…you must not attempt to acquire patience by immediately seeking crosses in which to delight; rather seek first the lowest degrees of this great virtue.  Similarly, do not aim at all sorts of virtue—not even many—simultaneously, but cultivate one firmly, then another, if you wish such habits to take deep root in your soul with greater facility.  For in the acquisition of a particular virtue, and in the focusing of thought upon its cultivation, the memory will be exercised more in this one line of endeavor; your understanding, enlightened by divine assistance, will find new means and stronger motives for attaining it, and the will itself will be invigorated with fresh ardor in the pursuit.  Such concentrated power of action is not possible when the three faculties are divided, as it were, by different objects. –Dom Lorenzo Scupoli ‘The Spiritual Combat’

St Dominic painting El Greco