The Enarrations, or Expositions, on the Psalms

¹¹ “Deliver me not over, O Lord, by my own longing to the sinner”. Behold to what end Your overshadowing shall avail for me, that I suffer not heat from myself. And what could that “sinner” do to me, rage as he would? For wicked men raged against the martyrs, dragged them away, bound them with chains, shut them up in prisons, slew them with the sword, exposed them to wild beasts, consumed them with fire: all this they did; yet did not God deliver them over to the sinners, because they were not delivered over by their own longing.

This then pray with all your might, that God “delivered you not over by your own longing to the sinner.” For thou by your own longing givest place to the devil. For lo, the devil has set before you gain, invited you to dishonesty; you can not have the gain, unless thou commit the dishonesty: the gain is the bait, dishonesty the snare: do thou so look on the bait, that you see the snare also; for you can not obtain the gain, unless thou commit the dishonesty; and if you commit the dishonesty, you will be caught....Hence is your head overshadowed in the day of battle.

For longing causes heat, but the overshadowing of the Lord tempers longing, that we may be able to bridle that whereby we were being hurried away, that we be not so heated as to be drawn to the snare. “They have thought against me; leave me not, lest perchance they be exalted.” You have in another place, “They that oppress me will exult if I be moved.” Such are they, because such is the devil also himself....