The Wise Man: It is true that, as to years, you are older than I — in this I do not contradict you; that is why you have also learned to lay so many and such varied snares, and with them have caught many like me, who are of weak human nature, in your chains. True you have said that eye hath not seen nor ear heard the justification of the hope of those who believe rightly. So it is indeed, for in return for the endurance of those whom you torment cruelly and mercilessly every day, every hour, and in every way, the Master of creation shall give them the good things they have not seen, and the delights they have not heard (1 Cor 2, 9); and He shall give them these because they did not mingle with you, and endured your terrible, tormenting torments. But after two truths you have added a lie also, as is nearly always your custom, and so I shall beautifully refute you with the blessed Paul, where he says: „be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord” [1 Cor 15, 58]; and he says again that the Lord has promised the pure the life to come. God cannot lie [Heb 6, 18]; have you anything to say against these words, stronger than walls and marble foundations? Is it not fitting, then, that I should now hope firmly and without doubt, since it is Paul himself who bears witness to the true promise of the Lord — Paul, who, like God, does not know how to lie? O world, blind guide; O world, full of cunning and a snare prepared; O world, fair of speech and speaker of lies! How greatly you labor, and how you struggle, to make me believe through flatteries that your words are true, and that the words of the Lord and of His faithful servants are lies! But I would sooner accept death than let it into my mind not only to do, but even to say, such a thing. But again, with a loud voice, I shall say: „Waiting I shall wait for the Lord [Ps 39, 1], and hoping I shall hope in the true words of His servants, and, not turning away from them, my hope shall be fulfilled.” As for you, empty apparition and deceitful dream, I shall count you and call you the blind guide of those who follow you.
Asking in Full Faith for the Things of Heaven, You Shall Be Given the Things of Earth as Well
The World: Since you hope so firmly and rely on so many things to come, which are only yet to happen, and believe not in what you see but in what you hear, why then, in all your affairs and in all your actions, do you make use of my provisions? First of all, why do you dwell in me? Why do you eat my food and my sustenance? Why do you gather the wheat and fruits of my fields? Why do you pick the fruit of my trees? Why do you clothe yourself in my garments, and, girding yourself, cover yourself with them? Why do you milk my cow? Why do you gather the honey of my bees? Why do you plow the field with my ox? Why do you sow with my seeds? Why do you sail my ship upon the sea and ride my horse upon the land? And why should I draw this out further? In short, as I have told you before: why do you make use of all my things? Since you say that I am neither good nor a benefactress, why do you provide for yourself in every way with them, since what I have seems good to you? All that you do, I know why you do it: so that nothing may be lacking to you tomorrow, and so that everything in your house may be multiplied abundantly. Let me tell you one more thing, O poor man in mind, which I know you will not deny: does not Holy Scripture teach you, „Take no thought for what ye shall eat or drink tomorrow”? [Mt 6, 25]. Can you deny this, or say it is not so? Certainly not! Then why do you live without hope? Why do you go about and not stand still? Why do you toil and take care of your affairs, if, according to the word of Scripture, even should you stand still and take no care, tomorrow you shall have all things necessary ready at hand, and shall lack nothing? Now, however, you must know — and knowing, thank me — that it is I who make and give to all every good thing, and that, though you are stubborn, I give you too, as I do the others, a share of my goods and treasures, and add still more to what you have. Therefore, acknowledging this, you must thank me.
The World changes weapons here: she no longer denies the Wise Man’s hope, but tries to turn it against him — if you do not believe in me, why do you make use of my bread, my clothes, my ox, my ship? It is the same snare with which Satan tempted in the wilderness, likewise quoting Scripture against itself (Mt 4:6), and this is why Saint John Chrysostom warns that the enemy does not always lie through false words, but more often through truths pulled out of their place. The problem is not contact with created things, but the confusion the World proposes between using them and trusting in them.
Blessed Augustine names exactly this distinction uti and frui: to use (uti) a thing as a means toward God is something wholly different from enjoying (frui) it as though it were the soul’s final goal. Wheat, the ox, the ship are good gifts of the Creator — „every creature of God is good… and it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer” (1 Tim 4:4-5) — but the World wants to be mistaken for the Giver, so that the one who receives them might owe her the thanks that belongs to God. The Wise Man dwells on the World’s earth exactly as he said in this series’ previous article: as though he were not in her (1 Cor 7:31) — making use of her gifts, without giving her his heart.
The word from the Sermon on the Mount that the World cunningly quotes — „take no thought for tomorrow” (Mt 6:25) — has, in that very chapter, a continuation the World passes over in silence: „Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Mt 6:33). It is not carelessness that is commanded, but the right order of care: whoever seeks heaven first receives earth added on top, not the reverse. This is precisely what the subtitle closing this exchange says — earthly things come added, not sought first — while the World, cutting the verse in half, turns a promise of God into an argument of her own.
This is why the ground the Wise Man offers is not rhetorical but juridical in the highest sense: „it is impossible for God to lie” (Heb 6:18), and the labor of the righteous „is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor 15:58). Saint Isaac the Syrian says that hope founded on a promise of God is stronger than any wall of stone, precisely because it depends not on the strength of the one who hopes, but on the faithfulness of the One who promised. And the title standing over this whole exchange — „the righteous man shall never die” — is no denial of bodily death, but the affirmation of the very distinction this series has repeated since its first articles: the World counts the body’s years; the Wise Man binds his life to the One who does not count.
