The time is coming when people will be insane, and when they see someone who is not insane, they will attack him saying 'You are insane because you are not like us.'
We must accomplish the course of our earthly pilgrimage with the greatest attention and watchfulness over ourselves, unceasingly calling upon God in prayer for help.
Do not dare to raise your weak hand to stop the elemental tide of apostasy. Avoid it, protect yourself from it, and that is enough for you. Get to know the spirit of the times, study it so you can avoid its influence whenever possible.
St. Paul says: 'The person engaged in spiritual warfare exercises self control in all things' (I Cor. 9:25). Aware of all that is said in divine Scripture, let us lead our life with self-control, especially in regard to food.
The blacksmith, who pounds a piece of iron, has previously thought about what he wants to make- a sickle, a knife, an axe - and works accordingly. And so let the man of God ponder in advance which virtue he wishes to acquire, in order not to toil aimlessly.
As the earth, long awaiting moistening and at last receiving it in abundance, suddenly is covered by tender and bright greenery, so also the heart, exhausted by dryness, and afterwards revived by tears, emits from itself a multitude of spiritual thoughts and feelings, adorned by the common flower of humility. The labor of weeping, being inseparable from the labor of prayer, requires the same conditions for success as prayer requires. Prayer needs patient, constant dwelling in itself; weeping requires the same. Prayer needs wearying of the body, and brings about exhaustion of the body; this exhaustion produces weeping, which must be born in the troubling and wearying of the body.
Those who have sinned must not despair. Let that never be. For we are condemned not for the multitude of evils, but because we do not want to repent...
Beware of the counsels of the evil one, if he should come in the guise of one professing truth to beguile you and lead you into deceit. Even if he should come to you as an angel of light, do not believe him or obey him: for he is apt to fascinate the faithful by the attractive semblance of truth.
The Antichrist will not rule over all, but only over those who are worthy of perdition, who, even if he did not come, still would have deprived themselves of salvation.
Every tribulation reveals the state of our will, whether it inclines to the right or to the left. An unexpected tribulation is called temptation, because it subjects a man to a test of his secret dispositions.
He who has not received within himself the kingdom of God cannot recognize the Antichrist. He is absolutely sure to become in a way incomprehensible to himself his follower.
If we want to do something but cannot, then before God, Who knows our hearts, it is as if we have done it. This is true whether the intended action is good or bad.
He who wants to cross the spiritual sea is long-suffering, humble, vigilant and self-controlled. If he impetuously embarks on it without these four virtues, he agitates his heart, but cannot cross.
