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Translated by W. Moore and H. A. Wilson
St Gregory of Nyssa Resources Online and in Print
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14 Pages
Page 12
Often, too, the Arranger of this Feast of Life exposes by such-like dispensations the cunning device of the "constraining cause" of money-loving [1569] , so that this vice comes to the light bared of all specious pretexts, and no longer obscured by any misleading screen [1570] . For most declare that they give play [1571] to their cravings for more, in order that they may make their offspring all the richer; but that their vice belongs to their nature, and is not caused by any external necessity, is proved by that inexcusable avarice which is observed in childless persons. Many who have no heir, nor any hope of one, for the great wealth which they have laboriously gained, rear a countless brood within themselves of wants instead of children, and they are left without a channel into which to convey this incurable disease, though they cannot find an excuse in any necessity for this failing [1572] . But take the case of some who, during their sojourn in life, have been fierce and domineering in disposition, slaves to every kind of lust, passionate to madness, refraining from no act even of the most desperate wickedness, robbers and murderers, traitors to their country, and, more execrable still, patricides, mother-killers, child-murderers, mad after unnatural intercourse; suppose such characters grow old in this wickedness; how, some one may ask, does this harmonize with the result of our previous investigations? If that which is taken away before its time in order that it may not continuously glut itself, according to our illustration of the banquet, with Life's indulgences, is providentially removed from that carouse, what is the special design in so and so, who is of that disposition, being allowed to continue his revels [1573] to old age, steeping both himself and his boon companions in the noxious fumes of his debauchery? In fine, you will ask, wherefore does God in His Providence withdraw one from life before his character can be perfected in evil, and leave another to grow to be such a monster that it had been better for him if he had never been born? In answer to this we will give, to those who are inclined to receive it favourably, a reason such as follows: viz. that oftentimes the existence of those whose life has been a good one operates to the advantage of their offspring; and there are hundreds of passages testifying to this in the inspired Writings, which clearly teach us that the tender care shown by God to those who have deserved it is shared in by their successors, and that even to have been an obstruction, in the path to wickedness, to any one who is sure to live wickedly, is a good result [1574] . But seeing that our Reason in this matter has to grope in the dark, clearly no one can complain if its conjecturing leads our mind to a variety of conclusions. Well, then, not only one might pronounce that God, in kindness to the Founders of some Family, withdraws a member of it who is going to live a bad life from that bad life, but, even if there is no antecedent such as this in the case of some early deaths, it is not unreasonable to conjecture that they would have plunged into a vicious life with a more desperate vehemence than any of those who have actually become notorious for their wickedness.
[1569] ten sesophismenen tes philargurias ananken.
[1570] peplanemeno
[1571] epiplatunesthai
[1572] ouk echontes pou ten ananken tes a& 207;rhostias tautes epanenenkosi
[1573] emparoinei
[1574] kephalaion; lit. "a sum total:" cf. below, epi kephalai& 251; sunapteon, "we must summarize."
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/nyssa/infants-deaths.asp?pg=12
