Hermas — Mandate 12.3-4

You say: “Lord, these commandments are great and fine and glorious, and they can gladden the heart of anyone who can keep them. But I do not know whether a human being can keep them, because they are very hard.” He answered: “If you set it before yourself that they can be kept, you will keep them easily and they will not be hard. But if it already rises in your heart that a human being cannot keep them, you will not keep them.”

Those who have the Lord on their lips, but whose heart is hardened and far from the Lord — for them these commandments are hard and difficult to walk. So you who are empty and light in the faith: put your Lord into your heart, and you will know that nothing is easier than these commandments — or sweeter, or gentler.