People are commonly called wise through an incorrect use of this word. Not those are wise who have studied the sayings and writings of the ancient sages, but those whose soul is wise, who are able to discern what is good and what is evil; who flee from what is evil and harmful to the soul, and who reasonably care for what is good and beneficial to the soul, doing so with great thanksgiving to God. These alone, in truth, ought to be called wise people.

A truly wise person has but one concern: with his whole soul to obey and to please God in every way. For this reason, and for this reason alone, he instructs his soul — how to be pleasing to God, giving thanks to Him for His good providence, whatever circumstances of life he may find himself in. For it is unfitting not to thank physicians even when they give us bitter and unpleasant medicines for the healing of the body, and yet to remain ungrateful to God because what befalls us seems joyless to us, not understanding that all things happen according to His providence and for our benefit. In such understanding and in such faith in God lie the salvation and the peace of the soul.

A wise person, examining himself, comes to know what he ought to do and what is beneficial for him, what is akin to his soul and salvific, and what is foreign to it and destructive. Thus he avoids what harms the soul, as something alien to it.

That a soul is truly wise and virtuous is revealed in the gaze, the gait, the voice, the smile, the speech, and the conduct. In such a soul everything has changed and taken on a most comely form; its God-loving mind, like a vigilant gatekeeper, closes the entrances to evil and shameful thoughts.

A wise soul strives to rid itself of licentiousness, arrogance, pride, deception, envy, plunder, and the like, for such deeds are the works of demons and of evil will. All else, through careful diligence and attentive reflection, is accomplished by the person whose desire is not directed towards base pleasures.

Only wisdom that is active in us by deed (as mentioned in the first point) makes us worthy to be called human beings; lacking such wisdom, we differ from irrational creatures only by the arrangement of our limbs and the gift of speech. Therefore, let the rational person know that he is immortal, and let him hate every shameful lust which becomes for people the cause of death.

Wise people have no need to listen to all kinds of discourse, but only to those that bring benefit and lead to the knowledge of the will of God; for it is the path by which people return once again to life and to eternal light.

There is no benefit in studying the sciences if the soul does not possess a good and God-pleasing life. The cause of all evils is delusion, deception, and ignorance of God.

In conversations there should be no coarseness whatsoever; for wise people are usually adorned by modesty and chastity more than maidens.

The unstable and the untrained should not put wise men to the test. He is wise who pleases God and mostly keeps silence, or, if he speaks, speaks little — and only what is necessary and pleasing to God.

One cannot become a good and wise person at once; this is achieved through attentive reflection, practice, experience, prolonged ascetic struggle, and — above all — a strong desire for good. A good and God-loving person, having truly come to know God, gives himself no rest in doing everything without exception that is pleasing to God. But such men are rare.

A wise man, contemplating communion and fellowship with the Godhead, never clings to anything earthly or base, but directs his mind towards what is heavenly and eternal, knowing that the will of God — the cause of every good and the source of eternal blessings for humanity — is that a person be saved.

The mind is not the soul, but a gift of God that saves the soul. A God-pleasing mind goes before the soul and counsels it to despise the temporary, the material, and the corruptible, and to love the eternal, incorruptible, and immaterial good, so that a person, while living in the body, may mentally contemplate and behold what is heavenly and divine. Thus, the God-loving mind is the benefactor and saviour of the human soul.

A wise and soul-profitable word is a gift of God; whereas an empty word, seeking to define the measure and distance of heaven and earth, and the size of the sun and the stars, is a human invention of one who labours in vain, who through empty self-conceit seeks what brings him no benefit, as though wishing to draw water with a sieve — for this is impossible for people to attain.

He who has a mind knows about himself who he is — namely, that he is a mortal human being. And he who has come to know himself knows also of everything else that it is the creation of God, made for the salvation of man. To understand all things thus and to believe rightly lies within the power of a person. Such a man firmly knows that those who despise worldly goods have very little toil, yet receive eternal consolation and peace from God after death.

A wise soul, standing immovably in its good intention, like a rider restrains anger and lust — its most irrational passions — and for struggling against them, subduing and overcoming them, is crowned and made worthy of abiding in the heavens, receiving this as a recompense for sowing and labour from God who created it.

A truly wise soul, looking upon the prosperity of the wicked and the well-being of the unworthy, is not troubled, pondering their enjoyments in this life, as happens with foolish people; for such a soul clearly knows the instability of fortune, the uncertainty of dwelling here, the brevity of this life, and the impartiality of judgement, and believes that God does not neglect what is necessary for its sustenance.

A wise soul, despising material acquisition and the short-lived life, chooses heavenly consolation and eternal life, which it shall receive from God for a good life.

The mind dwelling in a pure and God-loving soul truly beholds God — unbegotten, invisible, ineffable — the One Pure for pure hearts.