III. Последствия и плоды доброй христианской жизни и жизни противоположной ей

The distinctive feature of the Christian life is that it is a life of grace. Therefore, its fruits, or its effects on our being, include not only that which can produce virtue in us in general, but especially that which produces in us for the sake of our seeking goodness and labor; Therefore, Divine grace, as well as the non-Christian life opposite to it, is distinguished not only by what produces sin in a person, but also by what happens to him as a result of the fact that he loses or does not accept Divine grace. In order not to be confused in words, here both will be designated by the corresponding words: Christian - non-Christian, grace-filled - graceless, zealous for the Christian life - given over to sin and passions. 8. In what ways does the Word of God depict a true Christian and a non-Christian? If we collect all the passages of Scripture related to this, then in them we will find answers to the following questions: what is this and that life by its origin, by its actions, by its general spirit, by the society in which it develops, and by its destiny? A person outside of Christianity, or in sin, is descended by natural birth from the first fallen Adam, and in terms of his internal, moral properties is considered completely similar to him, i.e. those who are falling away from God. Being thus its true expression, it is also called old, as if existing as long as the human race, or not containing anything new, the same as everyone has been since ancient times. The Apostle writes that we “put on the likeness of the earthy” (1 Cor. 15:49) at birth, and if we do not “put off... this old man” (Eph. 4:22), then we will forever remain the same as the “early one” (1 Cor. 15:47). The actions of this man like Adam, like the old man, are predominantly sinful. He “has a diligent mind for evil from his youth” (Gen. 8:21), because he was “conceived in iniquities and born in sins” (Ps. 51:7), even “sold for sin” (Rom. 7:14). This sinful power, which entered into him through birth, rules in him with irresistibility, lives like a master (Rom. 7:20, 7:23); so that the whole being of man with all his members is nothing other than the “body of God”, and his powers are “instruments of unrighteousness” (Rom. 6:12-13). Therefore, “his eyes are full of fornication and continual sin” (2 Pet. 2:14); “his grave is open - his throat” (Rom. 3:13); he is “uncircumcised in heart and ears; ...his nose is flowing for evil and is quick to shed blood” (Acts 7:51; Isaiah 59:7). This foundation of inner life indicates some other origin in the spirit, namely from the devil. For “and first the devil sinned,” and then all people, who are sinners only from the devil, which is why they are called “his children” (1 John 3:8, 3:10), “seed of the serpent” (Gen. 3:15), or directly, “serpents, brood of vipers” (Matt. 3:7; Luke 3:7; Matthew 23:33), and “the devil is their father” (John 8:44). Due to this kinship with the devil, they are the true successors of his spirit, the spirit of fighting against God, enmity against God and opposition to Him, open and secret. Everything holy and Divine is generally unpleasant to all of them, and to some even disgusting. They say to God: get away from us, or that the Most High does not know God (Pharaoh); “They do not receive the Spirit of God” (John 14:17), God’s people are “hated” and persecuted (John 15:19). The entire totality of such people, the offspring of the devil, filled with the spirit of resistance to God, constitutes the dark “region of Satan” (Acts 26:18), in which he lives, has his own “depths” (Rev. 2:24), or throne, and as the “prince of this world” and “the god of the age” (2 Cor. 4:4; John 12:31) rules everything through “the rulers of the darkness of this world, the spirits of wickedness in high places” (Eph.6:12). This area is “a world lying in evil” (1 John 5:19), filled with “defilements” (2 Peter 2:20), wallowing “in lusts” (2 Peter 1:4), “blinded” (2 Cor. 4:4) and in blindness raging and persecuting all that is holy and all the saints and zealous for holiness; a world for which only love is “enmity against God.” and whose friend is the “enemy of God” (James 4:4). The spirit of blindness and stubborn violence is the direct “spirit of the world” or Satan (1 Cor. 2:12). The fate of these people is pitiful! She is the same with the world and Satan. Being “by nature children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3), they then, throughout their lives, “store up for themselves wrath on the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God” (Rom. 2:5); “their end is destruction” (Phil. 3:19), and they “shall observe dark darkness forever” (2 Pet. 2:9, 2:17; Jude 1:13). Not one of these will be saved except under the condition of conversion and repentance for the sake of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, by the action of grace-filled rebirth. “He who believes in the Lord will not be condemned, but he who does not believe is already condemned, because he does not believe in the name of the only begotten Son of God” (John 3:18). “Unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3). “Whoever believes in the Son will have eternal life, but whoever does not believe on the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” (John 3:36). In a person who has conceived a truly Christian life and succeeded in it, all these sides are completely opposite. Thus, “he is born from above” and in a completely new way, that is, with water and spirit (John 3:3), through communion with Christ, the only true source of truly human life, and through “putting on the image of this heavenly” Man, the new Adam, the new ancestor of true people (1 Cor. 15:49), which is why he is called “the new man”, who has put off the old (Eph. 4:24), the new creation in Christ Jesus (2 Cor. 5:1–7). Born “not of carnal lust, but of God..., he accepts the realm of being a child of God” (John 1:12–13) for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ, who sincerely partook of flesh and blood and makes believers “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:4), who, because “are led by His spirit, are sons” (Rom. 8:14), “those who have received the spirit of sonhood, by whom they cry: Abba, Father" (Rom. 8:15), - and which "submits to the spirit" of them, that they are sons (Rom. 8:16). In the feeling of this sonship, they enjoy God’s favor, are filled with love for God, and out of love are zealous for His glory. Everything Divine is, as it were, their own. By this origin, in them, both the spirit of life and the deeds themselves are holy and Divine. Even before the foundation of the world, they were determined to be holy and blameless in love (Eph.1:6) and after the fulfillment of the times, “created in Christ Jesus for good works...that they might walk in them” (Eph.2:10); and indeed “walk in newness of life”, in the likeness of the lordship of the risen Lord (Rom. 6:4), as “zealous for good works” (Titus 2:14). For just as the root is holy, so what is grafted into it is holy, “according to him who called... the Holy One” (1 Pet. 1:15). All these together constitute the chosen race, the royal priesthood, the holy tongue, the people of renewal - “proclaiming the virtues out of darkness of Him who called them into His wonderful light” (1 Pet. 2:9); all are “built into a spiritual church, a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5), “built into a habitation of God by the Spirit, ... into a holy church in the Lord” (Eph. 2:21, 2:22); “from Him the whole body is composed and put together decently, with all the touch of alms, according to the action in measure of each one part, the restoration of the body creates the creation of itself through love” (Eph. 4:16), and thus they make up the body of the Church, of which Christ is the head, “the fulfillment of Him who fulfills all things in all” (Eph. 1:23), and they are “His fruits from His flesh and from His bones” ( Eph.5:30 ; Col.2:19 ). Such people, all in their entirety and each in their parts, while still here under God’s special favor, are especially favored for high rewards in the future. “If God is for us,” cries the apostle, “who can be for us? Who will follow the chosen ones? God justifies” (Rom. 8:31, 8:33). This is here, but in the future they, like children, are “heirs: heirs to God, heirs to Christ.” The glory and greatness of this inheritance is so high that “every creature longs for it” (Rom. 8:17, 8:19). Just as each of them is a son, it is necessary that he is “and heir of God through Jesus Christ” (Gal. 4:7). Therefore, their “dwelling in heaven is, and they also look forward to the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humility, so that it may be conformed to the body of glory His” (Phil. 3:20-21) In appearance they are strangers and strangers, but in deed they are holy fellow-men and are here with God only for a time; and their homeland, where they are registered as citizens, is not here, but in heaven. How gloomy is the condition of the former and how joyful is the condition of the latter! Of course, there are different degrees on both sides; but more or less everything prescribed is characteristic of each degree. Others will be horrified at how gloomily sinners are depicted; what to do? such a gloomy face of theirs was not written by man, but by the untruthful Word of God. The further we go, the more this general outline of both sides will be justified. 9. The state of the constituent parts of human nature, its essential properties and powers in a true Christian and a sinner. The previously indicated opposition between people living according to the spirit of Christ, under the influence of God’s grace, and people who are alien to this spirit and rejecting grace, will be revealed even more clearly when we see what is the state of the general structure of all human nature and its main properties and what is the state of its strengths and abilities. The general structure of human nature is determined by the combination of its different forces and abilities and different parts of its composition. Thus, all the diversity of our internal conscious actions comes down to three initial principles, or forces: cognizing, desiring and feeling. Yet all these forces are concentrated and converge in our face, in our personality, in what speaks within us: I, which is the fusion and indivisible unity of all forces. They are centered in it and emanate from it as if from a focus. Further, the fact that knowledge, desires and feelings appear in us not only at different degrees, but even in opposite directions, forces, among other reasons, to admit in the composition of the human being three parts: spirit, soul and body, of which the character of the first is detachment from the sensory, the latter is immersion in it, and the middle is the compatibility of both. The goal and purpose of the former is communication with God and the spiritual world, the latter is mediation in communication with the sensory world; the middle must ascend from the sensible through the spirit to God and be inspired, and from God through the spirit bring down spirituality to the sensible. These parts in our composition do not lie one next to the other, but all, as well as abilities, converge in our person (I), are assigned to him and are constant means for him. The face of a person (I) is the unity of spirit, soul and body. One of the essential properties of a person is that he is gifted with consciousness, he can talk about himself - I, or have a person. This is the property by which a person, affirming his own existence and the existence of things outside himself, distinguishes them from himself, and himself from them, speaks about himself - I, and not they, and about those - they, and not I. It receives the name self-consciousness when it turns inward, to itself exclusively. In this turning into itself, it can again distinguish itself from its actions, or its being from what comes from it, rising, as it were, above both. At the same time, since alien, third-party forces can be applied to our being, then, conscious of his being, he can recognize himself not as himself, but as another person (among those possessed by demons). Reasonably free independence. Independence belongs to a being that is not a manifestation of another being, but is itself the source of all phenomena emanating from it. There are many such independent beings (substances). A distinctive property of human independence is that he not only performs actions, but also sees them, not only sees, but also rules them according to his own discretion and reason. This property is unique with reasonable freedom. Vitality. Man is a living being. There are dead forces, for example, electricity, magnetism. At every moment they are what they should be, they do not develop. A person in moments of origin is not what he should be, but develops, forms, grows, and succeeds. And the plant at first, in the seed, is only a future possible plant; becomes a real plant through the acceptance of alien elements and assimilation of them to itself. The growth of a person’s spiritual nature occurs in a different order. She matures with a variety of her own works: thoughts, feelings, desires and deeds, which, turning inward, are deposited, as it were, in her and constitute food for her or an element of growth. Therefore, the property of its life can always be determined by the property of its actions. The most special feature of life characteristic of man is immortality, which presupposes his endless perfectibility. Now the question is, what is the state of the relationship between the constituent parts of the human being and its abilities and essential properties before a person begins to live like a Christian and after he decides on this matter and becomes stronger in it. The natural relationship of the constituent parts of a person should be, according to the law of subordination of the smaller to the larger, the weaker to the stronger, as follows: the body should be subordinate to the soul, the soul to the spirit, and the spirit, by its nature, should be immersed in God. Man must dwell in God with all his being and consciousness. Moreover, the power of the spirit over the soul depends on the Divinity inherent in it, the power of the soul over the body - on the spirit possessing it. After falling away from God, confusion occurred and was bound to occur in the entire composition of man: the spirit, having moved away from God, lost its strength and submitted to the soul; the soul, not elevated by the spirit, submitted to the body. Man, with his whole being and consciousness, is mired in sensuality. Man, before accepting new life in the Lord Jesus Christ, is precisely in this state of degraded correlation of the constituent parts of his being, the likeness of which is represented by a telescope, when its constituent parts are pushed into one another. Thus, the Word of God, speaking about sinners who forget God, almost always calls them carnal, rarely - spiritual, and not only does not call them spiritual, it even considers them the opposite of such. Even about the first antediluvian world, God said: “My Spirit shall not dwell in these men, for they are flesh” (Gen. 6:3). It is clear that devotion to the flesh extinguishes the spirit and alienation from God. The prophet David says: “a man who is ignorant of honor is likened to foolish cattle and becomes like them” (Ps. 49:13), that is, he replaced the honor of God-likeness reflected in his spirit with bestiality, giving himself over to the flesh. The Apostle Paul says about the state of people before accepting grace in Christianity that then they were “in the flesh, therefore the passions of sin were at work in them” (Rom. 7:5), they lived “in the lusts of the flesh, doing the will of the flesh and of the mind” (Eph. 2:3), or, as the Apostle Peter says, “they followed the lusts of the flesh to become unclean” (2 Pet. 2:10). Apostle Jude He directly calls the unfaithful “bodily, having no spirit” (Jude 1:19). And in general, in the Word of God all evil is attributed to the flesh. (Gal.6:8). Spirituality in a person who has not received grace or has lost it, like a cloud, stands between the person’s face and God, cutting off communication between them. The one who is enslaved primarily by it, or “a spiritual man, does not receive even the Spirit of God” (1 Cor. 2:14). The predominance of the soul, as well as the predominance of the body, is the negation of life in the spirit. The Holy Apostle James, having enumerated the passions with which a person who does not accept the Spirit of God satisfies and acts, adds with great precision: “This wisdom... is not from God, but is earthly, spiritual, demonic” (James 3:15). The words: spiritual, earthly, not God’s are unambiguous... Where is the spirit of this kind of people? In them; but, being subordinate to the soul and body, he is exhausted and almost does not act in the way characteristic of him. His presence in them can be recognized, on the one hand, by the boundlessness of some spiritual and sensory aspirations, which are unusual for the soul and flesh by their nature, and on the other hand, by the often-occurring states of these people, in which they renounce the earth in defiance of the demands of the soul and flesh. In the latter case, the spirit attempts to gain its rights. Torment of conscience, fear of the Judge - God, constant melancholy - this is the essence of his effect on the soul, his groans, echoing in the spiritual consciousness. So in sensual and spiritual people the spirit smolders like a spark under the ashes. Arouse him, or rather, do not prevent him from being aroused by the “Word of God... passing through... even to the division of soul and spirit” (Heb. 4:12), and he will appear in all his power and authority. In a person who has clung to the Lord Jesus Christ and received His grace, all this has a different appearance. As is typical for a servant of Christ, he “crucified his flesh with its passions and lusts” (Gal. 5:24). From the first time, when he still intends to work for the Lord, he already determines himself to mortify himself, and then constantly “walks not in the flesh, but in the Spirit” (Rom. 8:1, 8:4), “putting to death the deeds of the flesh through the Spirit” (Rom. 8:13). He is, as it were, “not in the flesh, but in spirit, ... and should not be of the flesh, but should not live according to the flesh” (Rom. 8:9, 18:2). Having received the word, “passing... to the division of soul and spirit” (Heb. 4:12), he takes the soul into his power and sacrifices it to God (Matthew 10:39), begins to “get rid of... the lusts that make war on the soul” (1 Pet. 2:11), subject it to “the word that is able to save” (James 1:21), and thus transforms it all, edifying it in the spirit through “faith” or obedience to the truth" (1 Pet. 1:22; Jude 1:20), accustoms her to give... herself for good" (1 Pet. 4:19), and "her heart is circumcised in the Spirit" (Rom. 2:29), and everything pleasing to God, "even if she does, makes her do it from the heart," which she did not want before (Col. 3:23). Working in this way to God “with all my soul” and “from the soul” (Eph.6:6; Matt.22:37), he finds peace for his soul (Matthew 11:29), seeing “the end of faith... - the salvation of the soul” (1 Pet.1:9), which, “he had as a pot for his soul” (Heb.6:19). As a result of this, his spiritual life completely absorbs his carnal and spiritual life. He “glorifies God in his soul and body” (1 Cor. 6:20); with him everything is done in the spirit and by the spirit; he serves God and works in the spirit and “in renewal of the spirit” (Rom.1:9, 7:6; Phil.3:3), he is not lazy with diligence because he is “burning in the spirit” (Rom.12:11); “walks in the Spirit and does not commit the lusts of the flesh” (Gal.5:16); “sows in the spirit” (Gal.6:8); “filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18); He inclines in spirit to “hearing the truth” (1 Peter 1:22). Why is this so? A Christian “walks in the Spirit because he lives in the Spirit” (Gal. 5:25), because “the Spirit of God dwells in him” (Rom. 8:9; 1 Cor. 3:16); that he became a temple of the Holy Spirit living in him, “he was drunk on the Spirit” (1 Cor. 12:13; 1 Cor. 3:16; Eph. 2:22). This Spirit, having come through the word that separated soul and spirit, freed this last of the carnal bonds that constrained him spiritually, for “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor. 3:17), and thereby laid the foundation for a new, spiritually grace-filled life (Rom. 8:23). With such a “betrothal of the spirit” (2 Cor. 1:22), then “the hidden man of the heart matures in the incorruption of a meek and silent spirit” (1 Pet. 3:4). A Christian is strengthened more and more by the Spirit of God - “in the inner man”; Christ dwells by faith in his heart, rooted and confirmed in love (Eph. 3:16), for “be joined to the Lord; one spirit is with the Lord” (1 Cor. 6:17); why “he seeks the things on high, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God, the things above are wise, not the things on earth... and his life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3:1-3). From this it is clear that a true Christian and a non-Christian, or a false Christian, are in opposition according to the constituent parts of the human being. What is first for one is last for another. For this one the first thing is spirit, for this one it is suppressed; For one, the first thing is carnality; for another, it is denied, suppressed, crucified, and killed. The average soul obviously submits to the dominant one: for one, to the spirit, for the other, to the body. Therefore, the true relationship between the parts of the human being: “perfect... spirit, soul and body” (1 Thess. 5:23) - is found only in those who have become Christ’s. In them, therefore, is the truth of human being; Outside of Christianity, it is not truth, but lies - like the ghost of a person. This word would not seem cruel to anyone. It is a pity for some pagans, who stand so highly in opinion, and some who call themselves Christians, but who have rejected his power, who are also not without noticeable merits. But be patient. As we go on, the truth we are pursuing will become clearer and clearer, that truly human life can in fact only be visible in Christianity, in those who are united with Christ and accept His Spirit. Now about the general state and correlation of the forces operating within us. These forces, starting from our consciousness or person (I) and returning to it, must remain in mutual connection and agreement with each other, under the control of their imprecise beginning. Interpenetration and mutual assistance in dependence on the actor is their natural state. But in sinner man, who has fallen away from God and remains in this fall, as experience represents, these forces seem to have fallen away from his face, becoming somewhat independent of him and self-governing. What do, for example, our ordinary words mean: I would do it, but I don’t want to; or maybe it’s not so good, but I really want it; or the heart does not lie - go with your heart; or would believe, but the mind does not submit; the mind is the king in the head, where should I go with my mind? These and many other expressions mean that these forces are no longer in the power of man, but are either governed by themselves or are subject to the influence of an outside force. Having fallen away from the face of man, they have lost their mutual point of connection, and at the same time they have ceased to receive mutual help from each other and no longer have what one usually receives from others. So the mind is clouded, dreamy and distracted, because it is not restrained by the heart and is not governed by the will; the will is wayward and heartless because it does not listen to reason and does not look at the heart; the heart is uncontrollable, blind and blissful, because it does not want to follow the instructions of reason and is not sobered by willpower. But not only have these forces lost mutual assistance, they have taken a certain hostile direction against each other: one denies the other, as if absorbing it and devouring it. That is why the predominance of the heart is associated with weakness of the mind and inconstancy of the will, as if lack of character; the prevailing desire for knowledge leads to a weakening of activity or carelessness of the will and insensibility or coldness of the heart; the predominance of the will is always accompanied by a one-sided direction, stubborn, not listening to any arguments, where the soul does not listen to any convictions and is inaccessible to heart shocks. Thus, the inner world of a sinner is full of arbitrariness, disorder and destruction. This state is evidenced primarily by experience, but in the Word of God one can find many indications of this, although it depicts not so much spiritual forces and their state as the deeds of man - the product of all forces. In this regard, the following places are very remarkable. Thus, the Apostle Paul in the Epistle to the Romans in the 1st chapter depicts the great confusion and inner disorder that occurs in sinners and wicked people, resulting from falling away from God. “You understand,” he says, “they did not glorify God as God” (Rom. 1:21), that is, they despised God, fell away from Him, rejected Him. The natural consequence of this was that their hearts became blind, their wills became capricious, their minds became maddened by thoughts (desires), “their foolish heart was darkened” (Rom. 1:21) and “foolish” (Rom. 1:22). This natural consequence was followed by another, like execution from God... “God gave them over to the lusts of their hearts” (Rom. 1:24), that is, the waywardness of the heart, “the passion of dishonor” (Rom. 1:26), that is, the persistent depravity of the will, “an unskilled mind” (Rom. 1:28), that is, imprudence, dreams and abstractions (taken away by practical reason). The same apostle in the Epistle to the Ephesians (Eph. 4:17-20), calling pagans or unbelievers “alienated from the life of God,” here depicts the state of their souls, namely that they “walk in vanity of mind,” that is, in illusory, fantastic mental, ideal constructs, suffer from “petrification of the heart,” that is, heartlessness and insensibility; “they devoted themselves to student activity,” that is, to the violence and hobbies of the will. Man, who turned to God and in the Holy Church was united with the Lord Jesus Christ and renewed in Him, is portrayed in the Word of God in a completely opposite form. Thus, the Apostle Paul prays for the Ephesians (Eph. 3:16-19), may God give them “to be strengthened with power by His Spirit in the inner man,” that is, grant moral strength to the will through the union with the Holy Spirit, may God “dwell Christ by faith in their hearts,” that is, may they have a heartfelt union with Christ the Savior, “may they be able to understand,” that is, from this experience of tasting Christ the Lord, let them draw spiritual understanding and “may they be filled with all the fulfillment of God,” that is, from the totality of all this or from their union with God with all their strength, let the fullness of the internal perfections characteristic of Christians be formed or, under this condition, let their inner be a companion or a vessel that would be continuously filled with the tide of spiritual perfections from God... Apparently, as in Christ Jesus, the spirit a person becomes a strong or fastened vessel within himself. In the same Epistle (Eph. 4:22-24), the apostle describes the essence of Christianity, or the truth about Christ: “put aside for you, after the first life, the old man, which is corrupting in the lusts of deceitful desires” - this commands the renewal of the heart; “be renewed in the spirit of your mind” – here is a change of mind; “and put on the new, created according to God in righteousness and the likeness of truth” - here is a transformation of the will! This place indicates that in a Christian all the forces of his being are renewed together and simultaneously, and, moreover, all in one spirit and in one direction. In the Epistle to the Philippians, the apostle depicts that “the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,” is established in the heart along with the indwelling of the “God of peace” (Phil. 4:7, 4:9). In order not to disturb this world, he commands them: to turn all their thoughts, or in other words, the actions of all their abilities, to what is pleasing to God, namely: the mind - to the true, the will - to the righteous, the heart - to the kind. Whichever soul does this becomes capable of becoming the dwelling place of the God of the world. Look, moreover, the apostle first pointed out all these godly objects to the Philippians, and they understood them, accepted them and submitted to them, that is, they occupied themselves with them completely, to the best of their ability. The same combination of the activities of all forces in one, as the nature of Christian life, is indicated in the following places: Col. 1:9-11 - the apostle prays for the Colossians, “that they may be filled in understanding with the will of God in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, so that they may walk in a manner worthy of God in all ways pleasing” and so on; Col. 2:1-7 - the apostle prays for everyone, “that the hearts of all who dream of love and all the riches of understanding may be comforted in the knowledge of the mystery of God and the Father and Christ...” and so on; Col. 3:12–16 – “Put on your belly... let the peace of God dwell in your hearts... Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom” and so on; Eph.5:15-19 – “Be careful how you walk dangerously, not as if you were not wise, but as if you were wise... do not be foolish, but understand what is the will of God... be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourself in psalms and songs and spiritual songs” and so on. From them it is clear that in the soul of a true Christian there is absolutely no disorder that is inevitable in a person who is not part of the Spirit of Christ. All his abilities act together, are directed towards one thing, are subordinate to him as a person - which is why wholeness, completeness, and health are attributed to him. In the rules of holy ascetics on how to feed your soul with the truth of God through reverent reflection on it, you can see how by deed itself all forces must be combined in one. The elders of God usually command that you adhere to the following order: focus your attention on the subject you have chosen, for example, the presence of God, death, baptism, and consider it from different angles. At the same time, try to carry out every thought that is born to you into a feeling or introduce it into your heart; for example, from the thought of the proximity of death give rise to fear or repentance, from the thought of the vows of baptism - joy or sadness, etc. Conclude every reflection with the conclusion of rules for yourself in relation to your life and your circumstances, for example, God is everywhere, sees everything, therefore, me; I will not allow evil thoughts - I would rather die than sin; and in such and such a case I will do this and that, so as not to anger God, who sees me. In this way, obviously, all the forces of the spirit or the entire composition of a person’s inner life are consolidated; all life is constantly moving and renewing itself. There is another rule that shows how you should keep all the powers of the spirit in your hands, namely: in the morning, through prayer, sit down and figure out what you need to do throughout the day: where to be, what and with whom to meet - and in relation to this, determine in advance what to think where, what to say, how to hold your soul and body, etc. This means that a true Christian must control himself, be in charge of all the movements of his soul, and not allow them to happen by themselves, as if without his knowledge. He must himself be the master of everything that happens within him, the master of his powers. From everything that has been proposed, anyone can see that in a true Christian all the forces in their activity depend on himself, and do not move autocratically, that in this activity they act together everywhere, without fragmenting or separating one from the other, mutually helping themselves and mutually elevating the common life of the spirit, so that from this it is whole and strong, is a worthy vessel of the God who abides and rests in him. The sinner does not have this, but everything that is contrary is there, as we have seen. He himself does not see this and says about himself that he is safe and healthy, which is his trouble. But even those who have renounced their sins must be careful not to fall, at least temporarily, into such disintegration of forces as happens to those who are given over to sin... for this, too, is dangerous. Understanding this, everyone take heed. Following a change in the ratio of a person’s constituent parts and his main abilities, the essential properties of his face cannot but change, for this face is the center of both parts and abilities. Therefore, the state of these latter is directly reflected in the former and determines it, just as it is determined inversely by it. Among these properties, consciousness occupies the first place. It is a property that is initial for others, it is a direct property of a person and, as it were, an interpretation of it. In its production, it, positing the existence of itself and the existence of beings outside of beings, distinguishes itself from them and them from itself. The next condition for the perfection of consciousness or for its standing in its rank is the elevation of our face both above ourselves and above the outside world. Where this exaltation is absent, consciousness must be cloudy, vague, unconscious, or approach animal well-being. But about a person, before he perceives the good intention to live holyly, in a Christian way, about a person who works at sin and passions, it is undoubtedly known that he does not rise above the external world, but, on the contrary, is carried away by it, lives in it, as if dissolves with it, which is why he is called external, living outside himself, having gone beyond himself. He comes to his senses already in circulation. He considers the well-being of his external things to be the well-being of his own person and, on the contrary, their unwell-being as his misfortune. That is why there is an attempt to cause damage or actual damage to clothing, home, furniture, place, etc. shake him deeply, strike him to the very heart. He also does not rise above his inner world, but just like external things, he is carried away by the mechanism of his internal movements. They usually say: I was lost in thought, I was in a state of oblivion, I don’t remember what happened to me and around me... That is, at that time he was carried away by the movement of thoughts, or was beside himself with joy, heartbroken, lost his temper in his heart... That is, he gave himself over to the movements of his heart; or you won’t remember in your troubles and worries: this is needed, another is needed... That is, continuously drive forward and forward the diverse desires of the will. It is obvious that one given over to sin has no power over internal movements, but is, as it were, pressed into them, drawn by them, like a warrior cramped inside a regiment. And this is not just for one hour, but constantly. This is the law of his inner life: to lead as a follower. So, a sinner cannot have a clear consciousness. He doesn't exist. He walks as if in a fog, as if stunned, spinning as if in a whirlwind. Just as a half-asleep person weakly distinguishes objects from himself and is half-conscious only of himself, so is he devoted to passions. This phenomenon is very strange: in his pride he does not consider anyone higher than himself, and yet he is weakly aware of himself. A special turn of consciousness is self-consciousness, or self-knowledge. It is predominantly turned inward and distinguishes itself from its actions, again rising above both. This self-awareness is even weaker in a passionate person, devoid of grace. For for this you need to know your actions, know yourself and separate yourself from your actions. – There is no sufficient knowledge of one’s own actions. He does not know not only what was done yesterday, even today, or in a few hours. He is constantly in careful action, but does not know what to do, as if these actions did not take place on his behalf. This is because he is too carried away by the flow of his own actions and does not have time to look back at himself. – There is no knowledge of oneself, for this knowledge is composed of knowledge of one’s own actions and one’s relationship to everything else that exists. But there is neither the last nor the first in it. Therefore, he will not say what, in fact, he means, what awaits him, what condition he is in, what his main mood is, his main illness and how to help him. – Therefore, there is no distinction between oneself and one’s actions. This is the most dangerous of the deceptions of the sinner’s face. Everything that arises inside, he considers to be himself and stands for it as for himself, as for his life. That’s why he doesn’t want to deny himself anything. Meanwhile, you never know what comes into us from outside from Satan and the world, except for what arises from the sin living in us, which we also should not consider ourselves? For all these reasons and experiences, one must assume that the sinner does not know himself properly. This state of consciousness and self-awareness among sinners who have lost grace, and among infidels who have not accepted grace, is called sleep, which is why the apostle says to each of them: “Arise to sleep” (Eph. 5:14), also blindness, sitting in darkness, and even directly - darkness. Each of these is “blind, forgotten, forgotten” (2 Pet. 1:9). The sinner lives in self-forgetfulness, sees as if in darkness, and even more - walks like a blind man. Therefore, the Savior, as promised, came “to open the eyes of the blind, to bring from the chains that are bound and from the prison house those who sit in darkness...” (Is. 42:7). The sinner, as if in some kind of prison, is imprisoned in his inner darkness of self-ignorance and self-forgetfulness, from which he is driven out by the Savior. Recalling this good thing, the Apostle Paul says: “At times there was darkness, but now there is light in the Lord” (Eph. 5:8), that is, just as before, in you, due to the thickness of the darkness, nothing was visible, so now everything is visible, by the grace of the Lord. And indeed, the consciousness of one living gracefully in Christ is not at all the same as the consciousness of one working against sin and passions. They are as different as light and darkness. The first action of the grace-filled awakening of a sinner is to extract the soul from the mechanism of his internal and external life and to rise above its flow... Here, therefore, lies the first opportunity for true and complete consciousness. From this moment it begins, for the first glance of a person under the influence of grace is drawn to his essential relationships: first of all, its light falls on them. Then the one who is attentive to himself does not descend from this height of spirit. His eye is raised above everything that is his and above everything that comes into contact with him, and he is aware of and sees everything clearly, like some kind of guard. This property of one who has been blessed in the Word of God and in the instructions of ascetics is called vigilance and sobriety. The mechanism of internal and external life constantly strives to draw them into itself again, as if into a whirlwind or some kind of abyss; they keep to themselves. The tension of remaining within oneself is a feat of sobriety or wakefulness, the most important and initial one in spiritual life. As you perfect your sober vigilance, your consciousness rises above itself. Thus, Christians are commanded to “be sober and watchful, ... sober in prayers” or watchful in prayers (1 Pet. 5:8, 4:7) and, in general, to be fully awake: “But you, brethren, lie in darkness, lest the day come upon you like a thief. For you are all sons of light and sons of the day; unseen nights, below darkness. Moreover, let us not sleep like others, but stay awake and sober. Those who sleep, for they sleep in the night... Let us be sons of the day, let us be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and the helmet of the hope of salvation” (1 Thess. 5:4-8). Such guarding over oneself is commanded to Christians. Consequently, it is in them as a property. The same thing is depicted in the rules of holy ascetics, that there is new proof of the quality of a Christian, that he clearly sees himself, everything that is his own and everything around him. Thus, St. Philotheus writes: from the morning one must firmly keep God in memory and, constantly maintaining spiritual prayer to Jesus Christ, courageously and adamantly stand at the door of the heart and on this spiritual guard kill all the sinners of the earth (Philokalia, vol. 3, chapter 2). As a result of this, self-consciousness, as a further development or only a special turn of consciousness, is in a true Christian at the highest degree of perfection. So clearly he knows his actions, the actions of not only one day, but weeks and years, from the time of awakening he knows not only numerically, but by their strength and meaning, with motives, purity and impurity completely. Then he has a daily confession. Distinguishes itself from actions. All wise tactics in spiritual warfare are based on this, for the very first thing here is the consciousness of the enemy. Then every movement he makes is now assessed, where it comes from and what it means. In this regard, his gaze into himself is so deep that he not only sees generally wrong movements, but also distinguishes between them his own from those that are not his own. This is the distinction between things and thoughts known among holy ascetics. He knows what he means himself, what awaits him, what state he is in, what his relationship to others is... Of all these properties, that inner light is composed, which is attributed to true Christians and according to which their whole life is called walking in the light or doing a day. The second property of the human face is rationally free independence. The state of this property is already determined by the state of consciousness, for they serve as a mutual reflection of each other. Consequently, in its true form it occurs only among true Christians, and among those given over to sin one can only see its shadow. The independence inherent in man is characterized by rationality and freedom. Reasonableness requires that actions be arranged according to one’s own discretion, one’s own goals and one’s own reasonable direction. Its distinctive sign is that thought always precedes desire; on the contrary, where desire rules thought, there the absence or disadvantage of this property is not subject to any doubt. For a sinner, unguided and not strengthened by grace, this is the case. We have already seen that he is devoted to the mechanism of internal movements; and the Word of God says about him that he does only “the will of the flesh and the mind” (Eph. 2:3) and “walks in his own lusts” (2 Pet. 3:3), that is, as he wanted, so he does, whereas one should act as a person finds consistent with his own purpose. Freedom consists in having actions without any violence or attraction from the outside or from the inside, directly from the face. Its distinctive feature is independence and ease. If someone wanted to do something at his own discretion, and yet was forced to do otherwise, then this freedom would obviously be in bonds. This is how she is depicted by the Apostle Paul in a sinner, about whom he says in his own person: “I do this if I do not want, but if I hate this, I do it.” These bonds are imposed by sin living in us: “It is no longer I who do these things,” the apostle says there, “but sin that lives in me... For I see another law in my heart, warring against the law of my mind and taking me captive by the law of sin which is in my heart” (Rom. 7:14-23). The power of this sin is most experienced, felt and known from experience by those who have come to the consciousness of their dominant passion and are going to overcome it. He sees how he is led after “his own lust, enticed and deceived” like a slave (James 1:14). Therefore, such in the Word of God are called “slaves of sin” (Rom. 6:7-20), “sold under sin” (Rom. 7:14); “For if anyone is overcome, he also has work to do” (2 Pet. 2:19). Peace. A person who has not accepted the power of grace is dominated by the power and authority of passionate worldly customs and the spirit acting in the world, to the point that it cannot even occur to him to decide to do anything contrary. “No way: it’s customary.” This expresses the general consciousness of one’s slavery to the spirit of the world. This power is supported by some fear or fear for life. Because otherwise you need to leave the world, where to?! Therefore, in the Word of God they are called “enslaved under the elements of the world” (Gal. 4:3), “walking in the age of this world” (Eph. 2:2), “according to the tradition of men and according to the elements of the world” (Col. 2:8). The devil. He works through the world and the sin that lives in us; therefore, for the most part, his bonds are hidden. But if a repentant person looks around and reflects on his previous life, he will find that on his path to destruction the most cunning intelligence was observed, not his, nor, indeed, other people’s. Whose is it? Obviously, whose are murderers from time immemorial. Consequently, it must be said that every sinner, like all sinners, are persons at the disposal of the evil spirit, or are his slaves. This slavery is expressed in the sinner’s aversion from everything sacred and in his powerlessness to attract himself to anything like that. In the Word of God, sinners who are alien to the Spirit of Christ and his grace are directly called slaves of the devil, kept in his domain (Acts 26:18) and snares, and are “live snatched from him according to his own will” (2 Tim. 2:26). Thus, the second property, rationally free independence, is found in people who have not accepted the beneficial, restorative forces into themselves, in a bad and humiliated state. On the contrary, for those who have received these powers, it appears in its true meaning. As for rationality, it operates with all its strength among them already because they are extracted by the power of grace from their internal mechanism and elevated above their actions; especially because from the moment they turn to God and reunite with Him by grace, every action they take is carried out only in accordance with the consciousness of God’s will for him, every action - both internal and external. They “no longer live according to the lusts of men, but according to the will of God the rest of the time according to the flesh” (1 Peter 4:2). Life according to the will of God is, to the highest degree, rational life. Here, the will of God, through its mind, submissive to suggestions, rules all affairs and the entire course of life and leads a person to his final goal. Hence the structure, the wholeness of life. And only those whose lives are organized in the manner shown can be called free in the full sense. He alone is truly free whom Jesus Christ sets free (Gal.5:1); “there is only freedom where the Spirit of the Lord is” (2 Cor. 3:17). A Christian who abides in the Lord Jesus by the Divine power of the Spirit enjoys the joyful state of freedom (Rom. 8:2). Sin does not possess it (Rom. 6:7-12), he is taken away from the world (John 15:19) and is fearlessly ready to speak the truth “before the rulers” (Matthew 10:18), the devil and all he tramples the power of the enemy (Luke 10:19). Therefore, he stands like a solid pillar, not being shaken by any confluence of circumstances; on the contrary, he disposes of them at his own discretion or behaves among them, without changing his mood and his main intentions. Finally, the last property of human nature - life - in a sinner, according to the instructions of the Word of God, is completely lost. It hardly calls him anything other than dead, who only “has the name that he is alive, but in fact is dead” (Rev. 3:1). It produces this deadness from sin (Eph. 2:1-5; Col. 2:13), which “gives birth to death” (James 1:15), is the “thorn of death,” biting everyone to death (1 Cor. 15:56), and after which death follows as a “tribute” (Rom. 6:23). The deadening power of sin consists of: - In the alienation of man from God. The sinner is “alienated from the life of God” (Eph.4:18) and lives as if without God (Eph.2:12). Communion with God, Divine and spiritual things constitute the natural food of our spirit, or, as it were, its element. Having fallen away from there, he is now forced to be not in his natural place and die, as if without food and without air. - In a breakdown of strength and abilities. Human life consists of a harmonious combination of the forces of his nature and their interaction according to their nature. If this legal relationship between them is taken away, as we have seen, then there is no life and activity in man, characteristic of man. In appearance he is a man, but in his inner mood he is not a true man. Just as an instrument that is out of tune by appearance is one or the other, but by its sounds one does not know which, so one should judge a person whose inner being is disturbed by sin. In this regard, it must be said that what is truly human or what is characteristic of man has died or been lost in him. Just as a dead person does not see, does not hear, does not move, so a sinner does not see, does not hear and does not move like a human being: he does works, but “dead” (Heb. 6:1, 9:14). - In the taking away and, as it were, killing of mental and physical strength. Sin is called poison: and indeed, it is poison. Just as rust eats iron, so it eats soul and body. It robs the mind of liveliness, intelligence, and speed; the will has strength and stamina; the heart has taste and tact. The toxicity of sin for the body is obvious to everyone. In this regard, a person who labors under sin is the same as someone who is dying or languishing before death. How palpably this is expressed in the continuous joyless state of a sinner! There is joy in life, but there is no joy in the wicked. According to God's definition, every person has a law: you will surely die (Gen. 3:19). Everyone who enters this world enters the realm of death and through temporary death must fall into the second, eternal death. This is the natural order of life for man who has fallen and remains in the fall. Change in him is brought about only by Divine grace. Having come, she gives birth in man to true life in Christ Jesus. He who has received grace into himself places in his corruption an incorruptible seed, which grows into the tree of life. Whoever is worthy of this is taken from the jaws of death, and whoever is not, “remains in death” (1 John 3:14); “He who does not believe... will not see the life” (John 3:36). Thus, the believer, united with Christ, receives new life (Rom. 11:15) and therefore “passes from death to life” (1 John 3:14), from the dead becomes alive (Rom. 6:13). This depends on the fact that in this case a person is united with God, the source of life. He already “has the Son in himself, and with him the life” (1 John 5:12) and has received the life-giving Spirit (Rom. 8:10); “his life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3:3); for “he lives not with anyone, but Christ lives in him” (Gal. 2:20). The power of new birth and life begins to destroy sin in a person, and at the same time destroy the consequences of sin - the disorder of the forces and parts of his being, or restore in him true life, which multiplies, grows in him, comes from strength to strength and fills him with joy. And here, having been worthy to receive the spirit of life, he will live forever, for the second death will not have power over him. This new life is now hidden in those who sincerely work for the Lord and is even mostly hidden from them. It matures, as it were, under the cover of decay, building and composing there a new man or a man of eternity. But then, like a fruit from a tree or a tree from a seed, from it this life will appear in the whole world. She perceives her power gradually, like leaven gradually filling the dough, for she gradually removes our parts from death one after another... Having filled everything, she leaves the corruptible to decay, and betrays or transfers the living into the realm of life, into the Divine world. This is a controversial subject, although it is all about words. For those who do not want to distinguish between spirit and soul, it can be suggested that by the word spirit they understand the higher side of our incorporeal side, and by the word soul they mean its lower actions and directions. Anthony the Great (see Philokalia, vol. 1, saying 166) says that there are creatures gifted only with life (plants), there are others gifted with life and soul (animals), and there are also those gifted with life, soul and mind. This is a man. What is meant here by the word mind, we express by the word spirit. Isaac the Syrian also has three parts, as does Ephraim the Syrian, and many of the saints. the fathers allowed spirit, soul and body... In the Word of God three parts are understood: “your spirit and soul are perfect, and your body is blameless at the coming of the Lord... May Jesus Christ be preserved.” (1 Thess. 5:23). Elsewhere, the spirit and soul in us are sharply distinguished when it is said that “the Word of God, living and active, ... comes to the dividing of soul and spirit” (Heb. 4:12). 10. The state of cognitive, desirable, feeling forces in a Christian and a sinner Now I turn to a detailed indication of the effect of a truly Christian life, grace-filled, and the effect of sin on each, in particular, human strength and ability. Here it will be clearer how what part of us is affected by sin, how the harmful dew blooms, and how then in the converted sinner God’s grace again revives it and reveals it in its true form. It was previously mentioned that there are three powers in us, and it was shown in what relation they are in the sinner and the righteous. But that was said in general - now more about the same thing. And look. It is not surprising to notice that within us there are three types of actions: thoughts, ideas, considerations; desires, inclinations, enterprises and feelings of every kind. But just as in the composition of our being one cannot help but distinguish three parts: body, soul and spirit, then those three types of actions appear in us at three degrees, or in three states, namely: animal, mental and spiritual. Now placing a special force at the basis of each of these circles of actions, we must recognize the nine-fold hierarchy of forces that in our inner world are qualitative and act under the cover of the body - this gross material-elemental composition, just as in nature the nine-fold hierarchy of material forces operates under the gross composition of our planet visible to us, and how in the invisible, spiritual world there are nine ranks of angels. 1) State of cognitive forces We will describe each of these nine powers under the influence of sin and the influence of grace. Let's start with those forces that are engaged in knowing things or showing people the truth. Between these forces, at the lowest level, stands observation with imagination and memory, with which materials are collected; then comes the intellect, by which these materials are transformed into knowledge; above all of them rises the mind, which cognizes the invisible and spiritual and inner aspects of things already known by reason. a) The state of the highest faculty of cognition or reason The subject of the knowledge of reason is the Supreme Being - God, with His infinite perfections, and the Divine eternal order of things, reflected both in the moral and religious structure of the spiritual world, and in creation and industry, or in the structure of creatures and the course of incidents and phenomena of nature and humanity. All these are hidden, mysterious objects, and the mind in its true form is a contemplator of the mysteries of the Divine, spirit and the material world. The possibility of such knowledge is based on the fact that our spirit itself is from the spiritual world and has some predisposition towards it, some of its aspirations and demands. Thus, experience shows that we have a need for the Divine, the moral order of industry, a better eternal life, etc. and there is a common belief in all these things. Such demands, beliefs, aspirations are usually called ideas, or an indefinite contemplation of something better in existence and perfection than what we know around us. These ideas, as much as they assure that our spirit is from this world, also show that it is not deprived of the opportunity to cognize it. It is well to remember that from the fact that we have ideas, we can only conclude about the possibility of knowing and contemplating the invisible, spiritual world, and not about its reality, just as from the presence of visual power in our eye we can only see the possibility of seeing things, and vision itself is subject to its own conditions. Whoever considers ideas to be actual intuition makes a big mistake. Ideas only prove that there are invisible things, just as the demand for food proves that there is food; but what those objects are, what they are, where they are - this still needs to be found out. Moreover, this indication of the existence of the invisible world is not direct, but mediocre, inferential. It is convincing only because of its strong desire, and not in itself, so if you diminish or destroy the desire of those invisible things, the very conviction of their existence will be diminished or destroyed. In such a state, spiritual knowledge, or reason, is found in every person who comes into this world. It appears in the form of demands from the invisible world, accompanied by conviction of its real existence, but without real and true knowledge about it. Reason is only a visual force of the spiritual world. It is obvious that for the further development or multiplication of this knowledge it is necessary to exercise this power of spiritual vision with real vision, just as the visual power of the eye is exercised and diversified by the experience of your vision in real vision. And for this it is necessary to enter into direct communication and contact with that world, just as the sensory eye enters into such communication with sensory things, that is, it is necessary to be in communion with God and the spiritual world. Without this communication, spiritual knowledge will forever remain in our spirit in the form of a presumptive requirement and will never rise to the level of clear, real, definitely convincing knowledge, just as a blind man with his eyes closed, whose power of vision is, however, intact, will only know that, of course, there are luminous and illuminated things, but he will definitely not be able to know them until his eyes are opened. The reason for this is the fall into sin and remaining in this fall. Together with the falling away from God, our spirit has fallen away from everything Divine and spiritual, does not enter into direct communication with God, does not see Him, does not contemplate, it has become blind to Him. It is necessary to return him to his previous state so that he can know Him clearly and definitely... If now this condition can only be fulfilled when a person accepts the restorative powers in Christianity, it is obvious that outside of true Christianity, which is actively assimilated, the mind is blind, does not know spiritual things, but only demands knowledge of them, has ideas about them, but vague, unclear, conjectural. Meanwhile, the objects of the invisible world, by their height and especially by their kinship with our spirit, cannot but occupy a person, cannot but arouse in him the desire to unravel them. This is always the case. Is it a rare, lulled soul who doesn’t want to know what this world is? Many people are working on it. What is the fruit of this labor? If one way to true knowledge of it is spiritual experience, from the actual tasting of spiritual things, possible only for a person restored by grace, it is obvious that self-made knowledge of it should not promise much. To be convinced of this, you only have to look at the methods that the mind, left to itself, uses for this, outside the true path. Of these, two are known. One consists in a conclusive ascent from the lower to the higher, the other hopes for the clarification of ideas by their mechanical transition from one force to another within us. In both, the ambiguity and incompleteness of spiritual knowledge is recognized and the question is resolved: how to understand and supplement this knowledge? By the first we mean this: to conclude from actions to the cause of everything - God, attributing to Him to the highest degree what can be characteristic of Him, and denying what cannot be characteristic of Him. There is no doubt that in this way a lot can be explained about the secret realm of ideas; but, besides the fact that such knowledge does not concern the entire volume of invisible things, but only one Divinity, although this is the main subject, it is also not direct, not immediate, therefore, it also remains conjectural. Therefore, it does not satisfy in any way, but always makes us expect new confirmations and evidence, as Plato very strongly expressed it. With him, you can only say: it seems so and so, but when someone says: maybe it’s not so, the mind doesn’t always find something to answer. This is all the more necessary because here experience leads to many unsolvable questions regarding, for example, Divine Providence or the too great influence of a substance on the spirit. How many people are there who, looking at the secret, incomprehensible connection of events, say: is there anyone who sets all this in motion, is there freedom, what is spirit? and so on. And this forces the mind, if not to remain in decisive doubt, then often with sadness to experience strong attacks from this enemy of truth. Here is the fruit of the method shown. And there is no need to say that if it is used incorrectly, it can lead to dangerous misconceptions, as has already happened in reality. Why did Epicurus remove God from the rule of the world? Because he judged Him according to his mood, because he loved to indulge in sweet inaction and peace. Why did Origen come to the idea that eternal torment is incompatible with the goodness of God? Because he judged Him by his kindness and gentle disposition. Likewise, others can and do imagine God only as a formidable and indiscriminate despot. And what about eternal life - how is it not portrayed? And about angels, and about methods of salvation, and about other things, how are they not judged? Everyone judges by himself, by his own knowledge and his own mood. And, obviously, in all this they distort the truth and turn it into a lie, because they go the wrong way to the knowledge of those things. There is almost nothing to say about the second method. It resembles a fabulous march of ideas in our inner world. According to it, ideas first fall into consciousness, from here into the heart, then they are accepted by fantasy, then finally by reason, which builds concepts, judgments and conclusions from them. It is obvious that this image is completely alien to experience, is fictitious and cannot be recognized by anyone. However, it very clearly shows that the mind itself does not know how to cognize the invisible world, has lost the true way to do this and comes up with this and that, and in this confusion it falls into the ridiculous and absurd; for if an object is not completely visible, you need to go towards it, and not spin around or take different positions yourself, remaining at the same distance from it. What is unclear in ourselves is incomprehensible, how can it become clear in ourselves? Granted, however, it is possible to force out some thoughts from oneself during this turning or friction of ideas; It’s still not clear where they can acquire credibility and power of persuasion. If the ideas themselves are only conjectural, then what about everything developed from them? So, in a mind that is at a distance from God and His grace, the knowledge of the spiritual world, which it obtains from the development of ideas of supposed dignity and in ways that are incorrect and unreliable, - The very assumption is perplexing to everyone, excluding no one. What and how? - such a mind will always pose these questions to itself and will never solve them on its own; It is always almost incorrect, because it is not taken from the nature of those things, but is formed from other, opposite things; And of course it can only concern a small part of everything - the most obvious, what is the existence of God and his properties. As for the laws of the Divine world government, the moral and religious order of the spiritual world, and especially the sacrament of salvation of the human race, this is either not at all in thought, or appears in the form of the most dreamy assumptions. It should be noted that even when the mind is given access to revelation, even then, although absurd opinions are corrected, what is missing is replenished, but conjecture still remains, to whatever extent. And then he knows these objects as speculation, and until he tastes them in action, he does not know how they really are. Therefore, very many truths, and among them the truths of salvation, are contained in the mind as something alien, placed there from the outside, but not dissolved with the very nature of the mind. That is why further, even after their complete study, their meaning is still interrupted by doubts and perplexities, indecision, ready to waver, like a stem from the light breath of the wind. This is what St. says about such knowledge. Macarius of Egypt: “I consider those who proclaim spiritual teaching without having tasted or experienced it to be like a man walking on a hot summer afternoon through an empty and waterless country; then, from a strong and burning thirst, he imagines in his mind that there is a cool spring near him, with sweet and clear water, and as if he drinks from it to his fill without any obstacle; or a person who has not tasted honey at all, but tries to explain to others what its sweetness is. Such are truly those who, without having comprehended by deed and their own inquiry what belongs to perfection, sanctification and dispassion, want to instruct others in this. For if God grants them at least a little sense of what they are talking about, they will, of course, learn that the truth and deeds do not resemble their story, but are very much different from it” (Sermon on the Elevation of the Mind, ch. 18). “Those who have within themselves the Divine wealth of the Spirit, if they impart spiritual teaching to someone, then, as if bringing out their own treasure, they give it to them. On the contrary, those who do not have this wealth inside the heart, from which flow good Divine thoughts, secrets and extraordinary utterances of verbs, grasping only a few flowers from both Testaments of Scripture, wear them on the end of their tongues, or, having been listeners of spiritual men, are vain about their teaching, offering it as if their own, appropriating someone else’s acquisition for themselves” (The Word on Love, Chapter 5). “Even those who practice virtue are adherent to the Word of God, but have not freed themselves from passions - and they are like people walking at night by the light of the stars, which are the commandments of God; for since they have not yet been completely freed from darkness, it is impossible for them to see everything well...” They do well to turn to it (the prophetic word) as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day begins to dawn and the morning star shines in our hearts” (2 Pet. 1:19). But many do not differ in any way from those who walk in the middle of the night completely without light and who do not take advantage of even a small radiance, which is the Word of God, which can shine on their souls, and therefore (almost) look like the blind. These are the essence of those who are completely bound by the chains of matter and everyday ties...” (Sermon on Freedom of the Mind, Chapter 27). This is the state of mind or awareness of the invisible world among people who are not blessed! In what form it is in those who have received the Spirit of grace can be judged by contrast, that is, it must be clear, living, experimental, undoubtedly, true, because it is borrowed from the experimental tasting of the very things invisible; it must be complete: to know God, and His properties, and the laws of the world, and the mysteries of redemption, especially the latter, because through redemption the mind is introduced into that world. Again I refer those who want to St. Macarius. Let them see how he portrays this spiritual knowledge. Briefly, his thoughts can be summarized as follows: the eye of the mind was closed by the fall, and man was plunged into darkness. The grace of the Holy Spirit, through rebirth, bringing a person into living communion with the Lord Jesus Christ and God, introduces him into the spiritual world and shows him all the hidden secrets of God, which he learns here experimentally, truly, fully. “When a person transgressed the commandment of God and lost his heavenly life, then he became bound, as it were, by two chains: firstly, by a chain of everyday worries... secondly, by an invisible chain; for the soul is bound by the spirits of evil by certain bonds of darkness, so that it can neither love God, nor believe in Him, nor engage in prayer as it desires” (Sk. about the holy mind, ch. 29). “When Christ, this first and essential grace, sent the gift of the Spirit to the Divine disciples, then from then on Divine power, overshadowing all believers and dwelling in their souls, heals sinful passions and frees them from darkness and death; but until that time the soul was wounded, kept under guard and enveloped in sinful darkness. And even now the soul, which has not yet been worthy to have communion with the Lord and the power of the Holy Spirit, which would actively overshadow it with all its strength and fullness, is in darkness, but for those on whom the grace of the Spirit of God has descended and in whom it has settled in the depths of the mind, the Lord is, as it were, a soul: “he who is united with the Lord,” says the apostle, “becomes one spirit with the Lord” (1 Cor. 6:17 ; Word on freedom of mind, ch. 12). “We all, that is, born of the Spirit by perfect faith, “behold with open face the glory of God... When anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away...” (2 Cor. 3:16-17). The apostle clearly showed by this that a veil of darkness lay on the soul, which, since the time of Adam’s crime, had free entry into humanity; now, through the illumination of the Spirit, it is removed from believers and truly worthy souls. For this very reason was the coming of Jesus Christ, for it pleased God that true believers should come to this measure of holiness” (A Word on Freedom of Mind, chapter 22). Grace, having come through the cleansing of the inner man and mind, removes the veil of Satan, which was placed on people after the crime, and cleanses the soul from all filth and unclean thoughts, desiring that, returning to its own nature, it would see with open and clear eyes the glory of the true light. Such people are still admired in that century and see the beauty and wonders there. Just as the bodily eye, undamaged and healthy, freely looks at the radiance of the sun, so these, through an enlightened and purified mind, see everywhere the impregnable radiance of the Lord” (Sermon on the Exaltation of the Mind, Chapter 13). “Just as it is impossible without eyes, tongue, ears and legs to look, speak, hear, walk, so it is equally impossible without God and the action communicated by Him to participate in Divine mysteries, to comprehend Divine wisdom, or to become rich in spirit. For the Greek sages practiced the sciences and zealously engaged in word discussions, but the servants of God, even if they were unfamiliar with the sciences, are improved by Divine knowledge and the grace of God” (Sermon on the Exaltation of the Mind, Chapter 15). “Blessed indeed and happy in life and supernatural pleasure are those who, through a fiery love for a virtuous life, have received an experienced and tangible knowledge of the heavenly mysteries of the Spirit and have their home in heaven! They are superior to all people, and here is clear evidence of this: which of the strong, or wise, or intelligent, walking on earth, happened to ascend to heaven, perform spiritual deeds there and see the beauties of the Spirit? Meanwhile, apparently, a beggar, extremely poor and humiliated, not at all known even to his neighbors, falling on his face before the Lord, under the guidance of the Spirit ascends to heaven and in the firm faith of his soul enjoys miracles there, acts there, has a home there; as the Divine Apostle says: “our life is in heaven” (Phil. 3:20); and also: “What the eye has not seen, what the ear has not heard, and what has not entered into the heart of man, God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Cor. 2:9) and then adds: “But God has revealed it to us... by His Spirit” (1 Cor. 2:10)” (Sk. about love, ch. 17). “He who has grace rooted in the soul and dissolved with it... has known through experience another wealth, another honor and another glory, and feeds the soul with incorruptible joy, and feels and fully enjoys it through communication with the Spirit” (Word on Love, chapter 22). “As much as there is a difference between an intelligent shepherd and dumb beasts, so much does such a person differ in meaning, knowledge and reasoning from other people, for he has a different spirit and a different mind, a different meaning and a different wisdom than the wisdom of this world” (The Word on Love, ch. 23; manifold revelations of grace, - ibid., ch. 6). “The Divine Apostle Paul accurately and clearly showed that the perfect sacrament of Christ is experienced by the believing soul through the action of God, which is the radiance of heavenly light in revelation and the power of the Spirit, so that no one would think that the illumination of the Spirit occurs only through the knowledge of the mind, and through ignorance and negligence would not be in danger of deviating from the perfect sacrament of grace” (Homily on the Freedom of the Mind, ch. 21). “This radiance of the Spirit is not only illumination of the mind and grace-filled enlightenment, as said above, but is a constant and unceasing radiance of essential light in souls” (Sermon on the Freedom of the Mind, Chapter 22). “And the light that shone on the path of blessed Paul, through which he was caught up to the third heaven and became a hearer of ineffable mysteries, was not any enlightenment of thoughts and mind, but the essential radiance of the power of the good Spirit in the soul, whose extreme brilliance blinded the bodily eyes, unable to bear it, and by which all knowledge is revealed and God truly appears to the soul worthy and loving of Him” (Word on free mind, ch. 23). “Every soul, for its effort and faith, through the action and assurance of grace, has been worthy to be completely clothed in Christ and united with the heavenly light of the incorruptible image, and now already participates in the essential knowledge of the heavenly mysteries” (Sermon on the Freedom of the Mind, ch. 24). “Just as at first... the definition of death for a crime... was revealed in the soul by the fact that the mental feelings, having been deprived of heavenly and spiritual pleasure, extinguished in it and became as if dead, so now, through the cross and death of the Savior, God, reconciled with humanity to the true believing soul, still in the body, again allows the enjoyment of heavenly light and sacraments and again enlightens the mental feelings with the Divine light of grace" (Sermon on the Freedom of the Mind, Ch. 26). “When you happen to hear about the communication of the groom with the bride, about choirs of singers, about holidays, then do not imagine anything material and earthly. This is taken only as an example of condescension, since those things are ineffable, spiritual and inviolable for carnal eyes, but fit the concept only of a holy and faithful soul. The communication of the Holy Spirit, heavenly treasures, choirs of singers and the triumphs of holy angels are understandable only to a person who has known this through personal experience, and someone who has not experienced it cannot even imagine it. So, listen to this with reverence, until you, for your faith, are worthy to achieve such benefits. And then you will see with the eyes of your soul and experience what blessings Christian souls can share in here too!” (Speech about love, chapter 13). St. writes about this at length. Isaac the Syrian in the 55th Word. Everything that Saint Macarius the Great says is only the most extensive explanation, or justification by one’s own experience, of what the Word of God says about the mind of man, who for the sake of a holy life has become a vessel of grace. He receives “the anointing that teaches all things” (1 John 2:27), “the illumination of the mind of the glory of God” (2 Cor. 4:6), “light” (1 John 2:9–10), “wisdom and revelation” of spiritual things (Eph. 1:17), “spiritual knowledge” (Col. 1:9–10), “the mind of Christ” (1 Cor. 2:16). On the contrary, in a person who works through passions, the Word of God sees darkness (Eph.5:11-18), “darkness” (Eph.5:8-10), ignorance of God and Christ (Eph.2:12; Acts 3:13); true wisdom is hidden from him (2 Cor. 4:4), and he “cannot understand” (1 Cor. 2:14). From this it is clear that reason in its true form and in all its beauty appears only in the spirit of true Christians. For those who are entangled in sins or do not care about purity of heart, but accept the Word of God, theoretical knowledge can come close to the knowledge of true reason; but this knowledge does not lie in their mind, but as if on the mind, like dust, ready to immediately fly off, that is, it has not dissolved with its being, which is why its inherent presupposition is not destroyed in it, and it is often attacked by doubt, sometimes very deep, especially from the side where the secrets of redemption and the conditions for its assimilation lie... Whoever, having purified himself, has dissolved with the truths, is not afraid of such attacks (see bl. Jerome Greek, “Christ. Reader,” 1821). As for the mind that does not know the Divine Scripture, incomplete knowledge of spiritual things, infidelity, and most importantly, conjecture are inevitable in it... And this is even with a good direction, that is, when a person, without indulging in vicious passions, zealously deals with such things and well-intentionedly wants to recognize them. Since he is inattentive to the most important truths, does not try to explain and learn them, and is devoted to passions, then we can say that he does not have rational knowledge at all, although he pretends to have it. A few thoughts hastily grasped, memorized, accepted by ear - that’s all for some. For the most part, the qualities are ignorance or doubt and contempt. Such people truly have desolation in the inner sanctuary of our spirit, darkness and darkness are thick and impenetrable. Here are some thoughts about the mind! You need to confirm in yourself the idea that here we are talking about knowledge of the invisible world and spiritual things. Knowledge of the visible world and sensory things is a completely different matter. There are other abilities and other techniques at work here. The two should not be mixed. From this comes great evil... It is not difficult to recognize what is visible. Another, having learned some of this, says: Well, I know! - and stops there, not caring about the main thing. And others value him highly and consider him a teacher in everything, but he keeps telling them about extraneous things, but he himself doesn’t know the main thing. The ability directed to the knowledge of the visible, created, and finite is called reason. However, it’s not about the name, but about the characteristic features. Special attention is paid to them. This reason seems to retain all its strength - whether someone is a Christian or a non-Christian, virtuous or vicious, especially if you look at it as it is among educated people who devote themselves to the thorough study of some sciences. By mixing reason with reason, they acquire great value for themselves, and others consider them great heads. They themselves are always ready to be content with what they know, while others would be glad to even reach what they have achieved; Moreover, another, comparing their multiplicity of knowledge, usually high-toned, expressed in intricately woven words, with the simple words of the saints of God, may perhaps come to the conclusion that the latter lack much compared to the former. It is all the more necessary to explain what reason should be and what it can be in different kinds of people. It is necessary to establish the concept of what is required of the intellect, or what it must put on the stage of knowledge. His activity is directly based on the imagination and memory, which, through the senses, whether by observation or reading and hearing, collect materials for him, providing information about everything that appears and exists outside of us and in us as everything exists and appears in spatio-temporal relations. All this material or all the information collected in this way, which has not yet been qualified, must be transformed by reason into clear concepts and build knowledge from them through thinking. The mode of activity of the intellect consists in the methods it uses in acquiring the knowledge at its disposal, namely: the intellect constructs inductions, composes concepts, judgments and conclusions, or, in other words, makes generalizations, defines and develops thought. But we don’t need to dwell on this (formal) side of it. The content of rational knowledge (the material side of reason) is more significant. It consists of those aspects to which reason turns in the knowledge of objects, namely: the properties and composition of things, their causal relationships, that is, cause and effect, means and purpose, matter and form. That it is, indeed, involuntarily, as it were, of two types, depends on the fact that in reality, in reality, we see only beings and phenomena, what is and what happens. In the first case, there is nothing more to recognize as the properties and composition of a thing, just as in the second, there is nothing more to recognize except causal relationships: why? For what? How? The basis for reason in both cases should be observation and experience, and the tool should be generalization and guidance. How it works is clearer in the example. Let, for example, he want to recognize a person in his properties and composition. To do this, he needs to observe a person for a long time, his actions and everything that happens in him. These observations will make up materials from the collection of which generalizations and guidance begin. Thus, dividing them into groups, the mind finds that within a person there are ideas, desires and feelings; Peering further into each of these circles of actions, he sees that they are all of three types: sensual, mental and spiritual. Taking all this back to the beginning, he will have to assume that there are three powers and three parts in man. The starting point for both is the human face. It turns out that a person in his composition is a combination of three forces and three parts, which, mutually interpenetrating, converge in one inseparable person. At the same time, through distraction, he will obtain clear ideas about the properties of each force and each part, and finally, what the very face of a person is like or what are the inalienable attributes of each human personality. This, as already indicated, is consciousness, freedom and life. From this example it is clear that in relation to the knowledge of beings, reason inseparably ascends to the representation of composition and properties: from actions it goes to the forces that produce them, from forces - to their mutual correlation and structure. Knowledge of phenomena and incidents is built on the basis of knowledge of the properties and composition of beings and follows from them. Accurate knowledge of beings, forces and the laws of their activity serves as the beginning in explaining phenomena and incidents. Here the basis is the same: observation and experience, but the subject is different and the parties are different. More liveliness and intelligence are required from the mind here. Noticing the cause, guessing the goal, weighing the consequence - this is a more abstract activity, more giving scope for freedom of thought, but it is much more erroneous and less reliable. The task for reason is to determine the cause of the phenomenon, the means and law by which it occurred, the related circumstances of the phenomenon, its goals and consequences, the manner of its origin. The end of the work for the understanding is when it can confidently and satisfactorily answer the question: how could this or that phenomenon arise from a known cause, according to a known law, with certain aids and among known circumstances? The first definition is preparing oneself to answer the last question, that is, as if only material, the last is knowledge itself. It follows from this that knowledge in relation to phenomena is the contemplation of their origin with the consciousness of the inevitability and necessity of this particular course, and not another of their courses, judging by the reason and related circumstances. So, for example, whoever will analyze the fall of Russia under the yoke of the Mongols will prepare himself for an accurate knowledge of it when he finds out who and how it was done, in what way, when, what contributed to it, what were the consequences of it; and then he will definitely recognize it when he is able to explain how it was born from the state of Russia and the properties of the Mongols and developed according to temporary circumstances, in the form in which it happened. Judging by these obligatory activities, the following good qualities, or virtues, which can be called virtues of reason, can be demanded from reason or from a person in relation to reason: work - it must accurately and vigilantly find out everything that is, whether from one’s own observation or from the observations of others. Anyone who develops any part of history knows how necessary it is and how difficult it is. Integrity. Reluctance to work or half-work can force one to rush into something and then, during further work, allow omissions - hence there are big mistakes in generalizations and suggestions. When approaching them, a person must consciously say to himself: I did everything that I could and that was necessary, and based on everything I draw conclusions. Careful diligence. Everything he does must be based on facts; Meanwhile, either their number or details may elude; It may happen that the unimportant will be more obvious, and most importantly, more secretive; Many things can be insignificant, but one thing can be important. An omission or mistake in one’s gaze can give the whole course of the mind’s work a perverse turn. From this there always arises the need to trust others, to consult with them, to obey their judgment when necessary, and in general, as much as possible, to attach less apodictic immutability to one’s guidance and to humbly acknowledge one’s small foresight. Opposite to these good qualities, the vices regarding rational activity are arrogance and dictatorship, imprudence, dishonesty and superficial frivolity. After such remarks, we turn to the definition of the state of mind of people alienated from God, and of people clinging to Him. For the former, it always appears in almost the wrong direction. If you look at people, you will find an infinite variety of them in this regard. However, judging by the sides that are indicated above, they can be distributed either according to the types of rational activity, or according to its virtues. Some predominantly remain with the methods that the mind uses in cognition of things (during its formal activity), and either want to build everything from their arbitrary abstract concepts, following the example of the scholastics, or are ready to affirm “yes” or “no” with equal force about the same thing, following the example of the empty-talking sophists. Scholasticism and sophistry are inevitable for reason given the poverty of materials, for it is an active force that requires activity; therefore, when there is nothing to direct his forces to, he revolves with them within himself and, as only forms remain in him, he walks along them, as if from one room to another. Here, with an uncorrupted disposition, he will be a pitiful scholastic, and with a spoiled one, he will be an empty and evil sophist. Others are more inclined to acquire knowledge itself (material activity) and collect a wealth of information, moreover, about various kinds of objects. They usually have a huge memory, and their head is an endless store filled with all sorts of things. Work of this kind is necessary in the knowledge of things, but it should not stop there alone: ​​it alone is in some way even a negation of reason. Here, apparently, the materials are not revised, not cleaned, but remain as they are, and either burden only the head, or are used indiscriminately. Intelligence and independence of mind are suppressed. Still others stand in the middle between them and do not lean towards either side. These are primarily criminals of the rational virtues, that is, they do not want to work and use their heads and have little conscientiousness, but only somehow; Meanwhile, out of great arrogance, they want to pass judgment on everything, acting without any prudence. These are flighty, self-praising, know-it-alls. There are, however, in this middle, devoted to almost complete euthanization, who are content with what they somehow hear or see, but they themselves do not want to lift, so to speak, either their legs or their mental arms. The shortcomings shown obviously expose the unhealthy state of mind, as well as the painful state of the entire soul in which it is such. Judging by them, we can safely conclude that the mind of people who are not right-minded has moved out of its place, does not know its path, has lost its tact, taste and its characteristic techniques when considering cognizable things. That such shortcomings are not the consequences of any physical disorder of people, but the fruit of their moral damage, this is obvious from their very nature; and experience assures us that as soon as someone falls into any of the wrong directions shown, he will not get rid of it and will not think about it until he changes his whole life; at least for the most part this is true. For people who turn to God and accept restorative forces, one might say, first of all, these strings fall away. They are no longer lazy to work with their heads, they are not cunning with their thoughts, but they look at deeds and things as they are. That is why part of their subsequent struggle is a struggle with their reason, namely in those of its wrong actions, which were mentioned. Moreover, how do they approach a person? Through the sin of neglect and carelessness about oneself and one’s condition. Consequently, in general we can say that whoever has them is in sin and either has not yet been granted grace or has lost it. But who doesn't have them? Even those who spend their lives in scientific pursuits are not free from them to a greater or lesser extent. Some exceptions to this are represented by strong intellects (physicists, mathematicians, historians). Many of them have precise, complex, and sophisticated knowledge, while they apparently stand outside the kingdom of grace both in their way of thinking and in their lives. They seem to hold the true middle ground in rational activity, that is, between its formal and material activity, and fulfill as much as possible the virtues of reason. Some visible successes persuade them to shun all help from above and encourage them to believe that they are safe and sound. But such self-confidence now exposes the unsoundness of their minds, for a healthy person always tangibly sees and points out his weaknesses and his infirmity. If now this arrogance is common to almost all strong minds, then all of them must be considered damaged. Moreover, we just don’t know the entire production of their armchair works, we don’t have the leisure to more carefully review their published works, otherwise we could always find there, as we do, considerable common sins with others, for example: stretching through abstract concepts in order to complement the gaps of experiments and maintain their theory, contentment with a small number of facts, since they, in our thoughts, tend to see in everything a reflection of their own thoughts with the humiliation of others, exaltation themselves above all other people of the same class and in general the desire to quickly complete their work, regardless of whether everything that is required for the perfection and fidelity of their thoughts has been completed or not; that is, they either fall into sophistry and scholasticism, or forget about the virtues of reason. After this, without fear of these strong heads, we can leave in force the previous conclusion that the mind of people who are wrong, given over to sin and passions, is generally upset to the point that, despite all the efforts of the many learned, it pays tribute to its weakness and does not have the strength to free itself from it. Everyone will be even more clearly convinced of this when he takes the trouble to delve into our ordinary concepts, judgments and mentalities, at least for one day - in the circle in which he lives. Almost everywhere here in concepts: vagueness, confusion, lack of accountability, ignorance of their value and subordination, therefore - confusion and discord; in judgments: rashness and haste, sensuality, variability, lack of evaluation, ignorance, talkativeness and buffoonery, superficiality; in conclusions: short-sightedness and short-sightedness, lack of authority or conjecture, prejudices and sophisms. Also: unbelief, gullibility, stubbornness, cunning and resourcefulness, especially emptiness in words and thoughts show that the mind for the most part does not use its rights and sits, as if in some kind of ambush, without action or acts, but wrongly. Not a single person is free from this, those who do wrong and are not privy to the restorative grace of God. Suppose, however, that someone’s reason maintains the true mean between the previously shown extremes, carefully observing the duties that lie upon it, and successfully moves towards the intended goal - will it, despite all this, achieve everything that is needed? It should be noted that the understanding obtains some knowledge on its own, while it must obtain other knowledge in connection with reason. There are knowledges that reason alone can sometimes comprehend, but which reason alone, apart from reason, cannot comprehend in any way. To see what this is, let us imagine that every created thing is an exclusive object of reason? In addition to the factual, in every thing there is also a conceivable, intelligible and contemplated inner being, imprinted and expressed by its factual side. Each creature is a composition of forces and elements, harmoniously combined with each other according to a certain pattern or thought, which they must imprint on themselves. This thought, however, is not in a thing as a visible part, standing among other parts, but is something invisible, hidden under the visible, penetrating and animating it - therefore more thinkable and contemplated than tangible. With all this, however, it is not something dreamed of, but is a thought that is actually inherent there. Just as in a painting the visible outline, the combination of parts, the variety of poses, colors and shades are inspired by some thought that the picture expresses and is imbued with, a thought that is inherent in the picture, however, does not form a separate part along with others, so every thing has its own innermost thought, its life-giving essence; for the world, both in its entire composition and in its smallest parts, is an infinitely wise artistic work of God. The thought of God about the world and its parts (the ideal world), contained from eternity in the mind of God, during the transition to time or when carried out by the infinite will of God, was invested with forces and elements, through which it appeared in reality, just as now the hidden plans of the Divine world government are carried out by a diverse combination of various phenomena of nature and humanity. So, in the world we always see the visible, manifested side, underneath it are the forces and elements, and underneath them we must also see the thought of God hidden there. This thought is the goal of our efforts; comprehending it is knowledge itself, and everything else is preparatory information. Just as someone looking at a picture, when he describes the colors, lists the members, describes their position and combination, still will not say anything about the picture, because he does not explain the main thing - what the picture expresses; so is the one who, considering creatures, phenomena and incidents in the world, when he learns how everything is, namely: in things - the composition of forces and elements, in events - the combination of causes and their production with effects - still does not know either things or phenomena until he says what thought of God is hidden in both, what they express, what their eternal meaning is. How a thing and an incident appear in reality, the senses let us know about this; the forces and elements hidden under the appearance are recognized by the mind through generalization and guidance; the question is, how can we recognize the thought they are expressing? The answer is simple: how is an artist’s thought recognized? Through the aesthetic sense - an ability identical to the ability that participated in the production of the picture. The same is true in relation to created things: it is possible to know their innermost, placed in them from the Divine mind, only through the power of the Divine property. This power in us is spirit, and in spirit is reason. So, when reason, through its labor, has reached the end, that is, to the node of forces and elements, has found out everything factual, it must take reason, as it were, by the hand and say to it: go, look, what else is there. But it is obvious that this mind must be a sound mind, a seeing one, and not a blind and corrupt one, just as only a sound feeling understands the ideas of artistic works. A sound, sighted mind, as we have seen, is found only in those who, having turned from sin to God, have received grace, while among those who work in sin and do not have grace, it is distorted and removed from the truth. Consequently, knowledge of the hidden in things is possible only for the first, remaining inaccessible for the second. That the desire to unravel the hidden side of things is truly inherent in our spirit, every thinker provides evidence of this. The physicist wants to unravel the meaning of beings, forces, elements; historian - determine the significance of incidents; psychologist - the meaning of each ability and the person himself. Obviously, no one is content with knowing the factual side, but everyone wants to penetrate deeper under it. This is usually called philosophy, or ideality in knowledge. Despite all the naturalness, however, of such aspiration, its universality and seemingly uncontrollable nature, it does not escape the necessary condition: to have a mind not only developed by revelation, but also enlightened by grace. Without this, its constructions will be pure dreams, proof of this is the entire history of philosophy; for when the mind is perverted, and the slightest part of what is true in it, by the force of conviction, is nothing more than an assumption, then the future, created by the mind on what is in it, will all necessarily have the same property: untrue and dreamy. The necessary consequence of this must be that the factual itself is distorted, and reason sometimes gives itself the will to affirm as law, force and element what does not exist in reality (today’s geologists). It becomes foggy, and then a tactile darkness falls over the entire field of knowledge. It’s not at all the same with a person who is pure in life, enlightened from above. He will not keep silent about the hidden when he feels it, but he will never pass off as contemplation of the truth that which is not such. He does not acquire omniscience, but it is stated that if knowledge of the hidden in things and phenomena is available to a person, then only to a person blessed; for that region is actually the region of the Divine mind, where the mental treasures of God the King lie. Let no one hope to invade there by force or without permission. True philosophy is God-given wisdom. Having dissolved with the mind of God, the mind of man, clinging to God, can be introduced by Him into the mysteries of being and phenomena, for between the revelations that the saint assimilates. Macarius the Great, by the grace of God, an enlightened spirit, why not understand the mysteries of creation and providence, when to him, undoubtedly, belongs the knowledge of the mysteries of redemption, the most secret and mysterious. Not in vain at St. Isaac the Syrian calls this spiritual mind the feeling of mysteries, the feeling of the hidden, the highest spiritual contemplation (see his words about the three degrees of mind). St. Maximus the Confessor teaches: “Just as the basis of radii, rectilinearly emerging from one center, appears completely inseparable in the center itself, so the knowledge of a being united with God will be simple and singular about all the prototypes of created things contained in Him” (“Christian Reader,” 1835, 1 part). This also includes Solomon’s testimony that God gave him “the knowledge of things that are not false” and that because “the things that are hidden and manifest, he knew...” (Wis. 7:17, 7:21). If anyone now wants to seek true ideas, or ideal knowledge of things and philosophy, let him look for them primarily in the Word of God, then in the writings of the holy fathers, then in our liturgical books. For example, when it is said that the Lord came to lead all things, that true Christians are kings and priests, that the linguistic descent of the Holy Spirit is the beginning and foundation of the unification of all nations separated by the confusion of languages ​​during the pandemonium, that our life is a pilgrimage, almsgiving is the sending of treasure to heaven, etc. - all this represents the true ideas of contemplation or feeling of the hidden. It is especially remarkable that those enlightened by grace often contemplate the meaning of things without special help from reason, that is, their reason does not yet know the actual structure of things or knows it partially, but they already contemplate their meaning; whereas, on the contrary, a man who is learned, but has forgotten God, broadly depicts real life and, it seems, exhausts everything in it to the smallest detail, yet does not see and does not know how to say the hidden meaning in it. If we now value both of them according to their true weight, then, obviously, the first must stand incomparably higher than the latter, for he lacks something that can be done without, which is only a means and which can easily be replenished by anyone; the other lacks the main, essential thing, which he himself cannot fill. Therefore, when encountering, for example, some reservations in the writings of our fathers, against current experimental knowledge, we should not immediately humiliate them in our thoughts before some well-versed physicist. In his time, the real life of things was comprehended in this way, in ours - he admits this - later, perhaps, they will portray it in another way; but the true meaning indicated first will remain the same forever and ever. Reading, for example, the conversations of Basil the Great on the six-day period, you will find two or three words there that real physicists contradict; but on the other hand, he almost constantly points out the secrets of the most precious things, which no physics can provide. After this, it goes without saying that the most perfect knowledge is represented by the one who combines the grace-filled enlightenment of the mind with a multi-knowing understanding. But taken separately, the former is much higher and more valuable than the latter. Such perfection of knowledge, however, in the spirit of grace, is the fruit of reason rather than reason, or, better, a consequence of the replenishment of reason with reason. What happens in the mind itself? The destruction of his imperfections, not only voluntary, but often involuntary, and his healing. Grace, having come, does not bring with it much information, but it teaches a person to pay attention and, as it were, obliges him to accurately consider things; she does not interpret to him the laws of thinking, but infuses him with a love of truth, which does not allow him to deviate from the right paths and rely too much on abstractions, therefore, puts him in the true middle and confirms him in it, which he cannot do on his own. Because of this, often a person who has not devoted himself to science becomes reasonable and sane, and through long life experiences finally acquires true wisdom, sufficient for more than just his share. A scientific person develops a special method of research, a special instinct for the discovery of truth and the true path to it, and this, with the help of rational virtues, which now, together with others, return to the heart, such as: with work and the ability to work, conscientiousness, prudence, humble trust, especially with God's blessing - imparts special properties to his mental labors: success, strength, fruitfulness. Such soundness of rational activity is obvious to everyone both in his ordinary behavior and in his relationships: in concepts that are distinguished, in addition to clarity, definiteness and distinctness, by a certain depth of heart; in pleasures characterized by fidelity, discretion, tactility, distinctiveness; in reasoning characterized by strength, foresight, unity and harmony. Yet, taken together, such properties give him the title of a person of sound mind or sound mind. It remains to add two remarks about the influence of bad will on reason and what happens when reason prevails over reason. While the mind of the wrongdoer, on its own, having lost its point of support, barks here and there, the will little by little pours its corruption into it. Here the elements of the world spoken by the apostle are compiled: carnal wisdom, demonic wisdom - that is, various convictions are formed to please the depraved will, such as, for example, that life will not end soon, not soon and there is no end in sight, that there is only life in prosperity and happiness on earth, that one must maintain one’s name and honor no matter what, one must have strong hands to which one can turn in case of need, one must be able to take advantage of circumstances and so on. All of them are contained in the mind without investigation, therefore they are prejudices; They are rarely expressed in words, but are stored deep in the heart and are known only to the person himself, coming to his consciousness in the form of secret thoughts, in his free time from troubles, and moreover, serving as a hidden spring that sets his affairs in motion. But if even without such damage on the part of the will reason remained, then much harm to the highest truths would be expected from its predominance over reason. This harm is all the more significant and seemingly inevitable when the will acts on it perniciously. It is known that the primary subject of the understanding is what is and happens in us and outside of us, and more - the latter; the support of his activity is experience: he begins with it, and not before. Hence, the main property of rational knowledge is tactility. Reason begins with experience, which it transforms according to methods similar to itself. Whoever stands at the level of reason and primarily acts with it, little by little develops an inclination, which then turns into a permanent rule, and a mental disposition - only recognize as true what can be tactually convinced and what can be believed in a rational way. At the same time, little by little, the spiritual world must inevitably be obscured, and knowledge about it must lose significance. This knowledge is left to a person, as we have seen, presumably, while the understanding represents everything as tactilely obvious and forms the need for tactility. This of course should cast a shadow of doubt on the spiritual world and spiritual things. Therefore, rational scientists in general can be called wavering people of little faith in relation to the invisible and spiritual. Join this unkind heart with passions, which has strong reason to desire that there be no other world and no other laws and hopes than the visible ones - then a person will not escape either doubt, or, even more, final unbelief. That the understanding, through its activity, composes general principles that are always applicable to business, this forms in it a strong trust in its understanding, a tendency to comprehend and to place its comprehension above all else. That is why he does not give due honor to revelation, and if he accepts it, he wants to interpret it only according to his own understanding, or even recognizes as true only what is clearly understood in it. This disease is rationalism, which scientists rarely have in their hearts, although it is not revealed in words. Other bad mental inclinations from reason are imposed on the soul for the sake of the objects to which his labors are directed. Outside of us, where we live more by feelings, everything is material, everything is a composition of the elements, and all changes and phenomena there are nothing more than a consequence of action and reaction, hostility and peace between the elements. Whoever is constantly engaged in this alone, the thought is born, and then the beginning, that there is nothing but matter. This unhappy mood or disease of the mind, called materialism, most often befalls those who study chemistry and medicine. With it is always connected, as a disastrous consequence, the rejection of the immortality of the soul, God and the moral law of God. Further, the mechanism noticed everywhere in visible nature leads to the idea that everything is stamped with an inevitable necessity, which no hand can avert. Everything is subordinate to her, and she herself is subordinate to no one. This is fatalism, which the wise Stoics did not escape. The naturalness observed everywhere, or the fact that every thing achieves its goal by its own forces and everything that comes from it is the fruit of its activity, leads to the position that there is no flow into this world of other external higher forces, not even the power of God, to help and assist those who are in it. Therefore, there are no miracles, and there is no grace. A person can walk on his own and will get where he needs to go. This is naturalism. The mind gives birth to so many dangerous creatures when it is given too much power, given more than it should. Their existence is justified by experience. Here it is only explained how naturally they are formed in a person whose mind is not enlightened by spiritual knowledge, in whom, therefore, this knowledge remains conjectural, and has not been transformed into tactile through spiritual experience. And we can also add that if they naturally develop in a person who is not rightful, then they must be presupposed in every such thing, if not all, then some, if not in development, then in the seed. And indeed, a rare person is not tempted by them, a rare person sometimes does not like them, and a rare person, at least in his own way, does not come to the conclusion: and maybe so. What light, after such darkness, shines in a person’s soul after he turns to God and receives grace! And firstly, all those who came from the corrupted will of the beginning immediately disappear, like darkness in a consecrated room or evil spirits from a consecrated place. Convictions opposite to them are formed in the heart, in the very process of conversion of the penitent. When impurity is expelled from the heart, then all its consequences are destroyed. He feels that life is short and he must rush into things, that he must embitter himself, that he must expect everything from God and not from himself, that he should not look at people’s opinions, and so on. Secondly, the harmful consequences of the predominance of reason are either completely prevented if conversion forestalls its development, or they are corrected here, and reason turns into a service force, submissive to reason. Since mental evil inclinations mainly arise from the tangibility of the knowledge of the mind and the conjecture of the ideas of the mind, left to itself, then with the destruction of its foundation, what is built on it also falls by itself. This foundation is destroyed in the one who repents, turns to God and cleaves to Him; for from now on he begins to tangibly cognize spiritual things, as he previously cognized sensual things. This equality of tactility destroys the hesitation of doubt, and the fact that the most precious truths are offered in the enlightened mind inclines consciousness to its side and conquers it. When in this way, through this new path, a person learns many most hidden things, which he had not previously comprehended, but which he now clearly contemplates, then he naturally ceases to trust solely to his own understanding. Such a person will no longer think that there is no spirit when he lives in the spirit, or that everything is subordinated to inevitable necessity, when he feels the power that has come to him from above, from without, or that he can do everything himself, when only by the power received from God he has escaped the evil that oppressed him (the example of Augustine). At the same time, a new life begins for the mind, and a new direction in science begins in man, if it has existed or is being pursued. Just as before the mind acted as a master, so now it begins to act as a subordinate, on behalf of the spiritual mind. Therefore, just as before, when looking at things, a person saw, could not and did not want to see, anything except the things themselves, so now he sees in everything the clearest reflection of the spiritual world, both in things and in phenomena. The whole world is truly permeated with the spiritual, the Divine (Rom. 1:20); but before this was not noticed, but now it is clearly contemplated. Then everything that exists and everything that appears turns into a vast and continuous teaching or an intelligent book, as Anthony the Great said. Now you can be convinced that this is really the case by reading some holy father. Each of them constantly offers vision of the spiritual in the sensory or through the sensory. The Right Reverend Tikhon compiled four books from this under the title “Spiritual Treasure Collected from the World.” It follows from this that the integrity, completeness and truth of knowledge actually belong to people restored by grace and living in God. For others it is both incomplete and untrue. How true is the thought of the blessed one. Augustine, which he so persistently proved that only life leads to the church of wisdom, and not vice versa! False directions of reason are usually spoken of in logics, and various means for avoiding them are proposed there. It is obvious what the price of these instructions is. Whatever you say, logic will do nothing without internal change. To whom it is said: look, believe the revelation, he, perhaps, will say the same to himself, but in his heart and in reality he will believe only in himself; or he will say that God’s help is needed, but he will rely only on himself. It is impossible to educate our soul in its abilities, as it should, without subordinating it to healing and restorative grace-filled means. Briefly: for one who stands outside these means, the knowledge is as follows - the spiritual world and its things are hidden as if by a cloud and fog; he believes them little or does not think about them; His rational knowledge is directed only to the visible, the real, the tangible; the hidden in things is not seen; causes are known only to those that are immediate and present; the intentions of Providence elude attention... Therefore, all its knowledge is superficial: incomplete in composition, but in the general spirit it is corrupted, perverted by some wrong mental mood. c) The state of lower cognitive abilities The lower abilities of cognition are: internal and external observation, imagination and memory. They all act almost jointly, and what one does is immediately accepted by the other. What the eye saw, the image of it is now removed by the imagination and stored in memory, like in some archive. Everything external and internal that is subject to our knowledge and concerns our consciousness is certainly the subject of these abilities. They constitute, as it were, the entrance to our inner church, and therefore in the field of knowledge they have a significant value, and not only in the field of knowledge, but also in all human activity. From the initial activity of imagination and memory, when they only perceive objects, become aware of them, let the soul know about them, the subsequent activity must be distinguished, by which what was previously acquired is used for business according to the needs of the soul. Images compiled by the imagination and stored in memory are used either in the same form in which they were acquired, or in a modified form. The first activity is called memory, or reproductive imagination, the second - fantasy. In both, imagination and memory act together, only each in its own special way. In memory, the imagination gives an image, and memory testifies that it is the same one that was known before. Therefore, memory reproduces only the former and brings before the eyes of consciousness what was hidden in the depths of memory. The reason for recollection is, for the most part, the connection of present images and objects with past ones (otherwise, the association of ideas). Different types of this connection gave rise to different laws of memory, such as the laws of coexistence and continuation, similarity and opposition, whole and parts, cause and action, means and ends, matter and form. Another, no less significant part of memories comes from movements of the will and heart. A need or passion, being aroused, involuntarily brings thoughts to objects with which it can be satisfied, as if attracting attention to them, just as vice versa - the image of a passionate object disturbs passion. This reason for remembering plays a significant role in life, and the first one plays a significant role in knowledge. But there are also hidden reasons for remembering: not knowing why and how images of previous objects come, both in a calm state, and without any connection with present activities. They must be produced either from evil spirits, if the images are bad, or from good spirits - the Guardian Angel, if they are good; This also happens from the sympathy of souls. Fantasy creates completely new images, although from the same material and mostly based on ready-made or already known models. It should distinguish between good activity - efficient and disorderly - unauthorized movements. In the first, she creates images for the concepts of the mind, helps with thinking, vividly imagining a thought in some image, imagines what is read, and heard, and the like... in general, she acts in the interests of knowledge. In the second, he dreams or indulges in an unauthorized movement, in which he constructs various unprecedented stories to please his heart, which is not ruled almost by consciousness, but on the contrary, it captivates our attention and occupies the whole person. The kingdom of dreams is a dream in which consciousness and self-activity fall and images dominate, sometimes under someone else's influence. There are two types of observations: one external, the other internal. The external, or the perception of external things through the senses, is changed by the way of life not so much in its essence as in its use; for feelings always remain the same, only they turn to the wrong objects, and as a result of this they receive a difference not so much in their production as in their content. This is immediately revealed as soon as you ask who saw what and who heard what, or where someone is more willing to turn their ears, eyes and other senses. Thus, in a state of sin, feelings are given over not to the interests of knowledge and not to the improvement of the soul, but mainly to please the passions. In this activity, they are both governed by passions and, in turn, feed them themselves. Therefore, for example, the eyes are called “full of fornication and continual sin” (2 Pet. 2:14). Moreover, in this direction they do not need to carefully examine objects, but only touch them a little, which is why the ability to observe more and more is muffled and lost. Meanwhile, the soul is all in the feelings incessantly: from this a tendency is formed in it towards the external, or towards life outside. Whatever the use of feelings, such is their content: objects are predominantly passionate - because of this, some sacred objects cannot even be imagined. A person who has turned to God and lives as a Christian does not give free rein to his feelings, keeps them strictly in his power and turns them only where he sees fit, following the example of Job, who “set a covenant with his own eyes” (Job 31:1). Further, all of them are subordinate to him to the needs and benefits of the spirit, and he is guided, if not by knowledge, which is not universal, then always by a pious mood. Therefore, he looks only at what can edify - at holy images and so on. As a new property, the degree of feeling or attentiveness in them is noticeable in it: their job is to consider it in detail. Such activity, on the one hand, little by little forms the ability to clearly observe, which thereby acquires vigilance or accuracy; on the other hand, from the power of the soul over the feelings, or from their subordination to the soul, the feelings do not carry it outside and give it the opportunity to remain within itself - inside. Finally, on this path, through the senses, true treasures are collected both for knowledge and for a virtuous life, such acquisitions are acquired with which one can appear impeccably before the King of Glory... This is the same as if someone collected various jewels and presented them to the gaze of others. External observation at first seems to be of little importance in moral life, yet here it is of great importance. Through him the first food is delivered to the soul; and just as food has a significant effect on the body by changing its juices and composition, so observation in some way changes the composition of the soul and lays the foundation for character. In this regard, it is compared to the smell that penetrates a vessel that has just been made, but has not yet dried. This smell remains in him, if not forever, then for a long, long time. The same thing happens with the soul: the first objects of feelings form, one might say, the future person. It presents the soul with the first field for exercising its forces and produces their first bending and inclination. From here, not only a skill is formed in it, but also a tendency to deal with such and not other objects, for we are usually reluctant to take on what we are not used to. In this respect, the use of feelings is the same as the first direction of a tree trunk as it emerges from the ground. So, the use of feelings should not be considered unimportant. Internal observation is noticing what is happening in the soul through consciousness or inner feeling. This observation is the source of self-knowledge and knowledge of the human soul in general. It represents more differences in the fallen and the risen than the external; for here this difference concerns not only the use of the inner sense, but also its very ability to observe. What leads to such a thought is that although the soul itself is closest to itself, we still have very little knowledge about the soul, and what we have is mostly one-sided and false. On the contrary, what a wealth of self-knowledge the holy ascetics have when they are healed or healed from a sinful illness! From this it is clear that the ability of self-observation in some is in the worst state, while in others it is in the full height of well-being. What is usually cited in psychology to justify the poverty of soul knowledge should be turned into condemnation of the sinful soul, or into denunciation of its disorder by sin, and not into justification for the lack of knowledge of the human soul. They say that impressions constantly arriving from outside draw the soul outward and do not allow it to turn inward. But if it is in a person’s power not to be carried away by external impressions, then the constant striving of the soul outward must look for another reason, namely: this is the need of the sinful soul - to flee from within itself, where the stench of sin is, to the outside, where good is expected or expected. The tendency towards sensuality and visibility is one of the first traits and actions of damage. Consequently, there is nothing to expect good soul knowledge from someone in whom sin reigns. It can only be expected from someone who has renounced sin and is healing himself. In this it is, as it were, natural, for one of the first grace-filled actions is the return of the soul’s attention inward, with its distraction from the external. They say that everyday worries and work consume all the time: in the bustle there is no time to think about the soul and what is in it. The reason is not in external affairs and needs, but in the internal fussiness that drives a person forward. If we could pacify this inner weakness - fussiness, then external affairs would still leave a lot of time for self-occupation. Failure is not due to lack of time, for what is the purpose of special time for looking after the soul, when this can and should be done in the midst of business? One must observe the active soul. So, strength does not lie in time, but in the non-turning of the soul on itself. And this non-conversion comes from the disorder of the soul by sin. Where this disorder is cured by grace and all human activity is turned to one thing - to the need, there a calm flow of affairs is established, leaving the soul the opportunity to be in itself and vigilantly monitor its activity. External affairs and everyday activities then do not interfere with knowing your soul. Therefore, justifying oneself by these deeds must turn into condemnation of oneself. They say that mental activity is such that it is almost impossible to observe it, namely: it is instantaneous, fast, volatile, complex. It is impossible to establish a constant gaze on it and, if you do, it is impossible to decompose the contents of the observed action. But the soul is characterized by confusion, disorder of movements and excitement from inattention, carelessness and surrender to the arbitrariness of thoughts; and these bad dispositions come from sin or from the loss of power over oneself. He who is enthroned within himself by Divine grace holds his inner power, and therefore sees where things are going. He is characterized by sobriety or vigilance, due to which secretly coming disturbances do not escape his attention. Moreover, through long exercise in this inner work, he acquires the vigilance of the mental eye, which sees everything in himself accurately and definitely. Let us conclude: there are true obstacles to self-observation - appearance, care, theft of the mind. They are not a matter of inevitable necessity, but arise from sin. Consequently, as long as there is sin in anyone, there will be these obstacles and there will be no good knowledge of the soul. A person in a sinful state does not know his soul and cannot know. These obstacles are gradually eliminated and then completely disappear as sin is eradicated, and at the same time the very knowledge of the soul grows and comes to perfection. If now sin, and behind it these obstacles, lose their power only in people devoted to God due to the action of grace-filled forces, then it is obvious that true, lasting, complete soul-knowledge should be sought only among those who live truly as Christians. Who, not belonging to the number of such people, wants to know the soul - turn to the holy fathers, especially the ascetics, and draw abundantly from this source psychological wisdom. e) State of memory and imagination These two abilities belong to the labor force, and therefore are usually the same as the whole person. What is the sinner’s memory filled with and what is the sinner’s imagination occupied with? Sinful objects that feed only passions. This can now be seen in the conversation. The sinner will not say a word about the spiritual, because his memory does not represent anything like that, as if he had never heard or seen anything like that. Of course, he saw and heard, but it was not assimilated and retained, because his soul was not in it. As a result of such alienation from spiritual objects, the ability to imagine and remember them is diminished: due to lack of exercise and reluctance, they do not know how to imagine and remember them. In a person who lives a Christian life, on the contrary, the entire content of memory and imagination is holy, pure, Divine. They are filled with spiritual objects, for which he has a special affinity, and together he acquires a special ability to imagine and remember them. On the contrary, the recollection and imagination of vicious objects is alien to him: they are disgusting to him and therefore are not accepted by the soul. Just as the former easily imagines and remembers what is sinful and evil, so the latter easily imagines and remembers the spiritual and good. f) The state of recollection, or reproductive imagination The state of recollection corresponds to the state of memory and imagination, for what is usually reproduced by memory is what is imagined and remembered. It is impossible, however, not to point out the sharp difference between the causes or laws of recollection, which are predominantly of quality and are in force among those who live in the spirit of Christ and among those devoted to the passions and the world. For the latter, the main reason for remembering is passionate excitement or movements of habitual needs, because this is their life. Accordingly, and from the laws of combination of images, those that operate in them are predominantly those that relate more to the external side of things than to the internal; the images in their heads are linked more according to external spatio-temporal relations than according to internal relations of causality, and then, finally, secret impressions or influences come more from evil spirits than good ones. There is an agent from Satan near the sinner, who follows him and darkens him, filling his head with passionate images. For the first, everything is the other way around: secret influences descend to them from the Divine Spirit who overshadows them and the Guardian Angel, who always accompanies them and assists them in everything; Of the laws of combination of images, those that apply primarily are those that relate to the internal connection of causes, properties, parts; passions and needs, if aroused, are suppressed at first. Moreover, there is a difference between them in the types of memories. There are involuntary memories, which come by themselves, and there are voluntary memories, evoked by the initiative of the spirit. For those devoted to passions, the quality of memories is almost exclusively involuntary, because by their nature they are devoted to the internal mechanism of movements. Those who live according to the spirit of Christ, on the contrary, predominantly have voluntary memories, for they control themselves and do not allow anything to appear before their consciousness without their knowledge; at least they have jealousy about this and an internal feat aimed directly at this is established: vigilance and sobriety... In it, as we have seen, two activities should be distinguished: efficient and unauthorized. In relation to the first, we can say that people who are alien to the spirit of Christ have little ability to present abstract concepts and truths in decent images; that is why they are mostly distorted and ugly. On the contrary, if anywhere to look for a decent representation of these truths, then only among Christians, filled with the spirit of Christ, which imparts to them a special skill or instinct that determines the decency of the combination of images. The latter appears to both in this state: The main weakness of fantasy, one might say, is that sinners have a tendency to dream. This is not something accidental, but inevitable, as if akin to their soul, such that it is continuous and for almost everyone. The properties of this daydreaming, namely: removal from reality, entertainment, confusion, inconstancy of thoughts - make it clear to understand its cause. When a person moved from his true place and found himself in the false, untrue, then his thoughts rushed not to what is true, but to what seems to be such - to deceptive ghosts. Since firmness and constancy exist only in the real, thoughts that deviate from it must inevitably melt, like a whirlwind or frost. Hence, the sinful fantasy is constantly flighty. This frivolity both exposes and, in turn, produces a very dangerous state of mind. Its fruits, or its accompanying properties, include: Internal corruption: in the mind - avoidance of important and difficult activities and aversion to them, then superficiality or frivolity; in the will - the disintegration of passion. In dreams, I plays the first role in satisfying one of my passions. A person, staying in one place, takes revenge, scolds, hates, envyes, is proud, wages war, and so on... Since the whole soul is carried away by this, the dream defiles the person within himself. In feeling there is continuous defeat, for the blows of images fall directly on the heart and make the dreamer feel like one walking among thorns. But the main thing in this regard is the passion of the heart. Before you have time to look around, sort things out, your heart has already conspired with the subject and demands action. If a person is a slave of the heart, it is mainly due to the frivolity of fantasy or the dominion of images. But evil is not limited to the internal: it goes outside and here it cuts off everything around a person. A passionate person sees everything in rainbow colors, that is, things appear to them not in their true form, not as they are, but as they adapt and correspond to our feelings and our passions. Then, back, passions feed on them. A dreamer lives in a passionate atmosphere, composed of internal images and the external ghostly appearance of things. While this exists inside and outside a person, that is, when self-willed fantasy imprisons a person as if in some kind of prison, Satan begins to rage in this darkness with all his might. When the imagination indulges in self-willed movement, then Satan comes into the heart and steals the Word of God or good from it, like a seed sown along the way, and, on the contrary, sows his evil, as in the parable the enemy man sowed tares among the wheat. Having come to his senses from his dreams, a person finds that he is determined to do a certain evil, and does not know how and from where. In this confusion, among disturbing images and enemy forces, as if in a child, passionate plans for sin to the detriment of oneself and others are born: various kinds of intrigues, insidious quests from envy, flattery and malice, intrigues, malicious communities, and most importantly - all enterprises to satisfy one’s main passion. But, besides this, from the self-will of fantasy in a person who is inattentive to himself, permanent dispositions are also born, in which daydreaming turns into a permanent character. These are: a tendency to live in images, a tendency to make jokes, joke, idle talk, an aversion to mental work, a passion for reading empty books, for games, balls, theaters. Fantasy is most susceptible to damage from sin, or this damage is more noticeable in it than in other forces. That is why it is not suddenly healed for one who begins to work for the Lord, but gradually, although from the very beginning he sets a rule or makes an order as to how much this power can be established or supplied within his limits. So at the very beginning he goes inside himself, calms the confusion there, collects his thoughts. Self-collection is an integral property of a soul that has turned to God, which binds the self-will of fantasy. In his inner being landscaped in this way, he builds himself a spiritual church, like heaven, in which he strains to remain attentive, in the presence of God, angels and saints. From the inside, the same order extends to the outside, to help the internal. Here all things are transformed in meaning, cut off or covered with some kind of spiritual cover, according to which accidental glances at them or intentional looking at them do not entertain, do not deviate from the intended, but create and keep in it. In addition to this, he is surrounded by angels and the prayers of saints, who, like rays, are directed towards him, and thus lives in a certain spiritual, luminous and Divine atmosphere, which contributes to his speedy formation of a Christian character. It cannot be said that their imagination is not willful. But if this happens, it is not by their consent, but against their will. From the very first days they themselves begin a struggle with thoughts that is difficult, varied, and continuous. One might say that all their attention is drawn to their thoughts and then does not leave them until the very end. Hence, who among those who have labored does not know the deceit of thoughts? And what an extensive depiction of them and ways to overcome them can be found in every ascetic who has written? However, work and time finally subdue the imagination, and peace and silence, light, as if from the sun rising after the scattering of the clouds, are established in the inner world. The basis for this lies in the conversion itself, for it inserts a person into his rank, into his place; returns to reality, at the same time the self-will of fantasy, or dream, loses its basis. Further, constantly productive activities take away food from her, and she becomes exhausted like a drying tree. A third of life passes in sleep. It is impossible that it does not have deep significance for her. In the natural order, they renew their strength and form a person’s mental-physical being. Therefore, it is impossible not to be in relation to him a great difference in people who live in the spirit of Christ and those who are contrary to him. Although self-activity does not participate in it, the grace-filled change concerns being itself, and therefore also that which is outside the realm of freedom. Here it is not a matter of body sleep, but of dreams. Dreams are unauthorized movements of the imagination in the sleep of the body with a lack of self-awareness and spontaneous activity of the will. In the course of dreams, three degrees are distinguished: delirium - during dozing, the actual dream, or sleepy reverie, during the perfect sleep of the body, and secret, unremembered sleep, during the dead sleep of the body. In their production, the life of the heart with images dominates. When the soul’s power over itself is lost, then images of the imagination, as if breaking free from some rivets, fill the entire area of ​​the soul. Here, images of different times and places, present and past, bad and good, are mixed and combined according to laws that there is no way to know. The personality of the dreamer himself is lost: he is inserted into the dramas imagined by the imagination, as an outsider, and undergoes strange transformations: he now rejoices, now he suffers, now he is promoted, now he is put to shame, and so on. Since the soul loses its spontaneous activity in a dream, it is even more strongly exposed to the influence of another world than in reality, and the good one is influenced by the good, and the bad one by the evil. In the drama itself, however, he considers himself a person who thinks, desires, and decides on good or evil. This participation sometimes extends to the point that, upon waking up, the dreamer grieves or rejoices, is ashamed or approves of himself for how he acted there. Between these dreams there are three types. Some are disorderly, about whom Sirach writes: “As you chase the steppe, or drive the winds, so you eat faith with sleep” (Sir.34:2). Others are intelligible, which are implanted in a person who begins to regain consciousness by God or a Guardian Angel. Job says about them that during his “sleep and in the visions of the night,” when sleep overtakes a person, when he sleeps on his bed, God “opens his ear” and, having taught him, “seals” it in order to “lead a person away from evil deeds, to remove pride from him and to keep his soul from the grave” (Job 33:15–18). Third, finally, there are special dreams - Divine, prophetic. God Himself says about them: “If there be a prophet among you..., I will be known to him in a vision, and I will speak to him in a dream” (Num. 12:6). Dreams are as the heart is. For the most part, they can be considered witnesses to our moral state, which is not always visible in the waking state. In a careless person, devoted to passions, they are always unclean, passionate: the soul there becomes a playground of sin. For a person who has converted and is zealous for the purification of his heart, they are either good or bad, depending on what prevails, and sometimes how he falls asleep. Here he is subjected to frequent attacks by demons, who sometimes strongly seduce the inexperienced, as Saint Climacus notes. This forces a caring person, when going to sleep, according to the instructions of the Church, to cry out to God and the Guardian Angel, so that his sleep is preserved free from all the devil, dreams, and through sleep he himself becomes even more strengthened in goodness. As the heart is purified, dreams are also purified, so that for saints and perfect people they are like a continuation of their waking activity. Doesn't it even extend to preserving independent activity and self-government? From this consideration of cognitive abilities, it is revealed that a person who does not follow the right path and does not accept restorative forces is separated from the spiritual, invisible world and does not know it as he should; He knows the visible world superficially and only if he is engaged in this recognition; for the most part he only sees and observes him. Imagination predominates in him, amid whose activity he lives as if in a fog, in a crowd of ghosts, and is often subject to the close influence of evil spirits. For a person who lives according to the spirit of Christ, everything is different: the lower abilities, especially the imagination, are tamed and turn into instrumental forces that no longer dominate, as they should; on the contrary, the higher abilities act in full force. His mind is a treasure of the mysteries of God, for it directly enters into communication with the invisible world and directly experiences it with his spirit. At the same time, he acquires the ability to gain insight into the secrets of creation and industry to the point that, although many still lack data and although the mind has not yet made the proper preparations for analyzing the visible structure of things or the course of events, this does not prevent him from unraveling their inner, eternal meaning. Though reason is not always enriched with much information, it always returns to its place and, jealous of the fulfillment of its inherent virtues, with the passage of time acquires sanity, which knows how to give judgment to everything in its circle, and often, slowly, discusses third-party things thoroughly. 2) The state of human active forces The second class of qualitative forces in us is the totality of active forces. They also appear in three degrees, corresponding to cognitive powers. Above all stands conscience, which conveys the will of God to consciousness - a higher, detached power. Then follows the will, which deals with the arrangement of our temporary life and our temporary relationships. Below all is the ability of lower desires. Just as reason is appointed to open to man another, spiritual, most perfect world and to let him know about its structure and properties, so conscience is appointed to form a person into a citizen of the world where he must subsequently move. For this purpose, she announces to him the laws there, obliges him to fulfill them, judges him according to them, rewards or punishes him. Conscience is called practical consciousness. In this regard, we can say that it is the power of the spirit, which, conscious of law and freedom, determines their mutual relationship. By occupation or action, conscience is seen as a legislator, a witness or a judge and a rewarder. In all these aspects of her, great differences are visible in her in a good Christian and in a sinner who has fallen away from God. By the very fact that the sinner has separated from God, it should be expected that his conscience cannot be correct; for if she exists, then the voice of God in the soul (legislator), then His eye (witness), then the vicegerent of His justice (judge and rewarder); when we fall away from Him, all these Divine, so to speak, influxes upon us through the spirit must weaken and decrease in number and strength. Moreover, conscience does not act alone, separately, but takes other forces as intermediaries and instruments: reason, will, and the power of feeling. If these are upset in their ways, then one cannot expect right activity from conscience. There are involuntary, unintentional, so to speak, deviations of conscience from the paths of truth, as if delusions, and there are intentional distortions of it, or corruption of conscience, from counteracting it in favor of vices and passions. These two sides are now represented in all three acts of conscience. So the job of conscience, as a legislator, is to show the laws according to which a rationally free being should act, and to incline his will to this by the power of his obligation. How little power conscience has to induce the will to fulfill its instructions, even clearly conscious ones, there is nothing to say about that. She can still do this somehow if she does not meet with some passion and inclination, but as soon as there is such a clash, her voice is not heard, and by the power of it alone a person cannot overcome himself. Therefore, a person often sins due to the impotence of his conscience, he knows many virtues only by ear, he only enjoys many of them, just as he does not like other vices only in words and for the time being. Legislation itself, it seems, the easiest thing to do, is sent by the conscience incorrectly. The dictates of conscience are recognized in the form of demands. Since other needs, natural or instilled later, also make their demands, it is not surprising that a person, in the confusion that reigns in him after the fall, sometimes cannot make out what to obey. Thus, regarding the main principle in moral activity or where all attention should be directed and all thoughts directed, conscience for the most part is almost completely silent; That is why a person must sometimes ask: what have I done, will I inherit eternal life? - and when he is approached with such a question, he becomes embarrassed and is forced to admit ignorance, and if sometimes he offers something in response, he offers perverse principles, composed by a perverted mind in conspiracy with inclinations, like those of the Pharisees, Sadducees, Stoics, etc. But when the main principle is unknown, then not only is the thread of mutual subordination and correlation of particular laws lost, and some rise above others without reasonable grounds, due to random circumstances, but also much is included in the law that should not be law. So, for example, one places civil service above all else, another puts divine services above all else, another places the office studies of a scientist. Regarding particular cases, when conscience must immediately determine what to do in a certain case, there is even more uncertainty, short-sightedness and confusion. Here, for the most part, it either leaves a person to himself, which is why he often ignores good things and does bad things out of sheer ignorance of evil; or hesitates between “yes” and “no”, leaves a person undecided as to whether what he is doing is good; or calls bitter sweet, and sweet bitter, and this is even among the legislators who dealt with this, people experienced in life. In general, conscience leaves a person to act at random, according to circumstances, without inner confidence and approval. It is clear from everything that this legislator has been removed from his office, deprived of his dominance, and has become so weak that he does not stand up for his rights; on the contrary, another force seems to be at work - conscience. The legislative conscience is subjected to even greater damage and distortion if it encounters egoism and submits to it. Here, at first its laws are reinterpreted, then distorted and finally replaced by completely different ones, arbitrary and even contrary to the true laws. We willingly believe what we love, and strongly desire that the truth be on the side of our loved one. Therefore, if we happen to hear the voice of conscience with a commandment that is contrary to our inclination, then it has less conviction for us than the demands of the heart. In such circumstances, bewilderment immediately arises regarding the true meaning of the commandment; we ask with doubt: is this how it should be understood? Is this what the law requires? does he go to everyone? does it suit me and my situation? During this reflection, matters are mostly only put aside, left in doubt until another time; but soon thoughts are presented to please the heart, the law is reinterpreted, and we remove ourselves from fulfilling it under various pretexts. Thus, under the pretext of maintaining health, they avoid fasting and abstinence, and under the pretext of maintaining family well-being and needs, they refuse to do charity; in the form of righteous retribution they take growth; defending honor, they go out to duels, etc. All this, however, is only half-detrimental, if we go too far, it concerns individual cases and, moreover, with one person; but long-term activity of one kind, with a reinterpretation of the meaning of the law, leads to the fact that it is completely distorted in the conscience, and a wrong rule is put in its place. That is why stinginess is considered frugality, extravagance - generosity, anger - a feeling of noble indignation, indulgence - condescension, cruelty - jealousy of the truth, flattery - flexibility of character, cunning - prudence, pride - a sense of dignity. If someone happens to turn in such a circle where the above-mentioned opinions are accepted and contained as rules that determine the external behavior of a person in all his positions, what is surprising if he accepts these rules as decisive legislation of conscience, and satisfaction with them begins to be considered both a just cause and a virtue, just as, on the contrary, he begins to condemn life or actions not according to them not only with his tongue, but also with a sense of conscience. Conscience, as a witness and judge, is aware of how a person treated the law prescribed by it, and, subsuming the action under it with all the circumstances, both internal and external, determines whether the person is right or wrong. The court of a conscientious court, as they say, is incorruptible. This happens, but not always. One can expect infidelity in a court of conscience in all those cases where the legislation of conscience is incorrect, for then there is no beginning for the court. Moreover, for the justice of the court, it is necessary to notice the action in all parts, especially the internal, former dispositions; in a sinner, with constant plundering of the mind, much can be omitted from attention. Therefore, he has no conscience to apply judgment to. Finally, not the least important thing in this regard is jealousy for what is right, in order to relentlessly pursue everything criminal, for without this much of what is noticed can be ignored; This is also the basis for the sinner’s conscience to be unfaithful, for he is a sinner because he has no zeal for the truth. From this it follows that conscience should act like this: being zealous for the truth, carefully monitoring a person’s affairs, and if there is any malfunction, immediately bring him to court and judge him, without hypocrisy. But such actions are not in the conscience of a sinner. How can one expect faithful judgment from such a conscience? Its unreliability is already evident from the fact that it makes every person seem better to himself than he really is. Except for decisive cases and important sins, everyone is ready to say: what have I done? Therefore, God-fearing judges say to themselves: cleanse me from my secrets. Conscience in a fallen state is a broken mirror. Like a broken mirror, and now she does not represent our affairs and us as she should. Such is conscience, as a witness and judge, if passion is not mixed with it; in this case, its scales are tilted even more to the wrong side and the court is distorted. When conscience itself judges particular cases, then its judgment is still not incorrect at times; but, since one must judge one’s passionate deeds, the judgment of conscience is always crooked. Such is the judgment of an ambitious person for ambition, of a miser for stinginess, etc., while in other matters the same conscience is not dormant. A significant sign of distortion of conscience is the evasion of judgment from oneself to others. Conscience was given to us to judge ourselves; If she judges others, it must be said that she did not do her job. This condemnation of others can now be looked at as an indication of what our judgment should be against ourselves and as a denunciation of the constant infidelity of this latter. Thus, in judging others, judgment is usually quick, instantaneous, while when judging ourselves it is slow, delayed, and vice versa. Judgment about others can be inexorably strict, while judgment about oneself is always covered with condescension, and it should be the other way around. The trial always ends almost - not like other people... How strictly a merchant judges the affairs of a lawyer, a secular person judges spiritual matters, and so on! While others are constantly being condemned from the heart, we love to cover ourselves with justification. Self-justification is almost a common sin. They expose weakness, ignorance, circumstances, temptations, examples, the number of participants and somehow do not justify themselves! If we finally fail, we stubbornly stand up for ourselves. Persistent unconsciousness is the fruit of great damage to conscience and, at the same time, strong egoism. The person inside says in spite of himself: not guilty, empty, nothing! And at the same time, various twists and turns are used, mainly regarding the judged act, trying to fit it into a case in which such acts are excusable. Conscience is like a bribe-giver. As soon as judgment is pronounced and a person realizes in himself that he is guilty, grief, pain, annoyance with himself, reproaches, torment or torment of conscience begin. Such feelings are the essence of retribution for sins from conscience, just as, on the contrary, the joyful feelings of conscientious justification are the essence of retribution for truth. What this is and how strong it can be is shown by the persecution to which great criminals are subjected from their conscience, when it frightens them both internally with torment and externally with ghosts, both in reality and in their dreams. But again, how much injustice she has on this side too! There is only one reason for them: the infidelity of the first two actions - legislation and trial, for why should an innocent person be tormented? Another: in the state of the heart - the heart is hardened and indifferent, no matter how you blame it. As a result, the consciousness of one’s guilt mostly remains in the mind, without disturbing the heart, and a person often says: guilty, but what is it? - and remains a cold spectator of his sins, often considerable. The circumstances of time and place are of considerable importance. So, the recent crime is still quite disturbing, but over time it turns into a simple reminder; The crime scene is also very disturbing, and away from it we are at peace. Fearfulness (scrupulousness) often attacks the conscience, according to which, considering almost every deed to be a sin, it worries and eats a person for everything. The state of one who is subjected to such a judgment is painful and therefore a painful, unnatural state. But all this happens by itself, without our malicious participation. Where intent enters, we either distort conscientious retribution or force it to remain silent. This is done in different ways to lull the conscience. This lull comes naturally from the increasing frequency of falls, for it is known that the second fall hurts less, the third even less, and so on less and less, and finally the conscience becomes completely numb: do what you want. Out of fear that a lulled conscience might somehow awaken again, they resort to various tricks. These are: choosing a lenient confessor for yourself, false confession, false reassurance of self-resolution, limiting further correction to appearance alone, or external acts of piety alone, and excessive hope in the Lord’s mercy; or, even worse, convincing oneself that the torments of conscience are superstitious fears passed down from inexperienced childhood; deliberate removal of oneself from persons and places, even from objects of reflection, that may disturb the conscience; deliberate entertainment or abandonment of oneself to vain, stupefying, strong impressions, and finally, the end of it all - boasting of one’s sins. In these ways, little by little, they manage to completely drown out the conscience, and it remains silent for a time. So, conscience in a sinful state, according to legislation, judgment and retribution, is either itself incorrect or deliberately distorted for the sake of passions. Because of this, some freely indulge in all the overflow of passions and sinful life, for when the conscience is reconciled with the passions, who will bring them to reason? Others live in cold carelessness, neither good nor bad. For both of them, obviously, their activity is perverted, and it will remain so until conscience awakens. The measure of corruption determines what happens to a person. For others, although after a strong and painful turning point, return to true life; others, on the contrary, with the awakening of conscience, give in to despair and finish the bitter cup of iniquities, so that they can then drink to the bottom the cup of God’s wrath. For a person who has turned to God and restored grace-filled communion with Him, the erring conscience is corrected, and the distorted conscience is corrected in all three of its functions. The first ray of grace falls on the conscience and with its Divine fire purifies it, like gold in a furnace. When conversion is accomplished and communion with God is restored, then all the original strength returns to the conscience. Then what will prevent the voice of God - the law of conscience - from penetrating to the depths of the soul? What will prevent the ray from the eye of God - the judgment of conscience - from falling on the deeds and intentions of man and illuminating them? Or why couldn’t the soul be warmed by the warmth of God’s anticipated favor or shuddered by the fear of God’s wrath? Between God and conscience the mediastinum has been destroyed, the instrumental forces for conscience have been restored, therefore, conscience has all the means for proper action. This is how it is made correct in legislation. It is the consciousness of the Divine laws that awakens the sinner from sleep, but it subsequently does not diminish, but rises. This is facilitated by grace itself, which, like “anointing,” teaches everyone how to act (1 John 2:27), and guides him on all paths of life, secretly and openly. This is facilitated by a thirst for the Word of God, from which the converted sinner does not lag behind, but seeks to either hear or read it, drinks it in, feeds on it and transforms everything drawn from it in the depths of his heart into rules and principles and thereby illuminates his conscience. Life itself contributes to this. Feeling determined to be in the will of God, he carefully examines the will of God for himself and in all cases concerning him, and always in relation to sin, he says to himself: I will commit this evil verb and sin before God, but for good: my heart is ready, ready! In this way, he gets used to living a legal life in his circle and no longer has the need to consult the book of laws, but knows them directly, like an experienced lawyer. As for attacks from the depraved will, although they are felt, their voice is suppressed at the same time; even if it were still heard, legal activity is not abandoned in defiance of them, for it is determined to walk in the will of God without self-pity, with all kinds of donations, in the midst of all kinds of bitterness, both internal and external. It is correct in legal proceedings. A vigilant and sober eye, fixed on itself, notices all the shades of internal and external affairs. When, at the same time, on the other side there is a clear mirror of conscience, what prevents the matter from being reflected in this mirror in its true form and therefore the judgment of conscience from being true? A judgment is the application of a principle to a particular case. If both exist, then it cannot fail to happen and, if both are true, it cannot be false. The perfection of this action of conscience is further promoted by the fact that it is considered the greatest sin to condemn another, and when this happens accidentally, it is cleansed by strong repentance. But when the entire judgment is directed towards oneself, then here it is carried out without concealment, without false condescension, with all detail and completeness, touching not only deeds and words, but also intentions and thoughts. To warn against errors in this matter, a third-party judge is elected (a spiritual father or an experienced elder to whom everything is revealed), who decides the matter and whose decision is accepted as the decision of God. Here you will not encounter crude self-justification and lack of consciousness, for almost all of life is spent in self-condemnation and feelings of repentance; one’s deeds are not considered perfect and complete, and one’s face is not considered worthy of favors. How fruitful are such arrangements! They first bring peace to the soul, not disturbed by any local troubles, for the guilty person feels worthy of all executions; then - and purity in life, for the more cases or parties in cases are condemned, the more perfect they should become, if such a review is carried out with the goal of achieving perfection. She is also good at retribution. The petrified insensibility was driven away when God's grace melted the whole being of man; There is also a constant prayer for deliverance from him in the end. Therefore, just as in a barometer a slight fluctuation in the atmosphere is immediately reflected, so in the one who converts, either the sting of a conscience-stricken accusation immediately leaves a wound of painful contrition, or the oil of justification anoints the soul with the anointing of peace and fills it with a pleasing fragrance of joy. At the same time, it should be noted that the torment of conscience here has a completely different shade than what it has for an unconverted person. They are joyfully tender, do not become bitter, do not tear away, do not burn. Perhaps this is because after conversion, with zeal for pleasing God, only a few, accidental, unintentional sins occur. True, past deeds are not ignored and, when necessary, they are actively reproduced, explained with all the circumstances, with all the consequences, and are submitted to internal judgment, as if the hour of death, the judgment of God and the final sentence has arrived, and in the heart thus opened, everything done contrary to the will of God is washed with tears; but again this does not suppress their spirit with hopelessness. There is a breakdown in the spirit from comparing the past with the future, but it always ends in joyful peace in God: sinner, but Your creation, I turn to You, Thy will be done! And in this burning of conscience they save themselves from the fire of the future. The peace of conscience of the saints did not exclude such a collapse of the spirit, but on the contrary, many spent all their time in tears, others were dry because, as they said, they constantly remembered the fire of Gehenna, which scorched them incessantly (Macarius the Great). This state of conscience, on the one hand, brought them sobriety, refreshing and encouraging, on the other hand, in relation to God and the entire character of their life, it filled them with sweet peace, inexplicable joy, and all-encompassing bliss. “The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,” overshadowed them (Phil. 4:7). In this state, they received irresistible inspiration for deeds pleasing to God. The Apostle Paul valued the testimony of his conscience most dearly and for its sake went to all troubles. Others felt the same (Job 27:6). This is refreshing manna and strengthening heavenly food, brought by angels from heaven. This is the joy of the Holy Spirit, or the power by which one can, following the Apostle, rejoice unceasingly. The fruits of such a state of conscience are: first of all, boldness before God, according to which they unabashedly and undoubtedly turn to God, like innocent children to their father; then - living, strong and quick activity, for a clear conscience attracts Divine power, which, filling the entire soul, imparts to it tirelessness, unceasing work, insurmountability to obstacles, which, in fact, is the freedom of the spirit inherent in man; Finally, the will merges with conscience and all rebellion within ceases: a person enters into a state where the law does not lie to him, because he himself is completely filled with the law. Below conscience, among the active forces, stands the will, which owns the structure of our earthly temporary life: enterprises, plans, morals, actions, behavior - in general, everything with which a person expresses himself externally from the inside. It can be called the ability of aspirations and dispositions. Its main subject is good. The types of its actions are desire and aversion: turning away from evil, striving for good - this is the whole of life. A person cannot desire evil and turn away from good, but can only consider evil to be good, and good to be ungood and, through deception, desire the former under the guise of good, and not desire the latter, presenting it as ungood. Inevitability or the basis and source of aspirations and desires is the incompleteness of our being. The feeling of this incompleteness forces a person to look for objects to replenish himself. In this respect, man is a thirsty earth or a sponge; the number of needs is the number of its holes. An object in which a person expects to find satisfaction of his need is considered a good, which, the more comprehensive, the higher. It is obvious that the supreme good of a person can only be that which completely calms him down. Such goodness is only God. If, further, the strength of aspiration is determined by the quality of the expected good, then the desire for God should be our highest and strongest desire. This is also what we should expect, and here’s why: desire is a reflection of need, and need is a reflection of the structure of our being. Since man was created in the image of God, his main need, followed by his desire, should be the thirst for God and Divine things. “Whatever I have in heaven, and whatever I desire on earth from You, ... the God of my heart, and my portion, O God, endures forever” (Ps. 72:25–26). In man, in an innocent state, there was this rightness in the heart or will, but through the fall a transformation had to happen in him and did happen. Where did his will go? As can be seen from the circumstances of the fall - to oneself. Instead of God, man loved himself with infinite love, set himself as the exclusive goal, and everything else as a means. From this it is clear that the main disposition nesting in the very depths of the soul in a fallen person who has not yet risen is pride, or egoism. This disposition is so natural, universal, strong, irresistible that Aristotle (a pagan) wrote in his moral teaching: “Even a good person does everything for himself, therefore he should love himself.” That is why it is commanded at the very beginning of a good life in Christ Jesus to deny oneself, then throughout the continuation of walking after Christ, “to please not oneself” (Rom. 15:1), “to seek not one’s own” (Phil. 2:4). When Macarius the Great advises to go deep inside yourself and kill the nesting serpent at the very bottom of the heart, he means by this serpent self-love (Sl. 1, ch. 1). All vicious dispositions or all moral evil flow from pride, as Theodore, Bishop of Edessa says (Philokalia, vol. 3, chapter 93). “Pride is the mother of unimaginable evils. He who is conquered by it enters into union with all other passions.” It is not difficult, however, to notice that among these passions there are the most basic and inaccurate ones, standing at the head of others, themselves headed by pride. These first generation of selfhood are pride, or in general the thirst for exaltation, greed, or covetousness, and carnality, or more fully, the thirst for all-round pleasures and pleasures. This is confirmed by experience and simple guidance that no matter what passion you take, always, going back to the source, you will come to one of the initial passions shown. Therefore says St. Maxim the Confessor (On Love, Hundred 2, Ch. 59): “Keep away from the mother of evil - self-love. From this, the first three passionate thoughts are born - gluttony, love of money and vanity, from which the entire evil council is then born” (the same in Theodore of Edessa, ch. 61, 62 and in Gregory of Sinai in the Philokalia). The world is materialized self-love or is the totality of its creations in persons and actions; for St. John the Theologian divides everything in the world into three classes: “the lust of the flesh, the lust of desire, and the pride of life” (1 John 2:16), that is, that everything there moves according to the action of these three passions. It is the field where the activity of the sinful will develops in all its breadth. Each of these initial passions in turn is revealed by many others, filled with its spirit and character. They put their stamp both on all the powers of a person and on all his activities and thereby complicate his passion and multiply passions. The lust of the flesh is an insatiable desire for pleasure, or a continuous search for objects that can delight the internal and external feelings of the soul. It forces one to set one’s own pleasure as the only goal, or to live for one’s own pleasure, and to direct everything one encounters and everything one undertakes towards this end. The variety of private inclinations arising from it depends both on the objects of pleasure and on the organs with which it is tasted. Thus, from the pleasures of the taste, voluptuousness, drunkenness, and gluttony are born; of sexual passions - debauchery in various forms; from the organs of movement - absent-mindedness or laziness; from spiritual feelings - vicious love and dreamy voluptuousness through imagination, etc. Its main products are gluttony, fornication, laziness, amusements and pleasures. Whoever has this passion, it forces him to act everywhere according to its quality and imprints its spirit on everything. Thus, in relation to religion, in the knowledge of God, sensualists, due to their characteristic frivolity and almost exclusive turn to the outside, do not take the truths of God deeply to the heart, which is why these truths not only, as having no root, remain fruitless, but are also subject to strong attacks within from inclinations turned to a different order, and this last circumstance of a person devoted to pleasures, or inevitably puts him in a state of indifference to the truths of faith, or, even worse, casts doubts about them. In worshiping God, they need a pleasant sacred act, and in churches they seek not the glory and honor of God, but the pleasure of hearing and sight. In the innermost worship of God, they primarily seek sweet movements of the heart and evoke them with effort, which is why “in times of adversity they fall away” (Luke 8:13), when for the sake of the truth it is necessary to experience sorrows, either internal or external. They are “enemies of the cross; ...God is their belly” (Phil. 3:18). In relation to yourself. The sensualist is all occupied with pleasures and, moreover, only present ones, saying to himself: “Yes, pits and drinks, we will die in the morning” (Is. 22:13, 56:12; 1 Cor. 15:32; Wis. 2:6) - he does not even think about the future and therefore does not care about the consequences of his life, even those that are about to begin, even when he suddenly encounters illness, poverty, and disgrace. His soul is in contempt, his body alone is “fed extensively” (Tit.1:12; 1Tim.5:6). Because of this, you will not find in him either precise and worthwhile concepts, or firm rules of life. Both in his actions and in his thoughts he blows like dust in the wind. He is alien to solid, constant, intense, long-term activities, which is why he cannot imagine anything on his own behalf that could survive him. And in relation to others he is no better. True, he is reluctant to personally offend others, because this may be accompanied by troubles. But anyone who is not similar to him in character, who is not ready to share his affairs with him, is not only a stranger to him, but also an enemy. Moreover, if there is only a need, he is ready for all sorts of injustices: deception, failure to keep his word, false promises, cunning tricks. He has a penchant for friendship, but usually his friends are not chosen according to their true merit and are short-lived. When speaking, there is a desire to show politeness, but then there are barbs, witticisms, ridicule, and sometimes impudence. Little good comes from such people both in everyday life and in civil life. Actually, they are neither able to command nor obey properly. The sensualist is a father, a husband, a master, a boss - the worst of all. Children, wife, family, entrusted ones, perish. The reason for this is the negligence associated with it and false meekness or indulgence, because discipline is often accompanied by trouble. Among the lower ones in all forms there is no outrageous resistance, but there is almost always murmuring, slowness, laziness; in general, they are more “hearers” than creators of the law (James 1:22). Self-interest is an insatiable desire to have, or the search and acquisition of things under the guise of benefit, then only to say about them: mine. There are many objects of this passion: a house with all its parts, fields, servants, and most importantly - money, because you can get everything with it. Others, however, are exclusively addicted to silver and gold. Because of this, this passion can be seen primarily in two forms: love of money and covetousness, or acquisitiveness. Judging by its usage, under the influence of vanity it is pomp, from pride and lust for power - worldwide resourcefulness, seeking to seize all trade into its own hands, and from madness - stinginess. This passion is constantly accompanied by: tormenting care, envy, fears, sadness and sorrow. A title befitting the person it possesses is interesting; for he will not take a step without it bringing him benefit, and everything that his hand, word, thought touches, all bears its tribute to him. Then, when the thing arrived in his area, he says: mine forever... This exclusivity of ownership, decisive, heartfelt, like a fence around his things and cuts off all others. In relation to religion. He has no time to know God: therefore, he contains faith as he heard and accepted and as he can imagine with a soul cluttered with sensory things. He is most prone to superstition, anthropomorphism, and idolatry. A strong and exclusive love for things makes his internal worship of God suspicious, for, as the Lord says, “God and mammon cannot work” (Matthew 6:24). Therefore, he is directly called an idolater (Eph.5:5; Col.3:5; Matt.19:22; Job 31:24; Ps.119:36). He seems to honor God, but not with his heart, but with something external, and, moreover, not otherwise than in anticipation of an increase in profits or out of fear of losing and the desire to preserve what he has. Therefore, he is inclined to external worship of God and loves wealth and splendor in it. The passion for acquisition, with a lack of direct paths, sometimes leads him to magic and other absurdities (1 Tim. 6:9). In relation to yourself. For the covetous, the appearance of certain virtues is striking. He seems to be thrifty, and yet stingy; his labor and vigilance are only for self-interest; abstaining from pleasures and pleasures only so as not to be spent. He, in fact, has no concern for either soul or body: he sacrifices himself to things. Care does not give him time to enjoy his acquisitions, and therefore there is no peace in his soul. If misfortune happens, he is ready to fall into despair, easily loses his mind and becomes crazy, and sometimes commits suicide. In relation to others, he is inhuman, envious, treacherous, treacherous, and a litigator; he does not like to do good for nothing, unless his vanity overcomes him; does not know short friendships. There is no untruth that the selfish would not decide to commit, as Judas showed himself (Matthew 26:15). From him comes theft, sacrilege (Joshua 7:1; Acts 5:1), murder, betrayal. “The covetous” is an unworthy member of the home, society and the Church (Prov. 15:27, 15:29; 2 Kings 5; 1 Tim. 3:3; Phil. 2:20–21; 1 Pet. 5:2). The lowest of them are usually submissive, thrifty and work to somehow save a penny, but they are inclined to deceive the master or boss, somehow steal for themselves and hide the ends, and immediately leave them if they are in some kind of trouble. Higher ones or those in charge in some form - there is nothing worse in terms of negligence and carelessness about others. They have no need for anyone - neither for the truth, nor for people. They don’t like a boss like that, because he always wants to grab a penny; Therefore, they are unfaithful to him and are trying in every possible way to outwit him. In the house he poorly supports everyone, as well as himself, neglects the children and the whole family. This is how rudeness and ignorance are established. Pride is an insatiable desire for elevation, or an intense search for objects through which one could become higher than all others. Self-love is most obvious here. It’s here, as it were, with its own face, because here all the concern is about one’s self. The first product of internal pride is conceit, according to which all others are considered inferior to us; even those who are highly superior to us are not very important in comparison with us. Making its way out, it is already looking for uplifting objects and, judging by them, it itself is changing. Dwelling on insignificant objects, for example, on the strength of the body, beauty, clothing, kinship and other things, it is vanity; referring to the degrees of honor and glory, it is love of power and ambition; enjoying rumors, talk and the attention of people, it is love of popularity. In all of these forms, however, except perhaps conceit, pride is also accompanied by self-will, disobedience, self-confidence, arrogance, pretentiousness, contempt for others, ingratitude, envy, anger to the point of revenge and resentment. However, its main branches can be considered envy with hatred and anger with rancor. In the Word of God, the proud are also called “highly wise” (Rom. 11:20, 12:16; 1 Tim. 6:17; Is. 14:13), pompous (1 Tim. 6:4), high-hearted (Deut. 8:14, 17:20; Ezek. 28:2), despised (Luke 18: 9, 18:11); Gal.5:26). He who exalts himself above everyone in his heart - in relation to religion, in the knowledge of God - is the most dangerous person. He is capable of falling into the very abyss of wickedness. Due to his tendency to stand out from others, he either invents himself, or easily accepts new, invented opinions, distinguished by a certain height and strangeness. Often, in order to show his difference from the common people, he rejects the most obvious truths, such as: the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, etc. Therefore, they are rightly considered the inventors of heresies (1 Tim. 6:4-10). In general, his characteristic argumentativeness and stubbornness in accepted opinions are very unfavorable to the truth. In external worship of God, he loves stiffness, brilliance, and artificiality; in the internal – tension, height, abstraction; in prayer - lofty verbosity; in the discovery of piety - whimsicality: everything is in its own way, not like others; he can also accept all types of worship for glory and vanity and turn them into means to satisfy his lust for power, like Jeroboam (1 Kings 12:28–29). Temperance, hard work, frugality, patience, constancy give him the appearance of a strict performer of duties in relation to himself, but only an appearance; for all these virtues are means, not essential, and therefore their price depends on the spirit with which they are adopted and maintained. It is fair that he cares more about the education of his soul, but for what and in what spirit? Then, in order to show off, or also in order to support the glory of science or the glory of one’s own and one’s title, etc.; because of this he is more engaged in what is famous in his time. But he is angry, perky and does not give himself rest: as a result, he soon exhausts his strength and develops illnesses. In relation to others, he is the most unjust person: he attributes everything to himself, but attributes nothing to others; he is a hunter of always commanding and never obeying. Others, in his thoughts, should be means for his goals, and in fact he acts on them this way either through violence, when he is already strong, or through cunning, when he is not yet strong. He is a politician, therefore pretentious; Don’t expect gratitude from him, because he acquires the right to accept services from others as tribute. On occasion, he is not averse to insulting, committing violence, showing contempt, or intimidating. It is desirable for him to be feared more than loved. His friendship lasts until it meets his goals. In everyday life and civil life, all the disorder is from such people. The lower ones with this character do not want to obey, do not tolerate the bonds of duty that lie on them, which is why they are always ready for indignation. The higher ones are self-willed, hard-hearted; they punish unmercifully, forgive reluctantly; they want to rule by word and sight, not by conviction (1 Pet. 5:3). They like to set the tone in their address, but they are respectful to rare people, and sincere - to no one. Therefore, they are intolerant in society, hated by people and God, who opposes them and often humiliates them for admonition (Matt. 23:12; 1 Pet. 5:5; James 4:6; Job 9:13, 40:6–7; Matt. 11:23). There is no peace in their family, but fights and quarrels; children become rude; the servants are self-willed; wives either grieve or get used to perseverance. These are the closest products of self-love: the lust of the flesh, the lust of desire and the pride of life - with the passions that arise from them. There are, however, according to the remark of the holy fathers, among those descended from them also the most basic, as if necessary and everlasting companions. Five are recognized as such: anger, fornication, sadness, laziness, vanity. Their origin from the first is very simple. Thus, voluptuousness appears primarily in two passions, gluttony and fornication, and is accompanied by relaxation and laziness; The love of money is always associated with sadness and envy, with pride - anger and vanity. These five derivatives are placed with the first ones, according to the strength of their multiplicity, in one category, so that the first or inaccurate ones are considered to be eight or seven, for other vanities cannot be separated from pride. Look at Theodore of Edessa about this - chapter 10 (Philokalia, vol. 3); Evagrius on various thoughts (Philokalia, vol. 1, chapter 1:24); “Orthodox. Confession,” part 3, question 23 et seq. See the same thing in Climacus in the chapters about these passions. In these articles, the characteristics of each vice are defined with sufficient completeness and the passions derived from them - with sufficient detail. A special path to the development of passions was chosen by St. Gregory of Sinai (Philokalia, vol. 5, ch. 78, 79). He divides them into mental and physical; spiritual - again according to three abilities: thinking, lustful and irritable. But it is not difficult to notice that he does not depart from the general division, but only solves the question: how three-part self-love is reflected in the parts of the human being and in his abilities. That is why the passions produced, for example, from mental power, some have the qualities of pride, others - amorousness, and still others - voluptuousness. At least, organizing and developing passions in this way is possible and can bring undoubted benefits in life. Here you can see the meaning of each passion, and from their meaning you can scientifically deduce remedies against them, although these will be the same ones that are now proposed according to the experiences of the wise fathers. But it goes without saying that such a matter requires both a close acquaintance with the writings of the holy fathers and a deep knowledge of the human being. But who is happy with this? Peter of Damascus (see Slavic Philokalia, part 3), having collected 298 names of passions from the Divine Scriptures, without any order, adds: this is what I found in the Scriptures, but I could not arrange them by order, I do not even dare to attempt it; for, according to the word of St. For the Climacus, you will look for knowledge in evil, that is, their rational concept and explanation, and you will not find it. As for these passions in their application to every person, it is impossible to comprehend how diverse and sometimes ugly their combination is in one person. Every person who works against sin always has a self with its three generations and with some of the five passions, only one predominates in one, and the other in another. Together with them, there is also a whole tribe of passions in him according to the character and spirit of their ancestor, which diversifies in people according to the influence of gender, age, and condition. A detailed indication of possible combinations would be a very good guide to self-knowledge, for a person must know both his main passion and its entire family within himself. In this combination, they sometimes strengthen one another or limit one another, which is why there are many apparent virtues with which people usually deceive themselves. How his passions diversify is best explained by his history. Everyone is born damaged - with selfhood, or the seed of all possible passions. That in one person this seed develops predominantly in one direction, in another in the other, this, first of all, depends on the temperament received from the parents, then on upbringing, and most of all on imitation, which is nourished by existing examples, customs, treatment or community. Like a young tree, a person, amid these circumstances, involuntarily leans to one side, and then, having entered the path of life and acting in the same direction, a habit is established in him, which becomes the second, as they say, nature. And thus, a person became qualified by the passion that possessed him, or tempered in it, and his whole nature was imbued with it. The one who is established in this direction sits as if in a dungeon in chains, and can no longer get out of there on his own. Those passions or bad moods of the will themselves constitute an impenetrable cover, or a strong fence that does not allow the saving light of God to reach him. And, firstly, for each passion there is a circle of objects that satisfy it, which a person considers to be good and the possession of which is his ultimate goal. As with goods, he dissolves with them with his soul, as if chemically, and lives in them; therefore, he cannot look at himself until another beginning comes, dissolves with his heart and distracts him from them. Secondly, having become accustomed to dealing with only objects, a person, of necessity, seems to attack certain thoughts that indulge his passions and hide them from the eye of conscience. From such thoughts special sinful principles are formed, which can rightly be called prejudices of the heart or will. There, pride keeps in a person’s head the constant thought that he is better than others, brightens up his shortcomings and seems to himself to be always good. Pleasure assures us that pleasures are so natural to us that it is impossible to live without them; because why deny yourself them when nature itself has disposed you towards them? And absent-mindedness and frivolity do not allow one to delve into and understand where the strength lies. The love of money has so many rights! You can’t live - take care of a rainy day, the house is a hole, etc., and yet care drives everything forward and forward. Pride says: who should take these or those positions? If everyone refuses, then what? – you’ve already been placed on such a road, what can you do?.. And then some good-looking qualities, also supported by passion, jump out at you. In the demonstrated co-dissolution of the heart with visible goods and in the depraved principles that justify passion, although, apparently, they are of a prejudiced nature, lies the most solid barrier to the action of grace on the heart of a sinner and his conversion. Due to the influence of these reasons, not one of those possessing passions considers himself bad, does not see the need for correction, does not see what to correct. On whom, however, grace influences, a significant change occurs in the mood of the will. This change is accomplished when the self and man are accomplished through the crushing action of repentance, through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, ascending to the trustworthiness of salvation and deciding to work for the Lord to the point of being in the stomach, for the sake of which, in the sacrament of baptism or repentance, incomprehensibly reunites through the Lord Jesus Christ with God and becomes a partaker of the Divine nature. Just as before, having fallen away from God, he stopped on himself and for his own sake clung to the corruptible, so now, after conversion, having rejected himself and all created things, he clings to God with his heart. Hence, the main dispositions of the will of a Christian are: self-sacrifice and zeal for being in communication with God, or love. Self-sacrifice is the negation of self-love. It pursues everything that bears the stamp of selfhood, hates it and turns away from all things that feed it; puts all temporary, physical, external advantages at nothing; removes his heart from all created things. In the latter respect, it does not, in fact, stand in the absence or abandonment of things, but in the removal of the heart from them, or in such a state, according to which they are all considered as if alien, outside, not occupying the soul and not binding to oneself; therefore it is unambiguous with impartiality or dispassion, when everything except God is alien to the heart. Being by its nature a rejection of self-love, it also bears fruit or gives rise to dispositions in us that are completely opposite to those that selfishness produces, namely: Instead of pride, the selfless person has humility - such an attitude that he considers himself the most insignificant creature, worthy of all contempt and humiliation; attributing only sins to himself, he attributes everything good to the source of all good - God; he does not assimilate any advantages over others, but considers everyone superior to himself. This is self-abasement combined with a feeling of poverty and weakness. Instead of selfishness, he has not only selflessness and non-covetousness, but also a sense of wandering. He does not call anything his own, but everything is God’s, and only himself as an accessory to God’s property, which is why he freely communicates with everyone who has no property. He considers everything that he has only to be entrusted to him for a while - the house, the land, and the village. In the feeling of his heart, he has no place dwelling here, but seeks the city of the future, which is why he sends everything to his heavenly fatherland. Instead of lusts and pleasures - self-mortification and self-bitterness. There is no sorrow, no matter how much he considers himself worthy. Therefore, just as someone who lives in sin feels sorry for himself and treats himself like a sore spot, so someone who turns to God is angry with himself and is ready to torment himself, starve himself, lack sleep, and work; he is glad when he is insulted or struck, and he is insatiable when he is angry with himself. Love for God, or the thirst for being in communion with God as the supreme good and tranquility in Him, or the consciousness of bliss in His communion, is poured into the heart of one who turns to God by the Holy Spirit and directs his entire being towards God. This love is a real taste of God's bliss, and not mental or imaginary. Therefore, anyone who is perplexed about how one can renounce everything must be told: to renounce everything created in order to unite with the Creator means to change an imaginary good for a true one. Love is a necessary complement to self-sacrifice or renunciation of everything. He who has tasted sweet does not want bitter, and he who has tasted God will not want anything other than Him. Consequently, true self-sacrifice is contemporary with communion with God. From this love, or thirst for the Divine, according to its type, the following permanent dispositions develop or are installed in the heart, constituting the positive beginning of Christian activity: Walking before God. He sees God before him, before His face he acts as if under a guarantee from Him. Together with his heart, he is riveted to God and his attention does not take his eyes off Him. Therefore it is said that his belly is hidden in God. Gregory the Theologian says that one should breathe less than remember God. Therefore, some tried to tie this memory to breathing. Zeal for pleasing God, or constant, diligent, sincere fulfillment of every known will of God, without hiding from oneself and without any indulgence, even if it costs one’s life. It is accompanied by a careful recognition of this will and a quick start to its implementation through all obstacles. The Apostle Paul expresses this disposition with the word: I persecute. Sadness for God, for which, on the one hand, he wants to be resolved in order to be with Christ, so that the kingdom of God will come for him sooner, on the other hand, he laments about the incompleteness of the glory of God in himself and others, which is why he sheds tears in almost continuous feelings of repentance. Such is the quality of a lover that he wants to be in the presence of his beloved; That is why it is sorrowful if someone living in the body departs from the Lord. From here it is self-evident that the order of life of a Christian person, or the way of his activity, must correspond to these two fundamental directions - self-sacrifice and love. It is so according to the image of the saints. Thus, a Christian has what is always present. Self-resistance and self-coercion, that is, he constantly resists himself in evil and inclines himself towards good. Bad movements arise - you need to stop them, you need to do good, but your heart is not lying - you need to persuade yourself to do so. This is the continuous struggle of a person with himself. By constant exercise in it, he finally forms within himself a kind, willingly acting person, extinguishes evil and transforms the activity of forces for good (Macarius the Great, on guarding the heart, ch. 12,13; on freedom of mind, ch. 18). Since evil is not suddenly destroyed, but still remains in the converted person, he is commanded or characterized by continuous vigilance, sobriety, so as not to miss something harmful through inattention and not to fall. He is an invigorated guardian over himself, one who remains in constant anticipation of an attack and immediately, with a perspicacious thought, sees the approaching enemy. He is also characterized by constant tension of strength with the banishment of any relaxation. It is impossible to say: enough tension - for others, after spending five or six years in peace, were indignant and fell (Macarius the Great. On the exaltation of the mind, § 3). Therefore, a true Christian is always just beginning, he still thinks that he has not worked, he is still standing on the threshold, he has not achieved. The thought of relaxing yourself is the most deadly. Therefore, they say: determine yourself to work and exploits for the rest of your life. It is obvious that these last dispositions: struggle, sobriety and tension without relaxation - as combining self-sacrifice and love, can be called central or initial and therefore inaccurate. Through them, after and dispositions are developed, resulting from self-sacrifice and disposition, originating from love, and all together culminate in perfect self-sacrifice and perfect love. This, one might say, characterizes asceticism, or shows it the true path and, at the same time, the true meaning in Christian life. Everything that has been said so far concerns the directions of the will, which constitute its material side. But just as the understanding, in addition to the material, also has formal activity, so the will also has a kind of formal activity. Let's define it briefly. The activity of the will is directly based on wishes. Her job is to put indefinite and, so to speak, not yet qualified wishes in order, to agree with her goals, needs and the existing order, to establish human actions and undertakings and to outline a whole system of rules for the order of her social and domestic activities. It is also in activity, as reason is in knowledge. In this activity of the will there are three parts: choice, determination and the deed itself. When choosing, they look for what to stop at; in determination, the fluctuation of desires is affirmed on a single one, which, after the discovery of means, is carried out in practice. In all these moments there are new significant differences between the sinner and the seeker of truth. Choice. What is elected and how? You need to know that the types of objects have already been predetermined. They are indicated by the main character of life. How one turns only to what feeds self-love, that is, either to pleasures, or to interests, or to differences; so, on the contrary, for another, all intentions are directed solely and exclusively towards pleasing God; only what is true and honest, if he takes virtue and praise, this is what he thinks. We can say that the sum of deeds in all types of the first is all passionate and selfish, while the deeds of the other are all imbued with a selfless striving for God. Exceptions are very rare, and perhaps only in appearance. But here the basis of the difference is also in the form of election - for, while one chooses between two objects, of which one and the other is pleasing, he chooses without tension and dispute with himself, the other, on the contrary, chooses not only one good from two, but also in defiance of rebellious passionate desires and thoughts; therefore, his choice is always the fruit of struggle and victory or is accompanied by them to a greater or lesser extent. Moreover, it is often unnecessary for the former to choose, because he acts according to the established order, in which there is no need to stop, think and reason; the latter cannot have a routine, but on the contrary, ordinary affairs require all internal activity, as if they were performed for the first time. He often gives in to the pull of desire and does what his will falls on itself. This vigilant thought always rushes forward and from what is presented selects only that on which he sees the reflection of the will of God. He, out of self-confidence and arrogance, often allows himself to act at random, expecting that everything that will be said and done on his behalf will be good and worthy of universal approval. This one does not allow himself to make mistakes for a minute and with all attention and conscientiousness examines every even small circumstance and does not proceed to the task otherwise than with a clear consciousness of the will of God for it. He often chooses only because he wants, out of waywardness and corruption of his will, when he should obey calculations and the instructions of reason in everything. This one has a constant direction that is hostile to its own will, which is why it suppresses its uprisings at the first occurrence. From this, just as he cultivates willfulness into disobedience through his choices or lack of choice, so this one forms in himself reasonable obedience and willing submission to the will of God. Determination is an internal act of will, instantaneous, measured by the steadfastness of the desire, and not by duration or direction; why it is the same, one might say, no matter what type of case it relates to. It is necessary, however, to distinguish between some actions preceding and accompanying it. It is known that after a choice, at the transition to determination, the heart and will incline towards the subject. But for one, this inclination often precedes the choice, always almost decides it, at least, it only waits for its end in order to be expelled from the heart, which is why it never involves difficulties, does not require special tension and almost does not constitute a special act. For another, the disposition of the heart towards an object is not so natural, at least in the first experiments, it cannot be instantaneous, there is a task that is not easy, sometimes not short-lived, there is a special act that requires all the attention and tension. Therefore, here they often do, without having time to incline their hearts, in defiance of him and with his illness. This obedience and flexibility of the heart is acquired by prolonged sweating. One measure of desire is the measure of hope. It seems to him that the plan is already in hand. Vital activity stimulated by the movement of blood leads to the opinion that one’s strength is sufficient to carry out one’s undertakings without outside help; therefore, here things are done as much with greed as with self-confidence. The other one doesn't have it that way. Without the fogging heat of desire, with a cold intention, according to a reasonable choice, with the expectation of obstacles and dangers inside and outside, sedately, without arrogance, they begin to work, straining all their strength, but expecting success solely from the help and blessing of the Most High. Until now, it seems that all the benefits are on the side of the first, but from this point, that is, from an act of determination, a turn begins. Determination is an instantaneous, internal act, however, it has different degrees of strength and firmness. This firmness cannot be determined by the measure of previous desire. It is the fruit of complete strength of spirit, and not the ebullience of one force - will or heart. If the former does not have integrity of spirit, then his determination cannot reach the strength at which it always stands with the latter. It can be said affirmatively that the first’s resolve is always wavering; in the second, on the contrary, it is unshakable; for for no other reason does the former, both in general and in particular, have timidity and instability, especially when in fulfilling demands or undertakings it is necessary to disturb his most sensitive sides. The latter goes courageously before kings and rulers to torment and death - why? From firm determination, for he has unshakable strength. After this, to whom should patience in business be attributed to the highest degree? The last one. The first one is weak and attempts to conduct his own affairs with someone else’s hands. Business is the natural fruit of choice and determination. But before that, means are still chosen, and the matter is taken into account with the ordinary order of life, where one’s own person and other persons and things are taken into account. In carrying out these activities, the first does not hesitate to use both legal and illegal, the second only legal; he also resorts to cunning, the latter always acts openly and sincerely; This one's attention is paid more to external relations, while this one's - to internal ones; This one has politics, this one has spiritual wisdom; he defends more than himself, this one defends the glory of God, holy faith and eternal salvation; he has only business in mind, and he has fruitfulness; For one, the means are only positive, obvious, for another, often mysterious, inspired by faith; this one is fearful, doubtful, this one walks in confidence (Isaac the Sir. About the 3 degrees of reason) and so on. The work itself is characterized by an object, a goal and means, but even in its production considerable differences can be hidden. Thus, for the former, the most necessary deeds are considered to be those that tend to satisfy passions, for the latter – deeds of salvation; in relation to these last matters, he suffers from procrastination, this one hurries towards them with uncontrollable zeal; If he allows them, then only outwardly; this one always puts his heart into them. Their entire behavior from morning to evening is opposite, if we compare it at the same hours. The first case is only superficial, the second case is thorough and prolific. Finally, even in the lower desires of people who work for God and those who are devoted to sin, there are many differences. We have needs. There are few of them, and they flow from the structure of our being. There can be many items for each need, for example, to satisfy the need for nutrition, how many foods and different types of drinks? Once an object is known, it becomes an object of desire whenever a need arises. Frequent satisfaction of the same desire forms an addiction. So, wishes stand at the transition from needs to inclinations. Therefore, although they seem insignificant, they nevertheless have great power in life. They can be defined as follows: these are inclinations of the will towards one or another object under the guise of something pleasant, according to the imagination and feelings. Here you can now see the points of difference between the good and the bad. Both because desires turn more to the sensually pleasing, whose seat, as we saw before, is in the body, and because they are aroused by feelings, this ability in some is mired in sensuality, has become carnal, “animal” (2 Pet. 2:12-13), representing the most obvious evidence of human humiliation and corruption. In others, who, instead of pleasure, feed a thirst for self-bitterness and self-embarrassment, these in necessary cases, wishes are inserted within the most necessary limits, in unnecessary ones they are suppressed, in permissible, or, as they say, in innocent pleasures, even if they are sometimes relaxed, as Anthony the Great showed with the example of the bow, they are immediately strictly observed and used no longer for pleasure, but for deception, so to speak, of the body and sensuality. For some, this sacrifice of the carnal for the spiritual reaches the point where, instead of the inherent pleasantness from the sensual, one feels disgust and hostility towards it, even, for example, towards sleep and nutrition. Therefore, if the lower will is found in two actions: desire and aversion, then they are contained in an inverse ratio in the good and the bad. Where the desire of one is, there is the disgust of another, and where the disgust of one is, there is the desire of another. Other differences depend on the connection between wishes and imagination. The image of an object evokes desire the more vividly, the more vividly it is imagined. Due to this, so to speak, conspiracy of wishes with imagination, some of the properties of the latter naturally transfer to the former. And here is the difference. Thus, the former’s imagination constantly plays with images, and just as his latter are countless, varied, confused, changeable, his wishes are infinitely varied, mostly confused, like a dream, and changeable to the point of whimsicality and whimsicality. His imagination moves by itself, according to the laws of the concatenation of images; and his wishes stretch out in a certain familiar sequence, mechanically, as if without knowledge, and they themselves cause one another, cut off one another. His imagination reigns, and he lives in it or in its world, as if in some elemental composition, and is unable to free himself from its charms. He is a slave to his wishes. They crush him continuously and keep him in some kind of snare. From this he passes only from desire to pleasure and from pleasure again to desires. For the other, on the contrary, all this evil is cut off along with putting the imagination in order. First, a struggle is established with wishes, as with thoughts, and is waged with difficulty and sorrow, but not without success. Finally, the wishes are pacified. Therefore, here you will not find either their wayward confusion, or dominion over freedom, or mechanical movement. They are subordinate to a higher authority and are ruled by it. One can even say that they are born already at the direction of this power, but without that they are silent or lie in their hidden rivets. Here is another point of difference. Wishes stand at the transition from needs to inclinations and condition their formation. For the first one, this is inevitable. But if inclination does violence to the need, shackling it in a certain form, and distorts it or gives it an incorrect, unnatural direction, then we must conclude that the former’s needs and nature are in violent enslavement. On the contrary, in the latter, with the taming of wishes, the transition to inclinations is stopped. Therefore, the latter, naturally, must weaken and become exhausted, and from this the need comes to a natural state. By taming desires, nature is freed from the bonds that constrain it and brought to its rank. So, briefly: the active forces or the active, desirable side of our spirit in those who remain at a distance from God and indulge in sin, deviated from the higher, spiritual world, whose laws revealed in the conscience are sometimes obscured, sometimes distorted, then took on various egoistic dispositions, or turned into passions, and finally surrendered to the dominion of confused, discordant, illusory desires. In a person who has turned to God, Divine grace heals this degradation. She imprints the Divine laws on the conscience, then accordingly changes and transforms the dispositions of the will; lower desires are pacified or even suppressed, but in any case subordinated and placed at the disposal of the person himself. 3) The state of the sentient forces, or the heart While a person wants to collect everything into himself with his mind, and express himself externally by will, or to bring out the wealth of his internal acquisition in deeds, the heart remains in itself and rotates inside, without emanating. It can be seen that it lies deeper than those active forces and forms for them, as it were, a lining or foundation. However, in this situation it is not the same for them as the stage is for the persons acting on it, but itself takes a living part in their movements. They are reflected by their activity in the heart, and vice versa, the heart reflects itself in them. Therefore, it is rightly revered as the root of the human being, the focus of all its spiritual, mental and animal-physical powers. Having such a meaning in a person, it must also have an exceptional meaning in relation to everything that is outside of him, for a person is in connection with everything that exists. This connection cannot be affirmed otherwise than in the center of his being, just as the connection in a watch is affirmed in the relationship between the centers of all its wheels. If the center of the human being is the heart, then through it it enters into connection with everything that exists. In these two respects, it is necessary to define different states of the heart, that is, as a center of power and as a point of contact with everything that exists outside of us. a) About the heart as a point of contact or seat of sympathy With whom we have a living union, it is pleasant for us to be together; in that circle we are as if in our element, otherwise we have a living sympathy for that person. If everything that is outside a person and with which he can have a living union is God and the Divine order of things, the spiritual world and the material world, then they constitute, as it were, three areas in which it should be pleasant for a person to stay, with which he should have sympathy. What is it like? Delight in God and sympathy with the Divine world are muffled and perverted in the sinner. Here are some signs of this: God embraces a person, carries him with His strength, feeds him with the bounties of His goodness, but he does not feel it. Consequently, his heart for the Divine is numb, frozen, does not accept impressions from it; if he does not accept impressions and does not taste it, then he cannot have an attraction to him, as to the unknown, he cannot discover that it is sweet for him to stay in him, that it sympathizes with him; for it is impossible for a person to say that he finds it pleasant to be in this or that place, among these or other things and persons, when he has not been there and not seen them. That there is ignorance or voiceless sympathy is obvious, for it is almost everywhere. For sinners, the Divine is an unknown land, and when asked, they cannot say whether it is good or bad, unless someone else presumably says that, without conviction and force; but whether anyone will say how good it is there, there’s no need to ask about that. This is the first. Secondly, whoever tastes sweet will not want bitter. What is sweeter than the Divine? Therefore, shouldn’t it absorb the whole person, drowning out all other sensations? A necessary consequence of a living union with God should be dispassion for everything else. The heart is a vessel: if it is completely filled with the Divine, where is the place for anything else? If now there is a heart with strong predilections for something not Divine, then it must be said about it that it has lost sympathy for this world, is separated from it. The heart of a sinner is always partial to something, because it is passionate. It generally loves to enjoy the sensual, the sinful; but there is always one object in it, into which it includes everything, in which it dwells day and night, which colors in many different ways in day dreams and night dreams; there is, that is, something that replaces God and, like an idol, stands in the depths of the heart, in its most intimate and secret folds, in order to admire him alone. Anyone who is passionate is, essentially, an idolater. Finally, if the Divine is unknown, but on the contrary, something else, the opposite, is sweet, then when meeting images of the Divine, a sinner must either be indifferent to them, as to foreign objects, or feel uneasy from their presence, feel as if out of place here, turn away and run away. Why does a sinner not want to participate in sacred ceremonies, be in church, hear singing, look at holy images, listen to the Word of God, read spiritual books or prayers? Because all these are unpleasant objects for him, alienating him from himself; they are not to his heart, they are not accepted by him, they do not nourish him, but torment him. The heart has the property of elastic bodies. Just as these, when pressed from the outside, push objects away, so it tears away the Divine from itself even more and is itself torn away from it when it comes into violent contact with it. Just as water spews out a stick vertically immersed in it, so it hurries to free itself from what enters it from the outside - from another world. A person who has turned to God and received Divine grace, at the same time perceives his affinity with the Divine, as born of God, abides in God and the Divine world, being, as Macarius the Great says, raptured into this age. Having tasted how many good things the Lord has, he also knew the sweetness inherent in Divine things. At the very first turn to God, he takes the decisive intention to suppress and eradicate in himself any addiction and to this he turns all his inner power and all the strength received from God. First the struggle, and then the light of dispassion, or the earthly sky, as St. Climacus. But this is already in the last degrees of perfection. To cultivate such a disposition, right after conversion, he surrounds himself with objects that reflect the Divine, and prescribes activities that can nourish spiritual feelings, such as: prayer, contemplation of God, worship, reading the Word of God, etc. Having separated himself with them from everything earthly and suppressing earthly feelings inside with the power of spirit, he little by little manages to renounce everything and learns to taste the Divine and in it to anticipate eternal bliss. This is what should be kept in mind when forming the heart in the spirit of Christian life - to revive sympathy with the Divine, to make it pleasant for a person to deal with the world so that he is in it as in his element. Otherwise it causes suffering, not bliss. For a sinner and in paradise, the torment is unbearable. Now about sympathy with the spiritual world, that is, with angels and people (for what is the body in a person?). What does fear mean when holy angels appear, crushing, painful fear? This is more than if they were alien to us or were of a completely different nature. Where is the affinity and sympathy? And this is also true among people, as experiments show (in the Old Testament), although they are brought up in carnal principles, but according to God’s dispensation. One might say, they do not appear to sinful people because they cannot bear their presence. Another, even greater sign of alienation is disbelief in their existence. If the thought of them does not fit among thoughts, then what can we say about the heart, which is even deeper than thoughts? What someone does not believe, he rejects with hostility, it is not to his heart. Shouldn’t it therefore be assumed that in sinners, at least some of the main ones, there is enmity and hostility towards the angelic world, and not just a lack of sympathy? And in relation to people, the fact that at first glance almost everyone seems like a stranger to us, that from him to us and from us to him there is a coldness and then afterwards indifference to him remains in us all the time, does not this mean a loss of sympathy? Rare exceptions to this do not contradict the general conclusion, but, on the contrary, show even more the perversion of sympathy. There is instant sympathy and kinship with some persons without prior communication; but, besides the fact that great mistakes are often hidden here, even to the death of a person, it is almost always the fruit of the reflection of like in like. Indifference is not universal, for some are partial; but it also breathes untruth and always leads to untruth. Beyond what antipathy and hatred mean, for which some, without any reason, others, as a result of mutual relations, cannot appear to each other; What else does this atrocity mean, why they take pleasure in the destruction of others, if not a decisive perversion of sympathy for people? Having thus separated from his fellow brothers, what does a person admire? Where do you enjoy spending time? What makes it sweet for him to dwell among? He is there only in his element, where he sees the reflection of his face, with its iridescent glow in things or persons, for example, among the works of his mind and activity, or among vain things with which he can attract the eyes of people, or among people through whom his self-satisfaction can be nourished, etc. It is clear that he has returned to himself from others and sympathizes with himself alone. In a person who has turned to God, grace also heals this illness. In self-sacrifice lies the seed of hatred for everything that bears a trace of our self; and this does not attract, but drives the self-sacrificing person away from himself. At first it is not so easy and takes longer, with violence, and then turns into a natural feeling. Further, the measure of the repayment of passions is the measure of his affinity with humanity and the angels. At first, he strains to think and feel that there is no Jew, no Greek, no slave, no freedom, no male or female, and finally he comes to the point that, like Macarius the Great, he would like to embrace all of humanity with a single embrace and consider the last man in the world to be his kin. As for his relationship to the angelic world, he lives, as it were, in it; it happens that he often sees angels, feeds from them, sees them in front of others, hears them singing, and all this with such admiration and joy that it is even a rule to distinguish demons who have been transformed into an angel of light from true angels - by the joy and peace that remains with this in the soul. From this it is clear that sympathy with the spiritual world by Divine grace is completely restored in a person who leaves sin and turns to God. Sympathy with the material world is very vividly recognized by everyone; It is especially strong during spring and summer, both with all of nature and more with living, organic creatures. But even here, from the first time, doesn’t it at least show that its wrong direction is that it alone is strong among the others, whereas it should be weaker than the others. Again, what does the enslavement of living creatures mean for the benefit of our animal economy, when they are subjected to torment and torment without any pity? Or does it mean that a person is attached exclusively to one place and climate, when, according to his purpose, he could happily live everywhere? These are distortions of this sympathy, and the fact that he sometimes has no feelings in relation to nature testifies to his numbness. It doesn’t matter if people who please God continue to experience similar phenomena. However, almost everywhere, without difficulty, as can be seen from experience, the torment of animals on their part stops, and precisely because of sympathy; They show, without fear for life, a readiness to stay in any place on earth (Basily the Great), the ability to feel peace in cold and heat, all the more so - the need to live and breathe nature not to please the flesh (Antony the Great), to rejoice in the creations of God, to walk among them with joy and admiration. All these are the most obvious signs of the return or healing of sympathy for the material world. With all that, again, this feature is not such that one could regret it, even if it did not exist. For the main thing in a person is the spirit, and it can absorb the flesh with all its plausible movements; Moreover, in nature itself now not everything is as it should be. b) About the heart as the center of power of the human being In the heart all the forces of the human being are reflected in their activity at all their degrees. Consequently, it must have spiritual, emotional and animal-sensual feelings, which, however, both in the manner of their origin and in their properties differ so much that the very ability to feel must be considered in three types. c) The heart as a friend and receptacle of spiritual feelings Such spiritual feelings are those changes in the heart that occur in it from contemplation or exposure to objects from the spiritual world. The totality of them can be called religious feelings. Since the sinful soul is separated from God and the Divine world, religious feelings in their true form cannot exist in it. There are almost none. This is best seen from a comparison of the state of these feelings in a sinner and a true Christian. Thus, the inaccurate sense of dependence on God in the first one is in different degrees of weakness until complete disappearance or even rejection: get away from us; and for another it is so strong that he feels the hand of God on himself, feels how He holds him with His strength. And faith is a feeling. The first presumably knows about the existence of objects of faith, if he has not yet become mired in unbelief; the other lives by faith and establishes her kingdom as his own existence. And further, various feelings poured into the heart by faith from a sense of goodness, justice, power, providence, such as fear, reverence, devotion to the will of God, hope, love and others - for this very reason they cannot either exist at all or be in force in the first one, because it lacks faith - their source. For him they are only thoughts and ideas, not sensations. The same should be said about thanksgiving, doxology, and even prayer. And for the second, all these feelings constitute, one might say, the natural element in which he lives. His whole life is made up of the transition from one of these feelings to another. It is common for someone who lives in God to be full of feelings flowing from His action on the soul. What can we say about the feelings that, in continuation of the change for the better, occur in the soul and constitute its natural composition and consequence, such as: the consciousness of one’s guilt before God, shame before Him, repentance, the heat of zeal for pleasing God, the feeling of mercy in Christ Jesus our Lord and salvation for His sake? This is the exclusive property of people who have turned to God and who work for God. Who can feel the sweetness of something that has not been accepted or tasted? But the following circumstances should be pointed out as the most obvious feature. It cannot be said that the sinner has no religious feelings; but their main tone is a feeling of fading fear, a somewhat painful, restless feeling, as a result of which they do not want or are even afraid to lift their mental eyes to heaven to God and walk, as if under the cover of some impenetrable vault, in dark oblivion. In one who works for God, on the contrary, the main feeling is the feeling of sonship with God, a feeling that cleaves, sweet, delights the whole person to God and plunges him into His infinitely good bosom. The apostles repeatedly and at length instill this feeling, for they were predominantly filled with it. Then the whole life of the first one passes in some hopeless fearfulness or indecisiveness in business. He trusts only in the obvious, that is, in direct methods that are delivered by his own forces and the help of others; in general, he does not trust in God, but in something outside of God. And this, in addition to the fact that it means a perversion of his inner religiosity, keeps him surrounded by languid doubts and fears. The other, on the contrary, walks with hope. He does not refuse natural means either, but their strength for him depends on God, and if there is any deficiency in them, he does not linger in his activity; he undoubtedly asks and receives. The Lord is near, Who said: “Receive whatever you ask in faith” (Matthew 21:22). This property is especially revealed by St. Isaac the Syrian in words about the three degrees of intelligence. d) The heart as a container of emotional feelings Mental feelings are those movements of the heart that occur in it as a result of changes occurring in the soul from its inherent activity. They are divided into theoretical, practical and aesthetic, because, that is, they arise from the influence of reason and will, or are the consequences of the rotation of the heart in itself or in its grace. Theoretical feelings are born from the attitude of the heart to knowable truths. Here the need to know the mind is aroused to activity, and then, at the end of its labors, its fruit is deposited in the heart. The first is curiosity, the last is a sense of truth in varying degrees. This includes different degrees of conviction and different types of unconviction, such as: certainty, doubt, probability, disbelief, rejection, bewilderment, etc. Already from the first time the differences in this regard are visible, for who is tormented by unbelief, or doubt, or persists in rejecting the truth? A person who has fallen away from God, Who is the truth. Moreover, is it possible for him to know the truth when he is surrounded by vanities? This, even if he works on the sciences, one can suspect whether his curiosity is sincere? Does he do everything out of love for the truth, or ex officio and for some extraneous motives? How little, moreover, he has a taste for truth, the ability and desire to enjoy it is evident from his characteristic laziness, the rush of mental labor, the dominance of imagination, and frivolity in him. It is especially necessary to pay attention to the power of conviction in the truth. Conviction is a consequence of the penetration of the heart by truth. A heart that is in a lie will not allow the truth into itself. So, does a sinner have undoubted convictions in the truth? No, at least, looking at repeated experiments, how the same one easily runs from one beginning to another, one can suspect him of that. Moreover, where is the fruit of conviction, if it exists? And again, what does it mean that a person who has strayed from the good path he was on immediately loses many convictions from his heart, and he cannot reproduce them in himself until he returns to his previous path? Also, the lack of zeal to stand for the truth comes from what else if not from weakness of conviction? From such facts one can generally draw the conclusion that sinners have few or no undoubted convictions. It is completely different for those who, from the darkness of sin, turned to the light of God. The thirst for truth, one might say, is their first thirst; They have the Word of God constantly in their mouths and thoughts. Who knows the sweetness of truth if not they, when they live in the truth? They do not have the offspring of unbelief and doubt, but on the contrary, the power of conviction merges with their being, which is why what they know immediately turns into action, and they are ready to give their very life for the truth and give it when necessary. Let's add one more note. The sense of truth - the ability with the heart, without outside help, to recognize the true order of things, their true properties - an amazing ability inherent in human nature is completely suppressed in the first, but in the second it comes to life, intensifies and finally appears in all its strength. So, by instinct alone they recognize a brother, an enemy, a friend, sons, the right person and what to do in what case. Practical feelings are those movements of the heart that are in essential connection with the activity of the will and either excite it or follow it themselves. They can be said to be of two kinds: feelings of self (egoistic), pleasant and unpleasant, and different types of disposition towards people, kind and unkind (sympathetic feelings). The first kind is: self-satisfaction or self-contempt, self-exaltation, self-abasement, arrogance, arrogance, etc. The second is indifference, from which, on the one hand, respect, competition, rejoicing, condolences, regret, gratitude, friendship, etc., on the other, envy, gloating, revenge, hatred, enmity, contempt, condemnation, etc. However, any permanent mood of the spirit leaves a deep imprint on the soul, which is why it responds in the heart with a feeling of approval if the mood is good; disapproving if it is bad. Now, from the first time, it is already clear what these feelings should be like among good Christians and among unkind sinners. The first should have all good feelings from the very beginning of their path, if not in all perfection, then in seed. Through work and feat, they free good feelings from the bonds of egoism, purify and plant them in the heart. The Apostle tells them: “Put on... the bowels of generousness, kindness, mercy,... meekness” (Col. 3:12) - and so on. The clothing of the spirit is the feeling that overshadows it. As for egoistic feelings, it cannot be said that they do not arise, especially at first; but no strength is given to them, opposition to them is established, means are taken to expel them, and, indeed, they are expelled from the soul every time they arise. Deeds, labors, prayers finally suppress them and in their place are imprinted by feelings opposite to them. The whole point is to instill good feelings in the heart, for what is in the heart is before God. The careless sinner has no such division. As he devoted his life to the ordinary course, his feelings, both good and evil, develop and take root in his heart together, without his knowledge, and sometimes make up a very strange mixture. They are expelled from his heart on occasion by themselves, without rank or order. Since he has no jealousy about the purity of his heart’s feelings, he does not strain to give precedence to good feelings, but leaves them to themselves and, for the most part, distorts them with addictions and passions. Judging by this, their moral value is insignificant. On the contrary, his egoistic feelings lie deep in his heart and there they make a permanent home for themselves. One can say that there is not a moment in which he does not have complacency in his soul, or, if he has no food, annoyance with himself, etc. It is an accident if they are ever drowned out in the heart, which, however, mostly happens from a surge of natural sympathetic feelings towards family and friends. Between practical feelings there is also a special ability, on the one hand, to feel the sweetness of obvious goodness, on the other hand, to recognize the innermost kindness with the heart, without external aids. Both, since they mean perfection of the spirit, cannot exist in their purity in a sinful heart, but perhaps only in weak shades or light accompaniments of the law. In a good Christian this ability is in full force. Who better than he can perceive the beauty of virtue? He often recognizes the kindness and badness of the actions and hearts of others by direct spiritual touch. Aesthetic feelings are those movements of the heart that occur in it from the action of a special kind of objects on it, called graceful or beautiful. Here the heart enjoys an object only because it is good in itself, likes and delights without any special relationship to our personal interests. The force underlying these feelings is called taste. The variety of feelings in it depends on the properties of objects, but it is very difficult to define them and distinguish one from another; Therefore, they receive their names from objects and are the essence of feelings of grace, loftiness, etc. Again, there are shades in the sense of beauty of a painting, statue, etc. In general, graceful is the successful and striking expression in sensual form of something spiritual, that is, thoughts, feelings, virtues, passions. It is obvious that the external is of little importance here, and the main thing is the internal, what is expressed. According to the difference in this internal content, tastes should also be distinguished. There are two types of them: one is true, loving the proper content of the elegant, the other is false and perverted, loving its improper content. Now the question is: what is the proper and what is not the proper content of the graceful? What is the idea or feeling of grace? It is either a memory of a lost paradise, or a premonition of the future Kingdom of Heaven. If elegant objects are built under the guidance of this feeling, then here is the source of content for them! Depict heavenly, holy, heavenly. Transform this deplorable land into the threshold of heaven with your art. If a person is surrounded everywhere by earthly objects, for the sake of which he can forget about heaven - his fatherland, then surround him with such artificial works that would remind him of him, just as others, living in a foreign country, surround themselves with images of their city, home, parents, etc. The world, God's creation, is filled with reflections of Divine properties, but there they are in such breadth and immensity: collect them in a small volume and present them to the intelligent gaze of a weak person in a picture or music. Again, what should a person form in his soul in this life? Holy and heavenly dispositions. Give him the external appearance of these dispositions to help him, so that he can introduce them into himself all the more successfully. From all this it is clear that the main content of the elegant should be objects of the spiritual world. It goes without saying that the external form must correspond to them. If passions are now depicted and predominantly carnal, they are depicted in their characteristic shamelessness and alluring forms, or if good objects are also depicted, but in forms unworthy of them: in this case, the graceful is perverted. Now it is easy to judge true and false taste: true taste enjoys objects that express the spiritual, moral, Divine world; perverted taste loves to enjoy objects that depict passions or are generally shaded by passion and feed it. How the sinner's taste must now be perverted is evident from the mood of his soul, which in him is filled with passions and given over to lusts. He will not find beauty in the spiritual. Not without pleasure, he sometimes looks at spiritual pictures, but only if they are shaded in his spirit, just as he is ready to listen to church singing, but if it has passionate motives. He is bored everywhere where he does not meet objects of the same spirit as him. And on the contrary, how intact is the taste of one who lives according to the spirit of Christ! Both in himself and outside, he does not like to see even the shadow of passions, he pursues them and abhors them. On the other hand, just as he strains to feel holy on the inside, so on the outside he loves to look only at holy objects and, as soon as he encounters them, he almost knows how to appreciate all their dignity and all their perfection. Thus, sin perverts both elegant objects and taste itself; on the contrary, Christianity restores the graceful and heals taste. Just as in knowledge a bad direction of the intellect perverts the mind, a bad direction of the will distorts the conscience, so here a bad direction of taste perverts spiritual feelings. d) About the lower, sensual-animal feelings Feelings at the lowest level include rapid disturbances or affections of the heart (affectus), extinguishing the spontaneous activity of the mind and will and accompanied by special changes in the body. For the most part, these disturbances, occurring in the lower part, are the consequences of an unexpected disturbance of egoistic love of life, under circumstances favorable or unfavorable to it. Therefore, sometimes they are all attributed to the animal-sensual part of man. They are divided according to their destructive actions into the higher powers of man. So, some extinguish the clarity of consciousness, such as: surprise, amazement, fascination with attention, fear; others undermine the will, such as: fear, anger, zeal; still others, finally, torment the very heart, which sometimes rejoices and is merry, sometimes bored, grieves, annoyed and envious, sometimes hopes and despairs, sometimes is ashamed and repents, or even is in vain restless with suspiciousness. You can judge by their names alone what kind of villains they are for a person, the more they should be recognized as such, judging by their actions. They are elevated to the account of the actual human properties - consciousness and initiative, and as a result they almost always have an unnatural state of the body. These are painful shocks to the entire human being. This alone should suggest that they have a good place only in a sinner. Diseases should be taken to where the source of diseases is. And indeed, while in a sinner the highest spiritual feelings are drowned out and the spiritual ones are perverted, the lower ones rage in him in all their strength. This is facilitated by the loss of power over oneself, surrendering oneself to the general attraction of circumstances, failure to control either one’s external or internal, which constitute the constant property of a sinful person. In addition, the upset state of mind and will, already weak, easily exposes them to the power of these unexpected defeats and unrest. Finally, the dominion of a wild imagination, disturbing attention, disturbing desires, easily excites the heart. The sinner is inevitably in constant anxiety. There is no power in him that would protect him from their evil influence. Now fear, now joy, now melancholy, now shame, now grief, now envy or something else that continuously troubles and wounds his soul. The life of a sinner is a path along thorny thorns, despite the outer bright environment. It is in vain that they come up with some mechanical means against passions or talk about a safe middle. There is no salvation from them without healing the entire human spirit, for they are evidence and consequences of the disorder of our being. Return integrity to the being - and evil passions will cease. In true Christianity this wholeness returns through the action of God’s grace, which, having come, extinguishes passions. A Christian who follows his path as he should finally achieves sweet peace and an undisturbed, firm peace that is not shaken by the storm of passions. There is sadness here too, but not that kind; there is joy, but of a different kind; there is anger, and fear, and shame, and other movements similar in name to passions, but their essence is completely different, their source is different; they even come from another force, for they are reflected in the heart from the spirit, and not from the animal part. It is in vain that it is said this way: one should not eradicate passions, but should only moderate them. This is the same as saying: there is no need to hit the heart with a poisonous arrow through and through, but only on the surface. No, a zealous lover of moral purity, with the help of God's grace, fights against these incarnations of evil, suppresses them and finally manages to completely extinguish them. This is evidenced by the rules of those who labored and the depiction of the state of the perfect, which can be found among the saints. This is how it should be, for in self-sacrifice selfhood is extinguished and the intention is to extinguish animality. Consequently, the supports of passions are undermined at the very beginning. How can the passions themselves endure? They say: if so, then the soul will remain cold lifelessness, a wild desert. So - in the soul of some Stoic, but not a blessed Christian. To such people one can say: just drown out the passions in the Christian way, and you will find out for yourself what will happen; but know that it will not be a desert. Thus, in the sensory powers, a true Christian and a sinner are completely opposite. For him, the highest feelings are in full force, the spiritual feelings serve as a continuation of them or as an application to real life, the lower ones are extinguished. In the latter, on the contrary, the latter are in force, the higher ones are extinguished, the middle ones are perverted. The same, therefore, is true in all the forces of our inner world. Where one has a head, another has legs. One is all in God and lives in spirit, with the mortification of the lower part and the subordination of the middle; the other is outside of God, in the sensory-animal world, lives in fantasy, is troubled by desires, is struck by passions with the extinguishing of the spirit and the degradation of mental activity. The sharpest, most obvious and most visible difference between a true Christian and a person given over to sin is expressed in how they act with their body. Take the life of any saint and you will find that the beginning of his appeal to God or the first actions of pleasing God are signified by torment, exhaustion and exhaustion of the flesh. A person living in sin extensively nourishes and warms his flesh and cannot take the courage to deny it anything or to embitter it in any way. This is the general attitude towards the body of both. In the full picture it is like this. The body is the closest instrument of the soul and the only way to discover it outside in the real world. This is its original purpose. Therefore, by its very structure it is completely adapted to the forces of the soul. With all this, however, the body is still something external to the soul, something that it must separate from itself and, considering it its own, not merge with itself. When man fell, the soul weakened, lost power over itself, fell into the flesh and merged with it, merged to the point that it seemed to become conscious of itself only in the flesh and through the flesh. When such a merging of consciousness with the flesh occurred, the inevitable consequence of this was the consciousness of all the needs of the body, and all the instinctual drives that arise in animal life, and together - oblivion of the needs of the spirit, for the flesh and carnal things are more tangible. As soon as the needs of the body were considered one’s own, they had to be satisfied with care, without worrying about the spirit. Frequent satisfaction gave rise to carnal inclination and extinguished the corresponding perfection of the spirit. Since we have as many instinctual drives as there are functions in the body, and these last ones can be counted mainly as five, namely: the functions of the senses, movement, speech, nutrition and sexual functions, then according to these last ones we can also classify the very inclinations that are formed in the soul from the unreasonable satisfaction of their demands. So the senses give the instinct or the need to use them. Satisfaction of this need gives rise to the following inclinations: thirst for impressions, ogling, pleasure of the senses, absent-mindedness. These inclinations, having become stronger, destroy attention and self-collection in the spirit. From the organs of movement the need for movement develops, and from it then - an inclination towards independent activity, a desire for external freedom, self-will, and riotousness. They take away freedom from the spirit. The organs of speech have a need to be moved or irritated. Hence talkativeness, laughter, idle talk, jokes. They impose silence on the inner word of the spirit - prayer. From the instinct of nutrition develop voluptuousness, bliss, gluttony, laziness, and idleness. This takes away any movement of spiritual activity. As a result of undue satisfaction of sexual functions, the desire to please, panache, red tape and the very passions of dishonor occur. They take away the purity and dispassion inherent in the spirit. All this will immediately be found and recognized by every impartial observer of himself, especially by a person who has turned his attention to himself under the influence of God’s grace. He clearly sees and feels that he is surrounded, as if by bonds, by carnal passions and inclinations, which do not give freedom to his spirit to act in accordance with his nature, and when he looks closer, he finds that they are from the flesh and precisely from the unreasonable satisfaction of its needs. Having decided to correct himself in everything and, therefore, to restore the freedom inherent in the spirit, he would like to limit these needs to a prudent measure of their satisfaction, for example, moderate food, sleep, etc.; but the formed inclinations have become so closely related, or have come into such a sensitive connection with their organs, that the slight movement of these organs leads to the strength of the inclination and harms the spirit; for example, from a slight movement of feelings - plundering of thoughts and loss of composure, from eating enough food - coldness of spirit and lethargy, etc. Therefore, from the first time, he considers it a law for himself to bind the organs of the body, so that the inclinations formed through them are not excited by them and the spirit has the freedom to restore its inherent perfections. This is how bonds are imposed on the senses - through solitude, in order to establish and maintain attention and self-collection, in which the strength of the spirit: to movement - through regular work and obedience in order to restore freedom in the spirit; on the organs of the word - silence in order to resurrect the inner word, or raising the mind to God in prayer; on the nutritional organs - by fasting, not sleeping, lying down for long periods of time, in order to maintain liveliness in the spirit; on the genital organs - chastity and celibacy, in order to establish dispassion in oneself. This is the reason why the saints of God, without exception, went through a cruel life! Without this, it is impossible to purify the spirit, it is impossible to restore it and reveal it in all its inherent power. This is a necessary path to his freedom. Only as the flesh becomes exhausted is it released from it. Therefore, whoever flatters himself with the hope of achieving perfection in the spirit without harsh treatment of the body is like someone who would like to carry water with a sieve, or catch the wind with his hands, or write words on water. This is vain and unreasonable labor, in which what one acquires one minute is squandered the next. Among the saints of God, the body truly became an instrument for higher purposes. They scrubbed away the numb spirit through body friction. It is remarkable in this regard that they considered the body, or animal life, as if an outsider, which is why, when going to sleep, they said: go, donkey... this means that their body was separated from their personality and the co-dissolution of consciousness with it ceased. How obvious now is the need for a narrow, sorrowful and cross path to salvation! We meet it at all levels of our lives. The body must be constrained by bodily exploits: otherwise all labors are useless. The activity of imagination, desires and passions that follows inside - this restless, disorderly activity - must be suppressed by inner intense vigilance. The activity of spiritual forces that stands above this must be corrected by spiritual labors: reading and reasoning, good deeds and worship. Finally, the spirit must be restored or educated through contemplation of God, prayer, and the participation of the sacraments. These are all hard, sweaty activities! Consequently, the integral character of a truly Christian life is labor, asceticism, sweaty and intense work. This is a review of the beginnings of Christian life and activity. Now it is obvious that the natural principles of moral life, weakened and weakened in the fall, are restored by Divine grace in the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. In this gracious action, man is divided into himself, or light is separated from darkness in man. As time goes on, the darkness weakens, the light grows and rises, and as it intensifies, it drives away the darkness, which can shrink the area into a barely noticeable volume. Man comes “to the measure of the stature of the fulfillment of Christ” (Eph. 4:13). “This is why I say and obey about the Lord, who is not for you to walk, just as the rest of the heathen walk in the vanity of their minds, darkened in meaning, alienated from the life of God, for the ignorance that is in them, for the petrification of their hearts. Those who, in despair, have given themselves over to the practice of doing all kinds of uncleanness in covetousness. But this is not how you come to know Christ: If you have heard Him and have learned about Him, as is the truth about Jesus, after the first life you have laid aside the old man, which is corrupting through the lusts of deceitful desires: and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, which according to God was created in righteousness and the likeness of the truth” (Eph. 4:17-24). You might be interested in: