Blessed is the soul that constantly learns in the Law of God! in him she can see the image and beauties of the New Man, and by them she can see and correct her shortcomings.

Blessed is the soul that has bought the village of repentance by mortifying itself in relation to sinful undertakings! In this village she will find the priceless treasure of salvation.

If you have acquired the village of repentance, give yourself into infantile weeping before God. Do not ask, if you can not ask, anything from God; surrender with self-denial to His will.

Understand, feel that you are a creature, and God is the Creator. Surrender unconsciously to the will of the Creator, bring Him only infantile weeping, bring Him a silent heart, ready to follow His will and be impressed by His will.

If, in your infancy, you cannot immerse yourself in prayerful silence and weeping before God, say a humble prayer before Him, a prayer for the forgiveness of sins and healing from sinful passions – these terrible moral ailments that are caused by voluntary sins repeated over a considerable period of time.

Blessed is the soul that has recognized itself as completely unworthy of God, that has condemned itself as accursed and sinful! it is on the path of salvation; there is no self-deception in it.

On the contrary, he who considers himself ready to receive grace, who considers himself worthy of God, expects and asks for His mysterious coming, says that he is ready to receive, hear and see the Lord, deceives himself, flatters himself, he has reached the high cliff of pride, from which he falls into the gloomy abyss of destruction. All those who are puffed up over God descend there, who dare shamelessly acknowledge themselves worthy of God, and out of this conceit and self-deception say to God: Say, O Lord, as Thy servant hears.

The young prophet Samuel heard the Lord calling upon him, and, not recognizing himself worthy of conversing with the Lord, he appeared before his aged teacher, asking him for instruction in his conduct. Samuel heard the same calling voice for the second time and again appeared before his mentor. The teacher understood that the voice of the caller was the voice of God; commanded the youth, when he heard such a calling, to answer the speaker: "Speak, O Lord, as Thy servant hears" (268).

The voluptuous and haughty dreamer, who is not summoned by anyone, who is intoxicated with vain opinion, who composes within himself voices and consolations, who flatters his haughty heart with them, who deceives himself and his credulous followers with them, also dares to speak. {p. 118} Son of the Eastern Church, the only holy and true Church! in your invisible podvig, be guided by the instructions of the holy Fathers of your Church: from every vision, from every voice outside and within you, before you are renewed by the manifest action of the Holy Spirit, they command you to turn away, as from a clear reason for self-deception [270].

Keep the mind formless, drive away all the dreams and opinions that approach it, with which the fall has replaced the truth. Clothed in repentance, stand with fear and reverence before the great God, Who is able to cleanse your sins and renew you with His Most Holy Spirit. The Spirit that has come will guide you into all truth.271

The feeling of weeping and repentance is the only thing that is needed by the soul that has come to the Lord with the intention of receiving from Him the forgiveness of one's sins. This is the good part! If you have chosen it, let it not be taken away from you! Do not exchange this treasure for empty, false, violent, imaginary grace-filled feelings, do not ruin yourself by flattery.

"If some of the Fathers," says St. Isaac the Syrian, "wrote about what is purity of the soul, what is its health, what is impassibility, what is vision, then they did not write so that we would seek them prematurely and with expectation. It is said in the Scriptures: The Kingdom of God will not come with observance. Those in whom expectation lives have acquired pride and fall... The search with the expectation of God's lofty gifts is rejected by the Church of God. This is not a sign of love for God, it is an ailment of the soul" [273].

All the saints recognized themselves as unworthy of God: by this they showed their dignity, which consists in humility [274].

All the self-deceived considered themselves worthy of God: by this they revealed the pride and demonic delusion that had overtaken their souls. Some of them received demons that appeared to them in the form of angels, and followed them; to others demons appeared in their own form and seemed to be defeated by their prayer, which led them into arrogance; others aroused their imagination, heated their blood, produced nervous movements in themselves, took this for grace-filled pleasure and fell into self-deception, into complete delusion, numbered in their spirit among the rejected spirits.