In Librum Primum Regum Variarum Expositionum Libri Sex

For there are some who seek earthly gain through avarice, but nevertheless do not turn aside after avarice: because they both desire temporal things, yet in their desire for them they avoid falling into sin. They therefore turn aside after avarice who, for the sake of earthly things which they ardently covet, do not at all fear to fall into sin. For they value their own soul as lower than every thing they are able to covet. Hence comes violent plunder, hence secret thefts are committed: because they violently oppress those over whom the avaricious prevail, and those whose property they cannot violently seize, they strive to steal from. Often, too, those whom they cannot overcome by the theft of their hands, they lie in wait for by the falsehood of their words. Whence also the sons of Samuel, by an ordered progression, are marked out in the disordered confusion of avarice, when it is said: They turned aside after avarice, they took bribes, they perverted judgment.

For those who, in order to receive bribes, perverted judgment, did not seek the obscurity of night for bringing in the theft of a coveted thing, but the darkness of reason. And it is to be noted that the ardor of avarice is the cause of receiving bribes, and the receiving of bribes is the cause of perverting judgment: so that by the prophet's narrative the depravity of this vice is shown, not only how it advances in the hearts of the reprobate, but how it can be utterly rooted out from the minds of the saints.

For if this perversity of judgment is born from the acceptance of gifts, he who does not accept gifts does not pervert judgment, and he who has utterly uprooted the root of avarice from his heart lightly spurns gifts that are offered. But we gather this fault of Samuel's sons more fully by seeing than by speaking. For if we look to the abandoned places of the Churches, where the father grows old, the sons incur the mark of avarice, of accepting a gift, and of perverted judgment: because where the person of the ruler is dissolved by shameful gain, the hearts of the subject flock are easily scattered, so that they live wickedly among themselves and offer examples of depravity to others. But it pleases us greatly to marvel at the judgments of almighty God in these matters. For the sons of Samuel, while they turn aside after avarice, while they accept gifts for the cause of perverting judgment, bestow examples of depravity on the people whom they preside over. But the people themselves, while they seek a king, cast off the sons of the prophet from the height of power. But almighty God both receives the prayers of those seeking a king and is angry that a king is sought. By these things we can certainly be disturbed, if we do not see their reason subtly. For what is more just than that he should fall by the judgment of the people, who by the reprobate judgment of his own mind so strove that the people following him should perish? But nevertheless, when priests live badly, they are not to be judged by laymen. Worthily, therefore, they receive a more unworthy one, who unworthily presumed to cast out an unworthy one. For of the sons of Samuel it is said: They accepted gifts, and perverted judgments.

But concerning that king whom the sons of Israel request, very terrible threats are brought forth, because it is said: He will take your fields and your olive groves, and give them to his servants (1 Samuel 8:14). And what wise man would not consider that it is more wicked to take away fields and vineyards by public violence than to change a judgment under the pretext of truth in order to receive gifts? This fault is covered by a certain shamefacedness, overshadowed by modesty. But that fault is seen to be so much the more wicked, the more openly and atrociously it is perpetrated. But we have not yet come to discussing those times of the kingdom in which these evils are described even according to the letter. Therefore, while we speak of our juxtaposed topic concerning the chosen and good king, it seems useful that we should also subtly consider how the right of the king, which is foretold, can be understood in a good sense. For if it did not show something good spiritually, it would by no means be said in this sacred history: Samuel spoke to the people the law of the kingdom, and wrote it in a book and laid it up before the Lord (1 Samuel 10:25).

What is it that the sons of the Israelites are said to be placed in the chariots of the king? But the chariots of the prelates of holy Church are their devout desires. For while they eagerly reach for heavenly joys, they are borne as if in chariots through the heights. Hence it is that Elijah is declared to have been lifted up into heaven in his chariot (2 Kings 2:1): because surely he cannot be raised up to heavenly joys who does not seek them through lofty and fervent desires. When, therefore, good hearers begin, through the examples of preachers, to despise earthly things and to love eternal things, the sons of the Israelites are assuredly placed in the chariots of kings. And it must be noted that they are said both to be taken up and to be placed in chariots: because they ought first to be drawn away from carnal desires, so that they may be able to be well set aflame with the fires of heavenly love. And these earthly desires, because they are not easily abandoned, the sons are said to be taken up. For it must come about through great violence that the chosen hearer utterly forsakes earthly desires and raises himself sublimely to heavenly things. Of this violence, indeed, the Lord says: The kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force (Matthew 11:12). Of this Paul says: No one will be crowned unless he has competed lawfully (2 Timothy 2:5). This too is subtly shown by these words, that the sons who are taken up are said to be placed not in seats but in chariots. For in ancient times men were accustomed to fight from a chariot. But he who is said to be in a chariot is borne on high and terrible against the enemy.

For chosen men are by so much more sublime and more terrible to the hidden enemies, by how much they have advanced higher through the loftiness of inward love. They are sublime, indeed, because the suggestion of malignant spirits does not reach even to their intention. They are terrible also, because they can the more easily reject their counsels, the more they stand firm in the contemplation of supernal joy through the vigor of the inmost affection. This, indeed, as often as it is said to those who are still carnal, the goodness of pious threats is shown to them. Which is such as if he were to say: Because you seek the role of virtue, you cannot be at leisure for a life of ease under its discipline. Wherefore both the horsemen of the king and the persecutors of the royal chariots are said to be made tribunes and centurions. All these things, indeed, belong to earthly warfare. Therefore, when they are proclaimed to be made horsemen, and persecutors of chariots, tribunes, and centurions, they are stirred up to every exercise of war. They are horsemen, indeed, when in the strength of the spirit the flowing pleasures of their flesh are restrained, and they dominate all alluring motions with great power. For he is carried as upon a lofty horse, who, set over his flesh through the good of chastity, free and swift, can both escape the enemy when he disdains to fight and attack when he deigns to. By this very thing, indeed, that he has learned to preside well, he has received such great increases of virtue that the enemy cannot withstand the onset of the rushing horseman, as it were.

And because they follow the examples of the chosen Fathers in the strength of their virtue, they are persecutors of the king's chariots. For the king's chariots are the good examples of the chosen preacher. In them, indeed, he is shown both fighting and triumphing, because when we look upon the holy works of the preacher, we see him truly sublime both in the struggle of the contest and in the power of triumph. But those oppressed by carnal desires can see him in his chariots, yet they cannot pursue his chariots. For like foot-soldiers on level ground, they are sluggish for the race, weak for the conflict. Therefore, that they may be able to pursue the king's chariots, let them first become horsemen, let them trample earthly desires, let them rule over their flesh, let them shine with the armor of chastity. Then indeed we can run after the chosen Fathers in spiritual conflict, by so much more fittingly as, through that which we laudably undertake for ourselves, we powerfully strike down the ranks of hidden enemies. But if, as many manuscripts have it, we read not "persecutors" but "forerunners," it is not devoid of good understanding. For he is a forerunner of the king's chariots who praises the examples of the just in word. He ought, to be sure, to be a horseman, because he is a reprobate praiser who proclaims the lofty life and teaching of the saints but by no means takes care to imitate it with a sublime purpose. But he who knows how to set before others the life and teaching of others for imitation already begins, indeed, to be a master of the spiritual warfare. Well, therefore, is it added: (1 Kings

VIII, 12. And he will appoint for himself tribunes and centurions.

They are tribunes when they begin; centurions when they are perfected in spiritual teaching. For, as we said above, a centurion is named from the number one hundred. Tribunes can also be understood as spiritual men, simple in knowledge but inflamed with love of God and neighbor. Although they do not know how to speak of high spiritual things, nevertheless through the examples of the elect that they do know, they strive to ascend, as far as they are able, to the love of the Creator. A tribe is indeed called a kinship or a curia. If, then, those who bring forth the examples of the saints for the progress of their neighbors are called tribunes from "tribe," they are named tribunes. To destroy our rusticity, they come as it were a curia, when they set before us those things through which holy men pleased almighty God. And when they expound the particular virtues of very many saints, they open to us, as it were, the nobility of spiritual kinships. Centurions, therefore, can be understood as more perfect men, who, while they profit well under the teaching of preachers, become their hearers and co-workers. Of these indeed the Lord says in the Gospel: Every scribe instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like a man, a father of a household, who brings forth from his treasure new things and old (Matthew 13:52). Such men are not only outstanding in action, but also learned in the knowledge of the word of God.

Hence they can the more usefully exhort those near them to the conflict of spiritual warfare, the more they show forth in the work of virtue the lofty things they know how to preach. They have words in teaching, they have works for the examples of the simple: so that the wise may understand the lofty things they speak, and those who do not see the secrets of words in their inmost hearts may imitate the works they see outwardly. Centurions, then, are appointed when by perfection of virtue they attain the summit of dignity: so that they may live sublimely, and the more highly they live, the more usefully they may teach.

But those who are centurions, when they order the times of war, ought to advance: so that they may be known to bear the fruits of peace as well. After tribunes, then, and centurions, they become plowmen of fields and reapers of crops; so that they may now open the hearts of the conquered with the plowshare of exhortation, from which they may reap more abundantly the wheat of good works. As it were, in peace they now plow, who stir up to the practice of works of piety those hearts that had conquered spiritual assaults. And they reap crops when they rejoice that chosen works have burst forth from the seed of the divine word, which they had scattered in the hearts of their hearers. For as it were they reap wheat from the field with sickles, when in the embrace of charity they receive that from the heavenly conversation by which they may be satisfied with inner devotion.

But as long as we live in this life, we possess nothing in peace. For since the ancient enemy always opposes those who do good, we must always defend the good that we do. Therefore it is rightly said that after the plowmen of the fields and the reapers of the crops, they are made craftsmen of years and of the king's chariots. They fashion arms and chariots, so that they may defend the very fields they cultivate and the crops they reap. For they fashion a chariot, that they may be swift to meet the adversaries; and arms, that they may be strong. They mount the chariot, indeed, that with great force they may shatter the camps of demons; and they carry arms, that they may destroy those they attack. For in this lofty height of the chariot stood he who said: Our conversation is in heaven. Hence also, now secure, he who appeared superior to all his enemies, affirming, said: No creature will be able to separate us from the love of Christ. But he who had mounted the chariot held arms; hence he also explains, saying: I therefore so run, not as in uncertainty: so I fight, not as one beating the air, but I chastise my body and bring it into subjection. What, then, is more rightly expressed in this chariot than the loftiness of right intention? To fashion a chariot, therefore, is to raise up in the minds of hearers the height of right intention.

For those who receive the ministry of preaching through the examples of better men build chariots after the study of the plow and the harvest, when they teach their subjects who act well that from all the good works they do they should await only the eternal rewards of recompense. To despise earthly things, to desire no transitory things, to love eternal things, and to hasten toward them with great desires—this is already to preside over a lofty chariot. Of these chariots, surely, it is said through the Psalmist: The chariot of God is multiplied ten thousandfold, thousands of those rejoicing; the Lord is in them. But their arms are sharp counsels, with which they strike the enemy all the more powerfully the more quickly they detect his cunning. Hence that mighty man, as if armed, was saying: We are not ignorant of his devices. He was also making arms when he said: And the shield of faith, with which you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one, and the helmet of salvation; take up also the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Placed in those chariots and arms, the elect are swift and powerful. Swift indeed: because while they desire spiritual things, they detect spiritual wickednesses in a moment.

But they are powerful: because while they desire the highest things more ardently, whatever is suggested to them from the lowest love of the world they count as nothing; and as a chariot weighed down, they have a great charge against the enemy, who, full of holy virtues and sharp counsels, destroy in a moment all the temptations that are brought in. Nor is it foreign to this sense that a chariot, while it rolls over the earth, lifts its lower part upward and presses its upper part downward. So indeed also the right intention of holy men, while from earthly things that it does, it expects heavenly things, directs to the highest the part that it drags beneath the earth. And because it humbles itself in the sight of the Creator as much from good work as from the expectation of eternal reward, it plunges, as it were, to the earth the part that it lifts upward. For in its wheels our chariot is continually rolled, if from good work we always intend eternal things, and from every height of our progress we take care to be humble. These indeed are the king's arms and chariot, when they are seen to differ in no way from the form and doctrine of the holy Church of preachers. Therefore the elect preachers fashion chariot and arms, when they teach their hearers to hasten to the heavenly fatherland, both by the rectitude of intention and by the fortification of virtue. But all these things that we have shown in the progress of one, nothing hinders if we understand them distributed through themselves in many.

We have shown that the elect, advancing through the steps of the virtues, are first placed in chariots; then they are appointed as horsemen and forerunners of the royal four-horse chariots; they are established as tribunes, centurions, plowmen, and reapers; and finally they become makers of weapons. But because holy Church uses the diverse ministries of the elect, whoever wishes can attribute the individual gifts of graces to the individual ranks, so that each gift belongs to those who are more closely bound to its affections.

What then is it that he adds: that the daughters of the Israelites will be perfumers, and cooks, and bakers? But by the name of daughters, sometimes weakness, sometimes fruitfulness is designated. What then are the daughters of the Israelites, if not chosen minds, prepared for the conception of the divine word? These become the king's perfumers: because while they advance by the instruction of their preacher, they receive in themselves the abundant grace of the Holy Spirit, through which they can healthfully heal the contrite of heart. They also become cooks: because while they are full of the fervor of the Holy Spirit, by their example they kindle the hearts of their neighbors into the love of the Creator. They become bakers when they refresh chosen minds with the nourishment of the word of God. The daughters, then, become perfumers when they cure the wounds of sins. They become cooks when, with hearts cleansed from the filth of sins, they inflame them to the zeal of good work by the example of their virtue.

They are truly bread-makers when, for those advancing by examples, they no longer set forth examples but bring out words of profound knowledge, so that, as if fed on solid food, they act all the more strongly in proportion as, now spiritually instructed, they desire eternal things more fervently. It follows: (Verse 14.) Your fields also, and vineyards, and your best olive groves he will take away, and give to his servants.

What are the fields, what the vineyards, what the olive groves that are taken from us by the right of prelates? But the holy preachers, when they speak for the correction of sinners, reprove the delights of the flesh, the desires of the mind, and the pretenses of good works. For if the delights of the flesh were not fields of iniquitous possession, the Apostle would by no means say: He who sows in the flesh will reap corruption from the flesh (Gal. 6:8). To sow in the flesh is, indeed, to bury the mind's purpose in the pleasures of the body. These certainly reap corruption from the flesh, because at the resurrection of the elect they by no means receive the renewal of eternal incorruption. By the name of vineyards, likewise, the desires of the mind are rightly figured, because they inebriate the hearts of the reprobate and estrange them from the knowledge of the truth. Censuring the fruit of this vineyard, Moses says: From the vineyard of Sodom is their vineyard, and from the suburbs of Gomorrah: their grape is a grape of gall, and their cluster most bitter (Deut. 32:31). For he draws the vine from the vineyard of Sodom and the shoot from Gomorrah who fills the mind with most abominable desires.

For he makes, as it were, a vineyard, who on that account forgets eternal things, from which he is also made drunk through desires; and he who refreshes himself as if under the shade of a vineyard and the pleasantness of depraved delight prepares for himself the recompense of eternal fire. Hence, most aptly expounding the fruit of that same vineyard, he called it the grape of gall and the cluster of bitterness. For the grape is in the sight, the gall in the taste: delighting the sight, embittering the taste; because, to be sure, what it desires is exceedingly pleasing to the reprobate mind, but in eternal punishment what is now sweet to itself becomes bitter. The king, therefore, takes away our fields, when the chosen preacher by his speaking withdraws the joyful motions of our flesh in delight. He takes away vineyards, when he cuts off utterly from our heart the desires that make drunk. He takes away olive groves as well, when he censures the works of false mercy, when by rightly exhorting he suggests that there is no merit of a work unless it proceeds from the purpose of a good intention.

But it must be asked very carefully why they are said to be given to the king's servants. For if these things are rightly taken away from us, who then are they to whom they are not undeservedly assigned? Yet if we inquire into this subtly, we find that our great holy preachers are in their own realms. Who, then, are these servants, except those of whose head the Lord says to blessed Job: Will you take him as a servant forever (Job 40:23)? For malignant spirits are servants of holy men; but in this life they are servants for a time, in that life truly servants forever. For daily they bring in that by which holy men are crowned. For when from the battle of this life the victory of eternal glory is offered to us, those who renew against us those wars by which we are led to eternal rest plainly render us great services. They are also servants of the victors, as the Truth testifies: By whatever a man is overcome, of that he is made a servant (2 Peter 2:19). For while they stir up battles against those who are to conquer, they serve those who are crowned thereby, since for a time they powerfully sustain their battles. But because what profits the glory of the saints increases for malignant spirits an increase of damnation, the field, and vineyards, and olive groves taken away are assigned to the old man. Indeed, for all their malice demons will be punished in eternal penalty. In the conflict of hidden struggle, when the elect conquer, the evils which they repel they assign to their enemies: because these, like gold in the furnace (Wisdom

they are approved (III, 6), those are punished for their reprobate suggestion. Therefore the servants receive fields, vineyards, and olive groves: because when sinners return to life through the preaching of teachers, this also contributes to the accumulation of the demons' damnation, in that the penitent were for so long held back by their deceit in past guilt. These things are also given to the servants when sinners, converted to the Lord by the office of the preacher, recognize that they were held in the love of past crimes by the deceit of demons.

But what is it that the crops and the revenues of the vineyards are said to be tithed and given to the eunuch servants of the king? But the crops of the elect are tithed when we gather their more excellent works, so as to bring them forth as an example for the faithful. In short, there was one alone who had in himself the fullness of all virtues, into whom the whole fullness of divinity poured itself bodily (Col 1:19). But we, because we have all received of his fullness, possess the gifts of graces divided among us in parts. Hence Paul says: To one indeed through the Spirit is given the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge, to another kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of speeches, to another faith in the same Spirit, to another the working of virtues, to another prophecy, to another the discerning of spirits (1 Cor 12:8). But by the number ten, because it is perfect, we tithe the virtues, when we gather the gifts of individual elect, which the lesser ones may imitate. For of Moses it is written: that he was the meekest above all men of the earth (Num.

XII, 3). Of Abraham too it is said: Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him unto justice (Gen. XV, 6). When, therefore, we wish to imitate meekness together with faith, it is necessary that from the example of Moses and Abraham, as it were choice harvests, portions be set aside for the refreshment of our mind. So indeed without doubt preachers bring forward the chastity of Joseph (Gen. XXXIX, 8), the patience of Job (Job I, 21), the zeal of Phinehas (Num. XXV, 7) as an example for us: because while they show forth the virtues of the perfect, they gather as it were the tithes of choice harvests, which they may set before those who are making good progress. Hence also it is well foretold that the same tithes of fruits are given to eunuchs and servants. For eunuchs are those who by the strength of the mind have crushed within themselves all the fuel of lust. Of these indeed the Lord says in the Gospel: There are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven (Matt. XIX, 12). Servants are those who still serve the pursuits of the active life under another's care, and cannot yet go forth free to the height of charity. These also are found in Moses to be bound to serve their masters for six years (Exod. XXI, 2), so that in the seventh they may go out free: because without doubt they ought first to be perfect in work, so that they may be able to go forth in due order into the height of contemplation. To eunuchs, therefore, and to servants the teacher gives the tithes of the harvests, when those who in the purity of chastity are obedient to him follow the chosen works of their betters.

He also assigns tithes of vineyards, when he shows with what wondrous charity our fathers loved God and neighbor, so that they too may strive to be filled with the abundance of that same charity, and, as it were drunk and forgetful of the past, may love only what is to come, and not fail to run fervently toward it.

But after all these things, the male and female servants of the Israelites, the choicest young men, are foretold as being taken up and placed in the king's work. Who are the servants of carnal men, if not those who, by the example of the wicked, have been so depraved by long habit that they seem to have forever submitted the neck of the mind to the yoke of the most wicked imitation? The servants of these, then, are taken up when, by the zeal of the elect preachers, even those abandon their sins who seemed to be vehemently subject to the reprobate imitation of carnal men. These are also called the choicest young men. They are young men indeed, because they are strong in evil; they are also called choicest, because they are more wicked than the other sinners. To these, surely, it is said through the prophet: Woe to you who are mighty to drink wine, and strong men to mix drunkenness (Isa. 5:22). Finally, they drink wine who, by the deliberation of the mind, hastily receive the fervor of concupiscence, and they mix drunkenness, because while they are inflamed by the ardors of their desires, with reason lost, they do not know how to return to the paths of uprightness. They are mighty and strong both for drinking and for mixing drunkenness, so that on account of their fervent resolve in evil they are taught to be, as it were, the choicest servants.

The divine word likewise shows these to be the best of young men, when it sets forth the devil's greed, saying: His food is choice (Habakkuk 1:16). For the ancient enemy is greatly refreshed in the wickedness of those who are more wicked than the most wicked.

But by the name of maidservants is designated that most wicked condition of sinners, who through iniquity are utterly depraved, and who furnish examples of depravity to others. For just as maidservants give birth to servants, so these are not only workers of great iniquity but also its mothers. But because by the preaching of the saints even such as these are converted, who afterward render great services to almighty God, they are fittingly said to be servants and maidservants taken away and set to the king's work. Did not the King of kings then take a maidservant, when he said of that great sinner: Her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much (Luke 7:47)? And he set her to his work when he entered the village, and she received him into her house (Luke 10:38). He set her also to his work, because, rising from the dead, he entrusted to her the preaching of his resurrection (Mark 16:7). He took a servant too, when he called Matthew from the profit of the tax office to follow him. Him also he set to his work, because he provided him a banquet in his house, and made him a preacher to Ethiopia, the Evangelist of a converted world (Matthew 9; Mark 1; Luke 5, 17).

Therefore, because through the ministry of preachers these also return to the Lord, whose salvation human thought could have despaired of, they are rightly described as male and female servants and the best of young men to be placed in the king's work.

By the name of servants and female servants, the motions of the heart and affections can be understood. For when they suggest reprobate things to us, they are servants; when the affections of the mind desire to be subjected to the suggestions of depraved motions, they are female servants. Then indeed it is necessary that through the rigor of our purpose we exercise lordship over both. Preachers take our male and female servants when they instruct the motions of our hearts and our affections, how they are to be directed to God's service. They place them in the king's work when we now perform that same service of God Almighty which we have learned by their teaching. Why also are the lascivious motions of the soul figured more aptly in asses? But they are placed in the king's work when that mind which was accustomed to be stirred to lasciviousness by depraved thoughts makes progress through the preaching of the teacher, and places its affections in the desire of imitating chastity. By the name of male and female servants and of asses, those who strongly render bodily obedience to secular men can be designated. But they are placed in the king's work because, converted to the service of God Almighty, they endure spiritual things for eternal recompense all the more devoutly as they more clearly recognize that they were enduring great things without fruit.

The king is also said to tithe the flocks, because whoever desires to please almighty God must be pure through innocence and intent on the pursuit of good works. By the one, indeed, he is a good tree; by the other he also bears fruit. But because we make use of many things so that we may be able to preserve innocence and display good works, those very throngs of innocent thoughts are our flocks. What then is it that they are tithed, except that the subtlety of thoughts is not easily seen? For often we think we are thinking good things which, when subtly examined, are not good. The flocks, then, ought to be tithed, so that only that which is contained in the number ten may be of the king's right. This is done well in us when, by the teaching of our preachers, we learn to be perfect not only in the display of works but also in the examination of thought. Finally, it is said: (Verse 17.) And you shall be servants to him.

So that they may know themselves subject to his authority in such a way that they dare not pass over his commandments. The Lord surely wished to establish this royal dominion when he said: Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven (Matt. 16:19). He also demanded this power from his subjects when he said: If anyone has preached to you anything other than what I have preached to you, let him be anathema (Gal. 1:8). Hence again the Lord, sending his disciples out to preach, says: Whoever hears you hears me; and whoever despises you despises me (Luke 10:16). Hence the Lord says to the same disciples concerning the preachers of Judea: Whatever they say to you, do (Matt. 23:3). We are therefore servants of our kings when we are so subject to the command of our prelates that we presume to do nothing apart from their authority. Since, then, they preside over those who strengthen their virtues in the power of obedience, it is said at the end of the royal law: And you shall be servants to him: so that the faithful subjects may then also recognize that they ought to be subject to the precept of preachers, when through progress in virtues they are led to the heights of perfection. This too the Truth himself, teaching his disciples in the same words, says: When you have done all these things, say: We are unprofitable servants (Luke 17:10). Yet, because he was speaking these things to carnal people, he added, saying: (Verse

18.) And you will cry out in that day because of your king, and the Lord will not hear you in that day, because you asked for a king for yourselves.

Those who had asked for a king cry out because of the face of the king, when those who had vowed to lead a spiritual life under a good ruler attempt to abandon the labors of that same life. Indeed, all are known by their face. The face of the king, then, is the well-known manner of life and the teaching of a good preacher. These, surely, because they do hard and harsh things for the sake of eternal life and command hard things, carnal subjects try not to imitate but to flee their life and doctrine. For then they see the face of the king, they who had asked for a king, whose appearance they did not know, because in their prelate they consider how laborious is the strictness of the heavenly journey, which they had desired as though it were an easy thing before they knew it. Then they cry out because of the face of the king, they who asked for a king, because while they are unwilling to abandon the custom of the carnal life, they strive to escape the praiseworthy imitation of their own excellent shepherd, whom they wished to preside over them. And because with a blind heart they cannot see the light, they cry out to the Lord, that is, they beseech the Lord that they may escape the spiritual yoke of God. But the Lord does not hear them in that day. What is that day, when the reprobate subjects beseech the Lord, except the intention of vain prosperity? They are not heard, because by divine grace it never happens that the subjection once promised to good rulers can freely go out to the delights of the world.

Therefore he also added the reason, saying: (Verse 18.) For you have asked for a king for yourselves.

As if to say: The subjection promised to spiritual pastors is indissoluble. You easily ask for a king for yourselves, but because royal dignity is burdensome, you cannot easily escape their power. Since we say this with reference to history, we judge it should be noted that almighty God, when he foretells the right of a king, bestows a pattern of instruction upon religious superiors. Why? So that those who command the narrowest way of life may not easily grant access to those newly approaching. Therefore also the best teacher of that same narrowest life, the learned disciple of the highest truth, instructs, saying: Test the spirits, whether they are from God (1 John 4:2). And again: Let hard and harsh things be announced to him, through which one goes to God, so that he may know what he is entering. Therefore the Lord proclaims the right of a king; let him speak, let him know all things, what sort of carnal men they will be in observing him; and so that the weak may not easily approach the life of virtue, let strong superiors by no means easily accept the weak. Indeed, the swiftness of conversion often arises from the precipitation of counsel, not from an increase of devotion. For when the weak promise strong things, it is not the tested strength of the mind, but the confusion of discernment. All these the wise man admonishes under the designation of one, who says: Do not lift a burden upon yourself.

Those, therefore, who preside over others in the strong purpose of the regular life ought to receive those converted to that same life with as much discretion as it is also more useful to know beforehand whether the petition of those approaching comes from the virtue of the mind or from the precipitation of the will. For those who are easy in their own actions are accustomed to eagerly desire the harshness of the spiritual life, so that they may seem to desire with great virtue of mind what they seek. (Verses 10, 20.) But the people were unwilling to hear the voice of Samuel, and they said: By no means, but a king shall be over us, and we also shall be like all the nations, and our king shall judge us, and shall go out before us, and shall fight our battles for us.

Because this was expounded at length above, we are kept idle in their inquiry. It follows: (Verse 21.) And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he spoke them in the ears of the Lord.

18. To hear the voice of the people is what those seeking the habit of holy conversation say they acknowledge outwardly. For we hear, as it were, only the voice of those approaching, when we know what they assert outwardly; but we do not see what sort they will be among the assertions of their promise. We ought, therefore, to speak these things in the ears of the Lord, so that he himself may receive the words of the promise: who, while he hears the words, examines the hearts, and from the texture of their setting out, seeks the interest of robust work. For let the minds of our novices hear this and tremble: namely, that what they say to us, we speak in the ears of the Lord.

For what they promise in our presence, we offer to God, so that he may now hold from our hands what he examines. Indeed, this freedom of the ruler is the obligation of the subject, because one is subjected to a stricter sentence the more openly one can know that for what one answers, one must render an account to almighty God. When, therefore, we offer to God the things that the novices promise, we give to him, as it were, the written bond that they make to us. And because this is done secretly, Samuel is said to have spoken in the ears of the Lord the things that the people had said. For we speak in the ears of friends when we conceal from outsiders the things we say. It follows: (Verse) And the Lord said to Samuel: Hear their voice, and set a king over them.

Above, the prophet, foreseeing future things, said: You will cry out to the Lord, and he will not hear, because you have asked for a king for yourselves. But now the Lord says: Hear their voice and set a king over them (1 Kings 8:18). What is shown to us by this, except that often good rulers of holy Church are divinely inspired to subject to the pursuits of the heavenly life those who afterward are not devout under the discipline of that same profession? They will certainly afterward cry out from the face of the king, and yet by divine command they receive a king, because those are divinely inspired to approach the service of God devoutly whom, for the increase of eternal reward, the solicitude of pastors must restrain by great labor under the bond of that same service.

They are said, of course, to cry out to the Lord from the face of their king; but let the kings themselves hear what the prophet sent by the Lord answers, so that amid those very cries they may know what they ought to do. He says: I will not hear you. Therefore neither ought they themselves to hear. For those who are lukewarm in the holy monasteries are to be healed as the sick, not cast out as the dead. For if they have been sent by the Lord, they will recover among the warm applications of spiritual ointments. Let the Lord therefore say: Appoint a king over them; because assuredly some come to the service of God as devoted men, who are even allowed to grow cold, but by the zeal of the shepherds, to whose command they had submitted themselves by divine inspiration, they grow warm again to the love of the heavenly fatherland. But now he sets forth what sort of shepherd is fit for these things, saying: There was a man of Benjamin, by name Kish, the son of Abiel, the son of Zeror, the son of Bechorath, the son of Aphiah, the son of a man of Benjamin, mighty in strength. And he had a son by the name of Saul, chosen and good, and there was no man of Israel better than he; from his shoulder and upward he stood out above all the people.

What is it that, when a king is to be appointed, the names of fathers are proclaimed, unless it is that he is unworthily assumed to the leadership of the holy Church who does not hold the nobility of the holy Fathers in his conduct? But six names of fathers are assigned, so that the perfection of their holy way of life in good action may be designated. For in six days the world was founded, and it is completed in six ages. Six fathers, then, are named in the order of the genealogy of the elect shepherds of the holy Church, because without doubt those are their sons by imitation who obtain the summit of perfection in the form of those who follow. But the father of the king, Cis, is called, that is, hard, because surely those whose imitators the holy preachers are have not been slack in life and zeal. For they are hard, because they do not speak soft things to sinners; they are hard also because, in order to correct others well, they demonstrate in their own conduct the hard things they command them. For he seemed hard who rebuked the Jews, saying: You offspring of vipers, who showed you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruits worthy of repentance (Matt. 3:7). But he who was hard to others was not slack to himself. For in order to show that the Evangelist held the hardness of repentance that he preached, it says: He had a garment of camel's hair, and was girded about his loins with a leathern belt; but his food was locusts and wild honey (Mark 1:6).

It is also said to Ezekiel: Behold, I have made your face harder than their faces, and I have given your face as adamant and flint (Ezek. 3:8). But he who came so hard against the hard in evil, so as to show that he would speak hard things that were to come, wept for seven days in the midst of them before he spoke. For thus he says: And I sat where they sat, and I remained seven days mourning in the midst of them. Therefore, because holy preachers are not gentle and meek toward obstinate sinners, and they practice what they preach as harsh, the son of Saul is rightly called hard. For the chosen preacher ought to imitate those who both preach sharp things and observe what they speak. Hence it is added concerning the same king's father: Mighty in strength. There are some within the holy Church who are strong in elation and arrogance. For they do great things; but when men cease to praise the great things they do, they themselves cease to do those same great things. He is therefore mighty in strength who has the virtue that he shows in good work from the Holy Spirit. Concerning this strength, Anna prophesied above in her song, saying: The weak have been girded with strength. Concerning this the Lord promises to his disciples, saying: Sit in the city until you are clothed with power from on high (Luke 24:49). In this strength he walked strongly of whom it is written: Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee (Luke 4:14).

Therefore he who is called hard is declared strong in might, because the elect, when they preach the highest things, demonstrate great things; and everything high that they command, and everything great that they do, they accomplish in the power of the Holy Spirit. Concerning this it is fittingly added: And he had a son named Saul, chosen and good. For whoever is an imitator of such men is useful not only for the labor of ministry but also fit for the fruit of inheritance. Indeed, Judas also was chosen for ministry, but because he was not good, he lost the right of succession. Therefore what is signified in Saul, still chosen and good, except the chosen imitators of the holy Fathers, who are useful to others through teaching and to themselves through their manner of life—who can so rule others that they by no means cease to provide for themselves? For they are chosen and good because they seek the gains of others in such a way that they suffer no losses of their own. For they are full in themselves and overflowing to others, and from their abundance they give to others in such a way that they lose nothing of their own fullness. They have what they may offer to others, but possessing what can suffice for themselves, they offer it to no one. Thus they strive to offer oil to others in such a way that the fuel of their light is not cut off from them, so that while they illuminate others they do not extinguish themselves. Rightly, therefore, is he called chosen and good, because certainly whoever takes up the governance of the holy Church ought to be rich, both adorned with spiritual gifts and with a fullness of merits.

And because those who are to be chosen to excel must be taken from the common order, it follows: And there was none better than he among the children of Israel. His excellence is indeed commended when it is added: From the shoulder and upward he stood out above all the people. For by this kind of bodily form, in the person of the one to be ordained as high priest, the deeds of virtue are prefigured. For what is designated by the shoulder but fortitude? But he who stood out from the shoulder and upward above all the people was of such lofty stature that, though he was taller than the people, he reached with his head up to the shoulder of the king; while the future king surpassed the height of all by neck and head. But what are heads but the minds of the subject people? And when these are stretched out greatly, do they not reach to the shoulder of the king who is to be ordained? Because he who is sought to rule the height of holy Church ought to be of such perfection that whatever the people wish to set before themselves as a good work, he ought to demonstrate in his own conduct. For the heads of the people, as it were, touch the shoulder of the king when their hearts find whatever virtue they seek in their shepherd. But the king excels by neck, he excels also by head. For what is designated by the neck but speech, and what by the head but the contemplation of the mind? Therefore by head and neck he excels the heads of all his subjects, if he is wonderful in the height of contemplation and in the sublimity of doctrine. For he is, as it were, lofty by head when he contemplates those things concerning the heavenly secrets which others cannot contemplate.

He also has a neck above others, who by the height of his speech is wonderful and cannot be equalled by others. For he lifts up his head as it were on high, who said: I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. I know such a man, whether in the body or out of the body, I know not, God knows (2 Cor. 12:1-2). But as an elect and good king, to show that he holds even his neck above all things, he says: He heard secret words, which it is not lawful for a man to speak (ibid., 4). But why do we marvel at his neck as it were eminent in the things he kept silent? Let us equal him, if we can, in the things he said. From the neck of the apostle Paul his epistles proceeded, and though from that time wise men have begun to expound them, they still strive to know better the things he said. And while they profit daily in his teaching, as it were leaning upon the summit of his neck, they can by no means reach it. Let the king therefore be eminent in neck, eminent in head, lofty in shoulder; so that he may be perfect in conduct, wonderful in speech, and, before others, exalted in the citadel of contemplation. But he who is great in conduct, outstanding in speech, and raised above all in contemplation, before he comes to the summit of governance, ought to have outwardly the signs of brotherly charity: namely, so to have solicitude for his neighbors as to seek the gain of souls for eternal life. Well then, in the figure of these, it is added: (Verse

3, 4. Now the asses of Kish, Saul's father, had been lost; and Kish said to Saul his son: Take one of the servants with you, and arise and go, and seek the asses. And when they had passed through mount Ephraim, and through the land of Salisa, and had not found them, they passed also through the land of Salim, and they were not there, and through the land of Jemini, and they did not find them at all.

Kish, who is called hard, signifies not only his elect but even the Redeemer himself. For no one has stood forth harder to himself than he. For the prophet, hinting at the harshness of this hardness, says: Surely he has borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows. For to die is not to suffer for mortals; to suffer belongs to a condemned nature capable of suffering. He therefore stood forth vehemently hard to himself, who had nothing in himself from which to suffer; but in order to free us by suffering, he both could and worthily assumed that in which he might be hard to himself and suffer. The asses of Kish are sinful souls. Because they are also regenerated in faith in the Redeemer, they are said to be hard; but the asses that were lost, because through uncleanness they are separated from his service. Hence it is that, hastening to his passion, he sat upon the ass that was loosed, and upon the colt: to show plainly that he had come to suffer for this purpose, that he might come to the aid of sinners. For he declared that he was seeking the asses that were perishing, when he said: The Son of man came to seek and to save that which was lost.

He both sought these asses himself and still sends preachers to seek them. So Kish says to his son to seek the asses, when the Redeemer commands the hearts of the elect by spiritual inspiration to set out in the ministry of preaching. But those setting out in the office of preaching, because they ought to bring with them only the spiritual understanding, are ordered to take one of the servants. For he takes one servant who, while he sets out to provide a model of living for others, is spiritual in everything he does. For he took one of the servants of whom it was foretold: He himself will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah (Luke 1:17). He had taken one servant with him who says: We have not received the spirit of this world, but the Spirit who is from God (1 Cor 2:12). Hence again he says: We have the mind of Christ (ibid., 16). Hence through Ezekiel it is said of the holy living creatures: Wherever the impulse of the spirit was, there they went (Ezek 1:12). Therefore, seeking the asses, he takes one of the servants: when he who newly begins to seek the gain of souls disposes to do everything he thinks he is doing spiritually. But to find the asses is to see sinners converted in the light of holiness. For as if lost asses they are not found, when reprobate hearts bury themselves in the darkness of sins.

And because through the five senses of the body they fall into the same darkness of sins, they are sought in five regions where they cannot be found, namely the mountain of Ephraim, the land of Shalisha, and Shalim, and the land of the Benjamites, and Zuph. For each person, where he is cast down by sin, there he is hidden; and as one lost, it is not known where he is, when he abandons the light of righteousness in which God placed him. Hence it is that in paradise after sin He seeks the first man, saying: Adam, where are you? As if to say: Because I do not find you in the light in which I placed you, show me where you have placed yourself. Hence too He asks concerning the dead Lazarus, saying: Where have you laid him? But him whom He was seeking as one lost, in order to find him He commanded to come forth, saying: Lazarus, come out. Man, therefore, is lost when he sins; he is found when he declares his sin against himself, now by repenting. For because it is commanded to the sinner through the sacred Scriptures: Declare your iniquities first, that you may be justified: when he who sinned begins to be justified by confessing, he is now seen in the light, where he is now found to be placed. But Saul, who, seeking the she-asses, did not find them, designates the person of a learned preacher, but of one newly beginning. Whom indeed almighty God does not permit to bring forth the fruit of preaching, lest he esteem the conversion of sinners as something cheap, while he can easily convert them to the Lord.

Therefore conversion is delayed so that those who are converted may be loved; and the preacher loves them the more abundantly the more clearly he sees that he cannot quickly win them. But when holy men cannot convert others by their preaching, they begin to fear greatly for themselves, lest in that very matter they displease almighty God in which they thought they greatly pleased him; and it often happens that the hearts of new preachers are so terrified that they already resolve to abandon the office of preaching itself and to devote themselves to God through silence. Therefore it is also added: (Verse 5.) But when he had come into the land of Zuph and had not found them, Saul said to his servant: Come, let us return, lest perhaps my father has let the asses go and is anxious about us.

He resolves to return to the father who, setting aside the intention of preaching, desires to devote himself to God in the secrecy of silence. For he is said to return who is first reported to have been sent. For sons are, as it were, in the presence of their father when chosen men linger in the secret contemplation of the Redeemer. They return, then, when from the public work of holy preaching they come to search out the joys of eternal brightness. But because holy men do nothing without counsel, Saul consulted the servant about returning to the father. For then we consult the servant when with an attentive mind we take care that what we attempt to arrange ought not to differ from spiritual understanding.

For he had resolved to return to the father, who said: I said, I will keep my ways, that I may not sin with my tongue: I set a guard on my mouth, when the sinner stood against me (Ps. 38:1, 2). He stands against preachers as a sinner when, at their preaching, he does not abandon the state of his iniquity. And because then the preacher proposes to be silent for him and to be free for God, so as to return to the father, he falls silent. But because through silence he has learned the will of God better, his heart grew warm, and with the fire of inner meditation blazing up, he spoke. This too is shown in this place, because the boy, when consulted, gives counsel to the one consulting him, saying: (Verse 6.) Behold, there is a man of God in this city, a noble man, all that he speaks comes without ambiguity: now therefore let us go there, if perhaps he may show us concerning our way, for which we have come.

He calls Samuel a man of God, in whom we have already said the preachers of holy Church are designated. He is indeed called a man, out of reverence for his holy conduct, and all that he speaks is said to come without ambiguity: because whatever he threatens concerning eternal punishments, whatever he promises concerning eternal joy to the just, it is as he declares, and the wicked will go away to punishment, and the elect to glory. He is also said to be in the city: because the chosen pastor is known always to keep watch in the common custody of the people subject to him. The pastor is in the city, because when he guards others, he is fortified in himself.

Hence too it is said through the prophet, in the praises of all the men of God, under the description of one man: He dwells on high, his loftiness is the strength of rocks (Isa. 33:16). For the more sublimely he is suspended in the vision of the eternal citizens, the more he is found strong for himself and useful to his neighbors.

He is also called noble, because he is conspicuous by his heavenly conduct, and has nothing of the rusticity of worldly life. For he is seen as noble from the same source from which he is a citizen. For secular men, because there is no composition of manners in them, are, as it were, rustics nurtured in outward places. For from the accustomed dishonesty of the mind they bring forth shameful movements of the body; and as though greatly degenerate, they do not know the bearing of urban custom, while through all that they do they cover the appearance of their life with the vileness of earthly obscurity. By contrast, the men of God are noble, who while they bravely do the things that are divine, shine with heavenly light in all their work: and they have nothing of degeneracy, who in the great light of their whole conversation bring forth the rays of their heavenly origin. To this end, therefore, Saul is led from boyhood, that he may be instructed: because those who are to be placed in the citadel of prelacy are admonished to be subject to the spiritual sense of the perfect preachers as their teacher. From this boy he admonishes us to be led, who says: If you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law (Gal. 5:18). But it must be asked why it is said with hesitation: If perhaps he may show us concerning our way, for which we have come.

But because he desires to learn spiritual things, because he longs to receive great gifts, he cannot know whether he is worthy of those same gifts. Therefore he begins to doubt, who does not presume that he has deserved such great things by his own merits. And this doubt surely arises in the elect from the virtue of humility. Hence also it is said to Saul by the voice of the boy who was with him: If perhaps he may show us our way. Because surely the spiritual sense does not suggest to us that we should be wise in lofty things, nor presume boldly concerning almighty God, but rather ask for his gifts with the utmost reverence of holy fear. Rightly, then, is he called a boy, who is proclaimed always to teach humble things. Therefore, when he says, Let us go there, and suddenly adds, If perhaps he may show us our way, he openly indicates that the Spirit works in the understanding of God's elect, since he makes them approach to seek spiritual gifts devoutly, and to be fearful with great reverence concerning the omnipotence of the giver. Hence also he who is led by the Spirit is said to have regard for the poverty of his own merits, when it is added: (Verse 7.) And Saul said to his boy: Behold, we will go; what shall we bring to the man? Bread has failed in our sacks, and we have no gift to give to the man of God, nor anything else.

It is characteristic of humble minds to possess spiritual gifts but not to regard themselves in those gifts. For because they receive the gifts of virtues from the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit who bestows the gifts removes them from their estimation, so that they may have them in the strength of their conduct but not have them in the swelling of pride. Rightly, then, is it said of Saul: From his shoulder and upward he stood out above all the people. And he said to his servant: The bread has run out in our saddlebags, and we have no basket; because elect men, and those fit to set forth the height of holy Church, regard themselves as small through humility even in that in which they are great through virtue. And indeed they have bread for the refreshment of faithful souls in the wisdom of the word, but a basket in the memory of inner meditation. For when they store in memory, for the instruction of the faithful, the things they gather in secret meditation, they place, as it were, bread in a basket. For of these baskets it is said in the Gospel: They filled seven baskets with the fragments. When the loaves abound at the table of the Lord, the baskets are commanded to be filled: because when the soul of the elect is refreshed in the contemplation of the Redeemer on high, it is instructed in that same contemplation of truth, so that the nourishment of the word, which is seen to grow within it, may be stored in memory for the instruction of the faithful.

They have something else besides bread and a basket in abundance—those who, with the power of contemplation and the teaching of the word, abound in the richness of holy action. Therefore, so that the humility of the saints may resound in the words of the king being ordained, he says: The bread has failed in our sacks, and we have no basket to give to the man of God, nor anything else—because the Holy Spirit makes them great in the power of the inner gift when they are being prepared for the governance of the Church's flock, but altogether small in regard to their own estimation. So let the servant say: Let us go there, perhaps he will show us our way. But let Saul see himself empty—because the Holy Spirit, while instructing the minds of those who live honorably, now makes them bold, now fearful. Bold indeed, so that they may take courage; fearful, lest they become proud. He impels them to seek what is necessary; he restrains them, lest by presuming too much they incur the vice of recklessness. And because those whom he makes fearful he raises through the strength of confidence to take courage, it is suddenly added: Again therefore Saul's servant answered and said: (Verse 8) Behold, a fourth part of a stater of silver has been found in my hand; let us give it to the man of God, and he will show us our way.

As though a child, the understanding of the chosen man speaks good things when he is impelled to speak by the nod of the Holy Spirit. What is it, then, that he says: There was found in my hand a fourth part of a stater of silver? What is this part of a stater of silver? But because by the name of silver the divine utterances are designated, the silver in the hand of the child is the divine word in the power of knowing. For it is one thing to be able to speak a word, and another to be able to perceive it. For even the reprobate utter the divine utterances, but only the elect can perceive them. For that thing is perceived whose power is recognized. For even the sick eat fish, but the force of the sickness takes away from them the experience of its taste, so that what they seem to eat, they are prevented from perceiving. So indeed without doubt all carnal men, while they speak of heavenly things which they do not love, use things like the sick, which they are prevented from perceiving. In the hand of the child, therefore, silver is found when, through the merit of humility of the holy man, the heavenly things which they speak are received in the great affection of charity, so that it is very sweet for them to speak of supernal things, in that they are sweetly, and much more sweetly, satiated through love. Whence also it is written: The poor shall eat, and shall be satisfied (Ps. xxi, 27).

For the food of the soul is the word of God: the poor eat and are satisfied, the rich cannot be satisfied, because undoubtedly the chosen men who love heavenly things, as often as they hear these things, grow warm toward them more fervently; the reprobate speak and hear heavenly things, but receive them with no sweetness for the refreshment of their mind. Now the fourth part of a stater of silver is spoken of according to the quality of the time. For that we may see the other parts of this stater, the prophets, the apostles, and the martyrs are to be considered. For since according to the quality of the time the sound of preaching was distributed to each order, it is as though each had a fourth part of the stater. Therefore they displayed a fourth part of the stater when they promised to the Synagogue the coming of the Redeemer. The apostles gave their part when they preached to the Jews that he who had been promised had now come. The martyrs also contributed their part when they brought unbelievers to the end of the Redeemer. Therefore the fourth part of the stater is recognized to have remained, because through the bishops and teachers of the holy Church the word of faith is presented to the chosen faithful even to the end of the world. But the word of faith is well preached by those to whom it is supplied by the hand of the child, because undoubtedly those ought to preach heavenly things who have merited in the sweetness of their mind to know their sweetness.

For this part is given to the stateres, so that one may more fully deserve to know the way of right preaching: because the supreme teachers of holy Church entrust the authority of preaching to others only to those whom they know to love heavenly things, the things they speak. By these words the simpler sort are to be admonished according to the letter, that they not dare to suspect in the man of God the depravity of avarice, through what is said: That we may give to the man of God, and he may show us concerning our way. For if the prophet had a venal word, he would not be a man of God, and could by no means have the spirit of prophecy itself. When this is said, therefore, it is not the character of the man of God that is set forth, but the devotion of the one approaching: because Saul held him in great veneration, in whose sight he blushed to appear empty. And because the renowned report invited them to the veneration of that same man of God, he adds: (Verse 9.) For he was called the Seer.

For to be called is to be spoken of by public report. But the Seer is one who also looks upon inward things, which the mind of carnal men does not attend to. Hence also it is said of the holy animals: They were full of eyes round about and within. These are circumspect in outward things and provident within. Against the presumption of carnal teachers, on the other hand, the Lord says in the Gospel, rebuking them: If the blind leads the blind, both fall into the pit (Matthew 15:14). He is also called a Seer to whom things remote and absent are present.

This fits the holy preachers well, who through knowledge are present to spiritual things to the degree that they disdain to fix their attention on outward things. For they have, as it were, hidden things laid open and distant things present, who always understand those things that carnal people cannot know. For such a one ought the pastor of holy Church to be: because he is set in the way of the heavenly fatherland to give light to those under him. Let him therefore always scatter the rays of light, so that the faithful subjects, from the experience of his illumination, may draw others to illumination. It follows, and he says: (Verse 9.) In old times thus spoke in Israel every one going to consult God: Come, let us go to the Seer.

We go to consult the Lord when we go to learned preachers, so that we may find the counsel of our salvation. But because now there is such a scarcity of perfect men, while we attend to the honor of religion in ancient times, let us weep over its decline in the present time. Moved to compunction by the misery and calamity of the present time, let us sigh that the flower of the time that has passed away has withered with the beauty of holiness. Therefore, when we see the pastors of the Churches cling to earthly things, seek things that slip away, bring forth no marks of spiritual life, when no light of our prelates is poured into us, recalling those things that have passed, let us say to the labor of compunction: In old times thus spoke in Israel every one going to consult the Lord: Come, let us go to the Seer.

Israel is called "one who sees God," or "he in whom God is." This name is certainly fittingly applied to the holy Church, whose people he is called. For in the Gospel it is said: Behold, I am with you even to the consummation of the age (Matthew 28:20). And indeed, because in former times she had pastors flourishing in spiritual conduct, instructed in great knowledge, who with great contempt despised earthly things and thought on heavenly things, at the light which the people saw in them they could exhort one another, saying: Let us go to the Seer. If, then, it is right to go to those who see, it is likewise right to turn away from the blind, because we ought not to imitate but to flee the examples of reprobate prelates; but from those who by the merit of their conduct know spiritual things, we should always seek the instruction of our edification. And because spiritual men alone do this, it follows: (Verse 10) And Saul said to his servant: Your word is excellent; come, let us go.

The best word is that than which nothing better can be heard. Therefore, as often as the counsels of our salvation are spiritually suggested to us, a word is made within us than which nothing better can be found. We praise the boy's word, then, whenever we are pleased with the purpose of our spiritual understanding. And we promise to go with him when we consent to spiritual thoughts. But because a good thought is then fruitful when it is completed in action, it follows: (Verses 10–11.) And they came into the city in which the man of God was; and when they were going up the slope of the city, they found young women going out to draw water, and they said to them: Is the Seer here?

Those who seek the man of God come into the city, because it often happens that the life and teaching of a prelate is sought in the conduct of his subjects. So indeed trees are often sought out, whose appearance is found not in the leaves but in the fruit. But often undergrowth is mixed in with great trees, and it falsely claims that its fruit belongs to the trees with which it is mixed. Therefore, one who wishes to discern the fruit should first discern the branches as well, so that he may recognize from which tree the fruit proceeds. So indeed it is in the conduct of the faithful, because in the chosen people of a good preacher, while many wicked are mixed in, thorns arise, as it were, among good trees. And so the conduct of a chosen preacher is not to be examined in all his subjects, but only in the chosen.

Then indeed we discern, as it were, the branches of the good tree with discretion, when among the people we imitate those rulers as chosen fruits, who advance by the example of their master; and we flee from those as briars, who are reprobated by the fraud of the ancient enemy. Well, therefore, is it said of Saul and his servant: that they came into the city, and ascended the slope of that same city; because undoubtedly the more perfect among holy men are sought together with those not yet subject, and not imperfect members but chosen and perfect ones are to be sought. For craftsmen also first begin their works, then adorn them. The painter, too, when he desires to overlay beautiful colors or gold, first lays down a viler color. Whoever, therefore, wishes to judge the skill of craftsmen, should look not at their begun works but at their perfect ones. Let him, then, ascend the slope of the city, so that he who desires to find the Seer may find him. For the slope is the lowest and sunken place. In which part of the city, undoubtedly, are designated those who have as yet profited not at all toward a higher manner of life. We ascend the slope, then, when we avoid setting before ourselves as an example the level ground of weak hearers.

And then indeed we find the maidens going out to draw water, because we behold the beauty of holy minds in a more perfect manner of life. The maidens are the minds of the elect, pure through innocence, comely through the brightness of their virtues. And because in the more hidden life they preserve their beauty, they cannot be seen except when they go out to draw water. The maidens draw water when chosen souls, from the deep grief of the present exile, pour forth streams of tears. They are said to draw water because, while they recall themselves as cast down and mourning in this valley of tears, they send down, as it were, the rope of thought into the deep, from which they draw up the waters of tears with labor. Then also they are seen to have gone out, because those who lie hidden in themselves, of what sort they are, nevertheless appear in their eyes; and they show how greatly they love their Creator, who sustain life in the present age amid such great grief. From these, therefore, it must be asked: Where and Seeing? Because the place of the perfect is then well known when it is shown to us by those who through the progress of their life are near to their manner of life. But the preachers have different places. For they have one place for themselves, another for their subjects, because surely in themselves they dwell in the most high contemplation, but for their subjects they descend to the mountain of teaching. Through contemplation they are, as it were, in the height; and because the things they teach are high, they descend when they teach, and speaking of sublime things they keep themselves on high.

More perfect, therefore, are the hearers who are near to their ruler, not when he is in the height of contemplation, but on the lower mountain of teaching. Therefore the maidens also answer, saying: (Verse 12.) He is here, behold, before you: for today he has come into the city.

As if they were saying: We are able to point out his place for this reason, that he has come to that place where we were accustomed to see him. For if he were residing in the citadel of his own sublimity, no one would show him to you. For a teacher is in the city when, through the ministry of preaching, he lingers in the instruction of the people subject to him. A teacher is in the city when he leaves behind his own concerns in order to arrange common ones. For because the peoples of a good preacher are fortified and strong through his exhortation, when he lingers in their ministry, he is recognized to be in the city. Likewise, because in the multitude of the subject people some are simple and others wise, the maidens add: (Verses 12, 13.) Hurry now, today he has come into the city: for the sacrifice of the people is on the high place. But entering in, you will find him at once, before he ascends to the high place, to eat. For the people will not eat until he comes, because he himself will bless the sacrifice, and then those who have been called will eat.

When Samuel comes into the city, he goes up to the high place: because the chosen preacher, in the instruction of those under him, sometimes utters plain words, sometimes lofty ones. When, then, he gives plain and intelligible precepts, he is in the city; when he gives sublime ones, and those which are scarcely understood, he is in the high place. He is in the city when he sets forth examples for the simple; but in the high place when he proclaims the lofty things of spiritual words to the perfect. For he was, as it were, in the city who said: I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Christ, and him crucified (1 Cor. 2:2). Again he was in the city when he showed remedies to the weak, saying: Because of fornication, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband (Ibid., 7). But he went up to the high place, because not long after he adds: Now concerning virgins I have no commandment, but I give counsel. I would that all men were even as myself (Ibid., 8). He also confesses that he often ascends to the high place of words, because he says: We speak wisdom among the perfect (Ibid., 6).

What then is the meaning of the maidens' words, "Hurry now, today he has come into the city," except that he was rarely seen in the city—that is, coming late and departing quickly? By this lesson the teacher of the holy Church is instructed, namely to be rarely in public and frequently in private, so that the more slowly he is looked upon, the more devoutly he may be revered. Then indeed he is received as one from heaven, because the more deeply he has lain hidden in the secrecy of contemplation, the richer the treasures of God's word he draws out to those who await him. For that man can say many good things among the lowly, to whom it is granted through the secret gaze of the mind to see the highest things. And because those things which are spoken seem sweeter, the maidens say, "Hurry." As if they were saying: if he has accomplished that for which he came into the city, you cannot see what is stored away in his privacy.

36. This word is assuredly now not the letter but the example of religious men. For the holy man was of such strictness that he had fixed days and hours in which anyone who wished could see him. They say therefore, "Hurry." As if they were saying: if the appointed time has passed, during the hours of his quiet he does not attend to words or actions. We therefore who have taken up the order of the retired life ought to observe this more attentively. Hours of ministry must be fixed for us, so that we may persist briefly in the work and be able to return swiftly to the citadel of contemplation.

But the delays of our secret silence must be guarded with such a law of strictness that even those who are accustomed to approach may know that they have no access to us contrary to our purpose.

But since we have begun to explain these things spiritually, it can be fittingly understood that this is said against the simple. For in the city, he who seems a stranger is thought able to speak with Samuel; but in the high place he is not thought so: because those whom we believe to be simple, we judge to need plain, not lofty, instruction. Therefore they ought to hear holy preachers when they speak plain things to the simple, which they understand, not when they speak lofty things, which they are in no way able to understand. They say therefore: Hurry now, today he has come into the city: because the sacrifice of the people is in the high place. Which is as if he said: Because there are many who desire to hear the highest things, now you ought to hurry, when he seems to instruct simple people like yourself. Indeed the sacrifice of the people is the devotion of the chosen people. And this devotion, because it is stirred up in the hearts of the elect by the word of preaching, is, as it were, completed by Samuel. But the sacrifice of the people is in the high place when the hearts of faithful subjects devoutly long to hear the lofty words of holy preaching.

Hence it is also aptly said: "Because the people did not eat until Samuel had blessed the sacrifice"—because the more perfect hearers, while they desire to reach the highest perfection of virtues, await with great longing the word of knowledge, through which they may attain the things they desire. In this place it must be noted that the sacrifice had not yet been offered, and yet he says: "The sacrifice of the people is on high." For if the sacrifice is not, before it begins to be offered, how was it a sacrifice, which was not? But because we pursue spiritual things, the sacrifice was not yet, and it was: because when the elect faithful desire to be instructed more deeply, they already indeed have great devotion of hearing, which, after the preaching has been heard, they have far greater. The sacrifice, then, has not yet been offered: because that greatness of devotion, which is known in the heart of the elect from the word of preaching, is not in the heart before the preacher's word. And yet the sacrifice is on high: because from the expectation of the word, there is already in the heart of the one willing to hear a great force of devotion. Wherefore it is also well said: "Because the people did not eat until he bless the sacrifice." For because they eagerly love the highest things, they do not rest until they receive those same highest things. For if the sacrifice of the mind is its devotion, the sacrifice is blessed when it is sanctified at the voice of preaching, so that the purer it becomes, the more acceptable it may be held in divine reception.

For what is blessed in God's sacrifice is indeed clean when it is offered, and material; but once offered it is all the more clean, in that it is not only material but spiritual; in that it is not only clean but also cleansing. For who would doubt that sins are cleansed by the offerings of sacrifices? For so it is, so is the devotion of the mind: for when it longs to hear good things, it is clean; but when it has received and been blessed by the hands of holy preaching, it is rendered all the more ardent and sacred, the more clearly it has learned whom it may know it is sweeter to love. Indeed, what was before, as it were, the preparation of the sacrifice—that which desired to know the good—was clean, and yet it was a material preparation, because it did not yet know what it desired to learn; but it is very clean and spiritual when, now sanctified by the words of teaching, it no longer desires to hear what it may know, but delights to experience in practice what it loves. Then indeed the victim is not only clean but cleansing, because the more fervently it is set aflame with love of heavenly things, the more powerfully are the darknesses of carnal negligence driven out from it. For it is written: Because charity covers a multitude of sins (1 Peter 4:8); because undoubtedly we destroy our carnal things when with burning devotion we are raised up to heavenly things.

And because it is added: And then those who were called shall eat. What else does this signify, except that the affection of devotion is the food of the mind? For then we eat, when the sacrifice is blessed: because when at the voice of preachers our devotion is lifted up into love of the Creator, the soul that arrives at the sweetness of the Creator already has its food. Then, therefore, those eat who before the blessing of the sacrifice were unwilling to eat. For those who prepare themselves for the perception of divine sweetness with the highest expectation of intention, while they receive no evil desires through appetite, are like fasting men, more eagerly filled with the refreshment of devotion. For they wait, as it were, for the blessing of the sacrifice for their refreshment, who flee all illicit desires, so that they may be fed by devotion from the vision of inner glory. For it is written: Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God (Matthew 5:8). For he who does not receive unworthy things in his heart, while he desires heavenly things, is clean of heart; and while through the good of preaching he is led to the sweetness of divine contemplation, he has, as it were, the blessing of the sacrifice in the satiety of his soul. He says therefore: Then those who were called shall eat. For they are called fasting to eating, when the preacher speaks outwardly, who guard their mind from depraved desires, and by the grace of the Holy Spirit are drawn to the experience of inner sweetness. For then those who had come were invited, being called.

Therefore the called ones, fasting, then eat, when those who have prepared themselves to receive it by the great guard of their own majesty are fed by the devotion of spiritual grace. But what is it that they say: (Verse 13.) Go up, for today you will find him?

But while the elect praise the good things of the preachers, they illuminate the hearts of their hearers with great light. For that heavenly conversation of the good teacher, which they preach, is the day. Let them say therefore: Today you will find him. For on that day the preacher is found, when the life is not less than the report: when he is praised by the voice of the elect, but those who hear the praises find and recognize in his praiseworthy conversation everything that they hear. On the other hand, the Lord rebuking the Pharisees says: Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, who are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful to men, but inwardly are full of the bones of the dead (Matthew 23:27). Hence again he compares the vainglorious to unbelievers, saying: How can you believe, who receive glory from men (John 5:44)? On the day, indeed, those who are of this sort are praised, but on that day they are not found: because those who hear their praises look, as it were, at the whiteness of the tomb from outside; but when they seek the virtues that were praised, within they find the night of sins, as it were the sad and rotting bones of the dead.

Let them say, then, to signify the true glory of the righteous: Today you will find him: because when the righteous are praised, in the truth of their conduct they possess whatever shines brightly concerning them from the voice of praise. And because men of such greatness are to be sought with eager devotion, it follows: (Verse 14.) And they went up into the city. And while they were walking in the midst of the city, Samuel appeared, coming out to meet them, so that he might go up to the high place.

40. When we hear the proclamations of holy men, we go up into the city: because we seek them there where they descend, not where they are. But, as I said above, the place of preachers, which they have for themselves, is the secret contemplation of the divine nature; but the place for their subjects is preaching. At times indeed they speak plain things, at times lofty things. They have, then, a common place for all, a sublime and special place for certain ones, a secret place for themselves. These three spiritual places are surely signified: because Samuel is said to go out, and to appear in the midst of the city, and to go up to the high place. For he who went out so that he might appear was where he had lain hidden before he appeared. Priests, therefore, go out when they come from the secret of meditation to preach. They appear in the city when they speak plainer things, that is, for acting or for understanding. They go up to the high place when, to the wise, they either command strong deeds or reveal the deep things of mystery. Our ascent, then, is shown to be ordered by this, that Saul is said to go up into the city.

For the places of our pastors, in which they are accustomed to pray or to be alone, are to be venerated by us, not to be approached. We can know this not only from example but also from divine exhortation. Indeed, in the Song of Songs the bridegroom declares, saying: I beseech you, daughters of Jerusalem, do not awaken or arouse the beloved until she herself wishes (Cant. 2:7). For the minds of the perfect are the bride's: because while they place themselves in the secret of divine love as if in a bridal chamber, there they find through vision him to whom they are joined in ineffable love. When therefore the bride sleeps in the bridal chamber, she is joined to the bridegroom: because while the chosen soul of the preacher is hidden in secret contemplation, it is placed as it were in the bridegroom's chamber. Whoever therefore arouses her takes her away from the bridegroom: because surely the rest of the chosen soul is not only its own delight but also the bridegroom's. Whence also it is said through the prophet: The bridegroom will rejoice over the bride (Isa. 62:5). Rightly therefore the bridegroom adjures the daughters of Jerusalem that the bride, as long as she wishes to sleep, not be aroused by them: lest, while she rises from the quiet of the chamber, he lose the enjoyment of love. Therefore let Samuel's going forth be awaited, because holy men in the secret of their silence are to be venerated, not to be disturbed. In the city therefore one must go up; because the chosen teacher in the common place of teaching is seen by his own with as much profit as, in order to benefit, he is known to go out.

In this place it must be noted that it is not said of Samuel: "Today he went up into the city," but "today he came into the city"; of Saul, however, and the boy, it is said not "they came" but "they went up." For the one came as if along level ground, the other went up as if into a height. What else is shown to us by this, except that the level things which preachers speak are not level to us? In the city, therefore, we do not come but go up, when either we behold with difficulty the level things of preaching, or we bear with labor the small things that are enjoined upon us. But because to stand in the city is to be fortified, therefore we go up; because when the greatest men teach us to do small good things, they vehemently forbid us to acquiesce in the counsels of malignant spirits. And because it is very laborious to overcome all temptations, we strive to arrive at the words of the teachers, which enjoin this upon us, as if through the labor of an ascent. But because it is written, that Each one shall receive his reward according to his own labor (which assuredly is understood not only of eternal recompense but also of the present), almighty God bestows upon his elect increase of virtue according to the merit of their work (1 Cor. 3:8). For to Abraham's son, who did not spare, it is said: By myself have I sworn: because you have done this thing, and have not spared your son for my sake: I will bless you, and multiply your seed (Gen. 22:16). For often those who labor faithfully, in doing the things they know, merit through divine grace to know greater things which they may do.

In whose type Saul is rightly said first to go up into the city, and afterward those led by Samuel are presented as going up to the high place. To come to meet is to run to meet one coming by the same road. When, then, we wish to learn the way of salvation from the holy preachers, they indeed come to meet us when they run to us with the word of salvation that we seek. For they come as it were by the same road when they hasten to teach us what we have set out to learn. This is certainly moral for all: for if we search out the things that spiritually befit certain persons, he comes to meet us; because he foreknows that the king to be ordained is coming to him. But how he knows is added: (Vers. 15, 16.) But the Lord had revealed to the ear of Samuel one day before Saul came, saying: At this very hour which now is, tomorrow I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him leader over my people Israel, and he shall save my people from the hand of the Philistines.

He therefore went out to meet him, to lead him up to the high place: because the one who is sought for the governance of holy Church is both to be shown forth by divine gift and called to a lofty manner of life. What does Samuel's ear signify, since it is spoken of in the diminutive, if not the humble understanding of the spiritual teacher? The ear, then, is revealed by the Lord when the humble understanding of the preacher is instructed by the Holy Spirit, so that he may hear what he is to do and arrange what he has heard. But it must be carefully considered what is said: Before one day. For a day is the life of the righteous, as Paul attests, who says: You were once darkness, but now light in the Lord (Eph. 5:8). When, however, the life of the elect is shown forth, the hidden day is revealed. For man sees the outward appearance of a good work, but God sees the light of the heart. Since, therefore, the elect and the reprobate are hidden by the intention of the heart, the Lord makes known the coming king before one day, when through his grace the holy preachers recognize that in those who are to be advanced, the testimony of a good work precedes the purity of intention. For there is no light of work that is not preceded by rectitude of intention. Rightly, therefore, is the king who is to be ordained recognized before one day. But they do not look to the day that follows unless it is born from the one preceding: so that they may consider the day before the day, intention before operation, and may see in the light of holy work the one sent by God, whom divine grace shows to shine through the purpose of the heart.

And because he is brought forth in the very hour in which he is promised, what is thereby intimated but that the one who is chosen ought to be perfect not only in body but in mind? For when God speaks to holy men, it is the full light of day. For a day has both a beginning and an end. Toward its end he reproves sinners, saying, Adam, where are you? And because neither those who are beginning good things nor those who grow sluggish in good work are to be promoted, the preacher is sent at the hour of perfect speech, when such a one is brought forth as shines with the full light of good work and gleams with the full brightness of truth. He is also described as coming as a man from the land of Benjamin. He is called a man, indeed, for the strength of his work; from the land of Benjamin, for the right confession of faith. For Benjamin is called the son of the right hand. Who, then, is here called the son of the right hand but he of whom it is written: He ascended into heaven, he sits at the right hand of the Father? The land of Benjamin, therefore, is the holy Church. Since, then, heretics have been driven out from this land, the king comes from the land of Benjamin when one not polluted by any heresy but catholic in faith receives the primacy of the holy Church. He enjoys the proclamation of a man if he is firm in faith and strong in action. This one, surely, is commanded to be anointed as leader over the Lord's people: whereby the outward sacraments benefit those priests who are not unworthy of the gifts of those same sacraments. Or priests are anointed when, through those who ordain them, they are

they receive the increases of spiritual graces. Hence it also follows: He will save my people from the hand of the Philistines. As though anointed men can save others, because they have received spiritual graces more abundantly. For those who save the people are anointed over the people, because those who are appointed by the Lord to rule others receive the spiritual gifts of charisms, by which they can benefit them; and they are also superior in merits to those whom they precede in rank. And because a good shepherd is very often chosen by the merit of a good people, what is added is well put: (Verse 16.) Because I have looked upon my people.

Likewise, because a good shepherd is to be sought from the Lord with great prayers, it is added: (Verse 16.) Their cry has come to me.

But perhaps some are disturbed, because what is said here seems contrary to what was said above. For there he says: They have not rejected you, but me, that I should not reign over them, according to all their works which they have done from the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, even to this day (1 Kings 8:7). But now he says: You shall anoint him as leader over my people Israel, and he will save my people from the hand of the Philistines; because I have looked upon my people, for their cry has come to me. Above, the king is permitted to be appointed as if by one who is angry; now he is appointed as if by one who is gentle and kind. Who would not see how far the words of this kindness differ from that sentence which was brought against him by Samuel? Because, he says, you have rejected the word of the Lord, the Lord has rejected you, that you should not be king (1 Kings 15:26).

We solve this quickly enough if we look closely at the force of the words themselves. For all these words of divine kindness are ascribed to the merits of the people: He will save my people; and, I have looked upon my people; and, their cry has come to me. Therefore a king is appointed for those whose cry is heard. For although Saul was to be rejected from the kingdom on account of his future wickedness, he still had in himself, as long as he reigned, that by which he could benefit the people subject to him. To be sure, he was to be valiant in war, lofty in mind. He was to have that by which he would fall, and that by which he would stand for others. Therefore the Lord, providing for that by which he could benefit his subjects, says: He will save my people from the hand of the Philistines; and, their cry has come to me. Yet it still seems very contrary that the cry of that people is believed to be heard, which is reproved for having cast him off. To this it must be answered that there were in that people both the reprobate and the elect. There, then, the reprobate are charged with having cast off the Lord; here the desires of the elect reach the ears of almighty God. From this, what is to be gathered except that it is often good for the elect that wicked rulers are appointed? It is not surprising, then, if God is angry, as it were, over his rejection, and appoints a king, since the very dignity of the future king was both evil and good. Evil, indeed, because proud; good, however, because valiant in the defense of subjects.

We see all this being fulfilled now in the holy Church: for often the one who takes the primacy among her people is useful to others by his word, but swollen with pride in his own mind. By preaching virtues, as it were by standing firm, he destroys vices, but by thinking highly of himself, he falls. Thus he saves the people of God by preaching, but by his swelling pride he plunges himself down. Like a powerful king in word he crushes the hidden adversaries of God's people, but by elation he falls from the height of the kingdom. Therefore the king is appointed not for himself but only for the people, when in the holy Church that man is permitted to preside who tramples underfoot the good things he preaches, either by his pride or by his wicked living.

In this place it must be noted that when a pastor is chosen in the holy Church, sometimes he is ordained for himself and for the people; sometimes neither for the people nor for himself; sometimes for himself, not for the people; sometimes truly for the people, not for himself. For himself and for the people, when the chosen preacher is given to chosen subjects: because from the very source by which the multitude of subjects is led to the eternal fatherland, the gifts of merits are heaped up for the good pastor. Neither for himself nor for the people is a pastor given, when a reprobate people is permitted to have a reprobate pastor, since he so presides and they so obey that neither he who teaches nor they who are taught deserve to arrive at eternal goods. Concerning these the Lord says through Hosea: I will give you a king in my fury (Hosea 13:11). For in the fury of God a king is given, when a worse man is decreed to preside over the wicked.

For such a shepherd is given when such a people is taken up to be ruled as will be condemned together to eternal punishment. A shepherd is given for himself, not for the people, when a good man is set over evil men; as the Lord says to Ezekiel: I send you to the children of Israel, to a rebellious nation that has departed from me (Ezek. 3:3). A shepherd is indeed given for himself, not for the people, when, even if the chosen preacher cannot convert his hearers to God, he himself nonetheless does not lose the eternal rewards of his labor. But he is given for the people, not for himself, when a shepherd is appointed to good subjects, who has gifts by which he may benefit them and not benefit himself. Such men were those of whom the Lord instructs the disciples, saying: What they say, do; but what they do, do not do (Matt. 23:3). As if he were saying: What they have received for your benefit, take from them as your own; and leave in them, as their own, what they do not have for your gain but for their own destruction. Saul, then, is chosen after the Lord has been rejected, and yet they declare that he will free the Lord's people from the hand of the Philistines, because almighty God often benefits his good and faithful people through those rulers who do not please themselves with the office of that same rule. It follows: (v. 17) And when Samuel had looked upon Saul, the Lord said: Behold the man of whom I spoke to you; this one shall rule over my people.

For this was done on the following day which the Lord promised beforehand on the preceding day, saying: Tomorrow at this same hour I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him over my people Israel. He is therefore seen on the second day who is promised on the first, because the preachers of the holy Church search out the virtues of the elect in their hidden life. For those who are to be advanced, when they bring forth good things, promise something great concerning themselves. On the first day, then, the king is promised, because the preachers behold the great works of the elect, and, as if the Lord were speaking, they recognize inwardly what they wish to appoint as rulers of the holy Church. Samuel therefore looks on the following day, when the preacher sees in the great light of his conduct the one who is to be advanced. And then indeed, as if the Lord were indicating it, he recognizes the king who is to be appointed, because he sees that the one who stands out on the high citadel of holiness is worthy to be set before others. And because those who are great in merits are small through humility, it follows: (Verse 18.) Saul drew near to Samuel in the middle of the gate, saying, Tell me, I pray, where is the house of the Seer.

If the preacher is then in the city when he speaks plain and common things that are understood, what is the gate of this city but humility? For the knowledge of the divine word is hidden from the proud and revealed to the humble. Hence also in the Gospel he says to the Father: I confess to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and have revealed them to little ones (Matt. 11:25). He called the proud, who think highly of themselves, "wise," but the humble he called "little ones." Of these certainly another Scripture makes mention, saying: God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble (1 Pet. 5:5). For he resists the proud, lest they understand eternal goods, but to the little ones he gives grace that they may know those same eternal goods, with him revealing them. The elect, therefore, because they come to spiritual understanding through humility, in order to hear the preachers, walk as it were through the gate. The elect preacher also, because he speaks spiritual things humbly, meets Samuel with Saul in that same gate. For they are both, as it were, in the gate when the things that the elect preacher speaks are humbly heard by another of the elect.

But he who had newly come had found the one he was seeking, and did not know him. Therefore the same Saul says to Samuel: Tell me, I pray, where is the house of the Seer. For this is characteristic of great men, that they are with difficulty recognized by the least. In the flesh indeed they are despised, but in mind they are sublime. Outwardly they desire to appear contemptible, but they do not cease to do things worthy of veneration. Since, therefore, they greatly desire to profit by their examples, they admire them not only in outward things but in their inmost being. They see in them outwardly that which can be despised by carnal men, but they likewise attend to that which inwardly, as spiritual men, ought to be venerated with great admiration. And when they hear by report that they are sublime, they long to know them in the height of their manner of life. According to the history, then, Saul saw Samuel and did not know him, so that what was happening to them in figure might signify spiritual things to us. For when we are little ones, we as it were see perfect men when we hear their virtues from those who report them; but those whom we see, we do not know, because we cannot know them by experience, since what we perceive by hearing we hold in the eyes of the heart. When, therefore, we ask of them the secrets of his manner of life in order to imitate it, we are plainly questioning them, as it were, about their own house. For their house is their manner of life. This house the disciple of John wished to know when he asked the Lord, saying: Master, where do you dwell (John

And indeed he, because he was to be led to familiarity with that man as though a member of his household, heard: Come, and see. Philip did not recognize this house that he saw, to whom it is said: Have I been so long a time with you, and have you not known me: Philip, he who sees me sees also my Father (John 14:9). Of the Lord it is also written that he spoke to Moses as to his friend; but the same Moses, seeing and not recognizing, asked, saying: If I have found grace in your sight, show me your face (Exod. 33:13). But the spiritual conversation of the saints, because it is opened only to the devoted and the suppliant, Saul likewise prays that the house of Samuel be made known to him. The holy preachers also, when they hear great things concerning themselves, cast themselves down through humility, they are not puffed up. They know that they show great things to those who ask, things to be imitated; they know that amid the great things which they show, they do not appear great through boasting. Therefore also to the subordinate: (Verse 19.) And Samuel answered Saul, saying: I am the Seer. But go up before me to the high place today, that you may eat with me, and I will send you away in the morning.

What does it mean to say, "I am the seer," unless it is to show himself humble, as he appeared in the eyes of men? As if he were saying: You hold in your estimation as great the one whom you seek, but he whom you see is small. For this is not proclaimed in the word "you see," but "I." As if he were saying: That one is the seer; I am—not what you think, but what you perceive. But he who has learned to humble himself knows how to give gifts not as one who is humble, but as one who is exalted. Therefore he also commands him to go up to the high place before him, so that he may eat with him. He goes up to the high place who raises his mind to know higher things. To go up to the high place is indeed to prepare the heart to understand loftier things. Hence Peter too is taken up onto the mountain, so that he may deserve to see the glory of the transfigured Redeemer (Matthew 17:1). For in that ascent of the mountain is expressed the preparation of a lofty mind, because he will not be able to see high things who does not, by intention, place his spirit on high things. Since, therefore, we understand sublime things better when prepared, Saul is commanded to go up to the high place before Samuel. For it is as if we are commanded to go up to the high place before the preacher, when we first direct our mind to know high things, and afterwards they themselves speak to us of the things to which we have directed ourselves. But what is it that he says: "so that you may eat with me today"? Yet when the holy preachers speak of heavenly things, they refresh the hearts of their hearers, the elect: for truth testifies that the word of God is food for the soul—"Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4).

For the bread is the nourishment of the body, the word that of the mind. But those who refresh the body without the mind are dead in a harmful way, alive in the flesh. Hence Paul also says of the delicate widow: She who lives is dead (1 Tim. 5:6). For the widow would not die through the delicacies of foods, if she satisfied her soul with the food of the word of God, since Paul himself says that nothing is unclean which is received with thanksgiving (1 Tim. 4:4). But she lives. The widow dies when she nourishes the body with food and kills the soul with hunger (Matt. 4). In bread alone, therefore, man does not live, because since man consists of soul and body, just as he lives in one way through the body, so it is necessary that each part be nourished by different foods. Therefore, let us eat, let us ascend with the prophet, when we raise the mind to the heights of the divine word, so that we may be satisfied by its heavenly savor through devotion.

And because the preachers themselves greatly love the heavenly things which they speak, we eat as it were together with them when they, in devotion, bring forth by speaking what we, in devotion, place in the belly of the soul by hearing. For we eat together, because we hear the word of God in common. For the Truth says to preachers: It is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you (Matt. 10:20). Paul also proves this, when he questions his hearers, saying: Or do you seek a proof of him who speaks in me, Christ (2 Cor. 13:3)?

For therefore in the holy preachers Christ and his Spirit speak, and the preachers themselves hear him speaking the more clearly the nearer they are to him whose seat they deserve to be. The more fully, then, they are able to be refreshed by the nourishment of the word, the more they already have within themselves the chamber of refreshment. For they are friends of the bridegroom, and they stand and rejoice with joy because of the bridegroom's voice. When therefore the holy preachers speak divine things, they hear; but because they know by certain experience when the Spirit speaks in them, they hear themselves, yet not in themselves, because they too will speak, but having spoken in themselves, they reverence another speaking. In that, then, which they hear and speak, they both refresh and are refreshed. They refresh their hearers, indeed, when they bring forth the word with their voice; they themselves are refreshed when the word that they bring forth is brought forth to them by divine revelation. Yet those are more devoutly satisfied who, in the speaking of the Spirit, have experienced the delights of the mind. Is it not an experience of the speaking Spirit to see oneself uninstructed and unprepared, and suddenly to be instructed and made ready? To know what they did not know; to have what they had not had; to lose the sluggishness of the mind and, with wondrous devotion, to grow fervent; to be wonderfully filled with fullness of knowledge at once and in a moment; to bring forth, with wondrous eloquence of speech, the things they have understood?

Therefore the elect preachers have the experience of the Spirit speaking within them, in the sudden revelation of truth: they have a sudden ardor of charity, they have it in fullness of knowledge, they have it in the most eloquent preaching of the word. For they are both instructed suddenly, and in a moment they grow fervent, and in an instant they are filled, and are enriched with a marvelous power of eloquence. For concerning that sudden experience the Lord says: It shall be given you in that hour what you shall speak (Matt. 10:19). But concerning that sudden fervor of charity Cleopas says: Was not our heart burning within us on the way, while he talked with us and opened to us the Scriptures (Luke 24:32)? Concerning the experience of filling and eloquence as well, Luke records, saying: Suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting (Acts 2:2). For in the same Spirit they were both filled and spoke, so that they might signify this which we assert: namely, that by speaking they feed others, who are fed by hearing what they say. And because they recognize the sound of the mighty Spirit as ardor, or speech, or filling, they feast the more sweetly on spiritual gifts the more worthily they have been taken up to recline at his table. He says: Come up, that you may eat with me today; because the good teacher, while he sweetly receives what he says into the devotion of his mind, feeds both himself and those who hear.

By contrast, the reprobate teachers, because they do not love what they say, fast even while they feed others with the word. For since the Lord said that the word of God is the refreshment of the soul, and the word of God in the mind is full instruction, full devotion, those who do not devoutly hear what they speak are not fed by the word of God. Indeed the Apostle, as if already filled with that sweetness of the word, says: Of his fullness we have all received (John 1:16). One fullness is that of the word, another that of the book. From the fullness of the word, only the elect can receive; from the fullness of Scripture, even the reprobate can receive. For the book of the blessed apostle John and the book of the blessed apostle Paul are indeed fullnesses of what is contained in them. Paul or John certainly wrote their words, but whatever each wrote, the Word speaking in them inspired. Therefore one who receives the word of Scripture, not in love but in knowledge, receives from the fullness, not of the word, but of the book. And because he receives a dead thing, he himself does not live in that reception. But why do I call Scripture dead? It is not only dead, but killing. For it is written: The letter kills, but the spirit gives life (2 Cor. 3:6). This indeed every divine letter does. For the letter is the body, and the life of this body is the spirit. For he receives a body both made alive and giving life, who reads the letter and refreshes his mind in the love of understanding.

The reprobate, therefore, who search the Scriptures but do not love them, who speak boldly outwardly yet do not understand inwardly the savor of what they speak—while others receive with devout mind the refreshment of the Scriptures which they expound, they are, as it were, filled from what they themselves give, but not they themselves. Let Samuel therefore say: Ascend, that you may eat with me today—because from that which the chosen teachers bestow upon their hearers, they both hear together and are filled together. For behold, this is shown in that very word which we speak. For who doubts that Samuel wrote this Scripture which we are expounding? And yet he himself who wrote it says: Samuel answered—so as surely to show that what he himself was writing, another was imparting. Since, then, the Holy Spirit, who speaks through him, says through him concerning him: Samuel answered Saul: Ascend before me into the high place, that you may eat with me today. He says what he hears, and at the same time he hears and he says. Therefore, while the chosen preacher hears with great veneration of love and speaks, the good hearers receive with great devotion what is said; Saul and Samuel are said to eat together in the high place. Likewise, because the preachers are more worthy and more fervent than their hearers in the refreshment of the same word, it is not Samuel with Saul but Saul with Samuel who is declared to be about to eat. But also, because such splendid erudition of mind is in the great light of the spiritual life, he does not say: That you may eat with me tonight, but today. Whom also he sends away in the morning.

In the morning,” he says—the beginning of the following day. But the following day is the serene light of a holy way of life. He says therefore: (Verse 19) “In the morning I will send you away.”

“In the morning” indeed is sent from on high, when one, advancing to the summit of higher knowledge, sets himself to remain in the great light of good work. Or “in the morning” is sent away, when one intends to preach to others the word of great knowledge that he has learned from the preacher’s mouth. For when we purpose good things, we are, as it were, “morning” at the beginning of the day, because we have already begun to look upon the brightness of the good, that we may follow it. But this morning grows into full day, when he who has resolved to do great good things, or to preach the high joys of eternity, carries out in the great light of virtue what he has resolved. Saul, therefore, is sent away “in the morning” from on high, because the hearers of good preachers do not delay to practice in a lofty manner what they hear loftily from them. But chosen men know both how to hide the good things they have and how to make them manifest. They hide them, surely, lest they perish through boasting, but they make them manifest lest they remain unfruitful. By hiding them, they then keep them; but by making them manifest, they bring forth fruit. For it follows: (Verses 19–20) “And all that is in your mind I will tell you; and concerning the asses which you lost the day before yesterday, do not be anxious—they have been found.

How preachers strive to conceal themselves is indeed shown above in Samuel’s word, where it is said: “I am the seer.” But now, since he says: “All that is in your mind I will declare to you,” what else are we to understand except that holy men often both hide and bring forth the virtues they possess? But, as I said, they hide them lest they be seen as great in great virtues; they bring them forth so that the elect may imitate them. By the word of wisdom, therefore, or by the spirit of prophecy, they assert that they are strong—not so that they may be venerated, but so that they may be heard. Hence the Psalmist also, intimating that he has the grace of the word, says: “I have understood above all my teachers” (Ps. 118:99). Confident, then, of his knowledge of the spirit, he invites us, saying: “Come, children, hear me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord” (Ps. 33:11). For the prophet Micah affirmed that he was a prophet when he said: “Would that I were not a man having the spirit, and rather spoke a lie” (Mic. 2:11). Hence Elisha says of Naaman the Syrian: “Let him come to me, and let him know that there is a prophet in Israel” (4 Kings 5:8). Hence Paul says: “They are Hebrews, and so am I; they are the seed of Abraham, and so am I; they are ministers of Christ—I speak as less wise—I am more” (2 Cor. 11:22–23). On the other hand, however, Amos says: “I am not a prophet, but a herdsman plucking sycamores” (Amos 7:14). Hence also Paul, when he wishes to conceal himself for safekeeping, says: “I am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God” (1 Cor. 15:9).

Hence John the Baptist, when questioned, said: I am not a prophet. For he was not a prophet for the sake of vainglory, but he was a prophet and more than a prophet for the sake of ministry. Samuel, therefore, in order to guard himself, says: I am the seer; and in order to show himself for gain, he says: I will declare all things to you. But if anyone wishes to understand it in the same way, it is because when he says, I am the seer, if he asserts that he is a seer, he says this so that he may share the good that he has with the elect. Therefore, to prove what he asserts, he adds next: I will declare all things to you. This is what the teachers of holy Church do, because while they look into the virtues and vices of minds, they evidently know how to heal vices and promote virtues. Therefore he declares all things that are in the heart when he deigns to set forth by the instruction of manifest teaching the way of virtue that the good hearer desires to hold. But if he is great, he has resolved not only to do good things but also to preach them. All things that are in his heart the preachers declare, when they open to their minds what they desire from teaching. But because, to the one to whom he speaks, he signifies the one who relies on the gains of preaching, he adds and says: And concerning the asses that you lost the day before yesterday, do not be anxious, because they have been found.

5i. What was set forth above in the person of Saul, how it applies to unskilled preachers, has been explained. For he lost the donkeys who did not at all lead sinners, to whom he offered the word of life, to repentance. Indeed they found them, if those who had hidden themselves in the night of wickedness returned to the light of righteousness, in which they could be found as men. Why then does he say: They have been found, unless because often in them the greatest men consider that the good of salvation can easily be found, whose life the unlearned despair of? For even skilled physicians of bodies often presume to cure those whose health the unskilled cannot presume. So indeed even by learned teachers sinners are often drawn to repentance and satisfaction, who could not be drawn by the unlearned and unskilled. Since therefore both by the preaching and by the example of the perfect, those return to the Lord by repenting who could not be converted through the ministry of others; rightly does Samuel say that the donkeys have been found which Saul could not find. This statement can also be understood for the progress of the one to be ordained as ruler. As if he were saying: While you advance in learning and life, you will be able to gain for the Lord even those whom you have not yet been able to. Indeed the power of progress is so certain that its fruit, which does not yet stand in reality, stands in the certainty of hope. And because by these words he is invited to endure the labors of holy preaching, he explains what rewards of wages he ought to expect, saying: (Vers.

20.) And to whom shall the best things of Israel belong, if not to you and to all the house of your father?

Israel, which is interpreted as "seeing God," whom does it more rightly signify in this place than that blessed society of eternal citizens who have come from the labor of this life to the eternal vision of almighty God? What, then, are the best things of Israel, if not the gifts of eternal recompense? Indeed Paul says: Each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor (1 Cor. 3:8). Hence he also says: There is one glory of the sun, another of the moon, and of the stars. For star differs from star in brightness (1 Cor. 15:41). Therefore the recompenses and rewards of all the faithful are the good things of Israel. But because the reward of the elect preachers is the highest, the best things of Israel belong to them. For the Lord promises to his faithful servant concerning these best things of Israel, saying: Amen I say to you, he will set him over all his goods (Matt. 24:47). For he who is set not over some things but over all things is declared to possess not only the good things of Israel but even the best. Let Samuel therefore say: To whom shall the best things of Israel belong, if not to you and to all the house of your father? As if he were saying: even if the labor of preaching is great, it ought to be borne with all the more devotion in proportion as it has greater gains of reward. With anxious mind, therefore, the teacher of the holy Church ought to consider that the good things of Israel—not only the good but even the best—are his, so that he who awaits such supreme and best things may always do greater and more excellent things.

For those highest goods are not owed to the highest rank, but to the highest labor. For even the distinguished teacher did not say, "Each one will receive his reward according to his dignity," but "according to his labor." When, therefore, the best things of eternal life are promised to preachers, a great labor is laid upon them in this life, because surely he cannot prevail to have better things than others who does not dare to be better. And because this is common to all the preachers of holy Church, the best things of Israel are said to belong not only to Saul but to every house of his father. For as sons are born from a father, so when others are newly substituted into the order of preachers in succession to others, they are made splendid with the same nobility of holiness. The house of the preacher is also his spiritual manner of life. Therefore the best things of Israel belong to every house of his father, because wherever there is a priestly manner of life, there surely that is present, and it is so great that from the height of merit, in eternal life, their best things are those of recompense. Let preachers therefore look carefully into this, that the best things of Israel will belong not only to themselves but to every house of his, because if they go out from the house, they will not have the best things. For if they hold only the loftiness of preaching, they will not have the best things, because they do not hold the height of life. But each one of the elect, when he hears these great things about himself, brings his own weaknesses to mind, so that he may guard himself from pride, lest he lose the good things that he has. Hence it is also added:

(Verse 21.) Saul answered, saying: Am I not a son of Gemini, from the smallest tribe of Israel, and is not my kindred the last among all the families of the tribe of Benjamin? Why then has he spoken this word to me?

He is, as it were, saying: Why do you ascribe such great things to me, when I am nothing? For he is a son of Gemini who imitates the negligent in the care of himself and in the example he sets to his neighbor. For he is a twin, because while he neglects the care of himself, he does not bestow the examples of good works on others. Therefore whoever imitates such men is called a son of Gemini. He is said to be from the smallest tribe of Israel because the last order of the holy Church is that of converted sinners. Deservedly, then, he who confesses himself a sinner is said to be from the smallest tribe of Israel. His kindred too is declared to be the last among the others, because, according to the words of the Truth: Whoever breaks the least of the commandments is least in the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:19). For Benjamin is called the son of the right hand. By this name indeed the people of the holy Church is designated, which, while it is born in faith in the Redeemer, is prepared through good works for the goods of the heavenly fatherland. The right hand of God is that strength of eternal life. The kindreds of the tribe of Benjamin are now the diverse ways of life of the elect. For just as diverse kindreds come from one origin of generation, so from one origin of the orthodox faith many ways of life of the faithful arise.

Holy men, therefore, when they cast themselves down through humility, because they confess that they are sinners, and yet believe rightly in God, as it were assert that they are sons of Gemini and of the last kindred of Israel. But because the more they humble themselves, according to the voice of the Truth, the more they are exalted (Luke 14:10-11), it follows: (Verse 22.) So Samuel, taking Saul and his servant, brought them into the dining hall, and gave them a place at the head of those who had been invited.

Samuel takes Saul when the preacher of the Holy Church opens the heights of preaching to the chosen hearer of his own. For the subordinate is taken up when, through the word of the teacher, he is raised to the knowledge of heavenly things. And because you desire to know spiritual things not with a carnal intention, he took up not only Saul himself, but also his servant. For he had, as it were, remained below without the servant, who said: My heart has forsaken me (Psalm 37:11). For our heart forsakes us when we are so overcome by carnal desires that we place the intention of the heart on earthly, carnal, and bodily things, and not on heavenly and spiritual things. He had found this lost servant, who said: Your servant has found his heart (2 Samuel 7:27). For we find our heart when we seek spiritual things through the intention of the heart; when we tear it away from earthly things, so that we may direct it to heavenly things. The chosen preacher, therefore, neither commands strong things to those who are still carnal, nor makes spiritual things manifest.

For Paul also says to the Corinthians: I could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to carnal men, as to little ones in Christ I gave you milk to drink, not meat (1 Cor. 3:1). It is as if he were saying in these words: For this reason I did not lead you to the heights, because you did not have a spiritual understanding with you, like Saul with the boy. Therefore, also hinting at a pause, he says: For you are still carnal. Rightly, then, is Samuel said to have taken Saul and the boy: because the teachers of holy Church command strong things to those, and reveal high things to those, whom they consider to be spiritual. These are also brought into the dining hall: because the breadth of charity is shown to them. For one is placed, as it were, in the dining hall who, through what he has learned of high things, dwells in the breadth of charity. Or certainly the entrance into the dining hall is love; the dining hall is the beauty of the spiritual life. Hence John says: Whoever does not love remains in death (1 John 3:14). For if he who does not love remains in death, he who loves remains in life. We are brought into the dining hall, therefore, when we rise to the affection of the heavenly conversation through the affection of charity. In this breadth of the dwelling, without doubt, holy preachers obtain the higher place, because the blessed John the Evangelist says: And around the throne were four and twenty seats, and upon the seats four and twenty elders (Rev. 4:4). The elders, surely, are the holy preachers, mature in understanding, grave in conduct, who surround the throne of God with the seats placed near?

For those who love the Creator above all others rest closer to him through a most exalted manner of life. And so Saul with his servant obtains by lot a place at the head of those who had been invited, because in them the type of the pastors to be chosen is shown. For the ruler is established at the head when through the force of great love he receives the singular purpose of the heavenly life, when he holds the catholic faith in common with the others, but a virtue sublime above the others. Whence it also follows: (Verse 22.) For they were, as it were, thirty men.

Three times ten make thirty. Now the number three intimates the faith of the holy and undivided Trinity. The number ten, however, through the ten precepts of the law, designates the perfection of good work. The number thirty, therefore, designates those who hold that faith which works through love. At the head of these Saul is placed, when through divine grace he who is to be a pastor of the Church is made more exalted in merit, over those whom he ought to be superior in dignity. Samuel assigns this exalted place: because he who merits such high rank of life advances to it by the instruction of his elders. And to him, indeed, because great things that he is to do, and not small ones, are shown, it is added: (Verses 23, 24.) Samuel said to the cook: Give the portion which I gave you, and which I commanded you to set aside with you. The cook therefore took the shoulder, and set it before Saul.

And Samuel said: Behold what remains, set it before you and eat, for it has been kept for you on purpose when I called the people; and Saul ate with Samuel on that day.

What is signified in the "year" of the breast, if not the strength of action? Which is given by Samuel the cook, when it is shown by the highest preachers to the lesser ones. For cooks are priests, because while they speak to the chosen faithful in the fervor of the spirit, they cook the foods of the mind, as it were, through fire. But the portion that is given is said to be set apart, because the strength of good work in the preacher ought to be singular. This he sets before Saul when he bids him consider, as he is to be ordained a shepherd of the holy Church, of how great strength he ought to be. But also concerning that which the cook set out, Samuel says to Saul: Behold what remains, set it before you. It remains indeed, because Christ did not fulfill all our things; by his cross indeed he redeemed all, but it remains that he who strives to be redeemed and to reign with him may be crucified. This residue truly he had seen, who said: If we suffer with him, we shall also reign with him (2 Tim. 2:12). As if he should say: What Christ fulfilled does not avail, unless for him who fulfills that which remains. Hence the blessed apostle Peter says: Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example that you should follow his footsteps (1 Pet. 2:21). Hence Paul says: I fill up those things that are lacking to the passion of Christ in my body (Col. 1:24).

But it must be noted that the cook set the shoulder before Saul, and yet Samuel instructs Saul that he should set it before himself. What is this? But a servant is accustomed to set a dish on the table before those reclining at the meal; and when the one reclining draws it to himself, he sets before himself more closely that which was a little farther away before him. The cook, then, sets the shoulder before Saul; Samuel anticipates Saul, telling him to set it before himself: because that which is joined to a new preacher concerning the strength of good work, he ought, as it were, to draw closer to himself through the zeal of consideration. And even after he has drawn it to himself, he eats it: because, long considered, he resolves to do it. For to eat the shoulder is to store away in the mind by intention that which is commanded outwardly concerning strong action. For he was persuading each of the elect, as it were, to set the shoulder before himself and eat it, who said: If you sit at the table of a powerful man, attend wisely to what is set before you, because you ought to prepare similar things for yourself (Prov. 23:1). For in the table of the powerful man he designated the virtue of the shoulder. And when he said, Attend wisely to what is set before you, he taught the one to whom he spoke to set the shoulder before himself. He hinted that he ought to eat it, because he said: You ought to prepare similar things. For by preparing similar things we eat them, because while we resolve to do the strong things that we hear, as it were eating, we store up in the belly of the heart the foods of life. But to those very chief teachers he gives command through the instruction of one disciple, the vessel of election, saying: Do not lay hands quickly on anyone (1 Tim. 5:22).

For those who are to be raised to the highest office ought to be chosen with great deliberation of counsel, and so what follows is fittingly added: Because it was kept for you on purpose, when I called the people. As if he were saying: Set before me what I set before myself before it was set before you; consider what I have considered. For a portion of the arm is kept on purpose, because the strongest action of a preacher is rightly entrusted to one who is judged worthy of so great a ministry by the highest men with great consideration. But that portion was then kept on purpose when the people was called, because when faithful subjects come to undertake the ministry of preaching, to good preachers are enjoined not weak things for the weak, but strong things for the strong. But those who make good progress strive to hold, in their lofty manner of life, before all things the good of obedience. Therefore what follows is well added: And Saul ate with Samuel on that day. As I have already said, for the preacher to be advanced is to prepare himself to do that which is commanded him concerning virtue. But he is rightly said to have eaten with Samuel, because when those who have newly come propose to do great things, the highest men become more fervent in the virtue of good work. In this eating can also be signified that which he promised above, saying: Ascend before me, that you may eat with me today.

Saul therefore ate with Samuel, because when the preacher within hears the heavenly sweetness of the word of God, what his subjects outside hear as he speaks, they are surely satisfied with divine refreshment. It follows: (Verse 23.) And they came down from the high place into the town, and Samuel spoke with Saul on the roof. And Saul spread his bedding on the roof, and slept.

Whoever is taken up to the height of pastoral care ought, in that same loftiness of his rank, to have both the height of his own life and compassion for another's weakness. Let Saul therefore go up with Samuel, let him go down into the town. Let the ruler know what things he should do on high; let him know what things he should arrange as common matters. Let him say with Paul: Our conversation is in heaven (Phil. 3:20); let him say with us: Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death? I see another law contradicting the law of my mind, and leading me captive in the law of sin (Rom. 7:24). The ruler is on high when he speaks wisdom among the perfect. When he arranges carnal matters, he comes down into the town, saying: Because of fornication let each man have his own wife, and each woman her own husband; let the husband render the debt to his wife, and the wife likewise to her husband (1 Cor. 7:2). He is on high when he says: No creature will be able to separate us from the love of Christ (Rom. 8:39). But he comes down into the town when, speaking, he says: I became weak to the weak, that I might gain the weak; I became all things to all men, that I might save all (1 Cor. 9:22).

Samuel therefore brought Saul up to the high place, and set him down in the town: because when great men ordain the height of the holy Church, those whom they place on that same height they teach to live sublimely, to preach plain things, to be strict with themselves but temperate toward their subjects: so to attend to their own salvation that they can be made weak with the weak—weak, I say, through affection of mind, not through the sickness of inward ailment. For if the teacher lies low through sickness of mind, he cannot cure the sick and raise up the fallen. Rightly therefore are Saul and Samuel said to have descended into the town and to have spoken in the upper room. The town, of course, is on the plain, but the upper room is on high. The upper room is also high, the plain belongs to the town—not the plain, but the height. So indeed the chosen preachers, when they have compassion on the lesser members, as it were leave the high place; but descending into the town, they are in the upper room; because they indeed come from on high, but by pitying and counseling the weakness of their subjects, not by acting weakly and being made weak, they take it on. For having compassion on the weak, they command that a wife be taken, yet they themselves do not take a wife by being made weak. Descending therefore into the town, they are in the upper room: because even if they command plain things, they do not retain weak things in themselves. But because Samuel is said not to be in the upper room but to speak with Saul, this surely signifies that he who is to be a teacher ought to be taught thus to have compassion on weak subjects, that he himself nonetheless hold to the high things of conversation.

And because a new preacher needs much consideration to do these things, Saul is said to have spread a bed for himself and slept. For a new preacher to sleep in the upper room is, in his lofty contemplation, to arrange how he ought to bear the burdens of those under him. For if he keeps watch for the intention of the world, he assuredly brings it about that he does not seek within his inmost heart the good of such great discretion. He ought therefore to sleep, so as to think nothing of worldly things, because one oppressed by worldly affairs can never arrange spiritual things. But he who does not spread a bed for himself will not be able to sleep either, because, surely, if he does not ponder the examples or words of good men, it is impossible for him to rest from outward things. We place, as it were, soft bedding beneath us when we ponder the teaching or the life of the elect. And we sleep on the same bedding, because we can then rest well in contemplation when we are occupied with spiritual things. Let him say therefore: Because Saul spread a bed for himself and slept, so as to suggest to the chosen mind that if it occupies itself carelessly with outward things, it will not obtain the grace of inner quiet. But whoever wishes to arrange spiritual things well by contemplation ought not to wake up to outward things until he has perfectly ordered them within. Fittingly therefore it is added: (Verse 26.) And when they had risen early, and it was now growing light, Samuel called Saul in the upper room, saying: Arise, and I will send you away.

In the morning, indeed, it grows light when the splendor of truth reveals itself to the quiet mind. For the human mind, dark through ignorance, becomes bright through the illumination of truth. The ignorant man, therefore, is in the night; when he is enlightened, he is in the day. But he who sleeps in the night rises in the morning when he rouses himself to do the things he has arranged through consideration. And because the business of ordaining a king was being treated, both are said to have risen. The chief preacher rises, indeed, to ordain his hearer for the ministry of that same preaching. He who is to be ordained rises, so that he may not hope that so sublime an order is to be received with a lowly affection of heart—rather, with the deepest. They rise together, indeed, because a sublime office is given and a sublime office is received. In this place there is another thing to be noted: that both rose first, and then Samuel called Saul, saying: Rise, and I will send you away. But according to the history, if both rose from sleep, Saul is admonished to be prepared for the work, because he is commanded to rise. But because both the highest priests and he who is assumed to the order of preaching attentively consider the burden of so great a ministry, they sleep, as it were, together and rise together. But he who is newly to be ordained, rising from sleep, is again commanded to rise to the work: because, although he has striven to weigh the height of the order by meditating, he must nevertheless attain to it through the merit of his conduct. Rising, therefore, he is commanded to rise, so that he may purpose to match by his merits the sublime order he deliberates to undertake.

Hence it is also called on the roof chamber: because he is commanded to strive for high things. He also says: And I will let you go. For he rises in order to be let go, since he who has grown up in the height of great conduct can be free in the ministry of preaching. He rose, indeed, who had risen: because he who learned the height of dignity by considering it, took care to raise himself in that same height of dignity through the sublimity of life. Hence it is also added: (Verse 26.) And Saul rose.

Then it is added: (Verse 26.) And they both went out; namely, Samuel himself.

The shepherd goes out when he comes from the secrecy of meditation to the public sphere of work. For when he arranges what he wishes to do, he is inside; but when he does outwardly what he has thought, he, as it were, goes out. Saul also went out, because in outward dignity he who is promoted receives that which he had long considered, whether it was to be received. Both, therefore, are said to have gone out, because both were inside: while the one, with anxious mind, foresaw what he would give, or to whom; the other likewise thought more attentively what sort of man he was who would receive such high things. Since, therefore, the ministry of holy preaching must be given and received with the greatest discretion, when the king of Israel is anointed, both the king and the prophet who is to anoint him are said to have gone out. Many manuscripts, however, have: And when they had risen in the morning, before it grew light: which can certainly be understood fittingly.

It is morning, indeed, before the day breaks, when the day begins, as it were, to breathe, and yet it is not the full light of day. But the preachers of holy Church, when they consider the good conduct of those whom they arrange to ordain, it is, as it were, morning. But because they cannot know their future, it is morning, but before the day breaks. This is well said in the ordination of him who is remembered to have later displeased almighty God. For as it were in the morning, before the day broke, the prophet saw this man, who appeared to him in the light of good conduct. But the full brightness of day was not yet there, because he could not see the future darkness in him through the present light of knowledge. And this is surely done as often in holy Church as there are good men who are chosen in the present but will not persevere in that same good. For as it were in the morning, and before the light, he goes forth who shows the present light of good work but conceals the darkness of his future life. But what was done about this follows: (Vers. 27, seq.) And when they had come down to the farthest part of the city, Samuel said to Saul: Tell the boy to go before us and pass on; but you stay a little while, that I may declare to you the word of the Lord. Then Samuel took a flask of oil and poured it on his head and kissed him.

For what is it that the king is led to the outermost part of the city and is anointed there? But the outermost part of the city is the lowest part of the subject people. Those, therefore, who hold the lowest place in holy Church are, as it were, in the outermost part of the city. But in the outermost part of the Church itself, converted sinners seem to be. For all the righteous are in the higher or first part. Or perhaps virginity holds the first place, continence the second, conjugal life the third, and the conversion of sinners the last. In the outermost part of the city, then, the king is anointed: because the ruler of holy Church is appointed for sinners, not for the righteous. Hence the Truth says through himself: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Matt. 9:13). Hence again he says: They who are well have no need of a physician, but they who are sick (Ibid., 13).

But the boy. We have said that he designates the spiritual sense of Saul. What is it, then, that he is commanded to go before and pass on from Samuel? But the boy goes before when that which is suggested to us by the spiritual sense is done, not that which is commanded by carnal impulse. But some he goes before and passes on from, others he goes before and does not pass on from. The boy going before does not pass on from the arrogant, but he passes on from the humble: for while the arrogant do great and spiritual things, they are great in their own eyes. For they have, as it were, the boy with them, whom they follow, who glory that they are spiritual in the spiritual things they do.

To these, surely, the prophet reproaches, saying: Woe to you who are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your own sight (Isa. 5:21). The elect, therefore, in all that they do, take care to be spiritual, and avoid holding themselves to be spiritual. They are great indeed in merit, humble in estimation: because they always do great things, but in those same great things they never look upon themselves as great. As if a boy, whom they send ahead, they cause to pass by, when they hold the spiritual sense present in their action, but far from their estimation. But what is it that he is instructed to stand still for a little while, so that the word of the Lord may be made known to him? But he stands still for a little while, when the boy has been sent ahead, who for a time withdraws himself by his own judgment, and does another's will. He therefore causes the boy to pass by, and stands still for a little while, who at the command of a greater one forsakes even those things which he thinks spiritual, so that he may be able to accomplish effectually the things that are enjoined upon him. Which certainly applies to the preacher in praying: for while he considers the weight of pastoral care and his own weakness, the Spirit going before him says this to him: that so infirm a man unworthily undertakes so great a burden. Let him therefore not only pass over, but cause the boy to pass by: so that he may not follow his own judgment, but may undertake that which is decreed for him by the provision of a better one. And concerning the one standing still, it is immediately added.

CHAPTER V.

(1 Sam. 10:1.) Then Samuel took a flask of oil, and poured it over his head.

i. By this anointing is surely expressed what is even now carried out materially in the holy Church: because he who is placed at the summit receives the sacraments of anointing. But since the anointing itself is a sacrament, he who is advanced is rightly anointed outwardly, if inwardly he is strengthened by the power of the sacrament. Let us therefore first consider more attentively the very powers of oil. Oil, indeed, is preferred above other liquids; oil nourishes fire; oil is accustomed to heal wounds. By it, then, is signified the good of mercy, because it is written of the Lord: His mercies are over all his works (Ps. 145:9). Because it nourishes fire, it designates the grace of preaching, which enlightens the minds of the elect. But because wounds are healed by oil, this surely intimates that the wounds of sins are to be cleansed away. Let the head of the king therefore be anointed, because the mind of the teacher is to be filled with spiritual grace. Let him have oil in his anointing, let him have abundant mercy, which is preferred for him above other virtues. Let him have oil, so that while he nourishes in himself the ardor of the Holy Spirit, he may be able to shine vehemently upon others through the word. Let him have nonetheless the oil of medicine, so that he may wisely arrange how to wipe away the foulness of sins and restore sick minds to health. But Saul is anointed with a flask, not to prefigure doctrine, but to express things to come.

A lentil is indeed a small vessel; what then is the meaning of Saul being anointed with a lentil of oil, except that he is rejected in the end? For because he later refused to obey God, he heard from Samuel: Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, the Lord has rejected you, that you be not king (1 Sam. 15:26). For like a lentil of oil he had little, who was to be cast off and received spiritual grace. This is fittingly understood also in the rulers of the holy Church. For often those receive the height of prelacy who are not perfect in the love of God and neighbor. For they have a certain affection of love, but they do not have its fullness. That crude and imperfect affection of mind, therefore, what is it but a lentil of oil? For when it anoints the head and does not fill it, it is indeed all poured out, but it provides little. On the other hand, when the chosen king is commanded to be anointed, the Lord says to the same prophet: Fill your horn with oil, and come, I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite: for I have provided for myself a king among his sons (1 Sam. 16:1). Hence it is that the same chosen king, ascribing the fullness of his anointing to the praises of God, says: You have fattened my head with oil, and how splendid is my inebriating cup (Ps. 23:5). He, therefore, who received the grace of anointing without being about to persevere, is, by God's dispensation, anointed through the liquid of that vessel, by which the failure of the anointed one was signified. It follows!