xvi. Therefore saith the psalm: "if riches increase, set not your
heart upon them." For riches fail and last not with man, but glide away
like a phantom. But when men have got goods together, with right, or
with wrong and poor men's curses, then suddenly, they go from their
goods, or else their goods from them. And Holy Writ says "The world
passeth away and the lust thereof." A man that is fallen in the water,
and through the force of the water is borne forth and torn from the
ground; if he may get anything that has good fastening like a root or a
stake, he may hinder the water from carrying him away; but by anything
that fleets as he does himself, he cannot fasten himself: and soothly,
willy nilly, in this life, as if in water, we are ever passing with the
goods of this world; and there is naught in this world to fasten by, so
that we shall not pass: for the Wise Man saith, "We shall all die, and
like water slip away into the Earth." And therefore Job speaks, as if he
said "Riches and friends had I many, but they all could not hinder me
from going forth and not coming again." And by what path, man shall go,
the prophet shews: "All flesh is grass, and all the glory of it as the
flower of the field." Man's flesh is as hay, and all his joy and
splendour as the flower of the meadow. Hay is first green grass, and
soon after brings forth flowers: and a while after, the flowers dry and
fall; after it is mown down with the scythe, and dried and taken to a
house to be beasts' food. Thus it befalls man: in his childhood he
springs and grows as the grass does; after, he comes to manhood and
flowers in fairness and strength and wit and having of goods;
afterwards: he draws to age, and then his flowers fall, that are his
virtue, fairness, strength, wit and other power; afterwards, he is
stricken down with the scythe of Death, afterwards taken to a house to
beasts' food, that is, dug into the earth to feed worms. Therefore says
the holy man; "when a man dies, he shall dwell with serpents and
beasts." A dead man is so disgusting to the world, that one cannot let
him be in his house three days together; but bears him forth, that he
harm none with the odour. Therefore, it is now time to work; for in the
time to come there is no time to work, but to receive rewards for deeds
done erewhile. And this the angel affirms with oath and says, "For the
angel has sworn that there will be no further time." Do we then as the
Apostle says: "While we