It happens, I do not know how, that most of the proud never really discover their true selves. They think they have conquered their passions and they find out how poor they really are only after they die.

Ascend, my brothers, ascend eagerly. Let your hearts' resolve be to climb. Listen to the voice of the one who says: 'Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of our God' (Isa. 2:3), Who makes our feet to be like the feet of the deer, 'Who sets us on the high places, that we may be triumphant on His road' (Hab. 3:19).

The offspring of virtue is perseverance. The fruit and offspring of perseverance is habit and child of habit is character.

The friend of silence comes close to God.

The man who pets a lion may tame it, but the man who coddles the body makes it ravenous.

When a man has found the Lord, he no longer has to use words when he is praying, for the Spirit Himself will intercede for him with groans that cannot be uttered.

Everyone who asks something of God and does not receive it doubtless does not receive it for one of these reasons: either because they ask before the time, or they ask unworthily, or out of vainglory, or because if they received what they asked they would become proud or fall into negligence.