68. Молва и речи человеческие. Нужда в добром советнике. Постоянная опасность со стороны врага

God's mercy be with you! How painfully your word “rumor has spread” resonated in my heart! Oh, how terrible and corrosive is the fire of speech and suspicious human eyes! And it is clear why in the psalms the holy prophet David, with heart disease, often turns to God in prayer to deliver him from the tongue of man. Where can you find consolation and support? In the testimony of your conscience. Keep this awareness of the moral worth of your actions before God and all sane people in your mind and heart. With him, you will courageously face any speech, no matter what. Meanwhile, treat everyone as if you know nothing. In everyday life, you cannot completely neglect what they say or what they say. The matter of prudence, however, here should extend only to the following: conduct business in such a way as not to irritate speeches and not cloud the eyes of men. This should not go further: to postponing, for example, matters that are considered obligatory. So far, how have you expressed any peculiarity?! Was it really because they went to St. Sergius?! But this was not done publicly, and here you were hidden behind your own people. Or the fact that on all Sundays and holidays you go to church for the all-night vigil and the liturgy?! But this is a duty faithfully performed by all Christians who remember that they are Christians. Only extreme need can dissuade him from fulfilling it, without incurring the reproach of laziness and forgetting one’s Christianity. Don’t look at the bad customs of Moscow young ladies and don’t listen to their empty speeches. Now and tomorrow is death. She doesn’t look at beauties - she kills them too. And after death - immediately a report. And the cleverness of the young ladies there will not be taken into account. So don't worry about speeches. Everything is done on your part so as not to irritate them. If, despite that, they went, let them. To console and strengthen your courage, as I said, the testimony of your conscience before God is enough. Let everyone condemn, but if God justifies in conscience, all these judgments are nothing. One of the observers told me that human speech, as long as it does not cling to anything really bad, will stand over a person like a waterless cloud and move away. And their trace will disappear, and no one will remember them. The same, I think, will happen in relation to you. I wish this for you with all my heart. Keep yourself calm, as always, as if you didn’t notice anything. Instead of ascetic rigor, which is inapplicable in your everyday life, take the fear of God and mortal memory - and they will teach you everything. Write about everything. Secrecy in everyday life is not a bad thing, but in spiritual life it is the most dangerous. You definitely need to have someone with whom you can consult about everything that happens both outside and, especially, inside. As soon as you and I are talking about this, then write. There is some kind of bad force around us and in us, which, through various illusory good qualities, misleads us and confuses our affairs, leading us either to idleness or even to evildoing. The enemy sits by your side and pushes everything under your arm. One’s own reasoning also helps a lot against him: not immediately doing every deed that seems good, but discussing it comprehensively in advance. When you begin to discuss, the illusory quality of good with which the enemy dresses his suggestions will immediately dissipate. But his reasoning does not always have time to do this, because the enemy often confuses him with his hints (our elders called this decoys). Write and tell everything. And if you find anyone there, talk to them about everything more often. Save you, Lord, and have mercy! You have to learn to live. Watch yourself. Mistakes will show you how to do better next time. You might be interested in: