terrified demons, I have cast out the devil, I have raised the dead, I have cleansed lepers, the opposing powers hold me in fear, what further need have I of fasting and of the weakness which it brings?’ He said none of these things, nor were they in his mind; but the greater his abundance of good deeds, the more he feared and trembled, and this asceticism he had learnt from his master; for he who had been rapt into the third heaven and taken into paradise, who had heard ineffable words and had participated in mysteries so high, who had traversed the whole world as if with wings, said, in writing to the Corinthians: _I fear lest, having preached to others, I myself should be cast out_. Now, if Paul, who was able to say, _The world is crucified to me and I to the world_, is in fear after all these his wonderful deeds, how much more should _we_ fear, and this should increase in proportion to the number of our good actions. For the devil storms and rages the more when he sees us ordering our lives with care. When he sees much goodness pressed together and an accumulation of merits, then it is that he sets himself to bring about a completer shipwreck. For a poor and abject man, even if he be supplanted and fall, does not so injure the common good. Now, when he who stands, as it were, gloriously on the heights of virtue, seen and known to all, the object of general admiration, falls into temptation, he effects great ruin and havoc, not only because he fell from a high place, but also because he made those who looked up to him more slothful. Just as in the body, when a member withers up, the harm is not great, yet, if the eyes fail or the head is injured, the whole body becomes useless, so is it with the saints and with those who do great things. When these are extinguished, when they admit any stain, they work immense harm to the whole body.