On which account we labour to bind each of the mouthpieces of the senses before-mentioned with the imperishable bonds of temperance. "For whatever is not bound with a bond," says Moses, in another passage, "is impure," Numbers xix. 15. as if the cause of its unhappiness was the fact of the parts of the soul being relaxed and open and dissolved; but that the fact of their being compacted and tightly bound together contributed to goodness and soundness of life and reason.
He, therefore, curses the godless and impious Cain with deserved curses; because, having opened the caverns of this concrete creature, he opened his mouth for all external things, praying to receive them in an insatiable manner and to contain them, to the utter destruction of the God-loving doctrine, Abel.
"On this account shall he cultivate the earth;" Genesis iv. 12. he does not say, "He shall become a farmer." For every farmer is an artist, because farming is an art. But any of the common people are cultivators of the earth, giving their service to provide themselves with necessaries, without any skill. These men, then, as they have no superintendent in all that they do, do much harm; and whatever they do well they do by chance, and not in accordance with reason. But the works of farmers, which are performed according to knowledge, are all of them, of necessity, useful.