no further apprehension of shipwreck. Therefore, also, hath God provided for us a life that is naturally laborious and troublesome; to the end that being here urged by tribulation, we may conceive an eager longing for future blessings; for if now, whilst there are so many sorrows, and dangers, and fears, and anxieties, surrounding us on all sides, we thus cling to the present life; when should we ever be desirous of the life to come, if our present existence were altogether void of grief and misery? 8. Thus also God acted towards the Jews. For wishing to infuse into them a desire of returning (to Canaan), and to persuade them to hate Egypt, He permitted them to be dis- tressed by working in clay, and brick-making, that being oppressed by that weight of toil and affliction, they might cry unto God respecting their return. For if, indeed when they departed after these things had happened, they did again remember Egypt, with their hard slavery, and were urgent to turn back to that former tyranny; what if they had received no such treatment from these barbarians? when would they have ever wished to leave that strange land?1294 To the end, therefore, that we may not be too closely attached to the earth, and grow wretched whilst gaping after present things, and become unmindful of futurity, God hath made our lives here full of labour. Let us not then cherish the love of the present life beyond what is necessary. For what doth it profit us? or what is the advantage of being closely rivetted to the desire of this present state? Art thou willing to learn in what respect this life is advantageous? It is so, inasmuch as it is the ground-work and starting point of the life to come; the wrestling-school and the arena for crowns of victory hereafter! so that if it does not provide these for us, it is worse than a thousand deaths. For if we do not wish to live so as to please God, it is better to die. For what is the gain? What have we the more? Do we not every day see the same sun, and the same moon, the same winter, the same summer, the same course of things? “The thing that hath been, shall be; and that which is done, is that which shall be done.”1295 Let us not then at once pronounce those happy, who 385 are alive, and bewail the dead, but let us weep for those who are in their sins, whether they be dead or alive. And on the other hand, let us call those happy in whatsoever condition they be, who are in a state of righteousness. Thou, forsooth, fearest and lamentest “one” death; but Paul, who was dying daily,1296 was so far from shedding a tear on that account, that he rejoiced and exulted! 9. “O that I did endure the peril for God,” saith some one, “then I should have no anxi- ety!” But do not even now sink into despondency; for not only indeed is he well approved, who suffers in the cause of God: but he who is suffering any thing unjustly:1297 and bearing 1294 Numb. xi. 5, xiv. 4, &c. 1295 Eccles. i. 9. 1296 1 Cor. xv. 31. 1297 1 Pet. xi. 19, 20: “for it” in this text is not in the original, as is marked by the italics in our version. 546 Homily VI