St Augustine Treasure hunting

Let the Lord your God be your hope – seek for nothing else from him, but let him himself be your hope. There are people who hope from him riches or perishable and transitory honours, in short they hope to get from God things which are not God himself. Seek for him alone, and despising everything else, make your way to him. Forget other things, remember him; leave other things behind, stretch out to him. Let him be your hope, who is guiding you to your destination.

Wherein the end does coveting this world’s goods lead you? You want a farm, then an estate, then you shut your neighbours out and covet their possessions. You extend your desires till you reach the shore. Having made the earth your own, perhaps you want heaven, too?

Leave all your desires. He who made heaven and earth is more beautiful than all; he who made all things is better than all; he will be to you everything you love. Learn to love the creator in the creature, in the work him who made it. Don’t let what made take such a hold of you that you lose him by whom you yourself were made.

(S.Augustini, Enarr. in psalmos; in ps 39,8)