The Danger of Spiritual Pride and Deception

To have become pure, and to have ascended to the edge of holiness. Regarding these things—and the impurities from which he abstained, and the fasts he chose—they assign to him the times in which he ought to boast as an elite, and they diminish the brotherhood as something trivial. Thus, they narrate his struggles as if they were perfected by his own strength alone, saying, 'I did these things, and I practiced thus, and I was persecuted,' while even now cutting off the saying, 'Not I, but the help within me.' For they do not allow him to confess God as a helper in those things in which they make him magnify himself, so that, having completed all the struggles as if from his own inherent strength, he might fully demand the praise of his labors, so that he might sink into the abyss of blasphemy, unashamedly contradicting himself.

Chapter 44. Thus, indeed, when the heart is echoed by the glory of thoughts and does not oppose them, it will not be outside the possibility of a madness in the secret parts of the mind, with the ruling part of the mind being at risk of being cast out, or through believing in dreams, or being transformed in vigils, or being dazzled by a transformation of light. For Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light to deceive us (2 Cor 11:14), perhaps showing gifts, so that having fallen you might worship, or proclaiming himself to take up the role as another Elijah, or promising to sanctify, some of whom, having received faith in these, missed the truth and became mentally deranged. You then, O suppliant of the Holy Trinity, knowing these things in which you labor, keep your heart with every guard, lest, attending only to external labors, you be bitterly drenched from within. My words, then, O child, are spoken to you, and let your heart keep my sayings; remember Christ who guards you, and let him not forget the worshiper and the consubstantial Trinity, to whom is the glory forever. Amen.