II. (6) When then has a slave freedom of speech towards his master? Is it not when he is conscious that he has not wronged him, but that he has done and said everything with a view to the advantage of his owner? (7) When therefore is it proper for the servant of God to use freedom of speech to the ruler and master of himself, and of the whole word? Is it not when he is free from all sins, and is aware in his conscience that he loves his master, feeling more joy at the fact of being a servant of God, than he would if he were sovereign over the whole race of mankind, and were invested without any effort on his part with the supreme authority over land and sea. (8) And he mentions the ministrations and services by which Abraham displayed his love to his master in the last sentence of the divine oracle given to his son, “I will give to thee and to thy seed all this land, and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because Abraham thy father obeyed my voice, and kept all my precepts, and all my commandments, and my laws, and my Judgments.”{3}{#ge 26:3.} (9) And it is the greatest possible praise of a servant that he does not neglect a single thing of the commandments which his master lays upon him, but that he labours earnestly without any hesitation and with all his vigour, and even beyond his power to perform them all with a well affected mind.
III. (10) There are persons, then, to whom it is becoming to listen but not to speak, with respect to whom it is said, “Be silent and Hear,”{4}{#de 27:9.} a very admirable injunction; for ignorance is a very bad and a very audacious thing, the first remedy for which is silence, and the second, attention to those who present you with anything worthy of your listening to. (11) Let no one, however, think that this is all that is signified by those few words, “Be silent and hear;” but that there is also something greater in them which may give a lesson to any one. For these words do not recommend you only to be silent with your tongues, and to hear with your ears, but also to conduct yourself thus in both these respects in your soul; (12) for many persons when they have come to listen to some one, have nevertheless not come with their minds, but wander outside, and keep on thinking of thousands upon thousands of things within themselves, whether concerning their relations, or strangers, or themselves, which at that moment they ought not to remember at all, but which in short they, re-collecting to themselves in regular order, and thus by reason of the excessive tumult which they keep alive in themselves, they are unable to hear the speaker. For he speaks as if he were not among men, but among inanimate statues who have indeed ears, but no sense of hearing. (13) If, therefore, the mind chooses to associate neither with things wandering about inside, nor with those which are stored up within it, but, remaining quiet and silent, directs its whole attention to the speaker, keeping silent in accordance with the injunction of Moses, it will be able to listen with all attention, but otherwise it would not be able to do so.
Page 12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940414243444546474849505152
