If you move to a country house, do not leave your daughter at home; even if she does not know how to live without you, and will not be able to live without you; Let her tremble with fear if she is left alone. She should not talk to secular people; she should not have fellowship with bad maidens. She should not be present at slave marriages and should not take part in noisy games. I know that some forbade the virgin of Christ to wash with eunuchs and married women: because the former do not lose their masculine dispositions, and the latter, with the fullness of the belly in pregnancy, acquaint with shameful things. And I, for my part, do not approve of baths for a young girl at all; it should be ashamed of itself, and it should be impossible for it to see itself naked. If it dries up its body by vigilance and fasting and throws it into slavery; if she wants to extinguish the flame of lust and all the excitements of ebullient age with the cold of abstinence; If, having accustomed herself to austere simplicity, she tries to erase natural beauty, then why should she, on the contrary, stir up sleeping fires by poultices in the baths?

Instead of precious stones and silk, she should love the Divine Scriptures; not a scarlet cloth of gold and Babylonian wool, but a careful and diligent study of those who pertain to the faith should captivate her. Let him first of all study the Psalter and console himself with its songs; in the Proverbs of Solomon, let him study the science of life. From Ecclesiastes she will acquire the habit of despising worldly things. In the Book of Job he will find examples of virtue and patience. When he comes to the Gospels, let him never let them go out of his hands again. She must deeply impress the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles in her heart. And when the storehouse of his heart is enriched with these treasures, let him exercise his memory on the Prophets, the Pentateuch, the Books of Kings, Chronicles, and also Ezra and Esther. And let him study the book of the Song of Songs, without fear, at the conclusion of everything; This is so that, when she reads it first, she does not harm her soul, not being able to understand that under the sensual images is the marriage song of spiritual marriage. She must beware of any apocrypha. And if she ever wanted to read them, not for the sake of the truth of the teaching, but for the sake of respect for their titles, let her know that these are not the books of the persons to whom they are attributed in the titles, that there are many errors in them, and that great prudence is needed to know how to pick gold out of the mud. She should always have Cyprian's work at hand. Let him read the letters of Athanasius and the books of Hilary without hindrance. It should be carried away by the judgments and animated speech of only those writers in whose books there are no traces of wavering in faith. The rest she must read in such a way as to judge them more than to assimilate them on faith.

You will say: how will I have time to look after all this, I, a woman of the world, in such a crowd as in Rome? In such a case, do not take upon yourself a burden that is beyond your strength, but having weaned her from the breast, as Isaac was weaned, and dressed her as Samuel, you went to your grandmother and aunt. Give the most precious stone on Mary's bed, put it in the cradle of Jesus, the weeping Child. Let her be brought up in a monastery, enter into the ranks of virgins, do not know what an oath is, consider falsehood to be sacrilege, have no concept of the world, live like an angel, be in the body as if without a body, the whole human race imagines to resemble her, and in order not to dwell on other things, let her at least free you from the difficulty of supervision and the danger of protection. It is better for you to be bored in her absence than to be afraid at any event: will she say something, to whom will she talk, to whom she nods, to whom she looks with pleasure? Give the little one to Eustochia, her every cry is a plea to you for it. Give Eustochia a companion in a holy life, a future heiress. Let the little one see her, love her, marvel at her from the first years — her, whose speech, gait, and dress serve as the science of virtues. Let her go to the grandmother's bed, and let the grandmother repeat to her granddaughter what she has done for her daughter; By long experience she has learned to educate, protect, and teach virgins, and chastity is daily woven into her hundredfold crown. Happy maiden, happy Pavla Toksotsiev! Through the virtues of her grandmother and aunt, she is even more noble in holiness than in origin. Oh, that chance would lead you to see your mother-in-law and kinswoman, and to notice the great souls in their little bodies! I have no doubt that, due to your innate chastity, you would have warned your daughter and preferred the second law of the Gospel to the first sentence of God. Yes, you would cease to desire children more than other children, but would rather sacrifice yourself to God. But since there is a time to embrace, and a time to shrink from embraces (Ecclesiastes 3:5), and a woman has no authority over her own body (1 Corinthians 7:4), and in what [calling] he is called, brethren, in this let each one remain before God (1 Corinthians 7:24), and he who is under the yoke must flee so that he who is harnessed with him is not left in the mud,  "Then transfer to your children all that you would otherwise have shown on yourself." Hannah, having given to the tabernacle the son promised to God, did not take him back: she found it unseemly for the future prophet to grow up in her house, because she wanted to have other more children. Moreover, having conceived and given birth, she did not dare to come to the temple and appear before the face of God empty-handed before she had paid her due; and when she offered this kind of sacrifice, she returned home and bore five children to herself, because she bore the firstborn to God. Are you amazed at the happiness of the holy woman? Imitate her faith. If you send it to Paul, I give a solemn promise that I myself will personally be both her teacher and educator. I will carry her in my arms; although I am an old man, I will babble like a child; I will far surpass the philosopher of the world, because I will not teach the king of Macedonia, who is to perish by the poison of Babylon, but the servant and bride of Christ, in order to present her to the heavenly kingdoms.

To Marcella. About Onaz

Doctors called surgeons are considered cruel, and they are miserable. Is it not a misfortune to sympathize with the wounds of others, to cut dead limbs without mercy, to perform an operation without shuddering that terrifies the sufferer, and for this to be considered an enemy? Such is human nature; Truth is bitter to her, and vices seem pleasant to her. Isaiah was not ashamed to walk naked in the image of the captivity to come (Isaiah 20:2-3). Jeremiah is sent from among Jerusalem to the Mesopotamian river Euphrates, in order to lay down his belt among the hostile nations, where the Assyrians live and the hordes of the Chaldeans are located (Jeremiah ch. 13). Ezekiel is commanded to eat bread made from various vegetables and sprinkled with human droppings, then cow droppings (Ezekiel 4), and sees his wife's death without tears (Ezekiel 24). Amos is expelled from Samaria (see Amos ch. 7).

For what? Of course, for the very fact that spiritual doctors, cutting through the ulcers of sins, call for repentance. The Apostle Paul says: "I have become your enemy, telling you the truth" (Gal. 4:16). And since the words of the Savior seemed cruel, many of His disciples went backwards. It is also not surprising that we, rebelling against vice, insult people.

I intend to find infected and stinking noses, so let the one who has an infected nose be afraid. I rebel against the empty croaking of the crow, so let the crow realize that it is an empty chatterbox. As if there were only one man in all Rome with a nose tainted by the wounds of debauchery? As if Onaz Segestan alone, puffing out his cheeks, throws out words from them, pompous and empty as a bubble? I say that by villainy, perjury, and lies, some persons have bought for themselves who knows what dignity. What is the need for someone who feels innocent? I ridicule a lawyer who himself has need of a lawyer, I laugh at eloquence that costs two pennies—what need do you have of one who is so eloquent? I rebel against the presbyters who take bribes; You, rich man, why should you be embittered? I like to laugh at masks, night owls, Nile monsters; So all that Jani would say, do you think it's against you? Don't you think that you are good because you have a happy name (Onasus – from "to help, to be useful")? But they also give the grove the name of light (lucus), although it does not shine at all; the garden is called a park (parcae), although it spares nothing; the Furies are Eumenides, although they are not in the least favorable; and the people call the Ethiopians silver. If thou art angry when foul things are described, so will I sing to thee and Persius:

Let the Tsar and the Tsarina They are looking for you as a son-in-law, Let the young maidens lure you, Let everything you trample on become a rose,

but I have advised you to conceal something in order to appear even better. If the nose on your face were not visible and the sound of your voice was not heard, then you could seem both pleasant and eloquent.

To her

Ordinarily, bodily absence is compensated for by spiritual communion, and in this respect each one acts according to his predominant inclinations. You send gifts, we respond with a thank-you message. But at the same time, since the gifts belong to the hidden virgins, we want to show that there is a certain mysterious meaning in these gifts themselves. Sackcloth is a symbol of prayer and fasting. Armchairs mean that a maiden should not take a single step out of the house. Wax candles remind that with lit lamps you should wait for the Coming of the Bridegroom. The chalices signify mortification of the flesh and the spirit, always ready for martyrdom, for the cup of the Lord gives me joy as sovereign (Psalm 22:5).

For uncovered women, a small fan for driving away small insects has the sublime significance that luxury must soon be abandoned, because the flies killed destroy the smell of incense. Here are the symbols for the maiden and for the matron. And for us your gifts have the opposite meaning, namely: it is characteristic of the idle to sit, the penitent to lie in sackcloth, and the drinker must have cups. From the fear of the night and because the spirit is always indignant at an evil conscience, it is allowed to light wax candles.