ord, this is the business of a perfect man, never to relax his mind from attentive thought of heavenly things, and amid many cares to pass by, as it were, without care. Not as one destitute of all feeling, but by a certain privilege of a free mind, cleaving to no creature with inordinate affection.
I beseech You, most gracious God, preserve me from becoming too entangled with the cares of this life; from the many necessities of the body, that I may not be ensnared by pleasure; from whatever is an obstacle to the soul, that I may not be broken with troubles and overthrown. I do not say preserve me from those things which worldly vanity so earnestly covets, but from those miseries, which as punishments by the common curse of mortality† weigh down and hinder the soul of Your servant, that it cannot enter the freedom of the Spirit, as often as it would.
O my God, my eternal joy, turn to bitterness all carnal comfort, which draws me away from the love of things eternal, and in evil manners allures me to itself by the view of some present delightful good. Let me not be overcome by flesh and blood;† let not the world and its the brief glory deceive me; let not the Devil and his cunning make me fall. Give me strength to resist, patience to endure, and constancy to persevere. Give
