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| Chapter IV. How man's goodness and righteousness are not good if compared with the goodness and righteousness of God.
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Chapter IV.
How man’s goodness and righteousness are not good
if compared with the goodness and righteousness of God.
But if we want also to
establish the force of this opinion by still clearer proofs, is it not
the case that while we read of many things as called good in the
gospel, as a good tree, and good treasure, and a good man, and a good
servant, for He says: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil
fruit;” and: “a good man out of the good treasure of his
heart brings forth good things;” and: “Well done, good and
faithful servant;”2240
| 2240 S. Matt. vii. 18; xii. 35; xxv.
21. | and certainly
there can be no doubt that none of these are good in themselves, yet if
we take into consideration the goodness of God, none of them will be
called good, as the Lord says: “None is good save God
alone”?2241
In whose sight
even the apostles themselves, who in the excellence of their calling in
many ways went beyond the goodness of mankind, are said to be evil, as
the Lord thus speaks to them: “If ye then being evil know how to
give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father which
is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him.”2242
Finally as our goodness turns to badness
in the eyes of the Highest so also our righteousness when set against
the Divine righteousness is considered like a menstruous cloth, as
Isaiah the prophet says: “All your righteousness is like a
menstruous cloth.”2243
And to produce
something still plainer, even the vital precepts of the law itself,
which are said to have been “given by angels by the hand of a
mediator,” and of which the same Apostle says: “So the law
indeed is holy and the commandment is holy and just and
good,”2244
when they are
compared with the perfection of the gospel are pronounced anything but
good by the Divine oracle: for He says: “And I gave them precepts
that were not good, and ordinances whereby they should not live in
them.”2245
The Apostle also
affirms that the glory of the law is so dimmed by the light of the New
Testament that he declares that in comparison with the splendour of the
gospel it is not to be considered glorious, saying: “For even
that which was glorious was not glorified by reason of the glory that
excelleth.”2246
And Scripture
keeps up this comparison on the other side also, i.e., in weighing the
merits of sinners, so that in comparison with the wicked it justifies
those who have sinned less, saying: “Sodom is justified above
thee;” and again: “For what hath thy sister Sodom
sinned?” and: “The rebellious Israel hath justified her
soul in comparison of the treacherous Judah.”2247
| 2247 Ezek. xvi. 52, 49; Jer. iii.
11. | So then the merits of all the virtues,
which I enumerated above, though in themselves they are good and
precious, yet become dim in comparison of the brightness of
contemplation. For they greatly hinder and retard the saints who are
taken up with earthly aims even at good works, from the contemplation
of that sublime good.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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