De planctu naturae

"After the sacred hunger for gold pierces mortal hearts, the mind of man, once fasting, knows not how to stay still. It loosens friendships, breeds hatred, stirs up anger, sows wars, nurses quarrels, and renews warfare, breaks bonds once tied, shatters treaties, rouses sons against fathers, mothers against their own flesh, makes brothers fail to know their brothers' faces, and all whom the union of blood joins together, one single madness wickedly divides. While the burning of possessing swells the stomach of the mind like dropsy, the mind thirsts even as it drinks, and becomes another Tantalus, burning amid these waters, and abundance itself lends strength to the thirst of wealth. So the full man hungers, the drunk man thirsts, the man of plenty still longs; one man craves everything, and by that very craving is made poor, and rich outwardly, remains destitute within. The wretched man therefore has nothing, since he believes he has nothing, when his desires weigh his riches against poverty, and many enemies invade the lodging of his heart, and the walls of his greedy mind, and with great tumult assault the whole citadel of the human breast. For fear attacks the mind, and craving likewise shakes it, and impoverishes the whole city of the mind. Thus a twin whirlwind of cares disturbs the greedy man; and when he fears what is to be feared, his very mind dreams up fears, and often invents new terrors, and by fear of loss pays for losses, and weighs the evil of loss by dread of it: thus dreams of terror show him various misfortunes. Terror announces a wife's deceits, a thief's tricks, an enemy's assault, and falsely conjures swords threatening his throat, and the dread rivers of the powerful. Now he recalls plagues, fires; now he imagines the wrath of the ocean, and by fear alone stands already shipwrecked. The rich man's mind philosophizes not on his coin but in his strongbox, while he buries his money, and the buried coin dies to all use for the miser; not he, but the strongbox, possesses it, and claims for itself the whole use of the coin. So that he may offer varied courses of coins to his coffers, the rich man imposes fasting on his own belly. The belly shudders at avarice, and marvels that its own income is denied it; the belly seeks the coffer's favor, but the coffer turns deaf ears to the belly. Sight has its feasting, and the little eye banquets, alone in silver, but the belly is forced to philosophize, and endures long fasting through wishing alone. Not tears, not the honeyed sweetness of prayers, not the very poverty of men pleads enough to keep the rich man, through usury, from devouring the poor, and making the wretch's purse thin. He laughs at the poor man's tears, and feeds on the wretch's labor, and makes another's punishment his own repose. Grief holds one man, laughter another, jest holds one, mourning another; one groans, one laughs, one grieves, while another feels no grief at all. The whole affection of the rich man is loosened into passion for the greedy coin, for no other pleasure is granted to his mind, by which he might turn his face elsewhere. The rich man does not possess his riches, but is possessed by them; he is not the owner of his coin, but the coin owns him, and in his coins the miser's soul lies buried. These he worships as gods; these idols he enriches with the honor of divine worship, and grants divinity to money. Thus man's reason, trampled by greed, serves the flesh, and is forced to be its handmaid in servitude. Thus the eye of the heart, blinded by the fog of flesh, grows faint, and suffering eclipse, alone lies idle. Thus the shadow of flesh wickedly veils the radiance of human sense, and the mind's glory becomes inglorious through coin. This discourse does not disparage riches or the rich, but rather strives to censure the vice itself. I do not condemn wealth, riches, or a rich man's use of them, if the victorious mind, with reason as its master, tramples underfoot the riches subject to it, if in the end reason, the noble charioteer, directs the use of wealth. For even if a rich man scatters all his riches, pours out gifts, and aspires to praise, and seeks to win favor through his generosity, yet unless discretion is the author, guide, and charioteer of this generosity, no fruit will come of it, since praise is not earned by gifts, but rather bought by them, unless they are done with fitting discretion; for often, in exchange for a gift, hypocritical praise is given, a false pretense of reputation, an ape of praise, the shadowy shadow of such favor."