To Donatus 15

Only you, whom the heavenly soldiery has now marked for the spiritual camp, keep your discipline uncorrupted, keep it sober with religious virtues. Let prayer or reading be constant with you. Now speak with God, now let God speak with you. Let him instruct you by his precepts, let him direct you. Whom he has made rich, no one will make poor. There can be no want any longer, once heavenly nourishment has filled the heart. Now ceilings picked out with gold and houses faced with slabs of costly marble will seem mean to you, when you know that it is rather you who must be cultivated, you who must be adorned, and that this house is better for you, in which the Lord has taken his seat as in a temple, in which the Holy Spirit has begun to dwell. Let us paint this house with the colours of innocence, let us light it with the light of justice. This will never fall into ruin with the old age of time, nor be defiled by fading paint on the walls or gold. Whatever is painted over is perishable, and things that do not have the reality of possession offer no stable confidence to their possessors. This remains with ever-living adornment, unimpaired honour, lasting splendour. It cannot be abolished or extinguished; it can only be formed for the better when the body returns.