約伯倫理 第 1272 章

They who were formerly persecutors of the faith are afterward made preachers and defenders of it. — The clods lying upon cultivated ground are wont to press down the scattered seeds and to choke what springs up. By which clods in this place are signified those who, through their hardness and pestilent life, neither themselves receive the seeds of the word, nor permit others to bear the fruit of the received seeds. For every holy preacher, coming into the world, by evangelizing the poor, had, as it were, ploughed the soft soils of the valleys; but the Church, not being able to break the hardness of certain proud ones, endured them, oppressed, as clods cast upon her labour.

For many of perverse mind, relying upon the very unbelief of earthly princes, weighed down the rising Church with the burden of their evil living, since long they destroyed, by whatever means they could, those whom they were able—now by damnable examples, now by threats, now by flatteries—lest the earth of the hearers' heart, cultivated for the fruit of the spiritual seed, should attain it. But when almighty God subjected this rhinoceros under His reins, through him He straightway broke the hardness of the clods. For soon indeed He subjugated the earthly principality to His faith, and crushed the hard hearts of the persecutors, so that, like broken clods, they no longer, being hardened, pressed down, but, dissolved for the received seeds of the word, they germinated. Whence He now rightly says: Or will he break the clods of the valleys after thee?

As if He said: as after Me, who, after I enter the mind of any exalted power, not only render it subject to Me, but also employ it for the crushing of the enemies of the faith, so that the mighty of this age, bound by the reins of my fear, not only themselves remain believing in Me, but also, zealous for Me, break the hardness of another's heart. — The Church has within her bosom many enemies, against whom she seeks the aid of earthly princes. — But what we have said concerning the unbelievers, we see also in very many who are reckoned by the name of faith.

For many, placed in the midst of humble brethren, hold the same faith in word only; but while they do not forsake the swelling of elation, while they oppress by inflicted violence those whom they can, while, when others bear fruit, they themselves by no means receive the seeds of the word, but turn away the ear of the heart from the voice of him who exhorts—these, what else are they but hardened clods lying in the ploughed valleys? Who are so much the more wicked in that they neither themselves bring forth the fruit of humility, and, what is worse, oppress the humble who do bring it forth.

For the dissolving of their hardness, holy Church sometimes, because she does not suffice by her own strength, seeks the help of this rhinoceros, that is, of the earthly prince, that he may crush the overlying clods which the humility of the Churches bears as though it were the level ground of the valleys. These clods, therefore, the rhinoceros presses with his foot and breaks small, because the ruling religion by its power dissolves the hardness of the depraved and mighty, which ecclesiastical humility cannot withstand. And because this is wrought by divine power alone, that the summits of the earthly kingdom may be bent to the advancement of the heavenly kingdom, it is now rightly said: Or will he break the clods of the valleys after thee?

But that blessed Job may think humbly of his own virtues, and may yet recognize as lofty the powers of this world under the name of the rhinoceros, there follows: