The Enarrations, or Expositions, on the Psalms

^7. Let your love observe: “For his soul shall be blessed in his life”. As long as he lived he did well for himself. This all men say, but say falsely. It is a blessing from the mind of the blesser, not from the truth itself. For what do you say? Because he ate and drank, because he did what he chose, because he feasted sumptuously, therefore he did well with himself. I say, he did ill for himself. Not I say, but Christ. He did ill for himself. For that rich man, when he feasted sumptuously every day, was supposed to do well with himself: but when he began to burn in hell, then that which was supposed to be well was found to be ill. For what he had eaten with men above, he digested in hell beneath. Unrighteousness I mean, brethren, on which he used to feast. He used to eat costly banquets with the mouth of flesh, with his heart's mouth he used to eat unrighteousness. What he ate with his heart's mouth with men above, this he digested amid those punishments in the places beneath. And verily he had eaten for a time, he digested ill for everlasting. Is then unrighteousness eaten? Perhaps some one says: what is it that he says? Unrighteousness eaten? It is not I that say: hear the Scripture: “As a sour grape is vexation to the teeth, and smoke to the eyes, so is unrighteousness to them that use it.” For he that shall have eaten unrighteousness, that is, he that shall have had unrighteousness wilfully, shall not be able to eat righteousness. For righteousness is bread. Who is bread? “I am the living bread which came down from heaven.” Himself is the bread of our heart....Is then even righteousness eaten? If it were not eaten, the Lord would not have said, “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness.” Therefore “since his soul shall be blessed in life,” in life it “shall” be blessed, in death it shall be tormented....

8. “He shall confess to You, when You shall have done him good.” Be not of such sort, brethren: see ye how that to this end we say these words, to this end we sing, to this end we treat, to this end toil— do not these things. Your business does prove you: sometimes in your business ye hear the truth, and you blaspheme. The Church ye blaspheme. Wherefore? Because you are Christians. “If so it be, I betake myself to Donatus's party: I will be a heathen.” Wherefore? Because you have eaten bread, and the teeth are in pain. When you saw the bread itself, you praised; you begin to eat, and the teeth are in pain; that is, when you were hearing the Word of God you praised: when it is said to you, “Do this,” you blaspheme, do not so ill: say this, “The bread is good, but I cannot eat it.” But now if you see with the eyes, you praise, when you begin to close the teeth you say, “Bad is this bread, and like him that made it.” So it comes to pass that you confess to God, when God does you good and you lie when you sing, “I will always bless God, His praise is ever in my mouth.” How always? If always gain, always He is blessed: if sometime there is loss, He is not blessed, but blasphemed. Forsooth you bless always, forsooth His praise is ever in your mouth! You will be such as just now he describes: “He will confess to You, when You shall have done him good.”

9. “He shall enter even unto the generations of his fathers”: that is, he shall imitate his fathers. For the unrighteous, that now are, have brothers, have fathers. Unrighteous men of old, are the fathers of the present; and they that are now unrighteous, are the fathers of unrighteous posterity: just as the fathers of the righteous, the righteous of old, are the fathers of the righteous that now are; and they that now are, are the fathers of them that are to be. The Holy Spirit has willed to show that righteousness is not evil when men murmur against her: but these men have their father from the beginning, even to the generation of their fathers. Two men Adam begot, and in one was unrighteousness, in one was righteousness: unrighteousness in Cain, righteousness in Abel. Unrighteousness seemed to prevail over righteousness, because Cain unrighteous slew Abel righteous in the night. Is it so in the morning? Nay, “but the righteous shall reign over them in the morning.” The morning shall come, and it shall be seen where Abel is, and where Cain. So all men who are after Cain, and so all who are after Abel, even unto the end of the world. “He shall enter even unto the generations of his fathers: even to eternity he shall not see light.” Because even when he was here, he was in darkness, taking pleasure in false goods, and not loving real goods: even so he shall go hence into hell: from the darkness of his dreams the darkness of torments shall receive him. Therefore, “even to eternity he shall not see light.”

But wherefore this? What he has written in the middle of the Psalm, the same also he has writ at the end: “Man, though he was in honour, understood not, was compared to the beasts without sense, and was made like to them”. But you, brethren, consider that you be men made after the image and likeness of God. The image of God is within, is not in the body; is not in these ears which you see, and eyes, and nostrils, and palate, and hands, and feet; but is made nevertheless: wherein is the intellect, wherein is the mind, wherein the power of discovering truth, wherein is faith, wherein is your hope, wherein your charity, there God has His Image: there at least ye perceive and see that these things pass away; for so he has said in another Psalm, “Though man walks in an image, yet he is disquieted in vain: he heaps up treasures, and knows not for whom he shall gather them.” Be not disquieted, for of whatsoever kind these things be, they are transitory, if you are men who being in honour understand. For if being men in honour ye understand not, you are compared to the beasts without sense, and are made like to them.