Those two authorities are understood concerning those things which pertain to salvation and belong to oneself, but Solomon went beyond.
II. Likewise there is a doubt concerning what he says: One man among a thousand I have found. According to this he seems to confirm that heresy that no woman is saved; and heretics strive to prove this:
1. Because, if only that which Christ assumed is saved,
and he assumed only the male sex, therefore that alone will be saved.
2. And they endeavor to prove this by what is said in the last chapter of Mark: He who shall believe and shall be baptized: it does not say: she who shall be baptized. And the same is said in John chapter three.
The contrary of this is shown: I. By what is said in Matthew chapter twenty-one: The harlots shall go before you into the kingdom of God.
2. Likewise, this is shown because the Lord received both sexes, healed both bodily, called both through the Apostles. Solomon himself also praised both, and concerning the valiant woman in the last chapter of Proverbs: She shall laugh on the last day. What then does he mean when he says: A woman among all these I have not found, etc.
I respond: it must be said that he speaks of the universality of concupiscence, and of this one may speak in two ways: in one way with respect to carnal propagation, because it is transmitted; in another way with respect to the pursuit through actual sin. If in the first way, the statement is true and proper, because Christ alone was conceived without sin and did not contract original sin. If in the second way, the statement is hyperbolic: and this is evident, because there is not only one good man to be saved, but indeed many: and this is said with respect to the rarity of those who in that time were found free from the act of concupiscence.
As to what the heretics object, that he assumed the male sex: I respond that even though he assumed the male sex, it must be noted that he assumed it from a woman: which he would not have done if it did not pertain to salvation. Moreover, man and woman are of one nature and one body.
2. As to what they object from the Gospel, that it is in the masculine: it must be said that this masculine is generic and stands there for the nature, not for the sex: and frequently the masculine gender includes the feminine according to the manner of Scripture.