Wherefore, if in this life we strive to fulfill justice—whose proper work is to render to each his own—let us render ourselves to God, by whom we have been made; nor let us permit those things over which we are naturally set to lord it over us. Let reason rule over the vices, let the body be subject to the soul, the soul to God, and the whole perfection of man is fulfilled. And in this way we too, being made partakers of justice, render to each his own, if we make the lower things subject to the better, and carnal delights subject to the virtues;
and just as, by reasoning, we set living things above things lacking life, sentient things above living things, intellectual things above sentient things, immortal things above mortal things, so by living well let us prefer useful things to pleasurable, honorable things to useful, holy things to honorable, and perfect things to all things holy. Nevertheless, neither will the body be able to obey the spirit, nor the appetite to obey reason, unless God, who created the spirit itself and the body, being delighted with our thoughts, rest in us and, as a true husbandman in his own field, cast forth in our heart, so that whatever faith plants in it and devotion waters, He Himself may bring to the increase of consummated maturity;
and that in us, who voluntarily make ourselves subject to Him, He may subdue evil desires, so that from our very acts it may appear who is our indweller, and whose will is being done in us.