3. In Holy Scripture, the number a thousand is wont to be taken for totality. Hence the Psalmist saith, The word which He commanded to a thousand generations; when it is sufficiently plain that from the very beginning of the world up to the coming of our Lord no more than seventy-seven generations are reckoned up by the Evangelist. What then is represented in the number a thousand, save, until the bringing forth of the new offspring, the complete whole of the race foreseen. Hence it is said by John, And shall reign with Him a thousand years [Rev. 20, 6]; for that the reign of Holy Church is made complete by being perfected in entireness. Now forasmuch as a unit being multiplied is brought to ten, and ten being taken into itself is expanded to one hundred, which again being multiplied by ten is extended to a thousand, since we set out with one to get to one thousand, what is here denoted by the designation of ‘one’ but the commencement of good living? what by the fulness of the n...
