Chapter 46.—107. Petilianus said: "In the first Psalm David separates the blessed from the impious, not indeed making them into parties, but excluding all the impious from holiness. ‘Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners.’ Let him who had strayed from the path of righteousness, so that he should perish, return to it again. ‘Nor sitteth in the
seat of the scornful.’2124
| 2124 Et super cathedram pestilentiæ, cp. Hieron.
|
When he gives this warning, O ye
miserable men, why do you sit in that seat? ‘But his
delight is in the
law of the
Lord; and in His
law doth he
meditate day and
night. And he shall be like a
tree planted by the
rivers of
water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his
season: his
leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall
prosper. The
ungodly are not so: but are like the
chaff which the
wind driveth away.’ He blindeth their
eyes, so that they should not
see. ‘Therefore the
ungodly shall not stand in the
judgment, nor
sinners in the
congregation of the
righteous. For the
Lord knoweth the way of the
righteous: but the way of the
ungodly shall
perish.’"
2125
108. Augustin answered: Who is there in the Scriptures that would not distinguish between these two classes of men? But you slanderously charge the corn with the offenses of the chaff; and being yourselves mere chaff, you boast yourselves to be the only corn. But the true prophets declare that both these classes have been mingled together throughout the whole world, that is, throughout the whole corn-field of the Lord, until the
winnowing which is to take place on the day of judgment. But I advise you to read that first Psalm in the Greek version, and then you will not venture to reproach the whole world with being of the party of Macarius; because you will perhaps come to understand of what Macarius there is a party among all the saints, who throughout all nations are blessed in the seed of Abraham. For what stands in our language as "Blessed is the man," is in Greek Μαχάριος ἀνήρ. But that Macarius who offends you, if he is a bad man, neither belongs to this division, nor is to its prejudice. But if he is a good man, let him prove his own work, that he may have glory in himself alone, and not in another.2126
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