Ps 49:16

“The fact, he is saying, that you take pains to read the law, mouth the words of its stipulations, and listen carefully to its being read is no excuse. It only sets me more against you, your knowing the law, listening to the commandments and putting them on your lips while in practice pursuing the opposite, the result being that the reading is useless for you. Instead, listening to me when I speak and give commands in the law is an insult to me when there is utter neglect of me in practice.”

“But see what followeth, my brethren. For now some one or other, because God had said to him, "Immolate to God the sacrifice of praise," and had enjoined in a manner this tribute, did meditate to himself and said, I will rise daily, I will proceed to Church, I will say one hymn at matins, another at vespers, a third or fourth in my house, daily I do sacrifice the sacrifice of praise, and immolate to my God. Well thou doest indeed, if thou doest this: but take heed, lest now thou be careless, because now thou doest this: and perchance thy tongue bless God, and thy life curse God. O my people, saith to thee the God of gods, the Lord that spake, "calling the earth from the rising of the sun unto the setting," though yet thou art placed amid the tares, "Immolate the sacrifice of praise to thy God, and render to Him thy prayers:" but take heed lest thou live ill, and chant well. Wherefore this? For, "Unto the sinner, saith God, why dost thou tell out My judgments, and takest My Covenant in thy mouth?" Ye see, brethren, with what trembling we say these words. We take the Covenant of God in our mouth, and we say these words. We take the Covenant of God in our mouth, and we preach to you the instruction and judgment of God. And what saith God to the sinner? "Why dost thou?" Doth He then forbid preachers that be sinners? And where is that, "What they say do, but what they do, do not"? Where is that, "Whether in truth or on occasion Christ be preached"? But these words were said, lest they should fear that hear, from whomsoever it be that they hear: not that they should be without care that speak good words, and do evil deeds. Now therefore, brethren, ye are without care: if ye hear good words ye hear God, through whomsoever it be that ye may hear. But God would not dismiss without reproof them that speak: lest with their speaking alone, without care for themselves they should slumber in evil life, and say to themselves, "For God will not consign us to perdition, through whose mouth He has willed that so many good words should be spoken to His people." Nay, but hear what thou speakest, whoever thou art that speakest: and thou that writ be heard thyself, first hear thyself; and speak what a certain man doth speak in another Psalm, "I will hear what in me speaketh the Lord God, for He shall speak peace to His people." What am I then, that hear not what in me He speaketh, and will that other hear what through me He speaketh? I will hear first, will hear, and chiefly I will hear what speaketh in me the Lord God, for He shall speak peace to His people. Let me hear, and "chasten my body, and to servitude subject it, lest perchance to others preaching, myself be found a cast-away." "Why dost thou tell out my judgments?" Wherefore to thee what profiteth not thee? He admonisheth him to hear: not to lay down preaching, but to take up obedience. "But thou, why dost thou take My Covenant in they mouth?"”

“If a man is constant in reading, and in hearing, and in the meditation of the word of God, and yet perfecteth not by his reading the labour of works, against this man hath the Spirit of God spoken by the hand of the blessed David, rebuking and reproving his wickedness, and restraining him from taking even the Holy Book into his polluted hands, saying, "For to the sinner speaketh God, What hast thou to do with the books of My commandments, that thou hast taken My covenant in thy mouth? Thou hast hated My instruction, and thou hast cast My words behind thee," together with the other things which are written after these. Now as for the man who is constant in reading and remote from deeds, his reading is his own condemnation, and he is the more deserving of judgment, in that while he listeneth every day, he mocketh and is contemptuous every day, and he is thenceforth like a dead man and a corpse which hath no feeling, for if ten thousand trumpets and horns were to blow in the ear of a dead man he would not hear them; even thus is the soul which is dead in sins.”

“For often the tongue of preachers is restrained because of their own wickedness; but often indeed it happens through the fault of those subject to them that the word of preaching is withdrawn from those who are in charge. Indeed the tongue of preachers is restrained because of their own wickedness, as the Psalmist says: "But to the sinner God said: Why do you declare my justices?" And again, because of the fault of those subject to them, the voice of preachers is forbidden, as the Lord says to Ezekiel: "I will make your tongue cleave to your palate, and you shall be mute, and not as a man who rebukes, because it is a provoking house." As if he were to say openly: Therefore the word of preaching is taken from you, because while the people provoke me in their actions, they are not worthy to receive the exhortation of truth. From whose fault, therefore, the word is withdrawn from the preacher is not easily known. But it is known most certainly that the silence of the Pastor sometimes harms himself, but always harms those subject to him.”

“"But to the sinner God has said." Here he bars certain ones, namely sinners, from the sacrifice of praise; and he sets forth three things. First, human perversity. Second, God's patience. Third, he threatens divine severity. Human perversity consists in this, that they say good things and do evil; and therefore he shows how they are unworthy to speak good things. Now there is a twofold good: one is the instruction of morals, the other is formation for the praise of God. He says, therefore: you, namely my people, "offer to God the sacrifice of praise," etc. "But to the sinner God has said," that is, by God's preordination it is fixed that it is unjust for him to say good things and do evil. And he said this because it is impressed in the minds of all, even of sinners. And what did he say? "Why do you declare my justices?" Rom. 2: "You who preach not to steal, do you steal?" But does one who is in the state of mortal sin commit mortal sin when he preaches or teaches? It must be said that his sin is either public or hidden; and if hidden, it is either from contempt and without penance, or with penance. It must be said, therefore, that if someone is in public sin, he should not publicly preach or teach. And I say "public," because if the sin is not public, he could with charity privately admonish his brother concerning a sin even lesser than his own hidden sin, yet admonishing himself as well. But if he is in hidden sin and without penance, then he provokes God, because he simulates. Prov. 11: "The dissembler deceives his friend with his mouth." And it is of these that he speaks here, as the Gloss of Augustine says: "Let the tongue, which the conscience contradicts, not presume to praise." But if the sin is hidden and he grieves over it, he does not sin by preaching or teaching, even if he speaks publicly against that sin, because by detesting the sins of others he also detests his own. "And you take my covenant in your mouth." "Justice" refers to instruction; "covenant" refers to the praise of faith. Sir. 15: "Praise is not seemly in the mouth of a sinner," because the name of God is most holy; and therefore it is unfitting for it to be taken up by sinners, as if usurped. Prov. 26: "As a lame man has fine legs in vain, so a parable is unseemly in the mouth of fools."”