Moralia in Job 1385

5. The poverty of the elect is to have lost the heavenly riches. — For by the face knowledge is wont to be designated. Whence it is written: And my face shall go before thee (Exod. 33:14), that is, knowledge shall furnish the leadership. But it must be known that need is set down in the sacred word in one way for the elect, and in another for the reprobate. For the need of the elect is when the true riches of the heavenly fatherland return to their mind, and, placed in this toilsome exile of the present life, they remember that they are poor. For they sigh without ceasing after those riches, of which Paul says: That ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints (Eph. 1:18).

And because they still by no means behold them, they meanwhile groan earnestly in the wretchedness of this poverty. This poverty without doubt Jeremiah had beheld, when he said: I am the man that see my poverty in the rod of his indignation (Lam. 3:1). For the rod of the indignation of God is the smiting of severity. Which indignation man then endured, when, driven from paradise, he lost the true riches of inward joy (Gen. 3:24). But because each of the elect incessantly beholds that they have fallen into the penury of the present life from that faculty of their inborn power, it is well said: I am the man that see my poverty (Lam. 3:1).

For whoever still craves these visible things does not understand the evil of his own pilgrimage, and knows not how to see that very thing which he suffers. This poverty the prophet David beheld, saying: My strength is made weak in poverty (Ps. 30:11). For strength is said to be made weak in poverty, because the mind, fallen in this pilgrimage and beaten back by the vexations of its own corruption, is hindered from contemplating that which it has lost. 6. The reprobate know not this poverty. Emptied of the riches of virtues, they understand not. — But the reprobate know not how to consider this poverty, because while they pursue the things they behold, they neglect to think upon the invisible things they have lost.

Whence too their need is properly so called, because while they are filled with vices, they are emptied of the riches of virtues. To whom it often happens that, lifted up by the madness of exaltation, while they by no means consider the losses of their own ruin, they do not recognize that they are destitute even of good actions. Whence by the angelic voice it is said to the preacher of Laodicea: Thou sayest that I am rich and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked (Rev. 3:17). As though he reckoned himself rich, who is lifted up by the arrogance of holiness, but is convicted as poor, blind, and naked. Poor indeed, because he has not the riches of virtues; blind, because he sees not even the poverty he suffers;

naked, because he has lost the first robe, but worse, because he does not even recognize that he has lost it. Because therefore, as we have said, the need of the reprobate is the defrauding of merits, it is rightly said of Leviathan: Want shall go before his face. For no one is joined to acquaintance with him, unless he first be stripped of the riches of virtues. For first he withdraws good thoughts, and then infuses into them a more open knowledge of his own iniquity. Want therefore is said to go before his face, because first the faculty of strengths is lost, so that afterward, as though through familiarity, his acquaintance may be recognized.

Or surely, because he so fraudulently creeps upon many, that he can by no means be detected by them, and thus empties their virtues in such a way as not to display the malice of his cunning, want is said to go before his face, as if it were openly said that when he tempts by lying in wait, before he is seen he despoils. For hence it is that of Ephraim it is said through the prophet: Strangers have devoured his strength, and he knew it not (Hos. 7:9). For strangers are wont to be understood as the apostate angels, who devour strength while by perverting they consume the virtue of the mind. Which Ephraim both endured and knew not, because in the temptation of the malignant spirits he both lost the strength of his soul, and understood not this very thing, that he had lost it.

Leviathan therefore, want goes before his face, because he despoils the minds of the negligent by sharp tempting, before he who is tempted recognizes his snares. By this therefore which is said: In his neck strength shall abide, the might of violence is shown. By this indeed which is subjoined: And want shall go before his face, the subtlety of fraud is designated. 7. Before the coming of Antichrist, the wood of virtues shall be withdrawn from the Church, or few shall remain. — Although of that which we know goes before his face, namely want, there is another matter at hand which nevertheless we may expound as sadder. For by a terrible order of hidden disposition, before this Leviathan appears in that condemned man whom he assumes, the signs of virtues are withdrawn from the holy Church.

For prophecy is hidden, the grace of healings is taken away, the virtue of more prolonged abstinence is diminished, the words of doctrine grow silent, the prodigies of miracles are removed. Which indeed the supernal dispensation by no means withdraws utterly, but does not display these things openly and manifoldly as in former times. Which nevertheless is done by wondrous dispensation, so that out of one divine matter both piety and justice may at once be fulfilled.

For while, by the withdrawal of the virtues of signs, the holy Church appears as it were more despised, both the reward of the good increases, who venerate her for the hope of heavenly things and not on account of present signs, and the mind of the wicked is more quickly shown against her, who neglect to follow the invisible things she promises, while they are not held by visible signs. While therefore the humility of the faithful is as it were destitute of the multitude and manifestation of signs, by a terrible scrutiny of hidden disposition, thence a more bountiful mercy is heaped upon the good, whence a just wrath is heaped upon the wicked. Because therefore this Leviathan, before he comes manifest and conspicuous, the signs of virtues cease in great part in the holy Church, it is rightly now said: Want shall go before his face.

For first the riches of miracles are withdrawn from the faithful, and then against them that ancient enemy is shown through open prodigies, so that whereby he himself is exalted through signs, thereby he may be more robustly and more laudably conquered by the faithful without signs. Although even for the faithful signs shall not be lacking in their contest with him, yet his shall be so great that ours may seem either few or none. Whose virtue indeed becomes mightier than all signs, when whatever they behold done terribly by him, they tread down by the heel of inward constancy. But the malignant enemy shows himself with a fiercer monstrousness against them, the more he grieves to be despised even when his miracles grow bright.

He gathers himself therefore wholly for their destruction, and joins together all the reprobate in one unanimous cruelty against the faithful, that he may put forth his savagery the more robustly, by however much even among those whom he desires to make act perversely, no members of his own body are at variance with him. Whence too it is rightly said: