(149) Therefore take heed, that you be not found asleep in your sins; truly the prudent and the wise will take notice hereof, but the wicked will continue in their sins.

(20) Now if any one should in drunkenness or fulness fall upon them, and plunge himself into perdition, let him bear his own blame; he has need of a light in his heart, that his understanding and mind may be well governed.

(6) Wherefore "let the false lips become speechless, and let the Lord destroy the boastful tongue: those who say, We shall magnify our tongue, and our lips are our own; who is Lord over us? For the affliction of the poor and the groaning of the needy now will I arise, saith the Lord; I will set him in safety; I will speak out in his case." For it is to the humble that Christ belongs, who do not exalt themselves against His flock. "Lay not up for yourselves, therefore, treasures on the earth, where moth and rust destroy, and thieves break through and steal," says the Lord, in reproach perchance of the covetous, and perchance also of those who are simply anxious and full of cares, and those too who indulge their bodies. For amours, and diseases, and evil thoughts "break through" the mind and the whole man. But our true "treasure" is where what is allied to our mind is, since it bestows the communicative power of righteousness, showing that we must assign to the habit of our old conversation what we have acquired by it, and have recourse to God, beseeching mercy. He is, in truth, "the bag that waxeth not old," the provisions of eternal life, "the treasure that faileth not in heaven." "For I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy," saith the Lord. And they say those things to those who wish to be poor for righteousness' sake. For they have heard in the commandment that "the broad and wide way leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in by it." It is not of anything else that the assertion is made, but of profligacy, and love of women, and love of glory, and ambition, and similar passions. For so He says, "Fool, this night shall thy soul be required of thee; and whose shall those things be which thou hast prepared?" And the commandment is expressed in these very words, "Take heed, therefore, of covetousness. For a man's life does not consist in the abundance of those things which he possesses. For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" "Wherefore I say, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat; neither for your body, what ye shall put on.

(1) Whither stumble ye, sots, who have sopped up the wine of ignorance and can so far not carry it that ye already even spew it forth? Stay ye, be sober, gaze upwards with the [true] eyes of the heart! And if ye cannot all, yet ye at least who can! For that the ill of ignorance doth pour o`er all the earth and overwhelm the soul that's battened down within the body, preventing it from fetching port within Salvation's harbors.

(20) " And guard yourselves from all fornication and uncleanness, And from all pollution of sin, Lest ye make our name a curse, And your whole life a hissing, And all your sons be destroyed by the sword, And ye become accursed like Sodom, And all your remnant as the sons of Gomorrah.

(73) Then beware, lest somehow you fall into the hands of robbers. Do not allow sleep to your eyes nor drowsiness to your eyelids, that you may be saved like a gazelle from nets, and like a bird from a trap.

(52) Therefore take heed what thou dost, and consider what thou art; thou judgest others, and art blind thyself.

(26) Therefore have a care that thou put on the 1 corslet or coat of mail or habergeon [breastplate] of the spirit, else do venture to come near my warehouse, or thou wilt deal wrongfully [evilly] with my wares.

(95) Woe to you, ye rich, for ye have trusted in your riches, And from your riches shall ye depart, Because ye have not remembered the Most High in the days of your riches.

(59) Jesus said, "Take heed of the Living One while you are alive, lest you die and seek to see Him and be unable to do so."

(1) "So I say to you, be sober. Do not go astray. And often have I said to you all together, and also to you alone, James, be saved. I have commanded you to follow me, and I have taught you how to speak before the rulers.

I SAY not this for that I trow that thou, or any other such as I speak of, be guilty and cumbered with any such sins; but for that I would that thou weighest each thought and each stirring after that it is, and for I would that thou travailedst busily to destroy the first stirring and thought of these things that thou mayest thus sin in. For one thing I tell thee; that who weigheth not, or setteth little by, the first thought—yea, although it be no sin unto him—that he, whosoever that he be, shall not eschew recklessness in venial sin. Venial sin shall no man utterly eschew in this deadly life. But recklessness in venial sin should always be eschewed of all the true disciples of perfection; and else I have no wonder though they soon sin deadly.

(5) And those cares He indicated in the parable of the fourfold seed, when He said that "the seed of the word which fell unto the thorns" and hedges was choked by them, and could not bring forth fruit. It is therefore necessary to learn how to make use of every occurrence, so as by a good life, according to knowledge, to be trained for the state of eternal life. For it said, "I saw the wicked exalted and towering as the cedars of Lebanon; and I passed," says the Scripture, "and, lo, he was not; and I sought him, and his place was not found. Keep innocence, and look on uprightness: for there is a remnant to the man of peace." Such will he be who believes unfeignedly with his whole heart, and is tranquil in his whole soul. "For the different people honour me with their lips, but their heart is far from the Lord." "They bless with their mouth, but they curse in their heart." "They loved Him with their mouth, and lied to Him with their tongue; but their heart was not right with Him, and they were not faithful to His covenant."

(248) O man, know this, that the unrestrained are in a bad state; take care that greediness and vice do not bring thee to grief for a long time!