All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from where the rivers come, there they return again.
All Commentaries on Ecclesiastes 1:7 Go To Ecclesiastes 1
Gregory of Nyssa
AD 394
You, whose period of struggle is short, do not become more lifeless than the earth, do not become more unthinking than the insensible, for you are endowed with thought and directed by reason toward life. Instead, as the apostle says, “Continue in the things you have learned and been convinced of,” in that steadfast and immoveable stability, since this also is one of the divine commands, that you “be steadfast and immoveable.” Let your sobriety abide unshaken, your faith firm, your love constant, your stability in every good thing unmoved, so that the earth in you may stand to eternity. But if any one, yearning for greater possessions and letting his desire become as boundless as a sea, has an insatiable greed for the streams of gain flowing in from every side, let him treat his disease by looking at the real sea. For … the sea does not exceed its boundary with the innumerable streams of water flowing into it but remains at the same volume, just as though it were receiving no new water from streams. In the same way human nature too, restricted by specific limits in the enjoyment of what comes to it, cannot enlarge its appetite to match the extent of its acquisitions; while the intake is endless, the capacity for enjoyment is kept within its set limit.
