Page:King Alfred's Version of the Consolations of Boethius.djvu/148

 one loves this, another loves something else; so that what a man most loves is his god. In dividing their god therefore into so many parts, they find neither God Himself nor that part of the Good which they love more. When they make the Godhead into one separate whole they neither have Him altogether nor the part they have taken from Him. So no man finds what he seeks, for he seeks it in the wrong way. Ye seek what ye cannot find, when ye seek all that is Good in one form of Good.'

'That is true,' I said.

Then said she, 'When a man is poor he cares not for any power, but desires wealth and flees from poverty. He labours not to be first in flame, and that which a man does not toil after he does not compass. So all his life he toils after wealth, and lets go many a worldly desire, if he may get and keep wealth, for he craves it above all other things. When he does attain it he does not think he has enough unless he have power to boot, for without power he fancies he cannot keep his wealth. So too he is never content until he has all his desires, for wealth craves power, power honour, and honour glory. When he has his fill of wealth, unless he can get it with less; and he forsakes every other kind of honour, so he may come to power. It often happens that when he has given all he owned in return for power he has neither the power nor what he gave for it, but is now so poor as