The Deception of Demons and the Vulnerability of the Soul

Because the one who prays must be wholly separated from the things that imprint the mind. And you will inquire whether, as it stands with bodies and their thoughts, so it stands also with incorporeals and their logoi — and whether the mind will be imprinted in one way when it sees a mind, and disposed in another way when it sees its logos. From this we know how spiritual knowledge separates the mind from the notions that imprint it, and presents it unimprinted to God — because the notion of God is not in the imprinting ones; for God is not a body, but is rather in the non-imprinting notions.

Again, of the contemplations that do not imprint the mind, some signify the essence of incorporeals, and others their logoi; and it is not as it happens with bodies that it happens also with incorporeals: for with bodies, some imprinted the mind and some did not imprint it — but here, neither kind of notion imprints the mind.

Chapter 25. When the demon of gluttony, having struggled much and often, is unable to corrupt the imprinted temperance, then he plunges the mind into the desire for the most extreme asceticism — from which he also brings into the midst the things concerning Daniel, that poor life and the seeds (Dan 1:12), and recalls certain other recluses who lived thus throughout, or who began thus — and he compels the monk to become an imitator of these: so that, pursuing immoderate temperance, he may fail even of the due measure, the body not sufficing because of its own weakness — truly blessing with the body and cursing with the heart. I do not think it right to obey him in this, nor to abstain from bread and oil and water. For the brothers have thoroughly tested this most excellent diet — and this not unto satiety, and once a day. For I marvel whether anyone, being sated with bread and water, will be able to receive the crown of dispassion.

But by dispassion I mean not the cessation of sin in act — for this is called temperance — but that which cuts off the passionate thoughts in the mind, which the holy Paul also named the spiritual circumcision of the hidden Jew (Rom 2:29). But if anyone is disheartened by what has been said, let him remember the vessel of election, the Apostle, who finished the course in hunger and thirst (2 Tim 4:7). And the adversary of the truth, the demon of acedia, also imitates this demon, suggesting the most extreme withdrawal to the enduring one, calling him to the zeal of John the Baptist and of Antony, the first-fruits of the recluses — so that, unable to bear the long and inhuman withdrawal, he may flee in shame, abandoning the place — and he himself may then boast and say, ‘I prevailed against him.’

Chapter 26. The unclean thoughts admit matter for increase, and are extended along with many things; for they cross great seas in the mind, and do not decline to travel long roads, because of the great heat of the passion. But those purified in any measure are narrower than these, being unable to be extended along with things because of the weakness of the passion — whence they are also moved more contrary to nature — and, according to the wise Solomon, wandering outside for a time, they gather stubble for the unlawful brick-making (Exod 5:12), so that they may be saved like a gazelle from snares and like a bird from the trap (Prov 6:5). For it is easier to cleanse an impure soul than to call back to health again one that has been purified and wounded again, the demon of sorrow not permitting it, but always presenting to the pupils, at the time of prayer, the image of sin.

Chapter 27. The demons do not know our hearts, as some men suppose; for He alone is the knower of hearts, who knows the mind of men and formed their hearts one by one. But from the uttered word and such movements of the body, they know most of the movements in the heart — which I had wished to declare clearly now, but I was held back by...