“We must suppose that those who secretly wrestle with us abide in another great world which, in its nature, is akin to the natural powers of our soul. For the three princes of evil, in their fight with spiritual strugglers, attack the three powers of our soul, and if a man has failed in something or does not strive at something, they overcome him in this very thing. Thus, the dragon—the prince of the abyss—rises in arms against those who keep attention on their heart, as one whose ‘strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly’ (Job xl. 16). He sends the lust-loving giant of forgetfulness against them with his clouds of fiery arrows, stirs up lust in them like some turbulent sea, makes it foam and burn in them and causes their confusion by flooding them with torrents of insatiable passions. The prince of this world, who is charge of warfare against the excitable part, attacks those who follow the path of active virtue. Using the giant of laziness, he encompasses them with all kinds of witchery of the passions and wrestles with those who always put up a courageous resistance. Thus he either vanquishes or is himself vanquished and so he gains them either crowns or shame before the faces of the angels. The prince of high places attacks those who exercise themselves in mental contemplation, by offering them fantasies; for, in company with the spiritual wickedness in high places, his task is to affect the thinking and rise on high, darkens and frightens it, introducing into it vague fantastic images of spirits and their metamorphoses and producing phantoms of lightning and thunder, tempests and earthquakes. Thus each of the three princes, impinging upon the corresponding powers of the soul, wages war against it, conducting his attacks against the particular part allotted to him.”
St. Gregory of Sinai
“Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” (Ephesians VI. 11, 12)
“The dragon is thy sensual soul: how is it dead? It is (only) frozen by grief and lack of means.
If it obtain the means of Pharaoh, by whose command the water of the river would flow,
Then it will begin to act like Pharaoh and will waylay a hundred (such as) Moses and Aaron.
That dragon, under stress of poverty, is a little worm, (but) a gnat is made a falcon by power and riches.
Keep the dragon in the snow of separation; beware, do not carry it into the sun of ‘Iraq.
So long as that dragon of thine remains frozen, (well and good); thou art a mouthful for it, when it gains release.
Mortify it and become safe from (spiritual) death; have no mercy; it is not one of them that deserves favours;
For (when) the heat of the sun of lust strikes upon it, that vile bat of thine flaps its wings.
Lead it manfully to the spiritual warfare and battle: God will reward thee with access (to Him)…
Dost thou hope, without using violence, to keep it bound in quiet and faithfulness?
How should this wish be fulfilled for any worthless one? It needs a Moses to kill the dragon.”
Rumi
Source: Whitall N. Perry, The Spiritual Ascent: A Compendium of the World’s Wisdoms, pp. 397, 400
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