reignS through its supremely just laws of love to God for His
CHAP, xvl] the interpretation of figures. 95
Chap. xv.—Rulefor interpreting figurative expressions.
23. The tjrranny of lust being thus overthrown, charity reignS through its supremely just laws of love to God for His own sake, and love to one's self and one's neighbour for God's sake. Accordingly, in regard to figurative expressions, a rule such as the following will be observed, to carefully turn over in our minds and meditate upon what we read till an interpretation be found that tends to establish the reign of love. Now, if when taken literally it at once gives a meaning of this kind, the expression is not to be considered figurative.
CiiAP. -^xi.— Rule for interpreting commands and ijrdliihitions.
24.' If the sentence is one of command, either forbidding a crime or vice, or enjoining an act of prudence or benevolence.
It is not figurative. If, however, it seems to enjoin a crime or vice, or to forbid an act of prudence or benevolence, it is figurative^ " Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man," says
Christ, " and drink His blood, ye have no life in you." ^ This seems to enjoin a crime or a vice ; it is therefore a figure, enjoining that we should have a share in the sufferings of our
Lord, and that we should retain a sweet and profitable memory of the fact that His flesh was wounded and crucified for us.
Scripture says : " If thine enemy hunger, feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink ;" and this is beyond doubt a command to do a kindness. But in what follows, "for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head," ^ one would think a deed of malevolence was enjoined. Do not doubt, then, that the expression is figurative ; and, while it is possible to inter pret it in two ways, one pointing to the doing of an injury, the other to a display of superiority, let charity on the contrary call you back to benevolence, and interpret the coals of fire as the burning groans of penitence by which a man's pride is cured who bewails that he has been the enemy of one who came to his assistance in distress. In the same w\ay, when our Lord says, " He who loveth his life shall lose it," ^ we are not to think that He forbids the prudence with which it is a man's duty to care for his life, but that He says in a figurative sense,
1 John vi. 53. ^Rom. xii. 20 ; Prov. xxv. 21, 22.
3 John xii. 25. Comp. Matt. x. 39.