Do not adopt one familiarity of speech, and shun others. But what is useful for one to know, let it be known by all. Hear what the Lord says: 'What I tell you in darkness, speak in the light; what you hear in the ear, preach upon the housetops' (Matthew 10). That is, if anything has been revealed to you in the secret of the mind, say it openly: and what you have conceived in the heart, make manifest to all. If what you speak is good, why should one only, and not rather all, be informed? If it is base, you ought neither to think nor to speak what you would blush for others to know. It is no longer of the good, what a virgin speaks privately. For everyone who does evil, says the Lord, hates the light (John 3). Whence also that most prudent of philosophers said:
'All things rightly done love to be placed in the light.' O virgin, you speak secretly for this reason, because there is nothing whereof you might publicly glory. But if you deceive human ears and eyes, can you possibly deceive the knowledge of God? Beautifully does another say: 'What you wish God not to know, neither do nor think.' Let your conscience therefore be harmless, your speech free from fault. Let nothing worthy of rejection delight you either to hear or to think; much less to speak or to do.