Permanence and Impermanence

Ἀλλ' ἡ μὲν ἡδονὴ βραχεῖα καὶ πρόσκαιρος, ἡ δὲ ὀδύνη διηνεκὴς, καὶ πέρας οὐκ ἔχουσα. Καὶ ταῦτα, φησὶ, διὰ τῆς πείρας μαθόντες, Ὥς ἐστῶτα ὅλα ἐλογίσαντο καὶ μένοντα, καὶ οὐχ ὡς φεύγοντα, τοῦτ' ἔστιν, ἀφιπτάμενα, καὶ οὐδὲ τὸ τυχὸν παραμένοντα. Τοιαῦτα γὰρ ἄπαντα τὰ ἀνθρώπινα καὶ τὰ σαρκικὰ· οὔπω παρεγένοντο, καὶ ἀπέπτη· τοιοῦτον ἡ τρυφὴ, τοιοῦτον ἡ δόξα ἡ ἀνθρωπίνη καὶ ἡ δυναστεία, τοιοῦτον ὁ πλοῦτος, τοιοῦτον ἡ εὐημερία πᾶσα τοῦ παρόντος βίου, οὐδὲν βέβαιον ἔχουσα; οὐδὲν στάσιμον, οὐδὲν πάγιον, ἀλλὰ ποταμίων ῥευμάτων μᾶλλον παρατρέχει, καὶ ἐρήμους καὶ γυμνοὺς καταλιμπάνει τοὺς περὶ ταῦτα ἐπτοημένους. Ἀλλὰ τὰ μνευματικὰ οὐ τοιαῦτα,  ἀλλ' ἀπεναντίας τούτοις, βιβαια καὶ ακίνητα, μεταβολὴν, οὐκ ἐπιδεχόμενα, παντὶ τῷ αἰωνι παρεκτεινόμενα. Πόσης οὖν οὐκ ἄν εἴη παραφροσύνης τῶν ἀκινήτων τὰ σαλευόμενα ἀνταλλάττεσθαι, τῶν διαιωνιζόντων τὰ πρόσκαιρα, τῶν ἀφιπταμένων τὰ διηνεκῶς μένοντα, τῶν πολλὴν ἐν τῷ μέλλοντι αίῶνι τὴν ἀπόλαυσιν προξενούντων τὰ πολλὴν τὴν κόλασιν ἡμῖν ἐκεῖ κατασκευάζοντα; Ὁμῖλία Α'  Εἰς Την Γενεσιν, Ἅγιος Ἰωάννης ὁ Χρυσόστομος

But pleasure is certainly brief and temporary and grief is relentless and without end, and these things Amos says by experience he has learned, ' They judged everything stable and persistent and not as things that pass away,' that is, transient, not for a moment persisting. And such things are human and corporeal, they have but come and they fly away. And of these things are delights and glory and power, of these are riches and the prosperous life; which have nothing firm about them, nothing permanent, nothing fixed, but swifter than a river they flow away, and those who clung to them are left naked and alone. But things spiritual are not like this, they have a different way of being, they are things which are firm and immobile and not subject to vicissitude, stretching through every age. Most foolish, then, are those who confuse the transient and the permanent, temporal things with the things that persist through the ages, perpetual things with those that fly away; and these transient things, will they not bring us heavy punishment, when they carry away the future age's height of happiness? First Homily on Genesis, Saint John Chrysostom