Miscellanies 7.12.80

Having come into a settled disposition of doing good, he does good more quickly than he speaks of it, praying to share his brothers' sins for the confession and conversion of his kin, and eager to share his own good things with those dearest to him; and his friends are such to him. Increasing, then, the seeds entrusted to him according to the farming the Lord commanded, he remains sinless and becomes self-controlled, and lives in spirit with those like him in the choirs of the saints, even though he is still held on earth. All day and night, speaking and doing the Lord's commands, he rejoices exceedingly, not only when he rises in the morning and at midday, but also when walking and lying down, dressing and undressing; and he teaches his son, if he has a son, never separated from the commandment and the hope, always giving thanks to God like the living creatures that sing his glory, which are described allegorically through Isaiah, and patient in every trial: “The Lord gave,” it says, “the Lord has taken away.” Such was Job, who, when external things and even his bodily health were taken away, had already laid everything aside through his love for the Lord. “For he was,” it says, “righteous, holy, abstaining from all evil.” And “holy” indicates what is due to God in his whole dispensation, which he understood, and so he was one who knows. For one must neither, if things are good, cling to them, since they are human, nor again, if they are evil, hate them, but be above both, trampling the one underfoot and passing the other on to those who need it. The one who knows is careful in accommodating himself to others, so that the accommodation does not, without his noticing, become his disposition.