Caput V
The End of Wicked Glory
Worldly glory is fleeting and deceptive, as the wicked are honored only on the road but condemned at their arrival.
Anyone who is truly wise must judge the glory of the wicked by how it ends. As the fourth book of the Moralia discusses, the more deeply they are raised up in sin, the more fiercely they are overwhelmed in torments. What is exalted passes away; what is punished endures. They are honored along the road, but at their arrival they will be condemned. It is as if they pass through pleasant meadows only to arrive at a prison, while through the prosperity of this present life they head toward destruction.
The Groaning of the Good
The good observe the downfall of the glorious and confess human vanity, recognizing that even at the height of prosperity, glory vanishes in the moment of death.
Indeed, when good people observe anyone who is glorious either dying or being dishonored — because human glory is nothing — they are accustomed to confess with groaning, saying: 'Behold, man is nothing' (Job 16:8). They would speak more truly if they considered the downfall of any powerful person while still seeing them in the flower of prosperity.✦ For then we must consider how quickly happiness flies away, even though before human eyes it seems to endure and hold strong. For any of the wicked can reflect that the glory of a dying person is nothing, even in the very moment of death itself. Then even those who love this glory and follow it all the way to death strip it away.
Crushed at the Gate
Drawing on Job's figure of the wicked generation, the text interprets the gate as the last day of judgment, where the proud will be struck down.
Concerning these and their imitators it is written — under the figure, namely, of that wicked generation: 'Let his sons be far from salvation, and let them be crushed at the gate' (Job 5:4).✦ The gate is the last day of judgment, because through it one enters the kingdom.✦ The foolish, therefore — or their sons, that is, their imitators — are proud before the gate, but at the gate they will be crushed. For now they prosper, but in judgment they will be struck down.
Refusing the Father's Discipline
Those who refuse divine discipline and cling to worldly love will find no rescuer at the gate and will not heed any warning.
For whoever refuses to have God as a Father through discipline, preferring to be a son of this kingdom, will then deserve no rescuer to come to his aid — but will be crushed at the gate.✦1 Indeed, anyone seized by love — whether from either generation or from either rank of this life — takes its side and won't listen to a word of warning.2
Read the original Latin
Quisquis vero sanum sapit, oportet ut pravorum gloriam ex fine consideret, qui sicut in Moralium libro IV disputatur, eo atrocius in tormentis obruuntur, quo altius in peccatum elevantur. Transit quod extollitur, permanet quod punitur; honorantur in via, in perventione damnabuntur; et quasi per amoena prata ad carcerem perveniunt, dum vitae praesentis per prospera ad interitum tendunt. Et quidem boni cum quoslibet gloriosos aut mori aut dehonestari conspiciunt, quia humana gloria nihil sit cum gemitu fateri solent dicentes: Ecce quia nihil est homo (Job XVI, 8), quod nimirum rectius dicent si tunc interitum cujuslibet potentis cogitarent, cum eum in flore prosperitatis vident. Tunc namque considerandum est quo cursu felicitas transvolet, cum ante humanos oculos quasi permanens pollet. Nam gloriam morituri nihil esse in ipsa jam morte pensare pravi quilibet possunt: tunc enim ei etiam derogant qui hanc et usque ad mortem sequentes amant. De his atque eorum imitatoribus scriptum est sub typo scilicet illius pravae generationis: Longe fiant filii ejus a salute, et conterantur in porta (Job V, 4). Porta est ultima dies judicii, quia per ipsam intratur ad regnum. Stulti igitur vel eorum filii, id est, imitatores, ante portam superbiunt, sed in porta conterentur, quia nunc prosperantur, sed in judicio ferientur.
Qui enim tunc renuit Deum per disciplinam habere patrem, malens esse filius hujus regni, tunc per adjutorium habere non merebitur ereptorem, sed in porta conteretur. Sane quisquis vel de utraque generatione, vel de utroque gradu vitae hujus amore captus est; partibus ejus favet, et dehortatorium verbum non libenter auscultat.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Job.16.8 — You have seized me—it stands as a witness against me; my falsehood rises up within me and testifies to my face.
- ↩Job.5.4 — His children are far from safety, and they are crushed in the gate, and there is no one to deliver them.
- ↩Matt.7.13-Matt.7.14;Job.5.4 — Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road is broad that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter through it. Matt.7.14 — Because the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it. Job.5.4 — His children are far from safety, and they are crushed in the gate, and there is no one to deliver them.
- ↩Job.5.4 — His children are far from safety, and they are crushed in the gate, and there is no one to deliver them.
Notes
- 1 ↩'gate' (porta) echoes the previous section's explanation that the gate is the last day of judgment, through which one enters the kingdom.
- 2 ↩'either generation' (utraque generatione) and 'either rank' (utroque gradu) refer back to the two groups discussed in the surrounding context: the wicked and the faithful, or secular and religious orders.
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