7. Cf. Jer. xvii. 5.
268 ST. AUGUSTINE become sons of God. The Psalmist prays to be rescued out of their hand, lest he be drawn by them into that false opinion and into their impious sins. Truly they speak vanity when they 'have called the people happy that hath these things'—^the things which he had listed above, in which that good fortune consisted, the only good fortune which the lovers of this world seek. Therefore,
'their right hand is the right hand of iniquity' because they have preferred those things which should have been set aside, as the right hand is preferred to the left. Happiness in life is not to be attributed to the possession of those things; they should be subordinate, not pre-eminent; they are intended to follow, not to lead. If, then, we were to speak to him who prayed thus and desired to be rescued from the 'strange children' who 'called that people happy that hath these things,' and if we said: 'What is your own opinion? What people do you call happy?' he would not say: 'Happy is the people whose strength is in their own mind.'
If he had said this, he would, it is true, distinguish that people from the former which made happiness consist in that visible and corporeal good fortune, but he would not yet have passed beyond all the vanities and lying follies, for, as the same writings teach elsewhere: 'Cursed be everyone that placeth his hope in man.' ^ Therefore, he ought not to place it in himself, because he himself is a man. Thus, in order to pass beyond the boundaries of all vanities and lying follies, and to place happiness where it truly exists, he says: *Happy is the people whose God is the Lord.' You see, therefore, where we are to seek what all, both learned and unlearned, desire; but many,
7. Cf. Jer. xvii. 5.