Didaskalia De nobili dicto Davidis

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ARTABANUS, in Herodotus's Book VII Polymnia, says: "Learn that calamities rule over men, and not men over calamities." Understand: that misfortunes command humans, not the contrary, that humans command misfortunes.

But in the School of Christ, we learn to moderate our affairs through faith and hope so that we might command our troubles and calamities and transfer them to our own benefit.

Indeed, when we see that these are τιμωρίας chastisements, or punishments, we experience this exceptional good contained within them: that they correspond to the justice of God, which it greatly concerns us to see illustrated even through our own sorrows.

Again, when we perceive them to be δοκιμασίας trials/tests, and examinations of the gifts of the Holy Spirit which He himself has lavished upon us, there is truly reason for us to congratulate ourselves on the Lydian stone A touchstone for testing the purity of gold, of which the Apostle Peter spoke so clearly: "In this you rejoice,"