And on Psalm xvi.
Principles of Rabbinism: two Messiahs.
447
Will it be said that, as men have declared that righteousness has departed the earth, they therefore knew of original sin?—Nemo ante obitum beatus est[170]—that is to say, they knew death to be the beginning of eternal and essential happiness?
448
[Miton] sees well that nature is corrupt, and that men are averse to virtue; but he does not know why they cannot fly higher.
449
Order.—After Corruption to say: "It is right that all those who are in that state should know it, both those who are content with it, and those who are not content with it; but it is not right that all should see Redemption."
450
If we do not know ourselves to be full of pride, ambition, lust, weakness, misery, and injustice, we are indeed blind. And if, knowing this, we do not desire deliverance, what can we say of a man...?