Letters

³⁸ Answer me now, O Paul, in what way you give counsel for the present distress. “Because he that is without a wife is careful,” he says, “for the things of the Lord, how he may please God.” And he adds, “The unmarried woman and the virgin think of the things of the Lord, that they may be holy in body and spirit.” She has then her wall against the tempests of this world, and so fortified by the defence of divine protection she is disturbed by none of the blasts of this world. Good then is counsel, because there is advantage in counsel, but there is a bond in a commandment. Counsel attracts the willing, commandment binds the unwilling. If then anyone has followed counsel, and not repented, she has gained an advantage; but if she has repented, she has no ground for blaming the Apostle, for she ought herself to have judged of her own weakness; and so she is responsible for her own will, inasmuch as she bound herself by a bond and knot beyond her power to bear.