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Of his own will a man remains there where is his love, even if he has been baptized, for the freedom of his will is not constrained. When the Scriptures say that 'the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence' (Matt. 11:12), they are speaking of own's own will, so that each one of us should urge himself, after baptism, not to turn towards evil but to abide in good. Those who have received the power to fulfil the commandments, the Lord commands, as being faithful, to be diligent in them, that they may not turn back.
Spiritual training is not something separate from commandments. It is the commandments. Show me works which are not commandments. If you speak of prayer - this is a commandment; if of casting down imaginations - this is a commandment (be sober and watch); if of fasting and vigil, this too is a commandment; if you consider self-mortification, this is a commandment (renounce yourselves). Whatever act of ascetic virtue you may mention - each one is a commandment.
Holy baptism gives us complete liberation; but to shackle oneself once more by passionate attachment or to remain liberated through doing the commandments lies within our own free will. If thought is firmly caught in some sinful pleasure, it is through our own willful attachment and is not something that happens against our will.
According to the Scriptures, we have the power of 'casting down imaginations' (2 Cor. 10:5). An evil thought, for those who cast it down in themselves, is a sign of their love for God, and not of sin; for not the impact of the thought is sin, but friendly converse of the mind with it. If we have no fondness for it, why do we linger in it? It is impossible that anything we hate whole-heartedly should have long converse with our heart, unless we are wickedly parties to it.
When after baptism, being endowed with power to fulfil the commandments, we do not do so, we become possessed by sin even unwillingly, until we move God to mercy by repentance, striving to do all His commandments, and He abolishes the sin of our self-will.
You have put on Christ through baptism (Gal. 3:27) and have the power and the weapon to cast down imaginations (2 Cor. 10:5). But if, having power over them, you do not cast them down at the first suggestion, it is obvious that you are pleasure-loving through unbelief; that you consent to them and make friends with them. So, you are yourself guilty in such behavior.
At times some bad thought we hate suddenly attacks us without our consent like a robber, and forcibly imprisons our mind. Yet know for certain that even this thought arose from ourselves; for either we have been surrendering to this bad thought since baptism, although not acting upon it; or we voluntarily keep within ourselves some seeds of evil, which give the evil one strength to dwell in us; and having power in us through these evil seeds, he will not leave us until we discard them.
As to an evil thought which remains in us through our doing evil, it will be driven away when we bring to God works worthy of repentance. So, you are yourself guilty of an involuntary thought which troubles you, for having the power to drive it away and cleanse your mind of it at the start of its first suggestion, you have not done so, but have willingly conversed with it, although not carrying it into action. (It comes to a place kept warm, as to an old friend or comrade.)
When you see in your heart help coming to you, know for certain that this grace has not come to you from outside, but that the grace mysteriously given you at baptism has now become active in you, in the measure that you have hated a thought and turned away from it.
As though linked in evil kinship, our lusts and impacts of thoughts act in consort with one another. Each thought, taking root in the man who has welcome it, passes him on to his next of kin, so that the man, strongly drawn by habit to the first, is carried away be the second, even against his will.
For who can escape pride if he is full of vainglory? Or who, having slept his fill and abandoned himself to pleasure, will not be overcome by lustful imaginings? Or who, having given himself up to extortion, will not fall captive to mercilessness? And how can those who enjoy all this avoid irritability and anger?
Even after receiving grace, it is in our will to walk according to the flesh or according to the spirit. But to walk according to the spirit is impossible for a man, who loves human praise and indulging his body; and to live according to the flesh is impossible for those who have inwardly chosen to give preference to the future life over the present.
Therefore we should hate human praise and indulgence of the body, through which evil thoughts are born in us even without our will, and should say sincerely to the Lord, 'I have hath hated them with perfect hatred; they were counted my enemies' (Ps. 138:22).
To those baptized in the Church baptism mysteriously gives grace, which dwells in them secretly; later, as they practice the commandments and keep hope in their minds, grace reveals itself in the believer according to the words of the Lord: 'He that believeth on Me ... out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (But this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive.)' (John 7:38-39).
Thus, if any of the faithful, living according to the commandments, has correspondingly acquired a certain spiritual doing, he should believe that he had already received the power for this; for he received at baptism the grace of the Holy Spirit - the Cause of all good, of virtues not only secret and spiritual, but also visible.
Let no virtuous man suppose that he can do anything good by his own powers alone, for 'a good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things' (Matt. 12:35), and not out of himself, meaning by the treasure, the Holy Spirit concealed in the hearts of the faithful.
A man who has convinced himself that, according to the words of the Apostle, he has Christ concealed in him from baptism, renounces all things of the world and remains in his heart, keeping it with the utmost care (Prov. 4:23). 'For it is God Which worketh in you both to will and to do of His* good pleasure' (Phil. 2:13). By the words 'of good pleasure' the Apostle shows that to have good pleasure in virtues depends on our free will, but to practice them or to uproot sins without God is impossible. The words 'without Me ye can do nothing' (John 15:5) have the same meaning. But in all things there is too our own participation.
[*St. Mark interprets this passage without the word "His".]
The sovereign mind of every man first receives, from out of the secret temple of the heart, good and blessed counsels from Christ dwelling within; (thereupon) he puts these counsels into practice by virtuous living, which he offers back to Christ, Who gave him counsel through good thoughts.
The blessings that the righteous will receive on resurrection are on high; but betrothals to these blessings and their first-fruits are even now acting spiritually in the hearts of believers, so that, possessing testimony of the future, we should renounce all the present and should love God unto death.
Therefore the Apostle said, not you are to come, but 'ye are come unto Mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem' (Heb. 12:22), for we were all given this possibility upon baptism, but only those of firm faith are granted it, those who die daily for love of Christ, that is, those who have risen above all thought of the present life and think of nothing but how to attain to perfect love of Christ.
Seeking this above all else St. Paul said, 'I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus' (Phil. 3:12), that is, that I may love as I am beloved of Christ. And when he reached this love, he no longer wished to think of aught else - neither of affliction of the body, nor of the marvels of creation, but he abandoned all visible things and said, 'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?' (Rom. 8:35). So he no longer wanted to think of anything, but only to dwell there (in the heart, in the love of Christ).
The Apostle said that we have in ourselves the first-fruits of the Spirit (Rom. 8:23), thus showing the measure of our capacity; for we cannot contain the total effect of the Spirit except by perfection in the commandments.
Just as the sun, being perfect, pours out upon all a perfect, single and equal blessing, but each man receives its light so far as his eye is clear; so too the Holy Spirit has made those who believe in Him able from baptism to receive all of His effects and gifts; yet His gifts do not act in all people in equal measure, but to each they are given in the measure of his practice of the commandments, that is, to the degree that he has testified by good deeds and has shown the measure of his faith in Christ.
A suggestion of Satan is a purely mental imagining of some wicked thing (or action); it is only our lack of faith which allows it the possibility of even coming near our mind. For when, after receiving the commandment to lay aside all troubles and to keep our heart with the utmost care (Prov. 4:23) and to seek the Kingdom of Heaven which is within us, the mind falls away from the heart and from this seeking, it immediately gives room to the devil's suggestions and becomes accessible to evil counsel.
But even then the devil had no power to move our thoughts, for otherwise he would show us no mercy, but would force every kind of evil thought upon us and allow us none that are good. His power is limited to suggesting the false only at the first onset of a thought, to test which way our inner disposition will incline, towards his counsel or towards God's commandment, for they are opposed to one another.
When the impact of some hateful thought lingers inside and becomes established there, this is due not to our new disposition but to what we have previously received. Such an impact stands arrested as a single thought. Resentment of the heart prevents its passing into multiplicity of thought and passion.
A single (bare) thought, hated by a man who pays heed to himself, has no power to entice the mind into multiplicity of thoughts. This can happen only when the heart has sympathy for it. Therefore, if we completely renounce all sympathy, the appearance (in the mind) of previously received images will always remain merely a bare thought and will no longer have the power to harm us or offend our conscience.
When the mind understands the uselessness of its struggle against images (impressions) received previously and confesses its former guilt to God, this temptation itself is withdrawn and the mind regains its power to take heed of the heart and to keep it with the utmost care by prayer, striving to enter into the most inner and safe chambers of the heart, where there are no longer tempestuous winds of evil thoughts to drive both soul and body into the rapids of lust and the torrent of uncleanness; nor is there the broad and roomy way, paved with words and images of worldly sophistry, which beguiles those who follow it, however wise they may be.
For the innermost pure chambers of the soul and the house of Christ admit our mind, when it is stripped bare and brings with it nothing of this world, whether justified by reason or not, except 'these three,' designated by the Apostle, 'Faith, hope, and love' (I Cor. 13:13).
So, if a man loves truth and wants to guard his heart, then, as was said above, he can stop being enticed away even by the impressions he has previously received, but can pay heed to his heart, make progress (in attainment) towards the innermost and draw nearer to God, provided he does not neglect the work of prayer and living (according to God). For a man cannot help working in his heart if he heedfully abstains every day not only externally, but also internally, from distractions of the mind and carnal pleasures.
Not to experience impacts of evil belongs only to the Immutable - but not to human nature. Adam too was accessible to suggestions of Satan. But he had the power either to listen to them or not. The impact of a thought is neither sinful nor righteous - it is a test of our free will.
This is why it is allowed to impinge upon us, so that those who incline towards the commandment should be rewarded for their faithfulness with crowns (of victory), and those who incline towards self-indulgence, be shown as worthy of condemnation for their faithlessness.
But even here we must know that it is not immediately after every change of ours that we are judged as to whether we have proved skillful or worthy of reprobation. But when we have been tried all our life with suggestions, conquering and being conquered, falling and rising again, straying and being directed to the right way, then only, on the day of departure, will all be counted and we shall be judged or praised accordingly.
So it is not suggestion that is sin. Not at all! For although it involuntarily (without our consent)offers us things in a bare thought, we have received from the Lord the power of spiritual doing and it is within our will, at the first onset of a thought, to discriminate the harmful and the useful, and to reject or accept thoughts, which multiply not through necessity, but through the soul's disposition.
Since our soul, darkened by lustfulness and vainglory, has sunk into the depths of foolishness, it listens neither to the commandments of the Scriptures nor to natural reason, nor to explanations by the experienced, but follows only its own fancies. Therefore, since it keeps these causes of evil in itself, neither can it be free from corresponding actions.
To the extent that each man believes the Lord concerning future blessings and despises human glory and pleasures, he will have corresponding power to control his thoughts and to be more at peace than a man who loves pleasures; therefore we differ from one another both in thoughts and in life.
Know for certain that the Lord sees into the hearts of all men; and, as He promised, He immediately protects those who hate the first appearance of evil thoughts, and does not allow them to multiply and, in rising, to defile the mind and conscience. But those who do not by faith and hope in God repulse the first inception of thoughts, but take pleasure in them, He leaves without help, as unfaithful ones, to be overcome by subsequent thoughts, which He does not drive away, for He sees that we love their first impact and do not hate them at their first appearance.
No power impels us forcibly either to good or to evil. But for whomever we work of our own free will, be it God or the devil, he later incites us to whatever things constitute his realm.
The beginnings of action are two suggestions of thoughts, unnoticed by the mind: human praise and indulgence to the body; when they impinge upon us involuntarily, before our will consents to them, they constitute neither virtue or vice, but merely disclose the inclination of our will...
Those who have sinned must not despair. Let that never be. For we are condemned not for the multitude of evils but because we do not want to repent and learn the miracles of Christ, as Truth Himself says, speaking of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices, 'Suppose ye', said the Lord, 'that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish' (Luke 8:1-5). So do you see, we are condemned for not having repentance.
Repentance, as I understand it, is not limited by time or any deeds, but is accomplished by means of Christ's commandments, and is measured by them..."