XLII. De Luxuria.

XLII. De Luxuria.

But the seventh image signifies luxury, which follows from despair of oneself, because after people have despaired of God's mercy, they seize luxury, in which they indulge all their pleasures, doing whatever their flesh demands in its filth. It takes on the form of a woman, because just as a woman is made to give birth, so too does luxury exist as a desire and fuel for sin. And he lies on his right side, because he supports himself with the righteousness of good and pure deeds; and through the will of the flesh, he sometimes names God, excuses himself, and sometimes claims to want to have repentance, which, however, he does not have, and thus he sins with complete confidence. From this, he bends his legs toward himself, like a man who lies idly on his bed, because he turns the strength in which he should stand upright before God into the weakness of his flesh, and he draws that strength toward himself through the power of shameful deeds, and thus he also rests sensually in his mind, saying among sensual people that he cannot refrain from the desires of his flesh. But their grins are like flames of fire, because those who live luxuriously draw their shame, which they should direct toward chastity in their minds, into the heat of lust, and they nourish the flames of a wicked fire within themselves, through which they ignite both themselves and others in depravity. And his eyes are white like chalk, because the same vice shapes the intentions of wicked people into a not pure idleness, so that they may not see anything that appears laborious, and thus they become all the more eager to follow their own desires. But slippery things are such that they can neither walk nor stand on them, because they possess a delicate pleasure and not a just mortification of the flesh in the footsteps of men, showing even such lascivious gestures in them, that they do not strive to walk in the honor of righteousness, nor to endure in them with the gentleness of stability in any way; but they walk through every base path of lust, leaping in a sublime manner, through which they often fall into the depths. And since unclean men incline themselves to the allurements of the flesh and love the filth of human pollution, assimilating themselves to base creatures, and fleeing from the heavenly purity, they are subjected to many passions of their flesh by divine judgment, because they did not wish for those things in the property of their will which they ought to have desired for good, as it is written through the Apostle Paul.