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Practice of Perfection and Christian Virtues - Second Treatise-Alphonsus Rodriguez · The Imitation of Christ

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  Speaker 1: Chapter one of Practice of Perfection in Christian Virtues, Second Treatise.
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  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. Second Treatise on the Perfection of
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  Speaker 1: Ordinary Actions Chapter one. That our advancement and perfection consists
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  Speaker 1: in doing ordinary actions extraordinarily well. Thou shalt go justly
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  Speaker 1: about what is just, says the Lord to his people
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  Speaker 1: Deuteronomy sixteen twenty. What is good, and just do it well,
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  Speaker 1: justly and handsomely. The business of our advancement and perfection
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  Speaker 1: does not consist in doing things, but in doing them well,
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  Speaker 1: as neither does it consist in being a religious, but
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  Speaker 1: in being a good religious. Paulinus had made much of
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  Speaker 1: Saint Jerome's living in the holy places where Christ our
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  Speaker 1: Lord wrought the mysteries of our redemption, and Saint Jerome
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  Speaker 1: wrote back to him, it is not the living in
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  Speaker 1: Jerusalem that is praiseworthy, but the living well in Jerusalem, which,
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  Speaker 1: saying afterwards, became a proverb to warn religious not to
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  Speaker 1: be content with being in religion, because as the habit
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  Speaker 1: does not make the monk so neither does the place
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  Speaker 1: but a good and holy life. The point is not
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  Speaker 1: being a religious, but being a good religious, not doing
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  Speaker 1: the exercises of religious life, but doing them well. All
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  Speaker 1: our good consists in what the evangelist Saint Mark relates
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  Speaker 1: that the people said of Christ, he hath done all
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  Speaker 1: things well Mark seven thirty seven. It is certain that
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  Speaker 1: all our good and all our evil depends on our works,
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  Speaker 1: according as they are good or evil. For we ourselves
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  Speaker 1: shall be such as our works have been. They tell
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  Speaker 1: what each man is made of. For by the fruit
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  Speaker 1: the tree is known. Saint Augustine says that the man
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  Speaker 1: is the tree, and the works the fruit that it bears.
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  Speaker 1: And thus by the fruit of works it is known
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  Speaker 1: what each man is. And therefore Christ, our Redeemer said,
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  Speaker 1: of those hypocrites and false preachers, by the fruit of
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  Speaker 1: their works, ye shall know what they are Matthew seven sixteen.
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  Speaker 1: And contrawise, he says of himself, the works that I
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  Speaker 1: do give testimony of me. If ye will not believe me,
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  Speaker 1: believe my works, for they tell who I am. John
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  Speaker 1: ten twenty five thirty eight. And our works tell not
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  Speaker 1: only what each one is in this life, but also
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  Speaker 1: what he must be in the next, for we shall
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  Speaker 1: be such forever in the life to come, as our
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  Speaker 1: works have been in this For God, our Lord will
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  Speaker 1: recompense and reward every one according to his works, as
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  Speaker 1: is often said in Holy writ as well in the
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  Speaker 1: Old as in the New Testament. Thou, o Lord, will
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  Speaker 1: render to everyone according to his works Psalm sixty one.
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  Speaker 1: And Saint Paul, what a man soweth the same shall
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  Speaker 1: he reap Galatians six eight. But let us descend to
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  Speaker 1: particulars and see what those works are upon which all
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  Speaker 1: are good, and all our advancement and perfection depends. I
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  Speaker 1: say they are no other than are common and ordinary actions,
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  Speaker 1: such as we go through every day, in taking care
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  Speaker 1: that the ordinary meditation which we make be well made,
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  Speaker 1: in making a good thing of those examines that we make,
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  Speaker 1: in hearing mass and saying it as we ought, in
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  Speaker 1: reciting our hours and other devotions with reverence and attention,
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  Speaker 1: and exercising ourselves continually in penance and mortification, in doing
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  Speaker 1: our office and duty laid upon us by obedience, so
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  Speaker 1: that it be well done. And this rests our advancement
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  Speaker 1: and perfection. If we do these actions perfectly, we shall
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  Speaker 1: be perfect. If we do them imperfectly, we shall be imperfect.
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  Speaker 1: And this is the difference between a good and perfect
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  Speaker 1: religious an imperfect and intimid one. The difference lies not
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  Speaker 1: in the doing of more or different things in this
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  Speaker 1: case and in that, but in doing what one does
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  Speaker 1: perfectly or imperfectly. For this is one man a good
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  Speaker 1: and perfect religious, because he gets these things well done.
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  Speaker 1: And for this is another imperfect, because he does them
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  Speaker 1: with much stupidity and negligence. And the more a man
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  Speaker 1: lays himself out and goes forward in this particular, the
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  Speaker 1: more perfect or imperfect will he be. In that parable
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  Speaker 1: of the sore who went out to sow his seed.
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  Speaker 1: The Holy Gospel says that even the good seed sown
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  Speaker 1: on good soil yielded here thirtyfold, there sixtyfold, and they
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  Speaker 1: are one hundredfold Matthew thirteen twenty three. Whereby as the
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  Speaker 1: same explain, are denoted the three different degrees of those
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  Speaker 1: that serve God beginners, proficient, imperfect. We all sow the
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  Speaker 1: same seed because we all do the same actions and
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  Speaker 1: observe the same rule. All of us have the same
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  Speaker 1: hours for meditation and examines, and from morning till night,
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  Speaker 1: we are all occupied by obedience. Yet for all that,
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  Speaker 1: how one man excels another Homo homie qui praised that
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  Speaker 1: what a difference they say between Peter and Peter, between
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  Speaker 1: one religious in another. The reason is because in one
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  Speaker 1: the works that he sows yield one hundredfold as much
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  Speaker 1: as he does them with spirit and perfection. But these
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  Speaker 1: are the perfect. In another they yield increase, but not
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  Speaker 1: so much, only sixtyfold. And these are they who go
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  Speaker 1: on improving. In another, they yield only thirtyfold. And these
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  Speaker 1: are beginning in God's service. Let everyone therefore see to
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  Speaker 1: which of these degrees he is arrived. See if you
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  Speaker 1: be not amongst those who yield only thirtyfold in God,
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  Speaker 1: grant that none of us find ourselves of the number
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  Speaker 1: of them of whom the apostle Saint Paul says that
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  Speaker 1: on the foundation of faith they have built wood and
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  Speaker 1: straw and chafe to burn in the day of the Lord.
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  Speaker 1: First Corinthians three twelve thirteen. Take care, therefore, you do
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  Speaker 1: nothing out of ostentation, out of human respect, to please
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  Speaker 1: men or to gain their esteem. For this word, to
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  Speaker 1: make a building of wood, straw and chafe to burn
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  Speaker 1: at least in purgatory. But endeavor to do all your
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  Speaker 1: actions with the greatest perfection you are able, and that
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  Speaker 1: will be to erect a structure all of silver, gold
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  Speaker 1: and precious stones. The fact that herein lies our advancement
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  Speaker 1: and perfection will be well understood. From this consideration. All
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  Speaker 1: our advancement and perfection consists in two things, in doing
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  Speaker 1: what God would have us do, and in doing it
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  Speaker 1: as He would have us do it. Nothing more can
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  Speaker 1: be asked, nothing more can be desired than this. As
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  Speaker 1: to the first, the doing of what God would have
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  Speaker 1: us do. By the mercy of God, we have already
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  Speaker 1: secured that in religion, and this is one of the
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  Speaker 1: greatest advantages and greatest comforts that we enjoy. That we
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  Speaker 1: are sure that in the occupations given us by obedience,
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  Speaker 1: we are doing what God would have us do. This
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  Speaker 1: stands for a first principle in religion, drawn from the
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  Speaker 1: Gospel and the doctrine of the Saints. He that heareth
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  Speaker 1: you heareth me Luke ten sixteen. In obeying the Superior
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  Speaker 1: we obey God and do his will, because that is
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  Speaker 1: what God requires us to do. There and then there
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  Speaker 1: remains the second point, which is doing things as God
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  Speaker 1: would have us do them. That is the all possible perfection,
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  Speaker 1: because so God would have us do them, And that
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  Speaker 1: is what we are speaking of. It is recounted in
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  Speaker 1: the chronicles of the Cistern Order that Saint Bernard, being
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  Speaker 1: with his religious at Matins, saw a multitude of angels
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  Speaker 1: who noted and wrote down what the monks did and
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  Speaker 1: how they did it. They noted the doings of some
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  Speaker 1: in letters of gold, of others, in silver of others,
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  Speaker 1: in ink of others, in water, according to the attention
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  Speaker 1: and fervor with which each one prayed and sang. But
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  Speaker 1: of some they wrote nothing at all, who, being present
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  Speaker 1: in body but absentente spirit, let themselves be carried away
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  Speaker 1: with vain and unprofitable thoughts. He saw also that chiefly
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  Speaker 1: at the Tadeum, the angels were much concerned that it
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  Speaker 1: should be sung very devoutly, and that from the mouths
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  Speaker 1: of some, when they intoned it there came out as
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  Speaker 1: it were a flame of fire. Therefore, let everyone see
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  Speaker 1: what his prayer is like, whether it deserves to be
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  Speaker 1: written in gold or in ink, or in water, or
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  Speaker 1: not to be written at all. See whether when you
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  Speaker 1: are at prayer there come forth from your heart in
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  Speaker 1: mouth flames of fire, or yawns, and expressions of disgust.
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  Speaker 1: See whether you are in body only but in spirit,
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  Speaker 1: at your studies, or your business or office, or other
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  Speaker 1: things not to the point end of chapter one, Chapter
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  Speaker 1: two of Practice of Perfection in Christian Virtues, second Treatise
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  Speaker 1: by Saint Alphonsis Rodriguez. The c LibriVox recording is in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. Chapter two. That it ought greatly to
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  Speaker 1: animate us to perfection, that God has put it in
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  Speaker 1: something that was very easy. Father Master Nado, a man
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  Speaker 1: distinguished in our society for his learning and virtue, when
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  Speaker 1: he came to visit the provinces of Spain, made this
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  Speaker 1: one of the chief recommendations that he left behind him,
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  Speaker 1: that our advancement and perfection consisted in doing well the particular,
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  Speaker 1: ordinary and daily things that we have in hand. Thus,
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  Speaker 1: our progress and improvement does not lie in a multiplication
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  Speaker 1: of various extraordinary works, nor in filling high and exalted offices,
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  Speaker 1: but in doing perfectly the ordinary duties of religion, and
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  Speaker 1: filling those offices in which obedience places us, though they
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  Speaker 1: be the meannest in the world, because that is what
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  Speaker 1: God requires of us on this we should fix our
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  Speaker 1: eyes if we wish to please Him and attain perfection.
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  Speaker 1: Let us then consider at what a little cost we
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  Speaker 1: may be perfect, since we may be that by doing
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  Speaker 1: what we actually are doing, without adding further works, which
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  Speaker 1: should be a great consolation for all and animate us
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  Speaker 1: to much perfection. If we demanded it of you for
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  Speaker 1: your perfection, exquisite and extraordinary things, elevations and lofty contemplations,
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  Speaker 1: you might excuse yourself, saying that you could not venture
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  Speaker 1: so high. If we demanded of you daily disciplines to blood,
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  Speaker 1: or fastening on bread and water, or going barefoot with
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  Speaker 1: a perpetual hair shirt, you might say that you did
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  Speaker 1: not feel strong enough for that. But that is not
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  Speaker 1: what we demand of you. Nor in that does your
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  Speaker 1: perfection lie. But in doing the very thing that you
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  Speaker 1: are doing, taking care that it be well done, with
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  Speaker 1: the same works that you are doing. If you like
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  Speaker 1: you can be perfect, the cost is already paid. You
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  Speaker 1: need not add more works. Who will not be animated
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  Speaker 1: hereby to be perfect? When perfection comes so ready to
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  Speaker 1: his hand and lies in a thing so familiar and
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  Speaker 1: so feasible, God said to his people to animate them
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  Speaker 1: to his service in obedience of His law. The commandment
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  Speaker 1: that I give THEE this day is not a thing
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  Speaker 1: very far and very exalted above thee. Nor is it
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  Speaker 1: set there on the horn of the moon, that thou
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  Speaker 1: shouldst be able to say, which of us can mount
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  Speaker 1: up to heaven to reach it. Nor again, is it
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  Speaker 1: a thing on the far side of the sea, that
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  Speaker 1: thou shouldst take occasion to say, who shall be able
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  Speaker 1: to cross the sea and bring it hither from such
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  Speaker 1: a distance. No, it is very near and very ready
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  Speaker 1: to thy hand. Deuteronomy thirty eleven. We may say the
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  Speaker 1: same of the perfection of which we now speak. So
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  Speaker 1: with this consideration, the blessed Saint Anthony exhorted and animated
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  Speaker 1: his disciples to perfection. The Greeks, he said, to attain
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  Speaker 1: to philosophy, and the other sciences, take great journeys in
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  Speaker 1: long voyages, with great labor and risk to themselves. But we,
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  Speaker 1: to attain virtue and perfection, which is the true wisdom,
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  Speaker 1: have no need to put ourselves to such labors and perils,
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  Speaker 1: not even to stir out of our house, since within
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  Speaker 1: the house we shall find it, and even within ourselves
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  Speaker 1: the Kingdom of God is within you, Luke, seventeen twenty one.
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  Speaker 1: Grici Studia transmarina sectantor rhgnum autem julium intra vos este.
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  Speaker 1: In these ordinary and daily things that you do, your
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  Speaker 1: perfection lies an ordinary question at spiritual conferences, at a
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  Speaker 1: time of devotion, such as lent, advent with suntide or
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  Speaker 1: renovation of vows, is what means will help us to
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  Speaker 1: dispose and prepare ourselves for this renovation or this lent,
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  Speaker 1: or to receive the Holy Ghost or the child Jesus
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  Speaker 1: newly born. You will see, given such and such means,
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  Speaker 1: and such and such considerations, all good. But the principle
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  Speaker 1: means and that on which we ought to insist is
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  Speaker 1: that of which we speak now, namely, to perfect ourselves
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  Speaker 1: in our ordinary actions. Go to work ridding yourselves of
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  Speaker 1: the faults and imperfections which you commit in these ordinary
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  Speaker 1: and daily things. Contrive daily to do them better and
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  Speaker 1: with fewer faults, and that will be a very good,
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  Speaker 1: or rather the best preparation for all that you seek.
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  Speaker 1: Fix your eyes on this principally, and let all other
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  Speaker 1: means and considerations go to help this. End of Chapter two,
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  Speaker 1: Chapter three of Practice of Perfection in Christian virtues that
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  Speaker 1: can treat us by Saint Alfonsis Rodriguez. The Cebrodox recording
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  Speaker 1: is in the public domain. Chapter three, in what the
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  Speaker 1: goodness and perfection of our actions consists, and of some
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  Speaker 1: means to do them well? Let us now see in
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  Speaker 1: what the goodness of our actions consists, to the end
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  Speaker 1: that thereby we may better come to know the means
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  Speaker 1: of doing them well. I say briefly that it consists
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  Speaker 1: in two things, of which the first and chiefest is
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  Speaker 1: that we act purely for God. Saint Ambrose asks the
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  Speaker 1: reason why God, in the creation of the world, after
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  Speaker 1: he had created corporal things and the animals praised them
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  Speaker 1: at once, God created the plants and trees, and Scripture
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  Speaker 1: says at once that he saw that it was good
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  Speaker 1: Genesis one ten through twenty five. He created the beasts
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  Speaker 1: upon the earth, the birds also, and the fishes, and
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  Speaker 1: he saw that it was good. He created the heavens
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  Speaker 1: and stars, the sun and moon, and he saw that
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  Speaker 1: it was good. He praised everything he created as soon
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  Speaker 1: as he had created it. But man, he seems to
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  Speaker 1: leave alone without praise, because he added not presently. He
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  Speaker 1: saw that it was good, as he said of the rest,
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  Speaker 1: What mystery is this, and what can be the cause
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  Speaker 1: of this difference? The cause, says the saints, is this
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  Speaker 1: that the beauty and goodness of beasts and corporeal things
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  Speaker 1: consists in their outward appearance, and there is nothing perfect
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  Speaker 1: in them besides what at once strikes the eye, and
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  Speaker 1: therefore they may be praised as soon as they are seen.
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  Speaker 1: But the goodness and perfection of man consists not in
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  Speaker 1: the exterior, but in what lies inwardly hidden. All the
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  Speaker 1: glory of the King's daughter is from within Psalm forty four.
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  Speaker 1: It is this which is pleasing in God's sight. For
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  Speaker 1: man seeth what outward appeareth, but the Lord seeth the
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  Speaker 1: heart First King sixteen seven. He sees with what intention
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  Speaker 1: everyone does each action. And it is upon this account
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  Speaker 1: that He did not praise man as he did all
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  Speaker 1: other creatures, as soon as he had created him. The
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  Speaker 1: intention is the foundation of the goodness of all our actions.
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  Speaker 1: Foundations are not seen, and yet they sustain the whole edifice.
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  Speaker 1: Our intention also does the same. The second thing required
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  Speaker 1: for the perfection of all our actions is that we
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  Speaker 1: do what we can on our part to do them well.
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  Speaker 1: It is not enough that your intention be good, nor
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  Speaker 1: to say that you do this for God, but you
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  Speaker 1: must contrive to do it in the best way you can,
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  Speaker 1: the better to please him, Our blessed Father. Ignatius once
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  Speaker 1: asked a brother who was somewhat negligent in his office. Brother,
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  Speaker 1: for whom are you doing that? For the love of God?
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  Speaker 1: Answered the brother said, our Father, Then I assure you
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  Speaker 1: that if hereafter you do it in that same way,
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  Speaker 1: I shall take care to give you a right down
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  Speaker 1: good penance. For if you did it for men, it
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  Speaker 1: were no great fault to do it with so little care,
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  Speaker 1: But if doing it for so great a lord, it
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  Speaker 1: is a great fault to do it in that style.
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  Speaker 1: The second means, which the Saints set forth as very
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  Speaker 1: efficacious to this end, is to walk in the presence
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  Speaker 1: of God. Seneca says that a man desirous of virtue
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  Speaker 1: and of doing things well should imagine that he is
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  Speaker 1: in the presence of some personage for whom he has
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  Speaker 1: a great respect, and do and say all things as
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  Speaker 1: he would do and say them if he really were
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  Speaker 1: in that person's presence. Sick vive tenquam sub Alicutius bonni
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  Speaker 1: Veri et Sempire pray sentis oculis. Now, if this be
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  Speaker 1: sufficient for doing things well, how much more effectual will
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  Speaker 1: it be to our walk in the presence of God
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  Speaker 1: and keep him ever before our eyes, considering that He
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  Speaker 1: is looking at us, especially as this is no imagination
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  Speaker 1: like the other, but a reality. In fact, as Scripture
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  Speaker 1: so oft repeats, the eyes of God are clearer than
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  Speaker 1: the light of the sun. They see all the ways
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  Speaker 1: and steps of men, and the depths of the abyss,
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  Speaker 1: and the hearts of mortals, and the most hidden things
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  Speaker 1: therein Ecclesiasticus twenty three twenty eight. Hereafter we shall treat
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  Speaker 1: expressly of this practice of walking in the presence of God,
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  Speaker 1: and say how excellent and profitable it is, and how
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  Speaker 1: esteemed and recommended by the saints. Just now, the only
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  Speaker 1: thing we shall borrow from it as making for our
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  Speaker 1: present purpose is the importance of doing ordinary actions right well.
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  Speaker 1: Walking in the presence of God means not merely dwelling
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  Speaker 1: in that presence, but using it as a motive for
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  Speaker 1: whatever actions we do to do them well. Any attention
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  Speaker 1: to God's presence that makes us neglect our work and
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  Speaker 1: commit faults in it would be no sound devotion but
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  Speaker 1: an illusion. Some writers go further and say that the
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  Speaker 1: presence of God, which we ought to practice, in which
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  Speaker 1: holy Scripture and the Saints so much recommend to us,
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  Speaker 1: consists in contriving to do our actions in such manner
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  Speaker 1: and in such good style, that they may stand in
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  Speaker 1: the sight of God without there being in them any
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  Speaker 1: element unworthy of His eyes and his presence. In short,
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  Speaker 1: behaving as one who is doing things in presence of
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  Speaker 1: God looking on. This apparently, is what the evangelist Saint
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  Speaker 1: John would give us to understand in his Apocalypse, chapter four,
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  Speaker 1: verse eight, when rehearsing the properties of those holy living
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  Speaker 1: creatures that he saw before the throne of God, ready
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  Speaker 1: to accomplish his behests, he says that they were of
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  Speaker 1: eyes within and without in all around, eyes in their feet,
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  Speaker 1: eyes in their hands, eyes in their ears, eyes in
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  Speaker 1: their lips, eyes in their very eyes. To signify to
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  Speaker 1: us that they, who seek perfectly to praise God and
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  Speaker 1: to be worthy of His presence, ought in all things
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  Speaker 1: to be on the lookout, not to do anything unworthy
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: of the presence of God. You should be full of
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: eyes within and without, looking to see how you work
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: and how you walk, and how you talk, and how
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: you listen, and how you look, and how you think,
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: and how you mean, and how you desire, that in
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: all your actions there be nothing that can offend the
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: eyes of God, and whose watchful presence you stand. This
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: is an excellent way of walking in the presence of God.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: So Ecclesiasticus and the Apostle Saint Paul, commenting on the
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: passage in Genesis where it is said of Enoch that
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: he walked with God, which is the same thing as
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: in the presence of God, and was seen no more
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: because the Lord took him Genesis five twenty four, say
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: that Enoch pleased God and was translated to paradise. Ecclesiasticus
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: forty four sixteen Hebrews eleven five, giving us clearly to
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: understand that it is all one and the same thing
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: to walk with God and to please God. Since they
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: explain the phrase by the other in this manner. Origin
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: and Saint Augustine explain what Holy Scripture says in Exodus
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: eighteen twelve that when Jethro came to see his son
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: in law Moses, Aaron and all the elders of Israel
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: joined him to eat bread before God. It does not
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: mean that they met to eat before the tabernacle or
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: before the Ark, which was not yet in existence, but
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: that they met to feast and eat and drink and
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: make merry with Him, but all with as much piety
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: and holiness and religious cans posure as became people feasting
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: in the presence of God, taking care that there should
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: be nothing that might offend His divine eyes. In this way,
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: the just and perfect walk before God in all things,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: even in things indifferent and which are necessities of human life.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: But the Just, says the prophet, eat and drink in season,
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: and make merry and rejoice at proper times Psalm sixty seven.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Yet always in God's presence, in such sort that everything
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: they do may stand before the eyes of God, and
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: there be nothing in it unworthy of His presence. In
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: this way also many saints say that we accomplish what Christ,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: our redeemer says in his Gospel. We must always pray
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: and never desist Luke eighteen one, and what Saint Paul
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: says to the Thessalonians, pray without ceasing. First Thessalonians five seventeen.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: They say that he praise always who is always doing good,
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: so Saint Augustine on the verse all day long thy
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: praise Psalm thirty four says, would you find a good
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: means of being all day long praising God? Do well
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: all that you do, and so you will be ever
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: praising God. Quid quid igeris benny a jay et loraste deum.
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: The same says Saint Hilary. By this we succeed in
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: praying without ceasing, when by means of actions pleasing to
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: God and done always to His glory, all our life
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: is converted into prayer. And in this way, living according
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: to the law day and night, our very life will
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: come to be a daily and knightly meditation on His
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: law Psalm one. And Saint Jerome on that verse, praise
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: ye Him, Sun and moon, praise ye Him, all ye
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: stars and light. Psalm one forty eight asks how can
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: sun and moon and light and stars praise God? And answers,
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: do you know how they praise Him? And that they
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: never cease doing their duty? Well? They are always serving
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: God and doing that where unto they were created, And
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: this is to be always praising God. Thus, he who
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: does his duty well, doing right well. The dailia and
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: ordinary things of religious life is always praising God and
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: always in prayer. We may confirm this from what the
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: Holy ghost says by the wise man, he who observeth
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: the law multiplieth prayer. It is a wholesome sacrifice to
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: keep the commandments and stand aloft from all sin Ecclesiasticus
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: thirty five one. Hereby is well seen how much value
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: and perfection attaches to doing the ordinary things that we do,
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: taking care that they be well done, And how this
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: is living ever in prayer and in the presence of God,
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: and is a sacrifice very wholesome and very pleasing to God.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: End of chapter three, Chapter four of Practice of Perfection
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: and Christian Virtue, Second treat Us by Saint Alphonsos Rodriguez.
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: This recording is in the public domain. Chapter four of
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: another means to do our actions well, which is to
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: do them as if we had nothing else to do.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: The third means to do our actions well, is to
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: do each of them a part as though we had
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: nothing else to do. To make our meditation, to say mass,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: to recite our beads and divine office, and to do
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: all the rest of our actions as if we really
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: had no other business but just this, that we are
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: about what gets in our way. Let us not mix
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: up our works, let not one hinder the other. Let
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: us keep ourselves always to that which we are doing
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: at present. While we are at prayer. Let us not
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: think of our studies, nor our office, nor a business,
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: all that serves only to hinder prayer, so that we
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: do neither the one nor the other. Well, you have
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: all the rest of the day left to study in
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: to do the duties of your office, to fulfill your ministry.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: All things have their time Ecclesiasticus three one. Let us
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: give to each thing its proper time sufficient for the
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: day is the evil thereof Matthew six thirty four. This
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: is a means so just and so conformable to reason,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: that even the Pagans who had not the faith, taught
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: it as the proper way to deal more reverently with
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: those beings whom they took for gods. Hence sprang that
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: old proverb a doratory sedaeant. Let them who are to
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: dee all with God, settled down to do it in
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: attention and repose, not cursively and distractedly. Plutarch, speaking of
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: the regard and reverence with which priests in his time
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: approached their gods. Says that whilst the priest offered sacrifice,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: a herald ceased not to cry out and say in
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: a loud voice, howk a jay hawk ae jay Mind this,
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: mind this, Put your whole self into this business. Do
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: not turn aside, Look well to the business on which
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: you are engaged this hour. Such, then, is the means
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: that we are proposing now to endeavor to be wholly
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: absorbed in what we are doing, making that our steady purpose,
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: and as it were, sitting down to it, doing each
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: action as though we had nothing else to do. Think
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: what you are about, stand to that. Put all your
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: care and energy into that which is now present, never
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: mind for the time being, the whole of the rest
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: of creation. And in that way you will do everything well.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: A philosopher set about to prove that we should attend
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: only to that what we are doing at present, and
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: not to the past nor to the future. And he
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: give this reason. The present alone is that which is
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: in our power, and not the past nor the future.
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: For what is already passed is no longer in our power.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: And as for the future, we do not know whether
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: it will come. Ah, if a man could succeed with himself,
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: and be so far master of his thoughts and imaginations
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: as never to think of anything else but what he
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: is at present doing. But such is the instability of
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: our heart, And on the other hand, so great the
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: malice and cunning of the devil, that, availing himself thereof,
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: he brings before us thoughts and solicitudes of what we
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: are to do next, to hinder and disturb us from
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: doing what is before us at present. This is a
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: very common temptation of the devil, and a very harmful
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: and ingenious one, his aim being therein that we should
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: never do anything well. For this purpose, the devil brings
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: in at meditation thoughts of business, study, the duties of
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: your office, and represents to you how you might do
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: this or do that well, to the end that you
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: may not take the meditation well, which is your present concern.
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: And in return for that he does not hesitate to
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: put before you a thousand ways and manners of doing
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: that other thing well in the future, to the end
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: that you may do nothing well now and afterwards, when
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: you come to the doing of it, he will not
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: fail to find something else to put before you that
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: you may not do that well either. And in this
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: way he goes on playing tricks upon us, that we
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: may never do anything well. But his intentions are not
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: hidden from us. Second Corinthians to eleven. We understand them. Well.
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: Leave alone what is to come, and just at present,
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: take no care of it, For though that be a
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: good suggestion for afterwards, it is not good to think
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: of it now. And when there comes to you this
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: temptation under pretense that afterwards you will not remember the
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: suggestion that then occurred, by that very fact, you will
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: see that it is not of God, but a temptation
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: of the devil. Because God is not a friend of confusion,
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: but of peace and tranquility, order and agreement. Thus, what
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: disturbs your peace and tranquility and the order of things
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: is not from God, but from the devil, who loves
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: confusion and perturbation. Let it alone, and trust in God
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: that your doing what you ought to do. He will
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: suggest to you in due time all that will make
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: your purpose and with advantages. And even though the reason
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: and the good point, and the good agreement and resolution
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: that occur to you at the time of your spiritual
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: duties seem the very thing that you wanted, turn it down.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: And believe that you will lose nothing thereby, but rather gain.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: Saint Bonaventure says that the science which is set aside
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: for virtue's sake is found afterwards more aptly by that
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: same virtue. And father Master Avela says, when a care
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: comes to you out of due time, say, my Lord
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: gives me no orders about this just now, and I
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: have no business to think about it. When my Lord
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: shall command me, then I will deal with it. End
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: of Chapter four five of of Perfection and Christian Virtue,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: Second treat Us by Saint Alphonsis Rodriguez. This recording is
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: in the public domain. Chapter five of another means, which
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: is to do every action as if it were to
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: be the last of our life. The fourth means, which
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: the Saints give for doing our actions well, is to
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: do every action as though it were to be the
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: last of our life. Saint Bernard says, directing our religious
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: how to do his actions. Let each one ask himself,
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: over every action, if you were to die at once,
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: would you do this? Would you do it in this manner?
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: And Saint Basil says a thing which another holy man
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: also says, to put it in plain English. Thus you
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: should conduct yourself in every action as if you were
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: to die at once in the morning. Think that you
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: shall not live till night. And when the night comes,
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: do not dare to promise yourself that you shall see them,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: for many die suddenly. Akemphas. This is a very efficacious
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: means of doing everything well. And so we read of
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: the blessed Saint Anthony that he often give this reminder
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: to his disciples, to animate them to virtue and to
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: do things with perfection. Another author says, think that every
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: day is your last omnem cre da deum tb de
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: lucici supremium. If we did things each in turn as
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: if we were to die at once, and as though
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: this action were to be our last, we should do
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: them in another manner and with perfection. Oh what a
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: mass should I say if I understood that this was
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: to be the last action of my life, and that
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: there was now no time left for me to work
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: or gain merit. Oh what a meditation should I make
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: if I understood that that was my last, and and
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: that now I had no more time to beg God's
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: mercy and pardon for my sins. Hence the proverb if
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: you want to know how to pray go to sea.
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: Pray is made in another manner, with death before one's eyes.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: They tell of a religious a priest and a servant
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: of God, that he had the custom of going to
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: confession every day to prepare for saying Mass. At the
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: end of his course, he fell sick, and the Superior,
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: seeing the sickness to be mortal, said to him, father,
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: you are very ill make your dying confession. The sick
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: man answered, raising his hands to heaven, blessed in praise
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: be the Lord, that now, for thirty years and more,
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: I have made my confession every day as if I
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: were to die at once, And so there will be
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: no need now but to get ready for absolution, as
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: I would if I were about to say Mass. That
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: man went on, well, so should we go on. Every
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: confession we should make as though it were our dying confession,
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: and every communion as though it were our dying communion,
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: And so do all our other actions. And thereby at
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: the hour of our death, it would not be necessary
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: to tell us to confess so as to be ready
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: to die, but only to dispose ourselves for absolution as
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: though we were going to communion. If we lived always
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: In this way, death would find us well prepared and
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: never come upon us as a surprise. And this is
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: the best prayer and the best devotion to guard against
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: a sudden death. Happy, says Christ. Our redeemer is that
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: servant whom his master at his coming shall find thus
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: watching Matthew twenty four forty six, and so lived holy
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: job all the days of this life, he says, I
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: am looking for the other life fourteen fourteen. Every day
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: I make account that this is the last for me.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: Call me, O Lord, on the day that thou pleasest,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: since I am disposed and prepared to answer thee and
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: to meet thy call at any time an hour that
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: thou wishest to call. One of the best means to
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: know whether we walk well and rightly before God is
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: to consider whether we are in a state to answer
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: him at what timesoever he calls, and in what occupations
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: soever we are engaged. I speak not here of an
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: infallible certainty, because such is not to be had in
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: this life without a particular revelation. But I speak only
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: of probable and moral conjectures, which is all we can
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: pretend to. A great and main test is to see
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: whether in the condition and present conjecture you are in,
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: and in the very action you are about, you would
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: not take it ill that death should come upon you.
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: Think whether you are as ready to answer to God
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: as job was in case he should call you at
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: this moment. Try yourself often in this manner, and ask
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: yourself many times this question. If death were to come
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: upon you now, would you have reason to be glad?
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: When I reflect and ask myself whether I find that
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: I should be glad if death were to come upon
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: me at this instant and in this very action I
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: am doing, methinks I am going on well and feel
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: some satisfaction. But when I find that I should not
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: like death to come just at present and catch me
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: in this office, occupation, and conjecture, but had rather he
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: would wait a bit until the schemes I have on
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: hand which distract my thoughts were brought to an issue
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: that is not a good sign. But rather I take
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: it for a clear indication that I am neglecting my
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: spiritual warfare and not living as a religious should do.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: For as that holy man says, if you had a
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: good conscience, you would not much fear death, And if
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: you do fear it, so much, it is a sign
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: that you have some remorse of conscience, and your thoughts
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: are not in good order. Better fear sin than death.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: The steward whose accounts are in good order desires that
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: his masters should come and take them. But he who
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: has them in bad order is afraid of their coming,
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: and sets up all the excuses and delays in his power.
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: Father Francis Borgia used to say that a good exercise
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: for religious was four and twenty times a day to
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: put himself in the condition of a dying man. And
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: he added that a man might then think himself in
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: a good estates when often repeating these words, I must
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: die today, he found nothing that troubled him. Let everyone
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: then enter into to an account with himself and examine
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: himself many times on this point. And if it appears
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: that you are not today in a state in condition
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: to die, take care to put yourself in good condition
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: for this final crisis. Reckon that you beg of the
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: Lord to grant you a few days of life for
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: this purpose, and that he does grant them, and profit
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: by the time. And endeavor to live as if you
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: were presently to die. Plus, it is he who lives
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: in the disposition that he desires to be found at
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: the hour of death. This is one of the most
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: profitable things that we can preach to our neighbor, that
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: they should live in such a disposition as the desire
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: to be found in at the hour of death, and
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: not put off their conversation and repentance to the future,
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: because tomorrow is uncertain, and who knows if you shall
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: have tomorrow. God, who has promised pardon to this if
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: he repents, says Saint Gregory, has never promised him that
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: he shall have tomorrow. Qui potentibos veniam s popondit crossthiamdum
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: non promist. It is a common saying that nothing is
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: more certain than death, nor more uncertain than the hour
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: of death. But Christ, our Redeemer says yet more. Be ready,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: says he, because the son of man will come at
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: the hour. Ye think not Luke twelve forty. For though
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: he speaks in this place of the general day of judgment,
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: yet this may be understood also of the hour of death,
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: because then each one shall receive his particular judgment. And
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: such a sentence, as being once pronounced, will never be revoked,
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: but confirmed at that great and general day, Christ does
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: not contend himself with saying the hour is uncertain and
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: that you know not when it will come, but he
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: says it will come just when you least expect it,
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: and perhaps when you are least of all prepared for it.
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: Saint Paul tells the Thessalonians that the Lord will come
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: like a thief in the night. First Thessalonians five two,
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: and Saint John and the Apocalypse, speaking in God's name, says,
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: I will come to thee as a thief, and thou
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: shalt not know at what hour I mean to come
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: Apocalypse three three. The thief gives no notice, but waits
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: for the hour when all are least upon their guard
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: and even asleep. And along with the same comparison, Christ
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: our Redeemer, teaches us how we should behave to the
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: end that death may not catch us on a sudden
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: and off our guard. Know ye that if the father
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: of the family knew at what hour the thief would come,
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: he would surely watch and would not suffer his house
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: to be broken open Luke twelve thirty nine. And if
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: he knew the hour, he would be sufficient to be
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: awake just then. But because he cannot foresee the hour,
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: or whether it will be in the beginning, towards the middle,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: or at the end of the night. He continually stands
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: upon his guard to save himself from being robbed. Thus,
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: you must ever be watchful, for death will come at
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: the hour you think not. It is a very great
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: mercy of God that the hour of death should be
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: uncertain to the end, that we may always be prepared
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: for it. For if we knew the time, this assurance
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: would give us occasion of great laxity and many sins.
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: If uncertain as we are of the hour of death,
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: we live, notwithstanding with so great negligence, what should we
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: do if we were assured we should not die so soon? Fool?
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: Says the Son of God to the rich covetous man.
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: This night they are requiring thy soul of thee, and
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: what will become of those riches thou hast gathered together,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: Luke twelve twenty. Now, what we preach to others, we
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: should take also to ourselves. As the Apostle warns us,
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: what thou teachest to others, thou doest not teach to
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: thyself Romans two twenty one. One of the temptations the
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: devil most commonly makes use of to deceive men is
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: to hide as much as he can from them so
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: clear a truth as this, to divert their eyes and
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: their thoughts from it, and make them believe that there's
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: time enough for this world and the next, and that
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: one day they will grow better and live after another
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: manner than they do now. But it is not only
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: wordlings that he misleads after this manner, but he also
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: deceives many religious after the same fashion, persuading them to
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: defer their spiritual advancement from one day to another till
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: they have done their studies, till they are out of
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: this office and got this business off their hands. Then
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: I will get to writes my spiritual duties and my
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: penances and mortifications. Unhappy you if you die in your studies,
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: What will then the learning serve you for which you
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: have relaxed your efforts after virtue, but as straw and
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: wood for you to burn the more perfect in the
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: next life. First Corinthians three twenty one. Let us then
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: profit ourselves by what we say to others. Physician, cure
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: thyself look for twenty three. Apply this remedy to yourself also,
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: since you have need of it. End of chapter five,
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: Chapter six of Practice of Perfection in Christian Virtues, Second
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: Treatise by Saint Alphonsis Rodriguez. The cebrivox recording is in
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: the public domain of another means of doing our actions well,
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: which is to take no account of anything beyond today.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: The fifth means that will greatly aid and animate us
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: to do ordinary things well into perfection is to take
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: no account of anything further than the present day. And
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: though at first sight this means seems not at all
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: different from the last, yet it really does differ, as
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: we shall see in the sequel. One of the things
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: which is wont to discourage and enfeeble many in the
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: way of virtue, and one of the temptations by which
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: the devil works to this effect, is to put such
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: reflections as these into their head. Can you manage to
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: go on for so many years in such recollection, such punctuality,
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: such exactness, mortifying yourself, continually checking your pace, denying your appetite,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: and setting aside your own will in all things? The
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: devil represents this as very difficulty. It is not a
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: life that can be carried on for such a long time.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: We read of our blessed father Ignatius that when he
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: retired to Manresa to do penance, amongst other temptations wherewith
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: the devil assailed him, this was one. Can you suffer
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: a life so austere as this for the seventy years
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: of life that still remain to you against this temptation?
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: This means is directed. There is no question of many years,
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: nor of many days, but only of to day. It
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: is a means very proportionable to our weakness. For one day,
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: who will not animate and force himself to live well
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: and do all that in him lies that his actions
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: may be well done. This is the means that our
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: father sets before us in the particular examine where he
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: bids us make our resolution from half day to half day,
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: from now till dinner time, at least, I propose to
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: be modest in my gait, to keep silence, practice patience.
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: In this way that becomes easy, which possibly might be
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: too hard if you took it absolutely, I propose never
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: to talk, and always to go about with restraint on myself,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: in great composure and recollection. This was that means the
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: monk made use of of whom we read in the
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: lives of the fathers, that being so much tempted to gluttony,
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: that even at break of day, he found himself ready
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: to faint for hunger. Yet he resolved not to break
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: the holy custom of his order by eating before three
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: in the afternoon, and to this end made use of
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: this artifice. In the morning, talking to himself, he said, hungry,
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: as thou art, it is much to wait till nine o'clock.
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: Then thou mayest eat at nine o'clock. Verily said he,
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: I ought in something to do violence to myself and
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: not eat till noon. As I have been able to
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: wait till nine o'clock, so shall I be able to
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: wait till twelve? And so he entertained himself that time.
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: At twelve, he put his bread in water and said,
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: while the bread soaks, I must wait till three o'clock.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: As I have waited till this hour, I will not,
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: for a gain of two or three hours break the
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: monastic custom. Three o'clock came, and he ate, after saying
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: his prayers. This he did for many days, beguiling himself
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: with these short terms, till one day, sitting down to
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: eat at three o'clock, he saw a smoke rise out
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: of the basket where he kept his bread, and go
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: out by the window of his cell, which must have
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: been the wicked spirit that tempted him. From this time forth,
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: he never felt those false fits of hunger and faintness
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: that he used to have. On the contrary, he had
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: no trouble in passing two days without eating. Thus our
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: Lord rewarded the victory he had gained over his enemy
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: and the conflict that he had endured. But it is
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: not without reason we said that this means was very
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: proportionable to our weakness. For after all, it treats us
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: as men are wont to treat in firm and feeble folk,
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: helping us on little by little, that the work may
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: not frighten us. But if we were strong and fervent
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: and had much love for God, he would not be
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: necessary to help us on in this way, so little
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: by little, to hide from us the labor and difficulty.
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: Since the true servant of God does not put before
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: him the length of time or the number of years,
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: but all time seems to him short to serve God,
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: and all labor little, and so it is necessary to
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: help him on in this way, little by little. Saint
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: Bernard says this well, the truly just man is not
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: like the hireling or day laborer, who binds himself to
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: serve for one day or one month, or for one year,
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: but forever, without limit and without term. He offers himself
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: to serve God with hearty goodwill forever, and I I
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: will never forget o Lord, thy law and thy commandments
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: in councils Salm One eighteen. And because he offers himself
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: and determines to serve God absolutely and without limit, and
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: does not fix a term, saying for a year or
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: for three years, I will do this. Therefore his reward
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: and recompense shall also be without limit forever. And I
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: non m ad annom vel ad tempos in star mercenary
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: said in eterum divinio say mansipat famu latui non igatur
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: ad tempos pro in de gestilia ajus manette, non aliquanto
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: tempore said unseclum secluis sempiternam igotur just the essuies simpitunum
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: meriture refactionim. In this way, Saint Bernard explains the saying
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: of the wise man being made perfect in a short space,
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: he fulfilled a long time wisdom four thirteen. The true
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: just man, in a short time and in a few
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: days of life, lives many years because he loves God
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: so much and has such a desire to serve him,
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: that if he lived a hundred years or even a thousand,
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: he would be ever busying himself in serving Him more
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: and more. And for this desire and determination, it is
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: as though he did live all that time in this manner,
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: because God will reward him according to his desire and determination.
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: These are men of action, strong man like Jacob, who,
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: for the great love that he bore Rachel, thought it
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: a little thing to serve for seven years, and then
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: for seven years more. All this time seemed to him
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: short for the great love he bore her Genesis twenty
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: nine twenty end of chapter six, Chapter seven of Practice
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: of Perfection in Christian Virtues, Second treat Us by Saint
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: Alphonsis Rodriguez. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: Chapter seven of another means to do our actions well,
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: which is to get into a way of so doing them.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: That fine old philosopher Pythagoras give very good advice to
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: his friends and disciples how to be virtuous and make
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: to themselves the practice of virtue easy and sweet. Let
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: everyone said he choose a good course of life, and
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: in the beginning not mind his seeming hard or painful,
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: because custom will afterwards render it quite easy and agreeable.
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: Behold here a very important means whereby to help ourselves,
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: not so much because it comes from that philosopher, but
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: because the Holy Ghost himself suggests the same as we
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: shall see afterwards, and because it is most proper to
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: attain our end. We have already chosen an excellent way
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: of living. Or to say better, the Lord has chosen
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: one for us, because it is not you that have
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: made choice of me, but it is I that have
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: made choice of you. John fifteen sixteen. Blessed and glorified
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: be he forever for that. Notwithstanding, there may be a
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: more or a less in this state of life in
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: which God has put us, For according to the works
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: that you do therein, you may become either a good
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: or a tepid religious If then you desire to advance
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: and gain perfection therein, accustom yourself to do all your
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: duties well and perfectly. Accustom yourself to make your meditation
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: well and your other spiritual duties. Accustom yourself to be
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: very exact in obedience and the observance of the rules,
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: and to make account of little things. Accustom yourself to recollection,
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: to mortification, and penance, to modesty and silence. And do
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: not leave off because at the beginning you find some
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: difficulty therein, because afterwards, by custom, it will become to
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: you very sweet and pleasant, and you will feel that
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: you can never sufficiently render thanks to God for having
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: accustomed you there too. The Holy Ghost teaches us this
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: doctrine in many passages of Holy Scripture. In Proverbs four eleven,
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: he says, I will show thee the way of wisdom.
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: I will teach thee to find a sweet savor in
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: the knowledge of God, because this is the meaning of
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: wisdom sapienzia. In Holy Scripture, says Saint Bernard, wisdom is
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: savory sapidia sapiencia, wisdom sipididuria is a savory knowledge of God.
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: I will teach thee. Then, he says, the way whereby
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: thou mayest come to find savor and a sweet taste
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: in the knowledge, love, and service of God. I must
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: take thee by the narrow paths of virtue. He calls
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: them narrow because at the beginning virtue is made difficult
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: to us by our evil inclination, and we think it
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: a narrow path. But after thou hast passed these narrow entrances,
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: thou shalt find the way very wide, roomy into thy liking,
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: and thou shalt run without tripping up or being brought
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: to a standstill anywhere. Proverbs four twelve. The Holy Ghost
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: teaches us gracefully by this metaphor, that though at the
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: beginning we find difficulty in this way of virtue and perfection,
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: we must not be alarmed at that, for afterwards we
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: shall not only find no difficulty, but much relish, content
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: and mirth, and shall come to say, I have labored
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: a little and have found much rest to myself Ecclesiasticus
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: fifty one thirty five. The same is repeated in Ecclesiasticus
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: six twenty Thou shalt labor a little, and presently shall
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: eat and enjoy the fruit of thy labor. The apostle
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: Saint Paul also teaches us the same. Every training and
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: every good exercise. In the beginning appear it difficult and
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: painful and sad, but afterwards, as one groweth used to it,
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: it not only becometh easy, but very pleasant and enjoyable
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: Hebrews twelve eleven. Thus we see in all the arts
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: and sciences, how difficult is study when one first enters
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: upon it, how often it is necessary for one to
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: be brought to it by force. Hence they say letters
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: draw blood at first entrance. But afterwards, by practice, as
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: one improves and learns, one develops such a taste as
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: to find all one's entertainment and recreation and study. So
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: it is in the way of virtue and perfection. Saint
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: Bernard declares this very well on those words of job.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: The things that formerly my soul could not bear to touch,
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: now of necessity, have become my food job six'. Seven
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: how great is the effect of exercise and, custom and
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: what power it. Has in the beginning you think a
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: thing very difficult and. Insupportable but if you accustom yourself to,
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: it you will not appear so difficult nor so burdensome as.
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: That a little after you will think it light and,
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: easy and feel it almost as. NOTHING a little after
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: that you will not feel it at. All and in
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: a short time you will not only not feel, it
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: but it will give you so much delight in contentment
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: that you will be able to say With job sixty
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: seven as above premium tbi importubille v de bourg procisu
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: temporious SEE a. S suscass judy cabbis non adio grave
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: paulo post et neve scentes polo post nick scentes polo
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: post ettum delect. Tabit thus it all goes according to
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: the way in which one has got accustomed to. Act
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: the additions and instructions for meditation and examine are difficult
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: for you to observe because you are a little accustomed
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: to do. So the reason why you find such difficulty
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: in fixing your imagination and hindering it from roaming where
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: it would upon awakening and in time of meditation so
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: because you never have done violence to, it nor accustomed
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: it to recollection and, restraint and not go thinking of
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: anything but the matter of. Meditation the reason why silence
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: and recollection make you sad and melancholy is because you
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: practice it little jella continuata julcheositi et malay costididam teedium.
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: GENERAT a quiet corner is sweet when you stay, there
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: and worrisome when you are little used to. It, akempess
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: get used and accustomed to, it and it will become
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: pleasant and. Cheerful worldly people find prayer and fasting difficult
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: because they are not accustomed to. It king saw Glad
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: david in his, armor seeing that he was to fight
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: with The, philistine and as he was not used to
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: bear such, arms he could not walk under their weight
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: and give them. Up he afterwards got used to the
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: armor and fought good battles in. It in WHAT i
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: say of virtue and, GOODNESS i likewise say of vice and.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: Evil if you allow a bad habit to, arise the
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: evil thing will grow and gather, strength and afterwards it
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: will be very difficult to cure, it and so you
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: will remain with it all your. Life, oh if from
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: the beginning you had accustomed yourself to do things and
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: do them, well how well off would you find yourself,
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: now virtue and goodness having become to you so sweet and.
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: Easy see how satisfied he is who has a good
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: habit of not, swearing and with what ease and comfort
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: he avoids so many mortal. Sins begin then to form
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: a good habit from this, hour for better late than,
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: never take to heart the doing well of these ordinary
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: actions that you, do since that goes for so much in,
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: you and apply there to the particular, examine one of
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: the best examines you can. Make and in this manner
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: it will become to you sweet and easy to do them.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: Well end of chapter, Seven chapter eight Of practice Of
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: perfection In Christian, virtue Second treatise By Saint Alphonsis. Rodriguez
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: The sleebrivox recording is in the public. Domain chapter eight
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: Of how great importance it is for religious not to
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: slow down in the way of. Virtue by all that
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: we have, said it is easy to comprehend of how
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: great consequence it is for religious to keep up his
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: devotion and always to go on with fervor in the
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: exercises of, religion and never let himself fall into tipidity and,
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: weakness because afterwards it will be very hard for him
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: to get out of. It god certainly can make you
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: return afterwards to a life of fervor and, perfection but
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: it will be a miracle and a. Prodigy Saint bernard
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: perfectly well treats this, point writing To Richard abbot Of
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: fountains and his religious in Whom god had wrought this
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: wonder that whereas hitherto they had led a tepid and
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: loose kind of. Life god had now changed and brought
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: them to great fervor in. Perfection whereat The saint marvel's
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: and rejoices much and sends his. Congratulations the finger Of
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: god is, here who will grant me to come over
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: and see this. Marvel for a, marvel it is no
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: less than that Which Moses exodus three two beheld of
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: the bush that burnt and was not. Consumed it is
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: a most rare and an extraordinary thing for anyone to
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: advance and raise himself afterwards beyond the level to which
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: he has once settled down in. Religion it will be
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: easier to find many seculars converted from a bad to
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: a good life than to meet even one religious passing
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: from a tepid and lacks life to a fervent and perfect.
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: One ra rissima aves in tera et qui de gradu
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: quem forte in religion ae semmel at tigert vel parum.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: ascendAt and the reason of this is that persons in
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: the world have not the remedies that their souls need
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: so instantly at hand as religious, have and so when
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: they hear a good, sermon or see a neighbor and
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: friend carried off by a sudden and unhappy. Death the
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: novelty of the thing causes them alarm and, astonishment and
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: moves them to amend and change their. Lives but the,
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: religious who has these remedies so constantly at, hand such
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: frequentation of, sacraments so many spiritual, exhortations such exercise in
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: meditating the things Of, god and dealing with, death, judgment
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: hell and, heaven and for all that is, tependence. Lack
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: what hope can there be of his changing his. Life
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: his ears are not inured to, it and so these
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: considerations cannot aid or move. Him and what moves others
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: does not move him or make any impression on. Him
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: this is also the reason of that celebrated pronouncement Of Saint.
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: Augustine SINCE i have begun to Serve, GOD i have
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: not known any better men than those who have done
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: well in. Religion SO i have not known worse than
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: those who have fallen from. It Ex quo dio severi
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: coleppi quomodo dificile some experatos maneors quam qui in monasterio
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: proficierant ita non sum expertos prajoles quam qui in Monasteries.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: Chechidiront Saint bernard says that very few of those who
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: have fallen and failed in religion returned to the state
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: and degree that they held, before but rather go on
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: getting worse over such he, says the Prophet jeremy, Weeps
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: how has the purest gold lost its? Luster how has
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: that color so brilliant? Faded how has that former beauty?
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: Changed they who were reared in purple and laid on costly,
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: Couches they who were regaled with divine delights in, prayer
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: and all their discourse and conversation was in, heaven have
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: come to embrace dung and revel in mud and filth
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: lamentations four one. Five, thus ordinarily, speaking there is little
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: hope for those who begin to go backward and take
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: a turn for the worse in. RELIGION a thing that
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: ought to strike fear into, Us and the reason is
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: that which we have, mentioned since they fall sick under
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: the medicines and remedies under which they ought to improve
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: and get. Well but if that which improves and cures
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: others only makes them sick and worse than they, were
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 1: what hope can there be of doing them any. Good
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: when you find a sick man on whom medicines have no,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: effect but rather he feels worse for, them you may
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: well take him for one. Undone that is why we
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: take so much account of sin and a fall in
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: religious and fear it so, much while we do not
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: give so much thought to it in people of the.
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: World when a physician sees a fainting fit or a
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: great feebleness of pulse in a sickly and weak, subject
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: he is not much. Concerned but when he sees it
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: in a robust and right healthy, man he takes it
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: for a very bad, symptom because such a mischance cannot
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: happen in that case without the predominance of some malignant
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: humor prognosticating death or serious. Illness so it is here
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: if a secular falls into, sins they are not, mischances
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: very inconsistent with the careless life of one who goes
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: to a confession once or twice a year and lives
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: in midst of so many occasions of. Sin but in
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: a religious sustained by such frequentation of, sacraments so much,
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: prayer so many pious. Exercises when he comes to, fall
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: it is a symptom of a great decay of virtue
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: and a deep seated. Infirmity and there is reason to.
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: Fear FOR i do not say, this Says Saint, bernard
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: to drive you into, discouragement especially if you seek to rise,
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: immediately for the more you put it, off the harder
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: it will. BECOME i say this that ye may not,
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: sin nor, fall nor grow. Weak but if any one hath,
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: fallen we have a good advocate In Jesus christ First
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: john two, one who can do what we cannot. Do,
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: therefore let none be, discouraged since if he heartily returns
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: To god without, doubt he will obtain. Mercy if the
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: Apostle Saint, peter having attended the school Of christ for
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: so long a time and been so favored by, him
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: fell so, grievously and after so grievous a fall as
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: that of having denied his master And, lord returned to
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: so lofty and eminent in a, state who will be.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: Discouraged you have sinned in the, world Says Saint. Bernard
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: was it more Than Saint? Paul you have sinned here in?
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: Religion was it more Than Saint. Peter but, they since
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: they repented and did, penance not only gained, pardon but
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: very high sanctity and. Perfection do you the, like and
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: you will be able to return not only to your former,
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: state but to a much greater. Perfection end of chapter.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: Eight chapter nine Of practice Of perfection In Christian, Virtue
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: second Treat us By Saint Alphonsis. Rodriguez this LibriVox recording
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: is in the public. Domain chapter. Nine how important it
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: is for novices to make progress during the time of
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: their novitiate and accustom themselves to do the exercises of religion.
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: Well this instruction for novices may also serve all those
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: who are entering on the way of. Virtue the first
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: rule of The master Of novices in our society says
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: the thing well in a few, words which are addressed
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: not only to, us but to all Religious let The
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: master of novices understand well that he has given and
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: over to his charge a thing of the highest. Importance
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: and the rule gives two very solid reasons to make
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: The master Of novices open his eyes and understand the
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: weightiness and importance of his. Charge the first is that
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: on this first training in formation of the novices there
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: usually depends all their future. Progress the second is that
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: all the hope of the society pivots on, this and
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: on this depends the well being of the. Order coming
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: down to explain these things more in, PARTICULAR i say
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: first that on this first training given and the attitude
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: taken up by each novice in his novitiate depends all
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: growth or decay from the time to. Come commonly, speaking
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: as we said in the last, chapter if in the
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: time of his novitiate an individual is tepid and careless
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: of his spiritual, progress tepid and, careless he will. Remain
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: it is not to be supposed that afterwards he will
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: act with greater care and. Fervor there is no reason
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: to believe that he will affect this change and improvement,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: afterwards but very much reason to believe that he will
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: not to make this better. Appear let us address our
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: discourse to the novice, himself weighing the reasons and convincing
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: him therewith now you are in your No, bishop you
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: have a great deal of time to apply to your
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: spiritual advancement in different means that may contribute there, too your,
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 1: superiors thinking of nothing else but, this and making it
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: to their chief. Endeavor now you have many examples before
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: your eyes of others who are bent on no other
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: purpose than. This it is a thing that animates and
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: encourages one much to live with companions who have in
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: view this object alone and nothing. Else and the sight
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: of others going, ahead obliges, one however heavy and lumpish he,
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: be to get out of his. Sloth now you have
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 1: a heart this in, gear aged and, free and seemingly
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: desirous of, virtue with nothing to withdraw you from, it
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: but much to aid. You but, if now that you
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: are here for this purpose alone and have nothing else
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: to think, of you do not improve nor gain any,
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: virtue how will it be when your heart is taken
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: up and divided in a thousand different? Ways, if, now
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: with so much freedom from, business such advantages and aids at,
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: hand so much, leisure such, conveniences and so many, helps
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: you make not your meditation and, examine will nor take
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: pains to observe your additions and do your other spiritual duties?
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: Properly what will become of you when the care of
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: your studies shall take up your thoughts and in later
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: life business confessions and? Sermons if with so many, conferences
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: so many, exhortations so many, examples and so many, solicitations
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: you do not. Profit what will become of you when
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: you shall meet with impediments and obstacles on all. Sides
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: if in the beginning of your, conversion when novelty should
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: increase your fervor and, zeal you are notwithstanding slack and,
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: listless what will become of you when your ears shall
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: be inured and hardened to all things that may touch
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: or do you any? Good and, further, if, now while
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: passion is but beginning to, stir and the evil inclination
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: is not, strong being only at its, commencements still you
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: have not the courage to resist, It how will you
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: resist and overcome it, afterwards when it shall have taken
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: deep root and gathered strength by, habit so that it
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: will be like a very death struggle for you to change.
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: It Saint dorotheus illustrated this very well by an example
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: which he recounts of one of the fathers of the, desert,
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: who being one day in a place full of cypresses
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: of all, sorts great and small and of medium, size
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: bade one of his disciples pluck up a little. One he,
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: pointed at which his disciple presently did without any. Difficulty
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: then he pointed to another somewhat, bigger and said to,
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: him pull. Up that he did pull it, up but
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 1: with greater, difficulty being forced to take both hands to
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: it to. Pluck another he had to call in the
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: help of one of his. Companions another was beyond the
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: strength of all of them together to pull it. Up,
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: behold said the Ancient, father how it is with our.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: Passions in the, beginning when they are not yet, rooted
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: it is easy to master them if you take but
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: never so little. Pains but, afterwards when by long habit
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: they have taken deeper, root it will be very. Hard
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: much force will have to be. Used AND i do
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: not know if you will. Succeed but WHAT i have
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: said we may perceive that it is a very great
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: abuse and a very dangerous tempt to differ from day to.
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: Day our, amendment thinking we shall be better able to
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: mortify and overcome ourselves another, time because at present we
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: have not the courage to do it by reason of
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: the difficulty we. Experience if whilst this difficulty is yet,
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: small you cannot bring yourself to surmount, it what will
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: you be able to do when it shall become. Greater
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 1: and if at, present whilst your passion is but like allion's,
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 1: welp you have not the courage to attack, it how
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: will you be able to do it when it shall
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: be grown a great and furious. Beast hold it therefore
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: for a certain, truth that if now you are tepid and,
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: remiss tepid and, remiss you will be in the time to.
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: Come if now you are not a good novice and
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: a good, apprentice you will never hereafter be a good
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: senior nor a good. Workman if at present you are
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: neglectful of obedience and the observance of, rule you will
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: be more so. Afterwards if now you are careless over
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: your spiritual duties and botch them a, boucher you will
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: remain all your. Life the whole point lies in the
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: established attitude which you take up. Now they say that
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: the business of kneading dough lies in first putting in
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 1: of the. East Saint bonaventure says in the attitude which
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: one takes up at the, beginning and that he. Remains
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 1: it is very difficult for an old man to bend
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: himself to that which he was not accustomed. To in his.
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: Youth it is a proverb of The Holy. Ghost a
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: proverb it, is Says, solomon train a youth to go
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: one way when he is, old he will not depart
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: from It proverbs twenty two. Six, Hence Saint John clemachus
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: came to say that it is a very dangerous, thing
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 1: and a matter of much apprehension when one enters on
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 1: his course with stupidity and, faintheartedness because he, says it
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: is a clear indication of a fall to. Come for this,
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: reason it is of supreme importance to accustom one's self
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: to virtue from the, outset and to do one's spiritual duties.
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: Well The Holy ghost warns us of. This by the Prophet.
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: Jeremy it is a good thing for a man to
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: accustom himself to bear the yoke from his Youth lamentations
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: three twenty, seven because he will hold to it, afterwards
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: and thereby render to himself the way of virtue and goodness.
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: Easy otherwise he will find it very. Difficult what thou
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: hast not gathered in the time of, Youth how thinkest
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: thou that thou shalt find it afterwards in the time
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: of old, Age ecclesiasticus twenty five to. Five from this
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: first reason follows the. Second because of all the progress
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: of the religious in future depends on his first, formation
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: then all the good of the order depends likewise. Thereon
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: where an order does not consist of the, walls houses and,
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: churches but of the, religious they are gathered, together and
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: they who are in the noviceship are they who have
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: to be afterwards the whole. Order for this, reason the
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: society was not satisfied with establishing seminaries and colleges where
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: ours are reared in letters and virtue, together but has
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 1: established seminaries of virtue, alone where attention is paid to,
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: abnegation mortification of, self and to the practice of true
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: and solid, virtues as being more of a main foundation than.
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: Letters for this the houses of probation, exist being as
• 1:18:36
  Speaker 1: our Father Francis borgia, says for the novices Of, bethlehem
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: that is to, say the house Of, bread because there
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: are made the biscuits and provisions for the voyage against
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: the great risks that await. Us this is harvest, Time
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: this is the season of. Abundance these are the years
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 1: of fertility in which your business is to take in,
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 1: supplies As joseph did against coming years of hunger and. Stability,
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: oh if the people Of egypt had understood and cast
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: up their account and carefully considered what they were, doing
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: they would not have been in such a hurry to
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: empty their houses of the wheat Which joseph was gathering
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: and locking up in his. Barns, oh if you would
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 1: take account how important it is for you to come
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: out well provisioned from the house of, probation certainly you
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 1: would not be eager to get out of it, quickly
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: but would grieve at leaving, it considering how ill you
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: are off for virtue and. Mortification and Therefore Father Francis
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: borgia says that such an aim or are glad at
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: shortly going out of the novitiate shows signs of want
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 1: of judgment and lack of understanding of their need of good.
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 1: Preparation they make light of the day's work that is before,
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 1: them since they so lightly take the risk of rushing
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: into it. On, oh how rich and laden with virtues
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: does our father take us to be when we are
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: to leave the house of. Probation so he supposes in
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 1: the constitutions he appoints two years of probation and, experiment
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: wishing the novice during that time to think of nothing
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: else but his spiritual, advancement seeing no other books in,
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 1: studying nothing else but what may forward him in self
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 1: denial and growth in virtue and. Perfection he is supposed
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 1: to go out at the end of that, time so
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: spiritual and, fervent such a lover of mortification and, recollection
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 1: so devoted to prayer and spiritual, exercises as to need
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: even to be restrained. Therein he therefore advises such, persons
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: when they go to the, colleges to abate somewhat of
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: their fits of fervor during the time of their, studies
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 1: not to make such long, prayers nor do so many.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: Mortifications our father supposes one to leave the no bishop
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: with so much, light so much knowledge Of god and
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 1: contempt of the, world so fervent and, devout and inwardly
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: carried to spiritual, things as to need to be checked
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: in his pace by these? Cautions do you then endeavor
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: to go out such make the most of this, time so,
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: precious that perchance never in your life will you have
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: such a time again for gathering spiritual. Riches let not
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: so good time pass in, vain nor lose any part of. It.
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: Ecclesiasticos fourteen. Fourteen one of the great favors that The
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: lord does to those whom he draws to religion in
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 1: their tender, age a favor for which they owe him infinite,
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: thanks is that it is then very easy for them
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: to apply themselves to virtue and religious. DISCIPLINE a, tree
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: while it is tender at the, beginning may be easily
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: shaped so as to grow into a very beautiful. Tree but,
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: afterwards when you have let it grow in its own
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: way and become crooked and awkwardly, spreading you will break
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: sooner than guide it into the shape you. Want and
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: such it will remain as long as there is life
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 1: left in. It so it is easy to shape and
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: direct one of tender age and turn him to what is.
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: Good and by accustoming him to it from the time
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: that he is, small it will be rendered very easy
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: for him, afterwards and so he will go on and
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 1: ever persevere in. It it is a great thing for
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 1: stuff to be dyed in the, wall because then it
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: never loses its. Color who can restore it to its?
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: Whiteness Says Saint. Jerome the wall that has drunk in
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: a purple, dye and another says an earthen jar long
• 1:22:44
  Speaker 1: retains the odor of the first liquor poured in. It
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: the scripture Praises King josiah for, that when yet a,
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: boy he began to seek The god of his. Father
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: david Second chronicles thirty four. Three, umbertus a person of
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 1: note and Master general of The order Of, preachers relates
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 1: that a certain religious appeared some nights after his death
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: to another religious his, companion all in, glory and leading
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: him out of his, cell he showed him a great
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: number of, men clad in white and encompassed with, light
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: who carried very fair crosses upon their shoulders as they
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 1: went in procession Towards. HEAVEN a little after he beheld another,
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: procession fairer and more resplendent than the, former each member
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: of which carried a far richer and a more beautiful
• 1:23:33
  Speaker 1: cross in his, hands and not on his shoulders as
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: the former. Did after, that a third procession, passed still
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: more glorious and admirable than the two, former for all
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 1: their crosses were of a surprising, beauty and they carried
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 1: them neither on their shoulders nor in their. Hands but
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: an angel going before carried his cross for, him so
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: that they followed with much, alacrity and the, religious astonished
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 1: at this, vision asked an. Explanation his companion answered that
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: the first who carried their crosses upon their shoulders were
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: those who had entered religion at a mature, age the,
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: second who held their crosses in their, hands were those
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: that entered in early, youth and the, last who marched
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: with so much freedom and, cheerfulness were those, who when
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: they were small, children had renounced the world and embraced
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 1: a religious. Life end Of chapter, Nine end Of practice
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: Of perfection In Christian, virtue Second treatise By Saint Alphonsis,
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 1: rodriguez translated By Joseph, rickabye