Wisdom 4:14

In Genesis: “Then said the Lord to Adam, Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of that tree of which alone I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat, cursed shall be the ground in all thy works; in sadness and groaning shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life: thorns and thistles shall it cast forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field in the sweat of thy brow. Thou shalt eat thy bread until thou return unto the earth from which also thou wast taken; because earth thou art, and to earth thou shalt go.” Also in the same place: “And Enoch pleased God, and was not found afterwards: because God translated him.” And in Isaiah: “All flesh is grass, and all the glory of it as the flower of grass. …

Let us now go on to plainer matters. For while he was confined within these great straits, as to how souls can be held bound by the chain of original sin, when they derive not their origin from the soul which first sinned, but the Creator breathes them afresh at every birth into sinful flesh, pure from all contagion and propagation of sin: in order that he might avoid the objection being brought against his argument, that thus God makes them guilty by such insufflation, he first of all had recourse to the theory drawn from God’s prescience, that “He had provided redemption for them.” Infants are by the sacrament of this redemption baptized, so that the original sin which they contracted from the flesh is washed away, as if God were remedying His own acts for having made these souls polluted. …

3. But why should that be hard to bear which we must one day ourselves endure? And why do we grieve for the dead? We are not born to live forever. Abraham, Moses, and Isaiah, Peter, James, and John, Paul, the “chosen vessel,” and even the Son of God Himself have all died; and are we vexed when a soul leaves its earthly tenement? Perhaps he is taken away, “lest that wickedness should alter his understanding…for his soul pleased the Lord: therefore hasted he to take him away from the people”, lest in life’s long journey he should lose his way in some trackless maze. We should indeed mourn for the dead, but only for him whom Gehenna receives, whom Tartarus devours, and for whose punishment the eternal fire burns. But we who, in departing, are accompanied by an escort of angels, and met by Christ Himself, should rather grieve that we have to tarry yet longer in this tabernacle of death. …

2. What shall I do then? Shall I join my tears to yours? The apostle forbids me for he speaks of dead Christians as “them which are asleep.” So too in the gospel the Lord says, “the damsel is not dead but sleepeth,” and Lazarus when he is raised from the dead is said to have been asleep. No, I will be glad and rejoice that “speedily he was taken away lest that wickedness should alter his understanding” for “his soul pleased the Lord.” But though I am loth to give way and combat my feelings, tears flow down my cheeks, and in spite of the teachings of virtue and the hope of the resurrection a passion of regret crushes my too yielding mind. …

2. Wherefore, though you are already running in the way, I urge a willing horse, as the saying goes, and implore you, while you regret in your Lucinius a true brother, to rejoice as well that he now reigns with Christ. For, as it is written in the book of Wisdom, he was “taken away lest that wickedness should alter his understanding…for his soul pleased the Lord…and he…in a short time fulfilled a long time.” We may with more right weep for ourselves that we stand daily in conflict with our sins, that we are stained with vices, that we receive wounds, and that we must give account for every idle word. …

2. As the mother of Nebridius was sister to the empress and as he was brought up in the bosom of his aunt, another might perhaps praise him for having so much endeared himself to the unvanquished emperor. Theodosius, indeed, procured him from Africa a wife of the highest rank, who, as her native land at this time was distracted by civil wars, became a kind of hostage for its loyalty. I ought to say at the very outset that Nebridius seems to have had a presentiment that he would die early. For amid the splendour of the palace and in the high positions to which his rank and not his years entitled him he lived always as one who believed that he must soon go to meet Christ. …