11. But you will say: why did he confuse and mix together moral and ceremonial precepts? - I say that this commandment: Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day, is about charity: and whatever is manifest and hidden in the other commandments is consummated in this one. And therefore he mixed together the ceremonial and the moral, so that we might better recall them to memory: lest, if he had set them out separately, our memory would be burdened.
12. Now there are three things that are required for perfect love. The first is divine leisure, converting the soul to God. The second is the imitation of Christ in good works. The third is cessation from every servile work, which renders the heart pure and clean.
Now the conversion to God takes place according to seven works, without which the soul is not converted to perfect leisure in God; of which three are intrinsic, which are done by meditating, praying, and exulting: and from these three results contemplation. The other four are extrinsic, which are done by reading, chanting psalms, offering sacrifice, and fulfilling the divine law; and this is done either by hearing, or by teaching, or by conferring with others.
And this is what he says: Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day. The Lord therefore first commands leisure converting the soul to himself.
13. Second, he commands imitation of himself, when he says: Six days you shall labor. Concerning this imitation the Apostle says: Be imitators of God, as most beloved children: and in Luke it is said: Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.
Now there are six works of mercy, namely: feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, clothing the naked, gathering in strangers, visiting the sick, and ransoming captives. Moreover, the work of perfect virtue cannot exist unless the creature is conformed to Christ in these things.
14. Now for the work of virtue, six things are required corresponding to the works of the six days, which are provident circumspection, right intention, pure affection, just or right election, vigorous prosecution, and charitable formation.
The first, then, is understood in the work of the first day, when God said: Let there be light: and light was made: this is provident circumspection.
Second, it is necessary that a man set for himself a right end in God; and this is indicated when he says: Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters. And God called the firmament heaven; because it is necessary that a man be drawn upward, so that he may have a right intention toward God.
Third, pure affection is required; and this is understood in the third work, when God divided the land from the waters, that is, secular affections from divine ones.
Fourth, just or right election is required, so that all our works may be done in an orderly manner, according as they ought: and this is indicated in the fourth work, when he says: Let there be luminaries in the firmament of heaven, that is, let our works be ordered.
Fifth, vigorous prosecution is required, which is signified in the fifth work, when God brought forth living soul in the waters, as swimming creatures, and in the air flying creatures.
Sixth, charitable formation is required, so that the works may be complete, clothed over with all circumstances, according to what the law of divine charity demands. For charity is the perfective form of all things; and he who has charity has all these six. The sixth work of virtue, therefore, is the formation of charity: which is signified when it says: God made man in his image and likeness.
When the work of man is made complete from these six, then man is said to live rightly.
15. But it does not suffice to do the work of virtue unless man guards himself from vicious work; and this is touched upon when it says: You shall do no work in it, that is, no sin.
Now man can commit sin in five ways: first, when he perpetrates sin against the commandment; second, when he incites another to sin; third, when he defends the sinner; fourth, when he accepts the sinner; fifth, when he overlooks the sinner and neither rebukes nor punishes, and this is the greatest danger, when someone neglects to correct another.
16. The first sin is touched upon when it says: You shall do no work in it, that is, you shall perpetrate no sin.
The second sin is touched upon when it says: nor your son nor your daughter, that is, you shall not be the father of sin by instigating another to sin either by word or deed or example. - The third sin is touched upon when it says: nor your manservant nor your maidservant. He who commits sin is the servant of sin: but he who defends sin is the master of sin, by providing harbor to the one committing sin. - The fourth sin is when someone accepts the sinner: which is touched upon when it says: nor your beast of burden. A beast of burden, when it was tied, was not led to work except by the acceptance of its master, and this acceptance is a binding.
The fifth sin is when someone neglects to correct another: which is touched upon when it says: nor the stranger who is within your gates. One considers a man a stranger when he sees a man sinning and says: what is his sin to me? And thus, when a man does not punish the sin of another, he becomes a partaker of that sin.
In many other ways also a man becomes a partaker of the sin of another; and on account of this the Psalm says: From my hidden sins cleanse me, O Lord, and from the sins of others spare your servant.