Every person who cares about his own character, who examines his own manners and fairness, and who strives…

Every person who cares about his own character, who examines his own manners and fairness, and who strives toward beautiful morals belongs to a pure lineage. For the corruption in a person's nature does not allow him to think, “I must be a good person”; those whose nature has spoiled love not beauty and humanity but vileness and ignorance; it is not the triumph of goodness that delights them, but evil and wickedness; they draw strength not from purity and sincerity but from indecency, depravity, the forbidden and filth, and they cling to this wretchedness and keep merging with it, until there is no longer any possibility of separating them from vileness. The good are tormented by sin and disobedience and never remain in the clutches of baseness. They are moved by admonition, and they weep and beg God in secret, asking for the right path.