約伯倫理 第 777 章

(Verse 16) — Who were taken away before their time, and a flood overthrew their foundation. 14. The wicked always die before the time they had fixed for themselves, never before the time appointed by God. — Since the time of life is without doubt fixed for us beforehand by divine foreknowledge, it must earnestly be asked by what reason it is now said that the wicked are taken away from the present world before their own time. For Almighty God, though He often changes His sentence, never changes His counsel.

At that time, then, each one is taken away from this life, at which by divine power he was foreknown beforehand. But it must be known that Almighty God, creating and ordering us, according to the merits of each, disposes also their limits: so that either that evil man may live but briefly, lest he harm many who do well; or this good man may subsist longer in this life, that he may exist as a helper of good work to many; or again, an evil man may be deferred longer in life, that he may increase his depraved works, by the temptation of whom the just, being purged, may live more truly; or a good man may be taken away sooner, lest, if he lived here long, malice should corrupt his innocence. Yet it must be known that it is the benignity of God to grant sinners a space for penance.

But because they turn the time they have received not to the fruit of penance but to the interest of iniquity, they lose what they could have merited from the divine mercy. Although Almighty God foreknows for each one that time of death by which his life is terminated, and no one could die at any other time than at that very one at which he dies. For if fifteen years are recorded as added to Hezekiah's life (2 Kings 20:6), the time of life indeed grew beyond that limit at which he himself deserved to die. For the divine disposition then foreknew his time, at which it afterward took him away from the present life. Since, then, it is so, what is it that is said:

that the wicked are taken away before their time — what does it mean, save that all who love the present life promise themselves longer spans of that same life? But when death, coming upon them, takes them away from the present life, it cuts short those spans of their life which they had been accustomed to stretch out, as it were in imagination, longer for themselves. Of whom it is rightly said: And a flood overthrew their foundation. 15. The foundation of the wicked is in earthly things, that of the just is in heavenly things.

— For the wicked, while in heart they neglect to pass over to things eternal, and do not behold that all present things are fleeting, fix their mind in love of the present life, and, as it were, build for themselves in it the foundation of a long dwelling, because in earthly things they are made solid through desire. Thus Cain is described to have been the first to build a city on earth (Genesis 4), who is indeed plainly shown to be a wanderer, because he himself laid a foundation on earth, who was estranged from the solidity of the eternal fatherland. For being a wanderer from the highest, he laid his foundation in the lowest, who placed the station of his heart in earthly delight (Saint Augustine, book 15 of The City of God, chapters 17 and 19).

Whence also in his stock Enoch, which is interpreted 'dedication,' is born first; but in the progeny of the elect Enoch is recorded to have been the seventh — because, namely, the reprobate in this life, which is prior, dedicate themselves by building, while the elect await the dedication of their own building at the end of time, that is, in the seventh. For you may see very many think only of temporal things, seek honors, gape after things to be grasped, seek nothing after this life. What, then, do these do but dedicate themselves in the first generation? You may see the elect seek nothing of present glory, willingly endure want, patiently suffer the evils of the world, that they may be able to be crowned in the end.

Enoch, therefore, is born among the elect in the seventh generation, because they seek the dedication of their joy in the glory of the final recompense. And because the very mortality of this present life runs its course through the daily lapse of time, and destroys the dedication of the reprobate by carrying off those same reprobate, it is rightly said of the wicked: And a flood shall overthrow their foundation. That is, the very course of mutability undermines in them the standing of their perverse construction. There follows: