All who go to her do not return, etc. To her, to death he says, not to the woman. For it is possible for him who is mixed with an adulteress, with the help of the Lord, to return and earn life again by repenting; it is possible for him who is stained with heresy, by coming to one's senses, to return to salvation. But he who is once snatched away by eternal death will never return to the way by which he seeks the life of the blessed. This is said specifically against the Origenists, who promise to heretics, prostitutes, and all the crowds of the wicked, and even to the devil himself and his angels, forgiveness of sins, life, and the kingdom in the heavens after countless times of the filled universal judgment; misunderstanding that passage of Isaiah: And they will be shut up there in prison, and after many days they will be visited (Isaiah 24). As if, after many times of the finished judgment, the impious would be loosed and saved, whereas he rather grants them no salvation, but signifies that those who die at this time due to the enormity of their crimes, deserve to be confined in the prison of punishments, will be visited only for a short time at the time of resurrection, so that, having received their bodies, they will be condemned more severely in judgment, and immediately after the judgment will be shut up forever in more cruel punishments. Although it can also be rightly taken this way, All who go to her, that is, to the prostitute, or to her house, do not return, because, as far as nature is concerned, corrupted by their perverse will, it does not have a return by itself; but through the grace of God, by which it is helped and renewed, so that it may take hold of the paths of life. For by this saying the weight of iniquity is designated, so that when someone returns, he does not attribute it to himself, but to the grace of God, not from works, lest he should boast.
[AD 735] Bede on Proverbs 2:19