St John Cassian (c. 360 - 435)
Sometimes… we claim to need solitude, as if we should find the virtue of patience in some place where nobody provokes us. We think that the source of our anger is not ourselves, but others. While we lay blame on others, we shall never be able to learn patience…. Our improvement and peace of mind does not depend on another's will – over which we have no control – but lies rather in our own control. We… should not enter the desert as a way of cowardly flight, but for the purpose of divine contemplation. For whatever faults we bring with us uncured into the desert, we shall find still more hiding within us. Poisonous snakes and wild beasts are not harmless just because they are alone; they cannot really be described as harmless just because they are not actually hurting anybody…. But when they get an opportunity to hurt someone, they produce at once the poison stored up in them, and show the ferocity of their nature…. 