64 Blessed is he who has become magnanimous and kindhearted and not enslaved himself to untamed vehemence or wicked wrath; he will be magnified by the Lord. Blessed is he who has been exalted in love and stands like a city built on a mountaintop, for whom the enemy withdraws with terror when he sees him; for he fears a man who is firm in the Lord. Blessed is he who has shone forth with faith in the Lord like a bright candle on a tall candlestick, and has illumined the souls of those in darkness who followed the teachings of the faithless and the irreverent. Blessed is he who ever loves truth and does not let his lips arm dishonor with lies, for he fears the commandment that forbids even idle talk. Blessed is he who does not foolishly judge his neighbor, but rather, as befits a reasonable, spiritual man, tries first to cast out the beam from his own eye. Blessed is he who has consciously exercised restraint, and who has never been seduced, neither in thought nor in his senses, by skin and flesh which soon pass and putrefy. Blessed is he who keeps the day of his departure ever before his eyes, and has learned to hate arrogance before our inherent worthlessness is to be revealed by putrefaction in the grave. #Ephraim_the_Syrian #Spiritual_psalter