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the great weight of your many gifts. You who made the sparrows speak with voices, grant speech also to me, the all-wretched one, so that to all, in writing and unwritten, I may recount, what you have worked in me through infinite mercy, O my God, and through your philanthropy alone. For they are both awesome and great beyond understanding, what you have bestowed upon me, the stranger, the unlearned, the poor, the one without boldness, the one cast off by every man. My parents did not attend to me with natural love, my brothers and all my friends mocked me, for saying they loved me they lied in every way. My relatives, the outsiders, the rulers of the world turned away from me and endured to see me only so as to destroy me along with their own impieties. Often I desired glory without sin and I have not yet found it in the present life; for worldly glory, as I have been assured, is sin even without any other action. How many times I desired that men love me and to have boldness of intimacy with them, and none of those who are well-disposed endured me; but others rather wished to see me and know me, and I fled them as workers of evil. All these things, therefore, Master, and others more than these, which I am not able even to speak of, nor to recall, you, providing for me, the prodigal, have worked, that you might draw me from the abyss and the worldly darkness (142) and from the terrible deceit of the pleasures of life. The good fled from me because of my outward appearance, and I fled the wicked by my own choice; for I loved, as has been said, the glory and wealth of the world and the show of clothing and the ways of indolence. But I do not know what I shall utter, I do not know what to say to you; for I am afraid both to speak and to write such things, lest I fall into my own words and sin, and what is written falsely will be indelible. Whenever someone called me to works of madness and sin, truly, of this deceitful world, within, my whole heart drew itself in and as it were hid itself in shame, being held invisibly in every way by your divine hand. And I loved all the other things of life, all that delight the sight and soothe the throat and adorn the body, this perishable thing. But the foul deeds and licentious desires you indeed wiped away from my heart, my God,

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τό μέγα βάρος τῶν πολλῶν δωρεῶν σου. Ὁ τά στρουθία φωναῖς λαλεῖν ποιήσας δώρησαι κἀμοί λόγον, τῷ παναθλίῳ, ἵνα τοῖς πᾶσιν ἐγγράφως καί ἀγράφως διηγήσωμαι, ἅ εἰς ἐμέ εἰργάσω διά ἔλεος ἄπειρον, ὁ Θεός μου, καί διά μόνην τήν σήν φιλανθρωπίαν. Καί γάρ ὑπέρ νοῦν φρικτά τε καί μεγάλα πέλουσιν, ἅπερ παρέσχες μοι τῷ ξένῳ, τῷ ἀμαθεῖ, τῷ πτωχῷ, τῷ ἀπαρρησιάστῳ, τῷ ἀπό παντός ἀπερριμένῳ ἀνθρώπου. Γονεῖς οὐ προσεῖχόν μοι φυσικῇ τῇ ἀγάπῃ, οἱ ἀδελφοί καί φίλοι μου πάντες ἐνέπαιζόν μοι, ἀγαπᾶν γάρ με λέγοντες ἐψεύδοντο εἰς ἅπαν. Οἱ συγγενεῖς, οἱ ἔξωθεν, οἱ ἄρχοντες τοῦ κόσμου τοσοῦτόν με ἀπεστρέφοντο καί ἠνείχοντο βλέπειν, ὅσον συναπολέσαι με ταῖς αὐτῶν ἀσεβείαις. Πολλάκις ἐπεθύμησα δόξης ἀναμαρτήτως καί οὔπω ταύτην εὕρηκα ἐν τῷ παρόντι βίῳ˙ ἡ δόξα γάρ ἡ κοσμική, καθώς ἐβεβαιώθην, καί δίχα ἄλλης πράξεως ἁμαρτία τυγχάνει. Ποσάκις ἐπεθύμησα ἀνθρώπους ἀγαπᾶν με καί ἔχειν οἰκειότητος πρός αὐτούς παρρησίαν, καί οὐδείς μου ἠνέσχετο τῶν ἀγαθά φρονούντων˙ ἄλλοι δέ μᾶλλον ἤθελον βλέπειν με καί γνωρίζειν, ἐγώ δέ τούτους ἔφευγον ὡς τῶν κακῶν ἐργάτας. Ταῦτα οὖν πάντα, ∆έσποτα, καί ἄλλα τούτων πλείω, ἅ οὐδέ λέγειν εὐπορῶ, οὐδ᾿ ἀπομνημονεύειν, σύ εἰς ἐμέ, τόν ἄσωτον, προνοῶν ἀπειργάσω, ἵνα ἑλκύσῃς ἐκ βυθοῦ καί κοσμικοῦ με σκότους (142) καί τῆς ἀπάτης, τῆς δεινῆς, τῶν τοῦ βίου ἡδέων. Οἰ ἀγαθοί με ἔφευγον διά τό ἔξω σχῆμα, τούς δέ φαύλους ἐξέφευγον οἰκείᾳ προαιρέσει˙ ἠγάπων γάρ, ὡς εἴρηται, δόξαν καί πλοῦτον κόσμου καί φαντασμόν ἐνδύματος καί βλακευμάτων ἤθη. Οὐκ οἶδα δέ τί φθέγξομαι, οὐκ οἶδα τί σοι εἴπω˙ φοβοῦμαι γάρ καί τό λαλεῖν καί γράφειν τά τοιαῦτα, μή περιπέσω τοῖς ἐμοῖς λόγοις καί ἁμαρτήσω, καί ἔσται ἀνεξάλειπτον τό ψευδῶς γεγραμμένον. Ὅταν προσεκαλεῖτό με εἰς ἔργα τις μανίας καί ἁμαρτίας, ἀληθῶς, τοῦ πλάνου κόσμου τούτου, ἔσωθεν ἡ καρδία μου συνελέγετο ὅλη καί ὥσπερ κατεκρύπτετο ἑαυτήν αἰδουμένη, συνεχομένη ἀφανῶς πάντως χειρί σου θείᾳ. Καί τά μέν ἄλλα ἅπαντα ἠγάπων τά τοῦ βίου, ὅσα τε ὄψιν τέρπουσι καί λεαίνουσι λάρυγγα καί σῶμα καλλωπίζουσι, τό φθειρόμενον τοῦτο. Τάς πράξεις δέ τάς μυσαράς καί ἀσελγεῖς ὀρέξεις σύ δή ἐκ τῆς καρδίας μου ἀπήλειψας, Θεέ μου,