Attend to my wisdom, and bow your ear to my prudence, that you may guard your thoughts. For, indeed, nothing is more fugitive than the heart, which deserts us as often as it slips away through evil thoughts. Therefore, the psalmist says, My heart has failed me.^[1] Yet, when he returns to himself, he says, Your servant has found his heart to pray to you. When, therefore, thought is kept under guard, the heart which was inclined to fly away is found.

In the end, [Solomon] says, you will find what seemed sweet in the beginning to be more bitter than gall and sharper than the edge of a sword. But the nature of righteousness is the opposite: In the beginning, it seems more bitter, but in the end, when it produces fruits of virtue, it is found to be sweeter than honey.

What does it profit a man to be an expert theologian if he is a shameless fornicator; or to be nobly temperate but an impious blasphemer? The knowledge of doctrines is a precious possession. There is need of a vigilant soul, since many there are who would deceive you by philosophy and vain deceit.^[1] The Greeks, indeed, by their smooth tongue lead men astray, for honey drops from the lips of a harlot.

Even when the sinner looks for gratification, he doesn’t find the fruit of his sin pleasant. As the wisdom of God says in another place, Bread of deceit is pleasant to a man, but after he eats it, his mouth will be filled with gravel.^[1] And, Honey drips from the lips of an adulteress, and for a time it tastes sweet, but in the end you will find it more bitter than gall and sharper than a two-edged sword. So he eats and is quite pleased for a little while. Then, when it is too late, when he has cut off his soul from God, he rejects it. But the fool does not know that those who are cut off from God shall perish.

In a very short time [the devil] leads the proud and wicked to death on a broad and spacious path. Christ our Lord, on the contrary, leads the humble and obedient to life on the straight and narrow path. Both of these roads, the wide one and the narrow one, have an end and are very short. Labor is not long on the narrow road, nor is joy lengthy on the broad one. Those whom the broad way of wickedness delights, after brief joy will have endless punishment. Those who follow Christ on the narrow way, after brief tribulations will merit to reach eternal rewards. If a layman who is in the world possesses pride, it is a sin for him. If a monk is proud, it is a sacrilege. You ought to show yourselves living so holy a life, so justly and piously in such a way that your merits may not only suffice for you but also find pardon in this world for other sinners. If we do not bridle our tongue, our religion is not true but false;^[1] and it would have been better not to have made a vow than after the vow not to do what was promised.

The harlot knows not how to love, but only to ensnare. Her kiss has poison, and her mouth a pernicious drug. And if this does not immediately appear, it is the more necessary to avoid her on that account, because she veils that destruction, and keeps that death concealed, and does not permit it to become manifest from the outset. So if any one pursues pleasure and a life full of gladness, let him avoid the society of fornicating women, for they fill the minds of their lovers with a thousand conflicts and tumults, setting in motion against them continual strifes and contentions, by means of their words and all their actions. And just as it is with those who are the most virulent enemies, so the object of their actions and schemes is to plunge their lovers into shame and poverty and the worst extremities. And in the same manner as hunters when they have spread out their nets, they try to drive the wild animals into them, in order that they may put them to death. So also it is with these women.

Let us reflect on what is written concerning dissipation and evil desires: The lips of an adulteress are sweet for a time, it says, but in the end she is more bitter than gall. Now since our life in this world is known to be, as it were, a road, it is necessary for us to reach rest as the result of our labor rather than labor as the result of rest. It is better for us to work for a short time on the way, in order that afterwards we may be able happily to reach eternal joy in our [home country], with the help of our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit for ever and ever.

We should also be particularly careful of our eyes, for it is better to slip with the feet than with the eyes. The Lord offers a remedy for this weakness, indeed, with curt words: If your eye scandalizes you, cut it out,^[1] thereby tearing lust up by the roots. Melting glances, and sly looks out of the corner of the eye, which is what is also called winking, are nothing more than adultery with the eyes, since lust operates at a distance through them. The sight sins before the rest of the body does. The eye, seeing beautiful things, gladdens the heart, that is, when it knows how to see what is right it gives joy, but he that winks with the eye deceitfully shall cause men sorrow.^[2]

Your flight is a good one if your heart does not act out the counsels of sinners and their designs. Your flight is a good one if your eye flees the sight of cups and drinking vessels, so that it may not become envious as it lingers over the wine. Your flight is good if your eye turns away from the woman stranger, so that your tongue may keep the truth. Your flight is a good one if you do not answer the fool according to his folly.^[1] Your flight is good if you direct your footsteps away from the countenance of fools. Indeed, one swiftly goes astray with bad guides; but if you wish your flight to be a good one, remove your ways far from their words.

For who are more alien to us than evil spirits, who are separated from the lot of the heavenly country? And what honor is ours, though made in bodies of clay, that we are yet created after the image and likeness of our Maker? Or who is more cruel than the apostate angel, who has both afflicted himself with the pain of death through pride, and still, though lost himself, brought death to the human race? He who, being made after the image and likeness of God, gives his honor to aliens therefore devotes the seasons of his life to the pleasures of evil spirits. He also surrenders his years to the cruel one who spends the space of life accorded him after the will of the ill-domineering adversary.

Bear fruit for your own joy and delight. In yourself lies the sweetness of your charm, from you does it blossom, in you it sojourns, within you it rests, in your own self you must search for the jubilant quality of your conscience. For that reason he [Solomon] says, Drink water out of your own cistern and the streams of your own well.

Attempt, O hearer, to have your own well and your own spring, so that you too, when you take up a book of the Scriptures, may begin even from your own understanding to bring forth some meaning, and in ac-cordance with those things which you have learned in the church, you too attempt to drink from the fountain of your own abilities. You have the nature of living water within you.^[1] There are within you perennial veins and streams flowing with rational understanding, if only they have not been filled with earth and rubbish. But get busy to dig out your earth and to clean out the filth, that is, to remove the idleness of your natural bent and to cast out the inactivity of your heart.

Drink water out of your own cistern, that is, examine your own resources, do not go to the springs belonging to others, but from your own streams gather for yourself the consolations of life. Do you have metal plates, clothing, beasts of burden, utensils of every kind? Sell them; permit all things to go except your [soul’s] liberty.

Drink the waters from your own wells, fresh water from your own source. . . . As the prophet Isaiah declares, You will be like a well-watered garden, like a flowing spring whose waters will never fail. And places emptied for ages will be built up in you. You will lift up the foundations laid by generation after generation. You will be called the builder of fences, the one who turns the pathways toward peace.^[1]. . . And so it will happen that not only the whole thrust and thought of your heart but even all the wanderings and the straying of your thoughts will turn into a holy and unending meditation on the law of God.

Let us return to the sacred Scriptures and drink water from our own cisterns and running water from our own wells. Let us drink of the living water, springing up unto life everlasting.^[1] . . . Not visible rivers merely watering the earth with its thorns and trees, but enlightening souls.

Let the fountain of your water be your own and let no stranger share with you. For all who do not love God are strangers, are antichrists. And although they enter the basilicas, they cannot be numbered among the sons of God. That fountain of life does not belong to them. Even an evil person can have baptism; even an evil person can have prophecy. We find that king Saul had prophecy; he was persecuting the holy David and was filled with the Spirit of prophecy and began to prophesy.^[1] Even an evil person can receive the sacrament of the body and blood of the Lord, for about such it has been said, He who eats and drinks unworthily eats and drinks judgment to himself.^[2] Even an evil person can have the name of Christ, that is, even an evil person can be called Christian; and about these it has been said, They profaned the name of their God.^[3] Therefore, even an evil man can have all these mysteries. But he cannot have love and be evil. This, then, is the peculiar gift; it is the unique fountain. For drinking of this the Spirit of God encourages you; for drinking of himself the Spirit of God encourages you.

He shows also, by the mention of the creature [the hind], the purity of that pleasure; and by the doe he intimates the quick responsive affection of the wife. And whereas he knows many things to excite, he secures them against these, and puts upon them the indissoluble bond of affection, setting constancy before them. And as for the rest, wisdom, figuratively speaking, like a stag, can repel and crush the serpentine doctrines of the heterodox.

When Scripture says, Do not keep going steady with a foreign woman, it is advising us to make use of secular education but not to settle there permanently. Each generation received beneficial gifts at the appropriate points, but they were in preparation for the Word of the Lord.

Let those who are bound fear, those who are loosed fear. Let those who are loosed be afraid of being bound; those who are bound pray to be loosed. Each one is tied up in the threads of his own sins. And apart from the church, nothing is loosed. ^[1] PUNISHED BY OURSELVES. SALVIAN THE PRESBYTER. I have previously said that we are punished by God because of our sins, and now I say that we are punished by ourselves. Both are true. We are, indeed, punished by God, but we act so that he has to punish us. Since we ourselves cause our own punishment, who doubts that we punish ourselves for our own crimes? For, whoever gives cause for his punishment punishes himself, according to the saying, Each one is bound by the rope of his own sins. Therefore, if evil people are bound by the ropes of their own sins, each and every sinner, doubtless, binds himself when he sins. ^[1]

Clothed as you are in the rotten garments of your offenses and held fast in the meshes of your own sins, listen to the prophet’s voice saying, Wash yourselves clean! Put away the misdeeds of your souls from before my eyes,^[1] that the angelic choir may chant over you: Happy [are] they whose faults are taken away, whose sins are covered.^[2]

He will perish here with those who have no discipline; and he will be driven out of the abundance of his fatness.^[1] One who becomes the prey of sin and lacks discipline will experience the same things. Indeed the one who consorts with murderers becomes a murderer. See what bitter kind of death he [Solomon] designates when he says that he [the wicked person] will die with such companions. It is indeed horrible to depart from life with a bad reputation. Depravity—what he [Solomon] calls fatness—multiplies so that the flesh is destroyed completely by the works of flesh, keeping one away from the very kind of life that could save him. He [the wicked person] perishes because of imprudence, not because of lustful desires: he had a legitimate means to satisfy his desire, that is, his wife. Therefore nobody is allowed to accuse nature, but only human intemperance which is not proper to nature.

[E]very man twists for himself a rope by his sins. . . . Who makes a long rope? He who adds sin to sin. . . . One has committed a theft. So that he may not be found out, he seeks the astrologer [to prove his innocence]. It was enough to have committed the theft. Why will he add sin to sin? Behold! Two sins [are] committed! When you are forbidden to go to the astrologer, you revile the bishop. Behold! Three sins! When you hear it said of you, “Cast him forth from the Church,” you say, “I will go to the party of Donatus.” Behold! You add a fourth sin. The rope is growing. Be afraid of the rope. It is good to be corrected here, to be scourged with it, that it may not be said of you at the end, “Bind his hands and feet, and cast him forth into outer darkness” [Mt 22:13]. For “with the cords of his own sins everyone is bound” [Prv 5:22].