§ 2. Mortification.

As a pilgrim and stranger in this world, despise impure delights, that is to say, those of which God is not the cause, and which do not tend to union with God, and are not necessary to the support of nature. If thou still boldest the pleasures of the flesh in esteem and art much given to them, thou dost not yet sufficiently understand that thou art a stranger and pilgrim here.

Remember that thou art not an animal, but a man endowed with reason. Happy is the truly spiritual man, to whom it is sometimes given to experience how far heavenly and divine delights surpass and exceed those which are earthly and carnal. Happy is he who, beholding with the eyes of faith the pride of the flesh and the pomp and glory of the world, recognises that they are nothing: and in truth they are like a flower that quickly falls and withers away.