But these words do not apply to the virtues, but only to the secondary arts and any necessary trades which men practise to provide for the needs of the body, or to procure additional and material comforts. Labour undertaken for the perfectly good and excellent in any form, even though it fail to attain its end, is of itself strong to benefit the labourer from the first. It is those things which lie outside virtue which are all profitless, unless the result crown the work. It is just as it is with animals. If you take from them the head, all else goes with it. And the head of actions is their end or object. While it is in its place they live in some sort. If you choose to cut it off or amputate it, they die. So athletes who cannot win a victory, but are always defeated, will do well to retire. Merchants or shipmen who meet with perpetual disasters at sea should desist and change their occupation. Those who have studied the lower subjects, but have been unable through dullness of nature to imbibe any knowledge, will deserve praise if they abandon them. For exertion in such matters is not engaged in for the sake of the exercise, but for the sake of the object at which they aim. If then our nature opposes our efforts for progress in them, let us not fruitlessly resist her. If she forwards those efforts, let us do homage to God with those firstlings and honours which are the ransom of our souls, for they rescue it from cruel task-masters and redeem it into liberty.
On the Sacrifices of Abel and Cain 35
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