The second reason was to preserve them from lust:  because the employment of various materials in the making of garments signified inordinate union of sexes, while the use of male attire by a woman, or vice versa, has an incentive to evil desires, and offers an occasion of lust.  The figurative reason is that the prohibition of wearing a garment woven of woolen and linen signified that it was forbidden to unite the simplicity of innocence, denoted by wool, with the duplicity of malice, betokened by linen.  It also signifies that woman is forbidden to presume to teach, or perform other duties of men:  or that man should not adopt the effeminate manners of a woman.

Reply Obj. 7:  As Jerome says on Matt. 23:6, “the Lord commanded them to make violet-colored fringes in the four corners of their garments, so that the Israelites might be distinguished from other nations.”  Hence, in this way, they professed to be Jews:  and consequently the very sight of this sign reminded them of their law.

When we read:  “Thou shalt bind them on thy hand, and they shall be ever before thy eyes [Vulg.:  ’they shall be and shall move between thy eyes’], the Pharisees gave a false interpretation to these words, and wrote the decalogue of Moses on a parchment, and tied it on their foreheads like a wreath, so that it moved in front of their eyes”:  whereas the intention of the Lord in giving this commandment was that they should be bound in their hands, i.e. in their works; and that they should be before their eyes, i.e. in their thoughts.  The violet-colored fillets which were inserted in their cloaks signify the godly intention which should accompany our every deed.  It may, however, be said that, because they were a carnal-minded and stiff-necked people, it was necessary for them to be stirred by these sensible things to the observance of the Law.

Reply Obj. 8:  Affection in man is twofold:  it may be an affection of reason, or it may be an affection of passion.  If a man’s affection be one of reason, it matters not how man behaves to animals, because God has subjected all things to man’s power, according to Ps. 8:8:  “Thou hast subjected all things under his feet”:  and it is in this sense that the Apostle says that “God has no care for oxen”; because God does not ask of man what he does with oxen or other animals.

But if man’s affection be one of passion, then it is moved also in regard to other animals:  for since the passion of pity is caused by the afflictions of others; and since it happens that even irrational animals are sensible to pain, it is possible for the affection of pity to arise in a man with regard to the sufferings of animals.  Now it is evident that if a man practice a pitiful affection for animals, he is all the more disposed to take pity on his fellow-men:  wherefore it is written (Prov. 11:10):  “The just regardeth the lives of his beasts:  but the bowels of the wicked are cruel.”  Consequently