Prayer purifies us, reading instructs us. Both are good when both are possible. Otherwise, prayer is better than reading.

Number is divided into even and odd. Even number is divided into the following: evenly even, evenly uneven, and unevenly uneven. Odd number is divided into the following: prime and incomposite, composite, and a third intermediate class (mediocris) which in a certain way is prime and incomposite but in another way secondary and composite.

War with vices, but peace with individuals.

Teaching unsupported by grace may enter our ears, but it never reaches the heart. When God's grace does touch our innermost minds to bring understanding, then his word, which is received by the ear, can sink deep into the heart.

Nothing exists without music, for the universe itself is said to have been framed by a kind of harmony of sounds, and the heaven itself revolves under the tone of that harmony.

The more you devote yourself to study of the sacred utterances, the richer will be your understanding of them, just as the more the soil is tilled, the richer the harvest.

All spiritual growth comes from reading and reflection. By reading we learn what we did not know; by reflection we retain what we have learned. The conscientious reader will be more concerned to carry out what he has read than merely to acquire knowledge of it. In reading we aim at knowing, but we must put into practice what we have learned in our course of study.