XI. What then was it which persuaded him to flight, and made him depart from the Master, from the entreaty, the hope, the life, previously pursued with ardour?—“Sell thy possessions.” And what is this? He does not, as some conceive off-hand, bid him throw away the substance he possessed, and abandon his property; but bids him banish from his soul his notions about wealth, his excitement and morbid feeling about it, the anxieties, which are the thorns of existence, which choke the seed of life. For it is no great thing or desirable to be destitute of wealth, if without a special object,—not except on account of life. For thus those who have nothing at all, but are destitute, and beggars for their daily bread, the poor dispersed on the streets, who know not God and God’s righteousness, simply on account of their extreme want and destitution of subsistence, and lack even of the smallest things, were most blessed and most dear to God, and sole possessors of everlasting life.

Nor was the renunciation of wealth and the bestowment of it on the poor or needy a new thing; for many did so before the Saviour’s advent,—some because of the leisure (thereby obtained) for learning, and on account of a dead wisdom; and others for empty fame and vainglory, as the Anaxagorases, the Democriti, and the Crateses.

11.1 Τί τοίνυν ἦν τὸ προτρεψάμενον αὐτὸν εἰς φυγὴν καὶ ποιῆσαν ἀπαυτομολῆσαι τοῦ διδασκάλου, τῆς ἱκετείας, τῆς ἐλπίδος, τῆς ζωῆς, 11.2 τῶν προπεπονημένων; "πώλησον τὰ ὑπάρχοντά σου." τί δὲ τοῦτό ἐστιν; οὐχ ὃ προχείρως δέχονταί τινες, τὴν ὑπάρχουσαν οὐσίαν ἀπορ ρῖψαι προστάσσει καὶ ἀποστῆναι τῶν χρημάτων, ἀλλὰ τὰ δόγματα τὰ περὶ χρημάτων ἐξορίσαι τῆς ψυχῆς, τὴν πρὸς αὐτὰ συμπάθειαν τὴν ὑπεράγαν ἐπιθυμίαν, τὴν περὶ αὐτὰ πτοίαν καὶ νόσον, τὰς μερίμνας, τὰς ἀκάνθας τοῦ βίου, αἳ τὸ σπέρμα τῆς ζωῆς συμπνίγουσιν. 11.3 οὔτε γὰρ μέγα καὶ ζηλωτὸν τὸ τηνάλλως ἀπορεῖν χρημάτων μὴ οὐκ ἐπὶ λόγῳ ζωῆς (οὕτω μέν γ' ἂν ἦσαν οἱ μηδὲν ἔχοντες μηδαμῇ, ἀλλὰ ἔρημοι καὶ μεταῖται τῶν ἐφ' ἡμέραν, οἱ κατὰ τὰς ὁδοὺς ἐρριμμένοι πτωχοί, "ἀγνοοῦντες" δὲ θεὸν καὶ "δικαιοσύνην θεοῦ", κατ' αὐτὸ μόνον τὸ ἄκρως ἀπορεῖν καὶ ἀμηχανεῖν βίου καὶ τῶν ἐλαχίστων σπανίζειν μακαριώτατοι καὶ θεοφιλέστατοι καὶ μόνοι ζωὴν ἔχοντες 11.4 αἰώνιον) οὔτε καινὸν τὸ ἀπείπασθαι πλοῦτον καὶ χαρίσασθαι πτωχοῖς ἢ πατρίσιν, ὃ πολλοὶ πρὸ τῆς τοῦ σωτῆρος καθόδου πεποιήκασιν, οἳ μὲν τῆς εἰς λόγους σχολῆς καὶ νεκρᾶς σοφίας ἕνεκεν, οἳ δὲ φήμης κενῆς καὶ κενοδοξίας, Ἀναξαγόραι καὶ ∆ημόκριτοι καὶ Κράτητες.