When Moses' subjects became free from this passion as well; then they enter into the life of a foreigner, while the law, when they deviate in the other direction, leads them along the royal path. For it is dangerous for a traveler to deviate from the side. Just as if two shifted rapids leave one path on a high coastal cliff, then it is not unfortunate for the one who walks along it to deviate from the middle side, because on both sides, perhaps, the deviation will be followed by a precipice from the rapids: so the law requires of him who follows in his footsteps not to leave "the way", as the Lord says, "narrow and strait" (Matt. 7:14), not recognizing any deviation either to the left or to the right as successful. And by this word is defined the teaching that the virtues consist in the middle. Why is every vice usually committed, either from a lack or from a violation of the measure of virtue? for example, in relation to courage, timidity is a certain defect of this virtue; impudence is a violation of measure; but what is free from one or the other of these vices is seen in the middle between them and is virtue. In the same way, everything else that cares about the most perfect is kept in the middle between the evil neighborhood; wisdom occupies the middle ground between cunning and simplicity. Neither the wisdom of the serpent nor the simplicity of the dove is praiseworthy, if each of these qualities is taken alone, by itself; but conduct that keeps the middle ground between the one and the other becomes a virtue. He who lacks chastity is depraved; and whoever abounds in it is "burned in his conscience," as the Apostle defines (1 Tim. 4:2). One is irresistibly drowning in pleasures; another abhors marriage as much as adultery; and the conduct seen in the middle between these is chastity. Since, as the Lord says, "this world lies in evil" (1 John 5:19), and for the followers of the law that which is contrary to virtue, that is, vice, is foreign, then he who passes through life in this world will safely complete this necessary course of virtue, if he preserves the truly royal path, smoothed and whitened by virtue, not in the least seduced by vice to the adjacent crossroads.

But as, according to what has been said, with the ascent of virtue, along with the intrigue of the enemy, which seeks in relation to everyone a pretext for seduction into sin: the more the people have grown in life according to God, and the adversary then uses another intrigue against these strong in military affairs. When the belligerents see that a regiment of superior enemies is invincible in open battle, then he overcomes them, negotiating and setting up ambushes. In the same way, the horde of malice against those who are strengthened by law and virtue, does not bring out its forces face to face, but secretly plots against them in some ambushes. Therefore, even when he plotted evil against the Israelites, he called for the help of sorcery. And so history says that there was a certain "sorcerer" (Joshua 13:22) and a bird-diviner (Num. 23:23), who, by some demonic action, had the power to harm, but belonged to the number of enemies, and was hired by the ruler of the Midianites to harm those who live according to God with his curses; And he changed that oath into a blessing. And from the connection of what has been considered so far, we understand that magic is not valid against those who live virtuously; on the contrary, strengthened by God's help, they overcome every intrigue. That the one mentioned in history was engaged in bird-divination sorcery is testified to when it says: "Sorcery is in his hand" (Num. 22:7), and he consults with the birds, and even before that he says, as if by the cry of a donkey, he was taught what was before his effort.

The voice of this donkey (since it was customary for the sorcerer, by some demonic action, to consult with the voices of the dumb) is presented by the Scriptures as if articulate, showing that those who are preoccupied with such demonic deception come to the conviction to accept as a word by some observation from the voice of the dumb the instruction they have extracted. And the sorcerer, heeding this, by the very thing by which he was deceived, was taught that the power of those against whom he was hired was irresistible. In the Gospel story, a horde (legion) of demons was preparing to resist the power of the Lord: but when He who has power over all approaches him, he proclaims a power that overcomes, and does not conceal the truth that God's nature is the One Who in due time will inflict punishment on sinners. For the demonic voice says: "I know Thee, who Thou art the Holy One of God" (Mark 1:24); and: "Thou hast come hither before the time to torment us" (Matt. 8:29). The same thing happened then; the demonic power that accompanied the sorcerer reveals to Balaam the invincibility and invincibility of the people of God.

And we, adjusting history to what has been studied up to now, assert that he who intends to curse those who live virtuously cannot utter a single distressing and disgusting word, but turns a curse into a blessing. And it is understood that those who live virtuously are not touched by the reproach of slander. For how can one not reproach the acquisitive for covetousness? How can one spread a rumor about a hermit and one who lives in solitude that he lives dissolutely? Or about the meek, that he is irritable? Or about the humble-minded, that he is arrogant? or something else that is reproachful to divulge about people who are known from the opposite side, whose goal is to present a life that is elusive to a mocker. "Let him be ashamed," as the Apostle says, "that the adversary may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us" (Titus 2:8). For this reason the voice of him who is called to curse says: "How shall I curse? God does not curse him" (Num. 23:8), that is, how shall I curse him who has not given food to slander? For him, since his gaze is turned to God, then life is invulnerable to vice.

However, the inventor of evil, when he has not succeeded in this, does not entirely cease to intrigue those against whom he plotted, but on the contrary, turns his ingenuity to a special military stratagem, catches human nature in vice with the bait of pleasure. And indeed, pleasure, like some kind of bait to every vice, as soon as it is put on display, conveniently attracts greedy souls with the milk of perdition; and especially our nature, without any caution, is drawn into evil by voluptuousness. So it was then; those who overcame with arms, showed that every attachment of iron is inferior in strength to their own strength, were swiftly put to flight from the opposing retinue, and they themselves were stung by voluptuousness with women's arrows. And those who conquered husbands yielded the victory to their wives. As soon as the women appeared before them, instead of weapons, they set their faces against them, and they immediately forgot the power of courage, their irritation changed into a desire to be liked. And they came to such a state in which it is natural to be indulged in lawless mingling with foreign women to the point of frenzy. Assimilation with evil became the alienation of the help of good; for soon the Divinity rose up against them. But the zealous Phinehas did not expect that sin should be cleansed by a sentence from above; on the contrary, he himself became both a judge and an executor of execution. Moved with anger against the frenzied, he fulfilled the work of the priest, cleansing sin with blood, and not with the blood of any innocent animal, which had not taken upon itself any filth of lewdness, but with the blood of those who had copulated with each other in sin. And the spear that pierced their two bodies calmed God's justice, ready to move against them, the delight of the sinful plums into one with their death. But it seems to me that this history offers people a kind of spiritually beneficial advice, which teaches us that of the many passions that conquer human thoughts, not one has such power on us as to be equal to the disease of voluptuousness. For that these Israelites, too, who showed themselves not to be afraid of the Egyptian cavalry, defeated the Amalekites, and became terrible to the people who followed them, and then overcame the retinue of the Midianites, and they very suddenly, at the mere sight of foreign women, became enslaved to this disease, and by this, as it is said, they prove nothing else, but only that voluptuousness is such an enemy of ours, which is difficult to fight and overcome, who, by his mere appearance, having gained the upper hand over the invincible weapons, erected a monument to their dishonor, consigning the shame of the vanquished to shame, at the testimony of daylight. Voluptuousness transformed people into beasts, whom the bestial and irrational desire for lewdness convinced to forget their human nature; and they do not conceal their crimes, but are magnified by the dishonor of passion, they are comforted by the filth of shame, like swine, openly, in the eyes of others, they wallow in the mire of impurity.

What then do we learn from this narration? So that, having ascertained the force with which the disease of voluptuousness draws into evil, we may remove our lives from such a neighborhood as far as possible, and so that this disease, like some kind of fire, which produces a destructive conflagration at any approximation, may not creep up to us. This is what Solomon teaches, advising in the Book of Wisdom: "Can a man take fire in his bosom, lest his garment be burned? Can anyone walk on burning coals without burning his feet? (Prov. 6:27, 28); for it is in our will to remain in impassibility while we are far from Him who sets us on fire. And if we are so close that we touch this scorching heat, then the fire of lust will penetrate into us, and thus it follows that the foot will be burned, and the bowels will be damaged. In order that we may guard ourselves from such evil in the distance, the Lord in the Gospel, by His own word, as if a kind of root of passion, cuts off the desire aroused by sight, teaching that he who has taken passion into himself with his gaze gives the way to illness; for evil passions, like an infection, as soon as they once take possession of the essential in a person, cease only by death.

But I think that those who have offered Moses his whole life as a model of virtue do not need to prolong the word. Whoever exerts his strength for a lofty life, for him what has been said will serve as a meagre path to true wisdom; And whoever is exhausted for the feats of virtue, if he writes many times more than what has been said, there will be no benefit from this work, unless he consigns to oblivion that in which our word, according to the definition expressed in the preface, stands firmly, namely: a perfect life is such that no description of perfection stops further progress in it, but unceasing growth in the perfection of life for the soul is the path to perfection.

By bringing the word to the end of the life of Moses, it will be good to prove that this rule of perfection given to us is indubitable. For whoever in the course of his whole life attains greater and greater heights by so many ascents, did not doubt to become still higher than himself, so that his life, like an eagle, is seen in everything, I think, as above the clouds, surpassing, soaring in the ether of mental ascent. He was born when the Egyptians imputed a misdeed to a Jew to be born. The torturer punished the newborn according to the law. But Moses does not submit to the destructive law, having been saved first by his parents, and then by those who decreed the law; And those who, according to the law, should have taken care of his death, took full care, not only for his life, but also for his glorious life, teaching the youth all wisdom. After this, he placed himself above human honor, pre-eminent to the royal rank, recognizing himself as more powerful and royal, instead of the title of royal armor-bearer, and instead of royal adornments, to have the right to stand on guard of virtue and to boast of its majesty. Then he saves a fellow countryman, and destroys the Egyptian with a blow, by which in our successive survey we mean the enemy and friend of the soul. After this, silence makes the teacher of lofty lessons, and enlightens the mind with the light that shines from the bushes. And then he makes an effort to make his fellow tribesmen participants in the blessings granted to him from above. At the same time, he presented a special proof of strength, punitive in the various executions that followed one another against the enemies, and beneficial to his fellow tribesmen. On foot, he leads a multitude across the sea, not preparing a detachment of ships for himself, but equipping the Israelites for sailing. He makes the depth unwet for the Hebrews, and the sea for the Egyptians the sea. He also sang a song of victory, and was a pillar of guidance, illumined by heavenly fire, built his meal from food given from above, quenched his thirst with a stone, raised his hands to the destruction of the Amalekites; and he approached the mountain, heard the sound of the trumpet, entered into darkness, drew near to the nature of God, dwelt in the tabernacle above, gave splendor to the priesthood, built the tabernacle, corrected life by laws, and finally, according to what has been said, he succeeded in wars. At the end of his presuppression, with the help of the priesthood, he punished lewdness: for this was made clear by the wrath of Phinehas, which he had revealed against passion.

At the conclusion of all this, he ascends to the mountain of repose, does not descend to the lower earth, to which, according to the promise, the people who stood in the valley turned their eyes, he no longer eats earthly food who thought about the food of rain from above, but dwelling upwards on the very top of the mountain, like a learned sculptor, having transformed himself into a complete image of life, at the end of the work with care attaches, not the end, but the crown of all things. For what does history say about him? "And Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord; Moses was one hundred and twenty years old when he died; but his sight was not dulled, and his strength was not exhausted" (Deuteronomy 34:5, 7).

And from this we learn that for so many years he is then honored with this lofty name — to be called a servant of God, which means the same as to say: he has become more perfect than anyone else. For no one can serve God, except he who has become the most perfect in the world. With Moses, too, the end of a virtuous life was accomplished "by the word of the Lord." History calls it an end, a living death, after which no burial follows, no burial mound is poured, there is no darkening in the eyes and no decay in the face. And so, what do we learn from what has been said? One end should be kept in mind for the continuation of life, so that for what we have done in life we may be called a servant of God. For when thou hast overcome all the enemies, the Egyptian, the Amalekite, the Edomites, the Midianite, thou hast crossed the water, thou hast been illumined by a cloud, thou hast delighted in the tree, thou hast drunk from the stone, and thou hast tasted food from above, by purity and innocence thou hast laid the way to the ascent of the mountain, and having been there, thou shalt be initiated into the Divine mystery by the sound of trumpets, in the incomprehensible darkness thou shalt draw near by faith to God, there thou hast been taught the mysteries of the tabernacle, and thou hast studied the dignity of the priesthood; when you become a stonecutter of your heart, so that the words of God may be inscribed on its tablets by God; when you destroy the golden idol, that is, you will blot out the lust of covetousness from your life: when you will be so exalted that you will become irresistible to Balaam's sorcery (and when you hear about sorcery, understand the manifold charm of this life, from which people, as if drunk from some kind of cup, having come out of their own nature, turn into the appearance of dumb people); when all these things are accomplished, and the staff of the priesthood vegetates in you, not sucking into itself any earthly moisture for vegetation, but containing in itself the power of fruitfulness, and namely, the bringing into the fruit of a nut, in which the first thing that appears in it is bitter and hard, but containing in it sweet and suitable for food; when everything that rebels against your dignity you will bring to destruction, like Dathan swallowed up by the earth, or destroy with fire, like Korah: then you will come to an end; and I call the end that for the sake of which everything is done. For example: the end of agriculture is the eating of fruits; the end of the construction of the house is to live in the house; the end of trade is wealth; the end of ascetic labors is the crown: so the end of a lofty life is to be called a servant of God, by which is also meant not to have a grave mound over oneself, that is, to make life not entail evil consequences.

But the Scriptures tell us another sign of this slavery — not the darkening of the eyes and not the corruption of the face. For the eye, which is always in the light, how can it be darkened by the darkness to which it is estranged? And whoever has progressed in incorruptibility all his life, of course, does not accept any corruption into himself. For he who is truly created in the image of God, and has not changed in himself a single Divine trait; he bears these signs in himself, and in likeness in everything corresponds to the prototype, adorning his soul with incorruption, immutability and the absence of any admixture of vice.

Here is to you, O man of God, Caesarius, this brief discourse of ours on the perfection of the virtuous life, which depicts the life of the great Moses as a kind of prototype of beauty in persons, from which we, each one separately, by imitating these exercises, can depict in ourselves the outline of the beauty shown to us. That Moses succeeded in the possible perfection, in this can we find any witness more reliable than God's word, which says to him: "And thou hast found favor in My sight" (Exodus 33:12). And that he was called the friend of God by God Himself, and that, wishing rather to perish with all, if God did not show mercy to them also in good pleasure for all that they had sinned, he stopped his wrath against the Israelites, because God had changed His decree so as not to grieve his friend, — and this and all the like is a clear testimony and proof of this, that the life of Moses had reached the extreme limit of perfection.

And so, since our question was about what perfection is in a virtuous life; and according to what has been said, this perfection has been found: it remains for you, Valiant One, to have this example before your eyes, and what has been seen in the highest view of what has been said historically, applying it to your own life, to strive to be known from God and to become a friend of God. For in the true sense of perfection is not servile, not for fear of punishment to depart from a vicious life, and not for the hope of reward to do good, trading a virtuous life with some conditions and contracts; but losing sight of everything, even that according to the promises is observed in hope, one thing is to consider it terrible for oneself to be deprived of God's friendship, and only to recognize one thing as precious and desirable — to become God's friend, which, according to my reasoning, is the perfection of life. But what can be found by you with your mind, exalted to the more majestic and Divine, there will also be found many...; then, without a doubt, it will be a common benefit to all in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and dominion forever, Amen.