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58 And if through necessity you have to converse with such a person, be as brief as you can, and preserve a grave and modest demeanour, and let your words incline to harshness, rather than to excess of tenderness and affability.

Presume not on your own strength, if you are free, and have been for very many years free, from the temptations of the flesh; for this cursed vice does in an hour what for years it has failed to do, often making its advances stealthily; and the more it comes in the garb of a friend without exciting suspicion, the more grievous are the injuries and the more fatal the wounds it inflicts.

And often there is more to be feared—as experience has often shown, and shows every day—where intercourse seems perfectly legitimate, as with relations, or in the discharge of duties, or with persons who from their virtues ought to be beloved. For with this too frequent and unguarded intercourse, the poisonous pleasure of sense insinuates itself; gradually instilling itself, until it penetrates into the very depths of the soul, and darkens the reason more and more, until things which are most dangerous are regarded as of no account; such as loving looks, words of mutual endearment, and charms of conversation; and thus, step by step, a ruinous fall is approached, or at the least some painful temptation which is with great difficulty overcome.