The Doctor of our souls has placed the remedy in the hidden regions of the soul.

...we know that God arranges the opportunities for salvation in different ways. Our situation is that we respond eagerly or in a laggardly manner to these opportunities made available by God to us. God made the call come out of your homeland; Abraham by coming out was exercising obedience. There was the instruction come into the land; it was done, and that was the work of obedience. But the addition which I shall show you has to do with the grace of God, who gave a command - and a promise.

The apostles were very sure that everything of theirs which had to do with salvation was a gift to them from God. 'Increase our faith'. They did not presume that the fullness of faith would come to them merely because they freely opted for it. They believed, rather, that it was a gift of God which would have to be granted to them.

Everything we do, our every objective, must be undertaken for the sake of... purity of heart... we must practice the reading of the Scripture, together with all the other virtuous activities... to hold our hearts free of the harm of every dangerous passion and in order to rise step by step to the high point of love.

...we should realize that there are three sources for our thoughts - God, the devil, and ourselves.

Humility, in its turn, can be achieved only through faith, fear of God, gentleness and the shedding of all possessions.

...whoever is guided solely by his own judgment and decision will never climb up to the summit of perfection and will not fail to be the victim of the devil's ruinous power to delude.