Wisdom 4:1
O how beautiful is the chaste generation with glory: for the memory thereof is immortal: because it is known both with God and with men.
Open Wisdom 4:1 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- O quam pulchra est casta generatio, cum claritate ! immortalis est enim memoria illius, quoniam et apud Deum nota est, et apud homines.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- κρείσσων ἀτεκνία μετὰ ἀρετῆς· ἀθανασία γάρ ἐστιν ἐν μνήμῃ αὐτῆς, ὅτι καὶ παρὰ θεῷ γινώσκεται καὶ παρὰ ἀνθρώποις.
Haydock's commentary
Glory. The offspring of the chaste is happy, (Calmet) and honourable: (Haydock) very different from that of adulterers. (Calmet)
Bodily chastity is a great virtue; but purity of faith is more requisite to please God, being the foundation of all virtues. (Worthington)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Methodius The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity, Chapter III
Lest, however, we should seem prolix in collecting the testimonies of the prophets, let us again point out how chastity succeeded to marriage with one wife, taking away by degrees the lusts of the flesh, until it removed entirely the inclination for sexual intercourse engendered by habit. For presently one is introduced earnestly deprecating, from henceforth, this seduction, saying, “O Lord, Father, and Governor of my life, leave me not to their counsels; give me not a proud look; let not the greediness of the belly, nor lust of the flesh, take hold of me.” And in the Book of Wisdom, a book full of all virtue, the Holy Spirit, now openly drawing His hearers to continence and chastity, sings on this wise, “Better it is to have no children, and to have virtue, for the memorial thereof is immortal; because it is known with God and with men. …