Moralia in Job 137

Verses 18, 19. — He was yet speaking, and behold another entered, and said: Thy sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in the house of their firstborn brother; and suddenly a vehement wind rushed in from the region of the desert, and shook the four corners of the house, which falling crushed thy children, and they are dead; and I alone have escaped to tell thee. 76. The spiritual edifice rests upon four virtues. Whence it is shaken. — As we have already said above, the region of the desert is the abandoned multitude of unclean spirits: which, when it forsook the blessedness of its Creator, lost, as it were, the hand of the cultivator, from which a vehement wind came, and overthrew the house;

for a strong temptation from the unclean spirits steals in, and overthrows the conscience from the state of its tranquillity. This house stands upon four corners, for indeed the solid edifice of our mind is sustained by prudence, temperance, fortitude, and justice. This house subsists upon four corners, for upon these four virtues rises the whole structure of good work. Whence also the four rivers of paradise water the earth, for when the heart is flooded with these four virtues, it is tempered away from every heat of carnal desires. But sometimes, while sloth steals upon the mind, prudence grows cold; for when it lies weary and torpid, it does not foresee things to come.

Sometimes, while some delight steals upon the mind, our temperance withers; for in as much as we are drawn to the delight of present things, in so much the less do we temper ourselves from unlawful ones. Sometimes fear insinuates itself into the heart, and troubles the strength of our fortitude; and we stand the weaker against adversities, by so much as we more immoderately dread to lose certain things we love. Sometimes, indeed, self-love thrusts itself into the mind, and by a hidden motion turns it aside from the rectitude of justice; and by as much as it neglects to render itself wholly to its Author, by so much does it contradict in itself the law of justice. The vehement wind, therefore, shakes the four corners of the house, when a strong temptation by hidden motions shakes the four virtues;

and the house is, as it were, cast down with its corners shaken, when the conscience is troubled with its virtues assailed. 77. Thence the other virtues, like offspring of the heart, feed one another in turn. — But within these four corners of the house the sons feast, for within the secret places of the mind, which is chiefly raised up by these four virtues to the summit of the highest rectitude, the other virtues, like a kind of offspring of the heart, feed one another in turn. For the gift of the Spirit, which in the subject mind forms before others prudence, temperance, fortitude, justice, in order to train that same mind against each several temptation, presently tempers it into seven virtues, so that against folly, wisdom; against dullness, understanding;

against precipitancy, counsel; against fear, fortitude; against ignorance, knowledge; against hardness, piety; against pride, it gives the fear of God. 78. From those who are endowed with these virtues, grace sometimes usefully withdraws itself. — But sometimes, while our mind is propped up by the fullness and abundance of so great a gift, if it enjoys continual security in these, it forgets from whom they are; and it thinks it has of itself what it never considers to be absent from it. Whence it comes to pass that sometimes this same grace usefully withdraws itself, and shows to the presumptuous mind how far it is weak in itself.

For then we truly know whence our good things are, when we perceive, by losing them as it were, that they cannot be preserved by us. For the sake, therefore, of instilling this teaching of humility, it often happens that, at the crisis of an inrushing temptation, so great a folly smites our wisdom that the troubled mind knows not how to meet impending evils, nor how to prepare itself against temptation. But by this very folly the heart is prudently instructed, because whence it is for a moment foolish, thence it afterwards more truly, and more humbly, becomes wise; and whence wisdom is, as it were, lost, thence it is the more surely possessed.

Sometimes, while the mind raises itself up in elation by understanding sublime things, it grows sluggish with a heavy dullness in things lowly and cheap, so that suddenly he who nimbly penetrated the heights sees even the lowest things closed to himself. But this very dullness preserves the understanding for us while it withdraws it, because while for a moment it humbles the heart, it more truly confirms it for understanding sublime things. Sometimes, while we rejoice that we do all things with gravity of counsel, at the impulse of some emergent cause we are snatched away by a sudden precipitancy; and we who believed that we had always lived in an orderly manner are suddenly laid waste by an inward confusion. Yet nevertheless by the instruction of that same confusion we learn not to attribute our counsels to our own strength;

and we are the more maturely restrained to gravity, by as much as we return to it as though lost. Sometimes, while the mind bravely despises adversities, at the springing up of adverse events a vehement fear strikes it. But shaken by this it learns to whom to attribute the fact that in certain things it stood bravely; and it afterwards retains its fortitude the more strongly, by as much as, at the sudden inrush of dread, it sees it as already, as it were, slipped away from itself. Sometimes, while we rejoice to know great things, we grow torpid with the blindness of a sudden ignorance. But by so much as the eye of the mind is for a moment closed by ignorance, by so much is it afterwards more truly opened to knowledge, so that, instructed indeed by the scourge of its own blindness, it may know even the very knowing from whom it has it.

Sometimes, while we arrange all things religiously, while we congratulate ourselves that we fully possess the bowels of piety, we are smitten by a certain hardness of mind rushing in. But being as it were hardened, we recognize to whom to attribute the good things of the piety we had; and piety is more truly received as though extinguished, while, as though lost, it is the more loved. Sometimes, while the soul rejoices that it is subject to the divine fear, it suddenly stiffens with pride tempting it. Yet nevertheless, presently fearing greatly because it does not fear, it hastily bends itself again to humility; and it receives this the more solidly, by as much as it weighed the value of that virtue by, as it were, losing it. 79. By temptations humility and vigilance are acquired.

— The house therefore being overturned, the sons die, because when the conscience is troubled in temptation, the virtues begotten in the heart are overwhelmed suddenly and in a moment of time, for the profit of self-knowledge. These sons truly live inwardly by the spirit, while they die outwardly in the flesh, because indeed our virtues, in the time of temptation, though troubled for a moment they fail from the soundness of their state, yet through the perseverance of intention subsist entire in the root of the mind. With them also the three sisters perish, because in the heart charity is sometimes troubled by scourges, hope is shaken by dread, faith is assailed by questionings.

For often we grow torpid, as it were, from the love of our Creator, when we are wearied by the scourge beyond what we believe suited to us. Often, while the mind fears more than is needful, it weakens for itself the confidence of hope. Often, while the soul is stretched by immense questionings, faith, being disturbed, is wearied as though about to fail. Yet nevertheless the daughters live, who die when the house is shaken, because although the disturbance itself reports that within the conscience hope, faith, and charity almost perish, yet the perseverance of right intention keeps them alive before the eyes of God. Whence also the servant who reports these things alone escapes, because the discernment of the mind remains unharmed even amid temptations.

And the servant acts so that Job, weeping, may receive back his sons, when, discernment reporting, the grieving soul preserves by repentance the strength it had begun as it were to lose. But this is done with us by a wondrous dispensation, that our mind should sometimes be smitten by the assault of guilt. For a man would believe himself to be of great strength, if he never felt any failure of those same strengths within the secret places of his mind. But when he is shaken by an inrushing temptation, and is wearied, as it were, beyond what he can bear, the bulwark of humility is shown to him against the snares of his enemy, and whence he greatly dreads to fall enfeebled, thence he receives to stand strongly. And having been tempted, he not only learns from whom he receives his strength, but also understands with how great vigilance he must preserve it.

For often one whom the struggle of temptation could not overcome, his own security laid low more grievously. For while each one, wearied, lets himself relax in idleness, he prostitutes his dissolute mind to the corrupter; but if, by the dispensation of the heavenly Piety, a temptation smites him not by suddenly and vehemently rushing in, but by instructing him with a tempered approach, he assuredly keeps watch to foresee the snares, so that he may cautiously gird himself in the contest against the enemy. Whence also it is well subjoined.