Thursday.

   In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin (Prov. 10:19).[1] Christians who are attentive toward themselves call all the senses the windows of the soul; if these windows are opened, all the inner warmth will leave. But the most spacious doorway that releases this warmth copiously is a tongue given freedom to speak as much and whatever it wants. A multitude of words causes the same degree of harm to attentiveness and inner harmony as is inflicted by all of the senses in total, for words stimulate all the senses, and force a soul not seeing to see, not hearing to hear, not touching to touch. What on the inside is daydreaming is on the outside a multitude of words; but the latter is more ruinous, for it is real and therefore makes a deeper impression. Furthermore, it is closely connected with self-opinion, impudence, and self-wilfulness—those destroyers of inner harmony which are like a tempest, leaving lack of feeling and blindness in their wake. After all this, how can one escape sin in the presence of a multitude of words?!

[1]The Slavonic for Prov. 10:19 reads: In the multitude of words sin cannot be avoided.