52. But the foundations of virtue are never in
excess, for modesty does not hinder but rather commends the discharge
of duty. And so was his face suffused with a certain virginal
modesty, showing forth his inward feeling in his countenance, if
perchance he had, coming on a sudden, met some female relative, he was
as it were bowed down and sunk to the earth, though he was not
different in company with men, he seldom lifted up his face, raised his
eyes, or spoke; when he did one of these things, it was with a kind of
bashful modesty of heart, with which, too, the chastity of his body
agreed. For he preserved the gifts of holy baptism inviolate,
being pure in body and still more pure in heart; fearing not less the
shame of impurity in conversation than in his body; and thinking that
no less regard was to be paid to modesty in purity of words than in
chastity of body.