1 Samuel 8:17

Your male and female servants also, etc. Even the improper motions of mind or flesh, for example, anger, jealousy, gluttony, lust, and other such things, which must be restrained and curbed by the discipline of wise men; but even the other duties of right intention, the cruel deceiver will instead claim for his own jurisdiction, and in the rich flocks of virtues, in which you have long served in vain, lacking the perfection of ten, the enemy himself will receive the palm of pasture in the end. Thus, you will finally bewail yourselves made servants under the adversary, whom it had previously wearied you to live as free under the Lord.

So that, namely, they may know themselves to be subject to his authority in such a way that they dare not transgress his commands. The Lord indeed wished to establish this royal dominion when He said: "Whatever you shall bind upon earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you shall loose upon earth shall be loosed in heaven" (Matt. 16:19). This power also He demanded from His subjects, who said: "If anyone shall preach to you a gospel other than what I have preached to you, let him be anathema" (Gal. 1:8). Likewise the Lord, sending His disciples to preach, says: "He who hears you, hears me; and he who despises you, despises me" (Luke 10:16). Hence concerning the preachers of Judea the Lord says to those same disciples: "Whatever they shall tell you, do" (Matt. 23:3). We are therefore servants of our kings, when we are so subjected to the authority of our prelates that we presume to do nothing apart from their authority. Since, therefore, those who strengthen their virtues in the power of obedience are set over them, at the end of the royal law it is said: "And you shall be his servants" — so that faithful subjects may then also recognize that they ought to be subject to the command of their preachers, when through the advancement of virtues they are led to the heights of perfection. The Truth itself also taught this to the disciples in these very words, saying: "When you have done all these things, say: We are unprofitable servants" (Luke 17:10).

9. There follows: "He will also tithe your flocks, and you shall be his servants." As if to say: When a carnal pastor is placed over you, plunder of virtues is inflicted not only upon your possessions, but also upon yourselves. For the flocks of the elect are the multitudes of spiritual virtues. But since these very spiritual virtues are scattered by the example of the wicked, the king takes tithes of the flock when he who rules carnally destroys certain virtues in the hearts of the saints. He takes tithes: because while he scatters the integrity of the mind, he leaves the number of virtues incomplete. For perfection is signified by the number ten. Hence also, when the Lord showed the losses of our fallen humanity by an open comparison, He brought forward the woman who had lost one of ten drachmas (Luke 15:4 ff.); so that by this, because the number ten is shown to have been diminished, that heavenly fellowship which remained in the angels at the number nine might be taught to be imperfect without the restoration of our condition. And because tithes are exacted each year, those who do not cease to offer tithes are fittingly said to be servants of the king. For they serve each year those by whose example they often become worse. It can also be shown through this—that after the tithes are given, this servitude is asserted—as an evil progression. For those who gradually fail act daily in such a way that they are led to the depths of iniquity. He says therefore: "He will tithe your flocks, and you shall be his servants." As if to say: By the example of the wicked you will gradually fall away, but in falling you act so that you never withdraw from imitating them. For it is written: "By whom a person is overcome, of him he is made a servant" (2 Peter 2:19). Because indeed through imitating a reprobate pastor they fall into the servitude of sin, they cannot be freed from his yoke even when they wish.