The majority of mortals, Paulinus, complain of the spite of nature, because our life is short, and because the span granted to us flows away so swiftly that, with the exception of a very small number, all feel they must die at the very moment they have begun to live. Nor is it only the common crowd and the careless multitude that bewail this universal evil: it is the theme of the complaints of those illustrious men whose names have filled the world. And so it is not life itself that is short, but we who make it short; we are not ill supplied with time, but we squander it lavishly. Just as vast and kingly wealth, when it passes into the hands of a bad steward, is dissipated by his waste, so our time, the most precious of all nature's gifts, slips through our fingers if we lack the skill to use it well. Therefore we must not believe that those are right who say: 'Our life flows past only to depart,' and that it is too short; let us rather see whether we have not ourselves cut pieces from it. Life is long enough, and more than long enough, for the accomplishment of the greatest things, if it were all laid out; but when it is dissipated in extravagance and neglect, when nothing is reserved for it but lavish waste, at last the force of nature fails, and we find ourselves undone before we knew that we had begun to live. It is therefore no wonder that you find some rival who has outstripped you; it is no wonder that, grown old, we are astonished that we have not yet begun to live. Life is not short; it is we who make it so. But we are not poor in wealth, nor do we long for wealth in it; we lack only the skill to spend it. Look about you: some are gnawed by a raging greed; others are worn out by fruitless labors; some are steeped in wine, enervated by luxury; others are weary of a vain ambition, forever ignorant of what they desire; some have no other guide than the will of others, whose looks they wish to catch, standing before the very people to whom they have made themselves slaves; some are the slaves of ambition, or of covetousness, or of fear. How much time, too, they lose in waiting upon those who have no leisure! How much time in the saddle, at the bath, in games and spectacles! How much consumed in the exercise of arts that might be learned in a day! How much spent with the closest friends, to whom we grant the greatest part of our life; while what remains is swallowed up by illness, by travel, by the business of others, or by untimely visits! Add, finally, a fierce and needless passion, the craving for drink, and that other intoxication of the dice. Then come those men without rest whom remorse gnaws; remorse, ever recalling the past, ever agitated for the sake of a future that can never arrive. All this leaves us no power to make our life truly long, even if nature should grant it in abundance. Yet such is our blindness and our error that we do not see that time is the greatest of all blessings; and we prove ourselves more sparing of money than of time. When our money is stolen from us, we cry out; but for our time we let anyone carry it off, and nothing is easier to lose without regret, provided only a little coin slips from our hands. And so we do not live, but we hope to live; and always deferring, we put life off. But each day, once it is gone, is lost forever; and whatever time remains is only an addition to that loss. We live in order to die; and the only way to live is not to put off till tomorrow. The greatest loss of life is that it drains away in postponement, and that each of us dies before he has lived. Wherefore, if you would not dread the flight of your years, hold your life fast in your own hands: nothing will ever be well ordered for you if you look upon your past years as lost.