_R._ Thou art right. But I would know whether thy old _covetousness and greediness be entirely extirpated and uprooted from thy mind, so that it can not still grow_. _A._ _Why askest thou that?_ _R._ I speak of the things which thou before saidst to me that thou hadst decided to leave off and for nothing would turn back to again, namely: overmuch wealth, and _immoderate honor, and inordinately rich and luxurious living_; and therefore I now ask whether, either for the love of them or for the love of any thing, thou wilt return to them again. I heard formerly that thou saidst that thou lovedst thy friends, next to God and thine own reason, above other things. Now I would know whether thou, for their love, wouldst lay hold of these things again. _A._ I will lay hold of all again for their love, if I can not else have their companionship--_yet it doth not please me so to do_. _R._ Very reasonably thou dost answer me and very rightly. _Howbeit I understand that the lusts of the world are not entirely uprooted from thy mind, although the trench be prepared; for the roots can sprout thence again._ Yet I impute that not to thee as a fault, for thou layest hold of it not for the love of those things but for the love of this thing which it is more right to love than that. _I never ask about any man, what he doth; but yet I ask thee now why thou lovest thy friends so much, or what thou lovest in them, or whether thou lovest them for their own sake or for some other thing._ [Sidenote: 39.14--41.19] _A._ I love them for friendship and for companionship, _and above all others I love those who most help me to understand and to know reason and wisdom, most of all about God and about our souls; for I know that I can more easily seek after Him with their help than I can without_. _R._ How then if they do not wish to inquire _after the One whom thou seekest_? _A._ I shall teach them so that they will. _R._ But how then if thou canst not, and if they be so foolish as to love other things more than that which thou lovest, and say that they can not or will not? _A._ _I, nevertheless, will have them_: they will be helpful to me in some things and I likewise to them. _R._ But how then if they disturb thee, _and if the infirmities of the body hinder thee_?