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To this what shall we wretched creatures say, who though living in
Coenobia and established under the government and care of an Abbot yet
carry about our own keys, and trampling under foot all feeling of shame and
disgrace which should spring from our profession, are not ashamed actually
to wear openly upon our fingers rings with which to seal what we have
stored up; and in whose case not merely boxes and baskets, but not even
chests and closets are sufficient for those things which we collect or
which we reserved when we forsook the world; and who sometimes get so angry
over trifles and mere nothings (to which however we lay claim as if they
were our own) that if any one dares to lay a finger on any of them, we are
so filled with rage against him that we cannot keep the wrath of our heart
from being expressed on our lips and in bodily excitement. But, passing by
our faults and treating with silence those things of which it is a shame
even to speak, according to this saying: "My mouth shall not speak the
deeds of men," let us in accordance with the method of our narration
which we have begun proceed to those virtues which are practised among
them, and which we ought to aim at with all earnestness; and let us briefly
and hastily set down the actual rules and systems that afterwards, coming
to some of the deeds and acts of the elders which we propose carefully to
preserve for recollection, we may support by the strongest testimonies what
we have set forth in our treatise, and still further confirm everything
that we have said by examples and instances from life.
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