Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 50

(Admonition 36.) Those are to be admonished in one way who do evil secretly and good publicly; and in another way those who hide the good things they do, and yet by certain deeds allow evil to be publicly thought of themselves. For those are to be admonished who do evil secretly and good publicly, to weigh with what swiftness human judgments fly away, but with what immovability divine ones endure. They are to be admonished to fix the eyes of the mind on the end of things, because both the attestation of human praise passes away, and the supernal sentence, which penetrates even hidden things, grows strong unto perpetual retribution.

While, therefore, they set their secret evils before the divine judgments, but their upright deeds before human eyes, both the good which they do publicly is without a witness, and the wrong which they secretly commit is not without an eternal witness. And so, by hiding their faults from men and displaying their virtues, they both hide the things by which they ought to be punished, and disclose and hide the things by which they might have been rewarded. Such the Truth rightly calls whited sepulchres, fair outwardly, but full within of the bones of the dead (Matth. XXIII, 27); because within they cover the evils of their vices, but to human eyes, by the showing of certain works, they flatter with the mere outward colour of righteousness. And so they are to be admonished not to despise the right things they do, but to believe them to be of a better merit.

For they judge their own good things very wrongly who think human favours suffice for their reward. For when transitory praise is sought for an upright work, a thing worthy of eternal retribution is sold for a cheap price. Concerning which price received, the Truth says: 'Amen I say to you, they have received their reward' (Matth. VI, 2, 5). They are to be admonished to consider that, while they show themselves depraved in secret, yet display of themselves examples in public in good works, they show things to be followed which they flee, they cry aloud things to be loved which they hate, they live to others and die to themselves.

But on the contrary, those are to be admonished who do good things secretly, and yet by certain deeds allow evil to be publicly thought of themselves, lest, while by good deeds they quicken themselves with the right virtue of their action, they slay another in themselves through the example of a depraved estimation; lest they love their neighbours less than themselves, and, while they themselves sip the wholesome draught of wine, pour out a pestilent cup of poison into the minds of those who behold them. These indeed in one respect help less the life of their neighbours, but in another burden it much, while they are eager both to do right things secretly, and by certain deeds to sow depraved things of themselves as an example. For whoever is already able to trample down the concupiscence of praise perpetrates a fraud of edification, if he hides the good things he does;

and, as it were, having cast the seed, he withdraws the roots of germination, who does not show the work which is to be imitated. For hence in the Gospel the Truth said: 'Let them see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven' (Matth. V, 16). Where indeed that other sentence is put forth, which seems to have enjoined something far different, saying: 'Take heed that you do not your justice before men, to be seen by them' (Matth. VI, 1). What, then, is it that our work is both so to be done that it be not seen, and yet is commanded to be seen, save that the things we do are both to be hidden, lest we ourselves be praised, and yet to be shown, that we may increase the praise of our heavenly Father?

For when the Lord forbade us to do our justice before men, He straightway added: 'To be seen by them.' And when again He commanded our good works to be seen by men, He immediately subjoined: 'That they may glorify your Father who is in heaven' (Matth. V, 16). In what manner, therefore, they should be seen, or in what manner not seen, He showed from the end of both sentences, namely, that the mind of the worker should both not seek that its work be seen for its own sake, and yet not conceal this for the sake of the glory of the heavenly Father. Whence it very often comes to pass that a good work is in secret when it is done publicly, and again in public when it is done secretly. For he who in a public good work seeks not his own but the supernal Father's glory, hides what he does;

because he had that one only as witness, whom he was careful to please. And he who in his secret good work covets to be detected and praised—and perhaps no one has seen what he displayed, and yet he did this before men, because he took with him as many witnesses in the good work as the human praises he sought in his heart. But when a depraved estimation, in so far as it can be without sin, is wiped away from the mind of those who behold, guilt is administered by example to all who believe evil. Whence also it very often happens that those who negligently allow evil to be thought of themselves indeed do no iniquitous things of themselves; but yet, through those who imitate them, they transgress many times more.

Hence it is that Paul, to those who ate certain unclean things without pollution, but by this eating of theirs moved the scandal of temptation to the imperfect, says: 'Take heed lest perhaps this your liberty become a stumbling-block to the weak' (I Cor. VIII, 9). And again: 'And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died. Now when you sin thus against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ' (ibid., 11, 12). Hence it is that Moses, when he had said: 'Thou shalt not curse the deaf,' straightway added: 'Nor put a stumbling-block before the blind' (Levit. XIX, 14). For to curse the deaf is to disparage one absent and not hearing;

but to put a stumbling-block before the blind is indeed to do a discreet thing, yet to afford an occasion of scandal to him who has not the light of discretion.