Letter 370: Theodore Studite, Letter 370; Greek heading: Κασσίᾳ.

What things your decorousness [a respectful form of address, here to Kassia] has once again uttered to us, things at once wise and at once judicious, so that it is fitting that I should be amazed as at something strange and should give thanks to the Lord, beholding so great a knowledge in a girl newly come of age - not, indeed, after the manner of the ancients (for we who live now fall far short, and we are infinitely inferior, both men and women, to their wisdom and learning), yet nonetheless because for the present time you have surpassed yourself most exceedingly, and your discourse is an adornment to you, more comely than every perishable elegance. But the thing sought after is this: that your life too should keep pace with your discourse, and that you should not limp in respect to the one of the two, since you have thus chosen in the present persecution to suffer for Christ - not being content that you were scourged of old, but rather once again writhing, as it were, and not having strength to bear the burning love of the noble confession. In which confession may you be preserved, seething with fervor; for truly you know what is noble and what is delightful, namely nothing other than to suffer for the truth and to gain advantage in sufferings. But gold and silver, glory and good living, and anything whatsoever among earthly things that seems to be well - it is nothing at all, even if such things have been named among the good, since they are in flux and ebbing away, like things seen in dreams and shadowy. What comes next? Your monk-loving choice of life, as you say, after the cessation of the persecution. Which did not astonish me, even if it is something strange; why? Because from what goes before one infers what follows, and the demonstration is reciprocal. If there is smoke, fire will assuredly come forth; and here too, since there is the confession of Christ, it is clear that the life of monastic perfection will blaze up. How blessed are you in both respects! Only do not eagerly await the laying on of my hand, since I am a sinner, but rather that of her by whose august imposition you shall be consecrated. Her who bore you into the light, by a refashioning of the true light, I greet most warmly as a mother of the day; from whom, together with those who come from you, having received the gifts, I have set up as a gift to my Lord the thanksgiving and the intercession on behalf of you both. Only that I have greatly burdened you; but may he who takes away the sin of the world lighten for you the burden that is here understood.