約伯倫理 第 367 章

Verse 12: 'Am I a sea, or a whale, that you have surrounded me with a prison?' (Job 7:12). 39. Man, the devil, and the carnal are constrained by a prison, when they cannot fulfill what they wish. — Man is surrounded by a prison, because very often he strives to rise up to lofty things by the advances of the virtues, and yet is hindered by the corruption of his own flesh. Of which the Psalmist rightly prays to be stripped, saying: 'Bring my soul out of prison, that it may confess to your name' (Ps. 141:8). But what is expressed by the name of the sea, save the hearts of the carnal that surge with swelling thoughts; and what by the name of the whale, save the ancient enemy? Who, while he penetrates the minds of the worldly by possessing them, as it were swims in their slippery thought.

But the whale is confined by a prison, because the malign spirit, cast down into the lower regions, is straitened by the weight of his own punishment, lest he prevail to fly up to the heavenly things; as Peter attests, who says: 'God did not spare the angels that sinned, but delivered them, dragged down by the ropes of hell into Tartarus, to be reserved for judgment to be tormented' (2 Pet. 2:4). The whale is confined by a prison, because he is prohibited from tempting the good as much as he desires. By a prison the sea also is surrounded, because the swelling and insane desires of carnal minds are weighed down by the straits of their own impossibility for the carrying out of the evils they crave. For often they covet to lord it over their betters; but yet, by the divine judgment marvelously disposing all things, they are laid low beneath them.

Being exalted, they desire to harm the good, and yet, being subjected, they hope for solaces from them. For the fulfilling of the pleasures of the flesh they crave length of the present life, but yet from it they are snatched away in haste. Of whom it is well said through the Psalmist: 'He set the waters as it were in a bottle' (Ps. 77:13). For the waters are in a bottle when their slippery desires, because they do not find the effecting of a deed, are pressed down beneath the carnal heart. The whale, then, and the sea are pressed by the encompassing of a prison, because either the malign spirit, or his followers — in whose minds he gathers himself, and in them rolls the waves of swelling thoughts — the strict severity from above straitens, so that they cannot fulfill the evils they crave. 40.

The just complain that they suffer this same thing — not out of pride, but out of love of truth. Now holy men, the purer the heart with which they contemplate the secrets of heaven, the more they pant after them with daily kindled ardours. There they long to be fully satisfied, whence as yet they taste but a little something with the mouth of contemplation. They desire perfectly to subdue the goad of the flesh, to endure nothing unlawful in thought concerning its corruption; but because it is written, 'The body that is corrupted weigheth down the soul, and the earthly habitation presseth down the sense that museth upon many things' (Wisd. ii, 15), by intention they now indeed rise above their very selves, yet still, subject to the uncertain movements of their weakness, they grieve that they are shut up in the prison of corruption. Therefore he says:

'Am I a sea, or a whale, that thou hast enclosed me in a prison?' As if he plainly said: The sea or the whale — that is, the wicked, and their author the malignant spirit — because they crave to be unbridled unto the sole licence of perpetrating iniquity, are rightly bound in the prison of their punishment. But I, who now desire the liberty of thine eternity, why am I still oppressed by the prison of my corruption? Yet this is neither proudly demanded by the just — for, kindled with the love of truth, they perfectly long to pass beyond the straits of their weakness — nor unjustly ordained by the Author of the just; for in deferring the desires of His elect He torments them, in tormenting He purges them, so that they may at some time grow the better strong from the delay to receive what they desire.

But the elect, so long as they are kept back from that inmost rest, return to their own heart; and there, hidden from the tumults of their flesh, they seek as it were a most delightful retreat. Yet there they often feel the stings of temptation, they suffer the incitements of the flesh; and there they find the heaviest labours, where they had sought great repose from labour. Wherefore the holy man, after mentioning the prison of his corruption, hastening to return to the quiet spaces of the heart, because he finds the same strife within that he had fled from without, straightway adds, saying: