6.

Let me come then to my proper subject. I will not beat my breast with Jacob and with David for sons dying in the Law, but I will receive them rising again with Christ in the Gospel. The Jew’s mourning is the Christian’s joy. “Weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning.” ¹“The night is far spent, the day is at hand.” ² Accordingly when Moses dies, mourning is made for him, ³ but when Joshua is buried, it is without tears or funeral pomp. ⁴ All that can be drawn from scripture on the subject of lamentation I have briefly set forth in the letter of consolation which I addressed to Paula at Rome. ⁵ Now I must take another path to arrive at the same goal. Otherwise I shall seem to be walking anew in a track once beaten but now long disused.