Letter 929

Since you desire to be the guide of many brothers, test yourself first, whether you are able to teach what must be done by deed rather than by word, setting your own life before those who learn as an image of all virtue, so that those who copy from it may not, by the fault of a misstep, blunt the beauty of that virtue. For know that you are bound to strive on behalf of those under your rule no less than on behalf of yourself; for once you have undertaken their salvation, you will be required to give account for them just as for yourself. Indeed, for the saints too the whole of their concern has been not to leave behind the disciples they have taught fallen away from their own virtue. Thus the Apostle [Paul] made Onesimus, from a runaway slave, into a martyr. And the prophet Elijah made Elisha, from a plowman, into a prophet; and Moses transformed Joshua son of Nun for the better; and the priest Eli proved Samuel to be even greater than himself. For though it was by the diligence of these pupils that they worked together with them toward the acquisition of virtue, yet the whole cause of their progress was the obtaining of teachers able to fan the smoldering spark of their eagerness into something greater.