Moralia in Job 1128

Ibid.—Neither shall they cry when they shall be bound. 60. Even when struck, one blushes to confess his sins.—Every wicked man who, though he is wicked, does not desire to appear holy, when caught in the striking of the scourge, does not blush to confess that he is wicked. But he who, doing wicked things, intercepts human judgments of himself under the appearance of holiness, even when struck with the scourge, shrinks from betraying himself as wicked, because he has been accustomed to appear holy. And if ever he is grievously constrained, he scarcely confesses himself wicked even superficially, because he is ashamed to uncover his inner self by truthful confession. We are, as it were, free when we are chastised by no correction; but we are bound when we are constrained by the scourge of striking.

When bound, therefore, we cry the louder, in proportion as, placed under the striking, we more truthfully confess our sins. For before the ears of God a devout confession is a mighty voice. Because, therefore, the scourges of striking, even when they seize the dissemblers, do not lead them to a simple confession (for they shrink from being known as sinners, since they were held in the opinion of all to be holy)—although the scourges strike them at the last, although they are not ignorant that they are led away to eternal punishments, yet such men desire to remain, before human judgments, such as they had always striven to appear. Caught, therefore, even by the scourge of the final striking, because they neglect, even when afflicted, to put forth a pure confession, they scorn, as it were bound, to cry out. Well, therefore, is it said:

Neither shall they cry when they shall be bound. 61. Hypocrites reckon the saints holy not because they are, but because they are said to be. Deluded by vain hope, they flee not, even at the last, to the remedy of confession. A man's heart is often far distant from himself.—This can, however, be understood also in another way. For everyone who, though he is wicked, does not fear to be called holy by men, even if by silent thought he reproaches himself as wicked, yet when he has begun more often to hear himself called holy, he loses that which inwardly he held concerning himself. For he pours out his heart outwardly, and because he willingly receives outwardly false testimony about himself, he inquires not what manner of man he inwardly is.

Whence it comes to pass that he seeks the fomentations of empty praise even when they are wanting, and, forgetting what he is, desires to appear what he is not. Therefore those who are such, while they feign themselves just before human judgment, while they display their actions as worthy of praise to the eyes of beholders, a hidden justice deals with them, so that whereby they strive outwardly to deceive others, thereby they themselves are also inwardly deceived concerning themselves. For they lose every eye of anxious investigation concerning themselves. For they neglect both to examine and to scrutinize their own life, but they suppose themselves such as they hear, and reckon themselves to be holy, not because they so live, but because they are so called.

But the subtle judgment of God, and their own selves, they neglect to behold, because they place the confidence of their own merit in the attestation of another's mouth. But when they are struck by sudden striking, they can by no means either truthfully confess themselves wicked, or detect themselves as they are, because forsooth they believed themselves holy by human profession. Well, therefore, is it said: Neither shall they cry when they shall be bound. For with empty hope such men trust that they come before the supernal Judge such as they know themselves to have become known to men; and, wretched, they detect not their own selves even amid torments, and while they look to the testimony of false praise, they lose the remedy of true confession.

Even when bound they are led away, and cry not, because, overcome by the importunity of human praise, the wretches suppose themselves holy even when they die in their sins. To whom it is well said through the Prophet: 'Return, transgressors, to the heart' (Isa. 46:8). For if they returned to the heart, they would not pour themselves out through the words of outward attestation. For what is nearer to us than our heart? What is nearer to us than that thing which is within us? And yet, when it is scattered through depraved thoughts, our heart wanders far from us. Far, therefore, the Prophet sends the transgressor, when he compels him to return to his own heart, because whereby he has poured himself out outwardly, thereby he scarcely finds whence he can return to himself.

But because the mind of dissemblers, for the very reason that it is divided from the one intention toward eternity, is laid waste by the inundation of manifold thoughts, it is rightly subjoined: