His two Confessions or Reprehensions of himself are only effusions of his heart in these dispositions. The first he begins as follows: “Have pity on me, all ye that have bowels of compassion.” Then he earnestly begs their prayers that he may find mercy with God, though he was from his infancy an useless abandoned vessel. He laments his spiritual miseries in the most moving words, declaring that he trembles lest, as flames from heaven devoured him who presumed to offer profane fire on the altar, so he should meet with the same judgment for appearing before God in prayer without having the fire of his divine love in his heart. He invites all men to weep and pray for him, making a public confession of the failings which his pure lights discovered in his affections; for in these, notwithstanding his extraordinary progress in the contrary virtues, he seemed to himself to discern covetousness, jealousy, and sloth, though he appeared of all men the most remote from the very shadow of those vices; and by tears of compunction he studied more and more to purify his heart, that God might vouchsafe perfectly to reign in it. The second part of this work is a bitter accusation of his pride; which sin, as he adds, destroys even the gifts of God in a soul, blasts all her virtues, and renders them a most filthy abomination; for all our virtues will be tried at the last day by a fire which only humility can stand. He laments how pride infects the whole world; that some, by a strange frenzy, seek to gratify it in earthly fooleries, and the most silly vanities, on which the opinion of madmen has stamped a pretended dignity and imaginary value. He laments bitterly, that even spiritual men are in danger of sinning, by taking pride in virtue itself, though this be the pure gift of God; and when by his mercy we are enriched with it, we are, nevertheless, base and unprofitable servants.
In his second Reprehension of himself, after having elegantly demonstrated a particular providence inspecting and governing the minutest affairs and circumstances, he grievously accuses himself of having entertained a doubt of it in his youth, before his conversion to God. He condemns himself as guilty of vain-glory, sloth, lukewarmness, immortification, irreverence in the church, talkativeness, contentiousness, and other sins. He fears lest his repentance should be like that of Esau, and begs the pity and prayers of all men for an infamous blind leper. He weeps to see that some men had conceived an esteem for him to whom none was due; and he cries out to them—“Take off my false covering, and you will see in me nothing but worms, stench, and filth: remove the cloak of hypocrisy, and you will find me a hideous and nauseous sepulchre.” He compares himself to the Pharisees, as wearing only the habit of the prophets and saints, to his heavier condemnation; for vice, covered with a mask of virtue, is always more odious and detestable. In another Confession (t. 3, p. 439), after accusing himself of sloth, pride, uncharitableness, and other sins, he most movingly entreats all men to weep for him; wishing they could see the extreme miseries of his heart, which could not fail most powerfully to excite their compassion, though they could not be able to bear the hideous sight of the load of his monstrous iniquities.
His treatise on the Passions is of the same nature, a lamentation that from his infancy he had been a contemner of grace, and slothful to virtue, strengthened daily his passions, and groaned in the midst of snares which made him fear to live lest he should go on relapsing into sloth.
He has left us many tracts on Compunction, which indeed all his writings breathe. In the first which bears this title, he invites all, rich and poor, old and young, to join him in weeping, to purchase eternal life and to be delivered from everlasting death: by weeping and crying to see with the blind man in the gospel, the soul will be enlightened to see her miseries. God, the angels, all heaven expect and invite us earnestly to these tears: God’s terrible judgment is at hand which he describes, and then adds, to prevent its justice we must weep not one day only, but all the days of our life, as David did, in affliction, continual prayer, austerities, and alms. The narrow gate does not admit others; the Judge will exclude those who sought their joy on earth and pampered their flesh. Then it will be too late to trim our lamps, or seek for the oil of good works; then no more poor will stand at any door for us to redeem our sins by alms. He laments our spiritual miseries, especially his sins and sloth continued all his life now to the eleventh hour. He awakes his soul by the short time that remains, and that uncertain too.
In his second he relates, that going out of Edessa early one morning, accompanied with two brethren, and beholding the heavens beautifully spangled with bright stars, he said to himself—“If the lustre of these luminaries be so dazzling, how will the saints shine when Christ shall come in glory! But suddenly the thought of that terrible day struck my mind, and I trembled in all my joints, and was seized with convulsions, and in an agony of fear, sighing and overwhelmed with a flood of tears, I cried out in bitter anguish of mind: ‘How shall I be then found! How shall I stand before that tribunal! A monster infected with pride among the humble and the perfect, a goat among the sheep, and a barren tree without fruit. The martyrs will show their torment, and the monks their virtues; but thou, alas! O sinful, vain, and arrogant soul, wilt only bear thy sloth and negligence.’” His two companions, moved by the excess of his tears, wept with him.
In his Discourse, that we ought never to laugh with a worldly joy, but to always weep, he enforces the obligation of perpetual compunction and tears.
In his ascetic Sermon, he says grief and zeal compel him to speak, but his unworthiness and his sins persuade him to be silent, his eyes delight only in tears to bewail night and day in floods the wounds of his soul, and above all that pride which conceals them from him. He laments tepidity and love of earthly things should be found among monks, and that some interrupt their mortifications, weeping one day and laughing the next, lying one night on the ground, the next on a soft bed, whereas all our life ought to be a course of penance; he extols the humility and constant mortification of the ancient and all true monks, like shining diamonds in the world. The rest of this long discourse is a vehement exhortation of the monks to fervor and zeal, this life being a time of traffic, and very short, and a nothing; the recompense immense, and the rigor of God’s justice terrible to all. He pronounces woes to himself in the confusion he expected in the last day before all who esteemed him here. Begs earnestly all pray for him. One of the principal means to preserve this fervor, is a strict examen every night and morning. A trader casts up every day his losses and gains, and is solicitous to repair any losses; so do you, says he, every morning and night make up your accounts carefully; examine yourself: Have I to-day spoken any idle words, despised any, &c.? Have I this night watched, prayed, &c.? He advises not to undertake too much in austerities, but such as the soul will not relax in, than which nothing is more pernicious.
His parænetic Sermon is also addressed to young monks, whom he advises to the continual presence of God in their minds most earnestly under temptations. Against sloth, he observes, this succeeding fervor by fits makes a life one chain of risings and falling again; building by mortification and destroying again by relaxing. He bids them have this inscription in the beginning of their book: Sloth banished for ever and ever from my soul.
His two sermons on the Fathers deceased, are also to monks, showing and lamenting their tepidity by the fervor of their fathers in the deserts. His Hypomnisticon is an exhortatory epistle to the same.
His treatise on Virtue is to a novice; he tells him obedience has no merit unless in hard and harsh things, for even wild beasts grow tame by mild treatment.