Verse 28.—The bud of his house shall be laid open, it shall be dragged down in the day of God's fury. 38. In the judgment the evils lying hidden within shall be revealed.—Then the bud of his house is laid open, when every evil that was springing up in his conscience is shown. For now indeed the bud of the hypocrite's house remains hidden, because although his working appears good in outward image, yet the intention lies concealed. For it is one thing that he does, another that he intends. But when, at the coming of the Judge, the conscience of each shall have been brought to bear witness, whence it is written: «Their thoughts accusing, or also defending one another» (Rom. 2:15), in this the bud of the hypocrite's house is laid open, because in his mind the perverse thought is uncovered.
And in the day of God's fury it is dragged down, because, the wrath of the Judge being shown, delivered over to the avenging flames, he is separated from His sight. For he who would not live so as to ponder the highest things, oppressed by the weight of his sins, shall fall from the face of the Judge into the depths of torments. But now the Judge both considers and tolerates the sinner, and awaits the conversion of each one, because it is the day of patience, and not yet the day of fury. But in this day of patience the hypocrite remains as it were immovable, while he both perpetrates many evils, and no scourges chastise him. But in the day of fury he shall be dragged down, because, snatched to torments in the time of vengeance, he is separated from the countenance of the eternal Judge. It follows: