If your spirit still looks around at the time of prayer, then it does not yet pray as a monk. You are no better than a man of affairs engaged in a kind of landscape gardening.
Evagrius PonticusA man who worships in Spirit and Truth no longer honors the Creator because of His works, but praises Him because of Himself.
Evagrius PonticusHe who has mastery over his incensive power has mastery also over the demons. But anyone who is a slave to it is a stranger to the ways of the Saviour, for as the Saviour enjoined us: 'Learn from Me; for I am gentle and humble in heart: and you will find rest for your souls' (Mt. 11:29). Now if a man abstains from food and drink, but becomes incensed to wrath because of evil thoughts, he is like a ship sailing the open sea with a demon for a pilot.
Evagrius Ponticus