9. 2 Cor. X. 17.
POLITICAL WRITINGS 269 because of their wanderings and their self-suflBciency, do not know where it is to be sought and found. In a certain divine psahn two classes of men are held up to scorn: both 'they that trust in their own strength' and 'they that glory in the multitude of their riches,' ^ that is, both the philosophers of this world and those who despise even such a philosophy and call that people happy who abound in earthly riches. Therefore, let us ask of the Lord our God, by whom we were created, both the strength to overcome the evils of this life, and happiness in the next life, which we may enjoy in His eternity after this life, so that in the strength and in the reward of the strength 'he that glories,' as the Apostle says, 'may glory in the Lord.' ® Let us wish this for ourselves, let us wish it for the state of which we are citizens, for the happiness of the state has no other source than the happiness of man, since the state is merely a unified group of men.
Therefore, if all your prudence which makes you try to provide against human vicissitudes, if all the fortitude which keeps you from being frightened by any wickedness directed against you, if all the temperance which shields you from corruption in the midst of such foulness of evil conduct on the part of men, if all the justice which makes you judge rightly as you allot to each one what is his, aims at this, strives for this, that those whose welfare you have at heart may be safe in body and secure from the dishonesty of anyone, that they may enjoy peace and may have 'sons established as new plants, daughters decked out in the similitude of a temple, storehouses full, flow-
8. Ps. xlviii. 7.
9. 2 Cor. X. 17.