How is it that thou didst not open thine eyes upon these things? Have presumptuous thoughts and idle meditations deluded thee, and prevailed over thee? In the day the lustful reins have given thee counsel, and yet in the night seasons they have chastised thee with whips. With the venom of asps, mixed with the poison of serpents, did they make the clods of indolence sweet unto thy palate. With wanton words did they corrupt, make abominable, and mar for thee every good portion; salvation did they spoil with the flattery of words that are softer than oil. What meanest thou, O sleeper? How did they deceive thee by making thee forever the possessor of the riches of such lands, while thou art merely a sojourner for an appointed time in the innermost part of thy house? Cursed be they, for they have driven thee out that thou shouldst not cleave unto the inheritance of the holy ones, from whose rock thou wast hewn, and that thou shouldst not mingle in the assembly of the holy beings that gave thee life (but the lions’ dens became thy dwelling-place). If, because of the hoards of gold and the treasure of provinces which thou didst amass, thou hast added haughtiness to thy pride, and hast humbled the generous spirit before it, see then how thou art beaten with the rod of folly and the plagues of blindness. Hast thou, because of the treasures of darkness which thou didst bind up, despised the soul that is bound in the bundle of life? Hast thou, for the sake of pieces of silver, crushed and suppressed a truthful longing and a glorious desire? Verily the glory of wealth lasts not. In a little while an evil spirit of the Lord shall come forth to scatter thy possessions, and the fifty thousand pieces of gold, for the sake of acquiring which thou has sold thy soul, shall be as though they had not been. Time will turn round in a little moment, and take away grace and glory from thy head. A fire shall come down from heaven, and consume thee and thy fifty. Why shall I covet the earth which is like Admah and pleasure which is like Zeboim?[206] Her wrath is stored up in her company; her conspiracy is tightly fastened to her covenant; her sweetness and honeycomb are like chaff before the whirlwind; her end and conclusion are eternal disgrace and everlasting shame. Moreover, how can my flesh be delighted when it is announced to me that I shall live long, since there is no escape from the destruction of death? What avails the age of strength, since at the end thereof come wrath and the grave? What pleasure is there in eighty years, since by their side is the shadow of death? What cheerfulness is there in ninety years, since there is no salvation in their border? Shall ants that languish and perish, and creeping things that melt away like water, exalt themselves to reign? Even if they endure for a day or for two days, will they never be devoured with the sword? How can the fields of Sodom and the sheaves of Gomorrah prosper?