(Admonition 25.) In one way are those to be admonished who do not rightly understand the words of the sacred law; and in another those who indeed understand rightly, but do not speak them humbly. For those are to be admonished who do not rightly understand the words of the sacred law, to weigh that they turn the most healthful draught of wine into a cup of poison for themselves, and with the medicinal knife wound themselves with a mortal wound, while by that means they slay in themselves things sound, whereby they ought healthfully to have cut away things wounded. They are to be admonished to weigh how Sacred Scripture is set as it were a certain lamp for us in the night of the present life; whose words, indeed, while they do not rightly understand, they grow dark from the very light.
Whom, indeed, a perverse intention would not carry off to a depraved understanding, unless pride had first inflated them. For while they deem themselves wise above others, they disdain to follow others in things better understood; and, that they may extort for themselves among the ignorant crowd the name of knowledge, they strive with all their might both to destroy what is rightly understood by others, and to strengthen their own perverse notions. Whence it is well said by the prophet: 'They have ripped up the women with child of Galaad to enlarge their border' (Amos 1:13). For Galaad is interpreted 'a heap of testimony.' And because the whole congregation of the Church together serves, through confession, the testimony of the truth, not incongruously is the Church expressed by Galaad, which, by the mouth of all the faithful, bears witness to whatever things are true concerning God.
But the women with child are called those souls which conceive the understanding of the word from divine love, destined, if they come to the perfect time, to bring forth the conceived understanding by the manifestation of work. But to enlarge one's border is to extend the name of one's own opinion. They ripped up, then, the women with child of Galaad to enlarge their border; because indeed the heretics slay by perverse preaching the minds of the faithful, which had already conceived something of the understanding of the truth, and extend for themselves the name of knowledge. The hearts of little ones, already big with the conception of the word, they cut open with the sword of error, and make for themselves as it were a reputation for doctrine. When, therefore, we attempt to instruct such men lest they hold perverse opinions, it is first necessary that we admonish them not to seek vainglory.
For if the root of elation be cut away, consequently the branches of perverse assertion wither. They are also to be admonished lest, by generating errors and discords, they turn the very law of God—which was given for this purpose, that it might forbid the sacrifices of Satan—into a sacrifice of Satan. Whence the Lord complains through the prophet, saying: 'I gave them corn, wine, and oil, and multiplied for them silver and gold, which they made to Baal' (Hosea 2:8). For we receive corn from the Lord when, in the more obscure sayings, the covering of the letter being withdrawn, we perceive the inward things through the marrow of the spirit of the law. The Lord grants us His wine when He inebriates us with the lofty preaching of His Scripture.
He also bestows on us His oil when, by the more open precepts, He disposes our life with gentle mildness. He multiplies silver when He supplies us with words full of the light of truth. He enriches us also with gold when He irradiates our heart with the understanding of the highest brightness. All which things the heretics offer to Baal, because in the hearts of their hearers, by understanding all things corruptly, they pervert them. And of the corn of God, of His wine and oil, of the silver likewise and the gold, they immolate a sacrifice to Satan, because they bend the words of peace to the error of discord. Whence they are to be admonished to weigh that, while with a perverse mind they make discord out of the precepts of peace, by the just examination of God they themselves shall die of the words of life.
On the other hand, those are to be admonished who indeed rightly understand the words of the law, but do not speak them humbly; that in divine discourses, before they utter them to others, they seek themselves, lest, in pursuing the deeds of others, they desert themselves; and that, while they rightly perceive all things from Sacred Scripture, this alone, which is said through it against the elated, they do not attend to. For a shameless and unskilled physician is he who desires to heal another's wound, and himself knows not the wound which he suffers. Those, therefore, who do not speak the words of God humbly, are assuredly to be admonished that, when they apply medicines to the sick, they first inspect the poison of their own pestilence, lest, in healing others, they themselves die.
They ought to be admonished to consider lest they be at variance, by the quality of their speaking, with the virtue of what is spoken, and preach one thing by their speaking and another by their showing. Let them hear therefore what is written: 'If any man speak, let him speak as the words of God' (1 Pet. 4:11). Those, then, who have not of their own the words which they utter, why are they puffed up as though about their own? Let them hear what is written: 'As from God, before God, in Christ we speak' (2 Cor. 2:17). For he speaks from God before God who both understands that he has received the word of preaching from God, and seeks to please God through it, not men. Let them hear what is written: 'Every arrogant man is an abomination to the Lord' (Prov. 16:5). Because, namely, while in the word of God he seeks his own glory, he invades the right of the Giver;
and he in no wise fears to set beneath his own praise Him from whom he received this very thing for which he is praised. Let them hear what is said to the preacher through Solomon: 'Drink water out of thy own cistern, and the streams of thy own well. Let thy fountains be conveyed abroad, and in the streets divide thy waters. Keep them to thyself alone, neither let strangers be partakers with thee' (Prov. 5:15-17). For the preacher drinks water out of his own cistern when, returning to his own heart, he first hears himself what he says. He drinks the streams of his own well if he is watered by the irrigation of his own word. Whereupon it is well subjoined: 'Let thy fountains be conveyed abroad, and in the streets divide thy waters' (ibid. 16). For it is right that he first drink, and then, by preaching, pour forth to others.
To let fountains flow outward is to pour the force of preaching upon others without; but to divide the waters in the streets is to dispense the divine words amid the great multitude of hearers according to the capacity of each. And because for the most part a desire for empty glory creeps in while the word of God runs abroad to the knowledge of many, after it was said, 'In the streets divide thy waters,' it is rightly added: 'Keep them to thyself alone, and let not strangers be partakers with thee' (Prov. 5:17). For by 'strangers' he means the malignant spirits, of whom it is said, in the voice of the tempted man through the prophet: 'Strangers have risen up against me, and the mighty have sought after my soul' (Ps. 53:5). He says therefore: 'Divide thy waters even in the streets, and yet keep them to thyself alone.' As if to say more plainly:
Thus it is needful that you serve preaching outwardly in such wise that in the ministry of the divine word you do not admit your enemies to be partakers with you. We therefore divide the waters even in the streets, and yet possess them alone, when we both pour forth our preaching abroad far and wide, and yet by it seek in no way to gain the praises of men.