7. When can the upright man be alone, since
he is always with God? When is he left forsaken who is never
separated from Christ? “Who,” it says, “shall
separate us from the love of Christ? I am confident that neither
death nor life nor angel shall do so.” Rom. viii. 35, 38. And when can he be deprived of his
labour who never can be deprived of his merits, wherein his labour
receives its crown? By what places is he limited to whom the
whole world of riches is a possession? By what judgment is he
confined who is never blamed by any one? For he is “as
unknown yet well known, as dying and behold he lives, as sorrowful yet
always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing and
yet possessing all things.” 2 Cor. vi. 9 ff. For the
upright man regards nothing but what is consistent and virtuous.
And so although he seems poor to another, he is rich to himself, for
his worth is taken not at the value of the things which are temporal,
but of the things which are eternal.