Cap. 6, Vers. 1-7
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/15/d/6/q/bon-eccl-c6-v1-7
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### Chapter VI.

#### Thirdly, he detests avarice, because riches frequently devolve upon strangers.

*There is also another evil* etc. Above he showed that riches are to be despised, both because they do not enrich their possessors and because frequently they are not handed down to posterity. Here, thirdly, he shows that they are to be despised because *they frequently devolve upon strangers;* and this he does in this order. First, indeed, is intimated *the transfer of riches that have been kept;* secondly, *the detestation of niggardliness,* at: *If a man beget* etc.; thirdly is added *the reason for the detestation,* at: *In vain therefore he came* etc.

(Vers. 1. 2.). First, then, Ecclesiastes considered the *vanity* that attends the rich, and he *proposes* it, *assumes* and *concludes. He proposes,* saying: *There is also another evil, which I have seen under the sun;* and he aggravates it from a circumstance: *And that frequent among men,* that is, among the weak lovers of the world and the rich, of whom the Psalm: « O ye sons of men, how long will you be dull of heart? Why do you love vanity, and seek after lying » etc. — And he *assumes* the vanity which is attended to in this, that one keeps riches and another devours them; therefore he says: *A man to whom God hath given riches,* as to movables; *and substance,* as to immovables; *and honours,* as to lofty things. For all are from God: *riches* are from God; Proverbs, the third chapter: « Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left hand riches and glory ». And *substance* is from God, above all that of which Ecclesiasticus, the thirteenth chapter: « Substance is good to him that hath no sin in his conscience ». Likewise *honouring* is from God; whence, in Daniel, the fifth chapter, Daniel said to Baltasar: « O king! the most high God gave to thy father a kingdom and magnificence and honour ». And that he may complete the perfect abundance of the goods of fortune, he adds: *And his soul wanteth nothing of all that it desireth,* because he has sufficiently. *Soul* he calls here the carnal life, of which John, the twelfth chapter: « He that loveth his soul shall lose it ». So he has abundance for possessing, and yet he has avarice for retaining, which takes from him the potency for enjoying; therefore he adds: *Nor doth God give him power to eat thereof,* because he keeps it continually, and in vain; whence Ecclesiasticus, the fourteenth chapter: « To a covetous and niggardly man substance is without reason; and to an envious man, to what purpose is gold »? Neither does he himself use it, nor his posterity, but strangers; whence he adds: *But a stranger shall eat it up;* whence Ecclesiasticus, the fourteenth chapter: « He that heapeth up unjustly from his own mind gathereth for others, and another will live riotously in his goods »; and Proverbs, the thirteenth chapter: « The substance of the sinner is kept for the just ». — And from this he *infers* the vanity: *And this is vanity and a great misery: vanity,* because he himself does not rejoice; *misery,* because, when another takes it away, he is sorrowful; Isaias, the first chapter: « Your country strangers devour before your face » etc.

(Vers. 3.). *If a man beget* etc. Here is noted *the detestation of niggardliness* by reason of the aforesaid transfer, and he reproves that very niggardliness, however much successive prosperity a man may have. Therefore he adds: *If a man beget a hundred children,* it is said hyperbolically, that is, many children; because the wicked frequently beget wicked sons, in whom there is no joy, even if they are many; Ecclesiasticus, the sixteenth chapter: « Rejoice not in ungodly children; if they are multiplied, be not delighted in them ». To abound in sons is a temporal prosperity; and there follows another temporal prosperity: *And live many years,* that is, through many years; *and have more days of age,* that is, more than other men; and this prosperity indeed is temporal. This prosperity the impious frequently have; whence below, the seventh chapter: « The impious man liveth a long time in his impiety », if he has abounded in these prosperities. *And his soul make no use of the goods of his substance,* that is, he be niggardly and covetous in life; *and he be without burial* in death, according to what is said of Joakim in Jeremias, the twenty-second chapter: « With the burial of an ass shall Joakim be buried, rotten and cast forth without the gates of Jerusalem ». — These conditions of prosperity and of niggardliness having been set down, he adds the detestation: *Of this man I pronounce,* as judge of the earth, *that the untimely born is better than he,* on account of the misery and the great vanity which the untimely born lacks; whence it is said in Job, the third chapter: « Why did I not die in the womb? Why, coming forth from the womb, did I not straightway perish? Why received upon the knees? Why suckled at the breasts »? And again, in the tenth: « Why didst thou bring me forth out of the womb »?

(Vers. 4. 5. 6. 7.). *For he came in vain* etc. Here, thirdly, is added *the reason for the detestation,* namely that the untimely born is better than a niggard of this kind, because, as the untimely born came in vain and goeth to darkness, since it dies at once, so also does this man; therefore it is said: *For he came in vain, and goeth to darkness,* that is, the niggard himself; Job, the third chapter: « To a man whose way is hidden,

and God hath surrounded him with darkness »? And that such a covetous and niggardly man comes *in vain* into this world he shows both on account of *the blotting out of the name* in death, and on account of *the inexperience of good* in life, and on account of *the unfulfilment of desire* in both states. On account of *the blotting out of the name* he says: *And his name shall be blotted out by oblivion,* that is, he will remain neither in reality nor in name, according to what the Lord threatens to Babylon in Isaias, the fourteenth chapter: « I will destroy the name of Babylon, and the remains, and the bud, and the offspring, saith the Lord »; and in Wisdom, the second chapter, in the person of the wicked: « Our name shall be forgotten in time, and no man shall be mindful of our works ». — On account of *the inexperience of good* he adds: *he seeth not the sun,* in which, that is, there is delight and the experience of good, according to what is said below, in the eleventh chapter: « Sweet is the lumen, and it is delightful for the eyes to see the sun ». This the covetous man has not seen, because he errs; Wisdom, the fifth chapter: « We have erred from the way of truth, and the lumen of justice hath not shined unto us, and the sun of understanding rose not upon us » etc. And so *he hath not seen the sun,* that is, he has not had the lumen of cognition; *nor known the distance of good and evil,* because, that is, he has not experienced it. — Therefore he says: *Although he lived two thousand years,* because we do not have cognition through length of time, but through experience; Ecclesiasticus, the thirty-fourth chapter: « He that hath no experience knoweth little », according to what the Philosopher says: « Experience made art, inexperience chance ». On account of *the incompletion of desire* he adds: *Do not all make haste to one place?* as if to say: on the side of the body they will go into the earth; Ecclesiasticus, the forty-first chapter: « All things that are made of the earth shall return to the earth »; and above, in the third chapter: « All things are subject to vanity, and all things go to one place ». On the side of the *body*, therefore, there is incineration, but on the side of the *soul* the incompletion of its desire. — Therefore he says: *All the labour of man is in his mouth; mouth* is called the gaping of desire; for he who desires as it were opens his mouth; *labour* therefore *to be in the mouth,* that is, to labour for the completion of desire; whence Proverbs, the sixteenth chapter: « The soul of him that laboureth, laboureth for himself, because his mouth hath obliged him to it ». And although he does this for completing his desire, yet it is not completed; therefore he says: *But his soul,* that is, of the niggardly rich man, *shall not be filled with good things,* as was said above, in the fifth chapter: « A covetous man shall not be satisfied with money »; whence Habacuc, the second chapter: « He hath enlarged his soul as hell, and he himself, like death, shall not be filled ». So it is true of the covetous, of money; so also of knowledge; the second epistle to Timothy, the third chapter: « Ever learning, and never attaining to the knowledge of the truth ».

### Questions.

I. It is asked concerning what he says: *God hath not given him power to enjoy good things.* — *On the contrary:* This is free choice; but he gave free choice: therefore also power.

I respond: it must be said that he has the potency for enjoying, that is, by which he *can* enjoy; but by the just judgment of God it is hindered by some punishment, because he incurs superfluous solicitude and fear and grief; and since *power* signifies potency unhindered, and this is hindered by just judgment: therefore etc.

II. Likewise it is asked concerning what he says, that *his soul wanteth nothing of all that it desireth.*

**On the contrary:** Above, the fifth chapter: *A covetous man shall not be satisfied with money;* and again Jerome: « The covetous man lacks as much what he has as what he has not »: he speaks ill, therefore, when he says: *And wanteth nothing.*

I respond: it must be said that *to lack something* can be in two ways: either as to sufficiency according to *the thing* and nature, or according to *opinion.* I say, therefore, that a covetous man can well be so rich that nothing is lacking to him according to *the thing* and nature; but yet never so rich that something is not lacking to him according to *his own estimation,* because he always desires to have more; and so he lacks to himself.

III. Likewise it is asked concerning this, that he prefers the untimely born to him. It seems that he does so ill:

1. Because the untimely born had cognition of no things, but this man had; likewise, the covetous man, when he sins mortally, enjoys things that are to be used.

2. Likewise, how does he say that *he hath not known the distance of good and evil,* unless he has fully enjoyed good things? Therefore it seems that the untimely born is better than all who do not delight in present goods and who are not carnal; but this is heretical.

I respond: it must be said that according to that way, if this is said in *the person of the carnal man,* the answer is easy; holding, however, that he says this according to *the truth,* I say that he puts the untimely born before such a niggardly rich man, because the former, although he has not experienced goods, yet has not suffered evils; but this man has

suffered evils and has not tasted goods; therefore the former is preferable, and as to this he understands it.

1. As to what is objected from reason, that he has not fully enjoyed goods: it must be said that *to enjoy* in one way signifies *the love* of something *with quieting* in it; in another way *quieting and delight.* I say, therefore, that he who loves God has him, as Augustine says in the book of Eighty-three Questions, and therefore he who loves God delights in him. But money or a temporal thing, when it is loved and is not had as one wishes, gives birth to sorrow. Therefore there can be enjoyment of these things, that is, the highest *love,* and yet slight *delight* and great *sorrow.* Therefore it does not follow, although such a covetous man sins, that he rests in delight; but yet he rests in love, because he loves it for its own sake.

2. As to what is objected, that he has not known the distance: it must be said that by *simple* knowledge he who always has goods knows goods and evils; likewise also he who always has evils; but yet not by the knowledge of *experience,* unless he has goods and evils. And since such a man always has evils, never goods; therefore etc. — As to what is objected about the spiritual man, I say that he is not without spiritual delight, and therefore *he seeth the sun* and *knoweth the distance.* But the niggardly covetous man, because he is *a sinner,* has not spiritual delight; because he is *niggardly,* he has not carnal: and therefore he does not know the distance of good and evil.

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