CONFERENCE OF ABBOT JOHN.
ON THE AIM OF THE COENOBITE AND HERMIT.
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Of the coenobium of Abbot Paul and the patience of
a certain brother.
AFTER only a few days we made our way once more with great alacrity,
drawn by the desire for further instruction, to the coenobium of Abbot
Paul, where though a greater number than two hundred of the brethren
dwell there, yet, in honour of the festival which was then being held,
an enormous collection of monks from other coenobia had come there as
well: for the anniversary of the death[36] of a former Abbot who had presided
over the same monastery was being solemnly kept. And we have
mentioned this assembly for this reason that we may briefly treat of
the patience of a certain brother, which was remarkable for immovable
gentleness on his part in the presence of all this congregation. For
though the object of this work has regard to another person; viz.,
that we may produce the utterances of Abbot John[37] who left the desert and submitted
himself to that coenobium with the utmost goodness and humility, yet
we think it not at all absurd to relate without any unnecessary
verbiage, what we think is most instructive to those who are eager for
goodness. And so when the whole body of the monks was seated in
separate parties of twelve, in the large open court, when one of the
brethren had been rather slow in fetching and bringing in a dish, the
aforesaid Abbot Paul, who was busily hurrying about among the troops
of brethren who were serving, saw it and struck him such a blow before
them all on his open palm that the sound of the hand which was struck
actually reached the ears of those whose backs were turned and who
were sitting some way off. But the youth of remarkable patience
received it with such calmness of mind that not only did he let no
word fall from his mouth or give the slightest sign of murmuring by
the silent movements of his lips, but actually did not change colour
in the slightest degree or (lose) the modest and peaceful look about
his mouth. And this fact struck with astonishment not merely us, who
had lately come from a monastery of Syria and had not learnt the
blessing of this patience by such clear examples, but all those as
well who were not without experience of such earnestness, so that by
it a great lesson was taught even to those who were well advanced,
because even if this paternal correction had not disturbed his
patience, neither did the presence of so great a number bring the
slightest sign of colour to his cheeks.
Of Abbot John's humility and our question.
IN this coenobium then we found a very old man named John, whose words
and humility we think ought certainly not to be passed over in silence
as in them he excelled all the saints, as we know that he was
especially vigorous in this perfection, which though it is the mother
of all virtues and the surest foundation of the whole spiritual
superstructure, yet is altogether a stranger to our system. Wherefore
it is no wonder that we cannot attain to the height of those men, as
we cannot stand the training of the coenobium I will not say up to old
age, but are scarcely content to endure the yoke of subjection for a
couple of years, and at once escape to enjoy a dangerous liberty,
while even for that short time we seem to be subject to the rule of
the Elder not according to any strict rule, but as our free will
directs. When then we had seen this old man in Abbot Paul's
coenobium, we were struck, first by his age and the grace with which
the man was endowed, and with looks fixed on the ground began to
entreat him to vouchsafe to explain to us why he had forsaken the
freedom of the desert and that exalted profession, in which his fame
and celebrity had raised him above others who had adopted the same
life, and why he had chosen to enter under the yoke of the coenobium.
He said that as he was unequal to the system of the anchorites and
unworthy of the heights of such perfection, he had gone back to the
infant school, that he might learn to carry out the lessons taught
there, according as the life demanded. And when our entreaties were
not satisfied and we refused to take this humble answer, at last he
began as follows.
Abbot John's answer why he had left the
desert.
THE system of the anchorites, which you are surprised at my leaving, I
not only neither reject nor refuse, but rather embrace and regard with
the utmost veneration: in which system, and after I had passed thirty
years living in a coenobium, I rejoice that I have also spent twenty
more, so that I can never be accused of sloth among those who tried it
in a half-hearted way. But because its purity, of which I had had
some slight experience, was sometimes soiled by the presence of
anxiety about carnal matters, it seemed better to return to the
coenobium to secure a readier attainment of an easier aim undertaken,
and less danger from venturing on the higher life of the humble
solitary.[38] For it is better to seem
earnest with smaller promises than careless in larger ones. And
therefore if possibly I bring forward anything somewhat arrogantly and
indeed somewhat too freely, I beg that you will not think it due to
the sin of boasting but rather to my desire for your edification; and
that, as I think that, when you ask so earnestly, nothing of the truth
should be kept back from you, you will set it down to love rather than
to boasting. For I think that some instruction may be given to you if
I lay aside my humility, and simply lay bare the whole truth about my
aim. For I trust that I shall not incur any reproach of vainglory
from you because of the freedom of my words, nor any charge of
falsehood from my conscience because of any suppression of the
truth.
Of the excellence which the aforesaid old man
showed in the system of the anchorites.
IF then anyone else delights in the recesses of the desert and would
forget all human intercourse and say with Jeremiah: "I have not
desired the day of man: Thou knowest,"[39] I confess that by the blessing of
God's grace, I also secured or at any rate tried to secure this. And
so by the kind gift of the Lord I remember that I was often caught up
into such an ecstasy as to forget that I was clothed with the burden
of a weak body, and my soul on a sudden forgot all external notions
and entirely cut itself off from all material objects, so that neither
my eyes nor ears performed their proper functions. And my soul was so
filled with divine meditations and spiritual contemplations that often
in the evening I did not know whether I had taken any food and on the
next day was very doubtful whether I had broken my fast yesterday.
For which reason, a supply of food for seven days, i.e., seven sets of
biscuits were set apart in a sort of hand-basket,[40] and laid by on Saturday, that there
might be no doubt when supper had been omitted; and by this plan
another mistake also from forgetfulness was obviated, for when the
number of cakes was finished it showed that the course of the week was
over, and that the services of the same day had come round, and that
the festival and holy day and services of the congregation could not
escape the notice of the solitary. But even if that ecstasy of mind
of which we have spoken should happen to interfere with this
arrangement, yet still the method of the days' work would show the
number of the days and check the mistake. And to pass over in silence
the other advantages of the desert (for it is not our business to
treat of their number and quantity, but rather of the aim of solitude
and the coenobium) I will the rather briefly explain the reasons why I
preferred to leave it, which you also wanted to know, and will in a
concise discourse glance at all those fruits of solitude which I
mentioned, and show to what greater advantages on the other side they
ought to be held inferior.
Of the advantages of the desert.
SO long then as owing to the fewness of those who were then living in
the desert, a greater freedom was afforded to us in a wider expanse of
the wilderness, so long as in the seclusion of larger retreats we were
caught up to those celestial ecstasies, and were not overwhelmed by a
great quantity of brethren to visit us, and thus owing to the
necessity of showing hospitality overburdened in our thoughts by the
distractions of great cares, I frequented with insatiable desire and
all my heart the peaceful retreats of the desert and that life which
can only be compared to the bliss of the angels. But when, as I said,
a larger number of the brethren began to seek a dwelling in that
desert, and by cramping the freedom of the vast wilderness, not only
caused that fire of divine contemplation to grow cold, but also
entangled the mind in many ways in the chains of carnal matters, I
determined to carry out my purpose in this system rather than to grow
cold in that sublime mode of life, by providing for carnal wants; so
that, if that liberty and those spiritual ecstasies are denied me, yet
as all care for the morrow is avoided, I may console myself by
fulfilling the precept of the gospel, and what I lose in sublimity of
contemplation, may be made up to me by submission and obedience. For
it is a wretched thing for a man to profess to learn any art or
pursuit, and never to arrive at perfection in it.
Of the conveniences of the coenobium.
WHEREFORE I will briefly explain what advantages I now enjoy in this
manner of life. You must consider my words and judge whether
those advantages of the desert outweigh these comforts, and by this
you will also be able to prove whether I chose to be cramped within
the narrow limits of the coenobium from dislike or from desire of that
purity of the solitary life. In this life then there is no providing
for the day's work, no distractions of buying and selling, no
unavoidable care for the year's food, no anxiety about bodily things,
by which one has to get ready what is necessary not only for one's own
wants but also for those of any number of visitors, finally no conceit
from the praise of men, which is worse than all these things and
sometimes in the sight of God does away with the good of even great
efforts in the desert. But, to pass over those waves of spiritual
pride and the deadly peril of vainglory in the life of the anchorite,
let us return to this general burden which affects everybody, i.e.,
the ordinary anxiety in providing food, which has so far exceeded I
say not the measure of that ancient strictness which altogether did
without oil, but is beginning not to be content even with the
relaxation of our own time according to which the requirements of all
the supply of food for a year were satisfied by the preparation of a
single pint of oil and a modius of lentils prepared for the use of
visitors; but now the needful supply of food is scarcely met by two or
three times that amount. And to such an extent has the force of this
dangerous relaxation grown among some that, when they mix vinegar and
sauce, they do not add that single drop of oil, which our predecessors
who followed the rules of the desert with greater powers of
abstinence, were accustomed to pour in simply for the sake of avoiding
vainglory,[41] but they break an
Egyptian cheese for luxury and pour over it more oil than is required,
and so take, under a single pleasant relish, two sorts of food which
differ in their special flavour, each of which ought singly to be a
pleasant refreshment at different times for a monk. To such a pitch
however has this `ulikh kthsis, i.e.,
acquisition of material things grown, that actually under pretence of
hospitality and welcoming guests anchorites have begun to keep a
blanket in their cells--a thing which I cannot mention without
shame--to omit those things by which the mind that is awed by and
intent on spiritual meditation is more especially hampered; viz., the
concourse of brethren, the duties of receiving the coming and speeding
the parting guest, visits to each other and the endless worry of
various confabulations and occupations, the expectation of which owing
to the continuous character of these customary interruptions keeps the
mind on the stretch even during the time when these bothers seem to
cease. And so the result is that the freedom of the anchorite's life
is so hindered by these ties that it can never rise to that ineffable
keenness of heart, and thus loses the fruits of its hermit life. And
if this is now denied to me while I am living in the congregation and
among others, at least there is no lack of peace of mind and
tranquillity of heart that is freed from all business. And unless
this is ready at hand for those also who live in the desert, they will
indeed have to undergo the labours of the anchorite's life, but will
lose its fruits which can only be gained in peaceful stability of
mind. Finally even if there is any diminution of my purity of heart
while I am living in the coenobium, I shall be satisfied by keeping in
exchange that one precept of the Gospel, which certainly cannot be
less esteemed than all those fruits of the desert; I mean that I
should take no thought for the morrow, and submitting myself
completely to the Abbot seem in some degree to emulate Him of whom it
is said: "He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto
death;" and so be able humbly to make use of His words: "For
I came not to do mine own will, but the will of the Father which sent
me."[42]
A question on the fruits of the coenobium and the
desert.
GERMANUS: Since it is evident that you have not, like so many, just
touched the mere outskirts of each mode of life, but have ascended to
the very heights, we should like to know what is the end of the
coenobite's life and what the end of the hermit's. For no one can
doubt that no man can discourse with greater fulness or fidelity, on
these subjects than one who, taught by long use and experience, has
followed them both, and so can by veracious teaching show us their
value and aim.
The answer to the question proposed.
JOHN: I should absolutely maintain that one and the same man could not
attain perfection in both lives unless I was hindered by the example
of some few. And since it is no small matter to find a man who is
perfect in either of them, it is clear how much harder and I had
almost said impossible it is for a man to be thoroughly efficient in
both. And if this has ever happened, it cannot come under any general
rule. For a general rule must be based not on exceptional instances,
i.e., on the experience of a very few, but on what is within the power
of the many or rather of all. But what is attained to here and there
by but one or two, and is beyond the capacity of ordinary goodness,
must be kept out of general rules as something permitted outside the
condition and nature of human weakness, and should be brought forward
as a miracle rather than as an example. Wherefore I will, as my
slender ability allows, briefly intimate what you want to know. The
aim indeed of the coenobite is to mortify and crucify all his desires
and, according to that salutary command of evangelic perfection, to
take no thought for the morrow. And it is perfectly clear that this
perfection cannot be attained by any except a coenobite, such a man as
the prophet Isaiah describes and blesses and praises as follows:
"If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy own
will in my holy day, and glorify Him, while thou dost not thine own
ways, and thine own will is not found to speak a word: then shalt thou
be delighted in the Lord, and I will lift thee up above the high
places of the earth, and will feed thee with the inheritance of Jacob
thy father. For the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it."[43] But the perfection for a hermit is to
have his mind freed from all earthly things, and to unite it, as far
as human frailty allows, with Christ: and such a man the prophet
Jeremiah describes when he says: "Blessed is the man who hath
borne the yoke from his youth. He shall sit solitary and hold his
peace, because he hath taken it upon himself;" the Psalmist also:
"I am become like a pelican in the desert. I watched and became
as a sparrow alone upon the housetop."[44] To this aim then, which we have
described as that of either life, unless each of them attains, in vain
does the one adopt the system of the coenobium, and the other of the
hermitage: for neither of them will get the good of his method of
life.
Of true and complete perfection.
BUT this is merikh, i.e., no thorough and
altogether complete perfection, but only a partial one. Perfection
then is very rare and granted by God's gift to but a very few. For he
is truly and not partially perfect who with equal imperturbability can
put up with the squalor of the wilderness in the desert, as well as
the infirmities of the brethren in the coenobium. And so it is hard
to find one who is perfect in both lives, because the anchorite cannot
thoroughly acquire akthmosunh, i.e., a
disregard for and stripping oneself of material things, nor the
coenobite purity in contemplation, although we know that Abbot Moses
and Paphnutius and the two Macarii[45]
were masters of both in perfection. And so they were perfect in
either life, and while they withdrew further than all the dwellers in
the desert and delighted themselves unceasingly in the retirement of
the wilderness, and as far as in them lay never sought intercourse
with other men, yet they put up with the presence and the infirmities
of those who came to them so that when a large number of the brethren
came to them for the sake of seeing them and profiting by it, they
endured this almost continuous trouble of receiving them with
imperturbable patience, and men fancied that all the days of their
life they had neither learnt nor practised anything but how to show
common civility to those who came, so that it was a puzzle to all to
say in which life their zeal was mainly shown, i.e., whether their
greatness adapted itself more remarkably to the purity of the
hermitage or to the common life.
Of those who while still imperfect retire into the
desert.
BUT some are sometimes so tantalized by the silence of the desert
lasting all through the day that they altogether dread intercourse
with men, and, when they have even for a little while broken through
their habit of retirement owing to the accident of a visit from some
of the brethren, boil over with marked vexation of mind, and show
clear signs of annoyance. And this especially happens in the case of
those who have betaken themselves to the solitary life without a
well-matured purpose and without being thoroughly trained in the
coenobium, as these men are always imperfect and easily upset, and
incline to one side or the other, as the gales of trouble may drive
them. For as they boil over impatiently at intercourse or conversation
with the brethren, so while they are living in solitude they cannot
stand the vastness of that silence which they themselves have courted,
inasmuch as they themselves do not even know the reason why solitude
ought to be wanted and sought for, but imagine that the value and the
main part of this life consist in this; viz., in avoiding intercourse
with the brethren and simply shunning and loathing the sight of a
man.
A question how to cure those who have hastily left
the congregation of the coenobium.
GERMANUS: By what treatment can any help be given to us or to others
who are thus weak and only up to this; who had received but little
instruction in the system of the coenobium when we began to aspire to
dwell in solitude before we had got rid of our faults; or by what
means shall we be able to acquire the constancy of an imperturbable
mind, and immovable steadfastness of patience; we who all too soon
gave up the common life in the coenobium, and forsook the schools and
training ground for these exercises, in which our principles ought
first to have been thoroughly schooled and perfected? How then can we
now while we are living alone gain perfection in long-suffering and
patience; or how can conscience, that searcher out of inward motives,
discover whether these virtues exist in us or are wanting, so that
because we are severed from intercourse with men, and not irritated by
any of their provocations, we may not be deceived by false notions,
and fancy that we have gained that imperturbable peace of mind?
The answer telling how a solitary can discover his
faults.
JOHN: To those who are really seeking relief, healing remedies from
the true Physician of souls will certainly not be wanting; and to
those above all will they be given who do not disregard their
ill-condition (either because they despair of it, or because they do
not care about it), nor hide the danger they are in from their wound,
nor in their wanton heart reject the remedy of penitence, but with an
humble and yet careful heart flee to the heavenly Physician for the
diseases they have contracted from ignorance or error or necessity.
And so we ought to know that if we retire to solitude or secret
places, without our faults being first cured, their operation is but
repressed, while the power of feeling them is not extinguished. For
the root of all sins not having been eradicated is still lying hid in
us, or rather creeping up, and that it is still alive we can tell by
these signs. For instance, if, when we are living in solitude we
receive the approach of some brethren, or any very slight tarrying on
their part, with any anxiety or fretfulness of mind, we should
recognize that an incentive to the most hasty impatience is still
existing in us. But if when we are hoping for the coming of a
brother, and from some cause he perhaps delays a little, our mental
indignation either silently blames his slowness, and annoyance at this
inconvenient waiting disturbs our mind, the examination of our
conscience will show that the sin of anger and vexation is plainly
still remaining in us. Again, if when a brother asks for our book to
read, or for some other article to use, his request annoys us, or a
refusal on our part disgusts him, there can be no doubt that we are
still entangled in the meshes of avarice or covetousness. But if a
sudden thought or a passage of Holy Scripture brings up the
recollection of a woman and we feel that we are at all attracted
towards her, we should know that the fire of fornication is not yet
extinguished in us. But if on a comparison of our own strictness with
the laxity of another even th slightest conceit tries our mind, it is
clear that we are affected with the dreadful plague of pride. When
then we detect these signs of faults in our heart, we should clearly
recognize that it is only the opportunity and not the passion of sin
of which we are deprived. And certainly these passions, if at any
time we were to mingle in the ordinary life of men, would at once
start up from their lurking places in our thoughts and prove that they
did not then for the first time come into existence when they broke
out, but that they were then at last made public, because they had
been long lying hid. And so even a solitary can detect by sure signs
that the roots of each fault are still implanted in him, if he tries
not to show his purity to men, but to maintain it inviolate in His
sight, from whom no secrets of the heart can be hid.
A question how a man can be cured who has entered
on solitude without having his faults eradicated.
GERMANUS: We very clearly and plainly see the proofs by which the
signs of infirmities are inferred, and the method of discerning
diseases, i.e., how the faults which are concealed in us can be
detected: for our every day experience and the daily motions of our
thoughts show us all these as they have been stated. It remains then
that as the proofs and causes of our maladies have been exposed to us
in a most clear way so their remedies and cures may also be shown.
For no one can doubt that one who has first discovered the grounds and
beginnings of ailments, with the approving witness of the conscience
of those affected, can best discourse on their remedies. And so
though the teaching of your holiness has laid bare the secrets of our
wounds whereby we venture to have some hope of a remedy, because so
clear a diagnosis of the disease gives promise of the hope of a cure,
yet because, as you say, the first elements of salvation are acquired
in the coenobium, and men cannot be in a sound condition in solitude,
unless they have first been healed by the medicine of the coenobium,
we have fallen again into a dangerous state of despair lest as we left
the coenobium in an imperfect condition we may not now that we are in
the desert succeed in becoming perfect.
The answer on their remedies.
JOHN: For those who are anxious for the cure of their ailments a
saving remedy is sure not to be wanting, and therefore remedies should
be sought by the same means that the signs of each fault are
discovered. For as we have said that the faults of men's ordinary
life are not wanting to solitaries, so we do not deny that all zeal
for virtue, and all the means of healing are at the disposal of all
those who are cut off from men's ordinary life. When then anyone
discovers by those signs which we described above, that he is attacked
by outbreaks of impatience or anger, he should always practise himself
in the opposite and contrary things, and by setting before himself all
sorts of injuries and wrongs, as if offered to him by somebody else,
accustom his mind to submit with perfect humility to everything that
wickedness can bring upon him; and by often representing to himself
all kinds of rough and intolerable things, continually consider with
all sorrow of heart with what gentleness he ought to meet them. And,
by thus looking at the sufferings of all the saints, or indeed at
those of the Lord Himself, he will admit that the various reproaches
as well as punishments are less than he deserves, and prepare himself
to endure all kinds of griefs. And when occasionally he has been
recalled by some invitation to the assembly of the brethren--a thing
which cannot but happen every now and then even to the strictest
inmates of the desert,--if he finds that his mind is silently
disturbed even for trifles, he should like some stern censor of his
secret emotions charge himself with all those various hard wrongs, to
the perfect endurance of which he was training himself by his daily
meditations, and blaming and chiding himself as follows, say My good
man, are you the fellow who while training yourself in the practising
ground of solitude, ventured most determinedly to think that you would
get the better of all bad qualities, and who just now, when you were
representing to yourself not only all sorts of bitter reproaches, but
also intolerable punishments, fancied that you were pretty strong and
able to stand against all storms? How is it that that unconquered
patience of yours is upset by the first trial even of a light word?
How is it that even a gentle breeze has shaken that house of yours
which you fancied was built so strongly on the solid rock? Where is
that which you announced when during a time of peace you were in your
foolish confidence longing for war? "I am ready, and am not
troubled;" and this which you used often to say with the prophet:
"Prove me, O Lord, and try me: search out my reins and my
heart;" and: "prove me, O Lord, and know my heart: question
me and know my paths; and see if there be any way of wickedness in
me."[46] How has a tiny ghost of
an enemy frightened your grand preparations for war? With such
reproaches and remorse a man should condemn himself and not allow the
sudden temptation which has upset him to go unpunished, but by
chastising his flesh with a severer penalty of fasting and vigils;
and, by punishing his sin of lightness of mind by continual pains of
self-restraint, he should while living in solitude consume in this
fire of practice what he ought to have thoroughly driven out in the
life of the coenobium. This at any rate we must firmly and resolutely
hold to in order to secure a lasting and unbroken patience; viz., that
for us, to whom by the Divine law not merely vengeance for, but even
the recollection of injuries is forbidden, it is not permissible to be
roused to anger because of some loss or annoyance. For what greater
injury can happen to the soul than for it, owing to some sudden
blindness from rage, to lose the brightness of the true and eternal
light and to fail of the sight of Him "Who is meek and lowly of
heart"?[47] What I ask could be
more dangerous or awkward than for a man to lose his power of judging
of goodness, and his standard and rule of true discernment, and for
one in his sober senses to do what even a drunken man, and a fool
would not be pardoned for doing? One then who carefully considers
these and other injuries of the same kind, will readily endure and
disregard not only all kinds of losses, but also whatever wrongs and
punishments can be inflicted by the cruellest of men, as he will hold
that there is nothing more damaging than anger, nor more valuable than
peace of mind and unbroken purity of heart, for the sake of which we
should think nothing of the advantages not merely of carnal matters
but also of those things which appear to be spiritual, if they cannot
be gained or done without some disturbance of this tranquillity.
A question whether chastity ought to be ascertained
just as the other feelings.
GERMANUS: As the cure for other ailments, viz., anger, vexation, and
impatience, has been shown to consist in opposing to them their
contraries, so also we should like to learn what sort of treatment we
ought to use against the spirit of fornication: I mean, whether the
fire of lust can be quenched by the representation, as in those other
cases, of greater inducements and things to excite it: because not
merely to increase the incentives to lust within us, but even to touch
them with a passing look of the mind, we believe to be utterly fatal
to chastity.
The answer giving the proofs by which it can be
recognized.
JOHN: Your shrewd question has anticipated the subject, which even if
you had said nothing must have arisen from our discourse, and
therefore I do not doubt that it will be effectually grasped by your
minds, since indeed your sharp wits have outstripped our instruction.
For the puzzle of any question is easily removed, when the inquiry
anticipates the answer, and is the first to travel along the road
which it is to follow. And so to the treatment of those faults of
which we have spoken above, intercourse with other men is not merely
no hindrance, but a considerable help, for the more often that the
outbursts of their impatience are exposed, the more thorough is the
sorrow and compunction which they bring on those who have failed, and
the speedier is the recovery of health which they confer on those who
struggle against them. Wherefore even when we are living in solitude,
though the incentive to irritation and matter for it cannot arise from
men, yet we ought of set purpose to meditate on incitements to it,
that as we are fighting against it with a continual struggle in our
thoughts a speedier cure for it may be found for us. But against the
spirit of fornication the system is different, and the method an
altered one. For as we must deprive the body of opportunities of
lust, and contact with flesh, so we must deprive the mind of the
recollection of it. For it is sufficiently dangerous for bosoms that
are still weak and infirm even to tolerate the slightest recollection
of this passion, in such a way that sometimes at the remembrance of
holy women, or in reading a story in Holy Scripture a stimulus of
dangerous excitement is aroused. For which reason our Elders used
deliberately to omit passages of this kind when any of the juniors
were present. However for those who are perfect and established in
the feelings of chastity there can be no lack of proofs by which they
may examine themselves, and establish their perfect uprightness of
heart by the uncorrupted judgment of their own conscience. There will
then be for the man who is thoroughly established a similar test even
in regard to this passion, so that one who is sure that he has
altogether exterminated the roots of this evil may for the sake of
ascertaining his chastity, call up some picture as with a lascivious
mind. But it is by no means proper for such a test to be attempted by
those who are still weak (for to them it will be dangerous rather than
useful), ut conjunctionem femineam et palpationem quodammodo teneram
atque mollissimam corde pertractent. Cum ergo perfecta quis virtute
fundatus ad illecebram blandissimorum tactuum, quos cogitando
confinxerit, nullum mentis assensum, nullam commotionem carnis in se
deprehenderit exagitatam, he will have a very sure proof of his
purity, so that training himself to this steadfast purity he will not
only possess the blessing of chastity and freedom from defilement in
his heart, but even if he is obliged to touch the body of a woman, he
will be horrified at it.
With this Abbot John brought his Conference to an end, as he saw that
it was just time for the refreshment of the ninth hour.
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