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| Chapter XVI. After saying a few words about Tobit he demonstrates that Raguel surpassed the philosophers in virtue.
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Chapter XVI.
After saying a few words about Tobit he demonstrates
that Raguel surpassed the philosophers in virtue.
96. Tobit also
clearly portrayed in his life true virtue, when he left the feast and
buried the dead,708
and invited the
needy to the meals at his own poor table. And Raguel is a still
brighter example. For he, in his regard for virtue, when asked to
give his daughter in marriage, was not silent regarding his
daughter’s faults, for fear of seeming to get the better of the
suitor by silence. So when Tobit the son of Tobias asked that his
daughter might be given him, he answered that, according to the law,
she ought to be given him as near of kin, but that he had already given
her to six men, and all of them were dead.709
This just man, then, feared more for
others than for himself, and wished rather that his daughter should
remain unmarried than that others should run risks in consequence of
their union with her.
97. How simply he settled all the questions
of the philosophers! They talk about the defects of a house,
whether they ought to be concealed or made known by the
vendor.710
| 710 Cic. de
Off. III. 13. | Raguel was quite certain that his
daughter’s faults ought not to be kept secret. And, indeed,
he had not been eager to give her up—he was asked for her.
We can have no doubt how much more nobly he acted than those
philosophers, when we consider how much more important a
daughter’s future is than some mere money
affair.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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