Gregory Thaumaturgus

“ But he who leads a solitary life passes a species of existence full of terror to himself; not perceiving that if one should fall upon men welded closely together, he adopts a rash and perilous course, and that it is not easy to snap the threefold cord. ”

“ Yea, of the unrighteous and audacious, those who are dead fare better than those who are still alive. And better than both these is he who, being destined to be like them, has not yet come into being, since he has not yet touched the wickedness which prevails among men. ”

“ Moreover, I put a poor youth, if he be wise, before an aged prince devoid of wisdom, to whose thoughts it has never occured that it is possible that a man may be raised from the prison to the throne, and that the very man who has exercised his power unrighteously shall at a later period be righteously cast out. ”

“ And leaving all these reflections, I considered and turned in aversion from all the forms of oppression [1] which are done among men; whence some receiving injury weep and lament, who are struck down by violence in utter default of those who protect them, or who should by all means comfort them in their trouble. [2] And the men who make might their right [3] are exalted to an eminence, from which, however, they shall also fall. ”

“ For it may happen that those who are subject to a youth, who is at the same time sensible, shall be free from trouble,—those, I mean, who are his elders. [11] Moreover, they who are born later cannot praise another, of whom they have had no experience, [12] and are led by an unreasoning judgment, and by the impulse of a contrary spirit. But in exercising the preacher’s office, keep thou this before thine eyes, that thine own life be rightly directed, and that thou prayest in behalf of the foolish, that they may get understanding, and know how to shun the doings of the wicked. ”