Philo Judaeus De Virtutibus 145

I also greatly admire that law which, like a singer in a well-trained chorus, is perfectly in accord with those which have gone before it, and which forbids a man to "muzzle the ¹ ox which treadeth out the corn." ² For it is he who, before the sowing was performed, cut the furrows through the deep-soiled plain, and prepared the field for the operations of heaven and for the labours of the husbandman; for the latter, so that he might sow it at a seasonable time, and for the other, that the deep bosom of the earth might receive its bounty displayed in gentle showers, and in consequence might treasure up rich nutriment for the seed and dispense it to it gradually until it should swell into the full ear and bring its annual fruit to perfection. And, after the corn is brought to perfection, then again the ox is necessary for another service, namely, for the purification of the sheaves, and the separation of the chaff from the genuine useful grain.