the iniquities of that one simultaneously with the end of the world. Now that these words are to be understood expressly of Antichrist is shewn, when it is added; Ver. 20. In his days the last shall be astonied, and horror shall seize on the first.
27. For he will then let himself loose against the righteous xxiii. with such a measure of iniquity, that even the hearts of the very Elect shall be struck with no small consternation. Whence it is written. Insomuch that if it were possible, they shall de- Mat.24, ceive the very Elect. Which, clearly, is said, not because the ^** Elect shall fall, but because they shall tremble with terrible alarms. Now at that time both the latest Elect and the first Elect are described as maintaining the conflict for righteousness against him, in that both they that shall be found among the Elect at the end of the world, are destined to be laid low in the death of the flesh, and they too who proceeded from the former divisions of the w^orld, i. e. Enoch and Elijah, shall be brought back amongst men, and shall be exposed to the savageness of his cruelty still in their mortal flesh. This one's forces let loose in such terrible power, ' the latest are astonied at, and the first do dread,' in that, though in respect of this, viz. that he is lifted up by a spirit of pride, they despise all his temporal power, yet in respect of this, that they are themselves still in mortal flesh, wherein they are liable to suffer temporal anguish, they dread the very punishments, which they bear with resolution; so that there is in them at one and the same time both constancy 134 The wicked go at last to their own place.
Job 18, derived from virtue, and alarm proceeding from the flesh; in 21 p — - — that though they be of the number of the Elect, so that they cannot be overcome by torments, yet from this only that they are men, they fear the very torments, that they overcome. 8o let it be said. In his days the last shall he astonied, and terror shall seize on thejirst. In that he shall then shew forth such signs, and do things so cruel and hard hearted, as to force them to astonishment, whom he shall find at the end of the world, and to pierce with the pang of carnal death the first fathers, who are reserved for his extirpation. Therefore whereas he has described many particulars relating to all the wicked, or to the head of the wicked himself, he immediately adds with a general description, Ver. 21. Surely, such are the dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him that knoweth not God. xxiv. 28. For he had said above; He shall drive him from light Moral. ^^^^^ ^arkncss, and translate him out of the world; and upon subjoining his miseries, he added; Surely, such are the dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him that knoweth not God. In that he who is now lifted up from not knowing God, is then brought to his own ' dwellings,' when his own wickedness plunges him into woes; and one day he finds ' darkness his place,* who, while he made himself glad here in the counterfeit light of righteousness, was occu- pying the place of another. For bad men in all that they do in dissimulation, are striving to possess themselves of the righteous man's name of credit, as of another's place. But they are then brought to their own place, when they are tormented with everlasting fire, as the desert of their iniquity. For here in all that they do they are ministering to their desire of winning praise, and by the semblance of good works, they are opening wider the bosom of the mind to avarice. So let the wicked man go now, and full blown with complete equipments, let him build his habitations here below, let him spread a name of glory, let him multiply estates, and delight himself in abundant stores, but when he shall be brought to everlasting punishments, then surely he shall know that ' such are the dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him that knoweth not God.' Now Bildad said this rightly, but he did not know who it was that he Job vexed with hearing wrong and speaking in vain. 135 was saying it to. But the heart of a good man is seriously Book afflicted, when sentences are pronounced against him upon - an unfair estimate. Whence blessed Job directly answered, saying; How long will ye vex my soul, and break me in pieces with words?
29. The sayings of the holy man, as we have already often xxv. said, are to be understood as spoken sometimes in his own "^^^'^' person, sometimes in the voice of the Head, and sometimes in a figure of the Church Universal. Now the soul of the righteous is deeply distressed, when those persons launch severe sentences against the good, who have not learned to lead good lives, and by the words of the mouth claim righ- teousness to themselves, to which in practice they are enemies. Whence to the friends of blessed Job, who, as we have already often said, bear a type of heretics, himself rightly answers, How long will ye vex my soul, and wear me with ivo7'ds? For good men are * worn' with the words of the wicked, when those swell out against them in words of the lips, who lie low either in a corrupt faith, or in bad habits. It goes on; Lo, these ten times ye confound me.
30. On enumerating the successive times of the speeches xxvi. of Job's friends, we learn that as yet they had spoken but five times. But for this reason, that he had five times heard rebukes from them, and five times himself replied to their rebukes, he says that he had been ten times confounded; because both herein, viz. that he had been causelessly re- proached, he suffered deeply, and in this, that he uttered words of instruction to those that gave no ear, he underwent confusion. And so, while in hearing he held his peace, and in speaking was not heard, that person had trouble put upon him, who both in holding his peace submissively, and in speaking to them fruitlessly, experienced pain within his heart; and hence he says above. What shall I do? If I speak, my gri^ is not assuaged; and though I forbear, it will not depart from me. But if we make these words refer Alleg. to a type of Holy Church, it is well known that it is her great delight to keep the precepts of the Ten Commandments; and the wicked ' confound her ten times,' in that by all that 136 Shame checks some in sin that fear not God.
Job 19, they do wrong in their wicked principles, they forsake the ~ — '■ — precepts of the Ten Commandments, and cause confusion to the good as often as they set themselves against the words of God in their doings. It goes on; And ye are not ashamed that ye oppress me* xxvii. 31. There are some persons, whom bad principle suddenly springing up invites to the commission of wickedness, yet respect for their fellow-creatures recalls again. And very often from this, viz. that they are made ashamed outwardly, they are brought back into their own interior heart, and pass an inward judgment upon themselves; in that if they are afraid to do what is evil on man's account, how much more ought they not even to have longed after what is evil, on God's account. Who sees all things? And in the case of these persons it is brought to pass, that they correct greater evil by inferior good, i. e. interior sin by exterior shame. Again, there are some, who, when once they have brought them- selves to contemn God in their hearts, despise the judgments of their fellow-creatures much more, and all the evil that they long after, they do not blush to execute boldly, which persons secret wickedness invites to the commission of sin, and outward shame holds not back; as it is said also of a Lute certain wicked judge, Which feared not God, neither re- ' ' garded man. Hence too it is said of certain persons sin- Is. 3,9. ning with shameless effrontery; And they have declared their sin as Sodom. Thus very often there are such persons enemies of Holy Church, persons who are not withheld from committing wricked things, either by the fear of God, or regard of man; and it is well said to these by blessed Job, And ye are not ashamed that ye opp^^ess me; seeing that though it was wrong to have wished bad things, it is worse not to be ashamed of things wrongly desired. It goes on; Ver. 4. And he it indeed that I have been ignorant, my ignorance remaineth with, myself. xxviii. 32. Heretics have this about them, that they are swoln by the empty pretensions of their knowledge, and often turn to ridicule the simplicity of those that believe rightly, and i account the life of the humble to be of no worth. On the \ other hand Holy Church, in all that she has really wise in | her, keeps low the level of her view in humility, that she be Even their ignorance is good for good men. 137 not puffed up by knowledge, nor be made to swell high on Book the seeking out of things hidden, and venture to dive into - points, that are above her powers. For with more profit to herself she is anxious not to know things she is unable to fathom, rather than boldly to define things she does not know. As it is written; It is not good to eat mnch honey: Prov. so he that is a searcher of majesty, shall he overwhelmed by ' glory. For if the sweetness of honey be taken in greater measure than there is occasion for, from the same source whence the palate is gratified, the life of the eater is destroyed. The ' searching into majesty' is also sweet; but he, that seeks to dive into it deeper than the cognizance of human nature admits, finds the mere gloriousness thereof by itself oppress him, in that, like honey taken in excess, it bursts the sense of the searcher which is not capable of holding it. Now that is said to be * with' us, which is for us; and on the other hand that is said not to be with us, that is against us; and so, because his own knowledge puffs out the heart of the heretic, while his perception of his own ignorance abases the faithful, let blessed Job say in his own voice, let him say also in the confession of the Church Universal, And he it indeed that I have heen ignorant, my ignorance shall he with me. As if it were said in express words to Heretics; * All your knowledge is not with you, since it is against you, so long as it uplifts you in foolish pride; but my ignorance is with me, because it is for me; since, where- as I do not dare to search into any thing relating to God in pride of heart, I keep myself in the truth in a spirit of humility.' And because these very same things that heretics seek to know, they apply perforce to the furtherance of self- elation only, that they may seem learned in contrast to the faithful and humble, it is rightly added; But ye are set up against me.
33. But perhaps we shall consider these words more xxix. thoroughly, if we point out how they apply to the friends of ^^^^• blessed Job personally in a special sense. For they, when they saw the righteous man smitten, ought to have turned back into their own deepest interior, and not to have perse- cuted blessed Job with words of upbraiding, but to have bewailed their own case; seeing that, if he was so stricken, 138 Those who spare their own sin proud in judginfj others.
Job 19, who served as he did, with what vengeance did they deserve -jj~- to be smitten, who had not served like him? And it is rightly said to them, Ye are set up agaiiist me; as if it were said to them in plainer terms; ' Ye who ought by occasion of my being smitten to have been set up against your own selves,' this being the order of such setting up on the side of goodness, viz. that we be first set up against ourselves, and afterwards against the wicked. For he that is set up against the good, is blown out in pride. Thus we are set up against ourselves, when, reviewing our own evil deeds, we smite ourselves with the severe avenging of penance, when we do not spare ourselves at all in our sins, and are not biassed by any fond thoughts towards ourselves, who, if we first rigidly follow up our evil things in ourselves, it is likewise fair, that we should be set up against the evil in others too for their good, and that the evil which we punish in ourselves, we should subdue in others too, by charging it home to them.
34. But this sort of setting up the wicked know nothing of, because they leave themselves, and attack the good; they iiicline themselves towards themselves, in their secret heart, by the softness of fond flattering, and they are set up against the lives of good men by the severity of harshness, whence it is now rightly said to the friends of blessed Job swelling against him under his scourge. Ye are set up against me: i. e. * Your own selves, that deserve to be rebuked, ye leave, and me ye rebuke with severe sentences.' For he that does not judge himself first, is ignorant what to judge right in another; and if perchance he did know by the hearing what to judge right, yet he is not able to judge rightly the merits of another, who has no rule of judging supplied him by the consciousness of his own innocence. Hence it is that it is said to certain persons dealing deceitfully, when they brought Johns, an adulteress to receive punishment; He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. For they went for the punishing of others' sins, and they had left their own behind; and so they are called back to their conscience within them, that they should first correct their own faults, and then reprove those of others. It is hence that, when Judges ^YiQ tribe of Benjamin was deep sunk in the guilt of carnal llie Proud reproach the Righteous with their troubles, 139 sin, all Israel banded together would have avenged that Book wickedness, yet was once and again itself smitten down in the conflict of war; but on the Lord being consulted whether they should go to take vengeance, it was commanded them. The People, that went according to the bidding of God's voice, fell both once and again, and then at length effectually smiting the sinning tribe, almost wholly extirpated it. How is it that it is first kindled to the revenge of sin, and yet after- wards itself brought down; but that those are to be chastised first themselves, by whose means the sins of others are chas- tised; that they may themselves now come cleansed through vengeance, who are forward to chastise the evil of others } Whence it follows that when the vengeance of God's inquest is at rest towards us, our own conscience should reprove its own self, and by its own act lift itself up against self, to sorrows of penance, neither being set up towards the good, and humble towards itself, but unbending towards itself, and bowed low towards all the good. Thus to proud men administering reproof, it is rightly said; Ye are set up against me, and ye charge me with my reproaches. All persons that are set up, account temporal afflictions to be a grievous reproach, and they think every individual to be the more despised by God, in proportion as they see him scourged with the rod of aflSiction. For they look for nothing in principles, they look for nothing in practices; but whomsoever they see to be stricken in this life, they imagine to be already condemned by God's sentence; whence it is well said on this occasion by the voice of blessed Job; And ye charge me with my reproaches.
35. In that they, who knew him to be righteous before xxx. his strokes, were now judging him to be unrighteous by the mere fact of his being stricken, and hence it very often happens that Heretics, because they see persons within the bosom of Holy Church suffering affliction; (for it is written of God, And scour geth every son whom He receiveth;) fancy Heb. that the sorrows of the faithful arise from nothing but sin, ^' and themselves they for this reason conclude to be righteous, because being left in the thoughts of their evil ways, lacking the rod, they have become hardened. It proceeds; 140 Joh calls not God unjust, hut himself innocent.
Job 19, Ver. 6. Know now at least that God hath afflicted me with no just judgment.
xxxi. 36. O, how hard does the voice of the righteous man sound, sulf'ering under the infliction of the rod! which same, however, not pride, but grief gave vent to! Now he is not righteous, who gives up righteousness under sorrow; and blessed Job, because he had a meek spirit, did not sin even by a hard word. For, if we say that he did err by this voice, we make out that the devil accomplished what he Job 2, 5. purposed, when he said. Touch his bone and his Jlesh, and see if he have not blessed Thee to Thy face. Therefore a serious question arises; for if he did not sin in that he says. Know now at least that God has not afflicted me with a just judgment; we agree to God's having done something unjustly, which it is profane to say; but if he did sin, then the devil made appear concerning him the thing that he promised. And so it must be asserted both that God acted rightly in His dealings with blessed Job, and yet that blessed Job herein, viz. that he says that he ' was not afflicted by a just judgment of God,' did not speak an untruth, and that our old enemy in respect of that which he promised of sin in the blessed man did speak an untruth.
For sometimes the words of the good are for this reason supposed wrong, because they are not ever considered in their interior signification. Thus blessed Job had turned his eyes to his own life, and he estimated the strokes which he was undergoing, and saw that it was not just that upon such a life such strokes should be dealt. And when he says that he was not afflicted by a just judgment, he spoke that with unreserved voice, which God in His own secresj' V. 3. had said concerning him to his adversary, thou movedst Me against him, to afflict him. without cause. For what God expresses, that He * had afflicted blessed Job without cause,' this blessed Job asserts again in the words that he was not ' afflicted of the Lord by a just judgment?' Wherein then did he sin, who was in nothing at odds with the sentence of his Maker?
37. But perhaps some one will say, that for us to speak that good concerning ourselves, which the Judge may have said in secret concerning us, cannot be done without sin.
A man may speak truth for himself on occasion. 141 For he whom the Judge praises, it cannot be doubted, is ^i\?
justly praiseworthy; but if he in his own person praises himself, his righteousness is henceforth supposed to be no longer deserving of praise; and this is said rightly, if what the just Judge delivers in impartial sentence, the person in question should venture to say afterwards concerning him- self in pride of heart. For if he himself too continuing in a humble frame, when the occasion or his grief brings it out, has uttered good that is true in his own praise, he has not departed from the line of righteousness, in so far as he was not at all at variance with truth.
88. Whence Paul the Apostle also related many brave things of himself for the edification of his disciples, but he did not commit sin by relating these things, in that both by an undeniable attestation, and a humble mind, he did not depart from the pathway of truth; and so let blessed Job, conscious of his own life being just, say that he is not afflicted by a just judgment; neither yet does he sin by that voice, wherein he is not at variance with His Maker, in that he whom God ' smote without cause,' himself also asserts that he was not * afflicted by a just judgment.' But again there arises another question, which I remember has been already solved in the beginning of this work, viz. whereas Almighty God does nothing without cause, why does Pie bear witness that He had afflicted blessed Job without cause.f* For our just Creator by those many strokes inflicted upon blessed Job did not aim to do away with evil qualities in him, but to increase his merits; and so that was just, which He did in the heightening of his good deserts; but it did not seem equitable, because it was thought to be the punishing of instances of sin. Now blessed Job believed that sins of his doing were obliterated by those scourges, not that his merits