You should not surrender to these men once for all the rudders of your mind, as if of a ship, and follow them whithersoever they lead; rather, accept… - Basil of Caesarea

In general, just as painters in working from models constantly gaze at their exemplar and thus strive to transfer the expression of the original to their own artistry, so too he who is anxious to make himself perfect in all the kinds of virtue must gaze upon the lives of the saints as upon statues, so to speak, that move and act, and must make their excellence his own by imitation.

I consider it absurd that we should permit our senses to sate themselves without hindrance with their own material food, but that we should exclude the mind alone from its own particular activity.

βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν ἐντὸς ὑμῶν ἐστί. περὶ δὲ τὸν ἐντὸς ἄνθρωπον οὐδὲν ἕτερον ἢ θεωρία συνίσταται. θεωρία ἂν εἴη λοιπὸν ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν.