As the cloud is consumed and vanishes away: so he that goes down to the grave shall come up no more.
All Commentaries on Job 7:9 Go To Job 7
Gregory The Dialogist
AD 604
33. For a cloud is suspended in the higher regions, but it is condensed and driven by the wind that it flies, and it is scattered by the heat of the .sun that it vanishes. Thus, thus verily is it with the hearts of men, which by the faculty of reason bestowed upon them dart on high, but driven by the blasts of the evil spirit, they are forced hither and thither by the bad impulses of their desires, but by the searching eye of the Judge above they are melted as if by the heat of the sun, and being once consigned to the regions of woe, never return for the benefit of working. Let the holy man then, in setting forth the elevation, the career, and the eclipse of the human race, exclaim, As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away, so he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more. As if he spake in plain words, saying, ‘In flying on high he is brought to nought, who by exalting himself is advancing to destruction, whom, if sin once force to punishment, mercy never more restores to pardon.’
