In Moses’ day the Spirit was given by the imposition of hands; and Peter imparted the Spirit by the imposition of hands. Upon you also, who are to be baptized, the grace will come. In what manner I do not say, for I do not anticipate the proper time. . . . We learn clearly in the book of Kings [Samuel], of Samuel and David, how by the Holy Spirit they prophesied and were leaders of the prophets. Samuel in fact was called the seer. David says plainly: The spirit of the Lord has spoken by me; and in the psalms: and do not take your holy spirit from me;^[1] and again: May your good spirit guide me on level ground.^[2]

Much later, David was sitting opposite the enemy lines and desired longingly to drink from the cistern. Chosen soldiers of his broke through the enemy troops and returned unharmed with the water the king had desired. But the man who had been taught by his chastisements immediately reproached himself for having endangered his soldiers by his desire for water. He poured it out, making a libation to the Lord, as it is written there: He poured it out to the Lord. The water he poured out was changed into a sacrifice to the Lord, because he slaughtered his sin of eager desire by the penance of self-censure. The man who had once been unafraid to lust after another man’s wife was later terrified at having desired water. Since he remembered he had committed something forbidden, he was strict with himself and refrained even from what was allowed. FORTY GOSPEL HOMILIES 34.^[1]

This incident is evidence that uncontrolled desire indeed comes before reason but that reason resists irrational desire. David suffered what is human—an irrational longing—but it is praiseworthy that he cheated the irrational desire in a rational manner with the remedy that was at hand. I praise the men who were ashamed at the desire of their king and preferred to bring his shameful action to an end even with danger to their own well-being. I praise the more him who was ashamed at the danger to others in his own desire and who compared to blood the water sought at the price of hazardous chance. At once, like a conqueror who had checked his desire, David poured out the water to the Lord, to show that he quenched his lust by the consolation found in his Word.