night is near, when life is a burden and we remember our mortality, we
hasten the end, that those we love may cease to sorrow at the sight of
our decline; and we know that this is his will who called us into being,
and gave us life and joy on the earth for a season, but not forever.

"It is better to lay down the life that is ours, to leave all
things--the love of our kindred; the beauty of the world and of the
house; the labor in which we take delight, to go forth and be no more;
but the bitterness endures not, and is scarcely tasted when in our last
moments we remember that our labor has borne fruit; that the letters we
have written perish not with us, but remain as a testimony and a joy to
succeeding generations, and live in the house forever.

"For the house is the image of the world, and we that live and labor in
it are the image of our Father who made the world; and, like him, we
labor to make for ourselves a worthy habitation, which shall not shame
our teacher. This is his desire; for in all his works, and that
knowledge which is like pure water to one that thirsts, and satisfies
and leaves no taste of bitterness on the palate, we learn the will of
him that called us into life. All the knowledge we seek, the invention
and skill we possess, and the labor of our hands, has this purpose only:
for all knowledge and invention and labor having any other purpose
whatsoever is empty and vain in comparison, and unworthy of those that
are made in the image of the Father of life. For just as the bodily
senses may become perverted, and the taste lose its discrimination, so
that the hungry man will devour acrid fruits and poisonous herbs for
aliment, so is the mind capable of seeking out new paths, and a
knowledge which leads only to misery and destruction.

"Thus we know that in the past men sought after knowledge of various