Caput XLI
The Common Lot of Prosperity and Adversity
God ordains that temporal goods and evils be shared by the just and the unjust alike, so that neither prosperity is greedily desired nor adversity shamefully avoided.
Divine providence saw fit to prepare good things in the future for the just, which the unjust will not enjoy, and evil things for the impious, which the good will not suffer. Now he willed these temporal goods and evils to be common to both groups, so that good things would not be greedily desired — since even the wicked are seen to possess them — nor evil things shamefully avoided, which even the good for the most part endure.
God's Patience and Severity in the Present Order
In the present dispensation, God's patience cherishes the good and invites the wicked to repentance in prosperity, while His severity trains the good in patience through adversity.
In these goods — whether prosperous or adverse — which now proceed in mixed fashion, as we have said, the patience or severity of God is arranged through this dispensation.1 In prosperous times, you see, patience cherishes the good and invites the wicked to repentance; but in adverse times, severity trains the good in patience.
The Inner Person Matters More Than the Outer Trial
What matters is not the trial itself but the character of the one who endures it: the good are neither exalted by prosperity nor broken by evil, while the wicked are corrupted by the one and punished by the other, just as perfume and filth yield opposite fragrances when shaken alike.
It matters greatly what kind of use one makes of those things that are called prosperous, or of those things that are called adverse. For a good person is neither exalted by temporal goods nor broken by evils; a bad person, however, is punished by adversity precisely because he is corrupted by prosperity. It matters greatly, therefore, what sort of person the one who is afflicted happens to be. For just as perfume and filth, if shaken with equal force, produce opposite results — the one gives off a sweet fragrance, the other a foul stench — so the dissimilarity of those who suffer remains even when their sufferings are alike.
Shared Trials, Divergent Fruits
Just as fire makes gold glow and chaff smoke, and as threshing purifies grain while crushing husks, so shared trials purify the good and destroy the wicked, who respond with grumbling and ever-greater recklessness.
And just as gold glows red in the fire while chaff smokes, and just as under the same threshing grain is purified while husks are crushed, so any shared trial purifies the good and destroys the wicked. The good praise God; the wicked accuse themselves, they grumble, and with the kingdom's peace disturbed, the more freely they dare any shameful act, the more frequently and recklessly they commit it.
Scripture on the Chastened and the Uncorrected
Scripture testifies that the good, recognizing their sins through God's scourges, are called back from iniquity, while those who refuse God's commanding word are brought under His striking blows, restrained as with bit and bridle.
Of the good, who recognize their own sins through the scourges that cleanse them, it is written: "If they are in chains and bound with ropes of poverty, he will judge their works for them, so that they may turn back from iniquity" (Job 36:8).✦ Those who do not hear the words of God commanding are brought under the blows of God striking, so that rewards may draw to a good life — or to punishment — those whom rewards do not change: "With bit and bridle, restrain their jaws" (Ps.✦ 31:9).
The Wicked Who Will Not Hear
Of the wicked who are not corrected by suffering, Scripture declares they will pass by the sword and die without wisdom, for like the Ethiopian who cannot change his skin, their folly remains unaltered.
Of the wicked, however, who are not corrected, what follows there is this: "If they will not hear, they will pass by the sword, and they will not be consumed by folly" (Job 36:12) — that is, they are indeed troubled, but because the Ethiopian does not change his skin, what was said above in the same book of Job about them will come to pass: "They will die, but not in wisdom" (Job 4:21).✦✦
The Grievous Folly of Despising Correction
Those so tightly bound by iniquity that neither guilt nor punishment restrains them commit a grievous folly: the more they trample God's correcting grace now, the more severely they will be judged hereafter.
Grievous indeed is the folly in those whom iniquity binds so tightly that neither guilt nor punishment restrains them. Since they despise the scourges of correction, the more they trample the grace of a greater providence here, the more severely they will be judged there.
Read the original Latin
Placuit quippe divinae providentiae praeparare in posterum bona justis, quibus non fruentur injusti, et mala impiis quibus non excrucientur boni. Ista vero temporalia bona et mala utrisque voluit esse communia, ut nec bona cupidius appetantur, quae mali quoque habere cernuntur, nec mala turpiter evitentur, quibus et boni plerumque afficiuntur. In his autem bonis prosperis vel adversis, quae nunc, ut diximus, mistim procurrunt, patientia Dei vel severitas hac dispensatione disponitur. In prosperis namque patientia fovet bonos, et ad poenitentiam invitat malos: in adversis vero severitas ad patientiam erudit bonos. Interest autem plurimum qualis sit usus vel earum rerum quae prosperae, vel earum rerum quae dicuntur adversae. Nam bonus nec temporalibus bonis extollitur, nec malis frangitur: malus autem idcirco adversitate punitur, quia felicitate corrumpitur. Interest ergo plurimum qualis sit qui affligitur. Sicut enim si unguentum et coenum pari pulsu exagitentur, hoc suaviter fragrat, illud fetidum exhalat; ita manet dissimilitudo passorum etiam in similitudinem passionum.
Et sicut sub igne aurum rutilat, palea fumat, et sub eadem tritura frumenta purgantur, paleae comminuuntur, ita communis quaelibet tribulatio bonos purificat, malos exterminat. Boni namque Deum laudant, se accusant mali, murmurant, et turbato regni statu quaelibet flagitia quanto licentius, tanto frequentius effrenatiusque patrare solent. De bonis, qui peccata sua flagellis cognoscunt, et emundant, scriptum est: Si fuerint in catenis et vinciantur funibus paupertatis, judicabit eis opera eorum, ut revertantur ab iniquitate (Job XXXVI, 8). Qui jubentis Dei verba non audiunt, verberibus ferientis admoventur, ut ad bonam vitam vel poenae trahant quos praemia non mutant: In camo et freno, inquit, maxillas eorum constringe (Psal. XXXI, 9). De malis vero qui non emendantur, illic sequitur: Si non audierint, transibunt per gladium, et non consumentur stultitia (Job XXXVI, 12), id est, tribulantur quidem, sed quia non mutat Aethiops pellem suam, fiet quod superius in eodem Job de eis dicitur, morientur, sed non in sapientia (Job IV, 21). Gravis quippe stultitia in eis est, quos iniquitas sic obligat, ut eos a culpa nec poena compescat: qui dum correptionis flagella contemnunt, necesse est ut tanto illic gravius judicentur, quanto hic majoris providentiae gratiam calcant.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Job.36.8 — And if they are bound in fetters, they are caught in cords of affliction;
- ↩Ps.31.9 — But you have not shut me up in the hand of the enemy; you have set my feet in a broad place.
- ↩Job.36.12 — But if they do not listen, they will perish by the sword, and they will die without knowledge.
- ↩Job.4.21 — Is not their tent cord pulled up within them? They die, and not in wisdom.
Notes
- 1 ↩mistim (rare form) rendered as 'in mixed fashion' — the sense is that prosperity and adversity come intermingled, not neatly sorted.
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