In the year 350, Emperor Constans I was killed in a revolt led by a roman general named Magnentius. In the wake of this, a man named Nepotianus rushed in to claim the throne. He proclaimed himself Emperor and took the city of Rome on June 3, 350.

But general Magnentius was not about to yield to this new emperor. He sent one of his trusted officials to overthrow Nepotianus. On June 30, just 27 days after rising to power, Nepotianus was killed.

Three years later, Magnentius, the leader of both revolts, was dead himself, by suicide. Almost all the changes he had enforced during his short reign were quickly revoked by his successor.

Thus, the Roman citizens were forced to endure battles and changing leaderships within a very short space of time.

At the funeral of Nepotianus, whose rule over the Roman Empire had lasted less than a month, St. Jerome himself gave the oration (speech) to the gathered people.

In light of the recent turmoil, St. Jerome sought to instill in them the hard but vital truth that we cannot rely on this world.

He related the true story of Xerxes, a powerful Persian ruler of ancient times. One day, Xerxes looked down upon an impressive view of his countless soldiers, armed and mighty. He admired them for some time and then… began to weep. When asked the cause of his tears, he replied: "I weep because a hundred years from now not one of those I see before me will be alive."

After the anecdote, St. Jerome brought home the point to his listeners: "If only we could climb to some such height where we might view all the world at our feet. Then we could see the falls and disasters of all the world, nations destroyed one by the other, and kingdom by kingdom. Here would we see torments, and in another place massacre; some perishing at sea, others led away captive; here a wedding, there a death; some dying by violence, others in peace; some abounding in wealth, others in beggary. Finally, we should see not merely the army of Xerxes, but all men in the world, living today, and doomed, in a few days, to vanish."

This oration was so powerful that, centuries later, St. Peter of Alcantara cited it in his own writings, adding the wise counsel: "This meditation will help to make you understand how short and wretched is the glory of the world - yet it is on this that a worldly life relies - and in consequence how reasonable it is to disdain and scorn it."

Thus the saints urge us to set our minds and hearts on eternity, where we are destined to live forever. For, whatever our path through this world, whatever we are called to suffer or even enjoy in this life, nothing of this world will last forever… but our souls will. Let Eternal Life then be the object of our earthly life.