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16.

LIT.

116 Job's longings. How he could speak of the lowest Hell.'

JOB 17, those things which ye see, and have not seen them. And so as to that which is now said, Who considereth my patience? the breathings of fervent desire are laid open. For neither, as we said before, does God forbear to consider the patience of the righteous; but not to have regard,' in a manner, means to appear less quickly answering to the aspirations of longing desire, and by lengthened periods of time to delay the grace of His Dispensation. Therefore let him say, Who considereth my patience? in that what is short to Him that ordereth, is long to him that loves. Hence, still reflecting on the privations of his delay, he repeats that which he had already said before; and being destined to descend below, he redoubles the voice of his grief, saying,

Ver. 16. All of mine shall descend into the lowest hell. xlviii. 53. Whereas it appears that among those below the righteous are held bound not in places of punishment, but in the bosom of tranquillity above, an important question springs up before us, why it is that blessed Job declares, saying, All of mine shall descend into the lowest hell; who even if before the Advent of the Mediator between God and man he had to descend into hell, yet it is plain that into the 'lowest hell' he had not to descend. Does he call the very higher regions of hell,' the lowest hell?' Plainly because in relation to the loftiness of heaven, the region of this sky

4.

may not unappropriately be called the lower region. Whence when the Apostate Angels were plunged from the seats of heaven into this darksome region of the air, the Apostle

2 Pet. 2, Peter says, For if God spared not the Angels that sinned, but delivered them, dragged down with infernal chains, into hell, to be reserved for torments in the Judgment. If then relatively to the height of heaven this darksome air is infernal, relatively to the elevation of this air, the earth which lies below may be taken both as infernal, and as deep; and relatively to the height of that earth, even those parts of hell which are higher than the other mansions of the place below, may in this place not unsuitably be denoted by the designation of the lowest hell; in that what the sky is to heaven, and the earth to the sky, the same is that higher hollow of the regions below to the earth.

54. But that is very wonderful which he subjoins, All of

Job held his soul for all. His fears of Judgment. 117

mine shall descend; for whereas the soul alone shall descend Book into the regions of hell, how is it that the holy man tells that XIII. 'all of his' shall descend there, but that he saw himself to be there entire where he perceives the great weight of his recompense? seeing that this which he leaves of himself without sense on the earth, until he returns to the incorruption of the resurrection, he does not feel to be himself. And so he declares that all of his will descend into the lowest hell,' whither he sees his soul only shall descend; in that the whole of him is there, where he is capable of having a sense of that which he has got. Or, surely, all of his did descend into hell,' in that the recompensing of all his toils was as yet expected to be received only in the rest of hell; and all that he has done as it were descends' there, in that there he finds rest in his recompensing for all things. Whence also the expected rest is itself added, when the words are thereupon introduced,

Dost thou think at least there will be rest for me there? 55. By which same words he both makes known what he xlix. desires, and yet marks that he is still doubtful of receiving the rest, lest he whose holy works so many scourges followed, should by the hidden judgment of the heavenly Judge, after temporal scourges, have lasting torments likewise following him. Wherein it behoves ourselves to consider with exceeding fear which of us is now secure of the everlasting rest, if even he still trembles for it, proclaim of whose virtue the very Judge, Who smites, does Himself sound. For if the 1 Pet. 4, righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the sinner and the ungodly appear? For blessed Job knew that he should attain to rest after the strokes of affliction, but that he might shake our hearts with fear, he himself seemed to doubt about the recompensing of Eternal rest, when he says, Dost thou think? plainly that we might think well with what exceeding apprehension we ought ever to dread the Judgment to come, if even he, who was commended by the Judge, was not yet in his own words secure of the rewards of the Judg

ment.

18.

i.

BOOK XIV.

Wherein S. Gregory unfolds the historical, allegorical, and moral sense of the eighteenth and nineteenth chapters of the Book of Job.

1. In a former part of this work we have handled the point, HIST. that Almighty God, in order to amend the hearts of those under the law, brought forward the life of blessed Job for a testimony, who knew not the law and yet kept it, who observed the precepts of life, which he had not received in writing. This man's conduct is first extolled by God's bearing witness to it, and is afterwards suffered to be put to the proof by the devil's plotting against it, that he might prove by the trials of tribulation, how much he had attained before in a state of peace. This man's life the adversary of the human race, evil disposed after his manner, both knew to be commended by the attestation of God, and yet asked for to prove it. And when he could not succeed in bringing him to the ground, smitten with so many losses in his substance, so many bereavements, he set on his wife against him in the goading of mispersuasion, that at all events by the words of his own household he might ruin him, whom he could never bring down by so many torments of tidings. But whereas what by woman's aid he won against Adam first in paradise, he could not make good against this second man sitting on a dunghill, he betook himself to other appliances of tempting, that he should bring in his friends as if administering consolation, and yet stir up their feelings in bitterness of upbraiding, that him whose patience scourges had failed to subdue, at least bitter words in the midst of those scourges might succeed in overcoming. But the adversary, while laying his plots with craft, was a victim to the deceit, which he had contrived against the holy man, in

Bildad thinks himself scorned, as Heretics do.

119

XIV.

that for all the occasions of ruin that he brought upon the Book holy man, he supplied him with as many occasions of victory. For against torments he maintained patience, against words, wisdom, in that he at once sustained the pains of stripes with resignation, and restrained the foolishness of ill advisers with wisdom. But whereas in those very sufferings and well-instructed speeches he bears a figure of Holy Church, by his friends, as we have already often said, uttering some things right and some foolish, heretics are not unjustly represented, who in respect of this, that they are friends of the holy man, say many things right of the wicked, but in respect of this, that they bear a likeness of heretics, very often transgress in the excesses of the lips, and they smite the breast of the holy man with the darts of their words, but are tired out by their very own smiting against his indomitable spirit. So then it is our business to distinguish with exact discrimination, both what there is in their words that they think aright concerning the lost, and what that they sound that is foolish as directed against blessed Job.

Ver. 1, 2. Then answered Bildad the Shuhite, and said, Unto what end will ye cast abroad words? understand

first, and so let us speak.

ALLEG.

,1' fate

tur' is

2. All heretics think that in some things that are known ii. to her Holy Church is full of pride, while some things they fancy that she does not even understand. Whence Bildad the Shuhite, as it were, asserts that blessed Job had broken out into pride, when he declares' that he' casts abroad words.' But he gives a token with what pride he was himself swoln, used who supposed that blessed Job spoke things that he did not understand; and whereas all heretics complain that they are despised by Holy Church in her estimate of them, it is fitly subjoined,

Ver. 3. Wherefore are we counted as beasts, and reputed as vile in your sight?

thus

3. It is natural to the human mind to suppose that the iii. thing that it does is done to itself. Thus they believe themselves to be despised, who are used to despise the ways of the good; and whereas in such things as are capable of being understood by reason, the Church proves against heretics that what they make up is unreasonable, they imagine them

4.

120 Heretics think the Church proud, violent, and exclusive.

JOB 18, selves to be counted as 'beasts' in her view. On which supposition of their being despised, they directly break out in disdain, and are urged to abuse of that Church. Whence it is added;

ALLEG.

iv.

V.

vi.

Ver. 4. Why dost thou ruin thy soul in thy fury?

4. Heretics esteem whether a strong feeling for the rule of right, or the spiritual grace of holy preaching, not as good weight of virtue, but as the madness of fury. By which same fury they believe that the souls of the faithful are ruined,' in that they imagine that the life of the Church is destroyed by the very same means whereby they see she is made to kindle against themselves. It goes on;

Shall the earth be forsaken for thee?

5. For they think that they themselves worship God every where, that they themselves have occupied the whole world. What is it then to say, Shall the earth be forsaken for thee? but what they often say to the faithful, viz. that if this thing which you say be true, all the earth is forsaken by God, which we ourselves already occupy from the multitude of us.' Now the holy Church universal proclaims that God cannot be truly worshipped saving within herself, asserting that all they that are without her shall never be saved. But conversely heretics, who are confident that it is possible for them to be saved even without her pale, maintain that the Divine aid is rendered to them in every place. Whence they say; Shall the earth be forsaken for thee? i. e. 'is it so, that whosoever is out of thee cannot be saved?' Whence it is added further;

And shall the rocks be moved out of their place?

6. Heretics call those persons' rocks' who in their views by the sublimity of their thoughts stand out in the human race, which same they glory that they have for teachers. But when Holy Church addresses herself to the task of gathering together the different erring preachers within the bosom of the right faith, what else is this but that she 'removes the rocks from their places,' that having a right view of things, they may lie down in humility within her, who aforetime were standing stiff in their own wrong notions? But heretics altogether make against the doing of this, and withstand the 'rocks being moved out of their places' on account of her

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