Nilus of Ancyra→Julian|c. 415 AD|nilus ancyra|From Ancyra|AI-assisted
To Julian the Reader [Greek anagnostes, the lector who reads Scripture aloud in the liturgy].
Some are eager to lay hold of perfect and pure repentance, but, being hindered for a time by the wickedness of the spirits, they grow listless [Greek akedia, the despondency of the monastic life]; and, soon worn out, they withdraw from the contest they had begun, and the repentance which seems small and, as one might say, scripturally "short-sighted" [an allusion to 2 Peter 1:9, where the man lacking virtues is called blind and nearsighted], they too—since they do not know how to keep it—are driven on to their ruin. Therefore let us not withdraw from Leah, who has the weak eye [Genesis 29:17, where Leah's eyes are weak], and after no long while we shall obtain the longed-for Rachel, the fair-eyed. And this would be virtue most perfect, and pure, and unswerving.
To Julian the Reader [Greek anagnostes, the lector who reads Scripture aloud in the liturgy].
Some are eager to lay hold of perfect and pure repentance, but, being hindered for a time by the wickedness of the spirits, they grow listless [Greek akedia, the despondency of the monastic life]; and, soon worn out, they withdraw from the contest they had begun, and the repentance which seems small and, as one might say, scripturally "short-sighted" [an allusion to 2 Peter 1:9, where the man lacking virtues is called blind and nearsighted], they too—since they do not know how to keep it—are driven on to their ruin. Therefore let us not withdraw from Leah, who has the weak eye [Genesis 29:17, where Leah's eyes are weak], and after no long while we shall obtain the longed-for Rachel, the fair-eyed. And this would be virtue most perfect, and pure, and unswerving.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.