Philo: On the Posterity of Cain and His Exile

VIII. (24) On this account it is written in the curses contained in scripture, "Thou shalt never rest; nor shall there be any rest for the sole of thy Foot."

And, a little afterwards, we read that, "Thy life shall hang in doubt before Them."

For it is the nature of the foolish man, who is always being tossed about in a manner contrary to right reason, to be hostile to tranquillity and rest, and not to stand firmly or with a sure foundation on any doctrine whatever. (25) Accordingly he is full of different opinions at different times, and sometimes, even in the same circumstances, without any new occurrence having arisen to affect them, he will be perfectly contrary to himself, --now great, now little, now hostile, now friendly; and, in short, he will, so to say, be everything that is most inconsistent in a moment of time.

And, as the law-giver says, "All his life shall hang in doubt before him;" having no firm footing, but being constantly tossed about by opposing circumstances, which drag it different ways. (26) On which account Moses says, in another place, "Cursed of God is he that hangeth on a Tree;"

because what he ought to hang upon is God. But such a man has, of his own accord, bound himself to the body, which is a wooden burden upon us, exchanging hope for desire and a perfect hope for the greatest of evils; for hope, being the expectation of good things, causes the mind to depend upon the bounteous God; but appetite, creating only unreasonable desires, depends on the body, which nature has made to be a sort of receptacle and abode for the soul.