On the Meeting for the sake of seeking Instruction (161-165)

and proceeding outward from this point, he also calls the unleavened bread the symbol of the first festival, "the bread of affliction." [*] And yet who is there who does not know that feasts and festivals produce cheerful joy and delectation, and not affliction?

But it is plain that he is here using in a perverted sense this word for the labour of him who is the corrector. For the most numerous and greatest blessings are usually acquired by laborious practise and exercise, and by vigorously excited labour. But the festival of the soul is emulation, which is labour to attain those things which are most excellent and which are brought to perfection; on which account it is expressly commanded to "eat the unleavened bread with bitter herbs;" [*] not by way of an additional dish, but because men in general look upon the fact of being prevented from swelling and boiling over with their appetites, but being forced to contract and restrain them as a grievous thing, thinking it a bitter thing to unlearn the indulgence of their passions, which is the real feast and festival of a mind which loves honourable contests.

It is for this reason that the law, as it appears to me, was given in a place which is called Bitterness; for to do wrong is pleasant, but to act justly is laborious. And this is the most unerring law; for the sacred history says, "And after they had gone out from the passions of Egypt they came to [*] [*] [*]

and then he tempted him." [*] For the invisible trial and proofs of the soul are in labouring and in enduring bitterness; for then it is hard to know which way it will incline; for many men are very speedily fatigued and fall away, thinking labour a terrible adversary, and they let their hands fall out of weakness, like tired wrestlers, determining to return to Egypt to the indulgence of their passions.

But others, with much endurance and great vigour, supporting the fearful and terrible events of the wilderness pass through the contest of life, keeping their life safe from overthrow and from destruction, and rising up in vigorous contest against the necessities of nature, such as hunger, thirst, cold, and heat, which are in the habit of reducing other persons to slavery, and subduing them with great exuberance of strength.