Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 9

But very often those who desire to undertake the pastoral mastery also propose to their mind certain good works; and although they aspire to this with an intention of self-exaltation, they nevertheless revolve in their minds that they will accomplish great things; and it happens that one intention lies suppressed in the depths, while the surface of thought shows the deviser's mind another. For often the mind itself lies to itself about itself, and feigns that it loves in a good work what it does not love, and that it does not love in the world's glory what it does love: which mind, desiring to rule, becomes for this fearful when it seeks, bold when it has attained. For while striving, it trembles lest it should not attain; but suddenly attaining, it deems this a right due to itself, unto which it has attained.

And when it has begun to enjoy the office of the sovereignty it has received in a worldly manner, it gladly forgets whatever it religiously pondered. Hence it is necessary that, when thought is led beyond its habitual course, the eye of the mind be at once recalled to past deeds; and let each weigh what he did as a subject, and he suddenly recognizes whether as a prelate he can do the good things he purposed, because he can by no means learn humility on the height who has not ceased to be proud while placed below. He knows not how to flee praise when it abounds, who has learned to pant after it when it was lacking. He can in no way conquer avarice, when he is stretched toward the sustaining of many, to whom his own possessions could not suffice even for himself alone.

From his past life, therefore, let each find himself out, lest in the appetite for the summit the image of thought delude him. And yet very often in the occupation of governance the very use of good work is lost, which was held in tranquillity, because in a calm sea even the unskilled steers a ship rightly; but in a time troubled by the waves of tempest, even the skilled sailor is thrown into confusion. For what is the power of the summit but a tempest of the mind? In which the ship of the heart is ever shaken by the storms of thoughts, driven ceaselessly hither and thither, so that by sudden excesses of speech and of deed it is dashed as against opposing rocks.

Amid these things, then, what is to be followed, what to be held, save that he who abounds in virtues should come to governance under compulsion, and he who is empty of virtues should not approach even under compulsion? If the former utterly resists, let him beware lest, binding the received money in a napkin, he be judged for its concealment (Matt. 25:18). For to bind the money in a napkin is to hide the gifts received under the idleness of a sluggish torpor. But on the contrary, when the latter desires governance, let him take heed lest, by the example of a depraved work, after the manner of the Pharisees, he become an obstacle to those tending toward the entrance of the kingdom: who, according to the Master's word (Matt. 23:13), neither enter themselves, nor permit others to enter.

For which it is also to be considered that, when the chosen prelate takes up the cause of the people, he approaches as a physician to a sick man. If therefore in his own work the passions still live, with what presumption does he hasten to heal the stricken, who himself carries a wound upon his face?