על צאצאי קין מ״הOn the Posterity of Cain and his Exile 45
א׳
1Again we must search for the reason why she gives the servant to drink from the spring, but the camels from the well. We should probably explain it in this way: the water is the same in each case, the sacred word supplying streams of knowledge. But the well is particularly associated with memory; for things which have appeared to be by this time in the depths and out of reach are drawn up as from a well by means of a reminder (from outside). Such men we must cordially approve for the excellent nature which has fallen to their lot. But there are some men of diligence and effort, who at first think the way leading to virtue rough and steep and difficult, but for whom later on the all-bountiful God renders it a highway, transforming the bitterness of their toil into sweetness. In what manner He transformed it we will point out. When He led us forth out of Egypt, that is out of our bodily passions, as we journeyed along the track barren of pleasure, we encamped in Marah, a spot having no water fit to drink, but water wholly bitter (Exod. 15:23). for the delights that come by the way of eyes and ears and that of the appetite and sexual lusts bewitched us with their haunting music, ever ringing in our ears. And whenever we wished wholly to sever ourselves from them, they would pull against us, drawing us on and gripping us, and persistently casting their spells over us, so that, giving in to their unceasing efforts to subdue and tame us, we came to abhor labour as utterly bitter and repugnant, and we planned to retrace our course and return to Egypt, the refuge of a dissolute and licentious life; and, we might have done so had not the Saviour, anticipating us, taken pity on us and cast into our soul a sweetening tree like a syrup, producing love of labour instead of hatred of labour (cf. Exod. 15:25). for being the Creator He knew that it is impossible for us to rise superior to anything whatever,
ב׳
2[157] unless a vehement love of such effort be implanted in us. No pursuit that men engage in, where affection does not draw them, gains its fitting end. For complete success a sense of liking must be added, and the heart must be absorbed in the object of its desire.