Wisdom of Solomon 5:13

Deuterocanon

11 or as, when a bird flies through the air, no evidence of its passage is found; the light air, lashed by the beat of its pinions and pierced by the force of its rushing flight, is traversed by the movement of its wings, and afterward no sign of its coming is found there; 12 or as, when an arrow is shot at a target, the air, thus divided, comes together at once, so that no one knows its pathway. 13 So we also, as soon as we were born, ceased to be, and we had no sign of virtue to show, but were consumed in our wickedness." 14 Because the hope of the ungodly is like thistledown carried by the wind, and like a light frost driven away by a storm; it is dispersed like smoke before the wind, and it passes like the remembrance of a guest who stays but a day. 15 But the righteous live forever, and their reward is with the Lord; the Most High takes care of them.

Cyprian Treatises 5.4

Patristic

4 You impute it to the Christians that everything is decaying as the world grows old. What if old men should charge it on the Christians that they grow less strong in their old age; that they no longer, as formerly, have the same facilities, in the hearing of their ears, in the swiftness of their feet, in the keenness of their eyes, in the vigour of their strength, in the freshness of their organic powers, in the fullness of their limbs, and that although once the life of men endured beyond the age of eight and nine hundred years, it can now scarcely attain to its hundredth year? We see grey hairs in boys — the hair fails before it begins to grow; and life does not cease in old age, but it begins with old age. Thus, even at its very commencement, birth hastens to its close; thus, whatever is now born degenerates with the old age of the world itself; so that no one ought to wonder that everything begins to fail in the world, when the whole world itself is already in process of failing, and in its end.

 Notes and References

"... The most ancient of the Fathers to use Wisdom was Clement of Rome who quoted Wisdom 11:22 and 12:12 mixing both from memory (Ep. I ad Cor. 27:5). Eusebius (Ecclesiastical History 5:6) said that Irenaeus used Wisdom. From the time of Clement of Alexandria, the Fathers continually used Wisdom and often called it inspired. Athanasius, Eusebius, Cyprian, and Augustine (though not whole-heartedly) cited it as Scripture, that is, they regarded it as canonical and inspired (and written by Solomon), Origen, Didymus, Ephraem Syrus, Hippolytus Romanus, Chrysostom, and others referred to it in proof of doctrines in the same manner as they referred to the rest of the Bible. The views found in Wisdom are advanced beyond the Old Testament and contain many thoughts found in the New Testament. Perhaps its union of Jewish and Greek ideas explains its anticipation of doctrines and language found in the New Testament ..."

Berwick, Phillip W. The Way of Salvation in the Wisdom of Solomon (p. 141) Boston University, 1958

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