Demons, Passions, and Dreams

Having suddenly entered there, they seize the struggling soul. The evil demons draw their even more evil demons to their aid; and while opposing one another according to their dispositions, they agree only upon the destruction of the soul.

But let not the demon who snatches away the mind toward blasphemy against God and toward those unmentionable fantasies which I have not dared to hand over even by writing trouble us, nor let him cut off our readiness; for the Lord is a searcher of hearts and knows that, even while being in the world, we never raved with such madness. The aim of this demon is to make us cease from prayer, so that we may not stand before the Lord our God, nor dare to stretch out our hands, against whom we have thought such things.

For the passions in the soul are signaled either by some word brought forward beforehand, or by a movement of the body occurring, through which the enemies perceive whether we have their thoughts within us and are in travail, or whether, having rejected them, we are anxious for our salvation. For God who made us alone knows the mind, and he himself does not need signals to know the things hidden in the heart.

For those in the world, the demons wrestle more through external things, but for the monks, mostly through thoughts; for through external things they are lacking because of the desert. And as it is easier to sin by thought than by deed, so much more difficult is the war by thought than that composed of external things; for the mind is a movable thing and difficult to settle against lawless fantasies.

We have not been commanded to work continually and to keep watch and to fast, but it has been legislated for us to pray unceasingly; for those heal the passive part of the soul but need our body for the work, which through its own weakness is not sufficient for the labors; but prayer strengthens the mind and prepares it pure for the struggle, being by nature fitted to pray even apart from this body, and to fight the demons on behalf of all the powers of the soul. If any of the monks would wish to make trial of wild demons and to get a habit of their craft, let him guard his thoughts, and let him mark their intensifications, and the...

Seek from Christ the words concerning these things: the movements, the transmigrations, the times, which demons are doing these things, and which demon a person follows, and who follows whom. For they rage greatly at those pursuing the practical life more knowingly, wishing to shoot down in the moonless night those upright in heart.

You will find two very sharp demons almost running ahead of the movement of our mind: the demon of fornication and the one seizing us toward blasphemy against God; but the latter is short-lived, while the former, unless it moves the thoughts with passion, will not hinder us from the knowledge of God.

To separate body from soul belongs only to him who bound them together; but to separate soul from body belongs also to the one who longs for virtue. For our Fathers name withdrawal the practice of death and flight from the body.

Those who nourish the flesh badly and make provision for it unto desires, let them blame it; for those who have acquired the soul's dispassion through this body and apply it to the contemplation of beings know the grace of the Creator.

Regarding what happens in dreams: When the demons, fighting in the dream-phantasies against the desiring part, themselves show — but we run toward — gatherings of acquaintances and banquets of relatives and dances of women, and all other such things productive of pleasures, in this part we are sick and the passion is strong. When they again disturb the irascible part, forcing us to walk on precipitous paths, bringing armed men and venomous and flesh-eating beasts, while we are terrified by the paths and flee, pursued by the beasts and men, let us make provision for the irascible part, and calling upon Christ in vigils, let us use the aforementioned remedies.

The imageless natural movements of the body in sleep indicate to some extent that the soul is healthy; but fixation of images is a sign of sickness; and consider the indefinite faces a sign of the old passion, and the defined ones a symbol of the fresh wound.

The proofs of dispassion are, by day, through the thoughts, and by night...