Watching the Serpent’s Head

For the cunning serpent is always “watching our heel,” that is, lying in wait for the end, and trying to trip us up right to the close of our life. So it will be of no use to have made a good beginning and to have taken the first step toward renouncing the world eagerly and with all fervor, if a matching end does not likewise crown and complete it, and if the humility and poverty of Christ, which you have now professed in his sight, are not kept by you to the very end of your life, as they were first secured. And so that you may succeed in this, always “watch his head,” that is, the first stirrings of thoughts, by bringing them at once to your superior. For in this way you will learn to “bruise” his dangerous beginnings, if you are not ashamed to disclose any of them to your superior. [a]